Last Thursdayism
The idea that the universe could have easily been created last Thursday and that all previous history was generated spontaneously when required and only in retrospect to the current moment has lead to much dispute.
It has been cited that indeed there is no way to prove whether or not this could be the case.
Another way to hash it is that if the universe has finite energy and time to be manifested. The only reasonable way to generate a seemingly vast expanse of duration is the condensation of information into ever smaller intervals. Sort of like 1 divided by 2 is .5 divide by 2 is .25 and so on. The full extent never summing to anything greater than 1 from start to finish. Much like expansion of space time it’s a dilation of time within itself. So that one week is both enough to carry out a working week and also to have an entinte universe come and go. The relationship between the too is simply relative.
Thoughts?
It has been cited that indeed there is no way to prove whether or not this could be the case.
Another way to hash it is that if the universe has finite energy and time to be manifested. The only reasonable way to generate a seemingly vast expanse of duration is the condensation of information into ever smaller intervals. Sort of like 1 divided by 2 is .5 divide by 2 is .25 and so on. The full extent never summing to anything greater than 1 from start to finish. Much like expansion of space time it’s a dilation of time within itself. So that one week is both enough to carry out a working week and also to have an entinte universe come and go. The relationship between the too is simply relative.
Thoughts?
Comments (98)
Then what's to be gained by considering it?
It's better than if it was "Last Wednesdayism"
Quoting 180 Proof
I'm with 180 Proof. I there is no way to determine whether a proposition is true or false, even in principle, then it is meaningless. Another example is the existence of the multiverse associated with one interpretation of quantum mechanics. It may also be true of string theory, although I guess that is still an open question.
:smirk:
Why is it relative? I can't see your point. Are you referring to timeless universe as we debated together in your previous thread?
This statement could have traction. Because what proof is required to show that the universe has been around forever? The books at the library? The buildings and bridges we had built? The aging parents? Fossils? Meteorites falling from space? We have nothing but tangible objects to "prove" time. But the infinitesimal time dilation could very well be felt like a year, 10 years, 100 years, or forever. And the tangible objects -- that's the product of time dilation as well, for all we know.
Paper doubt? :smile:
For all you good people out there, this thread is about extremism. The point of view that the universe only existed last Thursday. So what could be gained from it? It is a challenge to our deep seated beliefs, the ones with absolute certainty. Nothing excites philosophers than a question of grounds for doubt -- why couldn't we just point to the sky, or to the moon as proof? Because paper doubt has that edge that we couldn't quite brush off. We have to deal with it.
Why doubt everything instead of "learn everything". To deny you typed a message after you send it is irresponsibility, so responsibility proves Thursdayism wrong
No, we're not denying we typed a message that we just sent. This is not about concrete evidence. It's Thursdayism -- time dilation. We could have everything concrete in one half of half of a second ago.
Is it possible to prove that the amount of information we have just won't fit in a (last) Thursday?
Thursdayism says the world started last Thursday. It has nothing to do with time dilation
Here is an example of the use of the time dilation formula, based on an example I took from https://www.softschools.com/formulas/physics/time_dilation_formula/222/
Clicking on the link will give you the aspects of special relativity involved and the workings of the formula.
observer time = proper time/square root(1- (velocity/speed of light)^2)
v = velocity is in meters per second
c = speed of light (3.0 x 10^8 m/s)
Tanya boards a spaceship, and flies past Earth at 80% of the speed of light. Her twin sister, Tara, stays on Earth. At the instant Tanya's ship passes Earth, they both start timers. Tanya watches her timer, and after she sees 60 seconds have passed, she stops it. At that instant, how much time would Tara's timer say has passed?
If we use the formula, Tanya observes that at 60 seconds, her sister Tara will observe that 100 seconds have passed.
But this formula also shows that if the velocity was at light speed then the bottom line of the equation becomes square root(0), which is 0. We then have observer time = proper time / 0.
This is an infinity!
