Post Mortem Consciousness.

I didnt even write once that this would be a reality. Im saying that we dont know and we cant prove anything at all when it comes to that. Therefore it is false to argue for one or the other side as a fact. You are still doing that though. All i did was put out an idea. I openly stated that i dont know whats going on and im sure that you dont know either.
Its fine though if you got the opinion you stated and this all seems to be more propable for your personally, but it is not a fact. And im not fond of just deeming something true just because we cant detect wth is going on out there. Doing something like that restricts the system we are working with, surely, but i do not see any positive effects from doing that.
Btw, when im searching for those keywords im only getting links where physicists say that it may be very well possible to detect them. So idk where you are trying to go with that.
As i wrote, there seems to be no point going any further with that discussion. We kinda drifted away from the main topic of this thread anyways. Im out :) Have fun man.
You went off track when you asked, why would it (consciousness) be bound by it? (The one and only universe we know of for certain.) So don't say it's my fault.
 
Well if survival is true (and I accept that it is) is it not possible that your "deceased" ancestors are helping you or at the very least watching what's going on with your life ?
I see no evidence to confirm or deny.
When I said "helping us" I mean in a general way all of humanity. You said yes, I asked for whom it is.
 
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Well if survival is true (and I accept that it is) is it not possible that your "deceased" ancestors are helping you or at the very least watching what's going on with your life ?
Funny thing is, in my early teens, when I had no particular belief, or at least was not committed to any particular stance, I felt after the death of a grandparent that they were watching over or caring for me. Also about that time, I had a vision of my future life-review, almost as though I could sense my own self observing me as a spectator, before I'd ever heard of the idea of a life-review.
 
All very difficult questions to answer.

They are everywhere because the universe is everywhere.

How do you know there are laws at all, or that they apply everywhere?

I don't know why. Be happy they don't changed from moment to moment or you and everything else including this universe would go poof releasing a lot of energy and ceasing to exist so you'd not be able to ask questions with a testy undertone.

You're assuming consciousness is dependent on the laws to exist. But you don't know how they impose themselves and ensure our experienced regularity. It seems consciousness could at least partially be responsible for the regularities we see.

Also, what's energy?

"It is important to realize that in physics today, we have no knowledge of what energy is. We do not have a picture that energy comes in little blobs of a definite amount. It is not that way. However, there are formulas for calculating some numerical quantity and when we add it together it gives “28″—always the same number. It is an abstract thing in that it does not tell us the mechanisms or the reasons for the various formulas."
-Feynman on Energy


I don't know, but they do. The stuff that makes up this universe behaves is certain predictable ways; those ways we label laws because they seem to be immutable.

Physicist Lee Smolin argues the laws are mutable.

Additionally are the regularities imposed from outside the stuff, or does the stuff behave in certain predictable ways? If the former, how do laws - which are fundamentally a different thing from matter - interact with matter?

If the latter, then where does the supposed immutability come from? In any case it has to be the latter ->

Do Physical Laws Make Things Happen?

The conviction that laws somehow give us a full accounting of events seems often to be based on the idea that they govern the world's substance or matter from outside, "making" things happen. If this is the case, however, then we must provide some way for matter to recognize and then obey these external laws. But, plainly, whatever supports this capacity for recognition and obedience cannot itself be the mere obedience. Anything capable of obeying wholly external laws is not only its obedience but also its capability, and this capability remains unexplained by the laws.

If, with so many scientists today, we construe laws as rules, we can put the matter this way: much more than rule-following is required of anything able to follow rules; conversely, no set of rules can by themselves explain the presence or functioning of that which is capable of following them.

It is, in other words, impossible to imagine matter that does not have some character of its own. To begin with, it must exist. But if it exists, it must do so in some particular manner, according to its own way of being. Even if we were to say, absurdly, that its only character is to obey external laws, this "law of obedience" itself could not be just another one of the external laws being obeyed. Something will be "going on" that could not be understood as obedience to law, and this something would be an essential expression of what matter was. To apprehend the world we would need to understand this expressive character in its own right, and we could never gain such an understanding solely through a consideration of external laws.

So we can hardly find coherence in the rather dualistic notion that physical laws reside, ghost-like, in some detached, abstract realm from which they impinge upon matter. But if, contrary to our initial assumption, we take laws to be in one way or another bound up with the world's substance — if we take them to be at least in part an expression of this substance — then the difficulty in the conventional view of law becomes even more intense. Surely it makes no sense to say that the world's material phenomena are the result — the wholly explained result — of matter obeying laws which it is itself busy expressing. In whatever manner we prefer to understand the material expression of the laws, this expression cannot be a matter of obedience to the laws being expressed! If whatever is there as the substance of the world at least in part determines the laws, then the laws cannot be said to determine what is there.

