tar

Spyman,

"So even if gravity is able to traverse the early Universe when light is blocked by matter, when the path is cleared light will be able to race through space, side by side with the gravity wave that is emitted at the same time as the photons, and reach the finish togheter."

Granted. This would have to occur. But I was trying to visualize the "event" as occuring in a particular "region" of space. The light and the gravity from the event would arrive here synchronized. We see the light image, and feel the gravitational image of the event, at the same time.

But, although it makes no sense, the gravity from that "region" also reached the milky way region, earlier. In terms of causal connectivity, that is. So is there somehow a "double" image of gravity we could observe, and use to help determine the distances to events?

Or conversely, do we "feel" the gravity from a distant region in space in a manner, that would not precisely coincide with the light image, in terms of distance, apparent size, and age? Not that some aspect of gravity does not arrive bringing information about the event, at the same time as the photon arrival, but that gravitational information about that region of space has been available, or is available, based on a different "starting point", which would place the importance, or gravitational effect of the mass of that region of space, (on the milky way region,) at a closer range, than the photon, graviton, image would report.

Regards, TAR

Mooeypoo,

I took a break from the forum. I was getting frustrated. We were not seeing eye to eye and although I appreciated your time, and learned from your posts, I didn't think you were seeing my points. And my defense was more philosophical than scientific, so I couldn't pursue my defense within the parameters of the board. So I decided to ban myself, before you had to.

Regards, TAR

Spyman,

Thanks for the response and the thoughts. Very nice.

I took a little break from the forum to do some more reading, and try to get a better picture of where I am getting it wrong. I still do not see my mistake. Something doesn't add up in my model, but it doesn't seem to add up in the accepted model either.

Perhaps you can help me sort it out.

There seems to be several "starting" points we have to deal with.

One is the "moment" of the big bang, when all the space and time and matter and energy, that ever has, or ever will directly effect our instruments or senses, began.

Shortly after this moment, an exponential inflation of space occurred, moving regions of space far out of causual connection with each other. No gravity, or light could communicate the state of one region to a widely separated one. After this inflationary period however, a second starting point seems to be suggested, where antigravity was mostly cancelled out by gravity, leaving just some gravity around. At this "second starting point" gravity, whose influence moves at the speed of light, could begin to relink one region to another. Even though photons were still being scattered at this point, gravity, being something somehow related more to the mass of somethings, than the electromagnetic wave/particle nature of photons, did not have to wait for the last scattering to begin relinking regions.

Then a "third starting pont" around 379,000 years after the first starting point, occurred at the "last scattering" when photons were free to travel.

The region of space, that is now the milky way, was present in the universe, at each of these "starting points".

At the moment gravity gained its footing, the amount of space, causually linked by gravity to the region of space that would become the milky way, could be thought of as zero, but the sphere of gravitational influence, would from that moment, expand at the speed of gravity. The "observable" universe, that is the regions of space whose gravity affects us, or, regions of space affected by our gravity, could be determined from that starting point.

Likewise, at the moment of the last scattering, our Milky Way region of space, was causally connected to zero other regions by photons(light), but our region's photons began at that point to enlarge a sphere, at the speed of light, of our "visable" universe. Regions of space, coming into our view, because their photons had the time to reach us, where simultaneously receiving our first photons. We each "saw" each other, as 279,000 year old regions of space.

Here is where our earlier (false result) excercise, of determining how long it would take photons to traverse a percentage of that earlier, smaller, but expanding, universe, comes into play. The false results of that excercise, indicated, that electromagnetic images of widely separated regions, could reach each other, after million or billions of years. What percentage of the universe could thusly be linked is obviously at question, depending upon the size of the universe at last scattering, and the rate of expansion, at that time. However, the important concept to me, is the fact that the arrival of the "image" denotes the actual causal connection. The photon from one region, has reached the other, and relayed the information of the "state" of that distant region of space (at the time the photon was released).

