bascule

Einstein is describing the fabric of spacetime itself as a sort of ether. That said, general relativity cannot ascribe properties to spacetime on the sub-Planck scale... only quantum mechanics and modern physics inspired by it can do that. That said, different theories within modern physics give remarkably different views of how space looks on scales below the Planck length, but they seem to fall into some distinct categories: That space is continuous and thus infinitely divisible is but one of three pictures of how space operates below the Planck length. This, I believe, is how space is modeled by string theory, aside from approaches involving "string bits", which I haven't heard outside of Lee Smolin. That said, Smolin used to paint a rather different picture: space is discrete, composed of chunks which are not divisible. He wrote an entire book on how spacetime is best modeled as an evolving network of relationships, best described in structures called "spin networks" or "spin foam". There exists a third picture, somewhere between the previous two. This involves modeling space as a self-similar structure, somthing akin to a fractal. I can't really speak of theories of this nature as I don't know any of the specifics.

One of science's greatest mysteries, solved! By Red Green: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yJJrjDI5xSQ

One of the coolest things I've seen in this regard is the suspension of objects in what I believe were the nodes of standing longitudinal waves in a gas (i.e. sound). Googling it really quick, it appears to be called acoustic levitation. I saw this on Beyond 2000 years ago... among other objects they were able to suspend a frog, to show that it wasn't harmful to life (or at least frogs) Again, not antigravity, just making stuff float...

I was trying to point you at some information I thought you might find interesting. For some reason this has put you on the defensive... however this was intended as a helpful post, directing you towards resources you might find interesting. Searle is a proponent of the idea that quantum indeterminism is integral to consciousness, although I've never read him proposing a mechanism by which it does so. Christopher Michael Langan's hypotheses greatly transcend the kinds of things even modern physics is able to describe. Other than that I don't see the relevance of physics to this thread. And for the record: no, I don't have a physics degree. I am quite likely the most knowledgeable person on this board on the subject of the philosophy of mind and consciousness studies. I was trying to point you at resources you might find interesting, even though I personally dislike the opinions of these individuals (though I have read them as I consider analyzing contrarian opinions as central to understanding anything). I'd still suggest you investigate these people. They're onto the same ideas you are.

The same thing I do already: don't drive my car. My car has been broken for almost 3 weeks now, and so far I feel no incentive to try fixing it.

I don't think so: http://www.abcnews.go.com/PollingUnit/Politics/story?id=4896202&page=1 http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/24736399/ http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080520/ap_on_el_pr/campaign_exit_poll While unfortunately I'm unable to locate the specific question being asked, all the news stories make it clear that the question involved whether race was an issue in their vote, not the votes of others. The question would be pretty pointless on an exit poll otherwise.

I'll defer to Dr. Aubrey de Gray, who proposes 7 principal causes of aging: 1. Cancer-causing nuclear mutations 2. Mitochondrial mutations 3. Accumulation of intracellular waste 4. Accumulation of extracellular waste 5. Cell loss 6. Cell senescence 7. Extracellular crosslinks

Sounds like a pretty canonical argument from ignorance to me, or at the very best an argument from personal incredulity. Claiming the models are inaccurate because the inputs are based on scientific theory is hardly a credible argument. Can you point out something specific you think is wrong with the models, beyond completely baseless claims regarding their accuracy?

You certainly have the roads you want to go down picked out. I've already been there, and can recommend some reading for you that you might find extremely interesting. Personally I consider these people crackpots, but I think you'd get a kick out of them: John Searle: Famous for his "Chinese Room" thought experiment which attempts a reductio ad absurdum against functionalism. Proponent of "biological naturalism," the idea that consciousness arose naturally but can only be a property of biological systems. Christopher Michael Langan: Famous for his high IQ, and a proponent of the "Cognitive Theoretic Model of the Universe", or CTMU (pronounced cat mew). His model suggests that mind has an integral structural role in the universe, with the end result of mind's role in the universe being God and God being the universe's creator, albeit in a somewhat Deist capacity, as he does not purport that God still exists or has existed at all since creation. Believes God is the creator of a Self-Configuring Self-Processing Language which lies at the heart of the universe's operation. Has thus far only managed to publish his model in Intelligent Design journals and has not received publication elsewhere. While he publishes through ID journals he should not be considered a cdesign proponentist as his ideas are wholly compatible with existing science. However, they are anything but scientific.

That said, looking at the exit poll numbers from Kentucky (where 41% of Clinton's supporters said they'd vote McCain over Obama, and 26% said they just wouldn't vote) I don't think it's a stretch to say that a large number of her supporters there were racists (did I mention that 20% admitted on the exit poll that race was an issue?) I'd love to see a woman president. I thought it was refreshing to see there'd be someone who isn't a white male as a mainstream presidential candidate, regardless of how the primaries turned out. That said, this woman isn't fit to be president, and as she vainly tries to claw her way out of the hole she's dug for herself I think she's really made her true nature known. What a harpy...

Take the 2D rubber sheet and rotate it 360° along all three axes of 3D space, and you'll get a better idea of what the theory is describing. That said, General Relativity is known to be wrong to certain extents. Satellite telemetry data has shown certain aberrations from the values GR predicts under certain circumstances, and more and more instances of this are popping up. In addition to the other problems explained above, these satellites show that there's something to their behavior which GR does not account for. That said, the theory has been confirmed by innumerable experiments and for most circumstances it seems to hold up just fine.

