Comments

  • About a tyrant called "=".


    :ok:

    I hadn't looked at it that way yet. I had an equality of masses in mind, but your example shows what it actually is. Literally a balance! The numerical values are equal, but the stuff on one side is different from the other indeed. Balanced but not equal. M(feathers)=M(steel). Equality=Balance...
  • POLL: What seems more far-fetched (1) something from literally nothing (2) an infinite past?


    Yes. One after another. For example, if the current universe has accelerated away to infinity, that a new one originates behind us. And then again for that one, etc.
  • POLL: What seems more far-fetched (1) something from literally nothing (2) an infinite past?
    The alternative is something coming from literally nothing.Down The Rabbit Hole

    The alternative is repeated starts from zero.
  • Global warming and chaos
    ITER is saying 'five years and we'll have cracked it' - but IMO - they never will. I do not believe fusion can work in earth gravity.karl stone

    Then why they still trying? You can make it happen in a bomb, so why not in a plant?

    If you have less energy, then everything gets more expensivekarl stone

    Or you can consume and produce less.
  • Global warming and chaos
    That's one way to go, but do you really want to disenchant people who believe in God as part of their identity and their purposes - but who have no power to craft energy policy? Are you going to look a little old ladies in the eyes and tell them - there's no such thing as God? And even if you are willing to be that cruel - how do you know there isn't a God? I don't know if God exists, and I know I don't know!karl stone



    :100:
  • POLL: What seems more far-fetched (1) something from literally nothing (2) an infinite past?
    Like Al-Ghazali's orbiting planets, it's not necessarily logically impossible, just counter-intuitiveDown The Rabbit Hole

    It's a physical impossibility. The 2nd law of TD requires a beginning in time.
  • Global warming and chaos


    Fusion could already have been economically if only enough effort had been put in it. Solar cells can get more economical still. You can put them on every roof top or even in the dessert. Hydrogen can be made with the aid of that energy and truly green cars pproduced. On my birth island in Italy, magma heath is used for saunas. Who knows what will happen if you tap magma energy for the whole Earth? Nobody.

    The best solution: lower the energy consumption.
  • What's the big mystery about time?
    No, it doesn't. To see what philosophy in modern times looks like, read some actual philosophy, e.g. here:SophistiCat

    It does. You just have to actually know something about science and mathematics. Jgill does.
  • Global warming and chaos
    Magma energy technology is possible, and could supply the world's energy needs and much much more, without greenhouse gas emissions. So it's not technology per se - it's putting national economic interest ahead of scientific truth.karl stone

    Without scientific truth, economy wouldn't have grown as devastatingly as in the modern world.
  • Global warming and chaos
    For my part, I'm talking about solving climate change by harnessing limitless clean energy from magma, and trying to understand why we haven't done that alreadykarl stone

    You can harvest the wind too. Or solar energy. And use hydrogen to store the energy and make it portable. Only water will be waste.

    Not to mention fusion energy.
  • Symmetry: is it a true principle?
    When two things which are different, are said to be equal, the difference between them has already been excused in that judgement of equal. So we now have a second level of excusing differences for the sake of symmetry, the excuse which exists right at the level of producing the equation.Metaphysician Undercover

    Exactly. Equality in number doesn't mean equality in nature. The numbers are balanced but the masses that are labeled by these numbers are different in nature, and have to be so for the equality not to be trivial.

    That's the quite terrifying unifying power of math. It equalizes what is not equal in nature.
  • What's the big mystery about time?
    This thread illuminates what it is to be a philosopher in modern times when all the sciences have progressed to the point that philosophical inquiries in them mean scientific speculationjgill

    Which means to be a scientist as well? Or better, a mathematician? :roll:
  • What's the big mystery about time?
    It is claimed that the unidirectional nature of time is mysterious. Isn't this, on the contrary, a prerequisite? You can say if one isolated particle moves forward or backward in time. But what about the evolution of a one-particle wavefunction?
  • Global warming and chaos


    Yeah, well, what's more to say about it. You might consider technology an art, the material expression of knowledge, and assign high value to state of the art technology, but it is embedded in a larger reality. It's a fact that if the presence of technology increases, and knowledge grows, they will reinforce each other exponentially, a fact supported by economic growth models. You might have a clean energy source, say the Sun, fusion, or magma, like on Island (where the world's first hydropen pump station opened up), you might recycle all you use, but if technology's presence grows exponentially, no technology in the world will be sufficient to restore the disturbed balance. Only a stable presence of tech can prevent disaster. Maybe a technology that doesn't grow but changes.
  • Symmetry: is it a true principle?
    Emmy Noether's work on mathematical symmetry (doesn't look like she's talking about mirror symmetry) became the basis for (derivation of) the conservation laws in science.Agent Smith

    She talked about symmetries generated by "charges". For example, the "momentum charge" generator generates translations in space which leave a system unchanged, hence momentum conservation. The energy charge generator does the same for time translations: energy conservation. The electric charge charge generator for local gauge transformations: conservation of electric charge. What other conservation laws can we think of? The one associated with rotations. The generator for rotations is?
  • Why do we do good?
    It's no coincidence that good and God differ one o. Doing good is, in a sense, doing God. God is omnibenevolent. Eve ate the apple of knowledge of good and evil, and only by reading and accepting His words the evil can be undone by cutting it's roots out, thereby removing the existence of the knowledge of evil, so devilish implanted by that cunning snake. By tempting the naive Eve to bite the apple. The word of God was received by Mozes (devarim). The Ten Commandments are the base of fighting the evil snake amidst us. The evil snake is wicked and constantly planning and looking for entrance in our being. Beware of the wicked!
  • You are not your body!
    Ever met anyone with schizophrenia?Tom Storm

    I saw one in the mirror! She thought she was me... I told her not to talk nonsense.
  • Global warming and chaos
    Not really, because it's the wrong technology applied for the wrong reasons.karl stone

    That's still technology.
  • What's the big mystery about time?
    I can't be measured but it exists. , for flat space. The distances between particles change, so time changes accordingly. If distances change, there will be a corresponding change of the hands on the clock.

