# Nowhere to go **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [July 1, 2000, 8:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/nowhere-to-go/24261 "2000-07-01T08:26:08Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 15\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![DBCooper](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/c77e96/32.png) [@DBCooper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DBCooper)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2000, 8:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/nowhere-to-go/24261/1 "2000-07-01T08:26:08Z")
Supposing that the Universe is unquestionably governed by certain immutable laws, and assuming that human life and/or consciousness in general will continue indefinitely, won’t humankind eventually reach a scientific zenith of sorts whereat there will be no more advances to be made, nothing left to invent, nothing already invented to be improved? I mean, there’s a ceiling here, right (read: the immutable laws)? What happens when we get that high? Perhaps the resultant stagnation will be our downfall, our apocolypse. I’m speculating, of course. ---
**Author:** ![Bluemonchichi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/6de8d8/32.png) [@Bluemonchichi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bluemonchichi)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2000, 9:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/nowhere-to-go/24261/2 "2000-07-01T09:17:02Z")
DB, I mean no disrespect by this, but I think you have too much time on your hands. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![my85car](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ed8c4c/32.png) [@my85car](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/my85car)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2000, 11:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/nowhere-to-go/24261/3 "2000-07-01T11:33:22Z")
Actually, 35 to 40 years ago when I was kid, I used to worry that there would not be any more popular songs to listen to on the radio. But there always were. Amazing how that works. ---
**Author:** ![Satan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e9bcb4/32.png) [@Satan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Satan)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2000, 2:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/nowhere-to-go/24261/4 "2000-07-01T14:27:34Z")
> [@](#): > > **What happens when we get that high?** We write posts such as the OP is my guess… ---
**Author:** ![SPECS](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/da6949/32.png) [@SPECS](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SPECS)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2000, 2:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/nowhere-to-go/24261/5 "2000-07-01T14:45:38Z")
DB, Any one entity claiming to know everything only happens to gods(if there are any) and egotists. No-one is everywhere simultaneously, and the scope of new things to experience is considerable. If nothing else, realistic curiosity always asks, what might I be missing? ---
**Author:** ![DBCooper](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/c77e96/32.png) [@DBCooper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DBCooper)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2000, 3:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/nowhere-to-go/24261/6 "2000-07-01T15:04:51Z")
Note to self: judging from these responses, should stick to the more prosaic debates nobody ever seems to get tired of, such as the existance of God, abortion…capital punishment…immigration…gun…control…getting sleepy…must…stay…awake…zzzzzzz ---
**Author:** ![tracer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tracer/32/20578_2.png) [@tracer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tracer)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2000, 3:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/nowhere-to-go/24261/7 "2000-07-01T15:17:38Z")
Near the end of the 19th century, physicists were convinced that their picture of the Cosmos was nearly complete. Aside from a few scruffy little details, like the exact mechanics of how electricity and magnetism are related, they thought they had it all figured out. Physics would become a “closed” subject within 10 or 20 years. Then Planck’s quanta and the Michaelson-Morley experiment came along and ruined the whole thing. I feel confident that the next time we think we’re about to have the universe completely figured out (and Stephen Hawking has said we’re pretty close), some new conundrum will poke its head into our living room and give us a whole new vista to explore, just like the last time. ---
**Author:** ![Saint\_Zero](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/c4cdca/32.png) [@Saint\_Zero](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Saint_Zero)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2000, 4:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/nowhere-to-go/24261/8 "2000-07-01T16:10:49Z")
> [@](#): > > \*\* > Note to self: judging from these responses, should stick to the more prosaic debates nobody ever seems to get tired of, such as the existance of God, abortion…capital punishment…immigration…gun…control…getting sleepy…must…stay…awake…zzzzzzz > \*\* You forgot the other 50% of the threads: Questions about Christianity. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![Gaudere](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e495f1/32.png) [@Gaudere](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gaudere)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2000, 4:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/nowhere-to-go/24261/9 "2000-07-01T16:40:16Z")
