Free will is real

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Belinda
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Re: Free will is real

Post by Belinda »

Atla wrote:
Living things don't "strive" to live. They are hardwired for survival.
Your metaphor is good enough too.
Saying that all this HAD to happen this way is a magical non-explanation. Design may not require a designer, but it sure requires a design mechanism that is probably outside this universe, or inside it but we can't find it.

The designer or design mechanism has to be explained as well, of course. I just find it impossibly improbable that there is only one world, and out of pure chance it's this world. That doesn't make any sense to me.
It did not have to happen as if planned from beginning to end. The design works so as to proceed stage to stage. It so happened that the design never came up against an insuperable obstacle like my new pudding recipe met yesterday.
Atla
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Re: Free will is real

Post by Atla »

Belinda wrote: Thu Apr 05, 2018 12:12 pm It did not have to happen as if planned from beginning to end. The design works so as to proceed stage to stage. It so happened that the design never came up against an insuperable obstacle like my new pudding recipe met yesterday.
I think this argument is probably the biggest probability miscalculation I've ever seen in philosophy.

I've seen various estimes for the probability of our universe. Some calculate it's 1 in 10^50 or 10^150 or 10^10^30 or whatever.

And these are probably very conservative estimates because, inside this universe, absolutely everything has to be in the right place at the right time and in the right order too, for us self-aware humans to be able to be here now.
(And then it's even possible that there is also an exteremly unlikely matter-antimatter distribution in our universe etc.)

Long story short, there is only an inconcievably small chance for only our world to exist, and exactly in this way, through random chance. To me that's not an explanation good enough.

(Plus if one universe exists, why would things stop there? This breaking point probably needs an explanation too.)
jayjacobus
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Re: Free will is real

Post by jayjacobus »

The universe is mechanical. It seems to be deterministic. At least science treats the universe as deterministic. The past leads to the present and will lead to the future.

Humans exist in the present however. If a person is walking to the store it is because he wants to go to the store. A moment later, if he is still going to the store, it is because he still wants to go to the store, not because of what he physically did in the past.

Humans are constrained by physics, biology and the conditions around them. But that doesn't mean that they are completely constrained. They actually have quite a bit of freedom.

If a person ducks a flying object, he may do so as a biomechanical reaction but that doesn't mean that eating a ham and cheese sandwich is a biomechanical reaction.

Humans are in the present, always. The past and what's going on around them are information for their consciousness in their present. The information may be suggestive, manipulative or inconsequential to what they do. Is consciousness completely constrained? If it was how could I ......
(stop).
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bahman
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Re: Free will is real

Post by bahman »

Serendipper wrote: Wed Apr 04, 2018 8:55 pm Why are they different?
Because in one I decide and in another one not, it is automatic.
Serendipper wrote: Wed Apr 04, 2018 8:55 pm I don't understand what you said.
I am afraid that I cannot rephrase it. I think you need to put the stress on middle of "not only no one" to understand the sentence.
Serendipper wrote: Wed Apr 04, 2018 8:55 pm When is that? Can you measure down the the second? .0001s? .0000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000001s? When?
It is at the moment that I decide.
Serendipper wrote: Wed Apr 04, 2018 8:55 pm And how does the dumb process know to resume control?
That automatically, unconsciously, happens when your attention is distracted to something else. You can do it consciously too. Just try to think of something else at a moment.
Serendipper
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Re: Free will is real

Post by Serendipper »

Atla wrote: Thu Apr 05, 2018 7:02 am
Serendipper wrote: Wed Apr 04, 2018 9:59 pmThere aren't infinite possibilities. There may be other possibilities, but this is the possibility that survived. It is like a tree growing branches to reach sunlight: the branches do not presuppose where the sun is (for the most part, discounting gravity, heat, etc) so the branches head off in random directions and the one that receives the best light survives while the others slowly die off. So it was likely the same with the universe: some possibilities happened and the one that beat the others managed to survive leading to the next competition in the evolution of things.
Well there you have it, this is why I choose the MWI.
Your explanation is magical, you say that there is something magical going on behind the scenes, or something magical right now in this world, that MADE this possibility be chosen.
Not only is that a non-explanation, it also goes completely against genuine randomness.
So out of genuine randomness, this and only this universe comes to be. THAT is the most crazy idea to me.
Magic is not the same as nothing.