If we "see" a region of space, then it must be causally linked to us. It's photons have reached us, and ours have reached it. If gravity causally linked us to that region, before light did, it seems to follow that that region's mass, the region associated with that visual image, should have been "felt" by our region of space, earlier than the arrival of the visual image. Meaning, for instance, that the gravitational image of that region of space, would not be the same apparent size, or the same calculated age, or the same calculated distance, as the photon image.

So, in April we found a gamma ray burst at Z=8.2 (GRB 090423) figured to be an image from a 630 million year old universe, the light having taken over 13 billion years to get here.

Yet we figure the background radiation to be the image of the surface of last scattering, at the limits of our observable, visible universe at Z=1000+ at the age of 379,000 years the light taking 13.73 billion years to get here.

There seems to be a very large percentage of our visible universe left to be discovered. Those images between Z=8.2 and Z=1000. Images we would see as regions of space as they were between the age of 379,000 and 630,000,000.

Regards, TAR

Last Post.

This is obviously a waste of my time. And yours.

Mooeypoo,

We only have one reality. It all fits together, it all works. Same for any observer.

If you have found a way to view reality objectively through math equations, and someone else has found a way to view reality objectively through the eyes of an imaginary being, it is still the same reality you both are viewing. And all those things which you both agree are real are real to me too. But you believe in super strings and nuetrinos and dark matter, and they believe in angels and spirits and cosmic energy. And I believe you both are trying to put words to stuff that is really apparently existing, and part of our reality. What of it is figurative or literal, matter or energy, now or then, cause or affect, connected or separate, is all a matter of the position of the observer, the sensitivity of their senses/equipment, and the direction they are pointing their attention. If we are building a consistent model of reality it has to have a place in it, for everything that is real.

Regards, TAR

iNOW,

"People who do think prayer works are deluded"

Well probably so. But you are testing philosophy and religion with a scientific testing methodogy build to test the efficacy of drugs. Rather slip shod, if you ask me.

Regards, TAR

Penrose's computational Turing machine approach, or Talbot's hologram approach.

Which do you think is more likely to reflect the reality of the human mind?

Regards, TAR

Mooeypoo,

You are saying two different things here. Which points out one of the major flaws in the study that I read about, that showed there was no empirical evidence to say that prayer was effective.

"You can't mix empirical data - and empirical scientific subjects, with their methodologies - with subjects that by definitions cannot be measured."

So why did scientists even TRY and measure prayer?

"Scientifically speaking, empirically tested reality shows that prayer is not effective."

But you admit that empirically tested reality is not "all" of reality, and there are real things that are not readily measured by empirical methods. Hence the failure to be able to measure it, does not make it unreal, just makes the serious attempt to measure it, laughable. And the assumption that the findings say that prayer has been properly scientifically tested and therefore forced out of the realm of "real" things, and its efficacy dispoven, even more suspect.

What about patterns and chaos, and life and love, and consciousness, and all sorts of things with emergent characteristics that resist empirical testing? Real or Magic?

Regards, TAR

Spyman,

Thanks again for helping me get the conventions straight. Some of my confusion has come from not properly parsing the meaning of then, and now, and currently and really, when the universe is talked about. And I still think, that I am not the only one that frame shifts when talking and thinking about the universe.

For instance, if the universe started at a point, where time, space and matter and energy came into existance, and inflated, had the last scattering, expanded rapidly at first light, and have continued to expand to the present day universe, then ALL regions NOW, regardless of how far away they are, or how old they look to us, are, in the current universe, ALL 13.73 billion years old. This would be true even if some regions of space are outside of our "observable" universe. Those regions NOW, would be what ever 13.73 billion years of development made them.

Is this a correct understanding of the conventional meaning of the universe now?

Regards, TAR

Bombus,

Thanks for the links. Especially the Talbot one with the hologram idea.

Fits nicely with the ideas I've been entertaining about memory and human perception, which have their impact on both our perceptions and the actual reality we perceive.

Mooeypoo,

I suggest that science and human subjective experience are closely intertwined. And that the "objectivity" of science can only be obtained by the establishment of a common "mind" that can objectively view the world.

