(by Dlanorrenrag*)
WHILE ACADEMIA SLEPT:
A civilization’s ideals affect what it and its members become and how they evolve or morph.
No imperfect, incomplete mortal can very long perfectly live up to ideals, yet each of us can come closer if we at least recognize and share ideals towards which we aspire.
A civilization, through its leaders, needs skill and vision to sense and plot the values and ideals it needs to inspire, in order to compete and flourish.
To not succumb, a healthy civilization needs vision and will enough at least to identify its challenges (stability, sustainability, and surpassability of environment and population) and to name its challengers (tick-academics, value-nihilists, death-dealers, doper-hedonists, trust-breakers, poverty-pimps, inspired-cynics, business-thugs, political-usurpers, and idea-fundamentalists).
Upon identifying its challenges, civilization may better identify the values and ideals that can surmount such challenges, so that leaders may at least more clearly perceive and inspire that which cries out to be done.
If academics and scientists are so damn much more “rational” than spiritual leaders, then why have they not yet approached, or made any discernible or measurable headway in, the challenge to identify and inspire that which civilization needs to do in order to flourish or at least to remain viable?
What the hell are Western academics doing, apart from sleeping through the systematic deconstruction and trashing of every traditional value of Western Civilization, in order to substitute each new short-sighted, Balkan-empowering, hedonistic-toleration du jour?
Viewing the demographic trends of Western Civilization, what the majority of its academics call “rational” appears instead to be impotent, inept, and insane! For God’s sake, Western brains need to be shaken, if not stirred!
****
From http://www.csmonitor.com/2001/1002/p13s1-leca.html :
“While we in academia slept, the terrorists were planning their next attack. We didn't study this according to our intellectual traditions.”
Thursday, May 8, 2008
Discrediting Anti-Anthropism
Discrediting Anti-Anthropism:
WIKIPEDIA’S TAKE ON AUTHOR OF THE DEVIL’S DELUSION:
From http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Berlinski :
David Berlinski (born 1942 in New York City) is an educator and author of popular books on mathematics. He is a leading critic of evolution within the intelligent design movement and author of numerous articles on the topic. Berlinksi is a secular Jew and self-described agnostic, and according to a 2008 Slate magazine profile "a critic, a contrarian, and — by his own admission — a crank."
....
An outspoken critic of evolution, Berlinski is a Fellow of the Discovery Institute's Center for Science and Culture, a Seattle-based think-tank that is hub of the intelligent design movement. Berslinski shares the movement's disbelief in the evidence for evolution, but does not openly avow intelligent design and describes his relationship with the idea as: "warm but distant. It's the same attitude that I display in public toward my ex-wives."
....
He uses uncertainty to challenge the scientific consensus; he points to the evidence that isn't there and seeks out the things that can't be proved.
GEORGE GILDER’S TAKE:
See: www.nationalreview.com, re May 5, 2008 issue, Vol. LX, No. 8, page 58, “Blinkered Sages,” with review by George Gilder of book by David Berlinski, The Devil’s Delusion: Atheism and Its Scientific Pretensions:
As Nobel laureate Steven Weinberg sums up the argument, in a transparent tautology preening as science, “Any scientists who study nature must live in a part of the landscape where physical parameters take values suitable for the appearance of life and its evolution into scientists.”
....
... this stupendous circularity is called the Anthropic Principle and is touted as an explanation of the universe superior to the idea of God. As Dawkins puts it, “Better many worlds than one god.”
....
But Dawkins affirms, if a tornado cannot do the job of creating life, then God cannot do the job of creating the Universe.... The ultimate 747 gambit, Dawkins writes, “comes close to proving that God does not exist.” Got that?
....
Berlinski concludes that “the willingness of physical scientists to explore such strategies in thought might suggest to a perceptive psychoanalyst a desire not so much to discover a new idea as to avoid an old one.”
....
The scientific community remains oblivious to these problems chiefly because of its insularity and defensiveness, protected by a trumpery of “peer review” and immunity to outside criticism.
....
... expressions not of bottom-up random processes but of heirarchical planning in which the ideas and schematics precede their physical embodiment.
....
Reifying mathematics and pushing its equations to extremes that could not be sustained in a Godelian universe, grand scientific theories lost all contact with the foundations of engineering reality.
....
Bill Buckley, in his final days, declared: “Berlinski’s book is everything desirable; it is idiomatic, profound, brilliantly polemical, amusing, and of course vastly learned. I congratulate him.”
MY TAKE:
First off, I would define each “holography” as consisting of all that manifests in respect of the interpretation of a sensing perspective.
I intuit that a holography may not in indefinite continuity present a perception of an accelerating dissipation at its fringes without synchronously presenting a continuing sensation of accelerating sentience in respect of its conscious core.
An appreciation of “anthropic coincidentalism” may enlighten three universal attributes:
1) HOLOGRAPHY: A role for holographic continuity in facilitating the guiding, interacting with, and rendering of our consciousness by Something that is not merely physically random, and which is beyond definite discreteness in particle physics;
2) WILL: a complex concentration of Will (spirituality beyond reduction to physics) at each local core of conscious sentience, which somehow reacts in appreciation of feedback in respect of interpretations of physically sensed perceptions of randomness at or beyond fringes of its control;
3) INCOMPLETENESS: an inherent incompleteness in any suggestion that all complexity and consciousness of “The Universe As A Whole” is dissipating.
