Proof there is a God

[IfIonlyhadabrain]

True as long as the condition is static (zero state condition of pure potential).

But that timelessness exists only until an anomaly causes it to be no longer static. This symmetry breaking can be "instantaneous" setting in motion a metaphysical mathematical process "eventually" resulting in expression in reality (note my proposition of a single mega-quantum event, a single instant) creating the universe and its physical evolution thereafter.

Yes, of course it must be true that "prior" to the BB, if it is truly to be a timeless state, then that timelessness is instantaneous. This means that the universe both has always been, and also has a beginning. But, the problem with saying that a timeless (and therefore changeless) "prior" state existed without an actualizing agent is the problem of "how did the anomaly arise?" Even if, as Bohm proposes, a combination of suitable potentials may form an implication which may express itself in reality, some activity has to occur in order for that expression to take place, and if we're talking about a state of pure potential, no activity can take place except by an external agent. The only way around it is to suggest that the combination of potentials is itself an actualizing agent, in which case the presence of this combination, having always been present, implies that there never was a zero state condition to begin with, since the presence of the combination auto-actualizes from timeless instantaneity.

But that begs the question too... from whence does such an implicate order arise? A zero state condition of pure, infinite potential implies latent reality. But if that's true, then all of reality has always existed in latent form. Where does the logic of the universe come from? You appear to be saying, "it just is," which is about as useful as saying "God just is," except that the position of an infinite intellect as the source of said logic is more coherent than its absence. It appears nonsensical to say that the universe has implicate order "just because."

And therein lies the crux. In his book "Wholeness and the Implicate Order", Bohm proposed an "enfolded order" and that the combination of suitable potentials may form an implication which may express itself in reality.

Below is a review:
and


Here is more on Bohm's work: http://www.theosophy-nw.org/theosnw/science/prat-boh.htm

 

[Write4U]

Yes, of course it must be true that "prior" to the BB, if it is truly to be a timeless state, then that timelessness is instantaneous. This means that the universe both has always been, and also has a beginning. But, the problem with saying that a timeless (and therefore changeless) "prior" state existed without an actualizing agent is the problem of "how did the anomaly arise?" Even if, as Bohm proposes, a combination of suitable potentials may form an implication which may express itself in reality, some activity has to occur in order for that expression to take place, and if we're talking about a state of pure potential, no activity can take place except by an external agent. The only way around it is to suggest that the combination of potentials is itself an actualizing agent, in which case the presence of this combination, having always been present, implies that there never was a zero state condition to begin with, since the presence of the combination auto-actualizes from timeless instantaneity.

A timeless zero state does not imply total stasis, it just cannot be measured as duration but only as an instant when meta-physics become expressed in physical reality.

Time (beginning of change, duration, result) can only be associated (measured) with physical events. In the meta-physical world no such chronology exists.

p.s. perhaps our eleusive entanglement problem might reside there as part of the mathematical function (a cosmological constant).

But that begs the question too... from whence does such an implicate order arise? A zero state condition of pure, infinite potential implies latent reality. But if that's true, then all of reality has always existed in latent form. Where does the logic of the universe come from? You appear to be saying, "it just is," which is about as useful as saying "God just is," except that the position of an infinite intellect as the source of said logic is more coherent than its absence. It appears nonsensical to say that the universe has implicate order "just because."

According to Bohm it has. His Implicate applies to all possible universes. But potential may remain latent until called upon to perform work. Example E = Mc^2, a potential which is latent in all matter but only expressed occasionally in say, a super-nova or an atom bomb.

This is why I see E = Mc^2 as a timeless potential, a mathematical constant.

Potential: "That which may become reality". This is a profound statement, IMO.
Any manifestation in reality (Bohm's Explicate) is always preceded by potential. It is logical to assume that the potential for this universe existed (metaphysically) before the beginning of the universe.

 

[IfIonlyhadabrain]

A timeless zero state does not imply total stasis, it just cannot be measured as duration but only as an instant when meta-physics become expressed in physical reality.

