Is mathematics intrinsic to the universe?

_{Denyse O'Leary

May 20, 2015

News, Philosophy, Science}

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Good question to ponder overnight.

John Hartnett quotes cosmologist Lee Smolin*:

It is true that mathematics is not a human invention, but more of a discovery, and thus has objective existence in that sense. But to declare the magnificent edifice of Mathematics to inhabit an orthogonal dimension that is inaccessible to scientific scrutiny, is a hypothesis that cannot in principle be falsified, and thus, it is not a scientific hypothesis but more of a belief, for those who are inclined to believe it.

Best read the whole thing.

But is this part of the current, quite serious, war on falsifiability? If not, how not? Readers?

(*see also: Should we be nicer to cosmologist Lee Smolin? )

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Comments

RB
i don’t agrere. Right and wrong is not from math. This because the settled presumptions of right and wrong are not settled. the math or logic is only a mechanism. math like logic is meaningless to truth. Unless settled points are established.
Ok, I disagree. Although it would certainly make it easier (in some ways) to be a YEC if math and logic are meaningless to truth. If there is no truth difference between a count of 6 and a million then there's no way to tell if the earth is young or old anyway. My theological point of view is different from yours, so this is probably not the best place to argue about that. I accept your difference of opinion - we could leave it at that.Silver Asiatic_{May 22, 2015
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Carpathian thanks for agreeing but i mean in a careful way. i mean math is just human discovery of details in the universe measurement. so math is a invention because of the claim its a accurate way of measuring the universe. i say its not and only a special case. this from the bibles implying Gods measurements are beyond us and God doesn't do OUR math.Robert Byers_{May 22, 2015
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Silver Asiatic. oh no. i don't agrere. Right and wrong is not from math. This because the settled presumptions of right and wrong are not settled. the math or logic is only a mechanism. math like logic is meaningless to truth. Unless settled points are established.Robert Byers_{May 22, 2015
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bfast. Yes your right and I did presume that our math conclusions were here from creation week. Yet i see it as a human invention. A human interpretion of the real measurement system. Its only a special case of accuracy. So i see it as a human invention. Counting 10 alligators is accurate but the universe doesn't recognize ten alligators but only alligators and a accurate number. Our count is not true but relative to a invented boundary.Robert Byers_{May 22, 2015
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mike1962 By invention i meant, and did say, that its a human construction to see this math. The real universe has no math. It has measurement and boundaries. yet I am aggressively saying math is a human idea. Yes the numbers worked from creation week. i'm saying mans discovery of math is a primitive interpretation of how the universe really is. math is premature just as Newton was in thinking things are explained.Robert Byers_{May 22, 2015
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Wheeler's Classic Delayed Choice Experiment: Excerpt: Now, for many billions of years the photon is in transit in region 3. Yet we can choose (many billions of years later) which experimental set up to employ – the single wide-focus, or the two narrowly focused instruments. We have chosen whether to know which side of the galaxy the photon passed by (by choosing whether to use the two-telescope set up or not, which are the instruments that would give us the information about which side of the galaxy the photon passed). We have delayed this choice until a time long after the particles "have passed by one side of the galaxy, or the other side of the galaxy, or both sides of the galaxy," so to speak. Yet, it seems paradoxically that our later choice of whether to obtain this information determines which side of the galaxy the light passed, so to speak, billions of years ago. So it seems that time has nothing to do with effects of quantum mechanics. And, indeed, the original thought experiment was not based on any analysis of how particles evolve and behave over time – it was based on the mathematics. This is what the mathematics predicted for a result, and this is exactly the result obtained in the laboratory. http://www.bottomlayer.com/bottom/basic_delayed_choice.htm An Interview with David Berlinski - Jonathan Witt Berlinski: There is no argument against religion that is not also an argument against mathematics. Mathematicians are capable of grasping a world of objects that lies beyond space and time …. Interviewer:… Come again(?) … Berlinski: No need to come again: I got to where I was going the first time. The number four, after all, did not come into existence at a particular time, and it is not going to go out of existence at another time. It is neither here nor there. Nonetheless we are in some sense able to grasp the number by a faculty of our minds. Mathematical intuition is utterly mysterious. So for that matter is the fact that mathematical objects such as a Lie Group or a differentiable manifold have the power to interact with elementary particles or accelerating forces. But these are precisely the claims that theologians have always made as well – that human beings are capable by an exercise of their devotional abilities to come to some understanding of the deity; and the deity, although beyond space and time, is capable of interacting with material objects. http://tofspot.blogspot.com/2013/10/found-upon-web-and-reprinted-here.html
