The origins of the universe

echi,

I think we get hung up on "origins" because we are predisposed to think in terms of "causal chains". The very notion of "understanding" usually relies on causality, prediction, and the urge to control.

When we talk in general terms of "rationality" we usually mean "what works as a system of thought".
Obviously those whose thoughts dwell on causality and prediction are drawn to rationalities which encompass them. Such rationalities include religions with "God as a controller" or atheistic materialism based on "universal physical laws".
The first tends to claim "consciousness" is "God given" - the second that it can be reduced to physics and chemistry.

It only when we allow "rationality" to encompass "meta-causal thought" that consciousness is freed from the bounds of either the "mystical" or the material. A possible candidates for such rationality might include "consciousness as an extension of the life process" (The Santiago theory of cognition) where "life" has evolved as a range self-sustaining dynamic structures (autopoisis) undergoing constant exchanges with their environment. Such organizational rationality is not confined to particular organisms but can be viewed as an embedded hierarchy from cell through organ, body, society and beyond, which transcends the bounds of the traditional "observer". The status of these ideas as "rationality" rests on non-linear (non-causal) mathematical systems as an independent arbiter of its coherence.

So there are rationalities which attempt to deal with "consciousness" but they may be based on systems which question the very nature of "normal explanation".

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fresco wrote:

A possible candidate for such rationality might include "consciousness as an extension of the life process" (The Santiago theory of cognition) where "life" has evolved as a range self-sustaining dynamic structures (autopoisis) undergoing constant exchanges with their environment.

If this theory defines consciousness as an extension of the life process then does it also define a point where consciousness (life) begins?
I try to think of consciousness as something like "heat", in the sense that it requires no beginning.

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echi,

As far as I can remember the position is that "life" has no distinct origins. Prigogine has demonstrated the spontaneous occurence of "dissipative structures" within chemical processes "far from equilibrium and these ase considered by Capra (et al) as candidates for "proto-cells".
Such structuring is considered as general result of "catastrophe theory" which when coupled with fractal geometry gives a credible discursive model for the visual appearance of "lifeforms".

Heres an interesting link in the light of the current ID debate

http://www.simonyi.ox.ac.uk/dawkins/WorldOfDawkins-archive/Catalano/box/laymans_response.shtml

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i believe the universe came from something small that absorbed so much emptiness that it was pretty much made up of a combination of gas, fire, and nothingness. After so much collective activity it had to much mass that it imploded showering nothingness with frozen bits of debris and frozen gases.

but its only a theory

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my other theory is that time is just a theory invented by life to tell where a person is in space. thusfore time is not absolutly physically real. its a mental concoction. So there was no beggining of time because accordingly time has been around since before the universe was created.

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pseudokinetics wrote:

my other theory is that time is just a theory invented by life to tell where a person is in space. thusfore time is not absolutly physically real. its a mental concoction. So there was no beggining of time because accordingly time has been around since before the universe was created.

Indeed. Although I do not agree with your conclusion,
I do tend to agree the mystery of the nature and substance of 'time' is the key to the mystery of origin.
I think the answer is somewhere in the future of QM.

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Time is so everything doesn't happen at once.

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Time is a word.

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I like the idea of life having no distinct origins. I understand that as meaning that life cannot be sufficiently defined.

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echi wrote:

I like the idea of life having no distinct origins. I understand that as meaning that life cannot be sufficiently defined.

You are right because no one knows the beggining of life means that life has no straight meaning its constantly changing. If everyone on earth chose the same path and followed it perhaps the meaning of life would be more clear. The other question is what if there is no meaning to life at all, if we are just here.

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where it all came from
...initially, a balance between the eternal Something and the eternal Nothing. Like the yin-yang in eastern philosophy.

Time happened. Why? Maybe because of the contradiction inherent in Everything existing in the same place at the same time; time was implied.

As a result, the Everything singularity detonated.

This also tends to explain the existance of the most fundamental condition of this universe:
Murphy's Law
A universe that began with a contradiction was bound to have it.

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pseudokinetics wrote:

echi wrote:
I like the idea of life having no distinct origins. I understand that as meaning that life cannot be sufficiently defined.

You are right because no one knows the beggining of life means that life has no straight meaning its constantly changing. If everyone on earth chose the same path and followed it perhaps the meaning of life would be more clear. The other question is what if there is no meaning to life at all, if we are just here.