There's [more I can say] about the nature of causality, but maybe that needs a separate thread...

Skeptics maybe don't, I don't keep track, but physicists certainly do ask those very questions.

Sure, and that reveals it's a mystery as to what the laws are and a question as to whether they are immutable ->

Interview w/ Lee Smolin at Scientia Salon

...there are several problems with extrapolating the laws that govern small subsystems to the universe as a whole. They are discussed in great detail in the books, but in brief:

  1. Those laws require initial conditions. Normally we vary the initial conditions to test hypotheses as to the laws. But in cosmology we must test simultaneously hypotheses as to the laws andhypotheses as to the initial conditions. This weakens the adequacy of both tests, and hence weakens the falsifiability of the theory.
  2. There is no possible explanation for the choice of laws, nor for the initial conditions, within the standard framework (which we call the Newtonian paradigm).
From Chris Fuchs' My Struggles With A Block Universe:

The world, its description, and the laws that govern it, are not simply there independent of our actions. There was a time when they were, before complex organic molecules, but now that’s not the case. The world and its laws seem to me to be every bit as evolutionary as life itself. And just as the idea of radical Darwinism becomes outdated when one realizes that random natural selection fails to hold the second one being can say to another, “I love you,” so it is with the universe. The world is a big pushme-pullyou.

And so on ->

Frozen Accidents: Can the Laws of Physics be Explained?

Is the Search for Immutable Laws of Nature a Wild-Goose Chase?

Physics books, websites.
To the bold. When I stated that, I was not in a testy frame of mind.

No, I mean how do you account for the Present within physics? You'd have to incorporate the reality of time in some way or claim our experience of the present is ultimately an illusion.

P.S. It has occurred to me the reason skeptics may not ask is because those questions don't offer affirmation to an already well established understanding how the universe works. Whereas I feel, understanding post mortem consciousness is an unknown that should be the next logical step in knowing from an NDE perspective.

I don't understand what the bold means.
 
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How do you know there are laws at all, or that they apply everywhere?
My answering this question won't matter to you, so I suggest a web search for you to do.



You're assuming consciousness is dependent on the laws to exist.
I assume because no one has provided evidence there is something outside of this universe.
But you don't know how they impose themselves and ensure our experienced regularity.
Never the less life is regular.
It seems consciousness could at least partially be responsible for the regularities we see.
How. I'm not asking for speculative answers




Additionally are the regularities imposed from outside the stuff, or does the stuff behave in certain predictable ways? If the former, how do laws - which are fundamentally a different thing from matter - interact with matter?

If the latter, then where does the supposed immutability come from? In any case it has to be the latter ->

Do Physical Laws Make Things Happen?



There's [more I can say] about the nature of causality, but maybe that needs a separate thread...



Sure, and that reveals it's a mystery as to what the laws are and a question as to whether they are immutable ->

Interview w/ Lee Smolin at Scientia Salon


From Chris Fuchs' My Struggles With A Block Universe:



And so on ->

Frozen Accidents: Can the Laws of Physics be Explained?

Is the Search for Immutable Laws of Nature a Wild-Goose Chase?
You are aware all of these people are expressing learned opinions, but opinions none the less?


No, I mean how do you account for the Present within physics? You'd have to incorporate the reality of time in some way or claim our experience of the present is ultimately an illusion.
This was never part of the question I asked in the begining.

Me: It has occurred to me the reason skeptics may not ask is because those questions don't offer affirmation to an already well established understanding how the universe works. Whereas I feel, understanding post mortem consciousness is an unknown that should be the next logical step in knowing from an NDE perspective.

I don't understand what the bold means.
It means there is no meta-physical importance.
 
My answering this question won't matter to you, so I suggest a web search for you to do.

I don't understand this sudden evasion? There must be some path of reasoning/reading you took to arrive at the conclusion so just post what that was.

I assume because no one has provided evidence there is something outside of this universe.

But you're assuming laws exist at all and that they apply universally, which just goes back to the "How do the laws work to limit what's possible?" and the "Why don't the laws change?" questions.

Nevertheless life is regular.

Regular and immutable aren't the same things.

How. I'm not asking for speculative answers

Seems like you are, if you're asking how the NDE can describe a real afterlife but also be subject to heat death.

As to how, see Gregg Rosenberg's A Place for Consciousness - you can get a summary of the ideas from the Limitations of Mechanistic Thinking thread. I can go deeper into it here, or in another thread, as you please but it does take us away from NDEs.

