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-- What We Still Don't Know

What We Still Don't Know

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of a 3 part documentary by Sir Martin Rees. The most modest thing I have ever seen in my life, and rightfully so. It was posted in the PDD a few months ago, but my search function is disabled. So, kudos to whomever posted this video and opened my eyes.

Don't get me wrong, science gives us an amazing advantage in our lives. It's given us cures, tools, and ideas that blew ourselves out of the boiling water.

In this thread, I ask you not to argue about what we know. Lets discuss what we don't know, and open our minds, rather than closing them to religion, or evolution.

Questions such as, "What is life" are totally welcome.

Hmm, I can't say for certain without watching the entire series what Rees' is referring to here with evolutionary theory. That theory is solely in regards to biological matters and not those of cosmology, so again I'm not exactly sure what he is stating about this without watching it in its entirety (which now that I'm commenting on it I feel pretty obligated to do so).

I don't mind discussing things outside of evolutionary biology, especially conceptual ideas such as abiogenesis prior to evolutionary beginnings, but I also do not want to confuse the two. The former is a pretty hot topic with still few answers to help bolster the idea, whereas the latter has a wealth of evidence for support.

Occ may be able to give us some more insight on the astronomy side of things. I do know that Sir Martin Rees is a very highly respected cosmologist, again I wonder what his purpose is involved with a field outside of his expertise. One comment I ran across from him does give me a bit of concern, however:

quote:

�My personal belief is that biologists tend to be uncompromising and reductionistic because they�re still feeling somewhat insecure with their basic dogma, whereas physicists have three hundred years of secure foundation for their subject, so they can afford to be a bit more freewheeling in their speculation about these complex systems.� http://www.pandasthumb.org/archives...di_strikes.html

As the commenter mentions, ahh hell I won't paraphrase since I think he states it well:

quote:

is some what of a �Holier than thou� mentality. When I want to talk about time loops etc I�ll talk to people like Davies and Penrose and Rees. When I want to talk about psychology I�ll talk to Pinker. When I want to talk about Biology I�ll talk to people like Dawkins and Goodwin. While I love how all of these men, and I don�t limit myself to listening to men, are big thinkers that are not scared to talk outside of their field of expertise.

Now if Rees has some major criticism of biological evolution with specifics in that film, perhaps someone can save me the much-needed time and summarize for me what those criticisms are. If, however, he falls into this similar rhetoric of empty potshots at evolutionary biologists without any counterevidence to support his notions, then I see no reason to address such unsupported assertions any further. If there is some valid criticism on evolution, then I would like to hear it. Rees taking a shot at biologists simply because the theory is still a little younger than some of the other theories in physics and astronomy really doesn't do his rationality much credit. If a given theory has a wealth of evidence to support it in the manner that evolutionary theory does, then why the fuck would it matter how young or old the damn theory is? Pretty irrelevant, IMO.

Aside of this point, again we can discuss issues you mentioned at will. I still have somewhat of a belief in a creator myself, though I admit it does not fit in the world of rationality or supporting evidence too much. It also doesn't fit very well in the "intelligently designed" idea either since there's no evidence to support that notion either. That's not to say that our universe, our world, even us MIGHT have been a deliberate design of some sort, but there's just no evidence to support that thought at present (and given the hackery of Intelligent Design quacks out there, I don't have much faith in much evidence coming out to support the idea in the future either).

I guess I will start.

I recently did a definition essay on the word "Understanding". What a complete mind fuck, it was. I have come to the conclusion, that humans fail to understand anything around them because:

A.) We are too stubborn to accept the facts
B.) We are physically and emotionally incapable of understanding (Particularly about ourselves and regret)
C.) There a mysteries in life

Now, C, is where I started to dip my fingertips into human curiosity. Starting off with primitive beliefs, gradually moving on to organized religion, and finishing off with the science age, and evolution. I have come to the conclusion that we simply don't know enough to prove that anything around us can even tell us the answers. We vaguely know our pre-history, what makes us think we know about what's beyond our little world?

We were given the gift of self-awareness. We question everything about ourselves. Why are we here? Where did we come from? Where do we go?

The scariest thing, in my opinion, is my conciousness. Where does it go? My real name is Nick. I feel like Nick. I Think like Nick. Is this truly all biological wires and chemicals that make up "Nick"? That is quite a slap in the face. So, when I die, and my electricity stop pulsing, Nick is no more. Ouch.

What if our conciousness is REAL? I mean, come on now, the thought isn't far fetched. We wouldn't be able to see three-quarters of the things we see in those hubble pictures if it wasn't for ultra-violet and infared filters. Maybe, our conciousness can be seen through some special filter that hasn't been invented yet.

Ultra-violet light can burn your skin. For millions of years, we knew something was doing it, but couldn't put our fingers on it. I know Nick is real, is it just my brain?

Now, lets say, that out concious is something real. Where does it go when we die? Could it float out into the air, free to roam the universe? Or is it bound to organisms that it must latch on to as soon as possible, to become stable (Much like our atomic friends) Forget mysticism and supernatural, I imagine this could be a very natural occurance.

Yeah, I know this is based on absolutely nothing. But I like to think outside the box sometimes, and you don't have to use things from the inside of it in order to do so.

You can comment on my thoughts, or type out something of your own.

EDIT: I read you're post Mister. It was very... Structured.

And don't think that I wrote this in my essay, I'd definitely fail.

It would be great it there was some "real" consciousness to cling on to, but my studies in pyschology signal to the opposite. It is sad that there is no comfort in discovering how the mind works. True, there are still some things to be clarified and explored, but the more information we get about the functioning of the mind, the more it points to our consciousness being a result of multi-threaded (to use a pc term) processes in our brains.

