Gregory Ganssle - How Belief Systems Affect Believers - Closer to Truth's

Philosophy
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I know the old timers can say, oh poop, not Cc’s song and dance again. How well, tough. You know what they say, practice, practice, practice. That’s what this is about.

I’ve listened to Robert Kuhn’s YouTube interviews on and off for a while, lately he’s had a run of interviews that I found interesting and somewhat relatable, more so than the physicist-philosopher superstars with their airs, laser focus on the tiniest of the tiny and inability to relate to real human living beings.

Why do people believe the things they do? We like to think that we are rational, that what we believe is true. But often we come to our beliefs, unknowingly, as a product of our particular ‘belief systems’. How do belief systems work their credulous magic? What principles enable belief systems to influence individuals and commandeer groups?

Closer to Truth’s
Gregory Ganssle - How Belief Systems Affect Believers

Greg Ganssle is a Senior Fellow at the Rivendell Institute and lectures in the Department of Philosophy at Yale University. His work explores the intersection of Christian faith and contemporary scholarship.

My response to some of things Kuhn went on to say and question.

4:00 ++ (5:00) excellent. Beyond that: dear Robert Kuhn, I believe a lot of the general confusion comes from not having stopped to recognize, let alone appreciate, the Physical Reality ~ Human Mindscape divide.

As for God, recognizing that God is a product of our human mindscape, goes a long way to resolving all these supposed conflicts you keep wrestling with. God’s are plenty real, but they are the product of our individual and collective minds, not the universe! Once we viscerally understand, and believe and appreciate that we are evolved biological creatures, the contrived arguments fall away.

Once we appreciate our evolved biological creature nature with it’s direct roots going back though over six-hundred thousands of years worth of evolution. We learn that creatures are perceptual instruments, not just major sense organs, but the entire body, which is in turn physically connected to my brain, it all works together in concert to perceive the world, to be aware, in order to act. That’s been the prime mover of evolution since forever.

As Dr Solms and others point out, consciousness is the inside reflection of the conversation your body is having with itself, as it’s dealing with itself and world. Consciousness is not a thing - consciousness is an interaction.

{Our modern human consciousness is the cherry on top of Earth’s consciousness sundae.}
Don’t worry still many more humanity related mysteries to solve once we finally resolve the fundamentals…

Greg Ganssle fascinating guest.

( fyi. Citizenshallenge blogspot 2022/06 philosophical-perspective-earth-centrism )

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Do they though? Evolution is hard to ignore, but people keep believing. How do you measure this “visceral”? That seems to fit with the underlying feelings he’s talking about, your lived experience.

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Well, yes they do.
If it weren’t so today’s Theory of Consciousness would have gotten turned totally inside out.

It’s the difference between:

I THINK, therefore I am !

vs.

I AM, therefore I think !

I’m talking about a deep down daily appreciation (visceral) of how Evolution reaches into our daily lives and world - speaking only from my experience, it has been very rare indeed.

The superficial understanding of Evolution is obvious in how often consciousness is talked about as something our human mind is doing, giving no thought into the layers of consciousness that reside within this physical body your mind inhabits. Simply labeling that unconscious hemostasis and calling it good won’t due - especially considering its connection to emotions.

That our mind is the product of Brain/Body, seems a no brainer, yet, yet, …

Before talking about human consciousness, we need to deep down realize that some 600 million years ago the first biologically complex creatures were imbued with a drive* towards better perception of the outside world;
Better processing of the information being absorbed through the entire body, not just main sensing organs;
Better command/control of manipulatory hardware (bodies and appendages).

*It’s nature’s relentless pursuit of that imperative that’s resulted in us.

Awareness led to consciousness.
Human Consciousness is not just driven by our brain being fed by sensing organs, but the entire body processing its interaction with its inside world along with the outside world, (something I like to think Dennett’s Pandemonium notion anticipates …).

The evolutionary perspective makes it plain that Conscious v. Unconsciousness isn’t as simple and clearcut as first impressions allowed humans to believe, (especially the “unconsciousness realm” that’s barely been plumbed).

As for visceral, yes that’s the term worth using to indicate that an understanding has permeated between superficial understanding and that interior light switching on with a “WHY OF COURSE” that resonates through and through.

Human consciousness is the cherry on top of Earth’s Consciousness Sundae.

:stuck_out_tongue:

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Questions;
Is the Earth a self-aware consciousness? (Does it have a brain?)
Is there a difference?

