Straight Dope Message Board

[QuickSilver]

Originally Posted by Machinaforce

It's essentially the same thing.

Right. And Carl Sagan didn't suffer an existential crisis over it, nor did he bother anyone with endless navel gazing and obsessive doubt on the matter. Move on. 301

[DrFidelius]

Originally Posted by QuickSilver

Right. And Carl Sagan didn't suffer an existential crisis over it, nor did he bother anyone with endless navel gazing and obsessive doubt on the matter. Move on.

Carl Sagan was also a noted pothead.
Perhaps our erstwhile and obsessive friend could move to Colorado. 302

[QuickSilver]

Originally Posted by DrFidelius

Carl Sagan was also a noted pothead.
Perhaps our erstwhile and obsessive friend could move to Colorado.

That explains, "Billions and Billions..."... too high to sit down and actually count them, I suppose. 303

[tampora]

Originally Posted by Darren Garrison

Because a part of a thing contained within a thing is not the whole thing.

Take a glass hologram of a racecar and break it in two halves. What do you expect to see? The front half of the car on one glass half and the back half on the other glass half? Nope. You receive two fully-functional and smaller holograms of the racecar. Break it in smaller pieces and each piece becomes a full but smaller hologram of the original car. How is that possible? Clearly, every smallest part of the hologram contains all the information necessary to recreate the entire hologram. In effect, the front half of the car IS the entire racecar.

Leonard Susskind talks about how any arrangement in 3D space is completely analogous to another arrangement spread out on a larger 2D surface. Long story short, our universe could be the 3D hologram that is created from a 2D surface of information; every bit of that 2D surface containing everything needed to reconstruct the entire 3D universe. Thus, if the world is a hologram, you are the ENTIRE thing that contains you.

As if that wasn't wild speculation enough, here's both feet into the land of misquoted science...

When a 3D star in our universe collapses into a black hole, it produces a 2D event horizon. When a star collapses in a universe of 4 spatial dimensions, the result would be a 4D black hole with a 3D event horizon. Could we live in such a 3D event horizon? Could the expansion of our own universe be the result of 4D matter falling into a 4D black hole and increasing its size? The period of hyper-inflation following the big bang could be explained by the initial feeding frenzy of nearby 4D matter after critical black-hole mass had been reached.

Where's my lava lamp at anyways? 304

[The Other Waldo Pepper]

Originally Posted by tampora

Take a glass hologram of a racecar and break it in two halves. What do you expect to see? The front half of the car on one glass half and the back half on the other glass half? Nope. You receive two fully-functional and smaller holograms of the racecar. Break it in smaller pieces and each piece becomes a full but smaller hologram of the original car. How is that possible? Clearly, every smallest part of the hologram contains all the information necessary to recreate the entire hologram. In effect, the front half of the car IS the entire racecar.

Okay, now take an actual racecar and break it into two halves; possibly you expect to see two fully-functional and smaller racecars? So break it into even smaller pieces; does each piece become a full racecar? Does every smallest part of that actual racecar contain all that’s needed to recreate an entire racecar?

Nope. In effect, each piece of the car ISN’T the entire racecar.

Thus, if the world is a hologram, you are the ENTIRE thing that contains you.

And if the world isn’t, then maybe you’re — not? Am I getting this right? If the world is like that glass hologram of a racecar, then okay; but if it’s like the racecar itself, well, then, uh, in a word, nope? 305

[Machinaforce]

Originally Posted by QuickSilver

Right. And Carl Sagan didn't suffer an existential crisis over it, nor did he bother anyone with endless navel gazing and obsessive doubt on the matter. Move on.

I doubt he fully grasped it.

Though the people who claim this to be so don’t provide and explanation for it. 306

[Darren Garrison]

I doubt he fully grasped it.

And I doubt that there was one single topic that Carl Sagan didn't have a much better grasp on than you. 307

[Machinaforce]

Originally Posted by Darren Garrison

And I doubt that there was one single topic that Carl Sagan didn't have a much better grasp on than you.

In this case he did.

Even though they don’t explain it the metaphor they often use is an ocean. That the wave is not separate from the ocean but is connected to it and part of the ocean and then it dies out. They see the universe as that and the apparent “separateness” of things around us as an illusion, that everything is connected and dependent on each other.

Another point is talking about how individual consciousness is an illusion and that it is universal consciousness, but that’s more sketchy to me, especially since there isn’t evidence to suggest that anything but animals are conscious. 308

[Machinaforce]

https://www.google.com/url?sa=i&sour...73265337510604 309

[Machinaforce]

http://bendedbrains.com/you-are-the-...encing-itself/ 310

[Machinaforce]

And this quora page: https://www.quora.com/Are-we-simply-...-consciousness 311

[Telemark]

Originally Posted by Machinaforce

I doubt he fully grasped it.

Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha.

No, wait, you're serious? 312

[The Other Waldo Pepper]

Originally Posted by Machinaforce

Even though they don’t explain it the metaphor they often use is an ocean. That the wave is not separate from the ocean but is connected to it and part of the ocean and then it dies out. They see the universe as that and the apparent “separateness” of things around us as an illusion, that everything is connected and dependent on each other.

