Is the “Multiverse” Reaching its Sell By Date?

22 Replies to “Is the “Multiverse” Reaching its Sell By Date?”

1. 1
   sean samis says:

   August 31, 2016 at 8:07 am

   The Atlantic’s article titles are of no importance. Scientific models don’t have expiration dates. And the problem of living ethically dogs religion as much as irreligion (as ISIS/ISIL demonstrates).

   sean s.
2. 2
   bornagain77 says:

   August 31, 2016 at 8:39 am

   The double slit experiment, which was mentioned in the article, is VERY friendly to Christian concerns:

   Double Slit, Quantum-Electrodynamics, and Christian Theism – video
   https://www.facebook.com/philip.cunningham.73/videos/vb.100000088262100/1127450170601248/?type=2&theater

   An Interaction-Free Quantum Experiment (Zeilinger Bomb Tester experiment and Detector is only placed at one slit during the double slit yet the photon or electron still collapses in the unobserved slit) – video – May 2016
   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vOv8zYla1wY

   Here is a bit deeper look at the many fallacies inherent in the Many Worlds Interpretation:

   A Critique of the Many Worlds Interpretation – (Inspiring Philosophy – 2014) – video
   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_42skzOHjtA&list=UU5qDet6sa6rODi7t6wfpg8g

   Of related note. Many Worlds interpretation (MWI) denies the actuality of wave-function collapse:

   Quantum mechanics
   Excerpt: The Everett many-worlds interpretation, formulated in 1956, holds that all the possibilities described by quantum theory simultaneously occur in a multiverse composed of mostly independent parallel universes.[43] This is not accomplished by introducing some new axiom to quantum mechanics, but on the contrary by removing the axiom of the collapse of the wave packet:
   http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Q.....plications

   The many-worlds interpretation is an interpretation of quantum mechanics that asserts the objective reality of the universal wavefunction and denies the actuality of wavefunction collapse.
   https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Many-worlds_interpretation

   Yet, contrary to MWI, the following experiment shows that the collapse of the wave function is a real effect,,

   Quantum experiment verifies Einstein’s ‘spooky action at a distance’ – March 24, 2015
   Excerpt: An experiment,, has for the first time demonstrated Albert Einstein’s original conception of “spooky action at a distance” using a single particle.
   ,,Professor Howard Wiseman and his experimental collaborators,, report their use of homodyne measurements to show what Einstein did not believe to be real, namely the non-local collapse of a (single) particle’s wave function.,,
   According to quantum mechanics, a single particle can be described by a wave function that spreads over arbitrarily large distances,,,
   ,, by splitting a single photon between two laboratories, scientists have used homodyne detectors—which measure wave-like properties—to show the collapse of the wave function is a real effect,,
   This phenomenon is explained in quantum theory,, the instantaneous non-local, (beyond space and time), collapse of the wave function to wherever the particle is detected.,,,
   “Einstein never accepted orthodox quantum mechanics and the original basis of his contention was this single-particle argument. This is why it is important to demonstrate non-local wave function collapse with a single particle,” says Professor Wiseman.
   “Einstein’s view was that the detection of the particle only ever at one point could be much better explained by the hypothesis that the particle is only ever at one point, without invoking the instantaneous collapse of the wave function to nothing at all other points.
   “However, rather than simply detecting the presence or absence of the particle, we used homodyne measurements enabling one party to make different measurements and the other, using quantum tomography, to test the effect of those choices.”
   “Through these different measurements, you see the wave function collapse in different ways, thus proving its existence and showing that Einstein was wrong.”
   http://phys.org/news/2015-03-q.....tance.html

   Moreover, Many Worlds truly exposes materialism in all its full blown absurdity. i.e. The material particle is given so much unmerited power in the many worlds interpretation of Quantum Mechanics that every time someone simply observes a particle, instead of the wave function merely collapsing, the particle instead creates a virtual infinity of parallel universes.