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No I do not think Earth is self-aware or conscious on any level because this planet Earth isn’t actually a biological being.
Still it’s Earth’s processes that created geology and then biology and the two conspired to invent life, then complex cells and then the race of creature evolution.

The awareness, consciousness, self-aware spectrum is strictly confined to the living.

This lead my mind to my splendid “god-eye view” of Earth over the course of time, one that began with the realization that consciousness, is in reality a thing of the now,
an interaction within and between living systems.
The interactions of the present.
Beyond memory, there’s no consciousness in the past, and there’s no consciousness in the future, which hasn’t happened.

The analogy would be something like this fire.

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It most certainly is! The Earth is a biome, a community of living beings sharing a common host.

Biome

One way of mapping terrestrial (land) biomes around the world
A biome (/ˈbaɪ.oʊm/) is a biogeographical unit consisting of a biological community that has formed in response to the physical environment[1] in which they are found and a shared regional climate.[2][3][4]

Biomes may span more than one continent. Biome is a broader term than habitat and can comprise a variety of habitats.

While a biome can cover large areas, a microbiome is a mix of organisms that coexist in a defined space on a much smaller scale. For example, the human microbiome is the collection of bacteria, viruses, and other microorganisms that are present on or in a human body.[5]

A ‘biota’ is the total collection of organisms of a geographic region or a time period. From local geographic scales and instantaneous temporal scales all the way up to whole-planet and whole-timescale spatiotemporal scales. The biotas of the Earth make up the biosphere.

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Let’s be clear about our definitions.

Earth is the originator and host to life.
Life creates this biome that Earth created and is host to.

Earth’s biome is a spark in time. We humans won’t be destroying that in any way.
Yet, the biome Earth is host to, it will expire in due time, then Earth will revert back to a lifeless orb orbiting the sun.

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How do you define the dynamics of the ecosphere like the climate zones and weather patterns that govern all events on earth but are themselves governed by dynamical conditions.

If you start making distinctions, then you cannot justify homeostasis as the exclusive function of biological systems.

An interesting tidbit.

The common view is that the conscious observer causes the collapse of the wave-function.

Penrose proposes that the wave-function collapse is causal to an instant of consciousness, what Hameroff calls a “bing”.

##Consider that this is actually what happens in the brain, the wave-function collapse in microtubules is causal to conscious thought, not the other way around!

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What’s that even mean?
Is wave function collapse a quantum event?
How many times does it happen per millimeter of brain?
If it’s that many, what’s it’s significance regarding actual conscious moments that are dependent on rapidly changing physical circumstances?

Who made Penrose the authority on everything? I’ve heard Penrose telling us, we need to look towards the cosmos to find the source of consciousness. It’s silly, but if well told, it pays well. Now I hear you saying the same thing, I’m disappointed.

No one ever mentions the gazillion creatures interacting every moment for the past millions, hundreds of millions of years and a gazillion times a gazillion interactions amongst them.

I’m sorry it sounds like insane disregard towards the physical reality unfolding upon Earth. (“Won’t find answers on Earth or within our own bodies, gotta trip within our mindscapes with all our convincing mathematics and the conviction of Ego.”)

How can a gazillion times a gazillion microtubules dictate the consciousness we experience as the real world unfolds in front of us unexpectedly?

Hoffmanian Conscious Agent is what you’re talking about - all of this might be fine & good for argument sake, or not, in any event, it’s crossed over into religion and not science!

Donald Hoffman Playing Basketball in Zero-Gravity,

a critical review of, The Case Against Reality: Why Evolution Hid The Truth From Our Eyes, by Donald Hoffman, ©2019, W.W.Norton Company

(Titles are linked)

(1.01) The Prelude, Prof Donald Hoffman Playing Basketball In Zero-Gravity

(1.02) Chapter 10a, Community: Network of Conscious Agents (1/3)

(1.03) Chapter 10b, Community: Network of Conscious Agents (2/3)

(1.04) Chapter 10c, Community: Network of Hoffmanian Conscious Agents (3/3)

(1.05) Chapter 1, Mystery: The Scalpel That Split Consciousness

(1.06) Chapter 2, Beauty: Siren of the Gene

(1.07) Chapter 3, Reality: Capers of the Unseen Sun

(1.08) Chapter 4, Sensory: Fitness beats Truth

(1.09) Chapter 5, Illusory: The Bluff of the Desktop

(1.10) Chapter 6, Gravity: Spacetime is Doomed

(1.11) Chapter 7, Virtuality: Inflating a Holoworld

(1.12) Chapter 8, Polychromy: Mutations of an Interface

(1.13) Chapter 9, Scrutiny: You Get What You Need, in Both Life and Business

(1.14) Appendix, Precisely: The Right to Be (Foolish)

If we want to under consciousness through science, biology is the only game in town.