So from an observer's point of view, a person traveling away from them, in a spaceship at light speed, would not age at all, but I think logic would suggest, that in their own reference frame, they would age, and they would live their normal life span within the spaceship and its reference frame. If at some point they traveled back to you at light speed, they would -re-enter your frame of reference. I have no idea what age they would be in relation to you at their point of return.
This of course cannot happen, as it's impossible for the velocity of any mass/spaceship to reach light speed. Mass cannot travel at light speed.
In Star Trek, it is suggested that if light speed or greater can be achieved then the mass involved would be 'enveloped in a warp bubble,' and would effectively be traversing the warp or the folded space, not the actual physical distance between positions A and B.
Time dilation is therefore not evidence of last Thursdayism in the sense that it cannot compress the proposed 14 billion years of observed universal time into a few days, using any accurate reference frame or time dilation equation I am aware of but my knowledge of astrophysics is quite quite limited.
Thank you for your explanation.
Quoting universeness
Isn't it that we could slow the v to zero meters (or miles) per second. The result is still zero, but not because velocity is equal to light speed. Trying to understand this part.
Quoting universeness
Nothing can be faster than speed of light. Hence, Star Trek.
Quoting universeness
No we cannot use time dilation as evidence of last thursday (we're stuck with this terminology now, but okay... we both know what that means though). We could only use it to plant doubt as to the existence of the universe in billion of years.
No, if v=0 then the v squared divided by c squared part of the formula would be 0, BUT inside the square root part of the formula we have 1- so we would have 1-0 if v=0. This would give the answer 1.
So if v=0 then in the example, the twin sister Tara would be at rest so the observer time = proper time.
No time dilation, both clocks would read the same time in the case of v=0.
The most interesting issue about the time dilation formula is if you consider v at a value ever closer to the speed of light, say 99. 99999999999999999999999999999999% light speed.
The closer you get to light speed (add many more 9's after the decimal point,), the bigger the time dilation becomes. From this, you can show that from the point of the observer, the 'proper time' passed reaches a value bigger than most of the predicted lifespans of the Universe! I don't get that one!
Quoting Caldwell
Not under normal circumstances no, you are correct but, It is suggested by many scientists that during the short time of 'inflation,' the Universe expanded at faster than light speed. It is also suggested that as the rate of the acceleration of the Universe increases, relative to us, its 'edge' will be moving at faster than light speed.
There may be a way to get from planet A in our galaxy to planet B without having to directly traverse the distance between them but how to do so is, for now, and probably for many thousands of years yet, pure sci-fi.
I read an interesting challenge to this logical positivist view, called 'Toy Story'. When the cupboard door is shut the toys come alive. We have no way of confirming or disconfirming this story. But it has a clear sense.
Welcome to The Philosophy Forum! :flower:
Having said that :scream: to math/Algebra
Ah, the beguiling, one might even say idealized, view that philosophy consists of the contemplation of those matters which have nothing to do with, but are nonetheless somehow more significant than, actual life. I'm with Pierce on this, and other things: "Let us not pretend to doubt in philosophy what we do not doubt in our hearts."
Hello, thanks for the welcome. I have enjoyed reading some of your exchanges in the shoutbox.
Yeah, I love maths, but I have only experienced it to second-year undergrad level within a Scottish Uni.
I taught it to advanced higher level for 5 years in Scottish secondary schools and then I was switched to teaching Computing Science full time. I did so for a further 25 years before taking early retirement.
I wish I had as good a command of maths as TPF members like Jgill.
lol. Yeah, that's what I was thinking, but not in relation to the square root. I was thinking of something else. So forget what I said. V at zero is at a standstill. V = SOL (only kinetic energy is infinite, but not the relation).
That said:
Quoting Gregory
This is correct.
Quoting Benj96
It can't be time dilation in a vacuum. Decomposing fractions does not have a relativity quality like time dilation where time is relative. Decomposing time into smaller and smaller fractions doesn't itself make it relative. So, the universe being created only last Thursday would have to be explained in relation to the infinitesimal fractions of time -- which confuses me.
:up:
If you travel at lightspeed through the galaxy for 8.673 years around the planetary system at near the speed of light and return on Earth, you will have aged about one week. So many passed Thursdays vs. one.