You are aware all of these people are expressing learned opinions, but opinions none the less?

If the NDE is a real description of the afterlife why wouldn't their opinions be more likely to be correct rather than those who think the universe, trillions of years from now, will experience heat death?

This was never part of the question I asked in the begining.

You asked in subsequent posts whether the NDE reality would be subject to heat death. Thus the question of whether physics has a complete understanding of time is important.

It means there is no meta-physical importance.

Asking why the laws don't change, how the impose regularity, and/or what guides their change, seems to be of incredible importance. I'd even suggest examination of the laws of nature is central to almost every dispute between proponents and skeptics.
 
Well if survival is true (and I accept that it is) is it not possible that your "deceased" ancestors are helping you or at the very least watching what's going on with your life ?
Tim, I also believe this to be the case, in the form of subtle signals and intuitions, but also believe that it takes a good deal of the right type of psychic development to make the most use of that guidance, in general. At the very least, most of us should be able to develop the minimal psychic skills to at least detect their presence. I was close to both my parents, but probably a bit more to my mother, yet I've been able to connect with my father on several occasions (two confirmed by a psychic, without me soliciting the confirmation) but have not been able to do so with my mother. It's a complicated process. I find it sad that at this point in time we are still wrapped up in debates over the very existence of the phenomena. let alone understanding and developing it.

Cheers,
Bill
 
I don't understand this sudden evasion? There must be some path of reasoning/reading you took to arrive at the conclusion so just post what that was.
I'm not being evasive. I'm just some schmuck whose commentary would be argued it's wrong. Like I said a keyword search will show you.






Seems like you are, if you're asking how the NDE can describe a real afterlife but also be subject to heat death.
Do you know off the top of your head what "heat death" means?

As to how, see Gregg Rosenberg's A Place for Consciousness - you can get a summary of the ideas from the Limitations of Mechanistic Thinking thread. I can go deeper into it here, or in another thread, as you please but it does take us away from NDEs.



If the NDE is a real description of the afterlife why wouldn't their opinions be more likely to be correct rather than those who think the universe, trillions of years from now, will experience heat death?
When something has not be tested then opinions don't matter one bit no matter whose opining, especially on subjects as esoteric as NDE's.


You asked in subsequent posts whether the NDE reality would be subject to heat death. Thus the question of whether physics has a complete understanding of time is important.
Even long before heat death happens if it does happen at all, there's going to be trillions of years passing before that. so what happens to ones consciousness during that time. For example, I've never heard of any reliable contact with any former extinct species of human.



Asking why the laws don't change, how the impose regularity, and/or what guides their change, seems to be of incredible importance. I'd even suggest examination of the laws of nature is central to almost every dispute between proponents and skeptics.
They are important to immaterialists because of their materialism is wrong perspective. Important to physicists because it would give them a better understanding of how this universe works. Two very different agenda.
 
I'm not being evasive. I'm just some schmuck whose commentary would be argued it's wrong. Like I said a keyword search will show you.

But what made you think the laws were immutable? Something you read, watched.....

Do you know off the top of your head what "heat death" means?

My initial answer:

Universe moves toward increasing entropy which in turn shifts energy toward heat which isn't converted back to any other form of energy. Thus the universe eventually runs out of energy.


Looking it up on Wikipedia:

The heat death of the universe is a possible ultimate fate of the universe in which the universe has diminished to a state of no thermodynamic free energy and therefore can no longer sustain processes that increase entropy (including computation and life).


Close enough I hope - been awhile since I did physics.

When something has not be tested then opinions don't matter one bit no matter whose opining, especially on subjects as esoteric as NDE's.

But I thought we were starting with the assumption that NDEs are true. In any case even assuming the laws apply outside of the conditions in which they are put to the test is opining. Even Sean Carroll notes they don't have to be universal:

Can the laws of physics change over time and space?

As far as physicists can tell, the cosmos has been playing by the same rulebook since the time of the Big Bang. But could the laws have been different in the past, and could they change in the future? Might different laws prevail in some distant corner of the cosmos?

“It’s not a completely crazy possibility,” says Sean Carroll, a theoretical physicist at Caltech, who points out that, when we ask if the laws of physics are mutable, we’re actually asking two separate questions: First, do the equations of quantum mechanics and gravity change over time and space? And second, do the numerical constants that populate those equations vary?

We can also then dig deeper and see which laws have only been shown in a lab, which have been extrapolated into useful technologies, which discoveries have been and can be replicated.