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This is another arbitrary place for you to draw the line. Not asking a question here, just pointing out my thinking. Microtubles are part of the real world, so it’s fine with me to include them in the consciousness discussion

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[quote=“citizenschallengev4, post:9, topic:9835”]
What’s that even mean?

Why does observation collapse the wave function?

https://physics.stackexchange.com › questions › why-d…
](quantum mechanics - Why does observation collapse the wave function? - Physics Stack Exchange)

Apr 15, 2017 — In Bohm interpretation the collapse of the wave function happens when the observer introduces into the measured system some perturbation, which is inevitable …

7 answers · Top answer: In the following answer I am going to refer to the unitary evolution of a quantum state …

Practically, how does an ‘observer’ collapse a wave …

6 answers, Oct 23, 2019

When will a wave function collapse if the observer was …

7 answers, Jun 18, 2021

What exactly causes quantum wave function collapse?

3 answers, Nov 27, 2015

Does the collapse of the wave function depend on the …

6 answers, Sep 3, 2021

More results from physics.stackexchange.com

Is wave function collapse a quantum event?

Wave function collapse

In quantum mechanics, wave function collapse occurs when a wave function—initially in a superposition of several eigenstates—reduces to a single eigenstate due to interaction with the external world. This interaction is called an observation, and is the essence of a measurement in quantum mechanics, which connects the wave function with classical observables such as position and momentum.

Collapse is one of the two processes by which quantum systems evolve in time; the other is the continuous evolution governed by the Schrödinger equation.[1] Collapse is a black box for a thermodynamically irreversible interaction with a classical environment.[2][3]
330px-Function_machine2.svg
Schematic depiction of a function described metaphorically as a “machine” or “black box” that for each input yields a corresponding output

A general description of the evolution of quantum mechanical systems is possible by using density operators and quantum operations. In this formalism (which is closely related to the C*-algebraic formalism) the collapse of the wave function corresponds to a non-unitary quantum operation. Within the C* formalism this non-unitary process is equivalent to the algebra gaining a non-trivial centre[18] or centre of its centralizer corresponding to classical observables.[19]

The significance ascribed to the wave function varies from interpretation to interpretation, and varies even within an interpretation (such as the Copenhagen Interpretation). If the wave function merely encodes an observer’s knowledge of the universe then the wave function collapse corresponds to the receipt of new information. This is somewhat analogous to the situation in classical physics, except that the classical “wave function” does not necessarily obey a wave equation. If the wave function is physically real, in some sense and to some extent, then the collapse of the wave function is also seen as a real process, to the same extent.

How many times does it happen per millimeter of brain?

Perhaps a million times? When you are living in the nano world, a millimeter is a long way. 1 mm = 1,000,000 nm
(consider a water wave travelling over a lake and each time it meets a stationary object, part of the wave collapses against that object. The rest of the wave continues on, slightly altered by the quantum event).

If it’s that many, what’s it’s significance regarding actual conscious moments that are dependent on rapidly changing physical circumstances?

That is why we our eyes can only observe 30 -60 frames per second. The significance is that what are quantum events seem continuous and seamless in motion. Just like a movie where each frame is a still picture.

One is absolute that the human eye cannot process visual data any faster than 60 frames per second. Mar 2, 2021
The Number of Frames That Human Eyes Can See Per Second

Who made Penrose the authority on everything? I’ve heard Penrose telling us, we need to look towards the cosmos to find the source of consciousness.

You are exaggerating. Penrose does not know everything, nor does he claim to know everything. But he just received a Nobel Prize for something he does know a lot about.

It depends on you definition of consciousness, doesn’t it?

Would you say that the addition of 1 + 1 = 2 is a form of logical clarity, a quasi-intelligent moment of mathematical resolution.
Value in → Function → New Value out.
This is the chronological evolution at quantum level.

