EvC Forum: Studying the supernatural

Thanks for the time and effort you put into this. I'm afraid I don't have the knowledge to respond adequately but I'll do what I can.

Rahvin writes:

We, as human beings with brains that of necessity run on entropy, experience change in one direction. The Universe just exists, at every moment of time simultaneously. If we could take a step back "outside" of the Universe and take a look at it, what we'd actually see is a four (or more...) dimensional "object" made up of the three spacial dimensions plus time. We'd be able to look at any given time coordinate just as easily as we could look at any given spacial coordinate. The Unvierse would have different states at different coordinates (for instance, as you approach T=0 the spacial dimensions become smaller and smaller), but you could play the timeline of the Universe forwards or backwards or just look at the whole thing at once, and it would be just as internally consistent. It's not an intuitive concept, but that's reality - our intuition is framed by our experiences, which themselves are drawn only from a very tiny, limited subset of the real Universe.

I wouldn;t call that "supernatural." I'd call that "using mathematics and observations to see what the Universe is really like."

In this thread there has never been any agreement on when the natural becomes supernatural, so I'll go along with the idea that if we can, through whatever means anyone comes up with, investigate other universe/dimensions then it is all natural.

I understand pretty much what you are saying but it would seem to me that one way or another any form of sentient life has to have a way of experiencing change. It seems to me that you are saying that when standing back outside the universe we can observe time in all directions but while we are in it we only observe it in one. (Isnt that something of a God's eye view.

) Looked at in that way though I can see why you would see it as natural. As you mention in your previous post, the idea of sentient life experiencing time in multiple directions makes sense mathematically. This does IMHO make the concept of an eternal intelligence or prime mover conceivable.

Rahvin writes:

But this doesn;t solve the problem of infintie regression at all. Instead, it brings us back to special pleading on the matter of complexity.

Again: the argument for the necessity of a "prime mover" rests on the hypothesis that all complex entities require a still more complex creator. If you hypothesize a "prime mover" who himself does not need a still more complex creator, then you lose logical consistency in claiming that the Universe itself requires a complex creator. In other words, if the "prime mover" doesn;t need a "prime mover"...then why does the Universe itself require a "prime mover?" If everything that exists does not require a more complex creator, then why can't the Universe just exist without one?

It's a lose-lose scenario for the theist, GDR, simply because you cannot maintain logical consistency by insisting the requirement of a "prime mover" while not requiring a "prime mover" for the "prime mover" itself. The entire argument is flawed from the beginning, and the theist is doomed to special pleading regardless of the tactic used. It's either infinite regression, turtles all the way down (typically considered unacceptable) or an uncaused cause, which directly contradicts the argument used to suggest a cause in the first place.

One of the arguments by atheists, as I understand it, is that if we have a universe that has always existed that it does away the need for a prime mover. It seems to me that if we could demonstrate that there is the possibility that a prime mover could always have existed then it does away with the need for a prime mover for the prime mover. Sure it gives us an uncaused cause but it still seems to me to be reasonable at some level to say that if something always was then it has no need of a cause.

The thing is of course the idea of always existing is something that we can only mathematically comprehend if even then. In the end we exist. I don't pretend to have all the answers at all and I'm only engaging in speculation. You say that it is clear that we are part of a greater whole. It appears that this greater whole or reality is in some way more complex that what we experience in our 4D world. If all of this is true and then we should look at what we know from the world that we are part of to consider what we might expect in a greater more complex reality. As humans we have intelligence, a sense of morality etc. If we are less complex part of a greater whole doesn't it stand to reason that within the more complex part of the greater reality that there would be sentient life with greater intelligence, greater morality etc.

Rahvin writes:

That's the thing, GDR - we can "make sense" of the world we experience all we want, but most of what we come up with jsut isn;t going to be at all accurate.

The problem is that our ability to hypothesize increases with less knowledge. The less we know about a thing, the more conceivable options we have that would look logically consistent with our limited data.

If I tell you "I saw something," what could you hypothesize that would "make sense" of that statement?

I could have seen a person. Or a pencil. Or a computer, or a cloud, or a ghost, or a troll, or a pencap, or a sandwitch, or the Sun, or a god...

Every last one of those, and an infinite number more, are viable hypotheses for what I saw given the information only that it was (at least briefly) visible.

What happens if we know more? What if I say "I saw something blue, on wheels." Now you know it's not likely to have been a person. Or a ghost. Or a pencil, or the Sun. It could still be a truck, or a bike, or a car, or a wheelbarrow, or a long list of other possibilities, but with just a tiny little bit of additional information we've excluded the vast majority of possibilities from the first example.