Even long before heat death happens if it does happen at all, there's going to be trillions of years passing before that. so what happens to ones consciousness during that time. For example, I've never heard of any reliable contact with any former extinct species of human.

But I thought we were assuming NDEs were true, which in turn suggests our understanding of time is incomplete especially since there exist arguments that our understanding of time is flawed which have nothing to do with NDEs.

Even meeting dead relatives suggests entropy/decay doesn't apply to spirits?

Once you accept NDEs as being a real description of the afterlife it challenges the very ideas that would leads us to conclude the universe will experience heat death?

They are important to immaterialists because of their materialism is wrong perspective. Important to physicists because it would give them a better understanding of how this universe works. Two very different agenda.

I don't understand this response. Still seems to me "skeptics" avoid skepticism where it challenges faith in their paradigms. Why the terms "skeptic" should be separated from groups that, to me at least, seem to range from atheist missionary groups to dyed in the wool cults.
 
Tim, I also believe this to be the case, in the form of subtle signals and intuitions, but also believe that it takes a good deal of the right type of psychic development to make the most use of that guidance, in general. At the very least, most of us should be able to develop the minimal psychic skills to at least detect their presence. I was close to both my parents, but probably a bit more to my mother, yet I've been able to connect with my father on several occasions (two confirmed by a psychic, without me soliciting the confirmation) but have not been able to do so with my mother. It's a complicated process. I find it sad that at this point in time we are still wrapped up in debates over the very existence of the phenomena. let alone understanding and developing it.

Cheers,
Bill

That's interesting, Bill and I agree, it is disappointing that we're still arguing about the basics.
 
But what made you think the laws were immutable? Something you read, watched.....
There's no evidence that that have changed. Of course something read.






But I thought we were starting with the assumption that NDEs are true.
Yes.

In any case even assuming the laws apply outside of the conditions in which they are put to the test is opining. Even Sean Carroll notes they don't have to be universal:
It doesn't matter what people think, only what can be proven. Speculation opens up all sorts of loop holes. This is a strict question I'm asking members with a few assumptions. a) there's one universe, b) this universe will last an extremely long time, but itself will end.






But I thought we were assuming NDEs were true, which in turn suggests our understanding of time is incomplete especially since there exist arguments that our understanding of time is flawed which have nothing to do with NDEs.
Yes, it's known time does run differently for various reasons, but it still does run in one direction; therefore there's no logical reason to think consciousness gets a free pass to avoid time.

Even meeting dead relatives suggests entropy/decay doesn't apply to spirits?
It does, but for how long?

Once you accept NDEs as being a real description of the afterlife it challenges the very ideas that would leads us to conclude the universe will experience heat death?
Why? Excluding what one believes is true, absolutely no one knows for a fact how long consciousness lasts post mortem or even the nature of post mortem consciousness actually is.
Observations show the early universe was more energetic than it is now. Later observations show it is less energetic. The logical extrapolations is it will be less and less energetic as time goes by ending in a state of maximum entropy, but it could end in other ways too.



I don't understand this response. Still seems to me "skeptics" avoid skepticism where it challenges faith in their paradigms. Why the terms "skeptic" should be separated from groups that, to me at least, seem to range from atheist missionary groups to dyed in the wool cults.
Eight days a week I read here how materialism is wrong and the paradigm is about to change. Should consciousness persist or any of the other things that fall into the "immaterial" side be true then the definition of materialism / physicalism expands to include those. There's no challenge and there's no faith involved.
 
There's no evidence that that have changed. Of course something read.

But you can't bring up what you read? I don't see the need for this bizarre secrecy?

For me there's no evidence that laws are immutable or even apply across the universe. There's not even evidence that laws are something external imposing themselves and a good argument why that's not logically possible.

All we have are a list of experiments, some of which were extrapolated into technologies a small amount of which we know works beyond the edge of the solar system.


So NDEs are true, but cause no revision into our known understanding of physics? I don't see how that makes sense.

It doesn't matter what people think, only what can be proven. Speculation opens up all sorts of loop holes. This is a strict question I'm asking members with a few assumptions. a) there's one universe, b) this universe will last an extremely long time, but itself will end.

There's a difference between random speculation and reasoned argument. No one has even proven there are external laws of physics, just regularities, and the boundary of which we know they apply is finite. Even that assumes a certain model of the universe is true.

For example if the Electric Universe is true heat death isn't even on the table.

Heck, no one can even explain why the world at the macro level isn't as bizarre as the quantum level.

Yes, it's known time does run differently for various reasons, but it still does run in one direction; therefore there's no logical reason to think consciousness gets a free pass to avoid time.