I would not go so far as to call it “motivated” consciousness, but I am sure that consciousness is an evolved result of biological organisms’ observation (wave function collapse in the eye) of the environment.

It’s silly, but if well told, it pays well. Now I hear you saying the same thing, I’m disappointed.

I am not getting paid for anything. Nor am I religious. The process is not the result of a motivated agent, unless you want to call “addition” a motivated causal action of mathematics … after all human mathematics are a product of the human mind. But there is no denying that there are certain orderly processes in the universe that may be called quasi-intelligent.

No one ever mentions the gazillion creatures interacting every moment for the past millions, hundreds of millions of years and a gazillion times a gazillion interactions amongst them.

You are underestimating the numbers. I believe here we may use the term “infinite” with justification when trying to address the number of quantum events in the universe.

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… that is one very specific thing - (in his own words) proving “singularity” - that doesn’t make him an expert on everything.

Oh, and okay, yes, I was exaggerating, Penrose never said he knows everything, in fact, I’ve heard him mentioning he could be wrong.
My inspiration came from how often his conjectures are invoked as if they were proof rather than a smart physicist talking about his pet theory, a theory that frankly blurs the line between science and religion.

Sounds more like the chronology of math in action.

No way to describe in a simple manner, gotta read all the physics and take a few years of college, if you have the mathematical chops to keep up to even guess at it - reminds me of the 300 pages it took to prove that 1+1=2. At some point we gotta ask ourselves is simple reality really that complicated; or is more an artifact of our human need to show off?

It sure does! I’ll give you that.

If consciousness causes “wave function collapse” then “consciousness” must permeate the universe and that consciousness is in fact, nothing more than a mathematical function.

Great, where does that get us?

Sure, if that’s how you want to set the parameters, it’s perfectly logical, …
but it reduced everything to mathematics and losses a lot.

When a look at the world around us, seems to me it clearly shows that biological reality is in an entire different realm, even if math is the best tool to help define aspects of nature, but math will never be the experience of the world creatures inhabit, it’ll always be confined to our thoughts.

It’s why I see Hoffman, Hameroff, Penrose, etc., even you, as pursuing as quasi-religious quest. “Wave function collapse” will never be scalable to the macroscopic reality of the living biological planet, the realm that created and supports our existence.

I’m about a sensing human creature gaining a better grasp of the living world we inhabit. I don’t dispute the need for mathematical understanding, but like every tool, it can, and does, get turned into a destructive (intellectually as well as physically) weapon.

My point is the detail that, "wave function collapse” must be happening about a gazillion to the power of gazillion times even second upon this planet alone, let alone the universe.

Well, doesn’t that reduce the profundity of the “wave function collapse” to trivia?
It’s the background hum of the proverbial tire hitting road.

It’s some physicists’ mathematical conception that helps explain a formula that helps explain experimental results, driven by a conjecture.

But back to the reality of whatever “wave function collapse” represent, of course the logical conclusion is that the universe must be crammed full of consciousness or atomic interaction would stop immediately.

What kind of consciousness could it be?
Math as quasi-consciousness.

Well, then of course, we’d have to reduce everything down to “information” and “patterns” - leaving nothing to the imagination?

Sounds like fun, but where’s it leave one, when one is back home with the partner and kids (or appropriate equivalent.)?

I myself prefer the living perceptions that our senses that body/mind produce, the human perspective.

Back to “wave function collapse”

You know, in my simple layperson mind, with a half century of reading and thinking about many simple layperson descriptions and renditions of what quantum physics is. I’ve arrived that the conclusion that “wave collapse” must simply be the point where the photon wave becomes particle,
as best expressed through our math.

It’s probably an example of math’s inability to accurately describe the actually event, so scientists are doing the best they can with the data and tools and imagination they have available.

I recently had the chance to ask a couple physics students, the question caught them off guard, no answer, baffled, left with something to ponder. It’ll be fun to see what they come up with when I hopefully see them again after the holidays.

Suddenly it makes me wonder why we don’t hear about "particle bang” or “decoupling” - or whatever it is when the particle becomes a wave again.

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[quote=“citizenschallengev4, post:12, topic:9835”]
My inspiration came from how often his conjectures are invoked as if they were proof rather than a smart physicist talking about his pet theory, a theory that frankly blurs the line between science and religion.

A causal agency? Yesssss!
Sans an abstract, emotionally motivated, willful agency that comes with every religion.

