God is an Iraqi
POSTED BY: dreamtrove
UPDATED: Tuesday, July 29, 2025 20:41
VIEWED: 12402
PAGE 11 of 12
Anytime someone uses the word spiritual I cringe :)
I can't recommend anything per se. I think the explanation in jurasic park is probably good enough if you want a non-mathematical one. Otherwise, I suggest boning up on that math. Like when I said I like presidents with a military background, and a lot of folks attacked me, and I said, military background is experience anyone can go out and get before running for president, if they so desire; likewise I say, rather than accept a weakness in mathematics, go attack it again. What was daunting in 9th grade will seem much less so now.
By random, I meant random. I think that everything is basically planless randomness, and only applied rules like natural selection turn the randomness into anything else.
Evolution, I hope you grasped, is essentially a branch of statistical mathematics, and not one of biology, a fact often obscured by some backwards debate by religious extremists against darwins evolution of species.
Conventional black hole theory I'm pretty sure is pretty much just flat out wrong, and I can more or less prove it. What a black hole really is is a dimensionally transendental region of space. I would not, however, recommend flying a spaceship into one to find out. I'm not sure it's a crossable barrier in either direction, and the nature of the internal space may not be one we are use to, it might be, say, a 10 million degree see of plasmic protomatter.
Wormholes make for fun sci-fi. I liked farscape. The reality is again probably less hospitable. The gravitational pull of wormholes is what creates galaxies, at least in theory, so I'd say it's pretty intense. It's possible that for a short period of time a wormhole of farscape size might exist, but not as a permanent fixture. Whether one coudl appear at seeming randomness or on a regular basis, I don't know. The theory suggests that rather extreme circustances are needed to create a wormhole. I wouldn't suspect that outdside of science fiction that wormholes will find an actual space travel application.
Re: Chaos and String theory, a decade ago's fringe theory is todays gospel. We just need to accept it and move on. If something late proves it false, then we'll adjust, but we're at the very least in the general ballpark of the truth here. Both theories have a more solid footing than the big bang.
Lawrence Krauss. No. I'll google him later. You shouldn't worry about offending anyone here. If you're using mysticism to trump science, it's liable to be poorly received. If you use science to trump beliefs, you're probably going to be more offensive, but then people probably need some offending to jar them from rigidly held beliefs that might be wrong.
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Quote:
Originally posted by Signym:
FINALLY!!! I found a kindred spirit!
Don't suppose this will help me on the political issues :)
So you came up with something similar yourself?
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Quote:
Originally posted by dreamtrove:
Anytime someone uses the word spiritual I cringe :)
I can't recommend anything per se. I think the explanation in jurasic park is probably good enough if you want a non-mathematical one.
rather than accept a weakness in mathematics, go attack it again.
By random, I meant random. I think that everything is basically planless randomness, and only applied rules like natural selection turn the randomness into anything else.
Evolution, I hope you grasped, is essentially a branch of statistical mathematics, and not one of biology
Conventional black hole theory I'm pretty sure is pretty much just flat out wrong, and I can more or less prove it. What a black hole really is is a dimensionally transendental region of space. I would not, however, recommend flying a spaceship into one to find out. I'm not sure it's a crossable barrier in either direction, and the nature of the internal space may not be one we are use to, it might be, say, a 10 million degree see of plasmic protomatter.
Re: Chaos and String theory
Both theories have a more solid footing than the big bang.
Lawrence Krauss.
Sp***t***ity is a staked word. Will entertain all suggestions for a substitution.
You got staked for suggesting high office holders should have military experience? Missed that. But W has the Secret Harvard Club instead, shouldn't that be enough? Ooops!
"Evolution is essentially a branch of statistical mathematics, and not one of biology," Yeah, statistics made visible on a biological canvas, I get that. I think "random" in statistical definition is a misapplication of unpredictibility ("-equal chances- or probability of occurrence for -each- member of a group" so says my dictionary, emphasis mine), I think there are rules about chance, even when we don't recognize them. You say "only applied rules like natural selection turn the randomness into anything else", I'm saying the application of natural selection reveals the inherent structure in something that -seems- unpredictable. Also saying that plan (the dread G concept) and structure are not the same thing. But this one I'm going to let go of now. Fly away little bird.
