Native
Free Natural Philosopher & Comparative Mythologist
I wonder if "the mad Gödel" did discover a kind of an "universal evolutionary motion" which never can be desribed fully by math?
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The Limits of Understanding
- Thread starter Native
- Start date
Native
Free Natural Philosopher & Comparative Mythologist
How would you decribe the assumed motion inside a black hole by math?
Native
Free Natural Philosopher & Comparative Mythologist
We live in different "time" locations on Earth, you know
- In the OP topic of "The Limits of Understanding", "thruth" otherwise should be very usefull propaganda material for all of us
Native wrote: "mathematical truths which simply can’t be proven."
They can't be assumed to be truths if they can't be proven.
Even a liar could tell a truth. It is possible to tell a truth without knowing that it is true and without proving it.
It is also possible to say something that is sometimes true.
Star Trek did an episode about befuddling a computer by saying "everything I say is a lie." The computer mind got stuck in an infinite loop "but if you are lying, then everything you say is true, and if everything you say is true, then you are true about lying." It didn't realize that people can sometimes lie and sometimes tell the truth.
Almost all math problems require proven truths. Fermat's unproven theorem was one that was recently proven. Yet, there were physicists who used that in some of their research. But, until that theorem was proven, their research was flawed.
Sometimes scientists use their imaginations to fill in unknown or unknowable information. For example, since a black hole has sufficient gravity to crush matter to a singularity, they assume that it is possible. (A singularity has zero width, zero depth, and zero height.....no dimension at all). In a singularity, all laws of physics break down (how can you calculate velocity, which is distance divided by time, if distance doesn't exist?). Since there is no way to know what is happening inside a black hole, we can't tell how it is structured. However, I reject the notion of a singularity, because physical laws break down. In the past month, someone submitted a new theory (based on calculations) that show that the interior of a black hole is a hollow sphere (I think this is right).
Another example of scientists using imagination to fill in unknown knowledge: The expansion of the universe is expanding, and Friedman's Equation seems to indicate that dark matter "might" be responsible. But, that dark matter would have to have repulsive gravity, and no one has ever observed repulsive gravity. CERN, this year, did a study of the gravity of antimatter. Since releasing antimatter in a matter world would quickly result in annihilation, they had to constrain the antimatter in a magnetic field, then release it to see what effect gravity would have on it. They had hoped that antimatter might have anti-gravity, but, found, instead, that it had regular gravity (results not quite confirmed).
Theists fill in gaps of knowledge with faith. Scientists are not supposed to fill in gaps of knowledge until they know things.
Science never proves anything (it isn't supposed to). Rather, scientists, with rigorous experiments, propose theories to try to explain phenomena. These aren't wild guesses, but theories based on experiments. Facts are few and far between in science, but theories are common.
So, when scientists make leaps of faith, to assume that singularities are inside black holes, and dark matter causes acceleration of the expansion of the universe, science behaves like a religion, rather than traditional science.
They can't be assumed to be truths if they can't be proven.
Even a liar could tell a truth. It is possible to tell a truth without knowing that it is true and without proving it.
It is also possible to say something that is sometimes true.
Star Trek did an episode about befuddling a computer by saying "everything I say is a lie." The computer mind got stuck in an infinite loop "but if you are lying, then everything you say is true, and if everything you say is true, then you are true about lying." It didn't realize that people can sometimes lie and sometimes tell the truth.
Almost all math problems require proven truths. Fermat's unproven theorem was one that was recently proven. Yet, there were physicists who used that in some of their research. But, until that theorem was proven, their research was flawed.
Sometimes scientists use their imaginations to fill in unknown or unknowable information. For example, since a black hole has sufficient gravity to crush matter to a singularity, they assume that it is possible. (A singularity has zero width, zero depth, and zero height.....no dimension at all). In a singularity, all laws of physics break down (how can you calculate velocity, which is distance divided by time, if distance doesn't exist?). Since there is no way to know what is happening inside a black hole, we can't tell how it is structured. However, I reject the notion of a singularity, because physical laws break down. In the past month, someone submitted a new theory (based on calculations) that show that the interior of a black hole is a hollow sphere (I think this is right).