[quote=“citizenschallengev4, post:12, topic:9835”]
Sounds more like the chronology of math in action.

Yes, a chronology of mathematically guided functional actions.

[quote=“citizenschallengev4, post:12, topic:9835”]
If consciousness causes “wave function collapse” then “consciousness” must permeate the universe and that consciousness is in fact, nothing more than a mathematical function.
Great, where does that get us?

No, Penrose proposes the exact opposite. He proposes that the wave function collapse causes “consciousness”, a moment of experiential and measurable deterministic chronology.

Yes, consciousness is the evolved (via natural selection) result of experiential dynamic processing of environmental information.
Greater complexity and functional refinement in ability of information processing generates an emergent awareness of the data being processed, i.e. “consciousness”

[quote=“citizenschallengev4, post:12, topic:9835”]
When a look at the world around us, seems to me it clearly shows that biological reality is in an entire different realm, even if math is the best tool to help define aspects of nature, but math will never be the experience of the world creatures inhabit, it’ll always be confined to our thoughts.

A look at the world around IS a mathematical function of the brain.
Ask how many animals use triangulation for orientation of themselves in relation to their environment or prey.
How many animals can count? How do birds use “lift” when airborne?

How is this for “triangulation”?
image
Everything we do is mathematical in essence. This is Tegmarks very argument.

image
image569×539 44 KB

It’s why I see Hoffman, Hameroff, Penrose, etc., even you, as pursuing as quasi-religious quest. “Wave function collapse” will never be scalable to the macroscopic reality of the living biological planet, the realm that created and supports our existence.

A quasi-religious quest is no more than confidence in the mathematical essence of spacetime and has nothing to do with a God.

There are two types of belief:

be·lief, noun

A belief is an attitude that something is the case, or that some proposition is true.[1]

Also known as an “Axiom”

In epistemology, philosophers use the term “belief” to refer to attitudes about the world which can be either true or false.[2]

To believe something is to take it to be true; for instance, to believe that snow is white is comparable to accepting the truth of the proposition “snow is white”. However, holding a belief does not require active introspection. For example, few carefully consider whether or not the sun will rise tomorrow, simply assuming that it will. Moreover, beliefs need not be occurrent (e.g. a person actively thinking “snow is white”), but can instead be dispositional (e.g. a person who if asked about the color of snow would assert “snow is white”).[[2]](Belief - Wikipedia

  1. a religious conviction:
    “Christian beliefs” · “I’m afraid to say belief has gone” · “local beliefs and customs”

No it doesn’t reduce anything to trivia, it establishes truth.
The awesome Truth.

Why do you want to make it some kind of “magic”? Now that is religion!

And what more do you need than “information and patterns” in order to acquire "understanding and allowing for greater imagination.
(Im’glad you are coming to understand the concept of "controlled hallucination…:slight_smile:

Mathematics are able to describe natural phenomena with incredible accuracy. The only remaining place of mystery is at Planck scale, but even there we can predict events with astounding accuracy because of the mathematical essence of all interactions between relational values.
(witness the Higgs boson, which cannot exist independently, but was mathematically predicted by Peter Higgs)

Yes, I agree completely! This is the definition of “observation” in physics. The conversion of an energy value into a physical value.

image

Storm Waves Crashing On Rocks Storm Waves Crashing On Rocks - on Canvas

By Highland Dunes

I don’t think that can be reversed. Once a portion of the wave has collapsed into a physical value it can no longer regain its original energy value.
But if we look at the double slit experiment we can see the collapsed bands on the screen which means that the collapsed particles are now visible as tiny little physical dots.
image
So we see the waves of the collapsed photons on the screen and which are now collapsing on our retina, transported as electrochemical data via microtubules and interpreted by the brain as visible “patterns”.

Note that the eye once was merely a light-sensitive chemical patch that evolved into the most incredible sensory organ in almost all animals.

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How does it do that?

What awesome truth?

What’s it mean for regular biological creatures navigating their days,
or a human struggling with their personal existential angst?

It’s a beautiful thing, another piece of the puzzle, but why does the rest of the system seems to be relegated to the trivial?

How can microtubules that infuse all cells be the have-all of consciousness?
A necessary fundamental component perhaps,
but it requires a body and environment to create the situations that drive consciousness to begin with.

To me it’s like you’ve taken the reducing pill and gotten lost within the realm of the tiniest, where matter energy interface. It may be the foundation of our world, but “we’ve” left that far behind.