    Distance doesn't exist in the Universe, as it is something that occurs through time.pfirefry

    Distances between particles exist every moment in time, even if we can't measure them. If they change, time changes.

    Indeed, to measure a distance, you have to walk with an odometer or, for distances in time, look at the clock. Ýou can even calculate changes in distance by knowing the change in time. .

    You are talking nonsense! ( :wink: ) Change is everywhere!
  • Global warming and chaos
    It's wierd, isn't it, that despite all this technological advance, things are getting in strange ways worsekarl stone

    Despite of all this technology? Because all of this technology.
  • POLL: What seems more far-fetched (1) something from literally nothing (2) an infinite past?
    I don't get it. Why can't it exist? What is it in its supposed eternal ticking that makes it impossible to exist?god must be atheist

    The second law of thermodynamics.
  • What's the big mystery about time?


    What does change are distances. A change in spatial distance is a change in time.
  • You are not your body!
    "There is thinking and a world that I perceive. I stands between them. I is the body."
  • WTF is Max Tegmark talking about?


    There is a pattern on my face toò. A math structure with a laugh? What's the structure made up?
  • WTF is Max Tegmark talking about?


    Some structures though don't even have an approximation. What's the functional form of the motion of gas particles that carry the information òf a piece of music? The particle oscillates at the rythm of the music. It can't be reduced to sine terms. Is a particle a mathematical structure?
  • Pragmatic epistemology
    someone's innate methodBitter Crank

    How do you know there is an innate methodology?
  • What's the big mystery about time?


    Yes. In one comment I quoted you for having used two t's, t1 and t2. I thought you had seen the light. Apparently, you hadn't. Of course, the image doesn't change in time. All dx/dy is invariant wrt time. I don't dispute that. I dispute that do arrive at dx and dy you don't need time. It takes time to perform the analysis. The picture is embedded in time. A change in x and y has to be accompanied by a change in t, dt. dx/dy is independent from time. In relativity, . So for both dx and dy a dt is involved but they cancel upon dividing. So the use of time is implicitly present but hidden.
  • What's the big mystery about time?
    It's the same problem that's encountered in the Wheeler-de Witt equation. No time involved, the whole block universe is laid out in advance. Problem is:how do things move on worldlines then?
  • What's the big mystery about time?
    But why is that relevantInPitzotl

    Because the picture you look at can't exist without time.
  • Pragmatic epistemology
    My point is, adhering to a spelled out methodology constraints the furthering of knowledge.
  • Pragmatic epistemology
    It doesn't need to be spelled outBitter Crank

    No, it doesn't. It doesn't need to be conscious either. But we all are conforming to "a methodology". Like we all are, consciously or not, obeying to the laws of God...
  • Pragmatic epistemology
    Your innate methodologyBitter Crank

    My "innate methodology"? Are you serious?
  • What's the big mystery about time?
    t is irrelevant; it doesn't matter if you "keep it constant" or not. Banno's image doesn't change over timeInPitzotl

    The very observation that it stays constant in time needs time in the first place.
  • Pragmatic epistemology


    Yes. And there is no single methodology involved in any of the kinds of knowledge you mentioned. And certainly not one that's spelled out.
  • Pragmatic epistemology
    love the absurdity of arguing against fairy tales and ignorance by telling fairy tales and embracing ignorance.pfirefry

    You should learn to read. I write:

    "I'm more interested in the knowledge itself."

    Doesn't sound like embracing ignorance.

    Then I write:

    "We all fall prey to temporarily periods of escapism from reality."

    By which I mean the method sold here. A fairy tale. Who tells fairy tales? Not me.
  • What's the big mystery about time?
    Now it is very clear that the fields change into birds. And further, that this happens over distance, not over time.Banno

    Only when your eyes gaze over Escher the day turns into night. Escher even predetermined you gaze and perception. You have to stop time first. Only then the partial derivative makes sense. The changes in space, dx/dy, pertain to constant time. How you stop time?
  • Immaterialism


    A particle is no concept. It's a reality.
  • Pragmatic epistemology
    Of course you will use and manage your knowledge, all the stuff you have accumulated over the years. You could avoid it by falling into a deep coma.Bitter Crank

    But not according to any method, so certainly not to the fairy tale propagated here. I'm not bound to any method. I don't mind that someone wants to gather knowledge methodologically sound, why should I? We all fall prey to temporarily periods of escapism from reality.

    To make this your bedrock of knowledge is turning knowledge into a slave. I'm more interested in the knowledge itself. Who cares how you arrive on it? The ignorant, maybe...

    "Of course you will use your knowledge." If I don't wanna use it I don't use it. I like knowledge for what it is. Knowledge. Falling in coma will indeed avoid me from experiencing that.
  • Ukraine Crisis



    From sticks and stones to clashing hydrogen.
  • What's the big mystery about time?
    and then finds itself at (2,1,1) at some different t coordinate t2,InPitzotl

    Sorry! Didn't see this! :smile:

    Which means time is involved in the change in color.