Time (beginning of change, duration, result) can only be associated (measured) with physical events. In the meta-physical world no such chronology exists.

p.s. perhaps our eleusive entanglement problem might reside there as part of the mathematical function (a cosmological constant).

So, you're saying that time is a physical dimension, and not a metaphysical one. What reason do you have for asserting this?

According to Bohm it has. His Implicate applies to all possible universes. But potential may remain latent until called upon to perform work. Example E = Mc^2, a potential which is latent in all matter but only expressed occasionally in say, a super-nova or an atom bomb.

This is why I see E = Mc^2 as a timeless potential, a mathematical constant.

Potential: "That which may become reality". This is a profound statement, IMO.
Any manifestation in reality (Bohm's Explicate) is always preceded by potential. It is logical to assume that the potential for this universe existed (metaphysically) before the beginning of the universe.

But you said it yourself, "potential may remain latent until called upon to perform work." Potential doesn't self-actuate. It just doesn't. You've presented me with no reason to think that it does. There is always something real that actualizes it, that calls it into being.

 

[Aqueous Id]

So, you're saying that time is a physical dimension, and not a metaphysical one. What reason do you have for asserting this?

But you said it yourself, "potential may remain latent until called upon to perform work." Potential doesn't self-actuate. It just doesn't. You've presented me with no reason to think that it does. There is always something real that actualizes it, that calls it into being.

In the quantum world, things also happen spontaneously.

 

[IfIonlyhadabrain]

In the quantum world, things also happen spontaneously.

I've always disputed this position. In the quantum world, things appear to happen spontaneously. Remember also that the vacuums we create for these experiments are artificial. In other words, there is an applied activity involved in these so-called cause-less occurrences.

 

[Write4U]

I've always disputed this position. In the quantum world, things appear to happen spontaneously. Remember also that the vacuums we create for these experiments are artificial. In other words, there is an applied activity involved in these so-called cause-less occurrences.

In a physical sense, I agree, but your example may be a false equivalence. The law of cause and effect may well apply only to physical (real) things. In a timeless meta-physical state of pure superimposed potentials this law may not necessarily apply and one of those (infinite) potentials may well be the ability for self-causation which would make the BB inevitable.

When we speak of the "fabric of space", we are not identifying a physical structure, but a mathematical one. And once we accept mathematics as a fundamental part (potential) of the meta-physical world, then mathematical functions themselves may become causal to the symmetry breaking of the zero state condition.

Bohm calls it the "unfolding" and I am sure, this inspired the proposition of CDT which is based on the abstract iteration of the simplest geometric plane, the triangle. Note that CDT is "background independent". IOW it requires no external causality, but is a fractal self unfolding (iteration) of space.
Interestingly, fractals can be reduced to at least Plank scale. Beyond that we know very little about the laws in that arena, except they involve mathematics. But, like Pi, fractality may be an infinite function. In fact Pi seems very much connected to the fractal function.

Oddly, even abstract mathematics seem to have certain preferences and cooperative functions. This is one of the reasons we have theoretical science, using the mathematical functions and language to describe what may or must happen mathematically and what cannot happen.

 

[Aqueous Id]

I've always disputed this position. In the quantum world, things appear to happen spontaneously. Remember also that the vacuums we create for these experiments are artificial. In other words, there is an applied activity involved in these so-called cause-less occurrences.

A spot check reveals that the mean free path in extreme vacuum physics is about 40 km. If a vacuum chamber were 1 m in diameter (large for most experiments) then the expected value of a result influenced by insufficient vacuum would be - worst case -1 out of 40000, which says the result should be unaffected 99.9975% of the time, which is better than just about any other lab result you can name.

In this case, wavefunction collapse follows from Heisenberg's 1927 thought experiment. There is credible evidence to support Heisenberg, such as the following.

http://scitation.aip.org/content/aip/journal/jmp/55/4/10.1063/1.4871444

http://www.sciencemag.org/content/339/6121/801

The following shows that mean free path is not the limiting factor but rather the noise of the measurement (which is why I said 99.9975% is more than adequate for most experiments conceivable).

http://www.sciencemag.org/content/339/6121/801

Remaining is the issue of reconciling QM with a theoretical special result of spacetime curvature (time travel). However, I think this issue has been blown out of proportion in the threads here which serve as platforms for dogmatic anti-science folks. The better way to approach this other issue is by noting that there may be exceptions to the Uncertainty Principle (for example, that it may only apply to most, but not all, relativistic cases). But this doesn't relate to the mean free path achievable under extreme vacuum experiments.

