My mind's in a knot... (Re: Who/what created God?)

I must say, I am rather disappointed with that exert - it starts well but then simply dies before actually explaining anything. The concept of the Universe arising from 'nothing' needs severe caveating, and this isn't done here and leaves just about all possible misconceptions intact. I'll see if I can dig out one of my past EvC monologues on this, or dig out enough enthusiasm to write a new one.

Ok, reading through some of these it seems that most of these scientists i.e. Paul Davies and others are just providing mere speculation and open dialog not adamant, dogmatic belief in a particular hypothesis of cosmogenesis. Michio Kaku, Brian Green, Stephen Hawkins and others do the same thing. It is part of the scientific process of open dialog a.k.a. brainstorming. Einstein, Heiseneberg, Bohr, and other leading theorists of the 20th century did the same thing. Mere speculation and advocating a specific scientific theory are two seperate things.Edited by DevilsAdvocate, : No reason given.

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For me, it is far better to grasp the Universe as it really is than to persist in delusion, however satisfying and reassuring.
Dr. Carl Sagan

Kaku, is writing to the layman not to an audience of scientists. He is a futurist and sort of theoretical physicists liason to the relatively uneducated public (at least in cosmology, particle physics and advanced mathematics). I don't think his intention was to leave us hanging and this book is over a decade old so I am not sure how much his views have changed in this respect.Either way I think people (like Agobot) take the term "something from nothing" at face value when there is much more to it than this i.e. vacuum energy is nothing. Maybe you can enlighten us in this respect Cavediver.

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For me, it is far better to grasp the Universe as it really is than to persist in delusion, however satisfying and reassuring.
Dr. Carl Sagan

This is not even close to the level of disagreeing with other physicists - I am disagreeing with your interpretation of what you 'think' other physicists are saying. This is primarily not your fault, as you are not a physicist and are attenmpting to learn this material from either popular science, which is typically just wrong, or from papers that are strictly beyond your current comprehension. Where you are at fault is not recognising that much of this is beyond your comprehension, yet conversing here as if you are approaching some level of expertise. I haven't interrupted before because 1) I can't be arsed, and 2) I don't like to dampen enthusiasm for my subject. However, much of what you are arguing is misplaced, misunderstood, or plain wrong.However, you have given me great hope - despite the surfeit of popular physics layman books available, I can see that there is still a place for my as yet unwritten masterpiece, as it is designed to actually dismiss much of the erroneous bullshit spread by these other tomes... I just have to see if I can have it published before Ray's

Oh, I am well aware of that. It's certainly not a topic you will find discussed amongst theoretical physicists in this way. And he is at fault here, but only as much as just about everyone else who has written on this subject - hence why all the misconceptions exist. Just as every popularisation of the Big Bang shows an explosion at a point shown from some 'external' viewpoint, perpetuating yet more bullshit ideas. And anyway, Kaku has far more to answer for, given some of the absurdities in his string theory text books And yes, we have told him Edited by cavediver, : No reason given.

Well, read between the lines of what Paul Davies (of which I have read some of his books on astrobiology) to see what he really is saying i.e. Obviously, he is not fully advocating this view. , etc.It seems from this article that he is very speculative of the idea of a multiverse for various reasons. If you want in understanding of what he proposes in place of this, read the following: Life the universe and everythingHere again a Q&A interview on the existence of a multiverse by Paul Davies (JTF is the John Templeton Foundation): Thus it seems that Dr. Davies is sitting on the fence (like many other scientists) and waiting for evidence to point one way or another. The multiverse hypothesis just like superstring and other speculative hypothesis are awaiting conclusive evidence to substantiate and affirm them as being true or false.In more simple terms, we have to wait and see where the evidence leads us in this regard.Edited by DevilsAdvocate, : No reason given.

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For me, it is far better to grasp the Universe as it really is than to persist in delusion, however satisfying and reassuring.
Dr. Carl Sagan

Kaku has done a lot to encourage the general public to get excited about science though. I understand that he may not be in line with the theoretical physicist community but would you rather that the general public have no idea what you guys do and as a result your funding would dry (if the President of the US can't even agree that evolution occurs what chance do you have of asking for funding to explore the string theory?).I don't like making people saints (i.e. Kaku and others) but I also don't like demonizing people as well (aka Agobot). The middle ground is that we all should be humble enough to say that "we don't know" and until we gain more evidence we should treat hypothesis such as multiverse, string and others as just that unsubstantiated speculation requiring further research, observation, testing and experimentation. I do agree that we have to weed out the kernal (of real scientific endeavor and discovery) from the chaff (of pseudoscience) as well or as we say in the Navy, no matter how many times you polish a turd, it is still a turd! And how do we do this? By adhering strictly to the rules of the scientific method and not jumping ahead of ourselves to say this or that unsubstantiated hypothesis is correct until we can unequivocally support it with sound emperical (mathematical and/or other substantiated) evidence.Edited by DevilsAdvocate, : No reason given.