of related note:
MAXWELL AND FARADAY - with audio Excerpt: Maxwell set the theoretical foundations of electric field theory in 1873. He says at the outset of his treatise, “Before I began the study of electricity I resolved to read no mathematics on the subject until I had first read [Faraday].” That’s an innocent enough remark until you follow it through. You see, Faraday’s pioneering work had made little sense to mathematicians. So Maxwell, a great mathematician himself, systematically went back and climbed inside Faraday’s head. There he found a great garden of delights. Here’s what he said about the experience: I found that … Faraday’s methods … begin with the whole and arrive at the parts by analysis, while the ordinary mathematical methods were founded on the principle of beginning with the parts and building up the whole by synthesis. http://www.uh.edu/engines/epi905.htm How the Recent Discoveries Support a Designed Universe - Dr. Walter L. Bradley - paper Excerpt: Only in the 20th century have we come to fully understand that the incredibly diverse phenomena that we observe in nature are the outworking of a very small number of physical laws, each of which may be described by a simple mathematical relationship. Indeed, so simple in mathematical form and small in number are these physical laws that they can all be written on one side of one sheet of paper, as seen in Table 1. http://www.leaderu.com/real/ri9403/evidence.html Designed Universe - Walter Bradley PhD. - video https://vimeo.com/105537135 “Occasionally I’ll have a bright engineering student who says, “Well you should see the equations we work with in my engineering class. They’re a big mess.”, The problem is not the fundamental laws of nature, the problem is the boundary conditions. If you choose complicated boundary conditions then the solutions to these equations will in fact, in some cases, be quite complicated in form,,, But again the point is still the same, the universe assumes a remarkably simple and elegant mathematical form.” – Dr. Walter Bradley
bornagain77_{May 21, 2015
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Robert Byers:
math is a human invention.
Agreed.Carpathian_{May 21, 2015
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Robert Byers
What did math ever do?
Math is a function of logic. It's the difference between true and false. It is built into the universe. You can't carry out a rational discussion without it.Silver Asiatic_{May 21, 2015
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It should be noted that Newton got into a bit of philosophical trouble for positing that God had to step in from time to time to correct the orbits of the planets:
"This most beautiful system of the sun, planets, and comets could only proceed from the counsel and dominion of an intelligent and powerful Being" -- Sir Isaac Newton. "Principia Mathematica" (1687) Perhaps the most spectacular early success of Isaac Newton’s theory of gravitation was its natural explanation for Johannes Kepler’s observation that the planets orbit the sun in elliptical orbits. But upon further reflection, some nagging problems emerge. The perfect elliptical orbits are only valid for an isolated planet orbiting around the sun. Gravity works on all objects, and so the other planets perturb the motion of the Earth, potentially leading to its ejection from the solar system. This problem vexed Sir Isaac, who postulated that God occasionally “reformed” the planets, perhaps by sending through a comet with just the right trajectory. In a famous exchange of letters, cut short only by his death in 1716, Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz, took Sir Isaac to task for his view. He objected that: "if God had to remedy the defects of His creation, this was surely to demean his craftsmanship."1 And moreover that: “..when God works miracles, he does it not to meet the needs of nature but the needs of grace. Anyone who thinks differently must have a very mean notion of the wisdom and power of God."2 In other words, the regular sustaining activity of God, as evidenced by natural laws, should be sufficient to explain the regular behavior of the solar system, without the need for additional ad-hoc interventions. Making it right the first time is more glorious than having to fix it later. Moreover, when God deviates from his regular sustaining activity to perform miracles, he does so for soteriological reasons, not to repair nature.,,, 1. 1. John Hedley Brooke, Science and Religion, CUP, Cambridge (1991), p147. 2. From letter 1 point 4 (Nov 1715). The full correspondence can be found online. http://www.earlymoderntexts.com/pdfs/leibniz1715.pdf As always in history, the whole story is more complex (and interesting) than the bits I highlight here. - per BioLogos
And indeed, Leibniz is found to be correct. The orbit of the planets are found to be ingeniously set up for long term stability:
