What I'd like to say is that Plato was wrong about something big. Plato said that ideas are perfect, and totally static, unchanging, immutable icons. They exist in a perfect, unflawed Universe and can be drawn into this flawed one. Not this horse, not that horse, but A Horse. And when A Horse is drawn up in this world, it becomes trhis horse or that horse.

I say that ideas, like matter are composed atomically. The greek atomists essentially said that something phyical can be torn up because it has flaws in it, little spaces where there are atoms, and little spaces where there aren't. Well, they've been proven right, of course.

The problem is that we still think that some things are not composed of "atoms," that is to say, most everyone in the western world seems to believe that there are certainties. They are certain that there are just "laws," they can't be broken because they are not composed of smaller pieces, they are monolithic.

IMHO, that is utter crap.

Hmm I just cant believe that the imperfection of fact or structure in this world excludes any absolute truth everywhere else. I`ll take Platos forms and run with them.

Example: The protons are neutrons in the necleus of any given atom are held together because of something called the strong force. The strong force law says that under standard conditions, the neutrons and protons will cling together in the nucleus of the atom. The subatomic particles that make the strong force law a law are called gluons. Essentially, gluons stick the neutrons and protons all togther.

What if you were to alter the conditions of the gluons? The standard conditions of the strong force law would be altered. Those standard conditions would cease to exist, so the law would not apply to this atom. We would have to discover whole new laws to explain the behavior of this atom. Of course, such an atom would probably blast away as soon as those conditions were altered. So any laws we could come up with to describe the behavior of these laws would become instantly irrelevant.


I'm not saying that laws don't exist. I'm saying relevence is a property all ideas have, and laws are just a certain kind of idea. Basically, an idea is never perfect because it would have to be relevant to every other idea and everything in existence to be perfect. I seriously challenge anyone to find ideas that are relevant to 100% of everything.

On the topic of what you are saying, the Strong Force, Weak Force, EM Force and Gravitational force were thought to have been combined at the beginning into one superforce. The splitting of this force into two, then three, the four is thought to have driven the expansion of the Universe...

This raises the rather disturbing question, how do we know that four is the end of the line, and what would be the rammifications to us if a fifth force were to emerge?

At this moment, thought is going on...

That is relevant to everything... Everything concerened with humans anyway...

But that doesn't have anything to do with the collision of two distant galaxies, does it?

Of course it does... No thought, no observation of the galaxies... No thought, the telescopes that we observe them with would never have been built... Thought is quintessential to everything we see,everything we do, and everything we are...

You're saying that trees in the forest make no sound if no one is around to hear it?

shroedenger's cat?

The fact is that all matter is interconnected to all other matter. But the fact is that Ideas have very little to do with the physical world except where we make them part of it.

IMHO not unless the almighty is listening for it. A sound is merely the way the human mind perceives the vibration of air molecules... The same event may take place with no one to hear or see it, but if no one perceives these vibrations one cannot really say that a sound was heard...

No, no one hears the sound, but the sound was made. It is essential for our cultural survival that we understand that our concept of the Universe has little to nothing to do with the way it actually functions.

But the sound wasn't made... Sound only exists when the Cochlea in the ear sends a certain signal to the brain, other wise, all that happens is that air molecules vibrate...

There are certain animals without ears that are sensitive to vibrations, but you can hardly say that they hear sound. No ears and / or no mammalian brain = No Sound...

A perfect way to demonstrate somethuing along the lines of what I'm talking about is to play your favourite song to a domestic cat or dog, and watch to see just how moved the animal is by beautiful music...

Sound is a human perception. It is not an event...

They don't hear sound, they feel it. Sound is a vibration of air molecules or a vibration of anything, really, but now we're arguing semantics. When a song is moving you it is not a physical thing. It's not like a specific combination of chords always produces the same effects. If that were so, a song would have the same significance to one person that is does ot every other person. When someone is moved by a song it is because they glean something emotional from the song. Essentially, their brain interprets there to be a meaning behind the chords and lyrics. That interpretation does not alter the music. Meaning occupies no space at all, it does not push anything in the Universe except the brain cells that are used to create that meaning.

I think essentially the debate we're having here is about what one would consider to be sound. You think that sound is a vibration of air molecules and I think that it is a transformation of that vibration of air molecules into a form of perception.

It's the same with colour. We see reality in a certain way because our brains interpret reflections of light to give us a measure of where we are in relation to our surroundings. Look into that picture further and we can see that as you progress further and further into the sub microscopic world, our perception of reality very quickly breaks down.

The same is true in sound. Our minds at large create and illusion which we define as reality, based on sight, sound, touch, smell and taste. None of this is real. A tree does not make a noise unless one of us or a similar creature interprets the vibrations given off in it's motion as a sound. This illusion is set up to allow us to survive and maintain the continuity of our genes, by giving us a kind of grid reference to where we are in time and space, and an early warning to danger, but none of it is real...

We might as well be arguing about the length of a piece of string, or the colour of the wind...

hehe... "not this piece of string, not that piece of string, but A piece of string..."

Parry thrust lunge parry thrust...


I love these kinds of debate...

dude, Johnny Cash singing "Hurt" by Nine Inch Nails... awesome...

Type O Negative Doing "Hit Me Baby One More Time" by Britney Spears... That is something...

:quote:
The same is true in sound. Our minds at large create and illusion which we define as reality, based on sight, sound, touch, smell and taste. None of this is real. A tree does not make a noise unless one of us or a similar creature interprets the vibrations given off in it's motion as a sound. This illusion is set up to allow us to survive and maintain the continuity of our genes, by giving us a kind of grid reference to where we are in time and space, and an early warning to danger, but none of it is real...
:quote:

Wouldn't the vibrations of the air mollicules make a sound?
Right I think I'm going crazy. Anyway, even if we did interpret vibrations and crap (which we do) and thats how we hear trees fall, etc., wouldn't that be the same as a dog's bark or a cat's meow. Aren't you then saying that if no ones around to hear the sound then there is no sound. Then why isn't it the same way for seeing. For example a building is on the corner of a street, if no one is on that street, or in the surounding area (no one can see the building) then is the building really there. Or is that a little off sentence, cause your not saying that the tree isn't there thats that it doesn't make a sound unless someone's around to hear it. But still, why isn't it the smae for sight then?

(Don't mind my spelling, and stupidity in some of my sentences and wording, just..yeah)