Most everyone here can agree that the universe is made of some sort of substance. Even if everything that you see in front of you isn't real, even if it's all some grand illusion, the fact remains that something is there. But what is that something? What is that substance that the world is composed of? Is it all physical, tangible material? Is it all thoughts and ideas perceived by the conscious? Is it a mix of both mind and matter? Is it just all a movie playing out in front of us? Will Irock ever fulfill his dream of having sex with Roph, or can he only do it in his mind?
I'm asking all of this because tomorrow in class, I have to choose a theory and fight for my idea in a debate TO THE DEATH. I've already got an idea of what I'll go for in my presentation, but I'd like to bring the discussion to RMRK to see what views you may have.
There are quite a few branches of thought. Firstly you have the people who believe that the world is made up of only one substance, and that substance is physical materials only. Thus, this branch is called materialism, in which everything, even thoughts and ideas, are just composed of atoms, electrons, molecules and etc. After all, if you've watched the Matrix at all, you might understand that the senses are but electric signals sent within the brain, and can be altered given certain circumstances. Materialists explore brain science and biological chemistry to explain how the world works, how the human conscious interacts with the world.
Oppositely, you have another group that believes the world consists only of ideas and perceptions. This branch is called idealism. From what I understand, it's essentially your will or conscious that is telling you what you see, how you feel; it sees everything for you, though nothing physically exists. For example, you see a computer screen in front of you, but its actually your mind (not to be confused with your brain) telling you a monitor is there, telling you how it feels and that you cannot pass your hand through it. How they can perceive these in this theory, however, I don't quite know yet. Some people believe that, in fact, their mind is the only thing that exists, and that everything, including you and I, is but a figment that their mind has created. Other people believe that everything has a conscious, even the smallest of atoms in your clothing, and that the world we perceive is a network of these conscious'. Others still believe that there is a god or grand master who controls what ideas our conscious' can see.
Another group believes that the world is comprised of two substances, mind and matter, material and immaterial. This branch is called dualism. The world consists of the physcial materials that take up space, but also thoughts and ideas that take up no space in the minds of everyone. If you've ever seen a picture of the the Young Woman/Old Woman illusion, you'd see a picture, but your mind would also be able to see two distinct pictures and ideas. The question though, is how does mind and matter interact? You could will your arm to move, but the truth is that its chemicals in your body that are making your arms move, not the thoughts of your mind moving it. The Mind-Brain mystery still remains to this day.
Based on some of these theories, what do you think the world is comprised of? Perhaps you even have a theory of your own to give, or can correct me of any mistakes I may have made with these existing theories.
I suppose materialism. However, I don't think that everything is made up of one substance, but rather there was an initial substance, or more than one, that then became many many different kinds of substances which I believe make the universe. Also, by 'more than one' I mean more than two as well, as not to be confused with mixing materialism and dualism.
Anyways, here's something interesting to watch if you want. It was a science channel special about the Theory of Everything (aka, String theory, which was broken and is now M-Theory).
Part I
[yt]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z7SDrj4Tjvk[/yt]
Part II
[yt]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SHzU3fgID3o&feature=related[/yt]
Part III
[yt]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dVfw1XOIFGk&feature=related[/yt]
Part IV
[yt]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P-mLF23JzKA&feature=related[/yt]
Part V
[yt]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GRRBz9b6mvA&feature=fvw[/yt]
Why this is relevant, is because it discusses the theory of the big bang, or more what you're asking for, how was the universe created.
I hate these arguments. They're awful.
I am in support of dualism. Many Wicans are, I suppose. It just makes sense to me. Any other argument is rediculous, since as Sartre says, it is the individual's perception which matters- so I guess the way to argue would be idealism, since it cannot be adequately proved OR disproved.
The universe is made of love and sunshine dust.
Quote from: Holk on February 10, 2010, 03:15:01 AM
The universe is made of love and sunshine dust.
lol. this.
Not useful, but amusing enough to have made it worth it. :3
The proponents of Idealism are self-absorbed wankers. The Universe doesn't exist for the benefit of a single consciousness, mortal or otherwise; unfortunately that's unprovable in the scope of the debate as framed, but it doesn't change the verifiable fact that those people are wankers. I don't know that you could use that in your debate, unfortunately.
Dualism is an interesting approach, and if there was more evidence to back up assertions of shared consciousness or actual material effects of mental abilities by themselves, it would be more interesting.