If I present you with two identical items, which will you choose? After you have selected one, then I ask you why you picked that one, will you reply "magic"? Or will you claim there are, magically, infinite other worlds where you picked the other one? Will you then say that, magically, there is infinite energy supporting the infinite other worlds? Or will you assert that energy is, magically, not necessary to have infinite universes?

Either you say there is no reason why you picked one over the other beside the fact that you had to pick one or you claim some magic as the reason.

So you object and theorize that the reason you picked the one is a function of how you were put together and that is a function of your atomic makeup and that was determined by a never-ending series of causality that had no beginning and therefore no cause, no identifiable determining agent, ie magic.

If you cannot pin down and tell me exactly what determined your choice, then it's either magic or it's nothing. That's your choices and I leave it to you to decide which you prefer.
I don't know how they derive that conceptualization knowing that space and time do not exist from the perspective of light, so there is no universe in which to have locality.
I guess looking at it from the perspective of light is also a new idea.
It shouldn't be. It should be a century-old idea.
It's not that randomness is required for consciousness, but that I can't understand how I have a point of view, an experience, if I am merely the product of a dumb mechanical process such as dominoes falling. It's hard to articulate why. Additionally, there is nothing to select for this point of view that I have because it makes no difference to anything if I have it. I could function as a robot just the same. All my emotions and whatnot could be programmed in, if all that I am is a determined process. If that is so, then how did awareness of myself and a feeling of a point of view on the universe come to be if there is nothing selecting for it?
But if you say that something is selecting for it, then you are saying that there is another mechanism outside this universe that made things happen the way they did. And you have to explain that as well.
What selects for deer having long or short legs?
My take is that there is no other type of mechanism, just more of the same: which is indeed why I chose the MWI. And so there is only the illusion of selection. I find this to be the simplest extension.
So is it a fluke that deer have long legs in this world and short legs in another world because there are no selective forces? Then it's random? If there are no selective forces, clearly decisions about which deer go in which universe are random (causeless).
Can you think of a way of having a universe without energy?
Sure, I think the net energy of the universe is zero.
But how did it get into a non-net state? How did plus get separated from minus? Antimatter was in the news recently, so how did matter get separated from antimatter? Just because everything cancels doesn't explain how it became separated. How do you take nothing, divide it in half, and create two opposites without using energy? Magic?
Because that's the theory: many worlds. Each quantum event happens in another universe.

Many-worlds implies that all possible alternate histories and futures are real, each representing an actual "world" (or "universe"). In layman's terms, the hypothesis states there is a very large—perhaps infinite[2]—number of universes, and everything that could possibly have happened in our past, but did not, has occurred in the past of some other universe or universes. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Many-worl ... rpretation

An infinite number of universes??? Each with no temporal end??? You don't see that as silly? Why not? What empirical observation has given you any clue that the infinite can exist or that all possibilities exist?
Well not quite, there seem to be several version of the MWI. In the non-layman's terms version, there is actually just the universal wavefunction assumed. But indeed some physicists take it to separate branching universes and that's crazy imo.
The first statement on wikipedia is:

The many-worlds interpretation is an interpretation of quantum mechanics that asserts the objective reality of the universal wavefunction and denies the actuality of wavefunction collapse.

I have two philosophical problems with that: 1) objectivity cannot be determined nor verified unless it is done subjectively. 2) Occam's razor asserts we should choose the solution with the least assumptions and assuming the wavefunction doesn't collapse is not consistent with what we observe, but attempts to explain that it's an illusion by assuming that the other possibilities manifest in other universes. So assumption #1 is the wavefunction doesn't collapse and assumption #2 is that other universes exist.