Thank God for Jupiter - July 2010 Excerpt: The July 16, 1994 and July 19, 2009 collision events on Jupiter demonstrate just how crucial a role the planet plays in protecting life on Earth. Without Jupiter’s gravitational shield our planet would be pummeled by frequent life-exterminating events. Yet Jupiter by itself is not an adequate shield. The best protection is achieved via a specific arrangement of several gas giant planets. The most massive gas giant must be nearest to the life support planet and the second most massive gas giant the next nearest, followed by smaller, more distant gas giants. Together Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune provide Earth with this ideal shield. http://www.reasons.org/thank-god-jupiter Of Gaps, Fine-Tuning and Newton’s Solar System - Cornelius Hunter - July 2011 Excerpt: The new results indicate that the solar system could become unstable if diminutive Mercury, the inner most planet, enters into a dance with Jupiter, the fifth planet from the Sun and the largest of all. The resulting upheaval could leave several planets in rubble, including our own. Using Newton’s model of gravity, the chances of such a catastrophe were estimated to be greater than 50/50 over the next 5 billion years. But interestingly, accounting for Albert Einstein’s minor adjustments (according to his theory of relativity), reduces the chances to just 1%. per Darwin's God Milankovitch Cycle Design - Hugh Ross - August 2011 Excerpt: In all three cases, Waltham proved that the actual Earth/Moon/solar system manifests unusually low Milankovitch levels and frequencies compared to similar alternative systems. ,,, Waltham concluded, “It therefore appears that there has been anthropic selection for slow Milankovitch cycles.” That is, it appears Earth was purposely designed with slow, low-level Milankovitch cycles so as to allow humans to exist and thrive. Per Reason Org Evidence from self-consistent solar system n-body simulations is presented to argue that the Earth- Moon system (EM) plays an important dynamical role in the inner solar system, stabilizing the orbits of Venus and Mercury by suppressing a strong secular resonance of period 8.1 Myr near Venus’s heliocentric distance. The EM thus appears to play a kind of “gravitational keystone” role in the terrestrial precinct, for without it, the orbits of Venus and Mercury become immediately destabilized. … First, we find that EM is performing an essential dynamical role by suppressing or “damping out” a secular resonance driven by the giant planets near the Venusian heliocentric distance. The source of the resonance is a libration of the Jovian longitude of perihelion with the Venusian perihelion longitude. http://iopscience.iop.org/1538-3881/116/4/2055/pdf/1538-3881_116_4_2055.pdf
And while the infinite genius of God is reflected in 'making it right the first time', it should also be noted that God continuously upholds this universe in its continued existence:
Revelation 4:11 "You are worthy, our Lord and God, to receive glory and honor and power, for you created all things, and by your will they were created and have their being."
And this necessity for 'agent causality', i.e. God, to sustain the universe in its continued existence, (to ‘breathe fire into the equations’ in order to give them a universe to describe), is now clearly seen in the field of Quantum Mechanics.
“I’m going to talk about the Bell inequality, and more importantly a new inequality that you might not have heard of called the Leggett inequality, that was recently measured. It was actually formulated almost 30 years ago by Professor Leggett, who is a Nobel Prize winner, but it wasn’t tested until about a year and a half ago (in 2007), when an article appeared in Nature, that the measurement was made by this prominent quantum group in Vienna led by Anton Zeilinger, which they measured the Leggett inequality, which actually goes a step deeper than the Bell inequality and rules out any possible interpretation other than consciousness creates reality when the measurement is made.” – Bernard Haisch, Ph.D., Calphysics Institute – Quantum Mechanics and Consciousness – A New Measurement – Bernard Haisch, Ph.D (Shortened version of entire video with notes in description of video) http://vimeo.com/37517080 Alain Aspect and Anton Zeilinger by Richard Conn Henry – Physics Professor – John Hopkins University Excerpt: Why do people cling with such ferocity to belief in a mind-independent reality? It is surely because if there is no such reality, then ultimately (as far as we can know) mind alone exists. And if mind is not a product of real matter, but rather is the creator of the “illusion” of material reality (which has, in fact, despite the materialists, been known to be the case, since the discovery of quantum mechanics in 1925), then a theistic view of our existence becomes the only rational alternative to solipsism (solipsism is the philosophical idea that only one’s own mind is sure to exist). (Dr. Henry’s referenced experiment and paper – “An experimental test of non-local realism” by S. Gröblacher et. al., Nature 446, 871, April 2007 – “To be or not to be local” by Alain Aspect, Nature 446, 866, April 2007 (Leggett’s Inequality: Violated, as of 2011, to 120 standard deviations) http://henry.pha.jhu.edu/aspect.html “Look, we all have fun ridiculing the creationists who think the world sprang into existence on October 23, 4004 BC at 9AM (presumably Babylonian time), with the fossils already in the ground, light from distant stars heading toward us, etc. But if we accept the usual picture of quantum mechanics, then in a certain sense the situation is far worse: the world (as you experience it) might as well not have existed 10^-43 seconds ago!” Scott Aaronson – MIT associate Professor – Lecture 11: Decoherence and Hidden Variables – Quantum Physics – (material reality does not exist until we look at it) – Dr. Quantum video http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D1ezNvpFcJU