In other words, anthropic coincidentalism is no answer for discrediting a Source (aka, “God”) beyond physics that guides intuitions and interactions among our respective holographies.
EDGING ASIMOV:
Sensing silliness in religious inclinations for imaging a God who dispenses eternal justice based on temporal trivialities (such as how one may mentally process magic word formulas of belief), Isaac Asimov, in youth, proclaimed himself an atheist. In maturity, rather than focusing upon what he did not believe, he tried to express what he did believe, considered under a rubric of “humanism.”
But, reflect on some notions Asimov expressed, such as in Foundation’s Edge. In a way of thinking, there seems little therein that need be inconsistent with a mature notion about God. I doubt Asimov meant Gaia is like wysiwyg (what you see if what you get). Rather, by Gaia, I suspect he was referring to that living ineffability that consciously represents that which is represented by us and to us.
Asimov fancied a living Gaia, spreading into a living Galaxia. As a conception for modeling reality of consciousness, what would be other than rational to consider that Asimov’ian Galaxia is what we have always had? Apart from degree of anthropic representation, what difference is there between Galaxia now and Galaxia later?
Concerning an Interconnecting Consciousness (God?) as a basis for enlightened empathy, was Asimov “really” an atheist?
WIKIPEDIA’S TAKE ON AUTHOR OF THE DEVIL’S DELUSION:
From http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Berlinski :
David Berlinski (born 1942 in New York City) is an educator and author of popular books on mathematics. He is a leading critic of evolution within the intelligent design movement and author of numerous articles on the topic. Berlinksi is a secular Jew and self-described agnostic, and according to a 2008 Slate magazine profile "a critic, a contrarian, and — by his own admission — a crank."
....
An outspoken critic of evolution, Berlinski is a Fellow of the Discovery Institute's Center for Science and Culture, a Seattle-based think-tank that is hub of the intelligent design movement. Berslinski shares the movement's disbelief in the evidence for evolution, but does not openly avow intelligent design and describes his relationship with the idea as: "warm but distant. It's the same attitude that I display in public toward my ex-wives."
....
He uses uncertainty to challenge the scientific consensus; he points to the evidence that isn't there and seeks out the things that can't be proved.
GEORGE GILDER’S TAKE:
See: www.nationalreview.com, re May 5, 2008 issue, Vol. LX, No. 8, page 58, “Blinkered Sages,” with review by George Gilder of book by David Berlinski, The Devil’s Delusion: Atheism and Its Scientific Pretensions:
As Nobel laureate Steven Weinberg sums up the argument, in a transparent tautology preening as science, “Any scientists who study nature must live in a part of the landscape where physical parameters take values suitable for the appearance of life and its evolution into scientists.”
....
... this stupendous circularity is called the Anthropic Principle and is touted as an explanation of the universe superior to the idea of God. As Dawkins puts it, “Better many worlds than one god.”
....
But Dawkins affirms, if a tornado cannot do the job of creating life, then God cannot do the job of creating the Universe.... The ultimate 747 gambit, Dawkins writes, “comes close to proving that God does not exist.” Got that?
....
Berlinski concludes that “the willingness of physical scientists to explore such strategies in thought might suggest to a perceptive psychoanalyst a desire not so much to discover a new idea as to avoid an old one.”
....
The scientific community remains oblivious to these problems chiefly because of its insularity and defensiveness, protected by a trumpery of “peer review” and immunity to outside criticism.
....
... expressions not of bottom-up random processes but of heirarchical planning in which the ideas and schematics precede their physical embodiment.
....
Reifying mathematics and pushing its equations to extremes that could not be sustained in a Godelian universe, grand scientific theories lost all contact with the foundations of engineering reality.
....
Bill Buckley, in his final days, declared: “Berlinski’s book is everything desirable; it is idiomatic, profound, brilliantly polemical, amusing, and of course vastly learned. I congratulate him.”
MY TAKE:
First off, I would define each “holography” as consisting of all that manifests in respect of the interpretation of a sensing perspective.
I intuit that a holography may not in indefinite continuity present a perception of an accelerating dissipation at its fringes without synchronously presenting a continuing sensation of accelerating sentience in respect of its conscious core.
An appreciation of “anthropic coincidentalism” may enlighten three universal attributes:
1) HOLOGRAPHY: A role for holographic continuity in facilitating the guiding, interacting with, and rendering of our consciousness by Something that is not merely physically random, and which is beyond definite discreteness in particle physics;
2) WILL: a complex concentration of Will (spirituality beyond reduction to physics) at each local core of conscious sentience, which somehow reacts in appreciation of feedback in respect of interpretations of physically sensed perceptions of randomness at or beyond fringes of its control;
3) INCOMPLETENESS: an inherent incompleteness in any suggestion that all complexity and consciousness of “The Universe As A Whole” is dissipating.
In other words, anthropic coincidentalism is no answer for discrediting a Source (aka, “God”) beyond physics that guides intuitions and interactions among our respective holographies.