Ironically, the assumptions are made to avoid the problem of something coming from nothing (ie randomness), but still doesn't solve it. So two new assumptions have been made with nothing being accomplished. What determines which possibility goes to which universe? What is the ultimate cause for everything? If there are more universes now than before, then logically there was a time when only one universe existed, so what was before the very first quantum event? Now that's a problem!
I also don't see why our universe couldn't have a temporal end, maybe time goes in circle in this universe.
It's possible. If time goes in circles, then that's infinite.
As I said above, I don't know the connection of randomness to consciousness; I just know determinism can't explain it.

I think if there is a fundamental thing, then that thing cannot have something more fundamental determining its behavior; therefore randomness must exist unless there is no fundamental thing, which implies an infinite number of smaller things. But again, there is no starting point for an infinite series of causality so again there appears to be no cause that can be identified. Whether the cause of an event is due to an infinite number of factors or zero factors, it is the same.
Determinism can explain it, as I showed. And a fundamental thing can easily be deterministic.
If the fundamental thing determines everything else, then what determines the fundamental thing?
Do you have substantiation?
The quantum measurement problem is imo the greatest unsolved mistery in physics and philosophy. No one could fully figure it out yet. But it's getting really old having to explain every time that the "mind causes the collapse" idea is just one of the many interpretations and while it may be partially true, it's fundamentally incorrect. That "mind" that causes the collapse is just another set of particles, that everything else is made of too. There's more and less to it.
If it would be so damn simple as you write then it had been solved long ago.
But if some minds cannot cause the collapse, then the mind must be able to understand what it sees in order to cause the collapse. You said that is wrong, so explain to me why that is wrong.

From what I understand from the delayed choice quantum eraser experiment, if we take a measurement, but discard the data before observing it, the pattern is the same as never being observed. So if we substitute an animal in place of a human, then discard the result such that a human could never know, which pattern would develop?
If a circle is not infinite, please write out PI in its entirety here for me.
That's a numerical represaentation of pi, which is an irrational number. Are you saying that every circle we draw or imagine is infinitely large?
Infinity and a circle has no starting nor ending point. An infinitely large circle is a straight line without end and with zero curvature.
What's the difference? If there are changes or no changes, then it's infinite regression. A simple illustration is to aim a camera at its monitor. Does the monitor change because of what the camera sees? Yes or no, it doesn't matter.
If there are no changes, then there are no changes.
That's not an infinite regression, your misconceptualization of it is an infinite regression.
I don't think the misconception is mine.
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bahman
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Re: Free will is real

Post by bahman »

Belinda wrote: Thu Apr 05, 2018 12:04 am Reality is pregnant with possibility . Wishful thinking is sterile, or at best it helps to soothe you to sleep.
It is more than wishful thinking. You believe that you can catch things in future when you do wishful thinking. You need to decide to stick to wishful thinking and act accordingly.
Serendipper
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Re: Free will is real

Post by Serendipper »

bahman wrote: Thu Apr 05, 2018 7:51 pm
Serendipper wrote: Wed Apr 04, 2018 8:55 pm Why are they different?
Because in one I decide and in another one not, it is automatic.
So the difference between the voluntary and involuntary is automatic?
Serendipper wrote: Wed Apr 04, 2018 8:55 pm I don't understand what you said.
I am afraid that I cannot rephrase it. I think you need to put the stress on middle of "not only no one" to understand the sentence.
Baham says "What do you think of my argument?"
Baham says " I am afraid that I cannot rephrase it."

If you can't rephrase it, then you don't understand it. <--- I could rephrase that any number of ways you like. If you understand something, you can speak it in many languages.
Serendipper wrote: Wed Apr 04, 2018 8:55 pm When is that? Can you measure down the the second? .0001s? .0000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000001s? When?
It is at the moment that I decide.
What is the distance in time from the moment you decide to breathe until the moment the decision is automatic? If the answer is zero, then there is no distinction because they are the same continuous event. If the answer is not zero, then give me the answer in seconds please. You are the one claiming that the voluntary is different than the involuntary, so you have to show a discontinuity between the events in order to call them separate events. And after you do that, then you have to show how one event influences the other.
Atla
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Re: Free will is real

Post by Atla »

Serendipper wrote: Thu Apr 05, 2018 8:09 pm Magic is not the same as nothing.