As it stands, the only take on this debate that produces verifiable outcomes, testable theories and whatnot is Materialism. Yee-haw. And since it's what we're stuck with, at least outside of academic debates, that makes it easier to defend as a philosophical stance.
But ... any self-aware creature can be governed by ideas just as much as physical reality. Winston Churchill said during WWII that "The empires of the future are the empires of the mind." You can interpret that in any number of ways, but the most obvious one is that the modern world is not confined by physical borders so much as ideological stances.
Personally, I despise these sorts of useless ontological arguments, and have great sympathy for your plight in arguing a position to any number of bored and distracted classmates. I'd rather spend time doing something productive, but the exercise in rhetoric is probably worthwhile in itself.
Debating is an art. The correct way to debate is not to prove that you are right, but to prove that your opponent is wrong.
Right, so two opponents who debate each other correctly will ... prove that they're both wrong? :)
I'd argue that debate is a useful exercise to develop the sorts of critical thinking skills that are necessary to understand the world around you, but that most debates, on their own merits, aren't terribly useful outside of the exercise that the participants get out of it.
Also, it's a lovely way to examine someone else's reasoning and logic from afar, and thereby be horrified, startled, or depressed that such people actually run for public office and get elected.
That's why it's an art, one will do it better than the other and so one will win. You don't literally need to prove they're wrong, just more wrong than you.
derp derp, off track now, I will not speak about it anymore unless I'm on topic.
Regarding the whole consciousness thing... who is to say that I'm not alone in the world? As far as I'm concerned, my reality belongs to me alone. I don't know for sure that you 'people' are people like me (you could simply be complex components of my own consciousness... a la The Matrix). I dont actually think that you're not real... I'm pretty sure that you are a person. But it leads me onto my next thought.
We have colours right, and we have names for them. But how do I know that my yellow is the same as your yellow? How do I know that my blue is the same as your blue? How do I know that my green isnt your brown? Well, I just don't. And I dont think that an experiment exists to find out. The trouble is, if your blue was my yellow, you would still your blue yellow, because that's what you have learned. At some point in your life, somebody has pointed to that colour and said "this is yellow". How the fuck does that teacher in class, teaching colours to kids, know if they are seeing the same colour or not? He doesn't, however he is imparting the knowledge on them that this one particular colour (whatever it may be for them) is called yellow.
Alas.
Technically the Universe is 95% or so of nothingness, so yeah.
To tell you the truth the answer lay in ur first paragraph. Scientists thought our universe was made up of atoms, until sum1 came along and broke one down into quarks, so our universe was made of quarks. A few years ago another scientist broke quarks down even further and found... nothing. Everything we see, feel, smell, hear, etc. is made up of nothing. When u multiply nothing 1000 times, u still get nothing, yet here we are. So how does it work? Vibrations and perception! Our brains emit electromagnetic waves that bounce back to us and are perceived by our senses. We convert these electrical vibrations, using nerve stems and what not, into information our brains can process. So thus, our world really is what we make it. We perceive it is there, and so it is there.
Quote from: demonking39 on May 15, 2010, 03:42:59 AM
So thus, our world really is what we make it. We perceive it is there, and so it is there.
So, if I was drunk for some reason and thought that the letter A was actually the letter O, even when everyone else said that it was A, does that mean it's O?
hahaha, that would be great, but no. It works on collective perception. Bc humans as a whole have trained themselves to think in one direction we only see in one direction. It's hard to explain it to sum1 who has never heard the theory b4, but u can look it up. Pretty much, if the world collectively thought unicorns were real, then they would be real, same rule applies to everything.
"Sanity is not statistical." (George Orwell, 1984).
I know I just half contradicted myself here, but this quote is just awesome. What I'm trying to say here is, just because everyone says that the letter is O, when it is clearly A, it doesn't mean that it is O. However, just because you say that the letter is A, when it is clearly O, doesn't mean that it is O either.
Back on topic: I'm a dualist. I also agree with Holk.
And did we just revive a dead topic? Oh noes!
Yeah, we totaly did, but I couldn't help it, it just got my attention. What ur saying is true, but u can't look at it like that, it's not sum1 simply stating sumthing about sumthing, it's a generalised idea or belief towards sumthing. So it wouldn't be enough for the whole world to SAY that A is O, but if everyone truely BELIEVED that A whas O then A would be O. That's simple though bc that alphebet is a human device to begin with, but if u look at it being applied to a non-human cration u can see how powerful suggestion really is. The placebo affect is the best example of this.