Of course, any new finding that Heisenberg was wrong would never lead to dragging God into science. That simply will never happen, not until all of history and science is overturned by mountains of new evidence. And that will not happen. Well, within far better than 0.999975 probability.

 

[IfIonlyhadabrain]

In a timeless meta-physical state of pure superimposed potentials this law may not necessarily apply and one of those (infinite) potentials may well be the ability for self-causation which would make the BB inevitable.

This isn't really much different than Anselm's cosmological argument for God, which is a really bad argument. Just because you can imagine that a zero state could potentially self-start doesn't mean that it actually can (or did). You're talking about a huge cosmological leap here.

When we speak of the "fabric of space", we are not identifying a physical structure, but a mathematical one. And once we accept mathematics as a fundamental part (potential) of the meta-physical world, then mathematical functions themselves may become causal to the symmetry breaking of the zero state condition.

Bohm calls it the "unfolding" and I am sure, this inspired the proposition of CDT which is based on the abstract iteration of the simplest geometric plane, the triangle. Note that CDT is "background independent". IOW it requires no external causality, but is a fractal self unfolding (iteration) of space.
Interestingly, fractals can be reduced to at least Plank scale. Beyond that we know very little about the laws in that arena, except they involve mathematics. But, like Pi, fractality may be an infinite function. In fact Pi seems very much connected to the fractal function.

Oddly, even abstract mathematics seem to have certain preferences and cooperative functions. This is one of the reasons we have theoretical science, using the mathematical functions and language to describe what may or must happen mathematically and what cannot happen.

All this is fine and dandy... if all we were talking about was an abstract meta-physical world. What you're proposing, though, is that this is the source of the physical universe as well. Again, you're talking about an ontological leap that I simply don't see as being supported. It's a neat theory, but there's a LOT of "may bes" in there.

 

[IfIonlyhadabrain]

A spot check reveals that the mean free path in extreme vacuum physics is about 40 km. If a vacuum chamber were 1 m in diameter (large for most experiments) then the expected value of a result influenced by insufficient vacuum would be - worst case -1 out of 40000, which says the result should be unaffected 99.9975% of the time, which is better than just about any other lab result you can name.

In this case, wavefunction collapse follows from Heisenberg's 1927 thought experiment. There is credible evidence to support Heisenberg, such as the following.

http://scitation.aip.org/content/aip/journal/jmp/55/4/10.1063/1.4871444

http://www.sciencemag.org/content/339/6121/801

The following shows that mean free path is not the limiting factor but rather the noise of the measurement (which is why I said 99.9975% is more than adequate for most experiments conceivable).

http://www.sciencemag.org/content/339/6121/801

Remaining is the issue of reconciling QM with a theoretical special result of spacetime curvature (time travel). However, I think this issue has been blown out of proportion in the threads here which serve as platforms for dogmatic anti-science folks. The better way to approach this other issue is by noting that there may be exceptions to the Uncertainty Principle (for example, that it may only apply to most, but not all, relativistic cases). But this doesn't relate to the mean free path achievable under extreme vacuum experiments.

Of course, any new finding that Heisenberg was wrong would never lead to dragging God into science. That simply will never happen, not until all of history and science is overturned by mountains of new evidence. And that will not happen. Well, within far better than 0.999975 probability.

Even if Heisenberg is right (and I'm not putting that to doubt), there is still the question of the nature of wavefunction collapse as a fundamental phenomenon or an epiphenomenon. My position is that it is an epiphenomenon, and this is supported by quantum decoherence.

 

[Aqueous Id]

Even if Heisenberg is right (and I'm not putting that to doubt), there is still the question of the nature of wavefunction collapse as a fundamental phenomenon or an epiphenomenon. My position is that it is an epiphenomenon, and this is supported by quantum decoherence.