We've already established that the world you and I experience is only a teeny, tiny fragment of a precentage of a fraction of the real Universe, that the human-sized scale is simultaneously too large and too small and too limited by our entropic brains and our visible-spectrum-only-eyes and our compelte lack of ability to detect neutrinos or protons or galactic clusters within our own experience. We're doomed to ignorance in our everyday lives; that's why we've needed to use mathematics and tools like the Tevatron or the new Large Hadron Collider or the Hubble Space Telescope to "see" what the Unvierse is really like - our experience alone can never and will never tell us enough about the Universe to let us make accurate hypotheses.

Combine that, then, with the fact that our ability to hypothesize solutions is increased by less knowledge about the world, and you can see the problem. To put it simply - even though it works just fine for everyday experiences, our gut feelings are nearly always wrong when applied at any scale outside of the everyday human life.

I agree with all of that and it seems very often that the more we know the more we find we don't know. The fact remains that even with the LHC and the Hubble we are still only able to perceive a "teeny, tiny fragment of a percentage of a fraction of the real universe". I think we agree, that the greater reality which we are unable to experience is more complex than our little portion of it. It seems to me that it is hubris to think that we would be the only intelligence in all of that greater reality, particularly when we consider that virtually nothing about the makeup of this world is intuitive.

I don't see it as a gut feeling. I think it is a reasonable subjective conclusion based on what we objectively know. You say that we can't be that accurate about these things and I don't disagree. My contention is' on the basis of what we are talking about' is that it appears that a prime mover is more likely than the lack of one. It doesn't mean that the prime mover is a single intelligence or multiple intelligence. It doesn't mean that this intelligence has any specific physicality or anything else. We are only talking about the existence of such an intelligence, without any reference to details about this theoretical intelligence. Yes, I do believe more but that has nothing to do with science.

Rahvin writes:

Infinity is a concept that gets thrown around an awful lot by people who don;t understand what it means. Is it impossible that the Universe "just exists?" Perhaps "existence" is inevitable.

Why is a finite "first cause" impossible? Is it inconceivable that a "first cause" can exist for all of time and yet still be finite? Is it inconceivable that perhaps a "first cause" could actually be a finite entity in a dimesional set superimposed over the set we're familiar with? I'm perhaps delving farther into the theistic realm of speculation than I'm typically comfortable with, but I see absolutely zero reason to focus on an "infinite first cause."

You're right about me not really understanding what infinity means. Other than from a mathematical sense though I'm not sure anyone does. I do know though that I can travel around the globe for an infinite distance. I'm not sure what you mean with the suggestion that the universe "just exists".

The problem with a finite first cause always goes back to turtles, so it's a problem. However, as far as I'm concerned the problem exists regardless of whether we believe in a prime mover or not. If there is a strictly natural first cause then we require a first cause for the natural conditions that brought about the first first cause and it's turtles all the way down.

Rahvin writes:

If not all things require a cause, then it's conceivable that the Unvierse just exists...or that the Universe was simply caused by something else that just exists. When you abandon the reasoning that tries to force the sqare peg of "Everything requires a more complex cause" into the round hole of logical consistency, you arrive back at the beginning: the Universe requires a cause, or it does not; the distinction can only be drawn by evidence.

It makes no sense to me to suggest that an entropic world that only experiences time in one direction just exists on its own without cause. If we are an emergent property of a greater non-entropic reality then at least we could say we are natural offshoot of that greater reality which might not require cause.

Rahvin writes:

No matter how strong our 5 senses are, we'd never be able to see a neutrino. The detection of neutrinos is not at all analogous to any of the 5 human senses - that's the point! We're limited by what we can detect ourselves, but what we can detect can clue us in to some of the deeper workings of the Universe, and we can use math to predict things that we can't actually detect, and then design technology to meet the sensory requirement!

If something is utterly impossible to detect, if it truly doesn't interact with reality in any way whatsoever...well, what's the difference between total and utter noninteraction and nonexistence? How would you know the difference? If there is no difference...then isn't that an admission that such things don't actually exist?

Which is a good point. From what I can gather, no matter how strong our 5 senses are we would likely be unable to see any particle, which makes all of what we see an illusion of sorts. Everything is nothing. All this again points to a greater reality where things are more real. It is an open question of how much we will be able to discern about the "deeper workings of the Universe".

Rahvin writes:

Why the separation of a "supernatural world?" Reality just as we know it today contains countless phenomenon that have traditionally been considered "supernatural" until a very short time ago. Why must the "supernatural" be a "different world?"

That brings us back to the definition of supernatural again. I agree that a greater reality with different natural laws could be considered natural, and as a part of a greater reality it wouldn't be a different world. It is just that we are only able to perceive a small part of the whole.