Our only evidence that the world wasn't created last Thursday is our memory (individual, collective, inanimate) of events that occured way before last Thursday.
The catch is memories can be implanted/erroneous (false memories, confabulation, Mandela effect, and so on).
Out goes the window, memory. What's left? I must mention inanimate memory here separately only if to prolong the nevitable.
Motor vehicle accident forensics, for instance, relies on inanimate memory: a red car collides with a black one and each car "remembers" the color of the other car (paint flakes, dents, scrapes, etc.). The world, many things in it, give us the impression that it's been around for at least 4.5 billion years (radioactive dating).
However, someone capable of inserting false memories must surely be capable of more: falsifying or manipulating the geological data for example. Forgers are known to have artificially aged paper/wood/etc. in order to dupe unsuspecting customers. In other words, inanimate memory too is no longer sufficient to disprove Last Thursdayism.
If God created the universe 6000 years ago, what was his reason to include fossils?
That is something I would like to discuss with him when the time comes.
I was talking about the more interesting examples:
Consider the formula again:
observer time = proper time/square root(1- (velocity/speed of light)^2
Consider a currently, good human lifespan of 100 years.
So the observers time is 100 years.
Perhaps one of our maths experts such as jgill could confirm my calculations here, in case I have blundered:
Consider velocity of the spaceship moving away from the Earth based observer as 299999999 meters per second. This would be 1 meter per second slower than light speed at 300000000 meters per second.
When I popped these values into the formula (I used the calculator app on my laptop as it offers many more digit places than my scientific calculator), I got the answer 1,224,644 years as the amount of time passed for the observer. Only 100 years would have passed for the people on the spaceship.
Now the spaceship still has to return to Earth, so, the round trip time for the observer would be 2,449,289 years.
Now lets use 299999999.9 for the velocity of the spaceship so 0.1 meters per second slower than light speed rather than 1 meter slower. Using these numbers in the formula and the same 100 years of observer life. We have a round trip journey time (from the standpoint of the observer) of 7,745,966,6930 years. (for the people on the spaceship, it would be 200 years). This is quite a jump for such a small increase in the velocity of the spaceship.
The maximum number of places I could enter using my laptop calculator app was 23 places after the decimal point so I could enter 23 nines after the number 299999999.
This gave me a round trip journey time for the observer of
774,596,669,241,483,377 years. So the Earth/Sun and solar system would be long gone in the 200 years of travel time for those on the spaceship.
Unless I have made mistakes in my calculations or units used, this is a serious mind f***.
If we consider a few thousand years of observer time I think we reach a point that the Universe ends before the spaceship traveling within it can return to its starting point.
I sent this question to 'askanastrophysicist,' ages ago and they pointed out the following:
1. You have not considered acceleration and deceleration times which would affect your numbers but not in a very significant way.
2. It is highly unlikely that a spaceship could reach the velocity increments you suggest as the energy input required would be vast to allow mass to travel at such velocity. As you get closer and closer to light speed, the extra input energy required becomes much more vast.
3. But yes, in theory, what you suggest is valid, time dilation is weird, isn't it!
Perhaps the rest of the avengers can prevent Thor from 'dissin' our 'Midgard' layer of the Universe with his 'Thorsdayism!' Freaking superhero gods!! More trouble than they were ever worth. Just as well that they don't exist!
The 6930 is after the decimal point and can be ignored.
A bloomin, flippin comma was required instead of a bloomin, flippin dot
It's very simple. Say a particle accelerates to just below c. If the particle travels for 1 day and returns to Earth then because of the asymmetry the clocks on particles on Earth show, say, 2 years, a considerable difference. The particle hasn't experienced thursday, but Earth a lot of thursdays have passed. Because of the asymmetry. So, has thursday passed or not? Yes it has. 104 times.
The road to destruction... :wink:
My posts about time dilation were a digression from how it was being used in the OP.
