A stone, given the laws of physics, must trace a parabolic path through the air. — Agent Smith

Well, through air, the path is not a parabola actually. But it looks like one. The very concept of a parabola follows from math. There are no parabolas in nature. The water rays shot from fountains resemble parabolas but before we invented them, it was nowhere to be seen. They are imaginaries. Of course some natural phenomena have mathematical shapes, but do they have them because they have to follow it?

In what sense does a parabola follow a stone — Agent Smith

The parabola form is traced out by the stone. It's not there before.

That's been ruled out — Wayfarer

It hasn't. It's gaining popularity, in fact. The search for primordial black holes is on. In fact, LIGO measurements support the idea.

"A new study theorizes that primordial black holes formed after the Big Bang (the far left panel) constitute all dark matter in the universe. At early epochs they cluster and seed the formation of early galaxies and then eventually grow by feeding off gas and merging with other black holes to create the supermassive black holes seen at the center of galaxies like our own Milky Way today. (Credit: Yale and ESA)"

See here

As far as I can tell, nature seems to follow mathematically describable laws. I think you've got it back to front! — Agent Smith

In my humble opinion, that's a matter of taste. Does the thrown stone follow the parabola or the parabola the stone? What comes first, the parabola or the trajectory?

You mean, the 4% of it that we can account for. — Wayfarer

The dark matter can be black holes. Dark energy is no matter or energy at all. It's empty spacetime itself that has inherent negative curvature. If matter is confined to three spatial dimensions, and if these three dimensions are embedded in a negatively curved 4d space, the matter in the 3d space will accelerate away from each other. Repulsive gravity.

Now, what do you understand a possible world to be? And can you distinguish one from a toity world? — Bartricks

I have to admit, you got humour! :lol:

I have put it in my Haglund. — Bartricks

:lol:

Okay, seriously now. An eternal universe can have created itself? The ball on the cushion is self caused?

Sweet dreams! :yawn:

Damn you! Still laughing. I can't stop...

Moments of clarity like this make a mockery of claims that all that is worthwhile has been mined from philosophy — jgill

:lol:

You make me laugh out loudly!

Sadly that's the strongest part of my body now. :worry: — jgill

Well, you climbed the 6 meter rope in 3.4 seconds once... with arms only! Did you succeed with that Victorian cross (no offense!)?

I return the spoon. Stick it in your... wherever you want, and enjoy the self created infliction.

This is an oversimplified story, a cartoon, but I'm sure people saw trees fallen across streams before we were homo sapiens. — T Clark

But they never saw the first bridge built.

The thought experiment - Kant's, not mine - illustrates the coherence of simultaneous causation. — Bartricks

It's clearly an incoherent thought process. Why consider the ball and cushion as separate. I see one thing only. Saying the ball and cushion exist apart is not self evident. I see a cushba.

What does that mean? Does that mean the universe must exist eternally. Er, no. It means that the universe could have created itself. Now, if it did that, would it be existing eternally? No. — Bartricks

It doesn't mean ziltch. There can be no conclusion drawn from this weird experiment. The universe is eternal and is made by gods. If you think it's self created on the basis of some frozen cushba, be my guest.

How can the cushba even exist without time? Is it a thought about the universe? Is the thought cushba a thought about the universe?

How can you talk about cause and effect without time?

Yes. I said I had a pragmatic understanding of knowledge. I wouldn't call that a priori at all. — T Clark

But if there were no bridges before they we're built, you must have had knowledge to build it. How can't that be a priori?

Sigh. If you think you can have an actual infinity of prior causes - an incoherent notion - then the universe could be eternal yet that would not amount to it being self-created — Bartricks

Why is that an incoherent notion?

It's all about time. If time doesn't go forward then what are we looking at? A photograph?

You've described an eternal universe
— Gregory

No I haven't — Bartricks

Yes you have. A cushion with a ball on it eternally. My god, am I really discussing about a cushion with a ball laying on it eternally? The dent causing the ball to lay on it? What's the problem? Tell me.

What's causing the dent? The ball. When is it causing it? All the time — Bartricks

That depends on the direction of time. Goes time forward?

That's one of the reasons I ended up becoming an engineer. — T Clark

Doesn't an engineer has synthetic a priori knowledge about the bridge?

You seem to think there exists no a priori knowĺedge. But correct me if I'm wrong. But if that's the case how can we anticipate unknown territory with which we don't have interacted? Don't you think Einstein's notion of spacetime is a priori constructed?

This thread is about self-creation — Bartricks

The cushion with the ball on it has to be its own cause as well as effect than. We can't tell. Is time going forward?

