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Thought experiment proposed to reconcile psychological versus thermodynamic arrows of time:
A pair of physicists has proposed a thought experiment to help reconcile the seeming disparity between the psychological and thermodynamic arrows of time. In their paper published in the journal Physical Review E, Leonard Mlodinow and Todd Brun claim their thought experiment demonstrates that the two seemingly contradictory views of time, must always align.
When ordinary people think about time, they see the past as something that has come before and the future as a great unknown yet to come. We can remember the past, because it has happened already, but not the future, because it hasn't. Physicists, on the other hand see time as able to move either forward or backwards (towards greater entropy), which implies that we should be able to remember events in the future. So, why can't we?
It's because of the way our memories work the two say, and they've created a thought experiment to demonstrate what they mean. Imagine, they write, two chambers connected by an atomic sized tube with a turnstile in it. If there is gas in one of the chambers, individual atoms of it will move through the tube to the other chamber (towards higher entropy) tripping the turnstile as they go, in effect, counting the atoms as they pass by, until both sides have equal numbers of atoms-creating a state of equilibrium.
http://phys.org/news/2014-05-thought-psychological -thermodynamic-arrows.html
http://physics.aps.org/articles/v7/47
http://journals.aps.org/pre/abstract/10.1103/PhysR evE.89.052102
(Score: 2) by VLM on Tuesday May 06 2014, @06:27PM
"I can't prove I have a soul, and you can't prove I don't."
That would quite effectively remove it from the realm of rational discussion. It would also remove it from rational philosophical discussion, as any argument can be circumvented by a declaration of belief. It can be studied, but not rationally. At best it puts it somewhere like classical element theory (air, earth, fire, and water) such that a study of it could possibly improve one's quality of life, or even be a coping mechanism in some peculiar form, but using it as a basis of chemical research is highly unlikely to be successful and in a modern world full of decisions to make about chemicals and chemistry and the environment, would likely be a strong net negative. But if classical elemental theory is not true, however theoretically appealing it may be, in practice it adds nothing to reality.
The appeal to authority bit does not impress me very much. Great thinkers of the past, great politicians, great scientists, all had faith, true. They also owned slaves, and were men. I agree with the factual observation of all three characteristics, and that all three characteristics substantially influenced their lives in general, but disagree that insight or accomplishment or worth requires any or all of the three.
"unfairly judge it"
From your discussion of great thinkers, I think you've judged it a net positive for humanity. I've come to an opposite conclusion, that its been a net negative toward humanity, in total, yielding some negative feelings toward it. Probably not going to be able to hash this one out in a short time on SN.
"screw the whole idea of faith up, does not mean you can entirely dismiss all ontological discussions as being products of delusion or physically impaired biology."
Has faith ever spontaneously arisen, under careful scrutiny? Enormous quantities of historical evidence show it only spreads at the point of a sword, peer pressure, or by brainwashing, especially of youth. Some delusional, medically mentally ill people have, under observation, created their own peculiar faiths. Usually it doesn't turn out well for them or their victims, and luckily doesn't usually spread via the three transmission mechanisms previously mentioned. That doesn't disprove a faith cannot exist from a positive source and be spread in a positive manner, although its apparently never happened before, or at least not while under observation.
A large aspect of this debate seems to relate to an aesthetic judgment of occams razor.
I enjoyed your post and found your arguments interesting, although I disagreed with them. Have a nice day
(Score: 2) by edIII on Tuesday May 06 2014, @07:20PM
Thank you as well.
Technically, lunchtime is at any moment. It's just a wave function.