I was merely presenting the implications of the extremity of the formula for real humans traveling close to light speed not unthinking particles. I think it's fascinating that this formula suggests that if a future human or perhaps even a future transhuman travels away from Earth for 200 years round trip, at 0.1 meters per second, slower than light speed. The Earth probably won't be there when they return. If that's the case then we do need to find a way to get from interstellar or intergalactic planet A to planet B which does not involve trying to directly traverse the physical distance between them.
Alcubierre's drive and wormholes don't work, even in theory. The fact that not one Thursday has passed for you and 50 on Earth proves that Thursday has passed. Of course you can say that the whole trip is a memory, but then we can just as well ask if this question was really asked. The question wasn't asked. "Questionism"...
A transhuman? Our follow up in evolution?
:lol:
Like last Thursday, it's questionable if that coming time exists.
More like a human merging with electronic/quantum systems and genetic engineering rather than any significant contribution from natural evolution. A human brain in a sustaining cybernetic body, a human consciousness that can be stored and transmitted from one location to another at light speed or greater.
Maybe from one cybernetic container to another. Perhaps the remake of 'Battlestar Galactica,' type idea that when you die, your consciousness is just automatically dowloaded into another of your stored clones.
All the current sci-fi suggestions are predictions of possible future technologies. Most will probably be unrealised but some will be. A lot of StarTrek tech is now all around us. The computer pad, video phone calls, a flip-top communicator etc.
If two ideas fail, people conceive new ideas.
Are you serious? Don't get carried away by those ideas. The next step in evolution is not how we engineer it.
Quoting universeness
These are the only two ideas to survey. Maybe God will show up to transport us instantaneously...
Imaginationism.
These are just fantasies, like gods are. Difference being that gods are real while these fantasies stay fantasies.
Very serious! I don't get carried away, I might get intrigued and become hopeful however. Out of little acorns, big oak trees grow! Any scientific/technological/chemical/biological idea that forms in a human mind should be heard, just like your ideas as to the structure and workings of the Universe. How would you respond to someone who said 'are you serious?' after you explained your ideas in detail.
They can always respond with 'I think you are getting carried away, Prove your idea is correct!' I hope your response would be, well I cant...YET.
I think it is natural that our science would outrun evolution and natural selection. A spear was created by humans and that sped up our ability to kill other creatures for meat. A spear did not evolve. Same with the electronic technologies. It seems natural to me that we will eventually merge with electronics and become transhuman (cyborg) for starters. Its already arrived to some extent, pacemakers, cochlear implants, small electronics physically connected to the brain, robotic/prosthetic limb replacement to name but a few developments. I don't think it's completely inaccurate to refer to someone with a pacemaker, which keeps them alive, as an early transhuman or cyborg.
Quoting EugeneW
Make up your mind......
Quoting EugeneW
You continue to play with Pascal's wager. Bet On...Bet Off...Bet On...Bet Off. The [s]Karate[/s] Theistic Kid (Only kidding!)
That which has been invented often began as someone's fantas(tic)/(y) idea.
Each of us can make the same claim. It's just solipsism and solipsism is nonsense in my opinion.
The "are you serious?" attitude I have encountered a lot. You are the first exception. Mostly these are underbelly reactions to the attack on the status quo and uttered by people who feel threatened wrt their view on reality. They dont try to understand and their reaction is irrational because if they react that fast they havent made any attempt to understand. Banning is the result.
Im not speculating about the application of science though. But I know a brain can't be contained in a vessel, no matter what SF fantasies show. It's nice to fantasize about the application of science and its application. But you should keep in mind that not everything is possible with science. It is claimed that robots and AI are the next step in evolution. I think this is not so.
:lol:
Haha! The quark kid strikes again. What is Pascal's wager?
Shhhhhhhh, your on a philosophy site. Pascals wager is a philosophy basic.
As long as no one else can hear this, let me whisper the address below at you!
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pascal's_wager
Have a wee look. shhhhhhhhh
Hope nobody heard or saw this. Did Pascal gamble with his life regarding the existence of gods? How can you wager your life on that? If they don't exist, I will drop dead? If they do exist then the other might drop dead? How can you know who wins the wage?