You know, I do love that realm too, via scientific findings, but its for visiting - I never forget I’m living in a real macroscopic world, and though aspect of my thinking could be described hallucination,
the vast majority requires a different label, since it’s all about processing feedback and being reactive to the constant flow of information,
some I’m aware of, much of it flows below my “conscious” awareness - though that doesn’t make it any less of “consciousness.”

Here my perspective forces an automatic “provisional” into my beliefs and search for “truth” - I know that’s an idealistic notion and that obsessing after absolute truths is folly, since the concept is foreign to a biological geological world traveling through time. With ours just one of gazillion points of view
How can there be absolute truths when everything has it’s own perspective, etc.?

That’s why physical observations and measurements and remeasuring matters, they provide a benchmark to help us keep our convictions in perspective.

Sure, but you’re missing my point, it fills that same human impulse, desire, need, that philosophers who’s arguments are rooting in the human search for God - reinforced by Descartes who’s philosophy is born from within his Christian convictions.

Beyond that, and more importantly, it’s the realm of educated conjecture, when I read the experts, they’ll admit, we simply don’t know, we don’t understand it well enough to give any definite answers. That’s what makes it religion, and belongs firmly in the mindscape realm.

Whereas Earth sciences, have a solid object, even squishy biology is solid, real substance that can be measured and studies from a myriad of different angles.

The deep wonder and truth to absorb is the amazing consilience between all the difference branches of Earth sciences and the coherent harmonious picture that can paint for us humans to appreciate.

Which seems patently deluded, no matter how many times I try to imagine what he is saying and how in tarnation it could work. That’s the stuff that makes me reach for the “religion” label.

Penrose proposes that the wave function collapse causes “consciousness”

For god sake, think about that. Wave function collapse happens at Planck scale, how the heck does that work for creature consciousness?
You know, real creatures interacting in a dynamic only marginally predictable world?

Re The Planck scale
LP = (hG/2πc3)1/2 .

This defines the Planck length, which is 1.6 x 10-35 metres. (That’s 0.000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 016 meters.) To give you an idea, let’s compare it …

Yes, but you don’t see the flip side. This universe we observe could not exist in the first place without exhibiting profound consistences within itself and algorithmic processes working through time, etc.

No need to put the math humans created within their own head, on top of the creation pantheon, though I appreciate that’s what we always do. Bring us right back to the Abrahamic Mindset I muse on, don’t it.

Here again, …, I would phrase that differently:
Us perceiving the world, is full of various cascades of events and processes that can be described mathematically.

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What does this mean?

I don’t think there is an answer to that. It will mean different things to different people. We survived long enough to create the scientific methods without having any idea how the biology actually works, let alone how cultural dynamics grow out of that. In a sense, we don’t need to know. Unless of course you are trying to settle the problem of how worldviews are leading to planetary collapse. If you understand that races don’t exist, and the world was not created for our pleasure and that God is not going to take us all up to heaven soon, you act differently. BUT, I don’t think you need to explain the entire history of the universe, or figure out what conscious is, to get people to stop burning the earth.

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The “unfolded explicate order” from that which was the “enfolded implicate order” (Bohmian mechanics)
Infinite Potential become manifest in physical existence.

Potential = That which may become reality.

And that seems also applicable to the concept of “superposition” of two possible quantum states (potentials) becoming “resolved” into a single expressed quantum state (reality).

This is a philosophy thread. Aren’t we talking about fundamental causality rather than practical solutions?

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No, I’m trying to talk about how people’s belief systems limit their understanding of the physical reality we exist within and depend upon.

I’m talking about wrapping oneself up in fantastical thinking that actually doesn’t impinge (or inform) our actual macroscopic day to day human experiences.

I’m talking about the deliberate mixing science into whatever it is Hameroff and company are trying to sell, with their injections of magical thinking into the pitch.

For instance: “Infinite Potential” it might work in the land where math is God.
But, the Big Bang created conditions for a very specific kind of history to unfold. And everything else has had its “guardrails” since.

Why isn’t it self-evident that the cosmos didn’t have the potential to turn into an infinity of different forms as it expanded outward and cooled internally?

What do you imagine “infinite potential” to be?