As current theory of multiple worlds in quantum physics goes, different possibilities for the universe exist simultaneously. — Jackson

Yes, and?

But the initial state of the universe is unique in this picture. The MWI was introduced to ensure unitarity in QM, during an interaction, which is just a mathematical necessity imposed on the world which doesn't have to hold physically. It's conceivable that a wavefunction collapses non-unitarily in a different interpretation of the wavefunction collapse.

Infinitely many inital worlds are not contained in this MWI.

Synthetic a priori knowledge. For example. If I consider all experimental scientific knowledge, non-natural knowledge, a step away from true natural knowledge, that knowledge is synthetic a priori knowledge. A kind of meta-knowledge guiding knowledge.

A cause doesn't need to be prior to the effect. That's onnly the case if time goes forward. In your cushion case, we can't tell which direction time goes. It can be both forward or backward. So the cushing with the ball on it can be both a cause or an effect.

It didn't 'get there'. It has always been on the cushion — Bartricks

Like I said, then time stands still. A ball eternally on a cushion is equivalent to time standing still. Nothing happening.

So, things can cause events. But when? That is, when a substance causes an event, when does the causation occur? Well, at the same time as the event. — Bartricks

Not true. The causating event lies infinite close to the event caused. It time goes forward. If time goes backwards, it's the effect coming prior to the cause event. Infinitely close but prior.

You suffer from the Zeno-syndrome. Spacetime can't be broken up into parts. Unless matter is confined to a subspace only.

Biological computing is doing leading-edge research on being able to identify two or more states which happen within proteins that are stable and reliable enough to represent data states. If they find them, then the biological computer can begin to have traction. Proteins are not the only candidates. — universeness

I'm not disputing the wonderful new developments in computing. It's the idea that by computing consciousness can be created that's a fantasy.

But introspection illusions, no? — 180 Proof

Einstein based his theory on thought experiments, for a large part.

But how it got there? It must have fallen on it, cause-> effect, it will leave it if time is reversed, effect->cause, it is laid on it by me for the dip, effect->cause, or it will be taken away by me intentionally, cause->effect. If eternally on the cushion, cause and effect coincide. Time has stopped. It's an event in spacetime.

If I lay a ball on a cushion to dip it, then the dip precedes the ball.

No I didn't. I asked you if causes must always precede their effects.

I had presented a case for thinking that they do not have to precede their effects. You need to address it. — Bartricks

It depends on which way time goes. If it goes backwards, effect precedes cause.

Hey, you asked me if cause and effect can coexist. Yes they can.

But existing religions disagree and use an inferior way of knowing that often leads to untruth; such religions serve State but not necessarily truth. — Art48

Can't the same be said of science nowadays? N
Just replace "religion" by "sciences" in my quote of yours:

"But existing sciences disagree and use an inferior way of knowing that often leads to untruth; such sciences serve State but not necessarily truth

On what else than instinct is reason and knowledge based. Any attempt to enclose knowledge in a rational system is doomed.

For if the light of reason uncovers disturbing truths, one solution is to turn off that light — Art48

Maybe the much too brightly shining light of reason is the disturbing truth. If you consider the infinitesimal specks in infinite eternity the divine specks the gods wanted all life to be there is a different light shining.

This makes sense to me, although I don't know if there are studies about experiences babies pick up in the womb. — T Clark

I can remember reading about the baby's retina aleady stimulating the brain with shapes. Don't ask me how they found out... Maybe you have seen it with your eyes closed. Concentric rings flowing in and outwards. Surely the bodily baby shape somehow projects in the baby brain.

Exactly. So the fact that computer memory exceeds an artificial number of brain capacity is useless
— Haglund

No because it provides a current guesstimated answer to the trivial question 'can the memory capacity of a computer equal that of a human brain?' that people will ask no matter how trivial you say it currently is. — universeness

How can it be useful if a brain memory is not based on static information as in the static maximum information content in a volume of space, the maximum content being the number of planckian areas on that surface? That number holds for memory chips but not for brains.

In my humble opinion it's math following nature and not nature following math, non? Math is a description. Not an explanation. The velocity of a falling stone doesn't increase linearly with time, v=at+c, because that follows from F=ma, but the formula follows because of the way the stone falls.

My preference would be that we focus on the general question of what can we know without empirical knowledge — T Clark

Knowledge of god can't be empirical, although you can see them all around. Somehow this knowledge resides in us. During education and participating in modern society this knowledge is delegated to the back seat or thrown out of the car altogether.

Do people feel the same as during the Cuban missile crisis?