   Too many worlds – Philip Ball – Feb. 17, 2015
   Excerpt:,,, You measure the path of an electron, and in this world it seems to go this way, but in another world it went that way.
   That requires a parallel, identical apparatus for the electron to traverse. More – it requires a parallel you to measure it. Once begun, this process of fabrication has no end: you have to build an entire parallel universe around that one electron, identical in all respects except where the electron went. You avoid the complication of wavefunction collapse, but at the expense of making another universe.,,,
   http://aeon.co/magazine/scienc.....a-fantasy/

   Many worlds is basically saying that, instead of God, the material particle has somehow bestowed within itself the omnipotent power to create as many universes as it wants or needs to in order to ‘explain away’ wave function collapse! And I am not overstating the bizarre case in the least!

   Atheism and the remarkable faith of the atomist – by Dave Armstrong • May 12, 2016
   Excerpt: The atheist places extraordinary faith in matter — arguably far more faith than we place in God, because it is much more difficult to explain everything that “god-matter” does using science alone.,,,
   One might call this (to coin a phrase) Atomism (“belief that the atom is god”). To the atomist, trillions of omnipotent, omniscient atoms can do absolutely everything that the Christian God can do, and for little or no reason that anyone can understand (i.e., why and how the atom-god came to possess such powers in the first place). The atomist openly and unreservedly worships these trillions of gods, with the most perfect, trusting, non-rational faith. He or she is what sociologists call a “true believer.”
   http://www.themichigancatholic.....h-atomist/
3. 3
   sean samis says:

   August 31, 2016 at 8:48 am

   Since the MWI is different from multiverse models, comment #2 seems irrelevant.

   sean s.
4. 4
   bornagain77 says:

   August 31, 2016 at 9:05 am

   perhaps someone should read the article.
5. 5
   sean samis says:

   August 31, 2016 at 9:12 am

   I did. Much ado about nothing.

   sean s.
6. 6
   bornagain77 says:

   August 31, 2016 at 9:59 am

   “I did.”

   Then why in blue blazes did you make your comment at 3 when he makes it clear in his article that he is talking about the multiverse associated with Many Worlds? And why not apologize for being wrong in your comment at 3 whether you read the article previously or not?

   Moreover, if you disagree that MWI is a subset of the multiverse scenarios envisioned by atheistic materialists to try to get around the Theistic implications of the creation and sustaining of the universe, then why don’t you take that up with Dr. Multiverse himself, Max Tegmark, in which he lists the MWI as a distinct subset of the multiverse scenarios?

   Parallel Universes by Max Tegmark – (Ironically subtitled) Not Just A Staple Of Science Fiction Other Universes Are Direct Implications Of Cosmological Observations – May 2003
   http://space.mit.edu/home/tegm....._sciam.pdf

   LEVEL III MULTIVERSE
   QUANTUM MECHANICS PREDICTS a vast number of parallel universes by broadening the concept of “elsewhere.” These universes are located elsewhere, not in ordinary space but in an abstract realm of all possible states. Every conceivable way that the world could be (within the scope of quantum mechanics) corresponds to a different universe. The parallel universes make their presence felt in laboratory experiments, such as wave interference and quantum computation.

   As to Tegmark’s claim that wave interference and quantum computation supports MWI, here are refutations to those two claims:

   A Conversation with Henry Stapp, Ryan Cochrane – March 2014
   Excerpt: As a junior in college, at the University of Michigan, (around 1950), I carried out, during Easter vacation a double-slit experiment where the photons were, on average, 1 km apart, and verified that effect was not due (to) different photons interfering with one another.
   Henry Stapp – Physicist
   http://social-epistemology.com.....-cochrane/

   Is Shor’s algorithm a demonstration of the many worlds interpretation?
   Excerpt: David Deutsch is very fond of pointing out Shor’s integer factorization algorithm is a demonstration of the many worlds interpretation. As he often asked, where else did all the exponentially many combinations happen?
   Are there any other alternative interpretations of quantum mechanics which can explain Shor’s algorithm, and the Deutsch-Jozsa and Simon’s algorithm?
   ,,, this argument is totally wrong for a simple reason: the real Universe – our Universe – is a quantum system, not a classical system. So it is normal for quantum systems in a single Universe to behave just like the quantum computer running Shor’s algorithm. On the contrary, if we only use the classical computers, we exponentially slow down the computer relatively to what it could do. In this sense, Deutsch’s “argument” shows that the many-worlds interpretation is just another psychological aid for the people who can’t resist to incorrectly think about our world as being a classical world of a sort.,,,
   There is one more lethal conceptual problem with the “many worlds” explanation of the Shor’s algorithm’s speed: the whole quantum computer’s calculation has to proceed in a completely coherent way and you’re not allowed to imagine that the world splits into “many worlds” as long as things are coherent i.e. before the qubits are measured. Only when the measurement is completed – e.g. at the end of the Shor’s algorithm calculation – you’re allowed to imagine that the worlds split. But it’s too late because by that moment, the whole calculation has already been done in a single (quantum) world, without any help from the parallel worlds.
   (Many more excellent answers are on the site)
   http://physics.stackexchange.c.....rpretation
7. 7
   News says:

   August 31, 2016 at 10:01 am

   Yes, it’s remarkable that a magazine like the Atlantic should take an interest and take this view.

   The multiverse is giving cosmology a bad name because most people are not yet ready to give up on falsifiability If we do, why fund science?
8. 8
   sean samis says:

   August 31, 2016 at 10:20 am

   Multiverse models are potentially falsifiable; there are active efforts to test them even now.

   We fund science because it’s the most reliable way to gain knowledge about the world we live in; and that knowledge is valuable.

   sean s.
9. 9
   bornagain77 says:

   August 31, 2016 at 10:56 am

   Exactly how do you falsify any particular multiverse theory that predicts everything?

   “These multiverse theories all share the same fundamental defect: They can be neither confirmed nor falsified. Hence, they don’t deserve to be called scientific, according to the well-known criterion proposed by the philosopher Karl Popper. Some defenders of multiverses and strings mock skeptics who raise the issue of falsification as “Popperazi” — which is cute but not a counterargument. Multiverse theories aren’t theories — they’re science fictions, theologies, works of the imagination unconstrained by evidence.”
   http://www.evolutionnews.org/2.....80281.html

   Cosmic inflation is dead, long live cosmic inflation – 25 September 2014
   Excerpt: (Inflation) theory, the most widely held of cosmological ideas about the growth of our universe after the big bang, explains a number of mysteries, including why the universe is surprisingly flat and so smoothly distributed, or homogeneous.,,,
   Paul Steinhardt of Princeton University, who helped develop inflationary theory but is now scathing of it, says this is potentially a blow for the theory, but that it pales in significance with inflation’s other problems.
   Meet the multiverse
   Steinhardt says the idea that inflationary theory produces any observable predictions at all – even those potentially tested by BICEP2 – is based on a simplification of the theory that simply does not hold true.
   “The deeper problem is that once inflation starts, it doesn’t end the way these simplistic calculations suggest,” he says. “Instead, due to quantum physics it leads to a multiverse where the universe breaks up into an infinite number of patches. The patches explore all conceivable properties as you go from patch to patch. So that means it doesn’t make any sense to say what inflation predicts, except to say it predicts everything. If it’s physically possible, then it happens in the multiverse someplace
   Steinhardt says the point of inflation was to explain a remarkably simple universe. “So the last thing in the world you should be doing is introducing a multiverse of possibilities to explain such a simple thing,” he says. “I think it’s telling us in the clearest possible terms that we should be able to understand this and when we understand it it’s going to come in a model that is extremely simple and compelling. And we thought inflation was it – but it isn’t.”
   http://www.newscientist.com/ar.....CajrGl0y00

   A Matter of Considerable Gravity: On the Purported Detection of Gravitational Waves and Cosmic Inflation – Bruce Gordon – April 4, 2014
   Excerpt: Thirdly, at least two paradoxes result from the inflationary multiverse proposal that suggest our place in such a multiverse must be very special: the “Boltzmann Brain Paradox” and the “Youngness Paradox.” In brief, if the inflationary mechanism is autonomously operative in a way that generates a multiverse, then with probability indistinguishable from one (i.e., virtual necessity) the typical observer in such a multiverse is an evanescent thermal fluctuation with memories of a past that never existed (a Boltzmann brain) rather than an observer of the sort we take ourselves to be. Alternatively, by a second measure, post-inflationary universes should overwhelmingly have just been formed, which means that our existence in an old universe like our own has a probability that is effectively zero (i.e., it’s nigh impossible). So if our universe existed as part of such a multiverse, it would not be at all typical, but rather infinitely improbable (fine-tuned) with respect to its age and compatibility with stable life-forms.
   http://www.evolutionnews.org/2.....84001.html

