Is this forum the liars paradox

[onthecuttingedge2005]

quote:Originally posted by markofkane

There are those that claim God does not exist, because there is no scientific proof. They say the burden of proof lies with the believer.

They also say the sentence "prove he does not exist" is akin to "prove that the spaghetti monster does not exist"

There are those trying to get believers to doubt their beliefs by using "logic" and science. If you cannot feel, touch, smell, hear, or taste something, it does not exist, unless detected by some kind of instrument. I go to board, where there are those who like to tear down believers. Not all, but quite a few. "They have science on their side"

And in this country, and everywhere, Christians are under attack for their beliefs. Maybe not physically, but verbally,  and by media.

Although the big bang is widely excepted as one of the most highly excepted theories of the universe (to mankind), we must be careful in realizing one thing, that we may never know and there is a high probability of the truth never being known, that is this, one day, we may find an edge to the Universe but we will never know if there is another Universe outside this one in the same physical void of space separated by trillions of parsecs of space between each edge .

It is possible, that another Universe may be only trillions of parsecs away outside our own for seeable Universes edge, the light from another Universe would be so weak from the propagation of its light that it would take optical abilities far beyond what it took us to see just the edge of this observable Universe alone.

We 'observe', we see a system and we study it until we can gather enough information about it to give a 'theory' as to how that system works, it is not a guess or a belief, it is an observed and studied conclusion of the result that has enough evidence to be peer reviewed then after it passes peer review it may become a law of physics or science or life, if it doesn't pass peer review and you still hold to it then it becomes a belief until it can get passed.

as far as the facts we seek as scientific minds has nothing to do with 'beliefs', science has nothing against the hypothisis of the existance of God because everything is empirical anyways.

some scientists or phyicsist do talk a lot about God during their discussions about how God makes a system work because most where raised to believe in God along side their family or friends, however it is not safe to enter the word God in a paper being peer reviewed scientifically unless it was a paper trying to prove the existance of God by observable facts.

to say there are 'infinite' Universes would never pass peer review because it can never be proven, how could anyone prove the existance of an 'infinite' God that can't be observed.

Though, I will not say that God doesn't exist, I just don't have as much influence as though's who believe in faith over facts.

Sincerely agnostic.
Jerry[8D]

[ramccoid]

No matter what the human race does in it's entire existence, no matter how great or wonderful it aspires to or not, would change absolutely nothing to the universe.

It's only our arrogance which perceives us as bigger cogs, than we are, in the great machinery of the cosmos; when in fact we are not even a simple single minuscule part of the vast machine in the least.

If the Human Race disappeared into extinction or even the entire Earth diappeared into oblivion, it wouldn't make the slightest iota of difference to the nature of the universe. It would continue to exist and expand regardless.

We must put ourselves into perspective. We are but only parasites living off the life of our host, mother Earth. If the Earth or even the Sun was to change dramatically, we would be exterminated without a care or thought, in the very least.

Our existence is completely in the hands of the cosmos, which makes the universe, God and if there is something beyond the universe it would be the God of God and so on and so on until we reach the utimate God, if an end could ever be reached ...

And on a lighter note, a quote from Douglas Adams, THE HITCH HIKERS GUIDE TO THE GALAXY.
'Space is big. Really big. You just won't believe how vastly, hugely, mind-bogglingly big it is. I mean you may think it's a long way down the street to the chemist, but that's just peanuts to space.'

Roy.

[Bill DeWitt]

Is it arrogance to presume that we know so much about the Universe that we can say with assurance that we have no part in the ultimate purpose of it?

For instance, if we are, in fact, the only intelligent life in it, then I would say we are the most important part of it. We would be the only part of the Universe which could ask , "What is the most important part of the Universe?"

If there is any purpose to the Universe, then we are an important part of it, if there is no purpose, then we become the only purpose.

[ramccoid]

No matter what we ask or what answers we discover, doesn't change the whole scheme of the universe. Whether we find more intelligent life or even just basic life or none out there in the cosmos doesn't stop the planets revolving around the Sun or the universe expanding out towards infinity.

These things are on such a greater scale that with even our puny involvement doesn't change anything, it will still go on without us no matter what we think or do.

If there is a grand purpose to the universe then you must acknowledge the existence of God being a supreme being because if there is a reason beyond natural occurrence for all of this universal creation then there must be an intelligence behind it.

Roy.

[Bill DeWitt]

quote:Originally posted by ramccoid

No matter what we ask or what answers we discover, doesn't change the whole scheme of the universe. Whether we find more intelligent life or even just basic life or none out there in the cosmos doesn't stop the planets revolving around the Sun or the universe expanding out towards infinity.

Well, according to many standard theories, yes, you are right.

But are our theories right? You may remember a conversation we had a few weeks ago about a possible description of the Universe as a 2 dimensional wave front in the Time stream, with all spatial and sub-nuclear compressed dimensions being nothing more than our awareness of the level of energy in different harmonics of that wave. This suggests that without our awareness, Space itself, that which seems to physically separate two events in our Universe, has no concrete existence.

In this description, while the levels of energy will diverge with or without us, the spatial universe appears to collapse into a primal point if we are not here to perceive it.

Again, without us, our Universe would seem to be a Singularity, to wit, a mathematical point which reveals no information and which cannot be meaningfully entered into certain calculations.

Considering the unidirectional flow of time, it is instructive to realize that the furthest possible point in our Universe is infinitely closer than one moment ago in time. There is some finite amount of energy we can apply to reach any current point in Space, but no measurable quantity of effort will decrease to zero the speed of our fall through Time, much less reverse it.

This confirms that Space, while related to Time, is a lower order of manifestation in much the way that Zeus was described as a secondary creation of Khronos (The Heavens were created by Time).

