merlin wood

Just your opinion whereas one could maintain that all you need for a strong enough argument is a verbal account with reference to photographic images, dating measurements and anatomical diagrams of such evidence as the evolution from the hyracotherium to the modern horse and how this could have occurred as the result of enviromental conditions. "In common usage in the 21st century, a hypothesis refers to a provisional idea whose merit needs evaluation. For proper evaluation, the framer of a hypothesis needs to define specifics in operational terms. A hypothesis requires more work by the researcher in order to either confirm or disprove it. In due course, a confirmed hypothesis may become part of a theory or occasionally may grow to become a theory itself." http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hypothesis I'd say it's enough for my hypothesis to make one testable prediction and up to others to find more. As it is, the hypothesis finds, with the aid of clearly explained diagrams, a direct relationship between the quantum evidence and the mind and consciousness and a plausible alternative to dark natter and energy and cosmic inflation. none of which have been supported by any experimentation. Go on then, describe the property of attraction by mathematics. This is merely your opinion again. My hypothesis is both based upon a mathematically expressed quantum interpretation and also strongly supports this account, and thus equations that describe the physical universe are essential to my hypothetical argument. Again merely your opinion, I don't see why I personally need to give any more than a visualised account of quantum behaviour that is consistent with Bohmian mechanics Prove this please Again your opinion against mine. The wave and entanglement diagrama are, in effect, visual representations of existing equations. One crucisl point in my argument is just that the standard quantum mechanics does not provide an account of quantum behaviour as partices and waves that can be visualised and is thus crucially limited in this repect, whereas Bohm's and my account do so. I think it could help if I added the diagrams that have been produced from Bohmian mechanics though, eg: http://evans-experientialism.freewebspace.com/BohmFig2.gif and http://evans-experientialism.freewebspace.com/BohmFig3.gif See reviews on books by the physicists Lee Smolin (Trouble with Physics) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lee_Smolin and Peter Woit (Not Even Wrong) http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/science/article672464.ece and here is a quote by the physics Nobel laureate Gerard ‘t Hooft (from his book In Search of the Ultimate Building Blocks): Actually, I would not even be prepared to call string theory a “theory", rather a “model" or not even that: just a hunch. After all, a theory should come together with instructions on how to deal with it to identify the things one wishes to describe, in our case the elementary particles, and one should, at least in principle, be able to formulate the rules for calculating the properties of these particles, and how to make new predictions for them. Imagine that I give you a chair, while explaining that the legs are still missing, and that the seat, back and armrest will perhaps be delivered soon; whatever I did give you, can I still call it a chair? Superstring theory being a prime example of where you can give a convincing mathematical argument in physics and call it a theory of everything but need not describe anything in the world at all. Although from reading Smolin's book myself it seems that the idea of particles as vibrating strings works but not compacted extra dimensions of space since this leads to equations with myriads of solution. But then Smolin points out that that string theory satisfactorily finds solutions to only one of five crucial problems in theoretical physics that it could be expected to resolve.

Then I could just add that, of course, there are many mathematical equations in the Bohmian quantum mechanics that my quantum hypothesis is fully consistent with. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bohm_interpretation

I was talking about the findings of paleontology, and which do not need to be described mathematically to back up the theory of evolution. And I didn't mention population genetics above at all. The hypothesis on my blog does indeed make one prediction, concerning the detection of solar neutrinos and which is testable at least in principle and no doubt it could make others if developed into a full blown theory. But then physics is by no means justabout describing the natural world by mathematical equations. There are no papers in physics that only contain equations and the verbal argument is just as essential as the maths. Also, there are essential properties in physics that can't, just as such, be described mathematically, the attraction of a force, for example. And above I said: "I suggest that there can be developed such a universal theory of natural cause and effect that, like the theory of biological evolution, is in the first instance and for the most partof necessity non-mathematical...And as long as it has not been developed mathematically except in the existing quantum interpretation it may not be regarded as a full blown theory, but nor could it justly be called speculative. But rather I'd say such an account could be called a general scientific hypothesis." So I'm not saying that a full general theory of natural organisation could not contain measurement, calculation and mathematical formulae. And I suggest if you carefully read the hypthesis on my blog you'll find that it is not vague at all, and I think the diagrams I have used - which are essential to my argument - while rather crude, are quite clear illustrations of the extradimentinal properties of a universal non-locally acting cause. Actually I meant to say it doesn't make testable predictions.

My point is that it's not essential to all explanatory accounts of the natural evidence that they need to be expressed mathematically for them to deserve the status of scientific theories, or that all accounts that are non-mathematical deserve to be called speculations, which is what JustSuit was arguing. So the nature of evolutionary theory is such the it can't even make precise or reliable predictions, and this also true of plate techtonics theory in predicting earthquakes and volcanic eruptions. And it's not their predictive power that makes either of these theories acceptable. Also, evolution was generally recognised as a scientific theory for over century before any statistics were introduced, and largely because of mounting geological and paleontological evidence that backed it up, Whereas measurement and calculation are criteria that physicists often impose by their opinions upon scientific explanations in general, and when applied to physics itself can lead to inadequately justified acceptance of mathematically complex accounts such as string theory, which is not supported by any direct evidence and makes no predictions at all. Also, there are many instances of notions in physics that can be mathematically expressed but by no means need describe anything in the world at all, such as magnetic monopoles, wormholes in space and, in string theory, compacted small-scale extra dimensions of space. And according to Lee Smolin in The Trouble with Physics, because the mathematics in string theory leads to myriads of different sub-theories, there are several eminent physicists who have come to accept the highly unscientific idea of the many worlds anthropic principle, while others, like David Deutsch, embrace the multiverse just in virtue Everett's interpretation of quantum mechanics. Whereas I'd say that what is and has been essential to any truly scientific theory is just that it is clearly and unambiguously describable account of natural cause and effect that accounts for a range of directly observable or detectable and consistently confirmable findings, and makes unique and conceivable predictions that are consistent with its cause and effect principles. Now I suggest that there can be developed such a universal theory of natural cause and effect that, like the theory of biological evolution, is in the first instance and fot the most part is of necessity non-mathematical, but like most existing theories can be expresed using diagrams and is founded in a particular causal interpretation of quantum mechanics. And as long as it has not been developed mathematically except in the existing quantum interpretation it may not be regarded as a full blown theory, but nor could it justly be called speculative. But rather I'd say such an account could be called a general scientific hypothesis.

Darwin's The Origin of the Species contained no maths at all. Does that makes his account of evolution speculation?