Isn't it always better to bet they exist? What you gotta loose?
What is a human head, if not a vessel? If we replicate every system inside the head and body that supports the brain then I don't see why not, given enough time and scientists.
You also might find the concept of the Boltzmann brain interesting if you don't already know about it.
have a wee look at:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boltzmann_brain
It doesn't really speak to my transhuman points but it's interesting as well as relatively debunked, I think.
Quoting EugeneW
I only like the evolution word when used in the natural sense, I don't like it applied to human scientific endeavors. Creating sentient AI is a whole different debate. I was talking about human life extension by transhuman methodology/technology. Not human simulations such as robots or androids.
I mean an artificial vessel. The Bolzmann universe encompasses infinite regression, which solves nothing.. It was invented by Bolzmann in relation to entropy. If the whole universe could exist as a fluctuation then in that fluctuation a thermal equilibrium would evolve which could result in a fluctuation of a universe, etcetera. Brains just involve a process leading to them and any attempt to create them must involve the whole universe.
I think the wager was your investment in belief in God despite all the arguments against such belief. I think that's what you do. You know the god story is highly unlikely but you have laid your bet by your version of theism in a similar way to Pascal. This is of course only my humble opinion on your theism.
To me, you are not a THEIST, you are a theist (this site does not allow you to alter text to point 6, very small text size, so you will just have to see the very small text in your head, perhaps right beside a tiny wee man (god) with a white beard)
Pascal was just suggesting that it is wise to bet that God exists, just in case it does, because the punishment for not believing was so bad.
That was Pascal's point exactly. I require proof! I don't fear the traditional theistic threats.
I have personally called them out very often, including on this site.
If god will manifest and submit to scientific scrutiny, then I will change my viewpoint, if the results confirm it as having demonstrated all the necessary omni's
If it can't even do that then It has no right to ask for belief.
But the artificial vessel would replicate the function of the human head and body minus the brain. It would be 'brain ready.' I take it that you believe such a construct is impossible. I don't think it is, given enough time and relevant scientists.
Yeah, I found the Boltzmann grain posit interesting but unconvincing.
How does one know there is no god behind a lightning strike? Im not saying there is, but who says that's so? They could interact by an unknown physical mechanism.
You can go with the image of Thor holding a lightning bolt and deciding when he wants to throw them into our atmosphere or you can go with the scientists who explain such via electrical discharge due to natural meteorological effects. I choose the scientists as I am 99.999% absolutely convinced that gods don't exist. It would be such a simple task for it/them to prove me and all atheists wrong.
So why /doesn't it/don't they? Perhaps you or the pope or the archbishop of anywhere or the recent member of TPF and ardent theist, Joe Mello could ask it/them.
The universe itself is proof. Dunno why they don't show themselves. Maybe they do but we don't see.
For me, this is just not adequate proof.
I have never found 'operatic choral music' intimidating or theistically threatening.
Here's a much better one:
How would adequate proof look like? Gods litterally showing themselves? Not sure if operatic choral music is meant to threat or intimidate. You seem to identify religion with powerful gods threatening people. Why should they be like that? Maybe they created the universe accidentally. And just moved on after the accident, without caring for the ones involved in the accident.
That's for the god(s) to decide, not my problem!
Quoting EugeneW
Not necessarily but the main religious doctrines do.
Quoting EugeneW
Well, I would describe this as a deistic viewpoint.
God is a completely illogical posit to me for all of the reasons put forward by atheists. Too numerous to list here. Its only hope that I can see, is, as an emergent label for an emerging universal panpsychism.
But I only have the smallest attraction to the logic behind this. I hate to use this tired old adage but we will just have to agree to disagree.
If science has closed all gaps, what else can we conclude?
Quoting universeness
Then maybe a voice in our head is proof.
But science has not closed all the gaps yet as unanswered questions remain.
Quoting EugeneW
I hear no voices in my head that I cannot identify.
I think I have. I know what space and time are, their basic constituents, the forces between them, the nature of dark matter and dark energy, etc. What more is there to know?)