   Multiverse Mania at Wikipedia – Woit – March 9, 2014
   Excerpt: It’s hard to know where to start with a document like this, and I’ve neither the time nor the Wikipedia expertise to start trying to edit it to something sensible (at this point I’d suggest that the most sensible edit would be to remove the whole thing).
   I include just a couple of random examples of problems with the entry. The “criticism” section has little actual criticism, just some mild comments from Ellis and Davies, together with positive quotes from them about the multiverse as a research program. Nothing from Gross or Steinhardt, for instance. Much of the “criticism” section is actually defense of the multiverse through claims about experimental evidence from Mersini-Houghton that I don’t think anyone except her takes seriously. Other claims of experimental evidence are completely outrageous, for instance we read that “Recent research has indicated the possibility of the gravitational pull of other universes on ours.[22]” where reference [22] is to a Planck collaboration paper which states the exact opposite (“There is no detection of bulk flow”).
   http://www.math.columbia.edu/~.....ss/?p=6758

   This Week’s Hype – November 3, 2011 by Peter Woit (Ph.D. in theoretical physics and a lecturer in mathematics at Columbia)
   Excerpt: the LHC has turned out to be dud, producing no black holes or extra dimensions,
   http://www.math.columbia.edu/~.....ss/?p=4118
10. 10
    sean samis says:

    August 31, 2016 at 11:40 am

    bornagain77;

    Re. #6

    This is going to seem strange to you, but because I am a rational person, Tegmark’s opinions are not Authoritative. Even his colleagues dare to disagree. Some reject the MWI, some reject multiverse models, some disagree on the details.

    But being a religious believer (as you are) perhaps makes you inclined to give some persons (like Tegmark) the Authority to declare some facts as true. We rational persons never grant that power to anyone. Nothing is so because [insert Eminent Scientist] says so. This difference has a lot to do with the long-lasting disputes on this site.

    And it is not just a little ironic that I have to explain this on a creationist site, devoted to declaring Eminent Scientists wrong!

    From what I have read, The MWI is about quantum wave collapse; about what happens in the world.

    Multiverse models are about how our Universe originated; about how the world came to be.

    It should be obvious that those two are different no matter how much they may be related. Quantum effects occur in biology, but that does not make either a subset of the other.

    As for Kriss’s article: like your #2, it is an attempt to shoe-horn religious ideas into some cherry-picked science.

    Re. #9;

    If you’ve actually read about multiverse models, then you already know how some are trying to observationally verify the idea. There’s this wonderful search engine called “Google”… Try it, you’ll be amazed what you will find.

    sean s.
11. 11
    mahuna says:

    August 31, 2016 at 12:36 pm

    Sean @ 8–

    “We fund science because it’s the most reliable way to gain knowledge about the world we live in; and that knowledge is valuable.”

    Well, no, child. We, that is the federal government and large tax-exempt “charities”, fund Science because otherwise colleges couldn’t charge obscene amounts of money to confer doctorates in Underwater Basket-weaving.

    Science pursued for practical application (i.e., the PORTION of knowledge that is valuable) is paid for by corporations who expect to improve their products. There ain’t no payback for yet another theory about Neanderthals or how closely whales are related to bears.
12. 12
    bornagain77 says:

    August 31, 2016 at 1:25 pm

    sean samis, who has now established himself as a troll, claims that

    “I am a rational person”

    Yet according to atheistic materialism in which there is no free will, and people become merely neuronal illusions, sean samis can neither be rational nor can he even be a real ‘person’.