The universe is made up of lasers that are shot at triangles.
But you have to put the triangle in the middle of the room first so you destroy as much of your belongings as possible.
Nothing but myself exists lol solipsism :V
I was reading some really old books one year and then some guy was talking on the tv about dark matter and dark energy and I had to do a double take because the guy on the TV supposed to be talking about god particles and atom smashers was sounding just like these dead guys talking about aether.
That's why I switched majors to languages and cultures - it's easier to understand.
Well, the univers is a four-dimensional shape (X,Y,Z and Time)
One of my theories is that i is a four-dimensional Mobious Band (a mobious band is a one-dimmensional object, then only way to have this is a mobious band...look it up...), therefor, once you get to the end of the universe, you find yourself at the other end.
Is it real? Well, in all technicalities, we don't exist, and could never have been living, but is everything else real? If you look throughout history, and go deep enough, there are some instances in history where technology MIGHT have been better than what we have today, but it isn't definate, and if you're suggesting that something happened to us like did on the Matrix, I'm pretty sure that it didn't.
If you look around, and think of how everything works. Not everything makes sense, does it?
Thinks of your computer right now. It technically shouldn't work. It uses tons of on and off switches to process things. Why should it work like it does?
Quote from: Event Master on August 26, 2010, 03:09:48 PM
If you look around, and think of how everything works. Not everything makes sense, does it?
Thinks of your computer right now. It technically shouldn't work. It uses tons of on and off switches to process things. Why should it work like it does?
Uh...computers do make sense. o_O
Just because you don't have a good understanding of how computers work doesn't mean they aren't working the way they were intended to. Computers are complex things, but they work the way they do for a reason, just like any other machine ever built. It isn't some magical box that you flip the switch on, and out comes all this cool stuff. @_@
I have a particular sense of universe. Think in how the time works, for us (occidental) the time works like a line, it's quantitative. For most of the orient's cultures, the time works like a cicle. Everything begins and end at the same time, what we have it's only a cicle.
Applies this concept on universe, a space that never have an end but ever reach the same place, and it's not a sphere.
This help me a lot to understand the universe.
(It's difficult to talk about abstract things in english, I don't know if you all will understand well.)
Forgive me for posting in a thread that hasn't been active for more than 60 days (I saw the warning) But this conversation interests me. =p
The universe is made up of space, because without space you can't really have the stuff that the space occupies. I think it's that simple. It's like, do you spend time in a small closet full of a lot of junk, with no room to breathe? Of course not, nobody would do that- or you would die. Space lets *everything* be.... the reason Buddhists and certain religionists (as well as philosophers) emphasis emptiness, and 'Nothingness' and 'space' is because that's the very essence force that allows All to exist.
Now can space itself be considered a 'something?' I think that answer is more of a 'yes' and 'no' thing. If it was a 'something' like the corporeal matter was, it would just cause more clutter. But if it was a true negative, it would be a black hole that innately and purely got rid of the 'something.'
I think this also explains why the universe adores ambiguity and ambivalence-y and doesn't like neat, pat answers. It thrives on complication and 'Yes and no' answers and 'It depends' and Yes' if x meets y to the z axis but only if D isn't in the mood of scorpio under the water blue fall of the great mood provided that- then back to the original score of Plato - blah blah blah.
There's a larger picture here. The universe as a whole is mainly concerned with balance. The reason rpg games are so popular- it goes back down to the basics. A fire-type creature is strong against fire, maybe lightning too- but weak against water/ice. That's a very simplistic version of how the universe operates. Everything that exists has things that its both strong and weak too- and you can narcissitically improve yourself (be a 'boss') to be very strong, but if you do THAT then you will be vulnerable to liberalism and faggy working-together-ness. You can try to have no weaknesses, but upon doing so you will just be weak against teamwork. Of course the contrary is true, if you act too goody goody and 'hippie-like' then you will just become easy to prey to bullies and thugs. When you try to get really good at one skill, you are avoiding getting good at another skill...the balance is balanced around the balance. But it has to be this way: Because everything is at stake. Or you couldn't ever get what you wanted.
Pancakes.
That are shot at triangles.
Politicians.
Cheese.
entire universe is babies.
but no, really, matter.