If I present you with two identical items, which will you choose? After you have selected one, then I ask you why you picked that one, will you reply "magic"? Or will you claim there are, magically, infinite other worlds where you picked the other one? Will you then say that, magically, there is infinite energy supporting the infinite other worlds? Or will you assert that energy is, magically, not necessary to have infinite universes?

Either you say there is no reason why you picked one over the other beside the fact that you had to pick one or you claim some magic as the reason.

So you object and theorize that the reason you picked the one is a function of how you were put together and that is a function of your atomic makeup and that was determined by a never-ending series of causality that had no beginning and therefore no cause, no identifiable determining agent, ie magic.

If you cannot pin down and tell me exactly what determined your choice, then it's either magic or it's nothing. That's your choices and I leave it to you to decide which you prefer.
Yeah I think every possible outcome happens. Still, to me there seems to be something "unique" to this perticular outcome of this perticular universe.

I don't believe in never-ending causalities, that requires the idea of linear time with no beginning.
I don't think energy is "supporting" worlds, why do you think that?

My main question remains. If our universe has like a 1 in 10^150 or 1 in 10^10^30 or something like that probability to be this way through random chance, then why should I believe in random chance instead of a multiverse or a God?
It shouldn't be. It should be a century-old idea.
Just as QM yet almost no one knows about it yet.
What selects for deer having long or short legs?
Nothing really "selects".
So is it a fluke that deer have long legs in this world and short legs in another world because there are no selective forces? Then it's random? If there are no selective forces, clearly decisions about which deer go in which universe are random (causeless).
That's right
But how did it get into a non-net state? How did plus get separated from minus? Antimatter was in the news recently, so how did matter get separated from antimatter? Just because everything cancels doesn't explain how it became separated. How do you take nothing, divide it in half, and create two opposites without using energy? Magic?
If everything cancelled out after the BB, we couldn't be here now. That idea doesn't work. And no asymmetries were found so far either.
Maybe one region of the universe is simply dominated by matter and the other by antimatter.
The first statement on wikipedia is:

The many-worlds interpretation is an interpretation of quantum mechanics that asserts the objective reality of the universal wavefunction and denies the actuality of wavefunction collapse.

I have two philosophical problems with that: 1) objectivity cannot be determined nor verified unless it is done subjectively. 2) Occam's razor asserts we should choose the solution with the least assumptions and assuming the wavefunction doesn't collapse is not consistent with what we observe, but attempts to explain that it's an illusion by assuming that the other possibilities manifest in other universes. So assumption #1 is the wavefunction doesn't collapse and assumption #2 is that other universes exist.
1. That's what they mean by objectivity now. Objective in theory, but in every interpretation we have intrinsic subjectivity now.
2. imo the Occam's razor choice is the MWI. It says that the collapse happens but it's apparent.
Ironically, the assumptions are made to avoid the problem of something coming from nothing (ie randomness), but still doesn't solve it. So two new assumptions have been made with nothing being accomplished. What determines which possibility goes to which universe? What is the ultimate cause for everything? If there are more universes now than before, then logically there was a time when only one universe existed, so what was before the very first quantum event? Now that's a problem!
MWI, something from nothing and randomness are three different topics.
Who said there was an ultimate cause? Who said there was something from nothing? Who said propabilities "go" to universes? Who said universes jump into existence and multiply?
It's possible. If time goes in circles, then that's infinite.
No, a circle is a circle. What you talk about is an infinite spiral. You keep confusing these.
If the fundamental thing determines everything else, then what determines the fundamental thing?
Your question makes no sense to me. Deteminism is not an act.
But if some minds cannot cause the collapse, then the mind must be able to understand what it sees in order to cause the collapse. You said that is wrong, so explain to me why that is wrong.