Moreover, due to advances in quantum mechanics, the argument for God from consciousness can now be framed like this:
1. Consciousness either preceded all of material reality or is a ‘epi-phenomena’ of material reality. 2. If consciousness is a ‘epi-phenomena’ of material reality then consciousness will be found to have no special position within material reality. Whereas conversely, if consciousness precedes material reality then consciousness will be found to have a special position within material reality. 3. Consciousness is found to have a special, even central, position within material reality. 4. Therefore, consciousness is found to precede material reality. Four intersecting lines of experimental evidence from quantum mechanics that shows that consciousness precedes material reality (Wigner’s Quantum Symmetries, Wheeler’s Delayed Choice, Leggett’s Inequalities, Quantum Zeno effect): https://docs.google.com/document/d/1G_Fi50ljF5w_XyJHfmSIZsOcPFhgoAZ3PRc_ktY8cFo/edit
Moreover, as pointed out previously in post 6 and 7, If we rightly allow agent causality ‘back’ into math (as the Christian founders of modern science originally intended, so as to ‘“breathe fire into the equations” and make a universe for them to describe), then a successful, empirically backed, resolution between Quantum Mechanics and General Relativity readily pops out for us that resolves the ‘infinity problem’ between the two theories. Verses and Music:
John1:1 “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.” of note: ‘the Word’ in John1:1 is translated from the word ‘Logos’ in Greek. ‘Logos’ also happens to be the root word from which we derive our modern word logic Matthew 28:18 Then Jesus came to them and said, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Brooke Fraser – Hillsong: “Lord Of Lords” – music http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WB4Tc5zJMUc
bornagain77_{May 21, 2015
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sergmendes, in the thinking of the Christian founders of modern science, it was not so much a 'formulation' within mathematics as it was an assumption of what, or more precisely Whom, was behind the equations 'breathing fire into the equations' that were and are describing the universe,,,
The Genius and Faith of Faraday and Maxwell - Ian H. Hutchinson - 2014 Conclusion: Lawfulness was not, in their thinking, inert, abstract, logical necessity, or complete reducibility to Cartesian mechanism; rather, it was an expectation they attributed to the existence of a divine lawgiver. These men’s insights into physics were made possible by their religious commitments. For them, the coherence of nature resulted from its origin in the mind of its Creator. http://www.thenewatlantis.com/publications/the-genius-and-faith-of-faraday-and-maxwell Kelvin's conundrum: Is it possible to believe in God and science? - 20 October 2013 Excerpt: Some years ago, the scientist Joseph Needham made an epic study of technological development in China. He wanted to find out why China, for all its early gifts of innovation, had fallen so far behind Europe in the advancement of science. He reluctantly came to the conclusion that European science had been spurred on by the widespread belief in a rational creative force, known as God, which made all scientific laws comprehensible," Lennox said. http://www.bbc.co.uk/religion/0/24535331 “Geometry is unique and eternal, a reflection from the mind of God. That mankind shares in it is because man is an image of God.” – Johannes Kepler Mathematics is the language with which God has written the universe. Galileo Galilei “The book of nature which we have to read is written by the finger of God.” (Faraday, as cited in Seeger 1983, 101). “This most beautiful system of the sun, planets, and comets, could only proceed from the counsel and dominion of an intelligent and powerful Being. This Being governs all things, not as the soul of the world, but as Lord over all; and on account of His dominion He is wont to be called Lord God.”(Newton 1687,Principia) NEWTON'S REJECTION OF THE "NEWTONIAN WORLD VIEW": THE ROLE OF DIVINE WILL IN NEWTON'S NATURAL PHILOSOPHY Abstract: The significance of Isaac Newton for the history of Christianity and science is undeniable: his professional work culminated the Scientific Revolution that saw the birth of modern science, while his private writings evidence a lifelong interest in the relationship between God and the world. Yet the typical picture of Newton as a paragon of Enlightenment deism, endorsing the idea of a remote divine clockmaker and the separation of science from religion, is badly mistaken. In fact Newton rejected both the clockwork metaphor itself and the cold mechanical universe upon which it is based. His conception of the world reflects rather a deep commitment to the constant activity of the divine will, unencumbered by the "rational" restrictions that Descartes and Leibniz placed on God, the very sorts of restrictions that later appealed to the deists of the 18th century. http://home.messiah.edu/~tdavis/newton.htm etc.. etc.. etc..