It's about God who created all 6000 years ago. Including all "fossil" memories. Who calls himself "God"...? Dumb name! "God! Dinner's ready!" I would change my name! In Fred maybe...
I'm curious about the video! What did you upload? I can't see it... :smile:
'I think I know,' is not enough. You need to convince at least a majority of others, otherwise, the question remains unanswered. Do you remember the DIMP guy and the Klein Bottle/Mobious strip guy, they have the same conviction as you and they report it with the same personal fervour. We both know there are also many others with similar convictions about their own hypothesis. You have yet to even publish a paper on your ideas and have it peer-reviewed.
I am suprised you cant see it. I can, along with your own posted tune.
I posted an excellent version of Andrew Lloyd Webber's 'Jesus Christ Superstar,' by an artist called Laibach. I really like the words of that song. It's an old recording but I like Laibach's very deep voice and dramatic arrangement. Use the song title and the name Laibach on a youtube search and you will find it.
Im working on it, but usually you get banned for these ideas because they go against the status quo and threaten the standard (model). I have experienced this on many forums of physics. But people don't even wanna think about it or criticize it constructively. Even just stating quarks and leptons are composite gives frowns only. There was one guy on a physics site with whom I had a good chat, but in the end he stated (quite irrationally) that they are just fundamental. He mentioned the mass paradox but that holds for massive preons only. And when reason fails, the irrational surfaces. There are only things to be gained with this theory. It only explains. Quark and lepton mass, mass generation, matter/antimatter asymmetry (there isn't one, and this confuses people because it seems so obvious, and in a sense there is), it explains the weak force, etcetera. Somehow people, peers or not, just wanna stay blind to it. Only irrational reactions. You think it gets peer reviewed? No way. Well I got a mathematical model now for a particle. I asked on a math forum, and as everything it's quite simple when you know it. The quantum gravity problem is solved by letting the virtual graviton field interact with space (so the virtual condensate is not one in flat space, and there is no foam on the smallest scales). I have an idea though for the quark or lepton masses to calculate. It's similar to calculating proton mass from quarks interacting. But quarks replaced by preons. The DIMP theory is easily and rationally debunked. I haven't seen one rational argument though against mine. Only underbelly reactions.
Well, enjoy the struggle against those who hold the current cosmological high ground.
It's been done before. I think there are enough influential cosmologists who are open-minded.
You should summarise your ideas and send a copy to all of them, you have little to lose.
Neil Degrasse Tyson's career started when he sent a letter, as an undergrad, to Carl Sagan.
Tyson was amazed when Sagan invited him to meet him and talk about his interest in physics and cosmology. One of the many many reasons that I hold Carl Sagan in very high esteem.
Every time I look at you I don't understand
Why you let the things you did get so out of hand.
You'd have managed better if you'd had it planned.
Why'd you choose such a backward time in such a strange land?
If you'd come today you could have reached a whole nation.
Israel in 4 BC had no mass communication. ( I don't get this line, it makes no contextual sense!)
Don't you get me wrong.
I only want to know.
CHOIR
Jesus Christ, Jesus Christ,
Who are you? What have you sacrificed?
Jesus Christ Superstar,
Do you think you're what they say you are?
VOICE OF JUDAS
Tell me what you think about your friends at the top.
Who'd you think besides yourself's the pick of the crop?
Buddha, was he where it's at? Is he where you are?
Could Mohammed move a mountain, or was that just PR?
Did you mean to die like that? Was that a mistake, or
Did you know your messy death would be a record breaker?
Don't you get me wrong.
I only want to know.
CHOIR
Jesus Christ, Jesus Christ,
Who are you? What have you sacrificed?
Jesus Christ Superstar,
Do you think you're what they say you are?
(Repeat many times)
I have send stuff to Tamara Davis. She seemed open minded. No reply. Ive send stuff to Verlinde. No reply. Hope they don't run with my idea! No, I wouldn't care. But why they don't reply? On forums you get banned or no rational or constructive arguments are given. Even a "beyond the standard model" rejects a model and deletes the contribution. Is one afraid of preons? I had a short email conversation with Harari and he said he didn't know it to be a good idea to consider preons massless.