Except there are experiments suggesting quantum particles move backwards and forwards in time. Also no one can definitively answer what the phrase "laws of physics" actually means or why the "laws" stay the same or whether they apply to the rest of the universe.

Nor have you managed to address the issues physics has with the present moment. If you need more detail Smolin & Unger's book is actually free, or you can watch Tallis' presentation:

http://www.skeptiko-forum.com/threads/free-book-singular-universe-reality-of-time.3090/

No one has an explanation for causation either, which is how people extrapolated the supposed universal laws from isolated observations.

It does, but for how long?

Nobody knows. Heck I don't even know if NDEs are actually a depiction of the afterlife, I'm just trying to understand why one would assume they are real but not revise physics?

I'm hoping you'll eventualy provide a well-reasoned argument for this.

Why? Excluding what one believes is true, absolutely no one knows for a fact how long consciousness lasts post mortem or even the nature of post mortem consciousness actually is.
.

If you assume NDEs show real events of post-mortem survival there are reports of people controlling space-time, guessing at least one NDE out there has told people the soul is eternal directly or indirectly?

I guess you could try to say that part of the NDE reports is false, that those people are deceived, but it's a bit odd to insist at the outset NDEs are true but everything that renders your question as meaningless or at least a non-concern gets excluded....

Observations show the early universe was more energetic than it is now. Later observations show it is less energetic. The logical extrapolations is it will be less and less energetic as time goes by ending in a state of maximum entropy, but it could end in other ways too

Observations just show results of experiments. You're extrapolating and pretending you have facts about what will happen trillions of years from.

It is interesting that your beliefs are "logical extrapolations" but anyone else - including physicists who don't share your faith - are just stating mere "opinions". ;)

And I'll ask again - What's energy?

"It is important to realize that in physics today, we have no knowledge of what energy is. We do not have a picture that energy comes in little blobs of a definite amount. It is not that way. However, there are formulas for calculating some numerical quantity and when we add it together it gives “28″—always the same number. It is an abstract thing in that it does not tell us the mechanisms or the reasons for the various formulas."
-Feynman on Energy

Also, while we're at it what's entropy? Do you think the concept of entropy in information science has any relevance?

Eight days a week I read here how materialism is wrong and the paradigm is about to change. Should consciousness persist or any of the other things that fall into the "immaterial" side be true then the definition of materialism / physicalism expands to include those. There's no challenge and there's no faith involved.

Except "matter" is now some kind of quantum foam that doesn't even have a spatio-temporal location. As Bitbol notes materialism is a stance that outruns empiricism.

Additionally you're assuming laws of physics don't change and their imposition is due to some external pressure.

Or that there's matter at all. Or that this "stuff" has no consciousness or conscious potential. And so on...

Once you remove all these assumptions you can have an ontologically neutral science.
 
But you can't bring up what you read? I don't see the need for this bizarre secrecy?
There's no secrecy just look it up for yourself. There have been many experiments delving into whether the laws of physics changed over time.

For me there's no evidence that laws are immutable or even apply across the universe. There's not even evidence that laws are something external imposing themselves and a good argument why that's not logically possible.
You can believe whatever you want, but the logical argument has no relevance to physics or in other words a logical argument will never find the truth.




So NDEs are true, but cause no revision into our known understanding of physics? I don't see how that makes sense.
That's what folk believe. Since post mortem consciousness is already known by some to be indicative it doesn't appear to have change the laws of physics at least to the precision current experimentation allows.



There's a difference between random speculation and reasoned argument. No one has even proven there are external laws of physics, just regularities, and the boundary of which we know they apply is finite. Even that assumes a certain model of the universe is true.
In this question it can only be argued using what is known. Let me show you what random speculation looks like.
I don't know. If this reality is a projection that would imply the data is stored elsewhere in some other form. Or the matter of the universe itself could be considered the information storage if it is possible to move around in time. In other words everything that has happened is still accessible because it still exists. Information storage is meaning in-formed into symbol which has a relatively low rate of change. So the tree outside could be considered to be the experience of a tree in-formed into matter. Light hits the tree and is decoded by the eye into electrical signals and these are decoded into a visual experience of the tree, like light hitting a CD and decoding into electrical signals and back to light signals. The tree changes slowly so that enables the assignment of identity to it and identity is a necessary part of memory.