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For me, it is far better to grasp the Universe as it really is than to persist in delusion, however satisfying and reassuring.
Dr. Carl Sagan

Oh, sure. As have many others - Brain Greene, Hawking of course, myself in my own small way But believe me, Michio doesn't do it out of some rare ultruistic drive to spread science. Thousands of physicists would love to be doing what he's doing - getting paid decent money to prattle on about the subject they love, and becoming semi-'famous' in the process. He's the lucky one. He's not to be applauded - he's to be envied. And thus he will (and does) attract criticism from his own quarter if he slips an inch. No, you misunderstand. In no way do I mean he is out of line with the theoretical physicist community. He's simply written some things for which we rib him, and in terms of his popular science, he can and should do better. I tend to write by stream-of-conciousness, and it is a big mistake on my part if it leads to misconceptions such as this. I don't mean to be rude here, BUT you are in no positon to have an opinion on this matter*. To call the concepts of string theory, 'multiverses', etc, unsubstantiated speculation is pure ignorance. Just because you can read about these subjects in popular science does not mean you have sufficient handle on these terms to wield them meaningfully in conversation, certainly not in conversation with a professional of the field.I can share with you concepts of 'multiverses' that are almost certainly correct, others that are theoretically suggested, some that are pure speculation, and finally those that are demonstrably false. Why would I ever say 'I don't know' when I have all this to discuss???When string theory is finally shown experimentally to be the correct view on nature, I will be amazed. When it is conclusively shown to be irrelevant to nature, I will also be amazed. Why would I ever say 'I don't know' when I have all this to discuss???*That said, nor is just about every working physicist outside those working specifically in these and related fields. Sadly, that does not stop many from pontificating on the subject, and using their credentials to bolster their claims (whether pro, anti, or ambivalent.) Your set of "we" is actually very small in size.

Sure, I can have an opinion just as Agobot can have his. It is just that I do not have the education, training, or research in this field to back up any of my claims (which I don't think I have ever made, I have just reitterated my interpretation of what leaders in the physics community have stated about in the field of physics, cosmology, etc). I understand it and get it. Our opinions mean squat in the field of particle physics and quantum theory. I have no problem with this and do not take it personally. I treat this in a similar manner as if a civilian were weighing in on military matter without ever having any type of military experience. So are you saying that layman should just let physicists do there work and not express opinions on the nature this work? I think this is a bit arrogant in itself. Just because a United States civilian doesn't have military experience does this mean he cannot express his opinion on where how the US military is deployed or used? Of course not. So to it is my duty and responsibility as a human being to ensure that science is effectively used to be used in an ethical manner which benefits humanity as a whole. Should my opinion on the validity of zero-point energy or superstrings matter? Of course not. However is it wrong for me to express my opinion that certain "scientific" ideas are or are not logically credible? No, I don't think so. Does one have to be a paid professional in the field of science to speculate about the nature of the universe (or any other scientific theory or philosophical idea)? No, I don't believe so. I believe it is a DUTY of all human beings to educate themselves in the sciences, critical thinking and logic. Or would you rather we all be sheep and blindly except whatever scientists spoon feed us as being unequivocally and without question true? I think I mispoke when I said this. I do understand that there is much mathematics and evidence that underly these hypothesis/theories, however my point is that some of these hypothesis/theories contradict each other and until further research and evidence is provided we have to resort to the fact that we cannot unequivocally state that the multiverse hypothesis or the superstring theory is an accurate depiction of reality as of yet. When I say we I mean humanity as a whole. We as humans, should as I said previously, do everything in our power to educate ourselves, our offspring and others "correct" science (not pseudoscience), logic and critical thinking. Do I have to be a paid scientist to do this. No. Or we will seriously set ourselves up for failure and shoot our selves figuratively in the foot. Science belongs to everyone not just the paid scientific community.As Dr. Sagan stated: and and my favorite (which applies to all pseudoscientific nonsense): Edited by DevilsAdvocate, : No reason given.