This common mind, that humanity has constructed, maintained and referred to, throughout its history of religion, philosophy, politics, engineering, technology and science is real. But this common mind, or maybe even a reference to it, is in some ways as illusive and etherial as the idea of God or prayer. Not easily defined by science. Experiments to test it's singular existence as an entity would prove it false and non existant. Seems like magic, with no physical characterisitics, no way to disect it, and measure it, no formula to apply to it, no predictive model to construct. Yet it is real. We all know it, maybe by different names, and we all effect it and are affected by it.

Regards, TAR

Spyman,

I have played with that calculator a little. It doesn't go above redshift 6. I am interested in what the formulas say about regions of space we might 'see' at redshift 15.

Also I am not 100% sure of what is meant by distance now and distance then. Are we talking about distance to the object or distance to the image, and does "now" mean when both regions of space, are 13.73 billion years old? And does "then" mean when both regions of space were (ie.) 6.7 billion years old?

Regards, TAR

If I may butt in to offer a few thoughts.

I think they may be valuable to the discussion, because 3 or 4 weeks ago, I posted some ideas on this board, that were soon moved to Peusdo Science and Speculation and I was disturbed, because I thought I had some insights into the nature of the universe, that would change scientist's view of what they were looking at, and spur a whole series of new discoveries. I thought I saw some logical inconsistencies in the current model. I still think I see some inconsistencies, but they are dwindling, and no doubt will continue to dwindle as I learn more, until I see NO inconsistencies and am in agreement with mainstream science, and would then know enough to form a hypothesis that would have a chance of actually being valuable in furthering human knowledge.

So here are a few of the mistakes I made.

One was a general overestimation of my own insights, and an underestimation of the insights of others (cosmologists for instance.) What I mean by that, is that if I could put two and two together, and be excited about the fact that I realized it COULDN'T be three, and COULDN'T be -16, I was overestimating my own insight in an objective comparison to the insights of those who have the insight that two and two would make four. Those people had already had the "couldn't be three" insight, and many subsequent insights that led them to the insight that two and two is four.

My second mistake, was jumping to conclusions, without all the facts. I figured the answer was probably about half way between 3 and -16 and that would put it in the -9 or -10 region. How could mathematicians think it was 4?

I am still seeing inconsistencies, but will not mention them here, this is the science section. I need to understand the facts first, before my speculations are anything but distractions from the truth. I mention this as a caution to certain others.

Don't take your conclusions about the universe, based on your own mental model of the universe, as fact, until you have matched "all" the facts we know against your model, to see if it works.

Many minds, as nimble as yours and nimbler, have been matching facts against model for many years, and all together have worked a model that fits what we know. Don't underestimate their insights, and don't overestimate your own.

On this board the goal is to bring the insights of science to those who have yet to have them.

If you would like to share half-baked insights of your own, I will see you in Psuedo Science, where I am sure to be, mucking about.

Regards, TAR

Thankyou Spyman,

That was instructive. I think I was moving the photon too far before I expanded the space, and I was not expanding the space fast enough. If the integral was smaller than a million years and you performed the same excercise (understanding its a false result since we evened out the rate) would the time the photon takes be longer with smaller integrals? Would the result be different if you expanded the space, and then moved the photon or moved the photon and then expanded the space? Or did your example simulate moving the photon effectively along with the expansion?

Regards, TAR

Mooeypoo,

Just lost a post I was working on. Can't reconstruct it. Sort of mental water under the bridge.

Thanks for your post though, and yes, I see what you are saying.

Regards, TAR

I am perplexed.

If we figure the age of the universe, based upon the relationship of the observed bits of matter and energy in it, are we not accounting for all the energy and matter that there is? Does this not imply finiteness? That is, that there is a certain finite amount of space, expanding in a certain finite manner, carrying a certain finite amount of matter and energy with it?

And if the whole universe was at one point very early in its history, causally linked, followed by a small period of drastic expansion, which inflated the whole universe so fast and much that regions were now no longer causally linked, followed by a period were gravity had regained its footing, followed by the last scattering after which photons were free to travel at light speed, we have postulated a very early causually unlinked universe (330,000 to 380,000 years old) which is huge, but only a percent of a percent as huge as it is now, with two very fast vehicles of causal connectivity, gravity and light, present, to begin reconnecting regions causually.

