The End of Time

JCNS,

Yes indeed, with the universe's foot on the accelerator, the end is near. However, I continue to work on the details of a variant of the Standard Model that is cyclic due to the nature of black holes. Unfortunately, this does not give us a way out since the phases of the different cycles of the cosmos are distinct and separated from each other via the light barrier.

Dan

Tom,

The horse has the blinkers. The jockey doesn't.

Your dependence on the model is unquestioned, but is it a matter of logic, or faith?

You insist it is a matter of logic, but how do you know, if you have never had the blinkers off?

If Einstein were alive today and I was to make the observation to him that the problem is trying to model the narrative effect, rather than the physical process, he would either slap his head and say; Of course! Or he would say; No, because... and give a clear and logical reason as to why. There would be none of these muddled misquotes and evasions. That's the difference between wearing blinkers because they are necessary, versus being able to see clearly and focused in the first place and not needing blinkers.

Steve,

And bubbles. Don't forget the bubbles. They are the spheres that grow until they pop.

Dan,

Good luck with your work on the variant to the Standard Model of Cosmology. From the sound of things, however, you'd better get a move on. Tempus fugit.

"At my back I always hear time's winged chariot hurrying near; and yonder all before us lie deserts of vast eternity." (--Andrew Marvell, 'To His Coy Mistress')

As I read the articles and blogs here at FQXi I become ever more convinced that science is the coy mistress of us all.

Best,

jcns

Blinkers are used to train, John. Just as scientific method is used to train one's mind to ignore personal belief in favor of objective theory.

Personal belief leads one to all manner of distracting conclusions, such as believing that one can know what's in Einstein's mind a half century after his death.

All that one can objectively know of Einstein, however, is contained in the history and mathematics of classical physics -- in whose principles and practice Einstein was well trained by his "blinkers."

Tom

John,

With apologies for jumping into the middle of your interesting dialogue with Tom, I'd like to recommend to you (as I know I've done in the past) that you read Thomas S. Kuhn's excellent book, 'The Structure of Scientific Revolutions.' This book speaks directly, explicitly, and eloquently to exactly the topic of your debate here. When I made this recommendation to you in the past you said you were too busy to read it. From what I've been reading here in these blogs it appears that you've somehow found or made time to read any number of other works. Just a suggestion. I think you'd like the book.

Best,

jcns

Kuhn is well worth reading. However, I take Karl Popper's side in the debate

Tom

Tom,

Thank you for that cogent summary of the Kuhn/Popper debate. It's my own view that both sides have merit and are not mutually exclusive in terms of real world, rubber meets the road advancement of science. I think no one would disagree with Popper's insistence on the importance of falsifiability as being a hallmark of science. Without that we have nothing.

The point I was hoping to make with John is that Kuhn's book does an excellent job, in my opinion, of citing numerous specific examples from the history of science to illuminate the points he's making. I suspect that some of these will resonate with John's thinking about the state of science today. Regardless of whether one agrees with every aspect of Kuhn's thesis, his book is a great and fascinating read!

Best,

jcns

It's true that Kuhn has history on his side. That very fact, however, is one of the things that Popper opposed. "Historicism," said Popper, endorses the instruments that suppress creativity. Popper was a liberal in every respect, and science, on the rationalist side of the creative process, is a most important -- though not only -- jewel in the crown of the open, liberal, rational society.

Historicism, OTOH, is always in the best interests of the authoritarian and totalitarian.

Tom

jcns,

Shorn of the personalities, it seems to be the dichotomy of evolution and what Stephen Jay Gould called "punctuated equilibrium." What was originally called catastrophism and is currently studied as Complexity theory.

They are two legitimate processes and serve to balance one another. The evolutionary progression of knowledge is quite successful at elaborating and expanding on a set of agreed premises, but it does necessarily avoid questioning those premises for the very basic reason that it is not possible to instill confidence in a system that is open to question. It would be like trying to build a building, while the plans are constantly being reconsidered and revised. If those who construct this system do keep in mind the potential for subjectivity, they can allow some flexibility, but the more successful any system is, be it scientific, social, economic, political, etc. the more it attracts adherents who lose sight of this subjectivity and treat those basic premises as absolute values and this is where the cancer starts to set in, as growth of the system becomes paramount.

The process of growth and collapse/contraction/consolidation is fundamental to natural processes. Biology overcomes this limiting factor by making organisms extremely mortal. This resets the species on a continuously adaptable basis and so the process of revolution, death of the old/birth of the new, is incorporated into the evolutionary process. Then on the next level up, entire species function as organisms, filling niches as long as they exist and either dying off, or adapting to new niches.