    More on John Searle and Free Will – Michael Egnor – July 27, 2016
    Excerpt: the three defenses of free will that I listed are obvious points that any informed and minimally thoughtful person would raise.,,,
    The denial of free will is a psychiatric, not philosophical, issue.
    http://www.evolutionnews.org/2.....03026.html

    Sam Harris’s Free Will: The Medial Pre-Frontal Cortex Did It – Martin Cothran – November 9, 2012
    Excerpt: There is something ironic about the position of thinkers like Harris on issues like this: they claim that their position is the result of the irresistible necessity of logic (in fact, they pride themselves on their logic). Their belief is the consequent, in a ground/consequent relation between their evidence and their conclusion. But their very stated position is that any mental state — including their position on this issue — is the effect of a physical, not logical cause.
    By their own logic, it isn’t logic that demands their assent to the claim that free will is an illusion, but the prior chemical state of their brains. The only condition under which we could possibly find their argument convincing is if they are not true. The claim that free will is an illusion requires the possibility that minds have the freedom to assent to a logical argument, a freedom denied by the claim itself. It is an assent that must, in order to remain logical and not physiological, presume a perspective outside the physical order.
    http://www.evolutionnews.org/2.....66221.html

    Physicalism and Reason – May 2013
    Summary: So we find ourselves affirming two contradictory propositions:
    1. Everything is governed by cause-and-effect.
    2. Our brains can process and be changed by ground-consequent logical relationships.
    To achieve consistency, we must either deny that everything is governed by cause-and-effect, and open our worldviews to something beyond physicalism, or we must deny that our brains are influenced by ground-consequence reasoning, and abandon the idea that we are rational creatures.
    Ask yourself: are humans like falling dominoes, entirely subject to natural law, or may we stand up and walk in the direction that reason shows us?
    http://www.reasonsforgod.org/2.....nd-reason/

    “What you’re doing is simply instantiating a self: the program run by your neurons which you feel is “you.””
    Jerry Coyne

    The Confidence of Jerry Coyne – Ross Douthat – January 6, 2014
    Excerpt: then halfway through this peroration, we have as an aside the confession that yes, okay, it’s quite possible given materialist premises that “our sense of self is a neuronal illusion.” At which point the entire edifice suddenly looks terribly wobbly — because who, exactly, is doing all of this forging and shaping and purpose-creating if Jerry Coyne, as I understand him (and I assume he understands himself) quite possibly does not actually exist at all? The theme of his argument is the crucial importance of human agency under eliminative materialism, but if under materialist premises the actual agent is quite possibly a fiction, then who exactly is this I who “reads” and “learns” and “teaches,” and why in the universe’s name should my illusory self believe Coyne’s bold proclamation that his illusory self’s purposes are somehow “real” and worthy of devotion and pursuit? (Let alone that they’re morally significant:,,) Read more here:
    http://douthat.blogs.nytimes.c.....oyne/?_r=0

    The Heretic – Who is Thomas Nagel and why are so many of his fellow academics condemning him? – March 25, 2013
    Excerpt:,,,Fortunately, materialism is never translated into life as it’s lived. As colleagues and friends, husbands and mothers, wives and fathers, sons and daughters, materialists never put their money where their mouth is. Nobody thinks his daughter is just molecules in motion and nothing but; nobody thinks the Holocaust was evil, but only in a relative, provisional sense. A materialist who lived his life according to his professed convictions—understanding himself to have no moral agency at all, seeing his friends and enemies and family as genetically determined robots—wouldn’t just be a materialist: He’d be a psychopath.
    http://www.weeklystandard.com/.....tml?page=3

    Darwin’s Robots: When Evolutionary Materialists Admit that Their Own Worldview Fails – Nancy Pearcey – April 23, 2015
    Excerpt: Even materialists often admit that, in practice, it is impossible for humans to live any other way. One philosopher jokes that if people deny free will, then when ordering at a restaurant they should say, “Just bring me whatever the laws of nature have determined I will get.”
    An especially clear example is Galen Strawson, a philosopher who states with great bravado, “The impossibility of free will … can be proved with complete certainty.” Yet in an interview, Strawson admits that, in practice, no one accepts his deterministic view. “To be honest, I can’t really accept it myself,” he says. “I can’t really live with this fact from day to day. Can you, really?”,,,
    One section in his book is even titled “We Are Robots Designed Not to Believe That We Are Robots.”,,,
    When I teach these concepts in the classroom, an example my students find especially poignant is Flesh and Machines by Rodney Brooks, professor emeritus at MIT. Brooks writes that a human being is nothing but a machine — a “big bag of skin full of biomolecules” interacting by the laws of physics and chemistry. In ordinary life, of course, it is difficult to actually see people that way. But, he says, “When I look at my children, I can, when I force myself, … see that they are machines.”
    Is that how he treats them, though? Of course not: “That is not how I treat them…. I interact with them on an entirely different level. They have my unconditional love, the furthest one might be able to get from rational analysis.” Certainly if what counts as “rational” is a materialist worldview in which humans are machines, then loving your children is irrational. It has no basis
    within Brooks’s worldview. It sticks out of his box.
    How does he reconcile such a heart-wrenching cognitive dissonance? He doesn’t. Brooks ends by saying, “I maintain two sets of inconsistent beliefs.” He has given up on any attempt to reconcile his theory with his experience. He has abandoned all hope for a unified, logically consistent worldview.
    http://www.evolutionnews.org/2.....95451.html