bornagain77_{May 21, 2015
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News:
It is true that mathematics is not a human invention, but more of a discovery, and thus has objective existence in that sense. But to declare the magnificent edifice of Mathematics to inhabit an orthogonal dimension that is inaccessible to scientific scrutiny, is a hypothesis that cannot in principle be falsified, and thus, it is not a scientific hypothesis but more of a belief, for those who are inclined to believe it. I demand a more scientifically sound falsifiable hypothesis for the ultimate nature of mathematics that gives it objective existence in the universe known to science. I agree with Lakoff and Núñez that mathematics is an artifact of how our mind makes sense of reality, and that therefore mathematics has physical existence or instantiation within the human brain. Our view of the world is not direct, we see the world indirectly, through a representation, or model of the world constructed in our brain, and that model is painted out in the geometric primitives of points and lines and planes, which are the elemental features of perception, and those geometric primitives correspond closely to the algebra which was ultimately derived from them.
Scientism, multiplied by trying to get to rational contemplation from blindly mechanical computation on a substrate that happens to be. Trying to get North by insisting on heading West. KFkairosfocus_{May 21, 2015
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bornagain77,
In other words, because agent causality was thrown out of mathematical descriptions of the universe then agent causality is deemed ‘unscientific’ in terms of describing ourselves.
I'm wondering, when was the time agent causality part of mathematical descriptions of the universe? How did such a formulation look? Thank you.sergmendes_{May 21, 2015
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Robert Byers, "math is a human invention." By invention, I presume you mean creation. This is why math is not a creation of man: If we were to discover an advanced alien civilization, we would not discover that they had a direct equivalent of Beethoven's 5th symphony. They wouldn't have a duplicate of the Mona Lisa. They wouldn't have "Mary had a little lamb." Nothing created by one is duplicated by another without copying. That is the foundation of the copyright system. On the other hand, if we found that advanced alien civilization we would find EXACT duplicates to most of our mathematical forms. They would be surprised by a few forms that they had not discovered yet. We would be pleasantly surprised to find that they had mathematical forms that we don't have. They would very likely not use a vertical line to represent "one". They would less likely use a circle to represent "none". But they would have a representation for each of these. It would be really unlikely that they would use base 10 as their common base. However, they would have discovered base N systems, as we have. They will have the exact same models because these exact models are "correct". The mathematical forms have been discovered -- the nomenclature around these forms have been created.bFast_{May 20, 2015
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Robert Byers: NO!!
So do you think that prior to humans "inventing" the equation "1 + 1 = 2" that one plus one didn't actually equal two in an absolute sense? If you don't think the numerical relationships that mathematics describes is not fundamental to the nature and construction of the universe, you might ponder this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Euler%27s_identitymike1962_{May 20, 2015
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NO!! god never did or does math. math is a human invention. its a language trying to describe the measured universe by God. its true as a special case. In other words math is too primitive to be a true measurement of the universe. People discovering math proves they discover a special case only. Math is boring and unrelated to true forces in the universe. Its only a language of existing forces etc. Math gets in the way of the intellectual accomplishment of man in figuring things out. What did math ever do?Robert Byers_{May 20, 2015
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A Quantum Hologram of Christ’s Resurrection? by Chuck Missler Excerpt: “You can read the science of the Shroud, such as total lack of gravity, lack of entropy (without gravitational collapse), no time, no space—it conforms to no known law of physics.” The phenomenon of the image brings us to a true event horizon, a moment when all of the laws of physics change drastically. Dame Piczek created a one-fourth size sculpture of the man in the Shroud. When viewed from the side, it appears as if the man is suspended in mid air (see graphic, below), indicating that the image defies previously accepted science. The phenomenon of the image brings us to a true event horizon, a moment when all of the laws of physics change drastically. http://www.khouse.org/articles/2008/847 THE EVENT HORIZON (Space-Time Singularity) OF THE SHROUD OF TURIN. – Isabel Piczek – Particle Physicist Excerpt: We have stated before that the images on the Shroud firmly indicate the total absence of Gravity. Yet they also firmly indicate the presence of the Event Horizon. These two seemingly contradict each other and they necessitate the past presence of something more powerful than Gravity that had the capacity to solve the above paradox. http://shroud3d.com/findings/isabel-piczek-image-formation
Moreover, as would also be expected if General Relativity (Gravity), and Quantum Mechanics/Special Relativity (QED), were truly unified in the resurrection of Christ from death, the image on the shroud is found to be formed by a quantum process. The image was not formed by a ‘classical’ process:
The absorbed energy in the Shroud body image formation appears as contributed by discrete values – Giovanni Fazio, Giuseppe Mandaglio – 2008 Excerpt: This result means that the optical density distribution,, can not be attributed at the absorbed energy described in the framework of the classical physics model. It is, in fact, necessary to hypothesize a absorption by discrete values of the energy where the ‘quantum’ is equal to the one necessary to yellow one fibril. http://cab.unime.it/journals/index.php/AAPP/article/view/C1A0802004/271 “It is not a continuum or spherical-front radiation that made the image, as visible or UV light. It is not the X-ray radiation that obeys the one over R squared law that we are so accustomed to in medicine. It is more unique. It is suggested that the image was formed when a high-energy particle struck the fiber and released radiation within the fiber at a speed greater that the local speed of light. Since the fiber acts as a light pipe, this energy moved out through the fiber until it encountered an optical discontinuity, then it slowed to the local speed of light and dispersed. The fact that the pixels don’t fluoresce suggests that the conversion to their now brittle dehydrated state occurred instantly and completely so no partial products remain to be activated by the ultraviolet light. This suggests a quantum event where a finite amount of energy transferred abruptly. The fact that there are images front and back suggests the radiating particles were released along the gravity vector. The radiation pressure may also help explain why the blood was “lifted cleanly” from the body as it transformed to a resurrected state.” Kevin Moran – optical engineer Scientists say Turin Shroud is supernatural – December 2011 Excerpt: After years of work trying to replicate the colouring on the shroud, a similar image has been created by the scientists. However, they only managed the effect by scorching equivalent linen material with high-intensity ultra violet lasers, undermining the arguments of other research, they say, which claims the Turin Shroud is a medieval hoax. Such technology, say researchers from the National Agency for New Technologies, Energy and Sustainable Economic Development (Enea), was far beyond the capability of medieval forgers, whom most experts have credited with making the famous relic. “The results show that a short and intense burst of UV directional radiation can colour a linen cloth so as to reproduce many of the peculiar characteristics of the body image on the Shroud of Turin,” they said. And in case there was any doubt about the preternatural degree of energy needed to make such distinct marks, the Enea report spells it out: “This degree of power cannot be reproduced by any normal UV source built to date.” http://www.independent.co.uk/news/science/scientists-say-turin-shroud-is-supernatural-6279512.html
Personally, considering the extreme difficulty that many, many, brilliant minds have had in trying to reconcile Quantum Mechanics and Special Relativity(QED), with Gravity (General Relativity),,,
A Capella Science – Bohemian Gravity! – video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2rjbtsX7twc Bohemian Gravity – Rob Sheldon – September 19, 2013 Excerpt: there’s a large contingent of physicists who believe that string theory is the heroin of theoretical physics. It has absorbed not just millions of dollars, but hundreds if not thousands of grad student lifetimes without delivering what it promised–a unified theory of the universe and life. It is hard, in fact, to find a single contribution from string theory despite 25 years of intense effort by thousands of the very brightest and best minds our society can find. http://rbsp.info/PROCRUSTES/bohemian-gravity/
Reflecting on that extreme difficulty, I consider the preceding ‘quantum’ nuance on the Shroud of Turin to be a subtle, but powerful, evidence substantiating Christ’s primary claim as to being our Savior from sin, death, and hell:
John 8:23-24 But he continued, “You are from below; I am from above. You are of this world; I am not of this world. I told you that you would die in your sins; if you do not believe that I am he, you will indeed die in your sins. G.O.S.P.E.L. – (the grace of propitiation) – poetry slam – video https://vimeo.com/20960385 Matthew 10:28 “Do not fear those who kill the body but are unable to kill the soul; but rather fear Him who is able to destroy both soul and body in hell. Colossians 1:15-20 The Son is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation. For in him all things were created: things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or powers or rulers or authorities; all things have been created through him and for him. He is before all things, and in him all things hold together. And he is the head of the body, the church; he is the beginning and the firstborn from among the dead, so that in everything he might have the supremacy. For God was pleased to have all his fullness dwell in him, and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether things on earth or things in heaven, by making peace through his blood, shed on the cross. Empty (Empty Cross Empty Tomb) with Dan Haseltine Matt Hammitt http://www.godtube.com/watch/?v=F22MCCNU
Supplemental notes:
Two very different ‘eternities’: Special Relativity, General Relativity, Heaven and Hell https://docs.google.com/document/d/1_4cQ7MXq8bLkoFLYW0kq3Xq-Hkc3c7r-gTk0DYJQFSg/edit
bornagain77_{May 20, 2015
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The most profound confusion in modern physics is the fallacious belief that blind causality is superior to agent causality in terms of explanatory power.