And as far as using information that comes through are senses, research also shows that it is slightly skewed in ways that help us survive better, like the sharpening of contrast on visual images, and the ability to localize where sound is originating from. But even at that our perception of the world is pretty accurate to a certain extent.

Now THIS is a good post!! Just what I needed.

Question: Why are the voyager satellites, launched decades ago, sending back information saying that the edge of our solar system is curving concavely?

Are they just old and sending back incorrect data?

Is space-time, for some reason, curving like a hill's topography around the weight of the objects within the solar system?

Does it have to do with masses which we can not yet calculate?

Hmmm!

U

quote:

Originally posted by Marc Summers Now, C, is where I started to dip my fingertips into human curiosity. Starting off with primitive beliefs, gradually moving on to organized religion, and finishing off with the science age, and evolution. I have come to the conclusion that we simply don't know enough to prove that anything around us can even tell us the answers. We vaguely know our pre-history, what makes us think we know about what's beyond our little world?

Aye.. the universe appears to be so large, and the planet so small... time seems to elapse so quickly, and yet we only have recorded history dating back 2000 years...

but look at what we've made with it so far.

IMAGINE if we had MORE space and MORE time (which will happen the future)... what will we create and build there?

Dyson Spheres are only fun on a small scale.

quote:

We were given the gift of self-awareness. We question everything about ourselves. Why are we here? Where did we come from? Where do we go? The scariest thing, in my opinion, is my conciousness. Where does it go? My real name is Nick. I feel like Nick. I Think like Nick. Is this truly all biological wires and chemicals that make up "Nick"? That is quite a slap in the face. So, when I die, and my electricity stop pulsing, Nick is no more. Ouch. What if our conciousness is REAL? I mean, come on now, the thought isn't far fetched. We wouldn't be able to see three-quarters of the things we see in those hubble pictures if it wasn't for ultra-violet and infared filters. Maybe, our conciousness can be seen through some special filter that hasn't been invented yet.

Aye!

Scary and grand, it's why we keep on moving

quote:

Ultra-violet light can burn your skin. For millions of years, we knew something was doing it, but couldn't put our fingers on it. I know Nick is real, is it just my brain?

Nick is real.

Question:

If this entire life is simply a virtual reality machine (like you are an element in a video game), as long as you exist and think and feel, it really isn't virtual at all anymore, is it?

To ask the questions and cross-analyze the data is to break away from the concept of artificiality.

quote:

Now, lets say, that out concious is something real. Where does it go when we die? Could it float out into the air, free to roam the universe? Or is it bound to organisms that it must latch on to as soon as possible, to become stable (Much like our atomic friends) Forget mysticism and supernatural, I imagine this could be a very natural occurance.

Your consciousness is an organ itself; it is the part of you that receives and decodes the impulses you receive from the environment around you.

Did you know that all of our senses are electrical impulses in the form of sine waves? They quantumly echo upon themselves, which is probably how the brain is able to be so small yet SO useful... it maximizes data entry and efficiency.

Did you know that all your senses reach your brain AFTER they've happened?

That's right: you are not a conscious being. You are an AFTER-Conscious being.

Everything you *perceive* with your consciousness organ through those electrical impulses has ALREADY HAPPENED a fraction of a second before you realize it.

Those electrical impulses take time, though very fast, to reach your brain.

Try it... watch the back of your right hand. Now touch the back of your right hand with your left pointer finger. Focus on the sensation and the feeling of that moment where they touch.

Did you notice a slight "lagg" so to speak?

What does it mean? It means we adapted to this lagg. We avoid hitting the deer in the road when driving before we even realize that there is a deer in front of us.

Our consciousness is actually a continually state of guessing unconsciousness.

There is more to humans than their consciousness though.

There are a lot of systems, a LOT of systems, functioning together.

When you die, your conscious mind may seize up and be overrun with natural painkillers and psychedelics... BUT the rest of you has history in it, and history to experience.

Energy is always shifting around... we have been born from some strange unknown "WHATEVER" in the cosmos. We are probably a reflection of the cosmos themselves.

Together, the human race is one giant organism. Perhaps we are an immune response dreamt up by the constellations to prevent some future event. Perhaps we are just... lucky.

quote:

Yeah, I know this is based on absolutely nothing. But I like to think outside the box sometimes, and you don't have to use things from the inside of it in order to do so. You can comment on my thoughts, or type out something of your own. EDIT: I read you're post Mister. It was very... Structured. And don't think that I wrote this in my essay, I'd definitely fail.

Thank you.

heres the link you lazy bums
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really enjoyed the video. the only thing i took issue with is their arguments concerning a "tuned" universe as evidence of a higher power. i wouldve liked them to explore that a little deeper, ie explain how the universe would be different had certain conditions been different. could different universes really exist with different natural laws?

ive always believed the universe exists the way it does because thats the only way it could have been (inherent balance & order etc). i find the idea of infinite universes at about the same "faith" level as believing in god. the gravity constant they mentioned that was exact right down to the point trillion trillion trillion etc, how would the world be different if that value was just a fraction different? that wasn't explored.

there certainly wasn't much in it at all that criticised modern evolutionary theory (that i noticed at least).

Re: U

quote:

Originally posted by DJ Shibby

Music to my ears!

This series talks about the "Virtual reality" theory. Just IMAGINE, right after we die, we take off our VR helmets!

Re: Re: U

quote:

Originally posted by Marc Summers Music to my ears! This series talks about the "Virtual reality" theory. Just IMAGINE, right after we die, we take off our VR helmets!

i found all the discussion about that to be almost disingenuously stupid. if youre going to entertain stuff like that then what's the point of discussing anything? it certainly doesn't further our understand of anything- merely an unnecessary distraction.

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