From what I understand from the delayed choice quantum eraser experiment, if we take a measurement, but discard the data before observing it, the pattern is the same as never being observed. So if we substitute an animal in place of a human, then discard the result such that a human could never know, which pattern would develop?
You are misunderstanding everything using dualistic thinking, but in the quantum world there are only correlations, and those require nondual thinking. So it's not about "understanding" and "minds" but correlations with the quantum observer, whatever that is.

Also you expect answers from me to questions which I have pondered for years but haven't been able to fully work out (nor has anyone else solved them so far). And what I have been able to work out would take weeks or months explain even if you had nondual thinking.
Infinity and a circle has no starting nor ending point. An infinitely large circle is a straight line without end and with zero curvature.
To us, a straight line with zero curvature is a straight line. But it can be on a circle in a higher dimension.
I don't think the misconception is mine.
A circle is finite. An infinite spiral is infinite and a spiral.
Belinda
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Re: Free will is real

Post by Belinda »

Serendipper wrote:
It's possible. If time goes in circles, then that's infinite.
Atla replied:
No, a circle is a circle. What you talk about is an infinite spiral. You keep confusing these.
Atla made a point in the same post regarding possibility equating possibility with necessity. I think this is true, and that a spiral is a good image for necessity. Atla also said that the spiral is infinite (in possibilities, I add). I suggest that the spiralling which is yet to come is not possibility in the sense of ontic necessity, but possibility in the sense of unknown.

The spiral image is strongly causal ,which is why that image looks like necessity, like determinism. The circle, by contrast is simpler as it is complete in itself that's to say the circle image is not an image of change through time. Both images are consonant with necessity. The spiral is consonant with necessity through time, and the circle describes eternal necessity.
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henry quirk
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Post by henry quirk »

If I choose, for example, to ignore X instead of callin' X a lowdown dirty Ametica-hatin' whore (cuz I find X corrosive and find dickin' around with X corrosive) I've made a choice, yes? A choice grounded in reasons I suss out for myself (not foisted up on me by circumstance).

If I choose, and if I choose for my own reasons, how have I not exercised my agency, my free will?
commonsense
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Re: Free will is real

Post by commonsense »

bahman wrote: Sat Mar 31, 2018 6:24 pm We are all sure about the fact that thought precedes act and the fact that they are different. There is therefore a point in which there is neither thought nor act. Lets call this point the decision point. This point cannot be affected by thought because otherwise it is a part of chain of thought. Therefore decision is free.
If we are to assume that there is a point, the so-called decision point, in which thought does not exist, then we can just as easily conclude that a decision is not made until an instant after your decision point.

If a decision is attempted at the point before thought exists, it would be a belief, not a decision.


:idea:
Serendipper
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Re: Free will is real

Post by Serendipper »

Atla wrote: Fri Apr 06, 2018 7:17 am I don't think energy is "supporting" worlds, why do you think that?
E=mc^2

and

Nikola Tesla — 'If you want to find the secrets of the universe, think in terms of energy, frequency and vibration.'
My main question remains. If our universe has like a 1 in 10^150 or 1 in 10^10^30 or something like that probability to be this way through random chance, then why should I believe in random chance instead of a multiverse or a God?
I think it's more like 10^300 by now. For a while I bought into astrophysicist Hugh Ross's assertion that the apparent fine-tuning means a creator must exist, but it occurred to me that I was looking at the problem backwards and indeed the probability is evidence he needn't exist because it's indicative of a honing/refining/evolutionary process commonly used in genetic algorithms to solve impossible problems, like teaching a car to drive itself. No one could possibility outright program a car to drive, but we can provide the groundwork for it to learn to drive on its own and that's where the astronomical odds are coming from. Instead of recognizing the the refinement that has taken place over many iterations, we assume it must have been designed precisely so in one iteration and the odds of that are ridiculous. But the odds that a car will eventually learn to drive are certain.
What selects for deer having long or short legs?
Nothing really "selects".
Predators select the short-legged deer for dinner while the long-legged ones run away. If there were no predators, then deer would have short legs in order to be more efficient grazers.
So is it a fluke that deer have long legs in this world and short legs in another world because there are no selective forces? Then it's random? If there are no selective forces, clearly decisions about which deer go in which universe are random (causeless).
That's right
That's right? Randomness exists?
But how did it get into a non-net state? How did plus get separated from minus? Antimatter was in the news recently, so how did matter get separated from antimatter? Just because everything cancels doesn't explain how it became separated. How do you take nothing, divide it in half, and create two opposites without using energy? Magic?
If everything cancelled out after the BB, we couldn't be here now. That idea doesn't work. And no asymmetries were found so far either.
Maybe one region of the universe is simply dominated by matter and the other by antimatter.
Eventually, it was shown that new inflation does not produce a perfectly symmetric universe, but that quantum fluctuations in the inflation are created. These fluctuations form the primordial seeds for all structure created in the later universe.[59] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inflation ... symmetries

