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Ishmael
In: Toronto
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| Grant wrote: | | They won't always. In some universes they will move apart; in some they won't move at all; in some they will move towards each other. Consciousness can exist only in universes in which they move together, so that's what we see. |
This (popular) proposal fails epistemological critique. One of our most basic rules states,
There is nothing unusual about who, when or where you are.
All theories requiring something special of where you are in time and space are assumed to be in error. Making one's own existence predicate upon the extraordinary is not allowed as a dodge.
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Grant
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| All theories requiring something special of where you are in time and space are assumed to be in error. Making one's own existence predicate upon the extraordinary is not allowed as a dodge. |
But I'm not predicating my existence on the extraordinary; I'm predicating it on the absolutely ordinary. After all, if everything exists then why shouldn't a creature exist which is aware of its own existence. The big question is why do I see other people existing as well.
I reckon that's because the majority of universes in which self-awareness is possible must allow many creatures to exist (evolution and all that!). So you see my position is not extraordinary. If I was the only creature alive in a universe it would be. There must be such creatures, but for every one of these there are trillions of universes like ours.
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Chad
In: Ramsbottom
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Come on Grant...get a grip.
We've all played out these scenarios (usually when we were about twelve years old...my eldest grandson is going through the process right now):
...am I the only conscious being in the universe?...are there other universes?...is all of this just playing out in my brain?...do I have a brain?...do I have a physical form?...am I god?...will all of this cease to exist when I cease to exist?...when will I get my end away?
But none of this helps us to understand how gravity works in this universe (the one we all know and love).
If Dan can help sort out gravity...then that's one less thing to worry about.
My own particular biggy is magnetism...how duff hook does that work? (Whenever I pick up a pair of magnets, I'm like a kid...I just have to play with them).
Pin that one on electric charges and we really are narrowing things down.
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Brian Ambrose
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| But none of this helps us to understand how gravity works in this universe (the one we all know and love). |
Quite right Chad. There is no such thing as science if we say "get over it, this is just how it is."
| My own particular biggy is magnetism...how duff hook does that work? |
If we (er, you) can come up with a model for gravity, it'll probably work for magnetism (and electro-magnetism) too - it'll just depend on how you align the dials. So come on guys, surely we have sufficient quantity of geniuses on this site to come up with something.
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DPCrisp
In: Bedfordshire
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To make another gesture towards gravity as residual electrostatic attraction:
The nucleus of an atom, where the plussy bits are, is billions of times smaller than the atom overall. In the case of hydrogen, twenty thousand billion nuclei (protons) would fit in the space of the atom.
They always say the vast majority of that space is just empty, but, actually, it's where the electrons live. In the case of hydrogen, that's just one electron. And if we imagine the electron to be a particle no bigger than a proton (perhaps much smaller), there's something funny about the picture of an atom comprising two minute dots that between them occupy an enormous space.
So they have taken to referring to "clouds" of electrons in an atom. In some way that has not been explained, the electrons in an atom take up all the space at once. But when not in atoms, it's different. Protons and electrons somehow "know" when they're paired off (whether in an atom or in a neutron), but can be persuaded to part company and behave as individuals. It's as if when the electron goes home, it can relax, kick off its shoes and slouch, spread out... a lot.
With the same amount of charge spread over a larger space, we'd have to say the charge density of the electron in the atom is much less than that of the proton.
The pull of a proton (the nucleus; almost all of the mass) on an electron (on/from the outside of another atom) is 2.27x10^-49/R2, whatever R, the distance between them, happens to be.
The pull of gravity between two hydrogen atoms is 1.87x10^-64/R2.
So, in the case of hydrogen atoms, Coulomb is just about 10^15 (one and fifteen noughts) times stronger than Newton. (That's the funny thing about gravity: it's so weak.)
But what if the different charge densities of electrons and protons in atoms has something to do with how well the plussiness is cancelled out by the minussiness? What is the ratio of charge densities in a hydrogen atom (i.e. atom volume to nucleus volume)?
As above, it's 2x10^16 (twenty thousand billion).
That's very close to the ratio between electricity and gravity. There's only one order of magnitude between them: one is 16.91 times the other, to be more precise, but when dealing in numbers with fifty or sixty zeros, they're almost the same. And this is only a "gesture towards".
Towards what? Well, if we think of the nucleus as appearing randomly within the electron cloud/atom {Imagine the cloud placed randomly over the nucleus if you prefer.} -- for whatever reason: Heisenberg Fuzziness Relation, quantum mechanical probabilities, continual reconfiguring of internal energy states... -- then the plussiness is normally cancelled by the minussiness... but for about one thousand-billionth of the time, it's close enough to the surface, not shielded, facing and attracting that other atom (which is minussy on the outside almost all the time).
A three-dimensional lighthouse, shooting out beams of strong attraction, very infrequently in any given direction.
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Grant
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Brian said
| Quite right Chad. There is no such thing as science if we say "get over it, this is just how it is." |
I'm not saying that we shouldn't try to work it out. I'm saying that everything we see is only there because it has to be that way if we are to exist to see it.