Okay, passions between creatures, an egg, a sperm unite and develop into a fantastic living creature. Or watching leaves enfold, with bud enfolding into flowers, wilting, while enfolding into fruit, and so on.
Yes, it is a wonder to behold, it is an “awesome truth” - if a bit underwhelming after a life time of pondering that wonder. I mean even the most profound insights settle back into the day by day as time goes by and we continued digesting. Although they do manifest in the very fiber of said being.

This on the other hand seems hollow since there’s no relating to it.

“the concept of “superposition” of two possible quantum states (potentials) becoming “resolved” into a single expressed quantum state (reality).”

Great, so what? How does it touch on my life and the people within it.

Ironically, actually physicist often go to pains to point out, a lot of this is educated conjectures, no one really understands it.
Much of it is unobservable, unfalsifiable, beyond the purview of science and firmly in the heart and soul and mind of the people who love it and who can do very complex math with alacrity. The human mindscape.

But then others will read off their various conjectures as if they were rock solid fact, like a piece of rock in your hand. (and if you want to tell me now, that that rock is actually mostly empty space - you will only be signaling, you’re blind to what I’m striving to getting at.)

And yes it all comes back down to an Appreciation for the Physical Reality ~ Human Mindscape divide, but I won’t repeat myself. :wink:

When I see people mixing and matching science with philosophical outlooks to make their point, that’s what raises my hackles. I haven’t forgotten about your Hameroff video challenge, I’ve watch it whole a couple times and some bits a few times, thought about it a lot, worked on it in fits, gave up, returned. Hopefully today I can focus on finishing it.

It’s a challenge since offending you guys ain’t my goal, but lordie now that I’ve taken a closer look the red flags are all over the place, and I think of him way differently than before, unfortunately it’s not in a good way either.

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And. . . that means, . . . we shouldn’t think about it?

That’s a non sequitur,
and of course.
The point being?

Babe, you so don’t get me, or my perspective.
I’m talking about thinking people surviving with a modicum of mental health.

So you’re at least acknowledging that something very, very, very big and destructive is unfolding, (or is it enfolding :wink: ) most will not survive,
But others will, then things will get interesting as people wake up to witness the utter hollowness of all they believed. Just listen to interviews after current extreme event (but nothing like what they will become), “we could have never imagined such a thing.”

My real audience is those who do appreciate the profundity and uniqueness of this moment in human history and are still trying to make sense of the poop.

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[quote=“citizenschallengev4, post:17, topic:9835”]
For instance: “Infinite Potential” it might work in the land where math is God.

But all concepts of a causality can be treated as God., because God has no other definition than “Causal Agency”, with one distinction of conscious “motive”.

But, the Big Bang created conditions for a very specific kind of history to unfold. And everything else has had its “guardrails” since.

Right and that is why I am amazed at your dismissal of the concept of a quasi-intelligent mathematical “guiding equation”. What is wrong with the concept of mathematical functions that you need to dismiss it in spite of the scientifically recognized, codified, and symbolized guiding equations by which the universe relational values interact.

Is this a false representation of “function”?

From wiki;

Function (mathematics)

MATHEMATICS

a relationship or expression involving one or more variables.
“the function (bx + c)”
330px-Function_machine2.svg
Schematic depiction of a function described metaphorically as a “machine” or “black box” that for each input yields a corresponding output

The earliest known approach to the notion of function can be traced back to works of Persian mathematicians Al-Biruni[4] and Sharaf al-Din al-Tusi.[5]

Functions were originally the idealization of how a varying quantity depends on another quantity. For example, the position of a planet is a function of time.

Historically, the concept was elaborated with the infinitesimal calculus at the end of the 17th century, and, until the 19th century, the functions that were considered were differentiable (that is, they had a high degree of regularity).

The concept of a function was formalized at the end of the 19th century in terms of set theory, and this greatly enlarged the domains of application of the concept.

You are asking the hard question of how and why.?

My point is that mathematics can provide all the answers to your questions. There is no mystery to any of it. Just cold hard physical facts that are indisputably true, such as “entropy” , that affects ALL dynamic systems and eventually is mathematically causal to change .

Take the “exponential function” expressed in a limited environment.
Think about the inevitable consequence of steady growth within restrictive boundaries. The “exponential function” is a mathematical function.
There is NOTHING that can replace these axiomatic concepts.

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I’m going to stop responding to comments like this. I don’t imply in anyway that we stop thinking about it.

I keep telling you that I don’t get you. And often you respond with “I’m talking about…” and introduce something you’ve never said before.