In the blog very poorly titled “Intelligent Science”, Eric Kemp discharges some warped or misunderstood concepts of his own, enlisting the help of colleagues. Although there is a bit of Intelligence, there is very little Science.
The latest episode is “The Fine-Tuning Argument“. The post itself contains a good review of the idea, although it slowly transfigures into a “fact”.
Going through post and comments is an entertaining yet painful experience, as we watch distorted scientific statements or simply plain falsehoods. To much surprise, theoretical research about the Big Bang and early stages of the universe is discarded or devalued as “just theory”, as if any research on the first second of the universe were applied science.
But when those theories are agreeable with their own chosen understanding of the universe, then scientific theoretical results get upgraded to the status of certainty, mixing up with distorted and/or misunderstood science statements that also had become “facts”.
To top it off, an utter refusal to research on your own leads to some interesting reference-picking: the poster read one book and quotes from it, yet turns down the chance to learn from other books or papers.
There is nothing wrong with ignorance, for we all have to start somewhere. But the refusal to learn or at least try to understand, that tells a different story.
On another note, most of the followers of that blog seem to share a common misunderstanding about the nature of “theory”. “Just a theory“, “could/would vs facts”, reflect how people normally have no idea of what it takes for an idea to become a scientific theory. “Theory”, it seems, refers to an imaginary concept that is too weak to stand on its own.
Such widespread mistake might reflect some basic educational handicap for a society that tries to reach the 21st century. On the other hand, before our schools get to the basics of what theory is, we should focus on simply high-school-level math:
I actually happen to know a bit about the Cyclic Model’s mathematics. And if I’m not mistaken, it was first figured out by Hawking, correct? And in his formulas he used the imaginary number “i” did he not?
So “i” is really imaginary… On that point, I threw the towel.
September 29, 2008 at 9:35 am
sofismata
No, “i” is the square root of negative one. But, correct me if I’m wrong here because I’m no math guy, isn’t “i” used in substitute of actual, real-world, values? My question in regards to the imaginary number wasn’t rhetorical.
Also, I never claimed that my post was just a bunch of “facts”. If you read some previous posts and comments of mine, you’d see I hold that there is no such thing as “brute facts” that stand on their own because everything must be interpreted by the subjective human mind. To the point, I claimed that you never SHOWED that post wasn’t factual, you only asserted it. Which you have again done here.
Also, I know what a theory is. I know that fine-tuning is a theory. But I included statistics and explanations to give evidence for my theory. On the other hand, you only postulated admittedly purely speculated theory that even you say we would “never know about” and claimed it, in theory, refuted my statistics and explanations. No matter how much sarcasm you use, that just doesn’t follow.
And still, you have not, even once, directly responded to my statistics or what those statistics point to.
September 29, 2008 at 10:22 am
I never refuted your statistics; please re-read carefully.
Fine-tuning is not a theory, it’s an argument. So is the Anthropic Principle.
Among the “evidence” of your theory you stated two “facts”. My point was that those two statements are not “facts”: #1 contradicts current theoretical understanding, and #2 has no evidence to support it. In the very best of moods, we could maybe say that you had come up with two opposing theories to mainstream physics, but not facts.
Now, isn’t Complex Numbers high-school level? Not a rhetorical question either.
September 29, 2008 at 1:25 pm
sofismando
“I never refuted your statistics; please re-read carefully.”
Exactly, that’s my point, you haven’t even tried to do so.
There is something I’m honestly curious about. The fine-tuning argument is based upon the evidence that, statistically speaking, the fundamental forces must be the way they are in order for life to exist. How can you argue against the fine tuning argument without arguing against the statistics of the fundamental forces?
“Fine-tuning is not a theory, it’s an argument. So is the Anthropic Principle.”
If the universe is fine-tuned for our existence, then we would expect to find phenomena that is fine tuned for our existence (in contrast to almost any value of phenomena being fit for our existence). That isn’t the structure of a theory?
For the record: I did not call them “facts”, Viggy did.
#1: You state that my argument contradicts “current theoretical understanding” as if your “theoretical understand” is the ONLY theoretical understanding out there or it contradicts ALL “theoretical understanding”. This is a blanket statement.
#2: *sigh*, saying “no evidence” and “aren’t facts” are two different statements. The former is just disengenuous while I agree with the latter.
You say that at the very least I have postulated an opposing theory to mainstream physics. Fine, I’ll take that. But your inability to argue against that theory (since all you’re doing here is pointing out that there are other theories out there, a fact I’m well aware of) is interesting.
“Now, isn’t Complex Numbers high-school level? Not a rhetorical question either.”
Yea, I think we covered that in high school algebra. But since it’s been 7.5 years since high school for me and, since I’m a biology guy, I haven’t taken an algebra class in 5 years I’m not going to feel bad about asking about cosmological math. So, is the square root of -1 used in substitute of real-world values or not? I’m honestly asking.
September 29, 2008 at 4:00 pm
“The fine-tuning argument is based upon the evidence that, statistically speaking, the fundamental forces must be the way they are in order for life to exist. How can you argue against the fine tuning argument without arguing against the statistics of the fundamental forces?”
I am not arguing against Fine-Tuning. For that I would bring up the Anthopic Principle, but i havent.
I argued against the insistence on misunderstood concepts, and the mislabeling them facts. I argued against the inconsistency of using the side of knowledge of the fundamental forces, yet ignoring the other side, of how these forces were together at some point in the early nanoseconds of the universe. I argued against the logical blunder of, given that you see one universe, stating that this is the *only* version of the universe, that the universe had “only one chance”.
