> -----Original Message----- > From: Gruss Gott [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] > Sent: Friday, December 07, 2007 4:26 PM > To: CF-Community > Subject: Re: Christian's: Paranoid or not > > > Jim wrote: > > Lately there's been a lot of attacks on atheism and I'll happily > admit that > > I've probably struck back harder than was necessary. > > > If you go back to the definition of Buddhism (teachings to guide one > to directly experiencing reality), it leads one to ask what reality > is. > > Quantum physics, near as I can tell, says that reality is what we want > it to be. That is, without an observer, there is no reality and the > act of observing causes phenomena which creates reality.
Quantum physics doesn't really say that. ;^) Although a LOT of people have been using Quantum Physics to make all sorts of woo-woo claims in the past few decades: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quantum_mysticism http://www.csicop.org/si/9701/quantum-quackery.html http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?chanID=sa006&colID=13&articleID=0006F4CB-F0 90-11BE-AD0683414B7F0000 >From the SI article: "The conventional interpretation of quantum mechanics, promulgated by Bohr and still held by most physicists, says nothing about consciousness. It concerns only what can be measured and what predictions can be made about the statistical distributions of ensembles of future measurements. As noted, the wave function is simply a mathematical object used to calculate probabilities." This idea that the physical world CAN'T exist until an observer collapses the wave function just doesn't exist in actual Quantum Physics. The consensus is that, yes, the world continues to exist even when our backs are turned. Although the question may still be open as to how an observer might affect the outcome of wave function collapse there's nothing that even remotely suggests that that outcome would be "what we want it to be". Finally the wave function calculates possibilities... possibilities constrained by physical law. It's not like collapsing the wave function can "cause" ANYTHING to happen - rather it "pins" the system in place. Consider an electron: it can be anyplace in the universe, going at any speed and be at any energy state POSSIBLE FOR AN ELECTRON. This is represented mathematically by the wave function. Observing it's speed, for example, may be possible but that also places limits on its possible position and energy states. It "collapses the wave". Don't get me wrong here: I'm far, far from an expert. Quantum Physics is definitely a "big brain" area. But the quackery almost always stems from applying the requirements of the mathematical model to the reality of the physical world OR applying quantum effects to the macroscopic universe (which is tremendously problematic at best). At its worst its total gibberish - adding a veneer of "science-y" words to crap. You can now find "Quantum"-related words in nearly all lines of crap. Homeopathy, physic healing, free energy, etc. It's actually a fun little Google exercise: take a crappy claim and see how long it'll take you to find somebody claiming it's due to Quantum-whatever. In skeptical circles it's taken on the same kind of gravity as the "Hitler Rule": once somebody tries to connect something to Quantum Mechanics you're not going to get any more intelligent conversation on that topic. > If thesim is the belief in one god as creator of the universe, could > phenomena then be considered "God", and therefore the study of physics > be considered religion? If you're willing to redefine terms then, yes. Of course it could. ;^) Personally I'm not willing to redefine those terms in that way. I can't see why physicists would want to either. Jim Davis ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~| Enterprise web applications, build robust, secure scalable apps today - Try it now ColdFusion Today ColdFusion 8 beta - Build next generation apps Archive: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/CF-Community/message.cfm/messageid:247908 Subscription: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/CF-Community/subscribe.cfm Unsubscribe: http://www.houseoffusion.com/cf_lists/unsubscribe.cfm?user=89.70.5