BRUCE GORDON: Hawking’s irrational arguments – October 2010 Excerpt: ,,,The physical universe is causally incomplete and therefore neither self-originating nor self-sustaining. The world of space, time, matter and energy is dependent on a reality that transcends space, time, matter and energy. This transcendent reality cannot merely be a Platonic realm of mathematical descriptions, for such things are causally inert abstract entities that do not affect the material world,,, Rather, the transcendent reality on which our universe depends must be something that can exhibit agency – a mind that can choose among the infinite variety of mathematical descriptions and bring into existence a reality that corresponds to a consistent subset of them. This is what “breathes fire into the equations and makes a universe for them to describe.” Anything else invokes random miracles as an explanatory principle and spells the end of scientific rationality.,,, Universes do not “spontaneously create” on the basis of abstract mathematical descriptions, nor does the fantasy of a limitless multiverse trump the explanatory power of transcendent intelligent design. What Mr. Hawking’s contrary assertions show is that mathematical savants can sometimes be metaphysical simpletons. Caveat emptor. http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2010/oct/1/hawking-irrational-arguments/
Professor Budziszewski puts the 'profound confusion in physics' between blind causality and agent causality like this
A Professor's Journey out of Nihilism: Why I am not an Atheist - University of Wyoming - J. Budziszewski Excerpt page12: "There were two great holes in the argument about the irrelevance of God. The first is that in order to attack free will, I supposed that I understood cause and effect; I supposed causation to be less mysterious than volition. If anything, it is the other way around. I can perceive a logical connection between premises and valid conclusions. I can perceive at least a rational connection between my willing to do something and my doing it. But between the apple and the earth, I can perceive no connection at all. Why does the apple fall? We don't know. "But there is gravity," you say. No, "gravity" is merely the name of the phenomenon, not its explanation. "But there are laws of gravity," you say. No, the "laws" are not its explanation either; they are merely a more precise description of the thing to be explained, which remains as mysterious as before. For just this reason, philosophers of science are shy of the term "laws"; they prefer "lawlike regularities." To call the equations of gravity "laws" and speak of the apple as "obeying" them is to speak as though, like the traffic laws, the "laws" of gravity are addressed to rational agents capable of conforming their wills to the command. This is cheating, because it makes mechanical causality (the more opaque of the two phenomena) seem like volition (the less). In my own way of thinking the cheating was even graver, because I attacked the less opaque in the name of the more. The other hole in my reasoning was cruder. If my imprisonment in a blind causality made my reasoning so unreliable that I couldn't trust my beliefs, then by the same token I shouldn't have trusted my beliefs about imprisonment in a blind causality. But in that case I had no business denying free will in the first place." http://www.undergroundthomist.org/sites/default/files/WhyIAmNotAnAtheist.pdf A Professor's Journey out of Nihilism: Why I am not an Atheist - 2012 talk University of Wyoming J. Budziszewski http://veritas.org/talks/professors-journey-out-nihilism-why-i-am-not-atheist/?view=presenters&speaker_id=2231
In other words, because agent causality was thrown out of mathematical descriptions of the universe then agent causality is deemed 'unscientific' in terms of describing ourselves. This denial of agent causality for ourselves leads to epistemological failure since it undermines our ability to be rational agents instead of mindless automatons (See Pearcey: Darwin's Robots). As well, C. S. Lewis has noted that the mathematical laws of the universe have never 'caused' anything. Lewis, in his usual crisp manner, clearly demonstrates that mathematical laws do not have causal adequacy within themselves in the following excerpt from one of his books:
“In the whole history of the universe the laws of nature have never produced, (i.e. caused), a single event.” C.S. Lewis – doodle video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_20yiBQAIlk
C.S. Lewis also noted that agent causality is illegitimately imparted to material objects as a result of the denial of the agent causality (i.e. God) behind math
“to say that a stone falls to earth because it’s obeying a law, makes it a man and even a citizen” – CS Lewis
The Christian founders of modern science understood the distinction between a mathematical description of a law and the agent causality required to be behind the law quite well.