I thought we were discussing the adequacy of vacuum technology in physics, as a limitation against corroborating Heisenberg & Schrodinger.

As for this other issue, it does not render the measurement problem (observation -> wave function collapse; aka "first intervention") moot, but rather, it recasts it as a repackaged theory*.

I'm not sure where that leaves this question of spontaneity v. causality. It would seem just as easy to acknowledge spontaneity as to hope to render the entire history of the universe as the mere result of (say) conservation of momentum, from the Big Bang. (If that is where you are headed.) And then the Big Bang becomes all the more problematic as far as its role in the creation of "everything". In fact, I would think that if you would prefer to acknowledge the likelihood of spontaneity regardless of whether some other "second intervention" is causally connected to wavefunction collapse.

_____
*referencing

Decoherence offers a theoretical framework in which the measurement problem can be swept under the carpet (pushed into a system larger than that which we can observe). The effect is that quantum mechanics can be studied and presented to a student without the need for the ad hoc ``wave collapse'' being presented as a primary tool of the theory. One can achieve, in many cases, the same apparent effect of a wave collapse without recourse to von Neumann's mysterious first intervention.

Thus we clarify that decoherence is not a new theory unto itself, but is instead an efficient and fruitful repackaging of theory. It does not solve the measurement problem, and most certainly wouldn't have satisfied the reservations of Einstein in his later years.

http://www.physics.drexel.edu/~tim/open/main/node2.html
​

 

[Aqueous Id]

Yes, of course it must be true that "prior" to the BB, if it is truly to be a timeless state, then that timelessness is instantaneous. This means that the universe both has always been, and also has a beginning. But, the problem with saying that a timeless (and therefore changeless) "prior" state existed without an actualizing agent is the problem of "how did the anomaly arise?"

The other interpretation of a timeless state is that it is eternal (static) and contemporaneous with every instant of real time. Time, then, "emerges out of" or "diverges from" the ever-present static condition of timelessness. (That is, spacetime emerges out of the timeless spaceless condition which is contemporaneous with every instant and colocated with every point in real space.)

 

[IfIonlyhadabrain]

The other interpretation of a timeless state is that it is eternal (static) and contemporaneous with every instant of real time. Time, then, "emerges out of" or "diverges from" the ever-present static condition of timelessness. (That is, spacetime emerges out of the timeless spaceless condition which is contemporaneous with every instant and colocated with every point in real space.)

Actually, I agree with this, and hold this position.

 

[IfIonlyhadabrain]

I thought we were discussing the adequacy of vacuum technology in physics, as a limitation against corroborating Heisenberg & Schrodinger.

That was actually only a side-point for me. I didn't respond to your argument because I accept the validity of it. My main concern is the assertion that anything (quantum or otherwise) can arise causelessly. We observe this on the quantum level, but every other real phenomenon we know of doesn't act this way, so I find it problematic that we would jump to this conclusion. Hence my reference to decoherence, which lends support to the idea that wave function collapse is an epiphenomenon rather than a fundamental phenomenon (which I find problematic because the implication then is that the universe is basically stochastic). I understand the measurement problem still exists, but decoherence lends to the possibility that there's another explanation than spontaneity.

As for this other issue, it does not render the measurement problem (observation -> wave function collapse; aka "first intervention") moot, but rather, it recasts it as a repackaged theory*.

I'm not sure where that leaves this question of spontaneity v. causality. It would seem just as easy to acknowledge spontaneity as to hope to render the entire history of the universe as the mere result of (say) conservation of momentum, from the Big Bang. (If that is where you are headed.) And then the Big Bang becomes all the more problematic as far as its role in the creation of "everything". In fact, I would think that if you would prefer to acknowledge the likelihood of spontaneity regardless of whether some other "second intervention" is causally connected to wavefunction collapse.

