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 What's our Universe made of? |
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What I think 70% of the universe consists of some form of energy about which we know nothing. As for the rest, 25% of the rest is "dark" mass, which we call dark because we are entirely ignorant of its nature. It does not react with light, so "dark" is a good name. About 4% of the mass of our universe is hydrogen and helium, in a ratio of four to one. Most of that gas is diffuse, in interstellular nebula. Some percent has coalesced into stars, and a smaller amount sucked into black holes--mass twisted out of our universe altogether. |
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Stal 03:04 I agree. I SAID I was speculating. <Why you need to invoke a God to create them is beyond my comprehension,> I agree. There are many things beyond your comprehension. Boom-boom! Sorry, mate, I couldn't resist that! But we have been over that question before in another thread. I still hold that bare 'Naturalism' leads to either circularity or infinite regression, both of which are philosophical forbidden zones. |
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LS 08:55 I also loathe a 'God of the Gaps'. That is the postulate of those who don't have a good grasp of either Theology OR Science. Perhaps the best was of correcting this error is to clarify the distinction between Immediate Cause, Effective Cause and Ultimate Cause. An example is someone being decapitated. The immediate cause is a combination of blood loss and nerve damage. The effective cause is the sword. The ultimate cause is the ISIS terrorist. Science is good at describing immediate causes. It usually does this by providing equations, such as Newtonian's Laws of Motion. But it rarely if ever gets beyond that level. At best it can tweak out a 'chain of causation', but this chain is usually an 'immediate cause' one step further back. Hence my comment to Stal a few minutes ago. But Science (meaning genuine science, not the half-baked stuff some cults put out!) never attempts an Ultimate Cause explanation. It can't by its own rules of evidence. Religious people (like so-called 'Creation Science' try to create a 'God of the Gaps' because they don't understand this distinction. And apart from that, they are of all Christians the ones who are most captive to the Science they say they hold in contempt. Just by coming up with 'scientific' theories in the attempt to give their schemes some respectability, they are admitting that Science works! And they feel the need for their own beliefs to piggy-back on science to get any credibility. |
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There you go THINKing again, Mo-two. After that: I tend to agree with Bob"s God Theory (God Science) THINKing. |
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stalhandske 05-Dec-20, 22:28 |
Bob 12:58 "Bare naturalism"? Is that how you call the reluctance to postulate another unknown (God) to explain unknown issues? This is not just applying Occam, it is pure realism and pragmatism. I also recall by mentor from my postdoc period in Amsterdam, always pointing out the dangers in postulating second or higher order hypotheses. |
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Stal Ah, you emotional Finns! So easily provoked into waving your hands as you speak! No, it's what I call the refusal to entertain ANY possible causes outside mass and energy as can be objectively measured. I include 'dark matter and dark energy' in 'Naturalism', because they can have effects that can be measured, so they also fall into the category of 'that which can be objectively measured'. I love you, mate, but there is another thread for this 'cause' debate. We should get back to the topic; which is about the fabric of the universe, not the causes of it. |
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Perhaps a sub-topic... I commented to my beloved Dreaded Black Wombat as the barbeque burned last night that life can be seen as solid air. It's just carbon dioxide, water vapour and a bit of nitrogen all bonded together, with a few trace elements like iron, sodium, calcium and potassium to add colour and flavour. |
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stalhandske 06-Dec-20, 00:04 |
Bob 22:57 <Ah, you emotional Finns! So easily provoked into waving your hands as you speak!> That's funny! <No, it's what I call the refusal to entertain ANY possible causes outside mass and energy as can be objectively measured. I include 'dark matter and dark energy' in 'Naturalism', because they can have effects that can be measured, so they also fall into the category of 'that which can be objectively measured'. > But you are mistaken, my Friend. It is no such refusal! Such possibilities can certainly be entertained, thought of, speculated about, made to artforms, etc etc. I don't even dislike such ventures. The only thing I meant was that if they are entirely irrefutable (cf. Popper), then they don't have a place in scientific thinking. They definitely do have a place in our imagination, religions, literature and art! |
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Stal 00:04 But even this humble wannabe theologian has a point when he says that Kepler's Laws by themselves don't adequately explain all possible trajectories. Some comets need a Higher Authority (i.e., Newton) to explain hyperbolic paths. And when Newton's equations break down, then Einstein... The infinite regression has commenced! But this is more about the Philosophy of Science than about Science per se. |
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Kepler's Laws The Dalai Lama says (paraphrasing) that if your religious beliefs are contradicted by science, you're best served by abandoning those beliefs. I don't know that theology should be BASED on scientific findings, but I can't see harm in theology paying homage to what has been discovered in other disciplines. |
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LS 14:02 Because they should focus on completely different aspects of life. Kepler's laws are as irrelevant to theology as they are to subatomic physics. <The Dalai Lama says (paraphrasing) that if your religious beliefs are contradicted by science, you're best served by abandoning those beliefs.> Tenzin said much the same thing to me back in 1985, over a cup of tea while trekking in Nepal. As usual, he was completely correct. I had to explain to him that the so-called 'Creation Science' he had read about was neither Science nor sound theology, but a body of belief held by people who understand neither. They confuse the analogy for the reality. Tenzin, being the very spiritually-aware guy we all know and love, commented that such people were well-intentioned, but on a lower path. They should be encouraged to aim for a higher path. Rather than quibble, I agreed that all beings should aim for the highest path within their reach, and we should all help each other to do so. He agreed, saying "That is Mahayana at its truest expression". |