The reason Kuhn's view is not "rational," from the Popper perspective, is that it's not linear. There is no clear step from one stage to the next. Being non-linear, it is more of a statistical event, a tipping of the scales. The straw breaking the camel's back. It is when the old system has become so overwhelming as to lose sight of all context, that the reset occurs. In terms of current politics, who would have thought one fruit seller setting himself on fire could have brought down various different regimes and sent shock waves through many others? It was simply not predictable, especially by those who are professionally employed to study such things, because their very function is control and this is the point control is lost.

You can push a model far, far beyond its original mandate, but eventually that extra distance creates an ever greater pushback.

There is a feature to earthquakes which reminds me of what is going on under the radar in science and that is liquefaction of previously solid ground. Much as those who questioned the banking system years ago were considered crackpots and are now being seen as prescient, there seems to be ever more questioning of physics by laypeople in various forums associated with Newscientist, SciAm, physorg, etc, than I ever remember before. There is only so much talk of multiverses, etc. that people can take, before they start scratching their heads and considering alternatives. The current physics will find its social foundations as unstable as many of the ideas it has been churning out.

The reset is coming, but we will only know after it happens.

jcns,

Admittedly having two jobs, etc, whatever free time I have is currently being spent reading news and following a few conversations, but if I may recommend a book you might find interesting, it would be Gilbert Murray's The Five Stages of Greek Religion, as a short, in depth analysis of the origins of western civilization. As such, it offers clear examples of how the most basic paradigms formed, solidified, broke down and were replaced, to take other forms, as our thought processes emerged from their native soil.

John,

I'll get the book you recommended and read it. I'm fortunate to have (or be able to make) the time to read what I like. Thank you for the recommendation.

Tom,

". . . the authoritarian and totalitarian . . . ." ? What is that all about? Is this your idea of a brilliant argument?

Have fun, you two.

jcns

JCNS,

Remember, we're speaking of philosophy, not science. Philosophy always over-reaches -- it's not my argument, it's the argument between Kuhn and Popper.

Tom

Tom,

Philosophy always over-reaches

How true.

"Popper argued that the central feature of science was that science aims at falsifiable claims."

As I've asked innumerable times, how can a theory be proven false, if every time there is a mismatch with observation, a patch is added? When you keep patching the theory, rather than questioning it, it is no longer science, it is faith.

You haven't understood the principle of falsification, John. Every observation is theory-laden -- no scientific theory can ever be verified, only falsified, i.e., proven wrong (which is why a valid scientific theory always provides its own means of being shown incorrect). "Patches" to you are new theories to the researcher,

You're looking for verification of a simple theory you personally believe to exist. Good luck. Objective science doesn't work that way.

Tom

Tom,

As shown in that article I posted above, July 4, 16:03, to which you didn't respond, I'm not the only one who finds currently cosmology to be an increasingly extreme patchwork.

John,

So what? Cosmology wasn't even considered a legitimate science by most until 20 or 30 years ago. It only got to be a hot topic in physics after Einstein pointed out the importance of the cosmological problem to general relativity.

Complaining about "patches" (most of which, in fact, follow from already successful theories) is farting in the wind. The kind of criticism that amounts merely to personal belief that all the answers should have been found by now if only the researchers believed in someone-or-another's personal version of "reality" is not useful to real research.

Tom

Tom,

It's not so much a matter of whether Big Bang/Inflationary cosmology is right, or not, but that the evidence does not support the level of confidence expressed in it.

Here is one more recent example I didn't bother posting: http://www.physorg.com/news/2011-07-supermassive-black-hole.html

John,

Until you understand that no scientific theory is EVER verified, you are likely to be disappointed with the amount of evidence for ANY theory that you happen to personally disagree with. Going by this standard, of course, you can also apply your personal belief to any theory you happen to agree with, and call the evidence "sufficient."

The "creationists" still insist there are no transitional fossils even when confronted with overwhelming evidence; they want transitions between the transitions. This game could go on infinitely.

Personal belief has no application to science.

Tom

Recent physical research on time suggests that time is not a physical reality in which humans perceive changes. Time measured with clocks is merely a numerical sequence of changes that takes place in quantum vacuum. Humans experience this constant flow of numerical sequence of change in the frame of psychological time, i.e. "past-present-future". In physical reality, the past, present, and future exist only as a mathematical numerical sequence of change taking place in quantum vacuum; time as a numerical sequence of change as measured with clocks is exclusively a mathematical quantity. We humans perceive this mathematical numerical order of change with our senses, then it is processed within the framework of linear psychological time "past-present-future", and finally it is experienced. The physical time that we measure with clocks is exclusively a numerical sequence of physical change, while the linear "past-present-future" time is exclusively a psychological reality contained in the human mind.Attachment #1: Relation_between_psychological_time_and_physical_time.pdf