9th grade geometry was good. A+ and the teacher told me I had a gift (ha ha ha). I enthusiastically ran to sign up for algebra, which was taught by a podperson, got D's and chalked geometry up to a fluke with a gifted teacher. I can calculate really quickly using sort of bunching techniques I make up. But that's arithmetic, different thing. Ok, I'll look into it. I do have a friend at Uni who might be able to recommend a good teacher, I would like to...I mean math is all mystical to me, and I can see where it would be a fabulous tool if properly understood. Drastic Park, ok, I'll bite next time I see it on the movie schedule. Drat. Math. I need a dimensionally transcendant math teacher now.
Yeah, the scientist-type who thought I was torching him...I was saying that science and religion are the same study. Not trying to trump, mind, still not well received.
Glad to hear that String and Chaos are in the forefront. I've hated Bang theory since the first time I heard of it, always chuckled at the part where they'd get .0000001 millisecond from the event, and it all fell apart.
I want to hear new theories on gravity as well, I think gravity is a misunderstood force (she says, going straight on to a new heresy). Black hole theory is as bad as bang theory. in my bratty opinion. I share your dimensionally transcendant theory of holes. (From my featherhead perspective.) It might only -look like- a 10 million degree sea of plasmic protomatter. It might actually be the midnightbomber what bombsatmidnight on the other side. Anyway, I don't think I'l be planning any vacations near one soon.
Krauss. Physics for SF fans
http://www.phys.cwru.edu/~krauss/krauss.html
And see, I thought you were a entemologist all this time.
Thanks to viral marketing...SERENITY: reopening soon in a theater near you.
Shiny Trees! Yavanna made Shiny Trees!
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I would like to spend as little time as possible discussing the antichrist. Oops, I mean the president. And he's my own party's candidate. How sad is that?
Spirituality isn't spun. The problem isn't spin. Just in general. The problem with news is spin. But words don't really change meaning. Sorry, a dispute from another thread getting me down.
It's the concept, spirituality. Some sort of mystical connotation. Great for fiction. Not for science. It brings with it the idea that it's okay to put your preconceived notions to work, and also the concept that it's okay to come up with magical connections not written out by known scientific explainations.
Okay, let me put another one out there.
I call this one "I think, therefore I am not."
I don't exist. Neither do you. It's sad in it's way, but also a happy thought.
Each brain cell has within it a network of microtubules that common science believes to be a cell skeletal strucure. They're just wrong again. There are some fringe people who point out that these structure don't span the cell and can't support the cell, but do have a lot of electrical activity.
This is because they are a network, a circuit, a sort of brain for the cell. Because each cell does exists, and does have a consciouness.
But communication between cells is such that as soon as one cell says something that other cells agree with, it takes over. Pretty soon no one can tell who had the original thought. As it exists in all of us cells, any one of us is just as like to have had the idea. More or less.
If we can't pass it on, the thought stops and we move on to the next. And so it goes. This is why if you remove some brain cells, the others continue to function more or less normally.
This also pushes a somewhat evolutionary process on thoughts. Since all brain cells, or a decent portion, need to agree, random destructive thoughts are overcome in normal brains.
So what about suicidal thoughts? Well, this happens when there is something wrong with the brain, in particular, there's no serotonin. Without serotonin, it is impossible to gain perspective on long term consequences of actions.
So all thoughts are had by random cells, and are randomly collective, and then evolutionarily selected. The random thought "if I turn right here off this cliff, I would die: all I'd have to do is pull this wheel" but that thought is trumped by everyone else in my head saying "so don't do it"
So I get all this, collective non-existance.
Yet some nagging notion that I am aware and surfing through time forwards rather rappidly still bugs me.
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JP. I meant the book. The movie doesn't really approach chaos theory as soundly. Gravity is tricky. it's like best explaination is probably as an extension of string theory. All the energy strands get tangled, and pull on one another.
Black holes, I meant it IS possible protomatter, or it IS possible universe, any black hole, you don't know what it is. A lot of stuff from big bang is decent, possible, and much of it may happen, but probably on a smaller scale. The whole "unverse came from one bang" I am pretty sure is bogus.
So million degree protomatter plasmic soup is one possible type of universe that may exist, and if you walk into it unsuspect then ... OW!
But individually, many may have rules very similar to our universe.
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Quote:
Originally posted by dreamtrove:
Okay, let me put another one out there.
I call this one "I think, therefore I am not."
I don't exist. Neither do you. It's sad in it's way, but also a happy thought.