Now for reasoned argument
The Degenerate Age
After the Stelliferous age, the universe is very different, for two reasons. First, stars are no longer shining. Second, galaxies which are not gravitationally bound to each other have been carried far away by the expansion of the universe. After several passes between our Milky Way and Andromeda, the two galaxies will merge. After trillions of years, all the galaxies in our Local Group will have coalesced into one big object. But all the other galaxies in the universe will have continued to move farther and farther away: by 10^(14) years in the future, even our nearest unbound neighbors will be more than one million Megaparsecs away from us.

The dominant forms of matter are now mostly dead stars, in several forms:

  • brown dwarfs: objects not massive enough to form stars (about the size of Jupiter)
  • white dwarfs: the dense, cooling remains of low-mass stars (about the size of the Earth)
  • neutron stars: the very dense remains of high-mass stars which ran out of fuel and suffered core-collapse (about the size of New York City)
  • black holes: the very very dense remains of high-mass stars whose cores were more than about three solar masses at the time of core collapse (about the size of Rochester)
The atoms in all these objects are unlike those in ordinary matter, due to their high density. Physicists call this sort of material degenerate, and that term gives its name to this Age.

Since these objects are not burning any fuel, they do not radiate light. The Degenerate Age is dark.

Over the course of this Age, gravity causes two competing effects.

Chance encounters between stellar remnants in our merged "Local Galaxy" cause some of the stars to fly off into intergalactic space, and others to fall deeper into the gravitational well of the "Local Galaxy".
If a remnant happens to pass close to a black hole, it may be torn apart. The resulting material may form an accretion disk around the black hole, spiralling inwards and emitting radiation as it goes.
.





Except there are experiments suggesting quantum particles move backwards and forwards in time. Also no one can definitively answer what the phrase "laws of physics" actually means or why the "laws" stay the same or whether they apply to the rest of the universe.
I don't think this is relevant.





Nobody knows. Heck I don't even know if NDEs are actually a depiction of the afterlife, I'm just trying to understand why one would assume they are real but not revise physics?

I'm hoping you'll eventualy provide a well-reasoned argument for this.



If you assume NDEs show real events of post-mortem survival there are reports of people controlling space-time, guessing at least one NDE out there has told people the soul is eternal directly or indirectly?

I guess you could try to say that part of the NDE reports is false, that those people are deceived, but it's a bit odd to insist at the outset NDEs are true but everything that renders your question as meaningless or at least a non-concern gets excluded....



Observations just show results of experiments. You're extrapolating and pretending you have facts about what will happen trillions of years from.

It is interesting that your beliefs are "logical extrapolations" but anyone else - including physicists who don't share your faith - are just stating mere "opinions". ;)

And I'll ask again - What's energy?

"It is important to realize that in physics today, we have no knowledge of what energy is. We do not have a picture that energy comes in little blobs of a definite amount. It is not that way. However, there are formulas for calculating some numerical quantity and when we add it together it gives “28″—always the same number. It is an abstract thing in that it does not tell us the mechanisms or the reasons for the various formulas."
-Feynman on Energy


Also, while we're at it what's entropy? Do you think the concept of entropy in information science has any relevance?



Except "matter" is now some kind of quantum foam that doesn't even have a spatio-temporal location. As Bitbol notes materialism is a stance that outruns empiricism.

Additionally you're assuming laws of physics don't change and their imposition is due to some external pressure.

Or that there's matter at all. Or that this "stuff" has no consciousness or conscious potential. And so on...

Once you remove all these assumptions you can have an ontologically neutral science.[/QUOTE]
But you can't bring up what you read? I don't see the need for this bizarre secrecy?

For me there's no evidence that laws are immutable or even apply across the universe. There's not even evidence that laws are something external imposing themselves and a good argument why that's not logically possible.

All we have are a list of experiments, some of which were extrapolated into technologies a small amount of which we know works beyond the edge of the solar system.



So NDEs are true, but cause no revision into our known understanding of physics? I don't see how that makes sense.



There's a difference between random speculation and reasoned argument. No one has even proven there are external laws of physics, just regularities, and the boundary of which we know they apply is finite. Even that assumes a certain model of the universe is true.

For example if the Electric Universe is true heat death isn't even on the table.

Heck, no one can even explain why the world at the macro level isn't as bizarre as the quantum level.



Except there are experiments suggesting quantum particles move backwards and forwards in time. Also no one can definitively answer what the phrase "laws of physics" actually means or why the "laws" stay the same or whether they apply to the rest of the universe.

Nor have you managed to address the issues physics has with the present moment. If you need more detail Smolin & Unger's book is actually free, or you can watch Tallis' presentation:

http://www.skeptiko-forum.com/threads/free-book-singular-universe-reality-of-time.3090/

No one has an explanation for causation either, which is how people extrapolated the supposed universal laws from isolated observations.



