Nope. If we define “observation” the way you do, as something that happens solely in the observer’s mind (brain and nervous system, supposing you’re not a substance dualist), we never see refrigerators, TVs, etc. etc., but only light.
Refrigerators usually also produce light. Anyway, that wasn’t the difference I meant. The TV might be turned off for all I care.
My position is not “yes” and has never been “yes”.
Sure I did. But we usually speak of “seeing the refrigerator” instead of “seeing the light reflected by the refrigerator”. In the former case, the refrigerator is affected by the observation (namely, by its collision with the light). In the latter case, only the light itself is affected (namely, by its collision with our visual perception mechanism). In any case, the object of observation is affected by the observation and in the observation.
The refrigerator is “observed” (experienced) by the light in its collision with it.
Technically, the refrigerator is construed, based on responses to the light that hits our retina and the conditions we call our brain. We don’t actually ever see anything as it is. We could even be seeing a scale picture of a refrigerator. An obvious thing to state but it seems indeed we need to start with the basics.
The problem with the Chinese entanglement observation is more related to that issue actually, as they might actually cause the entire situation into being by arranging circumstances for it to be observed.
This is my skepsis vis the Higgs Boson. I think it is not a particle but rather an epiphenomenon seen when a material self valuing takes shape - a spectre of its power perhaps. Not something that can exist by itself.
It needs the conditions in which it is required for something to make sense. It is like the wishful-thinking particle of those that refuse to contemplate philosophy’s grounding question “Why being and not rather nothing?”, the answer to which is the double entendre “Nothing can’t enforce itself.”
Kurt Gödel provided a mathematical solution to the Einstein field equations showing that the Universe could be cyclical. If I recall correctly, it required the Universe to rotate.
Gödel and Einstein were friends at the Institute for Advanced Study at Princeton. Even though the model was logically consistent, I don’t think that it was ever taken seriously.
But the universe is not an object.
It namely has no edge nor a center.
We cant look at it from outside and we cant know where we are in it with respect to its limits, as it has no discrete limits, as there cant be anything outside of it.
I would guess that a spinning Universe would have a higher Energy content than a stationary Universe, which in turn means that the spatial metric would change. Since time is part of the spatial metric it is possible, if it were setup properly, that the time variable could be sinusoidal.
Anyway, I am not an expert in this matter, I only know enough to be dangerous.
Thanks Ed
P.S.
After getting my feet wet with regard to Peirce, your conjectures appear to be true.
The universe contains many galaxies. We can observe the positions of those galaxies and determine if it they form a circular rotational motion. Thus, if the universe is truly rotating, we can also find the center of the universe, the point of no angular velocity, and if that point cannot be found, we can deduce it by comparing relative velocities to deduce an implied centerpoint.
Either the universe is spinning, or it is not, and this should be able to be determined by astronomers.
Yes there is. You are a thing. Your post is a thing. A word in your post is a thing. And so on.
You are speaking of things we cannot speak of.
What exactly is the point of that?
“Whereof one cannot speak, thereof one must be silent.”
– Ludwig Wittgenstein
There is indeed such a thing as finite number of things. For example, your post is one finite thing (because it is bounded by white or light blue space.) Your post + that white (or light blue) space that surrounds it are two finite things. And so on.
What exactly are you asking me?
I said it before: you’re asking if there is such a thing as infinite boundary.
In other words, you are not speaking of finitude.
If we add up my post and that space that surrounds it and everything else, do we arrive at a finite number? Suppose that we do. Suppose that number is 60000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000001. Now suppose there is a central thing. That thing is 1. This means there are 60000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000 things around it. Now let’s suppose there is an equal number of things on each side of the central thing: 10000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000 above it, 10000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000 below it, 10000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000 in front of it, 10000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000 behind it, 10000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000 on the left of it and 10000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000 on the right of it. What is there on the right of the 10000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000th thing on the right of the central thing?
Not sure you’ve understood me. Let me put it slightly differently.
If we add up my post and that space that surrounds it and everything else, do we arrive at a finite number? Suppose that we do. Suppose that number is 7. Now suppose there is a central thing. That thing is 1. This means there are 6 things around it: 1 above it, 1 below it, 1 in front of it, 1 behind it, 1 on the left of it and 1 on the right of it. What is there on the right of the thing on the right of the central thing?
But I do know this, consciousness can only percieve the infinite in the sense of an immortal consciousness, it cannot percieve the infinite in any given moment, only in the sense that there are an infinite amount of moments.
Note that I never said that the universe is finite.
Universe is a meaningless concept. Unless it refers to something specific (e.g. what was observed to have happened in the past.)
The meaningless version of the concept of universe says that the universe is the sum of everything that happened in the past and everything that will happen in the future.
It goes beyond one’s experience.
It is thus not finite.
We do not arrive at a finite number because you did not specify what this “everything else” is.
As it is, it is an unbounded concept.
It has no limits.
It is infinite.
And as I said, finite number plus infinity does not equal finite number.
No look. Suppose all of existence, nature, the universe, whatever you wish to call it, consists of a single thing. What is there around that thing?
If it consisted of seven things, and I were to ask what is there around the central thing, the answer would be: other things. But what would there be next to those other things, counting outward from the center?
If there is nothing, or nothingness, then we cannot conceive of the outer things, since we would have to conceive of them as being bounded by nothing(ness) on at least one side. Nothing(ness) however is inconceivable (for us).
And if all things are bounded by other things, there must be an infinity of things, which is equally inconceivable.
“Right” and “left” are higher level concepts. At the lowest level of abstraction, there is a sequence of events, which means, instead of “left” and “right” we have “precedent” and “antecedent”. I cannot say what bounds the peripheral objects (that bound the central object) because your specification does not specify these objects. That’s all there is to it.
I like your thinking here, Magnus. Yes, the infinity/nothingness problem forces us into phenomenology.
“[Husserl had realized more profoundly than anybody else that] all philosophic understanding must start from our common understanding of the world, from our understanding of the world as sensibly perceived prior to all theorizing. Heidegger went much further than Husserl in the same direction: the primary theme is not the object of perception but the full thing as experienced as part of the individual human context, the individual world to which it belongs.” (Strauss, “Philosophy as Rigorous Science and Political Philosophy”.)
If we keep going further in the same direction, what is there beyond Heidegger?