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For me, it is far better to grasp the Universe as it really is than to persist in delusion, however satisfying and reassuring.
Dr. Carl Sagan

OK maybe. There is a large rift between physicists how to approach non-locality(and not only non-locality - i am sure you know this). I do want to see your opinion how we can preserve locality, realism and QM. A number of physicists agree that we have to give up mind-independent reality(through experiments) - prof.Anton Zeilinger, Richard Conn Henry, Stephen R. Palmquist, etc.:http://henry.pha.jhu.edu/aspect.html"Alain Aspect is the physicist who performed the key experiment that established that if you want a real universe, it must be non-local (Einstein’s “spooky action at a distance”). Aspect comments on new work by his successor in conducting such experiments, Anton Zeilinger and his colleagues, who have now performed an experiment that suggests that “giving up the concept of locality is not sufficient to be consistent with quantum experiments, unless certain intuitive features of realism are abandoned.”Even Brian Greene, who is very reserved, says in "the Elegant Universe" - you have to have courage to ask certain deep questions about QM.
As far as i can see from his books, Einstein at the end of his life didn't seem much of a realist either. And yes, i am a total layman who doesn't have a clue about physics. I just want to see any physicist propose a way how to keep locality, realism and QM. Edited by Agobot, : No reason given.Edited by Agobot, : No reason given.Edited by Agobot, : No reason given.

Exactly, and if anyone were to offer the opinion that *all* infantry should behave a certain way, you would welcome his opinion but consider him an idiot. I prefer to point out that he doesn't have anywhere near enough information to make that point, and help him stop making himself look an idiot Unless he was particularly obnoxious and then I would simply enjoy laughing at him... Expressing opinions about technicalities of the subject just makes you look stupid, so I would discourage that. I encourage questions. To voice an opinion like yours (which I appreciate you now admit was mispoken to some degree) simply reveals an ignorance of the subject and, even worse, an ignorance of ones own ignorance. That is a huge barrier to learning. You need to be aware of your own ignorance to be able to effectively cure it. Don't worry, in my early days my own ignorance of my ignorance dwarfed yours I'm being harsh because you seem genuinely interested. You should assimilate what you hear, read, and study, and then test it by asking questions. And then ask more questions based on the answers. If you come to a conclusion, don't say "ha, this must be true" (as I once did as a student in front of the most senior members of my field , ask "I've come up with this, is this correct, and if not, where have I gone wrong?" Your ability to learn is inversely proportional to your pride that prevents you asking questions. If science says A, then what are you going to do about it? If you feel that strongly about knowing why A is true, or how A could possibly true, then you become a scientist studying A. There is no other way. Spout your popular opinion by all means, but it is worthless and you look like an idiot.If half the scientists say A, and the half say B, what do you do? If you feel that strongly about knowing which of A or B is true, then you become a scientist studying A and/or B. There is no other way. Spout your popular opinion by all means, but it is worthless and you look like an idiot.Science could not give a shit about democracy, or layman's opinions Edited by cavediver, : No reason given.

Much better But you are certainly gaining some clues... keep at it. And simply stop making definitive statements.Now, show me a popular article by Davies and I will disagree with most of what is said. But if Paul and I meet up, we will be very much in agreement with one-another. Trying to present a picture of our understanding of reality in a popular science article is next to impossible - I find it so even here at EvC where I have much greater freedom with words. Most of my technical commenst are written and re-written and written again. It's impossible to convey what I really mean because the gulf is too large. Slight biases in our thoughts can be massively amplified by dumbing down what we're saying - so Paul comes across as some mubo-jumbo religionist, and I disagree with his article, and I would be much more dry and mathematical, and he would disagree with me. But our differences are very slight and we would agree, in person, on most things.Many of the gulfs you think are there between different physicists are of this nature. But not all...Oh, and we simply don't require realism. I would have thought you'd appreciate that by now with all your talk of things not being as they seem...

Right.I don't believe many of the obvious things and i am not surprised to hear this.Thanks for intervening, to me these threads are the only of value on EvC.

LOL, true, true. Though I am a Sailor, not a soldier, so I too would be somewhat talking our of my ass on the infantry thing. I see how far Agobot and I have taken this out of hand. I guess I used his arguments proposing some weird, metaphysical hypothesis of the universe being a machine, etc as a way for me to gather more knowledge and hone my understanding of quantum mechanics and cosmology but the end I myself probably made an ass out of myself for trying to debate this line of thinking in the first place (if that makes sense). I was not doing out of self-righteous reasons per se as just a method to further my self-education. I concur. Point taken . Sounds like science and the military have a lot more in common in this respect than people would like to acknowledge.

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For me, it is far better to grasp the Universe as it really is than to persist in delusion, however satisfying and reassuring.
Dr. Carl Sagan

For most of it I thought you were doing very well - interestingly, your typical line of "I'm not sure that's right - isn't it more like this..." would tend to be very close to the mark, where-as your more definite statements/proclamations tended to be more bullshit inspired If I believed my own crap, I might suggest that your tentativity brings out better thought and understanding