Nobody knows. Heck I don't even know if ND


But you can't bring up what you read? I don't see the need for this bizarre secrecy?
There's no secrecy just look it up for yourself. there have been many experiments delving into whether the laws of ohysics changed over time.

{quote]For me there's no evidence that laws are immutable or even apply across the universe. There's not even evidence that laws are something external imposing themselves and a good argument why that's not logically possible.
You can believe whatever you want, but the logical argument has no relevance to physics or in other words a logical argument will never find the truth.




So NDEs are true, but cause no revision into our known understanding of physics? I don't see how that makes sense.
That's what folk believe on this forum. Since post mortem consciousness is already known by some to be present it doesn't appear to have change the laws of physics at least to the precision current experimentation allows.



There's a difference between random speculation and reasoned argument. No one has even proven there are external laws of physics, just regularities, and the boundary of which we know they apply is finite. Even that assumes a certain model of the universe is true.
The laws aren't external. In this question it can only be argued using what is known. Let me show you what random speculation looks like.
I don't know. If this reality is a projection that would imply the data is stored elsewhere in some other form. Or the matter of the universe itself could be considered the information storage if it is possible to move around in time. In other words everything that has happened is still accessible because it still exists. Information storage is meaning in-formed into symbol which has a relatively low rate of change. So the tree outside could be considered to be the experience of a tree in-formed into matter. Light hits the tree and is decoded by the eye into electrica
But you can't bring up what you read? I don't see the need for this bizarre secrecy?
There's no secrecy just look it up for yourself. there have been many experiments delving into whether the laws of ohysics changed over time.

{quote]For me there's no evidence that laws are immutable or even apply across the universe. There's not even evidence that laws are something external imposing themselves and a good argument why that's not logically possible.
You can believe whatever you want, but the logical argument has no relevance to physics or in other words a logical argument will never find the truth.




So NDEs are true, but cause no revision into our known understanding of physics? I don't see how that makes sense.
That's what folk believe. but since post mortem consciousness is already known by some to be indicative it doesn't appear to have change the laws of physics at least to the precision current experimentation allows.



There's a difference between random speculation and reasoned argument. No one has even proven there are external laws of physics, just regularities, and the boundary of which we know they apply is finite. Even that assumes a certain model of the universe is true.
In this question it can only be argued using what is known. let me show you what random speculation looks like.
I don't know. If this reality is a projection that would imply the data is stored elsewhere in some other form. Or the matter of the universe itself could be considered the information storage if it is possible to move around in time. In other words everything that has happened is still accessible because it still exists. Information storage is meaning in-formed into symbol which has a relatively low rate of change. So the tree outside could be considered to be the experience of a tree in-formed into matter. Light hits the tree and is decoded by the eye into electrical signals and these are decoded into a visual experience of the tree, like light hitting a CD and decoding into electrical signals and back to light signals. The tree changes slowly so that enables the assignment of identity to it and identity is a necessary part of memory.

Now for reasoned argument
The Degenerate Age
After the Stelliferous age, the universe is very different, for two reasons. First, stars are no longer shining. Second, galaxies which are not gravitationally bound to each other have been carried far away by the expansion of the universe. After several passes between our Milky Way and Andromeda, the two galaxies will merge. After trillions of years, all the galaxies in our Local Group will have coalesced into one big object. But all the other galaxies in the universe will have continued to move farther and farther away: by 10^(14) years in the future, even our nearest unbound neighbors will be more than one million Megaparsecs away from us.

The dominant forms of matter are now mostly dead stars, in several forms:

brown dwarfs: objects not massive enough to form stars (about the size of Jupiter)
white dwarfs: the dense, cooling remains of low-mass stars (about the size of the Earth)
neutron stars: the very dense remains of high-mass stars which ran out of fuel and suffered core-collapse (about the size of New York City)
black holes: the very very dense remains of high-mass stars whose cores were more than about three solar masses at the time of core collapse (about the size of Rochester)

The atoms in all these objects are unlike those in ordinary matter, due to their high density. Physicists call this sort of material degenerate, and that term gives its name to this Age.

Since these objects are not burning any fuel, they do not radiate light. The Degenerate Age is dark.

Over the course of this Age, gravity causes two competing effects.

Chance encounters between stellar remnants in our merged "Local Galaxy" cause some of the stars to fly off into intergalactic space, and others to fall deeper into the gravitational well of the "Local Galaxy".
If a remnant happens to pass close to a black hole, it may be torn apart. The resulting material may form an accretion disk around the black hole, spiralling inwards and emitting radiation as it goes.
.