Rahvin writes:

As far as I'm concerned, there is what {exists}, and what does {not exist}. Mysterious phenomenon are mysterious phenomenon, whether some people call them "supernatural" or not, whether they seem to contradict other well-established theories of nature or not. So far as we've seen, so far as we have reason at all to believe, reality seems to be governed by some set of consistent rules. It seems to me that, when an apparent contradiction is encountered, the rational approach is to investigate and find out if our observation is leading us to a false conclusion (meaning there was never a real contradiction), or if the observation is the key that proves our understanding of the rules of nature is flawed.

I view the investigation of the "supernatural" to be no different from the exploration of nature. There is only the discovery of what {exists} and what does {not exist}.

I have no problem with that.

GDR writes:

It is all so amazing. Nothing is intuitive. One science book I read made the statement that everything is nothing and he had a point.

Rahvin writes:

Precisely. So what would be the difference between the "natural" and the "supernatural?"

Good point. By the definition I had been using, would make a particle supernatural which kinda eliminates the natural making everything supernatural.

However if we accept that everything about the greater reality is natural then it follows that if there is a greater reality, and if within that greater reality there is sentient life, and if, (a lot of ifs here I agree

), some aspect of that sentient life is responsible for our little corner of that greater reality, then the prime mover would also be natural.

Rahvin writes:

The determination of whether sentience exists outside of Earth is a far more specific question than is asked in this thread.

I still see your position as drawing a very significant distinction between the "natural" and the "supernatural." You talk about two separate "worlds" interwoven, when what we're actually talking about is a loosely defined collection of mysterious phenomenon. I think you're making the very significant mistake of defining "the supernatural" as "GDR's Christian beliefs," which are actually themselves a very tiny subset of the "supernatural." When we ask "can we investigate the supernatural," we aren't asking "can we find heaven."

When we talk about our universe being part of a greater reality it is pretty natural for us to think of it in terms of our theistic or atheistic POV, so yes I do employ some circular reasoning here but I'd like to point out that it was agnostic science that came up with the suggestion that we are part of a greater reality, with no thought of a prime mover being part of it. I am merely suggesting that it is consistent with Christian thinking that we are part of a greater reality which conceivably allows for part of that greater reality would be God's dimension or heaven. There just seems to be at some level congruence between science and Christian thinking in all of this.

When we talk about investigating the supernatural why wouldn't it include heaven, if heaven exists. Who is to say whether it can be investigated or not.

We have a meeting of the minds here, or I'll say a congruence, (it seems to be may favourite word lately

), of thought. Really well and generously written. Thanks.

Rahvin writes:

I don't search for truth. Not at all. You can keep truth. I make my own meaning for life and all its wonders.

Maybe, but we all hold to a world view that we believe in regardless of what we believe the source of that world view to be.

Rahvin writes:

I search for facts. I find beauty in the methodical investigation of Nature, asking her questions and making sense of her answers, discovering the underlying rules that truly govern reality and testing them to test the accuracy of my own understanding, separate from my own limited human perceptions. I find grace not in the ability to hold steadfast and become more convinced of my existing beliefs regardless of experimental results and new observations, but rather in the capacity to change my mind. It is by changing my own understanding of Nature based on the answers she gives me, unrestrained by prior opinions or personal preference, that I grow. Not all change makes us stronger, but becoming stronger is always a change. Each time I am forced to chance my understanding of Nature by logic and evidence, my understanding becomes stronger, more accurate. My map becomes that much more complete.

I feel the same way, except that I have far fewer facts to clutter up my thinking.

I don't find that paragraph in any way contrary to Christianity. I'd even go further and suggest you are talking about studying natural theology which should lead to a greater understanding of God if He indeed exists.

As I said earlier it is clear that the more we find out the more questions we have. I think it was Einstein that was told he should stay out of physics as all the discoveries had been made and that all he could do is add a few more decimal points. Newtonian physics provided all the answers for a deterministic world. With all the great discoveries through relativity and QM it appears to me that Pandora's Box has been truly opened and there is a never ending stream of puzzles left to explore.

There is no shortage of ignorance in any field whether it be theology or science. Look at all of the competing theories in both fields. However, I do agree that we should embrace the reality, (or maybe what passes for reality), of what we can know. However that doesn't preclude us from searching for new realities that are beyond anything that we can now investigate.

We agree that we are part of a greater reality with more complex laws than the laws of very small portion of the whole that we are able to perceive. We would probably agree that the part we can't perceive is in some sense physical. As we are the smaller less complex part I think that it is a reasonable speculation that the part with the more complex physical nature would also contain more complex sentient beings than what exist in our little part of reality. If we are an emergent property of the whole than it also seems quite possible that we are the result of intelligence from the greater reality.

Sure that's all speculation but I don't think it is unreasonable.

Cheers

Everybody is entitled to my opinion.

2 online now:	LamarkNewAge, Rahvin
Newest Member:	ChatGPT
Post Volume:	Total: 916,482 Year: 3,739/9,624 Month: 610/974 Week: 223/276 Day: 63/34 Hour: 2/4