“God is not a “God of the gaps”, he is God of the whole show.,,, C. S. Lewis put it this way: “Men became scientific because they expected law in nature and they expected law in nature because they believed in a lawgiver.” John Lennox – Not the God of the Gaps, But the Whole Show – 2012 http://www.christianpost.com/news/the-god-particle-not-the-god-of-the-gaps-but-the-whole-show-80307/ “Geometry is unique and eternal, a reflection from the mind of God. That mankind shares in it is because man is an image of God." – Johannes Kepler
Moreover, Godel’s incompleteness theorem has proven that there will never be a ‘complete’ mathematical description of everything that is sufficient within itself so as to be a ‘theory of everything’.
Kurt Gödel – Incompleteness Theorem – video https://vimeo.com/92387853
Godel also stated:
The God of the Mathematicians – Goldman Excerpt: As Gödel told Hao Wang, “Einstein’s religion [was] more abstract, like Spinoza and Indian philosophy. Spinoza’s god is less than a person; mine is more than a person; because God can play the role of a person.” Kurt Gödel – (Gödel is considered among the greatest logicians of all time) http://www.firstthings.com/article/2010/07/the-god-of-the-mathematicians
And when one rightly allows God back into mathematics so as to bring ‘completeness’ to mathematics, and so as to ‘breathe fire into the equations’, i.e. so as to rightly bring agent causality back into math, then a solution to the most profound enigma in modern physics readily pops out for us. Namely, the resurrection of Christ from death provides a empirically backed reconciliation of Quantum Mechanics/Special Relativity, (Quantum Electrodynamics), and General Relativity into the much sought after ‘theory of everything’:
The Center Of The Universe Is Life (Jesus) – General Relativity, Quantum Mechanics, Entropy and The Shroud Of Turin – video http://vimeo.com/34084462
And as would be expected if Gravity was truly unified with Quantum Mechanics in the resurrection of Christ from death, Gravity was overcome in the resurrection event of Christ:
Particle Radiation from the Body – July 2012 – M. Antonacci, A. C. Lind Excerpt: The Shroud’s frontal and dorsal body images are encoded with the same amount of intensity, independent of any pressure or weight from the body. The bottom part of the cloth (containing the dorsal image) would have born all the weight of the man’s supine body, yet the dorsal image is not encoded with a greater amount of intensity than the frontal image. Radiation coming from the body would not only explain this feature, but also the left/right and light/dark reversals found on the cloth’s frontal and dorsal body images. https://docs.google.com/document/d/19tGkwrdg6cu5mH-RmlKxHv5KPMOL49qEU8MLGL6ojHU/edit
bornagain77_{May 20, 2015
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Is mathematics intrinsic to the universe? I don't think so. Mathematics, in my opinion, exists separate from the universe. Mathematics pre-existed the universe. Is God a mathematician? I actually think that God created mathematics too -- bit its a hard position to prove. Is mathematics discovered or invented? That is a stupid question. The real question is, what is invention -- discovery or creation of man. Invention has a fundamental core of discovery. There is a creative component to invention -- the desire to discover a way to do something (and the defining of the thing we are discovering a way to do.) Many inventions are little more than the desire to create something, and reaching into the common toolbox to pull out a solution. However, all of the great inventions, the things that come to mind when we think of invention, are almost completely discovery.bFast_{May 20, 2015
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Mathematical posts are always awesome of course. :-) This Hartnett guy is a bit unhinged, however. How do these things go together? 1. Cosmologist with a PhD in physics 2. YEC who has found "flaws" in General Relativity 3. Anti-Catholic loon (check out his twitter) "Rick Warren shows himself to really be a Catholic. He is probably an undercover Jesuit plant." Dang.daveS_{May 20, 2015
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Mathematics is intrinsic to the universe for the following reason: The universe is discrete and so is math.Mapou_{May 20, 2015
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God is one of those equations I can never seem to be able to solve.Mung_{May 20, 2015
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"Is mathematics intrinsic to the universe?" Yes because the universe is conceived by a mathematician. Mathematics is an invention of mind. That it pertains in the physical universe is evidence that the universe was designed. When you get to the bottom turtle, there is no physical reality only mathematical relationships conceived by mind. The big bang is merely a thought. In a realm where only mind exists, the only things that are real are thoughts.Jim Smith_{May 20, 2015
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