@Setanta,
The great guru tells us that evolution is not connected to the big bang! I thought the big bang was the beginning of the Universe. Does the great guru think that Evolution was not started in the great event which created the Universe. Just as a fetus is created inside of a mother; evolution was included in the birth of the Universe( unless the great guru wants to tell us that a "supernatural being" interposed his or her will as the universe was forming and decreed-There will be Evolution!!
I don't think so!!!
@spendius,
Quote from my post:
What we do with our knowledge of the universe and life is what is important.
Do try to keep up, spendi.
@edgarblythe,
Do try to stop sounding like a a lady of a certain age coming off a middling education Ed dear.
@spendius,
Do you have anything important to do, like, perhaps, sort your socks?
@farmerman,
I think the tachyon is a good example of the limits of particle physics. I dont think everything can be understood in terms of particles.
@Francis,
Quote:You cannot travel at more than 60 mph because you'll asphixiate.
That is an example of events within this universe. I ask again : Can you give me one possible way we could find out what existed before the universe ?
@ehBeth,
Quote:Not "one of the doctors", "doctors of the beginning ..."
And it would be incorrect to say this was the generally held opinion of doctors. I am only aware of one doctor who said that.
Ionus wrote: Can you give me one possible way we could find out what existed before the universe ?
I certainly can but in the present state of art of our knowledge it would be science fiction...
However, I note that your red herring in asking that question, in order to avoid explaining how it is possible to say "Science will never...", is just a failed try to make a point.
As I'm not interested in showing my manliness, at least the way you do, I'll let you have the last word...
@Francis,
You can" well, if you can, go ahead.
You wrote: "I certainly can but in the present state of art of our knowledge it would be science fiction..."
You mean the kind of "science fiction" that those who believe in God are accused of writing? That kind of science fiction? Oh, I see. Your Science Fiction is superior to anyone else's science-fiction.
@plainoldme,
Ionus- This kind of garbage below is beneath contempt. But I think you must pity this lady.
I certainly can but in the present state of art of our knowledge it would be science fiction...
Massagatto wrote:You mean the kind of "science fiction" that those who believe in God are accused of writing?
No, I don't possess that kind of wickedness (for my eternal damnation)...
Perhaps you have difficulty understanding, Francis, or it may be that I have not written clearly. I will try again but please excuse the format since I am going to try to make it quite clear to you,
I will quote from a very good book--A Short History of Nearly Everything by Bill Bryson. Now, Francis, if you are able to show that any of Bryson's comments are incorrect or misleading, please do so--But be specific!
Bryson writes:
"The singularity has no "around" around it. There is no space for it to occupy. No space for it to be. We cannot even ask how long it has been there--whether it has just lately POPPED INTO BEING, like a good idea, or whether it has been there forever, quietly awaiting the right moment. Time doesn't exist. There is no past for it to emerge from. In a single blinding pulse, the sigularity assumes heavenly dimensions. In three minutes, 98 percent of all the matter there is or will ever be has been produced"
Now, Francis, can you exclude the possiblity that there was a force that popped the singularity into being? If so, do it but be specific. Can you explain that there have been no past from which the singularity may have come? Are you,like the great guru, going to deny that since 98% of all matter has been produced, the POTENTIAL for future EVOLUTION lies within that matter?
Ionus said it best! The only tenable position for an honest man( who is not a man of faith) is to be an Agnostic. Atheists can really not explain a great deal because(as we read Bryson) it is obvious that we don't know!
\
@Francis,
I dont believe in manliness. I have done many macho things and it was for fun, not for bragging rights.
Quote:in order to avoid explaining how it is possible to say "Science will never..."
Because there ARE two things science will never do. Make matter go faster than the speed of light and know what existed before our universe.
I am interested in your opinion and I dont care if it is science fiction I will not attack it with ridicule but with logic.
@MASSAGAT,
Your inferences about being an agnostic or an atheist are those of a religionist that is shadowed by your own set of beliefs.
I used to read Bryson and I could see several times that he had no clue on what he was talking about.
Now, as to your suppositions about the Universe' physics, you forgot to mention many other theories like time=Möbius strip, theory of pulsating bodies and so on.
And I'm not going to deny anything, I'm just not interested in a discussion that turns out soon to be a confrontation of "beliefs"...
@Francis,
Oh, please, Francis, you are avoiding my question. I can understand why you might do so but being devious just makes you look very bad.
You also wrote:
Now, as to your suppositions about the Universe' physics, you forgot to mention many other theories like time=Möbius strip, theory of pulsating bodies.
Huh?
I hope you never tried to teach a class. Your answer is positively opaque. How does that answer the question posed?
@Ionus,
Ionus wrote: to Francis-
I am interested in your opinion and I dont care if it is science fiction I will not attack it with ridicule but with logic.
*********************************************
end of quote
I don't think he has an opinion, Ionus, at least nothing I can discern. Do you understand his answer? I must confess that I don't.
@Francis,
Francis wrote:
I used to read Bryson and I could see several times that he had no clue on what he was talking about.
end of quote
I do hope you contacted the poor man to set him straight! Of course, when Bryson would note that the corrections came from the scientific capital of the world, Paris, he would take notice.
@MASSAGAT,
You do realize that Bill Bryson is a humor writer and is nit really a primary source of scvientific information. That book was written with a bit of tongue in cheekness.
@farmerman,
Quote:In 2004, the book won the EU Descartes Prize for science communication.
Quote:Bill Bryson wrote this book because he was dissatisfied with his scientific knowledge " that was, not much at all. He writes that science was a distant, unexplained subject at school. Textbooks and teachers alike did not ignite the passion for knowledge in him, mainly because they never delved in the whys, hows, and whens.
"It was as if [the textbook writer] wanted to keep the good stuff secret by making all of it soberly unfathomable."
" Bryson, on the state of science books used within his school.
There's a lot of truth in that.
Laurence Sterne dealt in humour and tounge-in-cheekness too. That doesn't detract from his science. It's po-faced long-wordists like you who ruin science education.
@farmerman,
Trystam SHandy? a source book? To make such bold stements of implied credibility like Massa and Aonus requires a little more techy depth than some book that was written for entertainment alone. Bryson was never intending himself to be considered as a primary source or even correct (he says so much in his booK).
We know (and evidence) the Big Bang from a few tenths of a second after it began. The shape of the Universe, the cosmic element distribution and the relict radio leaves a footprint that only needs supernatural intervention because someones worldview requires it to have supernatural intervention. I think a natural physical phenom , sans supernatural beings, makes calculational and evidential sense.