    Existential Argument against Atheism – November 1, 2013 by Jason Petersen
    1. If a worldview is true then you should be able to live consistently with that worldview.
    2. Atheists are unable to live consistently with their worldview.
    3. If you can’t live consistently with an atheist worldview then the worldview does not reflect reality.
    4. If a worldview does not reflect reality then that worldview is a delusion.
    5. If atheism is a delusion then atheism cannot be true.
    Conclusion: Atheism is false.
    http://answersforhope.com/exis.....t-atheism/

    sean the troll goes on to claim that Tegmark is not an expert on multiverse models, Yet,,,

    Mathematician (Woit) wonders about the respectful reception new multiverse book is getting – January 25, 2014
    Excerpt: As recently as the 1990s, most scientists regarded the idea of multiple universes as wild speculation too far out on the fringe to be worth serious discussion. Indeed, in 1998, Max Tegmark, then an up-and-coming young cosmologist at Princeton, received an email from a senior colleague warning him off multiverse research: “Your crackpot papers are not helping you,” it said.
    Needless to say, Tegmark persisted in exploring the multiverse as a window on “the ultimate nature of reality”, while making sure also to work on subjects in mainstream cosmology as camouflage for his real enthusiasm. Today multiple universes are scientifically ‘respectable’, thanks to the work of Tegmark as much as anyone. Now a physics professor at Massachusetts Institute of Technology, he presents his multiverse work to the public in Our Mathematical Universe.
    http://www.uncommondescent.com.....s-getting/

    Thus basically we have sean revealing that he did not even read the article in 3. Then lying about not reading it in 5. Then making an unsubstantiated claim towards falsifiability in 8. Then in post 10 he falsely proclaims that the Tegmark to be a non-expert in the area of multiverses.

    Thus, all sean has really done in this thread is reveal himself to be a atheistic troll who could care less for truth. And if he persists in his gross misconduct towards me in his claims, I will ask that he be removed from UD for such gross misconduct.
13. 13
    wallstreeter43 says:

    August 31, 2016 at 1:49 pm

    Guys why hasn’t anyone posted this video link yet ?
    Physicist James Gates finds a special kind of computer code embedded deep withon the equations for string theory which prompted Neil degrassi Tyson to say “you mean to tell me that some entity just programmed the universe and we are just expressions of its code ?”

    https://youtu.be/oc4GOkHfxBY

    Very exciting stuff
14. 14
    sean samis says:

    August 31, 2016 at 2:28 pm

    I guess I should not be surprised; bornagain77 seems to regard anyone who dares to disagree as a troll, a liar, or both.

    But for the record; when bornagain77 wrote:

    sean the troll goes on to claim that Tegmark is not an expert on multiverse models, … Then in post 10 he falsely proclaims that the Tegmark to be a non-expert in the area of multiverses.

    Those are lies. At no point did I ever say anything like that. Search in vain for such statements from me.
    Unlike bornagain77, I do not advocate his banishment from the site for this gross misconduct. I’m a grown up; I don’t hide from bullies. We have a vigorous disagreement, nothing more.

    sean s.
15. 15
    Dionisio says:

    August 31, 2016 at 5:40 pm

    BA77

    Talking to a wall would be much more productive than replying to some of your interlocutors in this thread. 🙂

    But I assume you’re doing it for the anonymous onlookers/lurkers visiting this thread without commenting.

    Perhaps that’s a persuasive argument for using your interlocutors as a reminder for writing your interesting comments for the other visitors.