“Everthing that can be invented has been invented.”- Charles H. Duell, Director of U.S. Patent Office, 1899 I reckon if we ever do figure everything out (which may never happen in our species’ lifetime), we’ll have forgotten stuff we once knew. Then we can go rediscover all of those things. ---
**Author:** ![tracer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tracer/32/20578_2.png) [@tracer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tracer)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2000, 4:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/nowhere-to-go/24261/10 "2000-07-01T16:57:59Z")
Uh, Gaudere, I think you’ve just resurrected an old urban legend quote there. The Spring 1989 _Skeptical Inquirer_, pages 310-312, had an article titled “A Patently False Patent Myth” by Samuel Sass, which noted that the Charles H. Duell 1899 quote was probably fabricated in Morgan & Langford’s _The Book of Facts and Fallacies_ (St. Martin’s Press, 1981). ---
**Author:** ![Gaudere](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e495f1/32.png) [@Gaudere](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gaudere)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2000, 5:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/nowhere-to-go/24261/11 "2000-07-01T17:01:24Z")
Dammit! I suspected it might be, so I checked snopes and didn’t find it so I thought it was probably legit. ::sigh:: I should have known it was too good to be true. ---
**Author:** ![Ptahlis](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/a8b319/32.png) [@Ptahlis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ptahlis)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2000, 5:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/nowhere-to-go/24261/12 "2000-07-01T17:18:45Z")
Even if we understoof the “final solution” to physics, that wouldn’t imply that we could know everything. Like the atom, which we have a pretty good understanding of, those laws probably lend themselves to an infinite permutability which we could never fully explore, catalogue, or understand. ---
**Author:** ![DBCooper](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/c77e96/32.png) [@DBCooper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DBCooper)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2000, 5:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/nowhere-to-go/24261/13 "2000-07-01T17:52:12Z")
_To: [BlueMonchichi@sdmb.com](mailto:BlueMonchichi@sdmb.com) CC: [Satan@sdmb.com](mailto:Satan@sdmb.com) From: [DBCooper@sdmb.com](mailto:DBCooper@sdmb.com)_ > [@](#): > > \*\* > Near the end of the 19th century, physicists were convinced that their picture of the Cosmos was nearly complete. Aside from a few scruffy little details, like the exact mechanics of how electricity and magnetism are related, they thought they had it all figured out. Physics would become a “closed” subject within 10 or 20 years. > > Then Planck’s quanta and the Michaelson-Morley experiment came along and ruined the whole thing. > > I feel confident that the next time we think we’re about to have the universe completely figured out (and Stephen Hawking has said we’re pretty close), some new conundrum will poke its head into our living room and give us a whole new vista to explore, just like the last time. > \*\* P.S. I cordially invite the two of you yucksters to eat me. P.S.S. Thanks, Tracer, for taking it seriously. ---
**Author:** ![tracer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tracer/32/20578_2.png) [@tracer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tracer)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2000, 6:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/nowhere-to-go/24261/14 "2000-07-01T18:00:22Z")
Ptahlis wrote: > [@](#): > > Even if we understoof the “final solution” to physics, that wouldn’t imply that we could know everything. Like the atom, which we have a pretty good understanding of, those laws probably lend themselves to an infinite permutability which we could never fully explore, catalogue, or understand. Indeed, even Hawking, who believes we’re this () close to discovering the Universal Law of Everything [TM], makes this very point. Just because we know how one particle interacts with another does not mean it is easy, or even possible, to predict how a whole bunch of particles will interact with a whole other bunch of particles. Quantum mechanics has given us intimate, exacting knowledge of how electrons interact with nuclei and with each other, yet due to the sheer number of electrons in a single iron atom (let alone the number of electrons in the other atoms sitting next to that iron atom), we are no closer to being able to deduce the phenomenon of ferromagnetism from first principles than we were when the ancients discovered the first lodestone. ---
**Author:** ![DBCooper](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/c77e96/32.png) [@DBCooper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DBCooper)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2000, 6:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/nowhere-to-go/24261/15 "2000-07-01T18:03:46Z")
“Just because we know how one particle interacts with another does not mean it is easy, or even possible, to predict how a whole bunch of particles will interact with a whole other bunch of particles. Quantum mechanics has given us intimate, exacting knowledge of how electrons interact with nuclei and with each other, yet due to the sheer number of electrons in a single iron atom (let alone the number of electrons in the other atoms sitting next to that iron atom), we are no closer to being able to deduce the phenomenon of ferromagnetism from first principles than we were when the ancients discovered the first lodestone.” –Tracer So, in other words, we’ll never reach the ceiling I’m speaking of, although we may be able to at least SEE it from where we are?