_____
*referencing

Decoherence offers a theoretical framework in which the measurement problem can be swept under the carpet (pushed into a system larger than that which we can observe). The effect is that quantum mechanics can be studied and presented to a student without the need for the ad hoc ``wave collapse'' being presented as a primary tool of the theory. One can achieve, in many cases, the same apparent effect of a wave collapse without recourse to von Neumann's mysterious first intervention.

Thus we clarify that decoherence is not a new theory unto itself, but is instead an efficient and fruitful repackaging of theory. It does not solve the measurement problem, and most certainly wouldn't have satisfied the reservations of Einstein in his later years.

http://www.physics.drexel.edu/~tim/open/main/node2.html
​

Essentially, my argument could be reduced to: asserting spontaneity is as rational as just saying "God did it." We have an observation we can't explain. In every other instance of scientific study, we would say that there's an underlying variable that we're just not aware of yet that is causing this unexplained phenomenon. But not here. Eh, maybe I just don't get it. I'd readily admit to that.

 

[IfIonlyhadabrain]

.

 

[Kristoffer]

.

Well said.

 

[Write4U]

Essentially, my argument could be reduced to: asserting spontaneity is as rational as just saying "God did it." We have an observation we can't explain. In every other instance of scientific study, we would say that there's an underlying variable that we're just not aware of yet that is causing this unexplained phenomenon. But not here. Eh, maybe I just don't get it. I'd readily admit to that.

I am not sure if I can agree with that logic. To me that sounds like "random manifestations are a result of god's confusion." (thoughts?)

I have no quarrel with the word "divine" action (God caused) describing the mathematical abstract of "movement in the direction of greatest satisfaction" i.e. equilibrium.

However the implication of "purposeful" action by a supernatural superposition), makes physical proof impossible, unless presented in a circular reasoning.

OTOH, Potential offers an implication of a natural tendency of interaction between compatible potentials.

The four fundamental known forces are well defined in what context these attractive forces are causal to dynamic action.

• Gravity

• Electromagnetism

• Weak Interaction (or Weak Nuclear Force)

• Strong Interaction (or Strong Nuclear Force)

We always assign a prior physical background (framework) for these funamental physical forces, but according to Bohm these qualities exist in potential form (the implicate), before they become manifest, in our universe.

But the world of Potential (that which may become reality) is a metaphysical mathematical world and does not require purpose, just permission.

 

[Sarkus]

I am not sure if I can agree with that logic. To me that sounds like "random manifestations are a result of god's confusion." (thoughts?)

To me it sounds like he's saying we should simply say that the answer is currently unknown (and possibly unknowable?) as we do in science when confronted with insufficient/zero evidence one way or another.

 

[Write4U]

To me it sounds like he's saying we should simply say that the answer is currently unknown (and possibly unknowable?) as we do in science when confronted with insufficient/zero evidence one way or another.

I agree, however, to me a random event is more plausible than a purposeful act, which would not really clarify the mathematical nature of the universe.

 

[IfIonlyhadabrain]

I agree, however, to me a random event is more plausible than a purposeful act, which would not really clarify the mathematical nature of the universe.

Sarkus has it right, that is what I'm saying.

My position is that there's no such thing as purely spontaneous phenomena. We have no reason to posit this because except on the quantum level, we've never observed this. Moreover, I would suggest that the law of causation is a primal axiom.

Thus stated, if we're going to say that our only two options are random spontaneity versus intended causation, I'd bet on intended causation 100% of the time, because I have no reason to believe random spontaneity is even possible.

 

[Cris]

The very CONCEPT of existence necessarily involves the property of time. To state that there could be a meta-physical realm that is/was timeless is equivalent to stating that it does not exist. The status of existence requires a degree of continuity, even an infinitesimal small degree requires time to pass. Timelessness infers zero continuity and hence "Timeless Existence" is an oxymoron. Time becomes a fundamental requirement for something to be said to exist, whether physical or meta-physical.

A causation of anything necessarily involves the passage of time - the transition of a before state to an after state. Since we exist then there can never have been a point where time did not exist - if there was, then nothing could have begun and we couldn't be here discussing it. It follows that since time must have always been present then there cannot have ever been a beginning to everything. The BB cannot be the start point.