    In any case, thank you.

    BTW, some of your interlocutors might like to know that Norwegian Airlines is offering heavily discounted fares for trips to their beautiful fjords. Returning to their natural habitats seems very affordable these days. 🙂

    Banning doesn’t seem very polite, does it?
    It would be nicer if they voluntarily decide to get back to where they once belonged. 🙂

    However, in either case it would be a good riddance, because the hogwash they write shouldn’t be missed, except as motivational tools for writing for the serious readers. 🙂
16. 16
    chris haynes says:

    August 31, 2016 at 9:46 pm

    Dear Mr Sean Samis

    You claimed that “multiverse models are potentially falsifiable; there are active efforts to test them even now”

    You were asked how this could be done. Please answer the question
17. 17
    anthropic says:

    August 31, 2016 at 10:01 pm

    chris haynes 16

    “Dear Mr Sean Samis

    You claimed that “multiverse models are potentially falsifiable; there are active efforts to test them even now”

    You were asked how this could be done. Please answer the question”

    ———————————————————–

    Well, maybe they can’t be tested in THIS universe, but…
18. 18
    JDH says:

    September 1, 2016 at 9:57 am

    @sean samis

    please indicate your age range – I am just curious

    a) 10-20 b) 20-30 c) 30- 40 d) 40-50 e) >50
19. 19
    JDH says:

    September 1, 2016 at 11:15 am

    @sean semis – And I would also be interested in any other details of your curricula vitae

    Education –
    Professional Societies –
    Politics –

    I have an intellectual fascination with people who are unable to understand that the belief, “I can rightly conclude from the evidence that this is a material universe,” is an inherently self contradictory viewpoint and belongs to the set of ideas that CANNOT possibly be true.

    It is quite an achievement to be able to select for belief a statement which defies elementary logic.
20. 20
    Phinehas says:

    September 1, 2016 at 2:50 pm

    The thing that fascinates me is how atheists are shown to have prodigious faith in something eternal with god-like creative powers. It’s almost like they have no issues whatsoever believing in a god, just so long as it doesn’t bear that particular label.
21. 21
    HeKS says:

    September 1, 2016 at 3:47 pm

    Phinehas @20

    The thing that fascinates me is how atheists are shown to have prodigious faith in something eternal with god-like creative powers. It’s almost like they have no issues whatsoever believing in a god, just so long as it doesn’t bear that particular label.

    I tend to think that it’s because they don’t want that eternal thing with god-like creative powers to also be personal and have the ability to ground and impose moral values and duties on humans.

    As the multiverse has demonstrated, atheists have no problem at all with faith in something that is unseen, intangible, outside of the physical universe, eternal, capable of bringing about unlikely effects we can’t fully understand, and that cannot be falsified through any conceivable scientific experiment.

    The only thing they insist on stopping short of is something that is intelligent and that can ground moral values and duties … and probably they stop short of the former only because of the latter, as suggested by the willingness of some to accept the idea that we’re living in an intelligently designed simulation created by other contingent physical beings based largely on the same scientific evidence theists point to as suggestive of God’s existence, which they had denied suggested design until the simulation hypothesis came along. Neil deGrasse Tyson is one such example.

    BTW, long time no talk. I don’t know if you noticed but I responded in our conversation at the other board about 2 months ago.

    Take care,
    HeKS
22. 22
    Phinehas says:

    September 1, 2016 at 4:09 pm

    HeKS @21

    I tend to think that it’s because they don’t want that eternal thing with god-like creative powers to also be personal and have the ability to ground and impose moral values and duties on humans.

    Absolutely! The other thing I find a ironic is that the same atheists believe that consciousness somehow just “emerges” out of complexity. What could be more complex than the multi-verse? Maybe a conscious, eternal entity with god-like powers simply “emerged” out of that vast complexity. Oops. Can’t have that. We must, must, must not let a divine foot in the door. But the lesser complexity of a single human brain? Sure. Why not?

    I’ve been meaning to get back to our conversation at some point, but just haven’t found the time. Even if I don’t make it back, I enjoyed it for what it was and hope you did as well. I think it helped me sort out a few things, strengthening my beliefs, and what could be better than that?