Uh, yeah; an ocean, and a wave that doesn’t happen to be separate from that ocean, sure can be a metaphor. Likewise: the shirt I’m now wearing, and a rock on a planet that’s circling a distant star? That can also be a metaphor! Because, see, they’re separate, is my point, so you can use them as a metaphor for things that happen to be separate from each other!

Say I show you a gold cup full of delicious and nourishing milk, and an iron cup full of foul-tasting poison; are they like a wave and the ocean? I ask because there are times when that’s a good metaphor; maybe this is one of those times! But — and stay with me, here; there’s another possibility — are they like a shirt that’s here, and a rock that’s all the way over there, in that they happen to be separate from one another? Like, is this a time for Metaphor #1, or Metaphor #2? 313

[Machinaforce]

Originally Posted by The Other Waldo Pepper

Uh, yeah; an ocean, and a wave that doesn’t happen to be separate from that ocean, sure can be a metaphor. Likewise: the shirt I’m now wearing, and a rock on a planet that’s circling a distant star? That can also be a metaphor! Because, see, they’re separate, is my point, so you can use them as a metaphor for things that happen to be separate from each other!

Say I show you a gold cup full of delicious and nourishing milk, and an iron cup full of foul-tasting poison; are they like a wave and the ocean? I ask because there are times when that’s a good metaphor; maybe this is one of those times! But — and stay with me, here; there’s another possibility — are they like a shirt that’s here, and a rock that’s all the way over there, in that they happen to be separate from one another? Like, is this a time for Metaphor #1, or Metaphor #2?

The links phrase it better than I do. Saying that you are the universe experiencing itself, similar to what Sagan said by us being a way for the cosmos to know itself. 314

[The Other Waldo Pepper]

Originally Posted by Machinaforce

The links phrase it better than I do. Saying that you are the universe experiencing itself, similar to what Sagan said by us being a way for the cosmos to know itself.

The link you posted phrases it with a key word: “part”. Maybe you should try phrasing it with that word? I’ll try it, here, and then you can try it likewise?

Here goes.

Ahem.

You are a “part” of the universe: experiencing some parts of the universe — but, of course, not experiencing various other parts. Now consider somebody else: someone you don’t know, someone who could drop dead tomorrow and you may never find out. That person is also a part of the universe: experiencing some parts of the universe, but not others. To quote my favorite superhero movie: “the people only see the part I play in public; only a few select friends know my private parts.” 315

[QuickSilver]

Originally Posted by Machinaforce

The links phrase it better than I do. Saying that you are the universe experiencing itself, similar to what Sagan said by us being a way for the cosmos to know itself.

Turns out Sagan got high, a lot. Are you high? 316

[Machinaforce]

Originally Posted by The Other Waldo Pepper

The link you posted phrases it with a key word: “part”. Maybe you should try phrasing it with that word? I’ll try it, here, and then you can try it likewise?

Here goes.

Ahem.

You are a “part” of the universe: experiencing some parts of the universe — but, of course, not experiencing various other parts. Now consider somebody else: someone you don’t know, someone who could drop dead tomorrow and you may never find out. That person is also a part of the universe: experiencing some parts of the universe, but not others. To quote my favorite superhero movie: “the people only see the part I play in public; only a few select friends know my private parts.”

If the whole thing is just a flowery way to say that everything is connected then sure I can admit that "everything is the universe".

But I don't think that is what they mean: https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CR0HhIcUYAAHKh-.jpg

To me the universe isn't one thing it's many things, which is why the analogy of the ocean doesn't seem right. 317

[begbert2]

Originally Posted by Machinaforce

If the whole thing is just a flowery way to say that everything is connected then sure I can admit that "everything is the universe".

But I don't think that is what they mean: https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CR0HhIcUYAAHKh-.jpg

To me the universe isn't one thing it's many things, which is why the analogy of the ocean doesn't seem right.

Somethings things that sound stupid and wrong are, in fact, stupid and wrong.


And really, a lot of this junk is just changing the framing of the problem, usually in ways analogous to a broken analogy. Like your little picture, there, it's basically saying that if intelligence is housed in something, then that thing is intelligent. My brain has a mind in it, so my brain is intelligence. The building I'm in has my brain (and thus my mind) in it, and thus the building has a mind too! Actually about fifty different minds, which means the building has multiple personality syndrome and needs therapy, hyuk hyuk! Until the end of the workday when we all leave and the building gradually loses more and more intelligence until it's positively mindless, hyuk hyuk!

Seriously, it sounds like they're trying to make a bad joke, but suck at comedy. 318

[Machinaforce]

I don’t think that what it means.

I think they are referring to the universe as some monolithic “one thing” and that everything we see is just it. But the universe isn’t one thing it many things.

The other thing they say is that we just have the “experience of being a human” somewhat saying that we are the universe having a human experience, though that sounds like nonsense to me.