Exploding stars are not symmetrical either. https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2 ... 145803.htm
The first statement on wikipedia is:

The many-worlds interpretation is an interpretation of quantum mechanics that asserts the objective reality of the universal wavefunction and denies the actuality of wavefunction collapse.

I have two philosophical problems with that: 1) objectivity cannot be determined nor verified unless it is done subjectively. 2) Occam's razor asserts we should choose the solution with the least assumptions and assuming the wavefunction doesn't collapse is not consistent with what we observe, but attempts to explain that it's an illusion by assuming that the other possibilities manifest in other universes. So assumption #1 is the wavefunction doesn't collapse and assumption #2 is that other universes exist.
1. That's what they mean by objectivity now. Objective in theory, but in every interpretation we have intrinsic subjectivity now.
2. imo the Occam's razor choice is the MWI. It says that the collapse happens but it's apparent.
Wiki says "denies the actuality of wavefunction collapse." I don't think you're morally addressing my objections.
Ironically, the assumptions are made to avoid the problem of something coming from nothing (ie randomness), but still doesn't solve it. So two new assumptions have been made with nothing being accomplished. What determines which possibility goes to which universe? What is the ultimate cause for everything? If there are more universes now than before, then logically there was a time when only one universe existed, so what was before the very first quantum event? Now that's a problem!
MWI, something from nothing and randomness are three different topics.
Who said there was an ultimate cause? Who said there was something from nothing?
Either there is an ultimate cause or there is not. If there is not, then something came from nothing. If there is, then what is it and what caused that? So either we go forever back in causality, never reaching an ultimate cause or we go in circles (self-causation) or we concede that something came from nothing.
Who said propabilities "go" to universes? Who said universes jump into existence and multiply?
MWI
It's possible. If time goes in circles, then that's infinite.
No, a circle is a circle. What you talk about is an infinite spiral. You keep confusing these.
A spiral is a curled straight line, but where is the starting point on a circle?

If material is harvested from the earth, then it is a finite commodity, but if it is recycled (re-circulated), then it is infinite, right? We can never run out and supply can never be exhausted.

If you think about it long enough, you'll realize that the infinitely big is the same as the infinitely small (ie nothing) because if something takes all available space for its existence, then there is no room for a contrast to give it meaning and it ceases to exist in that instant which completes the circle. The only thing there can be infinite amounts of is nothing. Eternity is not infinite time, but absence of time.
If the fundamental thing determines everything else, then what determines the fundamental thing?
Your question makes no sense to me. Deteminism is not an act.
Determinism is the doctrine that all events, including human choices and decisions, have sufficient causes. So what is the cause of the most fundamental cause?
But if some minds cannot cause the collapse, then the mind must be able to understand what it sees in order to cause the collapse. You said that is wrong, so explain to me why that is wrong.

From what I understand from the delayed choice quantum eraser experiment, if we take a measurement, but discard the data before observing it, the pattern is the same as never being observed. So if we substitute an animal in place of a human, then discard the result such that a human could never know, which pattern would develop?
You are misunderstanding everything using dualistic thinking, but in the quantum world there are only correlations, and those require nondual thinking. So it's not about "understanding" and "minds" but correlations with the quantum observer, whatever that is.

