SCORE ONE FOR SIMPLICITY by Joe Fisher

Dear Joe Fisher

On seeing the comments to your essay, i got a suspicious, but I do not want to be unfair, so I am here to ask you: is it true that to those that comment favorable, you give a high vote, no matter their essay; and to those that are not so favorable, you vote "1"?

Alfredo Oliveira

Hi Jo I read your well-written essay, enjoyable for that and for the delightful pun " self-taut " great!

As an artist I could well understand the logic of accepting the reality of only what is literally seen at any one time. In Mideaval art each figure and shape is seen solid and whole, but the trend since the Rainnescance has been to only see from one viewpoint - and necessarily surfaces.

However..

if you look at a video of a baseball being manufactred like this one you can see all the stuff filling its insides. What happens to that material to justify your saying only the surface exists? Another problyem is with transparent materials such as a vase. Inside you can see a solid spca full of flower stems, water bubles and so forth. You will prbably say we are only seeing the surface of that.

OK no problem thanks to FQXI we are tfree to express our ideas here whatever they are.

Keep well

Vladimir

Dear Joe Fisher

OK! I though so, that is why I put the question, to give you the opportunity to clarify the subject. You know, it seems that there are some "trolls" around that are voting "1" by reasons that are certainly not the best. This is not a "reality show", at least it should not be. The important point is that we can friendly discuss each other ideas.

On my side, I up vote the essays that interest me the most, I do not down vote anybody. Community members can do it, but I think that authors of the essays should restrain to positive appreciations (above 5) when they consider that an essay presents a relevant contribution.

All the best

Alfredo

Dear Joe Fisher,

Thank you for visiting my essay and saying it is nice. I have downloaded your essay and will be reading it next week. We have communicated before in a past essay contest. I need to look at your position again. I remember that our approaches were different. I will see. Best wishes to you.

James Putnam

Dear Joe,

I am inspired by your deep criticism and enthusiasm for promoting the idea of simplicity of complexity (reality). I think that only the deepest criticism of the philosophical foundations of modern "fundamental science" will make it possible to overcome the crisis of understanding and "trouble with physics" (Lee Smolin) and build a model of the Universum that is uniform for physicists and lyricists , filled with the meanings of the "LifiWorld" (E. Husserl ). My high score for the promotion of the principle of simplicity.

Yours faithfully,

Vladimir

Joe,

I don't quite follow all that you say, but I know what you're trying to say. Your message has no less merit than many of the essays presented here carrying much better ratings. Good luck to you.

Bill.

Dear Joe Fisher, I think you did not see my answer:

"Everything should be made as simple as possible, but not simpler." That's my intention, indeed, with the essay. In this case, I deal with the problems dealt with the cornerstones of evolution, mainly the beginning, the origin. The proposal for chemical clocks is quite complicated in itself, as you can check in the additional notes and references. All you can do is approximate set of approximate chemical equations, which describe quite well the mechanism, but secondary products might be left out. I also made some simplified arguments using arrows on section 2, in order to show how to deal with the most important operators or regulators of the reaction.

The problem it is that the usual programs are extremely complicated and do not have a realistic expectation of a path from "primitive soup" to a cell. So, as you can see in the abstract, what I propose is more in the direction of an invitation to a new experimental program.

Dear Joe Fisher, I think you did not see my answer:

"Everything should be made as simple as possible, but not simpler." That's my intention, indeed, with the essay. In this case, I deal with the problems dealt with the cornerstones of evolution, mainly the beginning, the origin. The proposal for chemical clocks is quite complicated in itself, as you can check in the additional notes and references. All you can do is approximate set of approximate chemical equations, which describe quite well the mechanism, but secondary products might be left out. I also made some simplified arguments using arrows on section 2, in order to show how to deal with the most important operators or regulators of the reaction.

The problem it is that the usual programs are extremely complicated and do not have a realistic expectation of a path from "primitive soup" to a cell. So, as you can see in the abstract, what I propose is more in the direction of an invitation to a new experimental program.

Joe,

I found your essay to be better reading than some essays of more highly credentialed people. I particularly like the following:

"Men have never believed that Nature could ever produce a reality that was so simple, even single celled amoeba could deal with it."

and

"For some peculiar reason, scientists are convinced that their finite experiments in a laboratory are superior in the understanding of reality. They all fail to realize just how unnatural their activity is. Only nature can produce viable reality."

Lorraine

joe,

I stand in the middle of a crater with a bright laser on a fast rotating table. I spin up the table and turn on the laser. With my fantastic equipment the laser spot on the crater wall moves at warp 3 (three times the speed of light). Given that the laser light never moves from the surface of the laser how can the illuminated spot on the crater (a real surface) can move faster than light? Is the spot an object in motion or just my emotion?

Thanks for your essay.

Regards

Marts