EDGING ASIMOV:
Sensing silliness in religious inclinations for imaging a God who dispenses eternal justice based on temporal trivialities (such as how one may mentally process magic word formulas of belief), Isaac Asimov, in youth, proclaimed himself an atheist. In maturity, rather than focusing upon what he did not believe, he tried to express what he did believe, considered under a rubric of “humanism.”
But, reflect on some notions Asimov expressed, such as in Foundation’s Edge. In a way of thinking, there seems little therein that need be inconsistent with a mature notion about God. I doubt Asimov meant Gaia is like wysiwyg (what you see if what you get). Rather, by Gaia, I suspect he was referring to that living ineffability that consciously represents that which is represented by us and to us.
Asimov fancied a living Gaia, spreading into a living Galaxia. As a conception for modeling reality of consciousness, what would be other than rational to consider that Asimov’ian Galaxia is what we have always had? Apart from degree of anthropic representation, what difference is there between Galaxia now and Galaxia later?
Concerning an Interconnecting Consciousness (God?) as a basis for enlightened empathy, was Asimov “really” an atheist?
Wednesday, May 7, 2008
Edging Asimov
(by Dlanorrenrag*)
Edging Asimov:
Sensing silliness in religious inclinations for imaging a God who dispenses eternal justice based on temporal trivialities (such as how one may mentally process magic word formulas of belief), Isaac Asimov, in youth, proclaimed himself an atheist. In maturity, rather than focusing upon what he did not believe, he tried to express what he did believe, considered under a rubric of “humanism.”
But, reflect on some notions Asimov expressed, such as in Foundation’s Edge. In a way of thinking, there seems little therein that need be inconsistent with a mature notion about God. I doubt Asimov meant Gaia is like wysiwyg (what you see if what you get). Rather, by Gaia, I suspect he was referring to that living ineffability that consciously represents that which is represented by us and to us.
Asimov fancied a living Gaia, spreading into a living Galaxia. As a conception for modeling reality of consciousness, what would be other than rational to consider that Asimov’ian Galaxia is what we have always had? Apart from degree of anthropic representation, what difference is there between Galaxia now and Galaxia later?
Concerning an interconnecting Consciousness as a basis for enlightened empathy, was Asimov “really” an atheist?
Edging Asimov:
Sensing silliness in religious inclinations for imaging a God who dispenses eternal justice based on temporal trivialities (such as how one may mentally process magic word formulas of belief), Isaac Asimov, in youth, proclaimed himself an atheist. In maturity, rather than focusing upon what he did not believe, he tried to express what he did believe, considered under a rubric of “humanism.”
But, reflect on some notions Asimov expressed, such as in Foundation’s Edge. In a way of thinking, there seems little therein that need be inconsistent with a mature notion about God. I doubt Asimov meant Gaia is like wysiwyg (what you see if what you get). Rather, by Gaia, I suspect he was referring to that living ineffability that consciously represents that which is represented by us and to us.
Asimov fancied a living Gaia, spreading into a living Galaxia. As a conception for modeling reality of consciousness, what would be other than rational to consider that Asimov’ian Galaxia is what we have always had? Apart from degree of anthropic representation, what difference is there between Galaxia now and Galaxia later?
Concerning an interconnecting Consciousness as a basis for enlightened empathy, was Asimov “really” an atheist?
Tuesday, May 6, 2008
HUMANISM’S LEFT TURN
(by Dlanorrenrag*)
HUMANISM’S LEFT TURN:
Some quotes snipped from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Humanism :
Humanists endorse universal morality based on the commonality of the human condition, suggesting that solutions to human social and cultural problems cannot be parochial.
….
Humanism clearly rejects deference to supernatural beliefs in resolving human affairs but not necessarily the beliefs themselves; indeed some strains of Humanism are compatible with some religions.
….
In the United States, the Supreme Court recognized that Humanism is equivalent to a religion in the limited sense of authorizing Humanists to conduct ceremonies commonly carried out by officers of religious bodies.
….
According to Humanism, it is up to humans to find the truth, as opposed to seeking it through revelation, mysticism, tradition, or anything else that is incompatible with the application of logic to the observable evidence. In demanding that humans avoid blindly accepting unsupported beliefs, it supports scientific skepticism and the scientific method, rejecting authoritarianism and extreme skepticism, and rendering faith an unacceptable basis for action.
****
CRITIQUE OF SUCH INTERPRETATIONS OF HUMANISM:
I greatly admire the humanist valuing of rationality --- except when it turns rationality against itself.
Many expressions and interpretations of humanity --- such as tradition, history, sacred stories, parables, and customs --- come to represent more than mere symbols, and come also to represent emotionally conditioned investments in cultural aesthetics and polite sensibilities. Thus, it comes to make rational and moral sense to respect such expressions of humanity, regardless of whether or not they may otherwise be founded in pure logic.
Indeed much, if not all, that humans consider valuable in life (such as spirituality, soul, music, poetry, beauty, comedy, tragedy, drama, and companionship) depends upon conditioning and assimilating tastes, fashions, and interests, which may well have little, if any, basis in pure logic.
To hold all sacred traditions as either worthless or worthy only of deconstruction (unless logic can demonstrate their value) would be to annihilate much, if not all, of what is entailed, both, in being moral and in being human.