While clearly this is just me ruminating and maundering, it demonstrates that it is only our blithe confidence in our reasoning abilities that demotes us to Universal insignificance. Our Arrogance begets our Humility.

There's something unpleasantly incestuous about that.

[Bill DeWitt]

quote:Originally posted by onthecuttingedge2005
It is possible, that another Universe may be only trillions of parsecs away outside our own for seeable Universes edge, the light from another Universe would be so weak from the propagation of its light that it would take optical abilities far beyond what it took us to see just the edge of this observable Universe alone.

Well, since "Universe" implies anything which can conceivably affect us in any way, and since gravity seems to be both instantaneous and limitless in it's range, such a conjectural adjacent volume of space would actually be just another part of this "Universe" - in that we would be perturbed by it's distortion of the entire Space-Time field.

But there is an interesting point worth bringing up concerning the observable Universe. I don't remember the actual numbers, so let's just assume ball-park mathematics apply.

We recently were able to resolve images of galaxies composed of "First Generation" stars, presumably the first series of stars formed in our Universe after the Big Bang. The contention is that since these galaxies are about 10 billions light years away, and the Universe is probably 13 billion years old, the light we are seeing is light which left these stars just a few billion years after the begining of the Universe.

There's at least one problem with that.

At the time that light must have left those stars, the distance between Galaxies was only 25% of it's current expansion. In other words, those stars could not have been more than 2.5 billion light years away from the point in space we now occupy (remember: Ball Park Math).

In other words, the light we see now must have passed us, on it's way to the edge of the Universe, 7.5 Billion years ago.

How comes it that we are seeing it now? Either our estimate of distance is all wrong or our measurement of elapsed time is incorrect.

Inquiring minds want to know. I intend to make this number three on  the list of insolvable questions I want answered.

1) Why is there something instead of nothing?
2) Why is the Universe lumpy instead of smooth?
3) Does anybody really know what time it is?

BTW, <sing>Happy 500th post-day to me...</sing>

[ramccoid]

quote:How comes it that we are seeing it now? Either our estimate of distance is all wrong or our measurement of elapsed time is incorrect.

How can we be sure that all these points of light were conceived at the start of the universe. Stars are born and die all the time. Maybe we are seeing light from newer stars that were not around in the beginning and older light has, as you say, passed us by.
Or maybe we can see the back end of light moving away from us. Is that possible? Could that make us feel or give us data to perceive the universe as expanding? Maybe the universe is not expanding but just is.

Roy.

[aladyblond]

Insert Image:

[aladyblond]

you make the forum interesting , thank you!

[Bill DeWitt]

quote:Originally posted by ramccoid
How can we be sure that all these points of light were conceived at the start of the universe.

We are pretty sure. It's the whole red-shift thing. Doppler shift.

The galaxies are all running away from each other, part of the reason we believe in a Big Bang. The further away they are, the faster they seem to be moving away from us. You can look up Red shift and read details.

So the further away a galaxy is, the faster it is moving, and therefore the redder the light will shift. Calculations can then be made based upon the redness of star light to determine how far away the source is. Analysis of the light from these stars shows two things.

One, it is the type of light that would come from the first generation stars. According to theory, these stars are predominately Hydrogen and Helium, and their final explosions, 10 to 7 billion years ago, are what created the heavier elements we find in the current Universe.

Two, their red light shift corresponds to a galaxy 10 to 7 billion light years away.

The combination of facts convinces us they are 10 to 7 billion light years away.

If they are 10 to 7 billion light years away, their light must have taken 10 to 7 billion years to reach us.

Unless our theories are all wrong.

Explanations for the discrepencies might include:
1) Light travels at different rates in different parts of the Universe.
2) The Universe expands at different rates in different locales.
3) Light and Space were different in the earlier Universe
4) There was more than one center of the Big Bang
5) God did something more marvelous than we yet understand

Etc.

[ramccoid]

I see what you mean. But could time not be as constant as we believe?
As time and space is effected by black holes.
Maybe at the beginning time was slower than at present and gradually built up it's momentum and still is. Which would cause light to move at a lesser speed than it is determined today.
Maybe as the universe expands the quicker time will become. We feel that same effect as we grow older the years pass quicker. It could be that an older universe perceieves time at an more accelerated rate.

Roy.

[Bill DeWitt]

quote:Originally posted by aladyblond

I love the image, and I have to admit that is almost exactly the way I think.

My lovely wife mentioned to me that I never seem to question my ability to figure things out. When I have a problem or something gets broken, she says my first comment is, "I wonder how I'm going to fix this."

Not, "I wonder if I can fix this".

But can I request that you resize the image? Larger images make it hard for me to read threads. This one now spreads across two monitors.

[Bill DeWitt]

quote:Originally posted by ramccoid
Maybe at the beginning time was slower than at present

That's one of my theories, but I don't have the math skills to work it out in detail.

Either, Time falls towards mass in an accelerating rate (and therefore, light travels much slower on the flat parts of Space), or the density of the Universe has affected the rate of Time.

Either way, the light from the earliest stars has taken far too long to reach us, unless the mainstream theories are all wrong.

[Bill DeWitt]

quote:Originally posted by aladyblond

Thanks! []

[onthecuttingedge2005]

Hi Bill.

do you have a link to the Stars in mention?

also, is there a close enough nebula within 2.5 billion light years of those Stars?

the reason I ask is because old neutron stars can be reborn again if their path way leads them through huge Hydrogen nebula clouds, a neutron star's enormous gravitational pull will trap the Hydrogen  around its path until there is enough captured fuel to re-ignite itself.

if we can find enough data I might be able to use my starry night back yard program to plot a course, if the stars are in the catalog then I can virtually visit the stars while looking back at our own sun.

Jerry[8D]