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Author | Topic: Biocentrism - How life creates the universe | |||||||||||||||||||||||
ringo Member (Idle past 411 days) Posts: 20940 From: frozen wasteland Joined: |
cavediver writes:
Maybe "quantities" wasn't the best choice of words since it does imply measurement. Would "properties" be better? Position and momentum as such don't exist until measured - they simply aren't "things" that "exist" - they are answers to questions that are asked. I rode off into the sunset, went all the way around the world and now I\'m back where I started.
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GDR Member Posts: 6202 From: Sidney, BC, Canada Joined: Member Rating: 1.9 |
Here is an article called Space, Time and Consciousness by John Smythies. It provides another take on the issue. The following is the conclusion to this paper.
quote:
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jar Member (Idle past 394 days) Posts: 34026 From: Texas!! Joined: |
Ontology is still philosophy, not science.
Anyone so limited that they can only spell a word one way is severely handicapped!
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cavediver Member (Idle past 3643 days) Posts: 4129 From: UK Joined: |
Here is an article called Space, Time and Consciousness by John Smythies. It provides another take on the issue. Linde is a good physicist though he may be over-extending in his metaphysical ideas. But this guy is just a loon - it is abundantly clear that he has no clue of the physics he is butchering. I would ignore anything he writes and stick to those who actually have some grounding in the basics before they attempt to scale the difficult stuff (Penrose, Linde, etc) When physicists start encroaching on philosophy and metaphysics, take anything they say (me especially) with a large grain of salt. But when philosophers and neuroscientists start talking fundemental physics, probably best to just ignore them completely...
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GDR Member Posts: 6202 From: Sidney, BC, Canada Joined: Member Rating: 1.9 |
Thanks for the tip. It is difficult for someone with no background in physics to separate the wheat from the chaff. This was the book that got me started thinking about this.
Quantum EnigmaBoth authors are physics professors so hopefully they are somewhat on track. Thanks again.
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GDR Member Posts: 6202 From: Sidney, BC, Canada Joined: Member Rating: 1.9 |
AZPaul3 writes: This universe cannot be said to exist without my personal observance. I, AZPaul3, am the center of the universe. Actually, the bridge of my nose is the center since no matter which direction I look the measure of distance as far out as it is possible to see is exactly the same. From the philosopher's own handbook, I cannot say the universe existed before I, personally, was here to observe it. Further, then, this universe will end with my end of observation upon my passing. Actually I think that this is a great point and I've wondered the same thing myself. (My wife tells me that I certainly exist in my own universe. ) In a lot of ways I think that makes more sense of things considering what relativity tells us about time. Once again I don't have answers but that is certainly a good thought raising great questions.
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GDR Member Posts: 6202 From: Sidney, BC, Canada Joined: Member Rating: 1.9 |
I recently read a book by a Jewish physicist named Gerald Shroeder. The book is entitled . Obviously the book has religious overtones but I think that he raises interesting questions that are not part of the religiosity of the book. He does have 2 PHD’s from MIT, one in physics and one in earth sciences.
He writes the following:
quote: I found this very interesting and I think it plays into the relationship between consciousness and physicality but once again I’m not at all sure just how. Everybody is entitled to my opinion.
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crashfrog Member (Idle past 1466 days) Posts: 19762 From: Silver Spring, MD Joined: |
Let's say that I wanted to build or design a brain that could talk to itself. That is, it could experience the "inner monologue", that practice we frequently do where we hear our own speech inside our minds without actually engaging in the physical act of speech.
Let's further say that this brain already had discrete areas for both the production of language-based speech, and for the interpretation of language-based speech as heard from others. Couldn't I design such a brain such that the areas for speech generation and speech interpretation could be voluntarily connected? Wouldn't that generate the sensation of hearing your own voice in your mind, even though you weren't actually speaking?
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AZPaul3 Member Posts: 8513 From: Phoenix Joined: Member Rating: 5.3 |
In a lot of ways I think that makes more sense of things considering what relativity tells us about time. However, if you read the rest of my message, you will see where I conclude that this idea is false.