Although now, light and gravity crawl along at the rate of around the order of .01 universe diameters per billion years, then they sped along at first, at a rate more on the order of 10 universe diameters per billion years. Seems to me that light and gravity would have been able to relink the entire universe casually before the continuing expansion could dwarf their rate.

But I am perplexed. There is talk of an infinite universe, there is talk of the universe never being able to be causually linked. I don't get it. What am I missing?

Regards, TAR

Mooeypoo,

Speaking subjectively.

When I am in possesion of an insight, or a fact, I can sometimes tell when somebody else is operating without that insight, because they utter things that would not fit together well if they too were in possesion of that insight or fact. It is a little more difficult to know what insights and facts others are in possession of that I have not yet had or found out about, and do not possess. Knowing that I know more than many, and less than many others, I am always eager to bring those lacking to the insights and knowledge I have obtained, and always eager to be led to the insights and knowledge I have yet to have and find.

Again, subjectively speaking, I am constantly working on establishing a consistent worldview. I weed out the impossible in my own thinking, and constantly reevalute all the components, when new information or insights, new to me that is, come to light. It is important to me that my thinking is consistent with reality.

This thread is about "magic or no", and my vote is no. Magic is NOT consistent with reality. If there is no mechanism, if there is no cause and effect, if it does not fit together with reality, then it is NOT real. Supernatural events, disqualify themselves by definition. Dreams are dreams until realized. Thoughts are thoughts until expressed, beliefs are beliefs until tested against reality, and there, their truth or falseness will show itself. If they fit, if they work all the time, then they have a good chance of being true. If they often don't test out, then they are probably false. The true things are real, the false things are just in our imagination where everything doesn't have to fit together, and certain aspects of reality can be ignored, if desired.

The efficacy of prayer, has been disproved to the satisfaction of science. Understood. I read the study. I comprehend what it says and doesn't say about prayer. I "know" already that there is no magic, I have already come to the understanding that an Anthropomorphic God does not fit with what "we" know to be real. I know you can not talk to God and have him magically perform miracles for you. Understood. Agreed upon. Stipulated.

But still things must fit. Clairvoyant prays. This is a fact. This is real. Clairvoant is not "really" talking to an Anthropomorpic God, it is scientifically impossible. So to who or what is the appeal being made? Oneself? One's subcounscious? One's congregation? The patient? The people that see you pray? The doctors? The nurses? The human spirit? And if any of the above hear the plea, are they not in a position to respond to the plea? Have they not the power to effect reality? Close the window to stop the draft, or open it to allow in fresh air, straighen out the kinked hose, take a collection for new hospital equipment, help your body fight the infliction, say a supportive word, make an extra visit, pay closer attention, build new hospitals, and find new medicines and procedures to help.

I am not moving any goalposts, I am just noticing the mechanisms through which prayer actually does affect reality. And none of them are unscientific, and none of them are magic.

Regards, TAR

Thanks to all for your posts.

And keeping me honest. I tend to carry my logic far past the point, without properly inspecting the bridges from conclusion to next premise.

I don't do the white noise test, at least not rigorously.

I am just learning that this is indeed a science board, and scientific method must be adhered to, inorder to reach any valuable conclusions.

Mooeypoo,

I am not so sure that the subjective view and the scientific view need to be studied separately. Perhaps the two are more compatible than they seem.