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stalhandske 06-Dec-20, 21:22 |
Bob 13:44 Yes, I realise we aren't far apart. <I agree that the 'God hypothesis' has no part in scientific thinking. Just as Kepler's Laws have no part in Theology.> I actually don't think that comparison is good, because the reason the "God hypothesis" has no part in scientific thinking is very different from why Kepler's Laws have no part in theology. In fact, I think - hypothetically - Kepler's Laws of planetary motion may well have part in a theological study of how ancient people linked the heavenly bodies with their religious faith. This raises the interesting question of whether theology is science. Here, two definitions found on the Internet: "Theology is the systematic study of the nature of the divine and, more broadly, of religious belief." "Theology is the study of religion. It examines the human experience of faith, and how different people and cultures express it. Theologians examine the many different religions of the world and their impact on society." My view of theology is that it is science, and that a theologian does not necessarily have to have a religious faith. |
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Stal 21:22 That is a common understanding of "Theology", and within that definition you are correct. But I personally wouldn't call that discipline by the name "Theology". I would call it 'Comparative Religion'. This study certainly is a science, in that it follows the usual scientific paradigm of observation, analysis, falsification, etc. To me, "Theology" means what the etymology of it suggests. It is the study of God, which includes God's purposes, way of operating, relationship with Creation, etc. This is perhaps a 'science' in a looser term, because it has a more specialised concept of 'evidence and observation'. Some observations are accorded special status (e.g., the Bible) because they are deemed to be specially insightful. They hold this status mainly by tradition, and the tradition is justified on the basis of 'Providence', a rather unscientific concept, though it could be argued to be supported by the concept of 'first-hand account'. But it basically not a scientific paradigm. That's why I hesitate to use the word 'science', to avoid confusion with the Naturalist understanding. |
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God Science and God Theory They may well be the same thing. Maybe Science needs to discover how best to talk to Him and learn better how to ask the Ultimate Physicist/Mathematician/Etc it's questions, huh? |
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Mo 06:10 If that ever works, then what you find won't be God. It might be a vastly superior intellect, but it will still be part of the Cosmos, and therefore not the Transcendent One. <Maybe Science needs to discover how best to talk to Him and learn better how to ask the Ultimate Physicist/Mathematician/Etc it's questions, huh?> Like Deep Thought in the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy? |
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"Superior intellect" |
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41 What we really need of course is the ultimate question, rather than the ultimate answer. We already have the answer. What we lack is the question. Remember, the ultimate question must be phrased in just such a way that the answer is an unequivocal "41". Or thereabout. |
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41 When you are dealing with something as important as the Ultimate Answer, errors of the magnitude of almost 2.5% are totally unacceptable! |
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Mo 14:13 As Monty Python (may his name be blessed forever!) said in the Galaxy Song "You'd better hope and pray there's intelligent life in space, 'Cause there's bugger-all down here on the Earth." |
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British humor |
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Monty Python "Now write that 100 times and if you're not done by morning I'll cut your balls off!" It took me awhile the first time I watched it to catch on to what they were saying. But by the time Brian and his mother met the begger, "Jesus up and healed me. Without so much as a 'by your leave,' 'you're healed, mate!' Ruined a perfectly good trade. Bloody do-gooder!" Oh man. "The Meaning of Life" is mostly pretty good. The opening sequence, where the factory worker brings home bad news to the family, is absolutely priceless. |
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mo-oneandmore 07-Dec-20, 15:54 |
Deleted by mo-oneandmore on 07-Dec-20, 15:57.
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shiva I have never watched a Monte Python movie for longer than a few minutes, so I apparently didn't "catch on" to the humor idea --- maybe it was the British slang that got me. |
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The Mouse that Roared en.wikipedia.org) |
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LS 15:30 'Holy Grail' has similar scenes. There is one where some penitents are marching, chanting and hitting themselves on the head with a plank. The chant is 'I e, Iesu Domine, dona eius requiem!' Which translates to (imagine a cockney accent for full effect) "Get out, Lord Jesus, Give it a rest!" |
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Cockney Accent I watched "Life of Brian" at the student union building, Boise State University, probably spring of 1981 or fall of 1982. I don't remember which. I did not watch many movies there. I don't know why they were playing this one. Then they just kept building on it. The girl bursts into the secret meeting room, and Reggie's first reaction was, "what went wrong?" "Nothing, Reg. He wrote it all across the walls of the city, in letters ten feet tall!" "Oh, well good. We need people who can get things done." In a later scene you see two hapless souls conscripted to wash the graffiti off the walls, just in passing. Mo, you just have to check it out. Turn the subtitles on if you must. But the thing is a priceless work of art. Exquisite attention to detail. I will have to check out "The Mouse that Roared." |
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I am shocked and appalled. |
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