So your question about the particles should be:
" why is it that if two particles do not move together, consciousness is impossible?"
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Brian Ambrose
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So your question about the particles should be:
" why is it that if two particles do not move together, consciousness is impossible?" |
Nah, that's actually a much easier question to answer, in fact I'd tell you right now but I don't want to hijack Dan's thread any more than is strictly necessary.
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Brian Ambrose
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| To make another gesture towards gravity as residual electrostatic attraction: |
Yes, I wish people would stop changing the subject.
| There's only one order of magnitude between them |
Only? ^^
| And this is only a "gesture towards". |
Oh alright then.
Towards what? Well, if we think of the nucleus as appearing randomly within the electron cloud/atom {Imagine the cloud placed randomly over the nucleus if you prefer.} -- for whatever reason: Heisenberg Fuzziness Relation, quantum mechanical probabilities, continual reconfiguring of internal energy states... -- then the plussiness is normally cancelled by the minussiness... but for about one thousand-billionth of the time, it's close enough to the surface, not shielded, facing and attracting that other atom (which is minussy on the outside almost all the time).
A three-dimensional lighthouse, shooting out beams of strong attraction, very infrequently in any given direction. |
Not bad, and plenty of wiggle room to boot. But let me see if I've got this right. You're suggesting that the nucleus moves around (ie relative to an adjacent atom)? Since (in a two atom situation) both nuclei are doing this, isn't that then twice the attractive force (each want to get a tiny bit closer to the other)? And I'm not sure about this "minussy on the outside almost all the time". If this were the case wouldn't adjacent atoms be mostly repelling each other? Surely it is on the 'outside' that the atom is neutral? Maybe you could see this as an overlap between the two electron domains instead.
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Mick Harper
Site Admin
In: London
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Speaking of the Electric Universe, Komorikid sends me this from Australia
Lecture: Electric Morphologies
When: Wed, April 1, 6:45pm - 7:15pm
Where:Better Bankside Centre 18 Great Guildford Street, London, SE1 0SY
Nearest Tube: Southwalk
Description: This talk at the Better Bankside Centre follows contemporary speculations into the role that electro-dynamics play in forming the objects that we see in modern astronomy. Otherwise known as 'Electric Universe' theory or 'Plasma Cosmology' theory, the talk draws from publications by members of the IEEE and others and traces the history of the study of electricity in Space from Birkeland through Langmuir and Jeugens to today's advocates. |
Komorikid can't make it (Wednesday's washday) but I'll go if anyone will hold my hand.
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Chad
In: Ramsbottom
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I think I'll wait and catch it later...when the road-show reaches Ramsbottom.
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Brian Ambrose
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That would be to miss out on the opportunity to hold Mick's hand.
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Ishmael
In: Toronto
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This is the explanation for the Tidal Force as it appears on Wikipedia:
| The tidal force is a secondary effect of the force of gravity and is responsible for the tides. It arises because the gravitational force exerted on one body by a second body is not constant across its diameter. The side nearest to the second body experiences a greater force, while the opposite side experiences a lesser force. |
Is there anything wrong with it?
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Grant
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Ishmael wrote | Is there anything wrong with it? |
When I was a kid I remember being totally dissatisfied with the explanation as to why you get tides on both sides of the Earth at the same time. The difference in gravitational attraction between the near side and the far side must be negligible. Plus the Earth is so much bigger than the Moon.
I decided there was another explanation but as Mick would say it's probably bollocks:
The Moon and the Earth are in free fall around each other, so we don't feel any gravitational force from the Moon. But the water around the Earth forms the shape of a prolate spheroid as it is constantly falling towards the centre of gravity of the Earth/Moon system. Each point of the Earth's surface water will therefore encounter two high tides a day.
Actually, I've just realised that the centre of gravity of the Earth/Moon system is actually inside the Earth which would invalidate my explanation. So Ishmael, please do my thinking for me.
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Mick Harper
Site Admin
In: London
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| I've just realised that the centre of gravity of the Earth/Moon system is actually inside the Earth |
A fact that led eventually to SCUM and the overthrow of the present astrophysical paradigm.
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Ishmael
In: Toronto
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| Grant wrote: | | The Moon and the Earth are in free fall around each other....[thus] the water around the Earth forms the shape of a prolate spheroid as it is constantly falling towards the centre of gravity of the Earth/Moon system. |
And there you've just expressed the official explanation. That's what is meant by there being a difference in the gravitational force on each side of the planet. The explanation thus works for objects both in orbit and on a collision course. Both elongate with proximity to the center of gravity.
The source of my skepticism: The explanation doesn't match what I expect when I extrapolate out from the experience of swinging a bucket of water over my head. Centrifugal force keeps the water inside.
The principle of balancing centrifugal and gravitational forces along a curved line with either slightly stronger to each side of the line makes, to me, intuitive sense. But such an "explanation" would not explain the elongation of objects in free-fall -- I guess.
Yet, when I swing a bucket-full of water around my head I feel it isn't falling toward me at a differential rate -- I feel the water actually wants to pull away from me. That is what I thought should generate the tidal bulge on the outside hemisphere of a circling planet.
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