[lit-ideas] Re: The Piano Man
- From: "Veronica Caley" <vcaley@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Tue, 23 Aug 2005 21:04:38 -0400
Paul: This is the way science works: 1000 people fail and one
succeeds.
Ah, but when one succeeds, it's pure magic. Electricity, computers, clean
water, blood transfusions, medications that keep millions of people alive
or out of pain. What the Northern Lights really are about, no God needed.
And certainly evolutionary theory.
When I used to teach comparative religions, sometimes a student would ask
me if I believe in miracles. I always said yes, and told her why. I flick
a switch and the light goes on, or the radio, or the TV. I turn a key,
step on the accelerator and the car moves. I am up in years and still have
my teeth. I feel I owe a lot of debt to a lot of people, including the
ones that tried and failed. I could go on and on with this, being totally
impressed with seeing a fetus, brain surgery, etc.
And yet, I know the questioner wanted to know if I 'believed' what she
believed.
Especially spectacular are forensic anthropologists who can tell people
about the death of their loved one, even if they couldn't prevent a
massacre as in Bosnia. And these same people can tell us that Egyptians
did successful brain surgery thousand of years ago. Awesome. Literally
awe inspiring.
Veronica
> [Original Message]
> From: Paul Stone <pas@xxxxxxxx>
> To: <lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
> Date: 8/23/2005 3:47:32 PM
> Subject: [lit-ideas] Re: The Piano Man
>
>
> >A.A. Fundamentally it doesn't change. There's always still one answer
for
> >everything: God.
>
> Very few people actually believe that.
>
> >A.A. The jury's not out on what the universe is made up of. It's made up
> >of the 93 or whatever number of elements that Earth is made up of, held
> >together by the same forces earthly molecules and compounds are held
> >together by.
>
> Well as Tom Lehrer wonderfully rhymes "these are the only ones of which
the
> news has come to Hahvahd, there may be many others but they haven't been
> discahvahd!"
>
> >Admittedly ideas change. It used to be thought that life on
> >earth couldn't survive without sunlight (photosynthesis). Now it's been
> >known for decades that plants thrive at or near the bottom of the ocean
> >using volcanic heat and gases for food, never seeing sunlight. Now it's
> >thought all life on earth can't survive without water. Maybe someday an
> >organism that doesn't need water will be found. Likewise this new thing
> >about light traveling faster than the speed limit. Maybe it's true,
maybe
> >it isn't, but however it shakes out, that law will certainly pertain to
all
> >of the universe, not only Earth.
>
> How can you say that? Right now, light speed is always 186,000 mps.
That's
> the 'truth' regardless of how fast your flashlight is going already. So
if
> someone DisCAHVAHS that it's not true, then THAT becomes true. So who
gives
> a shit? Nothing is knowably true.
>
> As far as the consistency of elemental makeup is concerned... what about
> the possibility of other stuff that we haven't discovered? Can't you
> imagine a place in which our stuff doesn't act like there stuff?
>
>
> >A.A. Sort of like the Founding Fathers' attempt at creating a more
perfect
> >union. Science, good science, is always willing to become more correct.
> >Otherwise it wouldn't be science.
>
> A friend of mine is an electrical engineer who designs 3-d computer eyes
> which can detect inconsistencies in sheet metal. He has worked at the
same
> place for about 20 years. They have NEVER sold ONE SINGLE thing that they
> have researched and developed. They routinely work for 18 months on
> something and then they get to a point at which they say "it'll never
work"
> and they turf it. This is the way science works: 1000 people fail and one
> succeeds.
>
> Most brilliant minds in physics work their whole life and die without
every
> doing ANYTHING of note. They are sheep who contribute to the law of
> averages that if enough people work on something, discoveries will be
made.
> Right now, many of these brilliant minds are working on a T.O.E.
Apparently
> they think that all other 'mysteries' have been cleared up.
>
> There are generations of physicists banking on the inevitability that
they
> are on the right track with String Theory and M-Field this and blah blah
> blah. The thing is, every time they have something they think is
workable,
> someone else says "yes, but you need 29 dimensions to get rid of the -ve
> scalar in the 5th partial integral of the yadayadayada." Then the next
guy
> comes over to the school and says, no, we need to invent another type of
> imaginary particle ending in 'on' -- maybe go-on or loon -- so that we
can
> get rid of that number right there. That one that doesn't make sense!!!
Of
> course it doesn't make sense. It's WRONG!!! The whole of science, well,
> maybe not the whole, but most of recent science is hinged upon
> fudge-factors. We are so far from actually understanding things but the
> 'scientists' keep insisting that we know everything. We don't even
> understand the weather. Do you know how complicated CFD is? Do you know
> that we can't even realistically model the droplet dispersion in a spray
> tower? Did you know that we don't really know exactly how a fluidized bed
> will work? Granted, we have excellent predictive abilities on a lot of
> things, but we don't know shit on the microscopic or macroscopic scale in
> reality.
>
> >A.A. I think they did. The 18th century was an amazingly inquisitive
time.
>
> And now isn't?
>
> A.A. This is interesting. What kind of questions do you ask,
>
> all kinds
>
> A.A. and what answers have you found?
>
> not too many.
>
> >We are all clueless, yes, but growing incrementally less so. I would
say
> >even with really big questions, like
> >why death, the universe follows the same laws. Like humans, stars too
are
> >born, go through life stages, die. Why stardust needs to decay
(question
> >#37 on your list?) is one of the "it just does" scenarios. If stardust,
> >along with humans, needs to die, then truly, what was God thinking, and
> >where did he put the cemetary? That's why I don't fear death. We will
go
> >to whence we came ... ashes to ashes, dust to stardust ...
>
> But I don't want to.
>
> p
>
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