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GDR Member Posts: 6202 From: Sidney, BC, Canada Joined: Member Rating: 1.9 |
I understood that, but I was just suggesting that maybe you're wrong about being wrong.
I agree however, it is just far out conjecture. I just found the thought interesting.
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GDR Member Posts: 6202 From: Sidney, BC, Canada Joined: Member Rating: 1.9 |
crashfrog writes: Couldn't I design such a brain such that the areas for speech generation and speech interpretation could be voluntarily connected? Wouldn't that generate the sensation of hearing your own voice in your mind, even though you weren't actually speaking? I guess the point would be that you hear the speech in your head but somebody with a stethoscope up to your head wouldn't hear it. You don't have a speaker somewhere in your head. As he says: where is the playback?
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crashfrog Member (Idle past 1466 days) Posts: 19762 From: Silver Spring, MD Joined: |
I guess the point would be that you hear the speech in your head but somebody with a stethoscope up to your head wouldn't hear it. Why would they?
As he says: where is the playback? That's like asking "where do the tiny men inside my TV go when I turn it off?" What is this guy, a child? A Flintstone? How idiotic. "I don't hear the thoughts in other people's heads; therefore souls." I mean come the fuck on!
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AZPaul3 Member Posts: 8513 From: Phoenix Joined: Member Rating: 5.3 |
I guess the point would be that you hear the speech in your head but somebody with a stethoscope up to your head wouldn't hear it. You don't have a speaker somewhere in your head. As he says: where is the playback? The playback is still in your head. Your brain does not "hear" the sounds coming into your ears. The sound enters your ears and vibrates cilia. The cilia are connected to cells that, when sensing the vibration, send an electrical impulse through the auditory nerves to the region of the brain that is wired and chemically composed to interpret those electrical signals. It is this cascade of events the we term as "hearing". When I was in Grad School I shared an office with another Grad Assistant. His visual systems worked just fine as he could see the colors and shapes. But there was a "cross wiring" in his brain that also sent those visual signals to the auditory portion of his brain. He would "hear" colors and shapes. That was his normal reality. These types of things neither evidence nor deny the existence of a soul. You need to look elsewhere.
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GDR Member Posts: 6202 From: Sidney, BC, Canada Joined: Member Rating: 1.9 |
AZPaul3 writes: When I was in Grad School I shared an office with another Grad Assistant. His visual systems worked just fine as he could see the colors and shapes. But there was a "cross wiring" in his brain that also sent those visual signals to the auditory portion of his brain. He would "hear" colors and shapes. That was his normal reality. Interesting. Just the same the whole thing seems to me that in a sense we are a computer with no monitor attached. It seemed to me that he had a good point.
AZPaul3 writes: These types of things neither evidence nor deny the existence of a soul. You need to look elsewhere. I completely agree with that. I wasn't trying to make any theological point with that quote or with this thread. The last quote just happened to come from a book that certainly had a lot of Jewish apologetics in it, but all of the other quotes were from strictly secular books. I just thought that possibly the quote I used played into the idea of consciousness and how it relates to our experience of the universe.
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DevilsAdvocate Member (Idle past 3101 days) Posts: 1548 Joined: |
GDR writes: AZPaul3 writes: When I was in Grad School I shared an office with another Grad Assistant. His visual systems worked just fine as he could see the colors and shapes. But there was a "cross wiring" in his brain that also sent those visual signals to the auditory portion of his brain. He would "hear" colors and shapes. That was his normal reality. Interesting. Just the same the whole thing seems to me that in a sense we are a computer with no monitor attached. It seemed to me that he had a good point. Well, since computers are reverse engineered biological brains created by human beings, wouldn't that make sense? There is no mystery here. Most of our inventions and technilogical developments have some basis in things that already exist in nature. Edited by DevilsAdvocate, : No reason given. "It is far better to grasp the Universe as it really is than to persist in delusion, however satisfying and reassuring." - Carl Sagan, The Demon-Haunted World
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