@Adorkable
I think old school tabletop PCs were so popular because of math and imagination. You can't do X because of Y. Its a bunch of if / else statements.
I also never understood why ice puts out fire in RPGs, wouldn't fire melt ice, but water puts out fire? Whatever.
As for space... space is a blank container. If there is a planetoid around, that space can either contain a solid, liquid or gas. Gas for atmosphere, solid for dirt and liquid for water. Making them is a math equasion. Making a planet is a physics equasion with gravity.
People and how they react are nothing but complex math problems. Passive people = 1. Aggressive people = 9. When their interacting, if their combine sum is over a 12 then there's a problem, if its under a 5, there's nothing keeping them together so they drift apart. Then there's slight variations like your mood, your status and if you're just unstable. Plus there are adaptable people who can be a 9 or a 1 whatever the situation calls for. Most would call it a type B or A personality.
Hardcore astrology can lay out all the math for you.
Everything is math.
astrology, lol.
Taurus' leech seed beats Aquarius' water cannon.
Quote from: ShortStar on March 25, 2011, 07:02:26 PM
Everything is math.
... Only becuase we believe it has worked for us so far. And there's no
real way to do that. Someone had the idea that the universe operates on mathematics, a language that
humans either invented or discovered. We continue to use this system because we think that our physics make sense, but what if they don't? What if acceleration isn't a constant, and that the fact that it has been change in speed over time taken for every test is just a coincidence?
"Curiousity killed the cat."
I'm sure humans aren't the only ones to discover math. Aliens might have different words for one two and three, plus and minus, but its all the same. Their mental capacity might not be able to grasp it, just like many humans don't.
Gravity = sorcery.
Gravity = Force/mass
:V
Quote from: ShortStar on March 26, 2011, 02:02:32 PM
I'm sure humans aren't the only ones to discover math. Aliens might have different words for one two and three, plus and minus, but its all the same. Their mental capacity might not be able to grasp it, just like many humans don't.
I don't think you understood me. We didn't discover maths, we invented it. We expanded it and we believed in it. The only reason we continue to use it is because it has supposedely worked for us so far. Aliens aren't necassarily mathematical beings; perhaps they understand the universe in a different way that
we don't have the mental capacity to handle. Take the indigenous Australian culture for example. Their societies lived for thousands upon thousands of years in desert, barren lands and limited food and water supplies. They didn't have maths, they had a different way of understanding the Earth and universe, which didn't destroy their lands. They had one word for one, and one word for many. And that is all they needed.
Sure, their culture may not have been as advanced as our's in our own eyes, but to them, we looked like the ones who didn't understand life.
So, the universe might be maths, and it might not be. Right now, there's no way we can tell. Deal with it.
I'm sure other aliens have discovered and invented math. Chances are other planets will have Australian cultures, but they will also have specifics. Kind of like there will always be people that think in general terms and those that speak in specifics. Lazy and extensive.
Quote from: ShortStar on March 27, 2011, 01:19:46 AM
Lazy and extensive.
That sounds like slander to me. In any case, that is in no way what I was saying. There is no proof that maths is more advanced than normal thinking, it just makes sense to us. The idea of maths is human, and aliens most likely would not have invented it in the same way or form. You don't understand my cause; maths is not the only way of looking at the universe, and there is certainly no proof that it is the best. I'm educated in specialised maths methods and physics, and I think that it is wonderful, but I put forward this idea simply because we may have limited our learning by confining ourselves to mathematics. Earth's gravity might be 9.8 m/s multiplied by the mass of the object, but it might also be determined by the thickness of the frypan in Ms Walter's cupboard. My point being that their is no way to tell how the universe operates unless we ask it. And I think the universe is too busy to answer a question by people who limit themselves to numbers. If we gave another method a shot, perhaps we might be able to combine the methods together to have a better understanding of the universe. We might not. The point being that you don't know if you don't try.
I think I yeild to this conversation.
We're all kidding ourselves. Nobody has the slightest idea about the town we live in let alone the universe. The universe is unexplainable - it will take intelligence and understanding far superior to that of any human being to even BEGIN to comprehend it. Math is a security blanket for humanity - we see it work 99% of the time so we assume it can explain everything. It can't. It won't. The universe is a big, bad, powerful thing and something as closed minded as human thinking is never going to understand it. Now eat your pudding and get to bed children.
Quite sure that's what I was saying, just in not a forward choice of words. Also, it's 20 past 1 in the afternoon here. I'm not tired!