They say that we are really the universe and not a body and that we are just attached to the form or the body. But consciousness and senses and mind are all tied to the body and don’t seem to be separate from it so I would have to say no. We are a body. 319

[Beckdawrek]

315 posts ago this is the answer you got.

(6 months ago) 320

[Machinaforce]

Originally Posted by Beckdawrek

315 posts ago this is the answer you got.

(6 months ago)

And back then it didn't address the topic. 321

[Machinaforce]

That and no one has addressed this one either: http://bendedbrains.com/you-are-the-...#comment-18520 322

[Machinaforce]

I find it interesting that you consider your beliefs to be spiritual, aside from the undoubtedly profound emotional involvement you have in them. To me, when someone says ‘spiritual’, this connotes ideas of the immaterial, the supernatural, and the unreasonable (in the non-subtextual sense of being impossible to consider using the faculties of reason). But the idea of a global-consciousness-which-is-tied-in-with-simply-WHAT-exists appears (to me at least) to carry none of these features necessarily.

I actually have similar views about the nature of reality, but they came to me in pretty much the opposite fashion. I started with belief in God, which mature gradually into atheism, but eventually this seemed to mature even further into a belief in universal consciousness that is substantiated with scientific philosophy, based on the fairly normal empirical assumption that it is the structure of my brain which imbues what I call ‘me’ with consciousness. I don’t consider this belief spiritual to me, but I do feel that it is nearly ineffably beautiful and in a similar way to how you consider your beliefs, both powerfully comforting yet horribly strange.

It makes me really curious about what dying will feel like. Will it be similar to falling asleep? Certainly ‘I’ will cease to exist, along with any functional structure suggesting memory, reason, or emotion. But something that once experienced itself in these ways will begin to experience itself in a way that is much simpler, yet more akin to the basic laws of nature. In fact, presumably a lot of the matter of which I consist is doing just that as we speak, but the ‘I’ is to complex to functionally relate to these activities.

I find it very amusing that two very different paths can lead to the same place. Makes it seem all the more meaningful, doesn’t it?

Just an excerpt from the link. 323

[The Other Waldo Pepper]

Originally Posted by Machinaforce

That and no one has addressed this one either: http://bendedbrains.com/you-are-the-...#comment-18520

I have. That’s a link to some “You Are The Universe Experiencing Itself” talk; and, as I helpfully pointed out, that could be rephrased as:

You are a “part” of the universe: experiencing some parts of the universe — but, of course, not experiencing various other parts. Now consider somebody else: someone you don’t know, someone who could drop dead tomorrow and you may never find out. That person is also a part of the universe: experiencing some parts of the universe, but not others.

Once it’s rephrased that way, it becomes more accurate but less interesting. 324

[Machinaforce]

Well actually they are saying it is all the same thing. 325

[The Other Waldo Pepper]

Originally Posted by Machinaforce

Well actually they are saying it is all the same thing.

Anybody can say stuff. Anyone can say the check is in the mail; it means as little as a toddler saying he rode a giant blue doggie to the candy planet, or a president saying he’s not a crook. You ever notice how folks still ask for an ID even though the skinny teen trying to buy a beer says he’s twenty-one? You ever notice that, when a guy on trial says “Not Guilty”, we don’t apologetically call the whole thing off right then? You ever heard of lying, or being mistaken? 326

[begbert2]

Originally Posted by Machinaforce

https://www.google.com/url?sa=i&sour...73265337510604

Originally Posted by Machinaforce

http://bendedbrains.com/you-are-the-...encing-itself/

Originally Posted by Machinaforce

And this quora page: https://www.quora.com/Are-we-simply-...-consciousness

I just wanted to say I was thinking about this this morning, and I think it's really counterproductive for you to dump bare links out and expect us to interpret them for you. I mean, if we presume you have actual confusion about what these links are saying, it would be immeasurably more helpful if you were to accompany each link with an explanation of what that specific link is saying that's bothering you, and what you want explained about it. This would allow us to answer your actual concerns and questions directly, rather than trying to fucking infer what your problems are by reading thousands of words, all of which are stupid, and then trying to pick out which of those words are the most stupid and then trying to blindly rebut them, only for you to reply that we've once again guessed wrong about what your issue is or failed to directly answer your unstated question. 327

[QuickSilver]

Originally Posted by begbert2

I just wanted to say I was thinking about this this morning, and I think it's really counterproductive for you to dump bare links out and expect us to interpret them for you. I mean, if we presume you have actual confusion about what these links are saying, it would be immeasurably more helpful if you were to accompany each link with an explanation of what that specific link is saying that's bothering you, and what you want explained about it. This would allow us to answer your actual concerns and questions directly, rather than trying to fucking infer what your problems are by reading thousands of words, all of which are stupid, and then trying to pick out which of those words are the most stupid and then trying to blindly rebut them, only for you to reply that we've once again guessed wrong about what your issue is or failed to directly answer your unstated question.

He's not looking for enlightenment or truth. He's looking to argue, contradict, harangue and badger. If we agreed with every single word he ever posted or linked, without contradiction, Machinaforce would return to rebut his own position just to be contrary. Go ahead and challenge him to agree the sky is blue. 328