Except in figuratively modeled relations, we do not appreciate music, poetry, beauty, comedy, tragedy, drama, and companionship. We no more appreciate or measure such things directly than do we directly appreciate or measure spirituality, soul, or “God.”
Obviously, it would make little rational sense to annihilate music merely because it evades being captured in pure empiricism or rationality, devoid of emotional conditioning.
Likewise, it makes little rational sense to try to annihilate religion merely because the only way religion can meaningfully approach truth is with figures of speech and sacred parables (whose contextual meaningfulness ever changes and assimilates anew, in respect of our ever changing society).
While there is much in Humanism that I greatly admire, there is also much that suggests its leaders have misplaced, if not annihilated, their moral compasses.
To hope to endure, a moral civilization can ill afford to lose faith in the value of inculcating empathetic good faith among its members. For Humanists to devalue all faith is to devalue the only real glue of civilization.
In respect of good faith, mere physics offers no substitute “particle of faith.” And mere rationality offers no basis for valuing, devaluing, choosing or favoring anything, whether species, form, material, or ideal. Yet, we have no choice but to make choices!
Even a “non-choice” must, in some relation, be taken as a choice. (Just ask Carla Jean, in the movie No Country For Old Men (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/No_Country_for_Old_Men_(film).
So, in respect of what fundamental rock should civilization set its moral compass?
LIBERATING EVIL:
Well, under any serious inquiry, does it not seem that monetarist, materialist, libertine, liberal and humanist philosophers have abandoned any serious effort to comprehend a moral compass by which to guide civilization?
We have no shortage of philosophers for justifying the preservation of our earthly environment, but few for justifying the preservation, much less the propagation, of civilization.
We have plenty of smart professors in academia. So, why does there seem to be so much imbalance in what they are rationalizing, teaching, justifying, and leading? What may explain this? Is there some sort of imbalance in “the force”?
What of spiritual philosophers? Is it not readily apparent that followers and money are ripe for the picking? Given our present state of affairs, what sell-out of mediocre intelligence and self love could not find a niche for inventing and selling his/her own special brand of “liberation theology”?
Presently, no prevailing or assimilating vision, code, or norm of yore is trusted if it offends the exotic desires or mores of each newly evolving minority’s preferences or needs in respect of pleasure, sex, ceremony, liberation theology, dress, diet, language, gang, tribe, race, or alliance.
So, who among our esteemed elites and professors has very well considered what forces may be converging, or what aspects of human freedom and dignity may likely die or emerge as a result? Anyone? Anyone?
Check out http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Humanist_Association. No doubt, a Humanist Association could/should be a vital and important resource for rationalizing and inculcating civilizing mores. So, why, since 1984 --- apart from E.O. Wilson, William Schulz, Stephen Jay Gould, and perhaps a few others --- has the AHA elected as presidents so few who seem not to be weighted either towards angry atheism or deconstructive justification of every cheap thrill that can find support in some minority?
Where and when has the AHA, Walden II Society, or any moral philosopher, recently found spine enough to advocate a strong basis (or ANY basis) for disapproving of bestiality, polyamory, pedophilia, Nambla, race baiting politics, victim pleading politics, glorification of gang violence, recruiting of children as drug mules, nations bent on imposing Sharia law, annihilation of civilized borders, or laid back toleration of foreclosure on Western Civilization?
HUMANISM’S LEFT TURN:
Some quotes snipped from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Humanism :
Humanists endorse universal morality based on the commonality of the human condition, suggesting that solutions to human social and cultural problems cannot be parochial.
….
Humanism clearly rejects deference to supernatural beliefs in resolving human affairs but not necessarily the beliefs themselves; indeed some strains of Humanism are compatible with some religions.
….
In the United States, the Supreme Court recognized that Humanism is equivalent to a religion in the limited sense of authorizing Humanists to conduct ceremonies commonly carried out by officers of religious bodies.
….
According to Humanism, it is up to humans to find the truth, as opposed to seeking it through revelation, mysticism, tradition, or anything else that is incompatible with the application of logic to the observable evidence. In demanding that humans avoid blindly accepting unsupported beliefs, it supports scientific skepticism and the scientific method, rejecting authoritarianism and extreme skepticism, and rendering faith an unacceptable basis for action.
****
CRITIQUE OF SUCH INTERPRETATIONS OF HUMANISM:
I greatly admire the humanist valuing of rationality --- except when it turns rationality against itself.
Many expressions and interpretations of humanity --- such as tradition, history, sacred stories, parables, and customs --- come to represent more than mere symbols, and come also to represent emotionally conditioned investments in cultural aesthetics and polite sensibilities. Thus, it comes to make rational and moral sense to respect such expressions of humanity, regardless of whether or not they may otherwise be founded in pure logic.
Indeed much, if not all, that humans consider valuable in life (such as spirituality, soul, music, poetry, beauty, comedy, tragedy, drama, and companionship) depends upon conditioning and assimilating tastes, fashions, and interests, which may well have little, if any, basis in pure logic.
To hold all sacred traditions as either worthless or worthy only of deconstruction (unless logic can demonstrate their value) would be to annihilate much, if not all, of what is entailed, both, in being moral and in being human.
Except in figuratively modeled relations, we do not appreciate music, poetry, beauty, comedy, tragedy, drama, and companionship. We no more appreciate or measure such things directly than do we directly appreciate or measure spirituality, soul, or “God.”