I accept that the studies show that indeed there is no Magic in prayer. That is to say, that congregations, cannot, by uttering words to themselves affect the health of a stranger. There is no mechanism through which this can be accomplished. If there were, then prayer would not have failed the test. My argument is based around looking for a mechanism by which prayer indeed might affect reality. And in my search, I found found human will. I surmised that if human will can affect reality, which I take as stipulated, then a rather easy link between praying for something to happen, and willing it to happen, could be made, without too much fuss. Here I throw in an untested bit, that willing something to be so, will actually result in the required actions and manipulations of reality needed to actually affect reality in a manner that will result in the desired outcome. After applying the white noise test, I find I may be assumming too much. In fact, the fact that the prayer was said in the first place, could easily cause the willer to leave it the hands of God, expect a miracle, and NOT take the required scientifically proven actions. My mechanism would only be sure to work, if the prayer was said, set the will of the prayer toward the desired outcome, and was followed by actually changing the situation in scientifically proven ways. I can not provide a scientific reason for this part of the mechanism to work. I can just guess, or hope that consciously or subconsciously the sayer of the prayer would do things and cause others around, to do things, that would help.

But still, even though my hypothesis is weak, and I will discard it, for the moment, I would like to keep open the possibility that prayer is a part of a mechanism, that is actually scientifically definable. It may involve laws, and institutions, governments, religions, love, positive thinking, human wills and subjective thoughts of ones connection to the human race, the universe and an immortal spirit of some kind. But if it is a mechanism, a real mechanism, involving molecules that when put together, exhibit some emergent properties (humans,) then we can and should be able to approach it all, scientifically.

Regards, TAR

Mooeypoo,

I do not know what is stipulated and what is under discussion here.

Reasoning is no good without premises, and if I reason to a point using good stipulated premises, I would think the reasoning is sound. Evidently though this is more phisophical than scientific, by your reactions.

However, if there are details about the study, that show it is not directly addressing the situation Clairvoyant was talking about, you still say the study disproves my hypothesis.

This is very weird and disturbing to me. Are you after the "truth"?

Regards, TAR

iNOW and moo,

I need to provide quantitative data. This is difficult. As seen by the study cited, the setup of the trial, introduced quite a number of conditions, that separted the IP tested, from the 30 seconds of prayer that Clairvoyant was talking about. The prayers in the study were said on behalf of strangers, which is not the same thing as a bedside prayer. The patients were informed or not informed that they may or may not be prayed for by strangers. There was no mention of what effects this notice or lack of notice had on believers as opposed to non-believing patients, and there was no possible way to stop somebody from praying for a group, or prove that nobody snuck an undocumented prayer in for somebody that wasn't supposed to be prayed for. Basically, the holistic effects of bedside prayer by a loved one, was not tested.

I do not have the resources to set up a trial, nor do I think that the prayer, by itself, is what has real effect on a situation. My hypothesis is that prayer by a loved one, is more effective than lint picking in helping the patient.

I would have to establish scientifically that having somebody at your bedside, to watch over you and make sure the equipment was working, and alert the nurses if you were looking a bit yellow or something, was better at avoiding complications than not having a loving eye peeled.

I would then have to establish scientifically that wishing the patient would recover without complications would increase the likelyhood that you, the loved one, or a surragate would be present to monitor the situation.

I would then have to prove that praying for an outcome, correlated with a desire for the outcome.

I would then have to prove that desire for the outcome is correlated to the loved one taking actions consistent with increased likelyhood of the outcome.

If successful in establishing the correlations scientifically, I would then need to find if picking lint, or praying was more effective at focusing ones will on an outcome.

And that would just be to check out, one possible effect of prayer on the situation. There could still be other lines to check out.

Regards, TAR

Mooeypoo,

Where has it been proven that prayer does not help?

Regards, TAR

Martin,

Do we have estimates of the size of the Earth's location's observable universe at each of the billion year marks since the Big Bang started?

Regards, TAR

Padren,

"I challenge you to come up with a single reason why prayer is better than collecting lint as a means of helping someone heal that is not based on a fallacy."

I realize you were challenging Clairvoyant, but I will take the challenge. Actually I gave a valid reason, in my previous post.

There is no reason for you to compare prayer to lint picking, other than as an ad hominum attack which is in itself a falacious logical tactic.

Regards, TAR

Clairvoyant,

Does getting involved in Science mean that you can't believe in God ?

I guess it depends on what your definition of God is.

Is your God figurative or literal, for instance.