Also you expect answers from me to questions which I have pondered for years but haven't been able to fully work out (nor has anyone else solved them so far). And what I have been able to work out would take weeks or months explain even if you had nondual thinking.
What's this about nondual thinking? A magnet has N and S poles, but is one magnet, but also has N and S poles. N can't exist without S and vice versa. The magnet cannot exist unless there is nonmagnet to contrast it. The nondual can't exist without the dual. Reality is the interaction between subject and object, but I fail to see how realizing that subject and object are part of the same continuum is getting us anywhere except in explaining where the idea of infinity comes from (circularity of self-observation).
Infinity and a circle has no starting nor ending point. An infinitely large circle is a straight line without end and with zero curvature.
To us, a straight line with zero curvature is a straight line. But it can be on a circle in a higher dimension.
I don't think the misconception is mine.
A circle is finite. An infinite spiral is infinite and a spiral.
An infinite spiral is an infinite line that happens to be curly. Infinite straight lines are circles with large diameters because anything that has no beginning nor end is a loop.

Infinity: does it exist?? A debate with James Franklin and N J Wildberger https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WabHm1QWVCA

Bio:

Born and raised in Canada, I now enjoy the warmer Australian life-style, but still like to visit my home country. I was educated at Adam Scott High School in Peterboro Ontario, Richmond Hill High School in Richmond Hill Ontario, University of Toronto (BSC 1979) and Yale University (PhD 1984). I taught at Stanford University (1984-1986) and the University of Toronto (1986-1989) before coming to UNSW (University of New South Wales), Sydney, in 1990. http://web.maths.unsw.edu.au/~norman/

Here is his essay http://web.maths.unsw.edu.au/~norman/pa ... Theory.pdf

Here is a blog post about infinity http://theorangeduck.com/page/infinity-doesnt-exist

Another https://plus.maths.org/content/does-infinity-exist

In particle physics there has been a much longer-standing and more subtle problem. Quantum electrodynamics is the best theory in the whole of science, its predictions are more accurate than anything else that we know about the Universe. Yet extracting those predictions presented an awkward problem: when you did a calculation to see what you should observe in an experiment you always seemed to get an infinite answer with an extra finite bit added on. If you then subtracted off the infinity, the finite part that you were left with was the prediction you expected to see in the lab. And this always matched experiment fantastically accurately. This process of removing the infinities was called renormalisation. Many famous physicists found it deeply unsatisfactory. They thought it might just be a symptom of a theory that could be improved.

This is why string theory created great excitement in the 1980s and why it suddenly became investigated by a huge number of physicists. It was the first time that particle physicists found a finite theory, a theory which didn't have these infinities popping up. The way it did it was to replace the traditional notion that the most basic entities in the theory (for example photons or electrons) should be point-like objects that move through space and time and so trace out lines in spacetime. Instead, string theory considers the most basic entities to be lines, or little loops, which trace out tubes as they move.


That is why in String Theory textbooks you'll see 1+2+3+... = -1/12 because it matches what we see in the lab.

Infinity does not exist and therefore there are no straight lines, but circles or loops. Spirals are another form of straight line that cannot go on forever and therefore must be a loop. "Segments" exist, but lines are infinite and therefore loops. Same with planes.
Atla
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Re: Free will is real

Post by Atla »

Ok this is getting completely out of control, I think you have taken most things I wrote out of context. And what you did address, I mostly disagree with. Let's focus on one:
Serendipper wrote: Fri Apr 06, 2018 8:05 pmI think it's more like 10^300 by now. For a while I bought into astrophysicist Hugh Ross's assertion that the apparent fine-tuning means a creator must exist, but it occurred to me that I was looking at the problem backwards and indeed the probability is evidence he needn't exist because it's indicative of a honing/refining/evolutionary process commonly used in genetic algorithms to solve impossible problems, like teaching a car to drive itself. No one could possibility outright program a car to drive, but we can provide the groundwork for it to learn to drive on its own and that's where the astronomical odds are coming from. Instead of recognizing the the refinement that has taken place over many iterations, we assume it must have been designed precisely so in one iteration and the odds of that are ridiculous. But the odds that a car will eventually learn to drive are certain.
To me this is the same thing as saying that there is a multiverse or a hidden mechanism.