Obviously, it would make little rational sense to annihilate music merely because it evades being captured in pure empiricism or rationality, devoid of emotional conditioning.
Likewise, it makes little rational sense to try to annihilate religion merely because the only way religion can meaningfully approach truth is with figures of speech and sacred parables (whose contextual meaningfulness ever changes and assimilates anew, in respect of our ever changing society).
While there is much in Humanism that I greatly admire, there is also much that suggests its leaders have misplaced, if not annihilated, their moral compasses.
To hope to endure, a moral civilization can ill afford to lose faith in the value of inculcating empathetic good faith among its members. For Humanists to devalue all faith is to devalue the only real glue of civilization.
In respect of good faith, mere physics offers no substitute “particle of faith.” And mere rationality offers no basis for valuing, devaluing, choosing or favoring anything, whether species, form, material, or ideal. Yet, we have no choice but to make choices!
Even a “non-choice” must, in some relation, be taken as a choice. (Just ask Carla Jean, in the movie No Country For Old Men (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/No_Country_for_Old_Men_(film).
So, in respect of what fundamental rock should civilization set its moral compass?
LIBERATING EVIL:
Well, under any serious inquiry, does it not seem that monetarist, materialist, libertine, liberal and humanist philosophers have abandoned any serious effort to comprehend a moral compass by which to guide civilization?
We have no shortage of philosophers for justifying the preservation of our earthly environment, but few for justifying the preservation, much less the propagation, of civilization.
We have plenty of smart professors in academia. So, why does there seem to be so much imbalance in what they are rationalizing, teaching, justifying, and leading? What may explain this? Is there some sort of imbalance in “the force”?
What of spiritual philosophers? Is it not readily apparent that followers and money are ripe for the picking? Given our present state of affairs, what sell-out of mediocre intelligence and self love could not find a niche for inventing and selling his/her own special brand of “liberation theology”?
Presently, no prevailing or assimilating vision, code, or norm of yore is trusted if it offends the exotic desires or mores of each newly evolving minority’s preferences or needs in respect of pleasure, sex, ceremony, liberation theology, dress, diet, language, gang, tribe, race, or alliance.
So, who among our esteemed elites and professors has very well considered what forces may be converging, or what aspects of human freedom and dignity may likely die or emerge as a result? Anyone? Anyone?
Check out http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Humanist_Association. No doubt, a Humanist Association could/should be a vital and important resource for rationalizing and inculcating civilizing mores. So, why, since 1984 --- apart from E.O. Wilson, William Schulz, Stephen Jay Gould, and perhaps a few others --- has the AHA elected as presidents so few who seem not to be weighted either towards angry atheism or deconstructive justification of every cheap thrill that can find support in some minority?
Where and when has the AHA, Walden II Society, or any moral philosopher, recently found spine enough to advocate a strong basis (or ANY basis) for disapproving of bestiality, polyamory, pedophilia, Nambla, race baiting politics, victim pleading politics, glorification of gang violence, recruiting of children as drug mules, nations bent on imposing Sharia law, annihilation of civilized borders, or laid back toleration of foreclosure on Western Civilization?
Dignity Within Indefiniteness
(by Dlanorrenrag*)
Dignity Within Indefiniteness:
I suspect it is not “THE universe” whose entropy potential shows dissipation within a system that is finite yet unbounded.
Rather, it is only “A-universe-as-we-commonly-experience-and-interpret-it
-from-our-holographically-overlapping-perspective” whose entropy and/or organizational potential we experience as dissipating.
Of course, humanity’s shared interpretative experience of entropy is essential to our interpretative experience of a sequentially shared and communicable story line.
However, beyond our story line, perhaps enveloped within some sort of dark energy, mathematics may implicate the existence of other holographically interpretative experiences, wherein entropy may be experienced as proceeding at different (or even non-comparable) rates.
Within possibilities of existential expressiveness, perhaps it is only the quality and locus of one’s perspective of Will which govern that which should rationally be considered and distinguished as being purely random, partly random, partly willed, and wholly determined.
In other words, such words, i.e., “random, partly random, partly willed, and wholly determined,” do not necessarily say anything definite at all about THE universe. Rather, the usefulness of such words seems to be limited to our shared anthropic perspective. Now, that seems justly ironic, given the common admonition among scientists to avoid anthropic rationalizations!
I wonder whether a gifted mathematician may be able to demonstrate some such conjecture, as a sort of “Turing Corollary To Math Flesh And Free Will”?
Dignity Within Indefiniteness:
I suspect it is not “THE universe” whose entropy potential shows dissipation within a system that is finite yet unbounded.
Rather, it is only “A-universe-as-we-commonly-experience-and-interpret-it
-from-our-holographically-overlapping-perspective” whose entropy and/or organizational potential we experience as dissipating.
Of course, humanity’s shared interpretative experience of entropy is essential to our interpretative experience of a sequentially shared and communicable story line.
However, beyond our story line, perhaps enveloped within some sort of dark energy, mathematics may implicate the existence of other holographically interpretative experiences, wherein entropy may be experienced as proceeding at different (or even non-comparable) rates.