We aren't there yet, but at the same time we do understand how the building blocks of the brain work. A physicist may not be able to understand the computer program running on a microprocessor, but he can explain the physics of the processor itself, and in doing so rule out specifically quantum mechanical behaviors as an explanation for what the program is doing, even without understanding the program.

Perhaps "making laser beams visible" is a better phraseology. That said, laser Floyd rules, and laser beams rock a billion times more when they're visible.

Unless there's a part of the brain demonstrating behavior inexplicable by classical physics, there's no more need for a grand unified theory to explain it than there is the bouncing of billiard balls... the "incomplete" portion of the explanation is so insignificant as to be irrelevant.

Again, you're completely missing the point. The configuration of atoms and molecules inside a computer processor determine the outcome of the symbolic events occurring inside the processor, but those events play out in what's fundamentally a symbolically-driven process. Why does the substrate matter as long as the symbols are the same? There are hundreds of processors which are capable of processing the x86 instruction set, and the design of each of them is completely different, yet they are able to execute the same programs without problems.

I've got to say, under the influence of certain substances, I have truly believed the world will end in 2012. When I'm sober, well, let's say I'd consider it unlikely

Veto-proof? Apparently you didn't consider the power of confusion! http://www.cnn.com/2008/POLITICS/05/21/bush.farmbill.ap/index.html?eref=rss_topstories

Human-comprehensible approxminations of time, such as a "quarter after" or a "quarter til'" a particular hour are instantly and visibly deducible. When someone asks me for the time, I much prefer to relate it that way rather than give them the exact time. With an analog watch, it's completely intuitive to say "It's a quarter after 4" rather than "It's 4:17", since there's no translation there as there is with an analog watch. Plus, I've had people ask me "Hey you, that's an awesome watch, what time is it?" Haha, how uncanny that I posted that digital watches are tacky like immediately after you said that... ...but seriously, digital watches are tacky.

I've been freaked out about a nuclear Iran forever. I even beat the drum of war with Iran, but that was sort of in juxtaposition to Iraq circa 2003. That's because Iran had a bona fide nuclear program, and Iraq didn't have jack. A.Q. Khan, the father of Pakistan's atomic bomb, stole uranium centrifuge technologies from Europe and sold them to Iran and North Korea. Iran then began building centrifuges according to those designs, and using them to enrich uranium. They also adapted North Korean intercontinental ballistic missile technologies, in the form of the Shahab-6, an multi-stage ICBM capable of reaching sites in Europe. That said, I was worried for awhile, a long wile... a span of, well about 5 years. I'm a strong advocate of nuclear disarmament, and certainly don't want any country with any sort of fanatical aspirations obtaining nuclear weapons. Lately, my fears have waned. It seems like much ado about nothing. I am no longer afraid, nor do I believe Iran is developing nuclear weapons.

I don't know who would wear a digital watch anymore. I used to when I was younger, then I started carrying around a cell phone with a clock, which accomplished the same thing. Digital watches are generally pretty tacky, although I've seen some pretty nice ones. That said I wear an analog watch.

http://www.chick.com/reading/tracts/1041/1041_01.asp?wpc=1041_01.asp&wpp=a Jack Chick obviously has a few bones to pick with things like secular humanism and post-modernism. But, of course, he drags evolutionary biology into it and declares it equivalent to the two. That's not to mention eugenics! Oh, did I mention that science proved there is no heaven?

That's the basic argument behind functionalism: consciousness is a symbolic system and it doesn't matter how the symbols and functions operating on them are actually manifested.

No it's not. For one thing, nobody knows if there really is a "beginning of time" Our bodies are far, far too large to have a single wavefunction. Instead the innumerable elementary particles which comprise our bodies each undergo wavefunction collapse repeatedly at infinitesimal intervals. I can't. If you want to take the route of reductive eliminativism, then none of my arguments have meaning. But I have to wonder if you truly believe your own consciousness doesn't exist...

Hyperdimension is a nonsense word Judging from that, what I'm describing is in no way similar to your idea. If you are trying to describe consciousness as a physical system you are taking the point of view of reductive eliminativism. I'm describing consciousness as a metaphysical system.

No, it's certainly not a trick question. Physicists can describe the behavior of systems on the scale of neurons without resorting to quantum mechanics. This is similar to the way you can describe the behavior of billiard balls without having to resort to quantum mechanics. In the case of billiard balls, all that's needed to describe their behavior is Newtonian mechanics. Sure, there's fundamentally quantum effects going on underneath, but they're irrelevant to the behavior of the billiard balls on a large scale, because the quantum effects are occurring on a scale too small to matter to objects as large as billiard balls and are effectively averaged out. For such systems, quantum mechanics is effectively irrelevant. I contend the same is true with the brain, but you are arguing that it is not. In order for your argument to be correct, some part of the brain must behave in such a way that it cannot be adequately described without involving quantum mechanics. What part of the brain do you suggest behaves in such a way? Penrose has suggested microtubules, a proposal which has been thoroughly rebutted by several physicists, namely Max Tegmark.