Jesus just had a Jesus complex!
Why did they create a world with so much pain? I really don't know.
There can be many reasons, some fair reasons and some not-so-nice reasons. Maybe just too busy.
I would send to 'all of them' and I would pester until they responded, even to just get me off their back.
Sometimes you have to be stubborn in your determination to gain an adequate response.
It is of course vital to always stay within the law.
Non-existence is their one and only defense!
Yeah, sounds like a good idea! The net is ideal for that. How did they do that 150 years ago? 50 years ago even. Took a lot longer. Knowledge is growing exponentially because of that and new ideas prosper... when considered. Maybe it's best to be just satisfied with what I know, but people wanna share. I have the story written in prose almost, with as little math as possible. Somehow math seems to turn people off.
They're just laughing at us!
Sean Carroll seems a 'good guy' he also currently has a youtube podcast where he answeres all submitted questions. The last one I listened to was 3hours long. You might get a response from him.
I was just listening to him! In his interview with Rovelli! About the quantum nature of spacetime. I can relate to Rovelli. An iconoclast. I think I should send something to him too. I dont agree with him though. What causes space curvature? Einstein doesn't have an answer, nor Rovelli.
Im gonna ask questions on Carroll's podcast! Ill let you know the answers.
Good stuff, I really enjoy the cosmology offerings on youtube
Quoting EugeneW
I hope he treats you well and by doing so he will give the rest of us confidence that cosmologists such as him are not members of an aloof, exclusive group who are unapproachable by the majority of us.
That's exactly the problem of a lot of them. They think they possess a special kind of knowledge knowable to an elite group only and they try everything to keep up that image. They owe their money, power, reputation, etc. to it. Everything threatening it... Bang! I can imagine how Galilei felt back then. He had no proof either. Exactly what is told to me 1001 times. Every arguments is used... No proof doesn't mean a thing though. For Galilei it didn't.
As I said, I hope Sean treats you well, but don't be too downhearted if he does not.
I will send him a letter of complaint if he does not and I hope anyone reading this thread will do the same. United, people have the power to impress an intensity of objection towards an individual or a group. I don't mean in the 'unruly mob' sense but in the sense of a united legitimate complaint. So, I await your report of your attempt to communicate with him.
Just send a message! I'm curious what happens now...
Wilhelm Reich was something else! His books got burned... In modern day!
Only like this changes can be made! :100:
'I think therefore I am,' is convincing enough for me. No need for gods, an emergent pan/cosmopsychism is the absolute limit of the projection of my naturalism.
Quoting EugeneW
You may need to do more than send him a 'message' but I hope he responds anyway.
I have had recent responses from questions I sent to Dan Dennet and Joseph Atwill but no response from Sam Harris or Richard Dawkins. My questions to all of them were about Mr Arwill's book
'Caesars Messiah.' I was content with the responses I got.
Never heard of him but I will do a quick google search.
Read about him on Wikipedia. An interesting character who had an eventful life. Seemed to have had a lot of affairs with his patients and he designed some dodgy-sounding machines. Interesting that he worked for and with Freud and he wrote many influential books.
In the basic fundamental taxonomy of Rovelli time does not exist. But the clock ticks even at the fundamental level. The Dirac and Yang-Mills fields propagate and all real fields are just virtual fields asymmetric in time. What if space itself is a quantum field (which becomes visible at Planck scale)? What does that mean? It's not a field in space like an electron field represents particle paths. It's a field of that which underlies the continuum of paths in, for example, Dirac fields. Does it mean space is not continuous? A quantum field of space(time) does not contain particles, like an electron field excitation contains many electron paths. What kinds of paths are meant if an excitation of a space quantum field is considered? What is the equivalent of an electron field excitation (which is just a time-extended virtual particle fluctuation)? What is a spacetime field excitation (or fluctuation)? How does mass/energy couple to the space(time) curvature virtual field (like electrons to virtual photon field)? How does a virtual graviton field make up space?