So that would mean that even the beauty and symmetry people find in mathematics is an illusion.
Is everything all right here?
However, asymmetries and imperfections are everywhere and are essential to how nature works. The asymmetry of time, for example, the all-too-obvious fact that time only flows forward from past to future, giving us history and cause and effect. The origin of this unique directionality remains unknown. Confusingly, the fundamental equations of motion that model how particles move in space tells us that time could flow either way. But how fundamental are they if they tell something we don’t see? The usual answer invokes the complexity of the system: large systems made up of many interacting parts somehow force time to move forward. There are many ways that an egg can be scrambled, but only one that a scrambled egg can be unscrambled to its original shape. But that’s not proof, it’s evidence. If we dig deep into the argument, we see a few hidden assumptions that remain unjustified. Worse, from a cosmic perspective, time asymmetry is built into the properties of the very early universe: to be what it is today, the universe had to be much simpler in the past (or, in more appropriate jargon, have lower entropy). What set that stage? We don’t know.
Or take the elusive neutrinos, particles forged at the heart of the sun that hit you trillions of times per second. While particles like the electron or the proton spin either clockwise or counterclockwise, the neutrino is what we call a “left-handed” particle, only spinning in one direction. This asymmetry is essential for the workings of stars and radioactivity. Another one is the matter-antimatter asymmetry, the fact that even though the laws of physics state that particles of matter and of antimatter should exist in equal numbers, they don’t. If they did, the universe would be mostly filled with radiation, and we wouldn’t be here asking questions. Why the neutrino only spins one way? Why is there more matter than antimatter and what sets the value of the asymmetry? We don’t know. The models we have of particle physics add these asymmetries by hand to make things work. Not too beautiful anymore, at least not in a “perfect” sense of mathematical order and symmetry.
Asymmetry is the engine of change.
Marcelo Gleiser, “Physics needs an aesthetic revolution” at IAI.TV (October 4, 2021)
Right. Asymmetry allows the timeless to function in time. Of what would Marcelo Gleiser like to disabuse us?
Nature has its own aesthetics of the imperfect. To pretend otherwise and try to impose mathematical perfection as the only path to the truth impoverishes the many facets of nature’s beauty and leads, ironically, to a worldview as false and illusory as that depicted on Plato’s cave wall.
Marcelo Gleiser, “Physics needs an aesthetic revolution” at IAI.TV (October 4, 2021)
So what, exactly, is this “false and illusory” view? Is this short essay another veiled “correct” assault on the fact of the fine-tuning of the universe for life? There seems to be a lot of that out there these days:
Orthodox science is now in a deadly conflict with facts… There can only be one outcome.
You may also wish to read: Another shot in the campaign against the Big Bang. Bento’s theory sounds convincing — compared to the Easter Bunny. The question we should be asking is, why is the Big Bang so unpopular with these people?
Ethan Siegel makes another paper assault on the Big Bang Is the Big Bang the least popular widely accepted science theory? Theoretical astrophysicist Ethan Siegel wishes it out of existence by positing a cosmic inflation that wipes out all possibility of knowledge.
and
Physicist Brian Miller reflects on claims that the universe had no beginning Miller: Sutter asserts that Bento and Zalel’s article offers a credible response against the evidence for a cosmic beginning. Yet this claim is only based on what might be possible in the realm of the imagination.
The problem is not with science being in conflict with the facts. The problem is that science is trying to ascertain what are the facts.
There are known problems with the Big Bang theory so trying to find other explanations which address them is what science should be doing. We have relativity theory now because there were known problems with Newtonian mechanics which scientists of the period were trying to address. Einstein got there first.
Seversky:
I quite agree. All scientific knowledge is provisional, i.e. subject to new data and research. Also, all models are limited so there should be a continuous search for ‘better’, more comprehensive models.
Seversky and JVL still huddling over the sinking coals of a lie.
Belfast: Seversky and JVL still huddling over the sinking coals of a lie.
What’s your alternative? Something which is specific, time conscious, well documented in the scientific literature?
Belfast
I’d like to know what the lie is over which they are huddled. You make it sound pretty dramatic, whatever it is…
Marcelo Gleiser, who holds Darwinian evolution to be a true scientific theory,,,,
,,, Marcelo Gleiser, who holds Darwinian evolution to be a true scientific theory, should take a deeper look at what Darwinism actually entails and realize that if the reductive materialism of Darwinian evolution were actually true then, not only are beauty and mathematics to be considered illusory, but Marcelo Gleiser’s entire sense of self also becomes illusory.
i.e. Marcelo Gleiser himself is merely a ‘neuronal illusion’ generated by his brain!
Here are a few notes to that effect:
Although the Darwinian Atheist and/or Methodological Naturalist may firmly believe that he is on the terra firma of science (in his appeal, even demand, for naturalistic explanations over and above God as a viable explanation), the fact of the matter is that, when examining the details of his materialistic/naturalistic worldview, it is found that Darwinists/Atheists themselves are adrift in an ocean of illusions and imagination with no discernible anchor for reality to grab on to.
It would be hard to fathom a worldview more antagonistic to modern science, indeed more antagonistic to reality itself, than Atheistic materialism and/or methodological naturalism have turned out to be.
Of supplemental note, although Marcelo Gleiser, a physicist, grouped evolution with the Big Bang and Relativity, evolution simply has no right to be grouped with those well tested theories of physics.
Even arch-Darwinist Jerry Coyne himself honestly admitted as much,
I don’t quite understand why Gleiser thinks that his examples of asymmetries, such as the directionality of time, are support for his claim that the universe lacks beauty.
What is he doing anyway? Is “beauty” a scientific concept?
To the extent that this comment is even coherent, it is a complete non sequitur. Gleiser’s short article has nothing to do with ID’s sacred cow of fine tuning. More important, it does not “mean that even the beauty and symmetry people find in mathematics is an illusion.”
Gleiser is clearly not saying, as Bornagain suggests, that:
Rather, Gleiser explains very clearly what he means, following directly from the title of his article:
In other words, as Gleiser’s title says, physics needs an aesthetic revolution…..
seversky:
Scientists do that using science.
The lie is that nature didit. The lie is that the universe spontaneously arose. That is untestable and ass such still nonsense.
CD, you do realize that I was talking about the self-refuting epistemology inherent in what Darwin’s theory actually entails do you not?
Bornagain
It is hard to miss; it is a common theme in your comments.
However, I don’t see its relevance. You say that in Gleiser’s view, “beauty and mathematics [are] to be considered illusory….” You are clearly trying to paint Gleiser as some kind of nihilistic bogeyman who claims that all beauty and mathematics are illusory.
But that is not what Gleiser says. What he says is that attempting to deny the imperfection of nature and instead impose on nature mathematical perfection, as many physicists do in their obsession with finding symmetries, leads to a false and illusory worldview.
It seems like a pretty simple distinction to me…….
Whatever CD. Gleiser thinks “he” is making a rational argument. Yet Gleiser holds Darwin’s theory to be true. Thus Gleiser undermines any claim that he is making, or can ever make, a rational argument.