1. If there's nothing to guide the process, then we take a universe and we will have to run it through like 10^300 random iterations until by chance we get one that's like ours.

2. If there is really only one universe, and something is guiding it to turn out like our universe, than what is this guiding mechanism? How and why is it there? And why is it exactly the way it is, without having gone through for example an extremely large number iterations of its own? The classical "yeah but how did God get there" question.
jayjacobus
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Re: Free will is real

Post by jayjacobus »

The probability of something happening once it happens is 100%. The probability of throwing 100 heads in a row is .5^100 but once it happens it is 100%.
Serendipper
Posts: 201
Joined: Sun Apr 01, 2018 1:05 am

Re: Free will is real

Post by Serendipper »

Atla wrote: Fri Apr 06, 2018 8:41 pm Ok this is getting completely out of control, I think you have taken most things I wrote out of context.
I think that's an immoral diagnosis.
And what you did address, I mostly disagree with.

Dogmatically.
Let's focus on one:
What were the odds that I knew you'd say that?
Serendipper wrote: Fri Apr 06, 2018 8:05 pmI think it's more like 10^300 by now. For a while I bought into astrophysicist Hugh Ross's assertion that the apparent fine-tuning means a creator must exist, but it occurred to me that I was looking at the problem backwards and indeed the probability is evidence he needn't exist because it's indicative of a honing/refining/evolutionary process commonly used in genetic algorithms to solve impossible problems, like teaching a car to drive itself. No one could possibility outright program a car to drive, but we can provide the groundwork for it to learn to drive on its own and that's where the astronomical odds are coming from. Instead of recognizing the the refinement that has taken place over many iterations, we assume it must have been designed precisely so in one iteration and the odds of that are ridiculous. But the odds that a car will eventually learn to drive are certain.
To me this is the same thing as saying that there is a multiverse or a hidden mechanism.

1. If there's nothing to guide the process, then we take a universe and we will have to run it through like 10^300 random iterations until by chance we get one that's like ours.
And how is 10^300 other universes a solution?
2. If there is really only one universe, and something is guiding it to turn out like our universe, than what is this guiding mechanism?
What is the guiding mechanism that determined the subject/object relationship? Was it discovered or planned? Did it just so happen to work that way or was it made to work that way? Duality was the first truth discovered; it had to be because everything is based on that. True/false, on/off, plus/minus. Why would it be any other way?

From there it was an evolutionary process of what worked, worked and what didn't, fell apart and ceased existence. Maybe there were competing trialities or quadalities that didn't compete as well. Maybe instead of charge being divided into 2, there was plus, minus, and something else and that just didn't work.

So once duality was the dominant form, it became the environment that selected what came next: matter/antimatter, positive/negative, up/down.

Matter that didn't attract other matter did not work; it died out and ceased existence. Matter that had gravity worked and became dominant.

Who knows how many iterations it took just to get that far. Maybe the universe formed and fell apart 10^300 times before the first atom was formed. Who could say?

I was telling Greta the other day that life probably evolved with no idea how to reproduce. Well how would it know how to? So there must have been oodles of lifeforms popping into existence in a short time until, by chance, one of them figured out how to reproduce and then it became dominant due to that advantage.

Why are we programmed to die? Well probably because the first lifeforms that could reproduce also didn't die, so they ate all their food and went extinct. Now we need a lifeform that manages to figure out, by chance, how to reproduce and also have a finite lifespan in order to be in harmony with their finite environment.

But by your reasoning and MWI, the organisms that didn't survive went to live in other universes. And in those universes, the organisms that didn't survive went to live in yet other universes. The triality that didn't happen here, happened in another universe. The matter that doesn't have gravity must exist in another universe. Why have it that way instead of things just ceasing to exist?

If I flip a coin and it lands heads, why does it have to land tails in another universe? Why can't that outcome simply not manifest?
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