Pretty soon no one can tell who had the original thought. As it exists in all of us cells, any one of us is just as like to have had the idea. More or less.
So random cells, randomly collective,The random
Oh, sure, take it to a whole new level of eerie ass weird discussion. Especially since it's just you and I noodling around in an -apparently- empty thread. I've lit campfires in these things before so I know there are other eyes glowing in the dark around the fire. Want a beer? My cells agree that it's time for mysticism. You started it. I have proof that you had the original idea, so don't go blaming me for that later, you republican you.
No speaking Latin, and let's try to keep the blood pressure under control because we're going straight into that heresy that I unwittingly used to offended an other scientific American. At least I think he was American.
Yup, I avoid all discussion of the antichrist in this happy place, FFF. It goes straight to an epic unpleasantness like that other thread you mention. I keep reading that thread and remain ambivalent about adding my .02 On the other hand I will never again feel as terrible about hijacking a thread.
"But communication between cells is such that as soon as one cell says something that other cells agree with, it takes over. Pretty soon no one can tell who had the original thought. As it exists in all of us cells, any one of us is just as like to have had the idea. More or less."
Have you heard the story of the hundredth monkey? Of course you have. This is one of my favorite things. I think the paragraph above also speaks directly about the hundredth monkey concept.
Original thought? No such thing. We're all just electro-magnetic receptacles, and don't think I'm invoking the G, because we've been over that ground. I'm talking about group consciousness. We might each have one syllable of an original thought, but creation on any real level is by the group imagination, not by individuals. Just my opinion.
I think, therefore, big deal.
Ideas are hard to prove in a scientific way. All ideas, not just ideas about the nature of consciousness. I think it takes someone imagining a thing is possible before it can be brought into reality. Until imagination is allowed, proof can't be found. Oh oh getting cryptic again. All right, I'll provide a concrete example then. Until someone imagined flight, planes couldn't be built. Once the idea took shape, it took many many trials of piles of outrageous designs that didn't really understand the principles involved before a method was discovered to get a plane to stay in the air. Along the way, some of the principles of flight were discovered. Then with slow motion photography (to take one example of information that introduced a new perspective), other possibilities emerged. We continue to find ways to make advancements in the tech of flight. In the area of consciousness, I think there are many possibilities for which we modern humans are only beginning to allow an exploration. We know so little about the workings of the brain in real terms, much less about the mind contained within that collection of cells. If you're right about the separateness of cells, that adds even another dimension to consciousness, where each individual cell is having its own separate experience of the world.
"Some sort of mystical connotation. Great for fiction. Not for science. It brings with it the idea that it's okay to put your preconceived notions to work, and also the concept that it's okay to come up with magical connections not written out by known scientific explainations."
Science also brings with it preconceived notions to try to prove them. That is the heart of science - the hypothesis - isn't it? Of course you then apply the clearest methods you can conceive to prove/disprove the argument, but at the b
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Lim,
Not sure I have this all figured out exactly what you're saying, but here goes.
1st, JP, the book, is okay. It's Chrighton so it's kind of probably limited, but in the way that spielberg is fun without being truly deep, so was, for me, jp, the book.
Now to mysticism. My mind read this in funny order because, well it will become obvious why, so I'm answering it in random order.
Some things are not possible because they are out of the framework of the universe, that is to say the region of space in which we live. Every dimension, whatever you want to call it, has its own rules.
We live within a collection of stars trapped within a very large black hole. That universe has certain rules. One rule is that time travels forwards through a system of events. The event model define us and cannot be escaped. I can't determine if outside of those rules if it can be escaped or not, but inside it, it's certainly not possible.
Another thing is teleportation is only possible under some fairly peculiar circumstances that don't particularly apply to us. It's clearly far more possible than time travel, but it's not something that a human could reach via meditation or spellcasting.
I'm familiar enough with the rules of this universe that there are a good number of things I can say with absolute certainty. Though everything can be disproven, with that disclaimer, it is sometimes better to be certain of certain things than to fog the possibilities by taking as unknown what is known. The are other times when just hte opposite is true.
This hundredth monkey?
http://www.worldtrans.org/pos/monkey.html
Basically I feel there are several levels of magic.
1. First, comes the lack of understanding. Nothing in the world makes sense.
2. Then as things start to come in to focus, there is a logical part of the world, and everything outside of that falls into the realm of the mystical.