Within possibilities of existential expressiveness, perhaps it is only the quality and locus of one’s perspective of Will which govern that which should rationally be considered and distinguished as being purely random, partly random, partly willed, and wholly determined.
In other words, such words, i.e., “random, partly random, partly willed, and wholly determined,” do not necessarily say anything definite at all about THE universe. Rather, the usefulness of such words seems to be limited to our shared anthropic perspective. Now, that seems justly ironic, given the common admonition among scientists to avoid anthropic rationalizations!
I wonder whether a gifted mathematician may be able to demonstrate some such conjecture, as a sort of “Turing Corollary To Math Flesh And Free Will”?
Monday, May 5, 2008
Anthropic Ships Passing
(by Dlanorrenrag*)
Anthropic Ships Passing Indefinitely In The Darkness Of Space:
It is a good laugh to watch as physicists engage delusions for measuring the “changing heat and informational entropy of our universe as a whole,” qua universe (as if any mortal could measure anything as an independent whole). In good humor, then, taking our universe as a whole: are physicists suggesting the extent, degree, or level of organization of our universe as a whole is becoming greater or lesser? With a straight face, which physicists imagine they are really measuring apples against apples, as they seek to extrapolate generalizations as a whole about any aspect of our universe, in respect of extent, degree and/or level?
No matter how one conjures or labels, our universe becomes no less a universe, does it not? Within our universe, is not every interpretation and experience necessarily subjective to each holographically different point of view (regardless that many subjective interpretations will touch and concern various overlapping commonalities)?
In what “sense of objective definiteness,” then, are physicists saying “definite things” about our universe? Are not physicists’ attempts at definiteness necessarily limited to their respecting or assuming of anthropic points of view?
From my anthropic point of view, I appreciate that the entropy of my present form of perspective of consciousness changes. I appreciate that I am mortal, my time is limited, and my physical body must eventually undo into dust. So, in generalizing from my limited, trivial, anthropic perspective, what could justify me to assume that the universe (whatever that is)(or even existence) must itself be becoming less organized? What sort of “rationality” could justify me to assume that some aspect of consciousness in which my consciousness shares does not simply transition, in order to assume a different perspective within a different form of universe or existence?
Sure, I accept that “universe as I experience it” proceeds along a general sequence of heat dissipation, punctuated by locally increasing complexities in informational organization. But then, for spiritual purposes, I ask: So what? How or why, then, should any sensible being deduce that whatever authored our universe must Itself be becoming less organized (or less anything)?
Against scientists’ efforts to set scales in order to measure or say “definite things” about our universe, may not dark matter and/or energy simply express a shrug, as scales are reset anew for each conscious perspective’s assumption of a new form and/or point of view?
Punt anthropic!
Anthropic Ships Passing Indefinitely In The Darkness Of Space:
It is a good laugh to watch as physicists engage delusions for measuring the “changing heat and informational entropy of our universe as a whole,” qua universe (as if any mortal could measure anything as an independent whole). In good humor, then, taking our universe as a whole: are physicists suggesting the extent, degree, or level of organization of our universe as a whole is becoming greater or lesser? With a straight face, which physicists imagine they are really measuring apples against apples, as they seek to extrapolate generalizations as a whole about any aspect of our universe, in respect of extent, degree and/or level?
No matter how one conjures or labels, our universe becomes no less a universe, does it not? Within our universe, is not every interpretation and experience necessarily subjective to each holographically different point of view (regardless that many subjective interpretations will touch and concern various overlapping commonalities)?
In what “sense of objective definiteness,” then, are physicists saying “definite things” about our universe? Are not physicists’ attempts at definiteness necessarily limited to their respecting or assuming of anthropic points of view?
From my anthropic point of view, I appreciate that the entropy of my present form of perspective of consciousness changes. I appreciate that I am mortal, my time is limited, and my physical body must eventually undo into dust. So, in generalizing from my limited, trivial, anthropic perspective, what could justify me to assume that the universe (whatever that is)(or even existence) must itself be becoming less organized? What sort of “rationality” could justify me to assume that some aspect of consciousness in which my consciousness shares does not simply transition, in order to assume a different perspective within a different form of universe or existence?
Sure, I accept that “universe as I experience it” proceeds along a general sequence of heat dissipation, punctuated by locally increasing complexities in informational organization. But then, for spiritual purposes, I ask: So what? How or why, then, should any sensible being deduce that whatever authored our universe must Itself be becoming less organized (or less anything)?
Against scientists’ efforts to set scales in order to measure or say “definite things” about our universe, may not dark matter and/or energy simply express a shrug, as scales are reset anew for each conscious perspective’s assumption of a new form and/or point of view?
Punt anthropic!
Sunday, May 4, 2008
GETTING IT
GETTING IT:
Dave,
I came across an article by Steven Weinberg. I think it is interesting, not for its insight or logic, but for its demonstration of a constricted way of thinking --- which seems to be quite prevalent. (The Anthropic tendency seems to be weakness that confers opportunities equally, to believers and atheists alike.)
But, I may be wrong.
*****
See http://www.physlink.com/Education/essay_weinberg.cfm:
“So there seems to be an irreducible mystery that science will not eliminate.
But religious theories of design have the same problem. Either you mean something definite by a God, a designer, or you don't. If you don't, then what are we talking about?”