If those mistakes make a crack on the basis of your theory, that’s something else. But I didnt get to refute Fine-Tuning. :-) Didnt have to.
“So, is the square root of -1 used in substitute of real-world values or not?”
Not really. Sometimes they used in trigonometrical representations, sometimes they are abstractions that encapsulate multi-dimensional values.
September 29, 2008 at 6:54 pm
sofismando
“I argued against the insistence on misunderstood concepts, and the mislabeling them facts.”
You did not explain which concepts and how they are misunderstood, and, as I said, you and I are on the same page with the word “facts”.
“I argued against the inconsistency of using the side of knowledge of the fundamental forces, yet ignoring the other side, of how these forces were together at some point in the early nanoseconds of the universe.”
Curious. If you would have said this in the comments on my blog, I would have agreed with you, because . . . I agree with you. They obviously had to be together in the first “nanoseconds” because the universe hadn’t expanded yet. But in order for the universe to expand in such a way that it would hold itself together, but not too closely, and hold it’s atoms together, but not too closely and make gravity strong enough but not too strong etc etc; those values had to be set just after the “nanoseconds” in order for the universe to form itself at all.
“I argued against the logical blunder of, given that you see one universe, stating that this is the *only* version of the universe, that the universe had “only one chance”.”
Bottom line: My idea that there is only one universe has evidence because . . . we can only see one universe. Your idea that there “may be” more universes has ZERO evidence because, as you’ve admitted, we’ll never know. No matter how many times you repeat this multiple-universe speculation, it doesn’t get any more valid. But, continue to hold onto this speculation sofismando, because it’s the only thing you’ve got against the fine-tuning argument.
You’ve also ignored the implications of your multiple-universe theory, I think I posed this question to you before. Where did the multiple universe machine come from? The multiple universe machine would have to be fine-tuned to be able to make a universe fit for life. How do you answer this fine-tuning?
“If those mistakes make a crack on the basis of your theory, that’s something else. But I didnt get to refute Fine-Tuning. Didnt have to.”
There are no cracks because there were no attacks, only speculation.
“Not really. Sometimes they used in trigonometrical representations, sometimes they are abstractions that encapsulate multi-dimensional values.”
O K, so how did Hawking use it?
September 30, 2008 at 8:34 am
“You did not explain which concepts and how they are misunderstood”
I did a few times, and this will be the last. These are actual quotes from you:
#1 Anthropic Principle was compared to “God did it”
#2 “The fundamental forces of the universe must have been present at the beginning of the universe in order for the universe to form.”
#3 “The universe didn’t have billions of tries to get it right. It had ONE TRY!”
#4 “There is one universe therefore it had one chance, you know, cause it only formed once.”
You misunderstand the Anthropic Principle, symmetry breaking, and logical inference.
September 30, 2008 at 3:57 pm
sofismando
Well, I’m done offering to have an evidence-based conversation with you. I will not try to force you to do something you don’t want to do. As such, this is my last post on this topic.
#1: I never invoked the Anthropic Principle. Not once.
#2: I just explained this position in my last comment to you. Instead of responding to it, you ignore it and then write this #2 point, well done.
#3 & #4: In order to find these points fallicious, you must subscribe to “multiple universes” theory as just as valid as the single universe theory. In refutation of this idea, I have pointed out that the single universe theory has evidence, since we can only know of one universe, and the multiple universe theory has ZERO evidence because, as you admit, we will just never know. You have flatly ignored this point, plugging along with your accusations of faulty logic while ignoring the explanations of why that logic is actually not faulty. Well done.
“You misunderstand the Anthropic Principle, symmetry breaking, and logical inference.”
I understand the Anthropic Principle.
You have not mentioned symmetry breaking until now and, even now, you have not explained how it refutes any of my points or how it applies to this conversation. But this is par for the course for you in this discussion.
You have still not SHOWN where my logical inference has gone wrong (In fact, I’m unsure of wether or not you understand what this means in the context of a discussion). You have only repeatedly stated it.
Perhaps we can get further in a later discussion.
September 30, 2008 at 5:10 pm
Eric,
You mentioned Anthropic Principle without the name: see fourth and fifth lines of last paragraph of your original post. You say you understand it, so you can probably find an oversimplified version of it there.
No, you don’t have to adhere to “multiple universes” to find the mistake. First, both cyclic model and Big Bounce theories have only one universe and still many “Big Bangs”. But more importantly, you don’t understand logical inference. Just because you cant prove A -> B (in plain words “B doesn’t follow A”) doesn’t mean B is false, or B is true, or that some alternative A’ must be in place. Nothing of that sort must happen.
You see a blue sky and say “it’s a blue sky, there is no dragon behind it”. That’s clearly a flawed argument. But pointing that out doesn’t mean I believe in dragons or that I question the blueness of the sky; in fact, pointing out the flawed argument says nothing about dragons or colors, only about the argument.
We see one universe, we live in it. But from that you cannot say this is the only universe ever formed; it might be the case, but you cannot *conclude* that out of our single universe experience. Our universe doesn’t say anything about the previous cycles of contraction-expansion of this same universe, or parallel p-brane universes living in other dimensions. It doesn’t say those other universes don’t exist either. That’s the logical inference mistake. From A you cannot get to B; it doesn’t mean A is true, or false, or B is true, or false.
“You have not mentioned symmetry breaking until now”
:-) See my comment to your original post on Sep 23rd, 12:39am, second paragraph. Like I said there, symmetry breaking says the fundamental forces were merged and broke apart in the first nanoseconds after the BB, contrary to what you have stated. If you have recanted your statement, fine.