My personal test for whether or not a person's God is real or imagined, is whether or not the attributes of that God apply to everybody and everything, regardless of people's beliefs or imagined conditions.

If the God you pray to requires that you believe in him/her/it, inorder for him/her/it to answer your prayer, then your belief is the deciding factor, in which case, its an imagined God to which you pray. A real god, on the other hand, would have a consistent response, regardless of your beliefs.

Although this does not discount the ability of prayer to affect reality. If you pray, your own will and attention is focused on determining a certain outcome. Your prayer will affect your own actions and body chemistry, and probably the actions and body chemistry of those around you. Everyone may act in the appropriate ways to guide the situation toward your desired outcome. So your 30 second prayer could certainly make a difference. But it's your will that would have been done.

Regards, TAR

Hermantc007,

"Magic or not?"

No magic. The thing about reality is that everything fits together. Everything has its causes and it consequences. It all has to add up, the consequences all have to play out. The laws of nature don't change because we want them to, or wish or pray them to. Science's job is to figure out the laws and the relationships and hence find ways to use the laws of nature to our advantage.

On the other hand, we have dreams and magic, and superstitions, and imagination which follow internal human rules, and need not fit together, need not have consequences. In dreams we can fly, walk on water, open the bathroom door and step out on the stage of the Metropolitian Opera house and open clouds with a zipper and find our lost teddy bear inside. And the human mind can convince itself that impossible things are true. But the test of any idea of how reality is, is not valid, when performed in the human mind. There anything is possible, and things need not fit together, they need not touch all the bases, they need not work. The test is only valid if it is performed in reality, where everything HAS to fit together. That is why scientists ask for evidence. Not the kind your logic or your imagination provides. "Show me an example of magic happening in reality", where EVERYTHING fits together, and ALL the rules HAVE to be followed. If you can show me such a thing, then it isn't magic, is it? Its real.

Not that reality does not exhibit strange and wonder combinations, and emergent properties. But when we uncover something in reality we are sure to find with it, a mechanism, a set of rules by which real things combine and interact in real ways, following all the laws of nature.

No magic. Not in reality. Only in our dreams, and imagination.

Regards, TAR

Martin,

Do we have estimates of the size of the universe at each of the billion year marks since the Big Bang started?

Regards, TAR

Pangloss,

OK, I fullfill all the critera of a psuedo-scientist. Send my two threads, this one and my hypothesis:all space is causally linked, to the speculation section. I will continue to think about it, and read, and try and put 2 and 2 together. I admit that the chances of me seeing it right and you seeing it wrong are very very slim.

But I would like a last word, a summation of my thoughts, which I still believe are consistent with observation and fact and the Big Bang Theory.

WMAP after they released the 5 year survey, gave us a powerful amount of new information about our Universe. We have only had a year or two to study it, and think about it and fit it into our model of the universe. Much of the "fitting" that is being done is based on our previous notion that the background radiation was the left over heat, from the big bang. Hence it must be an image of the surface of the last scattering, that is just getting to us now. I do not think that forcing our recent findings into that mold is correct. It doesn't work out. We were AT the surface of the last scattering when it happened, 13.7billion years ago. We can't just be seeing it now, we already saw it. The furthest matter from us could only have been 84,000,000lys away at a maximum and we would have seen that matter by the time we were 100,000,000years old. And once we see some matter, it has no physical way to leave our view. Space can expand all it wants, as fast as it wants and we are forever linked to that matter by the stream of photons it is emitting. That matter can congel, form stars, a galaxy, a quasar, but still it continues to send out an unbroken stream of photons. The stream of photons can be stretched from gamma rays to radio waves, it can become less and less luminous, the angular size can lessen, the photons can arrive at longer and longer intervals, but no physical law in the universe will remove that piece of matter from it's radial position in our skies. Once we see it, we will always see it (and it, us,) till it stops putting out photons, and even then the photons will continue to arrive at our location for 10s of billions of years.

So we see the whole universe, every light emitting part of it. But we see NONE of the current universe, and none of the universe as it looked to us, in our past. We only see every part of the universe, as it looks to us now.

Regards, TAR