Regarding “what are we talking about:” I suspect Steven Weinberg may “get it,” but simply be too focused to deem it worthwhile in his narrow world to let on about it. To “get it,” just ask: What is “it” that seems always to have been most fundamental about God? Does it not relate to the need for each sentient perspective of consciousness to connect, communicate, and empathize with other such perspectives, and to inculcate in them a belief or respect that they should return the favor? Most fundamentally, is not “God” the believed source and shared basis for such interconnecting empathy (and associated sense of higher or poetic meaningfulness) in consciousness?
Regarding how such empathy should be expressed in specific terms, there is not so much need to prove it out. Indeed, were specifics dictated, we would be less than freely sentient beings. Mr. Weinberg seems jealous that spirituality might conceit to intrude into empirical specifics. However, for making specific moral choices, enlightened spiritual believers rely on faith, intuition, and judgment --- not on empirical, scientific proof. It is quite simple, actually, to “get it:” Simply review Stephen Gould’s notion of “NOMA.”
Regardless, absent some such respect or inculcation for common intuition of moral propriety or civilizing empathy, what would Mr. Weinberg offer, as an alternative, as basis for inspiring us to gather in good faith in order to seek and be receptive to moral guidance?
Regarding: “It seems a bit unfair to my relatives to be murdered in order to provide an opportunity for free will for Germans, but even putting that aside, how does free will account for cancer? Is it an opportunity of free will for tumors?”
Interesting: Is not Weinberg here resorting to a sort of reverse kind of anthropic reasoning or "selection effect," to promote himself as judge of the fairness of God?
Yet, not being God, we are only temporal perspectives of consciousness.
We phase in and out; we die; we evolve; we may even transcend.
Why on earth should anyone suppose that, for God to “be fair,” we should forever be sustained in Eden?
Regarding “free will for tumors:” For free will, consider beyond physics, tumors, and bodies. Instead, consider the perspective that is doing the considering. That perspective is what accompanies one’s entire holography; it is not confined to one’s brain, skull, or body. In other words, experiencing free will is an aspect of consciousness of holography; it is not reducible merely to an aspect of physics.
Regarding: “I know, I know, we are not supposed to judge God according to human standards, but you see the problem here: If we are not yet convinced of His existence, and are looking for signs of His benevolence, then what other standards can we use.”
No, I do not see the problem. A rational person does not look strictly to empirical signs to evidence God. A rational person looks to intuition of consciousness and empathy. A rational person does not mix magesteria that cannot be mixed. (Advice: Remedially reread NOMA above; repeat as needed.)
Regarding: “The prestige of religion seems today to derive from what people take to be its moral influence, rather than from what they may think has been its success in accounting for what we see in nature. Conversely, I have to admit that, although I really don't believe in a cosmic designer, the reason that I am taking the trouble to argue about it is that I think that on balance the moral influence of religion has been awful.”
Now, this again is interesting. Is Weinberg suggesting he would accept religion were its moral influence more benign? (I doubt it.) Even if so, how would he deign to measure “awful” vs. “benign” ---- holistically, I mean? Is Weinberg saying we cannot, in good faith, evolve in our appreciation of religion and sacred parables and histories? Is he saying we could better evolve in morality and good faith were we to jettison all notions of religion, God, and moral spirituality? If so, just what is the historical, empirical, scientific basis for such a grand presumption by such a narrowly focused person? Should we put progeny of B.F Skinner in charge and make Walden Two the model for our world? If so, please demonstrate why --- scientifically.
Regarding: “… it is hard to imagine Nazism taking the form it did without the foundation provided by centuries of Christian anti-Semitism.”
Well, not everyone finds it quite so hard to imagine. After WWI, Germany was looking for scapegoats, and it had them, and not just in Jews. What else have scientists done, eugenically and experimentally, with monkeys, dogs, frogs …. Does Weinberg just assume irreligious scientists would deal with everyone else under a sort of noblesse oblige? My goodness --- what of the Stalinists, Maoists, and organ harvesting Chinese?
Regarding: “One of the great achievements of science has been, if not to make it impossible for intelligent people to be religious, then at least to make it possible for them not to be religious.”
Well, rational folks do not begrudge Weinberg his right to not be religious. But, if Weinberg does not quite mean to say that intelligent people cannot be religious, then his rather gratuitous insult seems close to a smoking gun for PRECISELY WHAT BEN STEIN WAS SAYING, in his recent movie, Expelled.
*****
BTW --- I enjoyed Asimov's Foundation's Edge. Asimov at one time called himself an atheist. Later, he called himself a Humanist, feeling it more appropriate to emphasize what he believed, rather than what he did not believe.
Regardless of what he called his conception of an interconnecting consciousness (Gaia/Galaxia) in Foundation's Edge, it seems not very far removed from what I would conceive to be "God." If consciousness has potential to interconnect, it seems relatively unimportant to try to imagine whether God learns or already knew everything at the time of an "original design." Makes me wonder whether Asimov would consider me an "atheist."
Dave,
I came across an article by Steven Weinberg. I think it is interesting, not for its insight or logic, but for its demonstration of a constricted way of thinking --- which seems to be quite prevalent. (The Anthropic tendency seems to be weakness that confers opportunities equally, to believers and atheists alike.)
But, I may be wrong.