What I mean is that what we call "life" may just be a matter of opinion. It may have more to do with our perception than with any precise definition. There may be organisms all around us that we don't recognize as "life". Maybe the life cycle is too slow or too fast for us to see. Maybe the organism is so big that we are only aware of its parts and fail to see their interrelations. Maybe it makes no real sense to call one thing "life" and another thing "not life".

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Re: where it all came from

xylene2301 wrote:

...initially, a balance between the eternal Something and the eternal Nothing. Like the yin-yang in eastern philosophy.

Time happened. Why? Maybe because of the contradiction inherent in Everything existing in the same place at the same time; time was implied.

Nothing happened to cause time to exist. "Time" could not have preceded itself.

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Re: The origins of the universe

The Pentacle Queen wrote:

Either 'at some point something came from nothing', or 'the universe has always existed'

Two imposssible ideas.

Generally the one you find the most comfort with is the one you support, but how can we distinguish which one is better, if indeed one is?

Discuss.

xxx pq xxx

i'll fall in behind both scenaria; our specific universe came from 'nothing'(ness) [a point where 'everything' had collapsed completely into a 'non' point in spacetime where for one 'non' instant, 'nothing' existed - and then erupted toward 'everythingness']
and
this pulsating "everythingness to nothingness to everythingness" universe has always existed! [probably repeated infinitely throughout the 'Ultiverse']

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and just to add a comment more topical to the present turn of this dicussion, in my understanding of reality 'time' is not a 'thing', it is merely a description of relationships between things - stars, atoms, eras, what have you.......
[time is a measuring stick, no more, no less.]

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echi wrote:

xylene2301 wrote:
...initially, a balance between the eternal Something and the eternal Nothing. Like the yin-yang in eastern philosophy.

Time happened. Why? Maybe because of the contradiction inherent in Everything existing in the same place at the same time; time was implied.

Nothing happened to cause time to exist. "Time" could not have preceded itself.

"Time" could not have preceded itself.
Hmmm...but maybe Timelessness did...and Murphy's Law as well.

Consider the balance beween Eternal Nothing and Eternal Something.
The particle physicists see that the small somethings are continually reverting to nothing and vice versa; the balance is dynamic/changing.

What if something went wrong with that balance (Murphy's Law says it will if it can.) and the Eternal Something Singularty reached criticality. Time started as a result of the Bang and is a fundamental (but not prime) motivator in our universe because in our space, things cannot co-exist spacially at the same time (at least it's not Einsteinian to do so).

I believe Murphy's Law may be Prime because it was an underlying condition before time itself.

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You are still using "time" to explain how "time" came into existence.
"What if something went wrong with that balance..."
"Time started as a result of the Bang..."

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BoGoWo wrote:

in my understanding of reality 'time' is not a 'thing', it is merely a description of relationships between things - stars, atoms, eras, what have you.......
[time is a measuring stick, no more, no less.]

It's undoubtedly closely related to the perceptions of sentient creatures of our dimension.
(aside: Kurt Vonnegut's Tralfamadorians perceived humans as millipedes because they could see a human's entire life as a trail of movements and actions.)

Yes, Time is a measuring stick but also may be a fundamental property of existance. It think H G Wells theorized in "The Time Machine" that Time was a distinct dimension: something like, "...a thing must have length, width, height and duration in order to exist."
So just as length may describe a unit on a measuring stick, it is also a basic property of existance.
...and time; a measurement but a property as well.

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Some very intelligent comments here (and, by the way, great to see you, BoGoWo; it's about time). But I can't help myself. I must wonder about the condition of Reality "before" the Big Bang, which the latest scientific position holds to be the origin of both time and space (including "before" and "after"). In other words, with regard to this matter, it is a false one insofar as we cannot possibly answer it. The questions we ask reflect our limitations, resulting in very limited answers. But I do feel that since some of us cannot help but inquire, we get more for our efforts by taking a pragmatic approach and pursuing "explanations" that serve some purpose--as well as the gratification of curiosity.
By the way, I appreciate the Santiago model of congnition and Doktor's "expansion" of the topic to include possibilities that we cannot yet imagine.

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Time is, to me closely related to gravity;
as our universe expands, the device we use to measure the expansion it time - a positive time that is!
at some point expansion will stop as the cumulative effect of gravity brings all outward movement to a halt.
Then, measured by negative time, our universe, driven still by this same attractive force of gravity that resisted the expansion, will collapse toward nothingness again; tick by negative tick.
[i wonder if the Ultiverse is also cyclical; or perhaps it just IS!]

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The origins of the universe

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