This conversation is about as useful as a $5 note at the cinemas.
Thats very useful. £5 can buy popcorn and a large drink at my cinema.
BED NOW MISTER FOR BACK CHATTING.
Big difference, Gracie. Five pounds is like 12 dollars here. $5 will get you a smack on the ass.
Fine, I don't wanna stay up anyway! You're not my real mum!
Pff, I ain't that cheap bizatch.
I WILL BEAT YOUR ASS SO HARD, JUST WAIT TILL YOUR FATHER GETS HOME!!
I don't care about this family! I'm going to London with my band and we're going to be famous! Just you see!
... I'll be good.
Cheese.
Actually, the universe is mostly dark matter. and cheese.
The universe was created when Carl Sagan decided to invent cake. Since he needed something to hold the cake in. Therefore the universe is made up of a giant convection oven.
That's why our universe is cake-shaped.
On earth, every cubic square cm contains around 30,000,000,000,000,000,000 particles of oxygen. So nothing is basicly empty. The lowest ammout of particles per cubic square cm that humans ever managed to reach was 100, by using vacuum.
Now you might be wondering where i'm going with this. Now let's go to space.
The space between the planets in our solarsystem contains an amount of 10 oxygen particles per cubic square cm. But it can even go lower. If we leave our solarsystem and enter the interstellar space, you can only find 1 oxygen particle per Square METER.
So the answer, the question where the universe is made of, should be "Air".
I got this from Vsauce btw, i'm not the kind of smartass that could write that what's above here all by myself :P
I'm going to have to politely disagree with you on that one. I'll start on a large scale to prove that most of the universe is not matter.
The stuff of the universe we common folk know of in our universe are basically stars and planets and asteroids and moons and comets and stupid run-on sentences. These stars and planets and asteroids and moons and comets and stupid run-on sentences are contained in galaxies. These galaxies are in clusters. Clusters that we would say are humongous. Then we realize the fucking massive void right next to it that makes the cluster look like an ant to the void's Rosie O'Donnell. They're very large. To through some maths at you, this guy (http://science.howstuffworks.com/dictionary/astronomy-terms/question221.htm) told me that the universe is 0.0000000000000000000042% matter. That is a very small number:
(https://rmrk.net/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww3.wolframalpha.com%2FCalculate%2FMSP%2FMSP74719ibi2d6bh32b7dg00000dad2eb8c7e3399b%3FMSPStoreType%3Dimage%2Fgif%26amp%3Bs%3D21%26amp%3Bw%3D442%26amp%3Bh%3D36&hash=2a5075266752428cd977b46184583171351071e9)
That's 21 / 5 * 10^21. Yeah.
Then we get inside the clusters. The galaxies are not shoulder-to-shoulder. They are certainly not touching, except in cases where they are colliding or merging or whatever they do. Galaxies are weird people.
Then we get inside the galaxies. We know that galaxies are comprised of solar systems and nebulae and black holes and all that crazy stuff. And, of course, an incredibly large amount of nothing between all these somethings.
Then the solar systems. THE SOLAR SYSTEMS (http://www.phrenopolis.com/perspective/solarsystem/). JUST LOOK AT HOW EMPTY THAT IS. THAT'S NOT EVEN AS EMPTY AS THE UNIVERSE.
Then the planets. We know that the planets are made of stuff, we can see it. So that's not that shocking.
Then, life. I.e., organisms, organs, tissue, cells, organelles, acids and the stuff that comprises all of it: atoms. There are billions upon billions of atoms in your vision, right now. Can you see a distinguish a single one of them? I bet you can't. So you know that they're small. Then think of what makes the atom. Protons are tiny, tiny things that do stuff, but that's not all. Electrons are even tinier (http://wiki.answers.com/Q/What_is_the_size_of_an_electron) things that do other stuff. Then you have to think about how electrons orbit the nucleus of the atom. Picture a cathedral. A massive cathedral. Now picture a fly circling the middle of the cathedral, from the very edge of the cathedral. That's a pathetic attempt at scaling the orbit of an electron. The rest of the space in the cathedral-atom is empty. Nothing. That is how empty an atom is. Any atom. All atoms.
So, the universe has comparatively barely any matter in it at all. What the rest is isn't as easy to figure out. It could be anti-matter, dark matter, Xenu's minions or just nothing.
Wow. And I thought I felt empty because of some psychological disturbance...