Another example of scientists using imagination to fill in unknown knowledge: The expansion of the universe is expanding, and Friedman's Equation seems to indicate that dark matter "might" be responsible. But, that dark matter would have to have repulsive gravity, and no one has ever observed repulsive gravity. CERN, this year, did a study of the gravity of antimatter. Since releasing antimatter in a matter world would quickly result in annihilation, they had to constrain the antimatter in a magnetic field, then release it to see what effect gravity would have on it. They had hoped that antimatter might have anti-gravity, but, found, instead, that it had regular gravity (results not quite confirmed).
Theists fill in gaps of knowledge with faith. Scientists are not supposed to fill in gaps of knowledge until they know things.
Science never proves anything (it isn't supposed to). Rather, scientists, with rigorous experiments, propose theories to try to explain phenomena. These aren't wild guesses, but theories based on experiments. Facts are few and far between in science, but theories are common.
So, when scientists make leaps of faith, to assume that singularities are inside black holes, and dark matter causes acceleration of the expansion of the universe, science behaves like a religion, rather than traditional science.
Native
Free Natural Philosopher & Comparative Mythologist
I think this is the natural method of science and it concerns all of the unsolved problems in cosmology, of which, according to Gödel, some problems never can be solved mathematically.
I´ve nothing at all against imaginations, but I´m concerned if one imagination is inserted to "prove" another imagination which isn´t proved either.
Don´t you think of "dark energy" here?
Completely agreed. Filling in cosmological gaps with new matters because a scientific observation is not understood, is no better than a religious dogma.
Despite I know of the standing "explanations" of all this, I agree here too.
Apropos the concept of faith: One of the video participants even believes that:
I guess I don't see it as an argument from ignorance. It is proven that ignorance on this point is inevitable.
There is an inherent limitation to our understanding on this.
No.
Not the case. Imagine I have a statement and I *know* that it is impossible to either prove it true nor to prove it false. Then either that statement or its negation is true but unprovable.
It turns out that there are such statements in math. Godel showed that they are inevitable.
it isn't just that the statement hasn't *yet* been proved true or false. It is actually that we have *proved* that it cannot be proved true nor proved false.
So what?!?!?!!?
I do consider it an 'argument from ignorance' based on the facts of your statements. Science does not function on what cannot be proven.
OK, If you don't see the point, I can't point it out any more. But many mathematicians and logicians feel that this is a HUGE point.
Mathematics is NOT simply a handmaid for science. it is a subject in its own right. And, as a subject in its own right, this is a BIG DEAL.
The *fact* is that it is impossible to either prove or disprove some meaningful statements. Furthermore, we have *proved* that impossibility. That is, in itself, a big deal.
We *know* that we cannot know. That isn't simply ignorance. It is knowledge that ignorance cannot be overcome within the system. it is knowledge that, for such statements, you can either assume them to be true *or* assume them to be false. Either way, you get an *equally consistent* system.
Again, that is a HUGE deal.
Science goes on as usual without 'Big Hairy' points.on logic.
Never claimed such. Unfortunately you a playing the Melodrama Queen.
No
You just bit yourself in the butt.
Lousy on logic. I never said it was a question of ignorance. It is you 'arguing for ignorance' in a meaningless way.
No need to over come anything.
Big Hairy Deal and meaningless
Having known about Gödel's incompleteness theorems for quite a few decades, I can't say they challenge any of my "standing points of views".
What's your answer to your own question?
Native
Free Natural Philosopher & Comparative Mythologist
The OP title was/is "The Limits of Understanding" in general, and not just about Gödel's incompleteness theorems, hence my question of eventually "having challenged standing points of views".
Maybe I should have been more specific on that as it seems other debaters also have their main focus on "just Gödel".
I wasn´t challenged by the entire video content either, but more stunned over that four scientists couldn´t come to any overall philosophical or scientific consensus.
Native
Free Natural Philosopher & Comparative Mythologist
More in the line of this:
This raises to me a general question on believing in math concerning several "scientific cosmological dogmas".
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That's all part of the dialectic of science ─ and not all scientists are in their element discussing philosophy anyway. Roger Penrose is a mathematical platonist (!), for instance.
In the sciences, math works as a language. The use of that language is not affected by the Godel statements.
paarsurrey
Veteran Member
Math is the language of sciences or a human tool to investigate into the Universe/s, does universe/s work according to this language? How did Universe acquire this language, please?
Regards
It is a human language used to help us investigate the universe.
paarsurrey
Veteran Member
It is its own foundation. There is no evidence of a deeper basis.