3. Next you start making rules about the magic, and new kinds of mysticism and superstition are born.
4. You find random spot evidence which seems to support your mystical model, or change its course, and you follow this.
5. After that, you begin to notice that ultimately the scientific model seems to trump the extant mystical models, and you lose faith completely.
6. Finally you realize that the true nature of the universe is far different from the mainstream scientific understanding.
Stage 6 is the starting point for discussion, but it looks exactly like stage 3. So on every single issue and subtopic even the most knowledgable must closely reexamine their understanding to see if perhaps they aren't at stage three on that point. It happens to me frequently.
That said, moving on.
There are several elements of mental state:
Main among these are Focus, Perspective, Noise, Instinct and Sleep.
Dopamine is the agent of focus. A low level causes disorientation. This leads to memory loss, and various other degenerate and vague states of mind. High levels cause halucination, a state randomly produced by dumb kids who don't know what they're doing.
The important thing here is focus is the opposite of perspective, but they are controlled by different mechanisms.
The mechanism of perspective is serotonin. You are absolutely right that modern society depresses serotonin levels. Many food additives can do this, as does stress, and serotonin precursors are actually quite rare.
A lack of perspective IS depression. They are actually the same thing. Both psychologically and chemically.
In normal health levels, these two mechanisms will fight for dominance. At unhealthy levels, one will win.
Chemical relations here are important.
Serotonin is closely related to Melatonin, the agent of sleep. Taking melatonin can cause a reduction in serotonin production, causing depression. The best supplements to take for this are 5-HTP, the direct serotonin precursor, or Tryptophan, which is banned in the US by an immensely stupid or crooked govt. These supplements compete with SSRIs, which are profitable and highly dang
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About ancient beliefs I have to say, I'm no mysterian. Mysterians like to exaggerate the unknown. I think that modern knowledge falls into two streams:
1) Mainstream knowledge. This is what most of the people know and understand. Their world is notably shallow and built on misconceptions. They eat non-food, and practice non-exercise, and have a mental state of a tv-watching vegetable. They understand little.
2) Experimental Science. These people usually work with mice and understand a great deal. In theory they could easily reconstruct whatever was done in the past if there was a reason to do so.
Ultimately there is, a reason to do so, but it becomes a tricky process of knowing what to recreate. Such a society would know why it was doing what it was doing, which would likely give it a one up on its ancient counterpart, which may have understood, or may have simply been following a pattern of behavior that had value in a system of darwinian evolution. It's really hard to say which. Likely it was a matter of being one or the other on a case by case basis within each society. Eg. The ancient Mayans may have done X, Y and Z which gave them a more aware mental state, and they understood how X worked, and they knew Y was beneficial but didn't know how it worked, and had no idea that they were doing Z and let alone its effect or workings behind that effect.
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That was an interesting set of associations between neurochemicals and basic responses. I would need to think about it more before I could comment on it. Though I think of myself as fairly knowledgeable, your statements are so uniquely constructed I will need to translate them somewhat.
I would like to state a small caveat: there are issues of faulty brain wiring per se that have nothing to do with chemical imbalance, and that cause brain/mood malfunction.
Nearly everything I know I learned by the grace of others.
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Quote:We observe a phenomenon where the frequency of light seems to get longer with increasing distance. So rather than accept the simple explanation- that there is a distance-related affect on light of some unknown mechanism-people proposed that the universe is accelerating away from us in all directions. Then we get to posit dark energy and dark matter and explain away why there appear to be some VERY OLD galaxies in far distance, presumably "younger" regions of the galaxy. DUH!
Signym: FINALLY!!! I found a kindred spirit!
DT: Don't suppose this will help me on the political issues :) So you came up with something similar yourself?
I have a very unformed notion that basically we have got our dimensions all wrong and that it's messing up our understanding. What is so fundamentally different between x,y, and z that they each require a different dimension? And isn't time just a complex function of distance?
I'll give you a couple of... mmm..."glimmers". Our gaze encompasses a larger and larger swath of the universe the further "out" we look. When we look out at infinity, does our vision wrap around so that we see ourselves? Why is is that some mathematical operations are "orderless" or "commutative" while others aren't? Maybe one dimension has more to do with "sequence-dependent" versus "unordered".
I have no idea where this is going. I haven't had time to pursue it. Like I said, it's just a nagging feeling that our understadnign has been limited by the fact that we are simply looking at things from the wrong angle.
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Please don't think they give a shit.
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