*****
See http://www.physlink.com/Education/essay_weinberg.cfm:
“So there seems to be an irreducible mystery that science will not eliminate.
But religious theories of design have the same problem. Either you mean something definite by a God, a designer, or you don't. If you don't, then what are we talking about?”
Regarding “what are we talking about:” I suspect Steven Weinberg may “get it,” but simply be too focused to deem it worthwhile in his narrow world to let on about it. To “get it,” just ask: What is “it” that seems always to have been most fundamental about God? Does it not relate to the need for each sentient perspective of consciousness to connect, communicate, and empathize with other such perspectives, and to inculcate in them a belief or respect that they should return the favor? Most fundamentally, is not “God” the believed source and shared basis for such interconnecting empathy (and associated sense of higher or poetic meaningfulness) in consciousness?
Regarding how such empathy should be expressed in specific terms, there is not so much need to prove it out. Indeed, were specifics dictated, we would be less than freely sentient beings. Mr. Weinberg seems jealous that spirituality might conceit to intrude into empirical specifics. However, for making specific moral choices, enlightened spiritual believers rely on faith, intuition, and judgment --- not on empirical, scientific proof. It is quite simple, actually, to “get it:” Simply review Stephen Gould’s notion of “NOMA.”
Regardless, absent some such respect or inculcation for common intuition of moral propriety or civilizing empathy, what would Mr. Weinberg offer, as an alternative, as basis for inspiring us to gather in good faith in order to seek and be receptive to moral guidance?
Regarding: “It seems a bit unfair to my relatives to be murdered in order to provide an opportunity for free will for Germans, but even putting that aside, how does free will account for cancer? Is it an opportunity of free will for tumors?”
Interesting: Is not Weinberg here resorting to a sort of reverse kind of anthropic reasoning or "selection effect," to promote himself as judge of the fairness of God?
Yet, not being God, we are only temporal perspectives of consciousness.
We phase in and out; we die; we evolve; we may even transcend.
Why on earth should anyone suppose that, for God to “be fair,” we should forever be sustained in Eden?
Regarding “free will for tumors:” For free will, consider beyond physics, tumors, and bodies. Instead, consider the perspective that is doing the considering. That perspective is what accompanies one’s entire holography; it is not confined to one’s brain, skull, or body. In other words, experiencing free will is an aspect of consciousness of holography; it is not reducible merely to an aspect of physics.
Regarding: “I know, I know, we are not supposed to judge God according to human standards, but you see the problem here: If we are not yet convinced of His existence, and are looking for signs of His benevolence, then what other standards can we use.”
No, I do not see the problem. A rational person does not look strictly to empirical signs to evidence God. A rational person looks to intuition of consciousness and empathy. A rational person does not mix magesteria that cannot be mixed. (Advice: Remedially reread NOMA above; repeat as needed.)
Regarding: “The prestige of religion seems today to derive from what people take to be its moral influence, rather than from what they may think has been its success in accounting for what we see in nature. Conversely, I have to admit that, although I really don't believe in a cosmic designer, the reason that I am taking the trouble to argue about it is that I think that on balance the moral influence of religion has been awful.”
Now, this again is interesting. Is Weinberg suggesting he would accept religion were its moral influence more benign? (I doubt it.) Even if so, how would he deign to measure “awful” vs. “benign” ---- holistically, I mean? Is Weinberg saying we cannot, in good faith, evolve in our appreciation of religion and sacred parables and histories? Is he saying we could better evolve in morality and good faith were we to jettison all notions of religion, God, and moral spirituality? If so, just what is the historical, empirical, scientific basis for such a grand presumption by such a narrowly focused person? Should we put progeny of B.F Skinner in charge and make Walden Two the model for our world? If so, please demonstrate why --- scientifically.
Regarding: “… it is hard to imagine Nazism taking the form it did without the foundation provided by centuries of Christian anti-Semitism.”
Well, not everyone finds it quite so hard to imagine. After WWI, Germany was looking for scapegoats, and it had them, and not just in Jews. What else have scientists done, eugenically and experimentally, with monkeys, dogs, frogs …. Does Weinberg just assume irreligious scientists would deal with everyone else under a sort of noblesse oblige? My goodness --- what of the Stalinists, Maoists, and organ harvesting Chinese?
Regarding: “One of the great achievements of science has been, if not to make it impossible for intelligent people to be religious, then at least to make it possible for them not to be religious.”
Well, rational folks do not begrudge Weinberg his right to not be religious. But, if Weinberg does not quite mean to say that intelligent people cannot be religious, then his rather gratuitous insult seems close to a smoking gun for PRECISELY WHAT BEN STEIN WAS SAYING, in his recent movie, Expelled.
*****
BTW --- I enjoyed Asimov's Foundation's Edge. Asimov at one time called himself an atheist. Later, he called himself a Humanist, feeling it more appropriate to emphasize what he believed, rather than what he did not believe.
Regardless of what he called his conception of an interconnecting consciousness (Gaia/Galaxia) in Foundation's Edge, it seems not very far removed from what I would conceive to be "God." If consciousness has potential to interconnect, it seems relatively unimportant to try to imagine whether God learns or already knew everything at the time of an "original design." Makes me wonder whether Asimov would consider me an "atheist."
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