Except there are experiments suggesting quantum particles move backwards and forwards in time. Also no one can definitively answer what the phrase "laws of physics" actually means or why the "laws" stay the same or whether they apply to the rest of the universe.
I don't think this is relevant.





Nobody knows. Heck I don't even know if NDEs are actually a depiction of the afterlife, I'm just trying to understand why one would assume they are real but not revise physics?

I'm hoping you'll eventualy provide a well-reasoned argument for this.



If you assume NDEs show real events of post-mortem survival there are reports of people controlling space-time, guessing at least one NDE out there has told people the soul is eternal directly or indirectly?

I guess you could try to say that part of the NDE reports is false, that those people are deceived, but it's a bit odd to insist at the outset NDEs are true but everything that renders your question as meaningless or at least a non-concern gets excluded....



Observations just show results of experiments. You're extrapolating and pretending you have facts about what will happen trillions of years from.

It is interesting that your beliefs are "logical extrapolations" but anyone else - including physicists who don't share your faith - are just stating mere "opinions". ;)

And I'll ask again - What's energy?

"It is important to realize that in physics today, we have no knowledge of what energy is. We do not have a picture that energy comes in little blobs of a definite amount. It is not that way. However, there are formulas for calculating some numerical quantity and when we add it together it gives “28″—always the same number. It is an abstract thing in that it does not tell us the mechanisms or the reasons for the various formulas."
-Feynman on Energy

Also, while we're at it what's entropy? Do you think the concept of entropy in information science has any relevance?



Except "matter" is now some kind of quantum foam that doesn't even have a spatio-temporal location. As Bitbol notes materialism is a stance that outruns empiricism.

Additionally you're assuming laws of physics don't change and their imposition is due to some external pressure.

Or that there's matter at all. Or that this "stuff" has no consciousness or conscious potential. And so on...

Once you remove all these assumptions you can have an ontologically neutral science.[/QUOTE]
But you can't bring up what you read? I don't see the need for this bizarre secrecy?

For me there's no evidence that laws are immutable or even apply across the universe. There's not even evidence that laws are something external imposing themselves and a good argument why that's not logically possible.

All we have are a list of experiments, some of which were extrapolated into technologies a small amount of which we know works beyond the edge of the solar system.



So NDEs are true, but cause no revision into our known understanding of physics? I don't see how that makes sense.



There's a difference between random speculation and reasoned argument. No one has even proven there are external laws of physics, just regularities, and the boundary of which we know they apply is finite. Even that assumes a certain model of the universe is true.

For example if the Electric Universe is true heat death isn't even on the table.

Heck, no one can even explain why the world at the macro level isn't as bizarre as the quantum level.



Except there are experiments suggesting quantum particles move backwards and forwards in time. Also no one can definitively answer what the phrase "laws of physics" actually means or why the "laws" stay the same or whether they apply to the rest of the universe.

Nor have you managed to address the issues physics has with the present moment. If you need more detail Smolin & Unger's book is actually free, or you can watch Tallis' presentation:

http://www.skeptiko-forum.com/threads/free-book-singular-universe-reality-of-time.3090/

No one has an explanation for causation either, which is how people extrapolated the supposed universal laws from isolated observations.



Nobody knows. Heck I don't even know if NDEs are actually a depiction of the afterlife, I'm just trying to understand why one would assume they are real but not revise physics?

I'm hoping you'll eventualy provide a well-reasoned argument for this.



If you assume NDEs show real events of post-mortem survival there are reports of people controlling space-time, guessing at least one NDE out there has told people the soul is eternal directly or indirectly?

I guess you could try to say that part of the NDE reports is false, that those people are deceived, but it's a bit odd to insist at the outset NDEs are true but everything that renders your question as meaningless or at least a non-concern gets excluded....



Observations just show results of experiments. You're extrapolating and pretending you have facts about what will happen trillions of years from.

It is interesting that your beliefs are "logical extrapolations" but anyone else - including physicists who don't share your faith - are just stating mere "opinions". ;)

And I'll ask again - What's energy?

"It is important to realize that in physics today, we have no knowledge of what energy is. We do not have a picture that energy comes in little blobs of a definite amount. It is not that way. However, there are formulas for calculating some numerical quantity and when we add it together it gives “28″—always the same number. It is an abstract thing in that it does not tell us the mechanisms or the reasons for the various formulas."
-Feynman on Energy

Also, while we're at it what's entropy? Do you think the concept of entropy in information science has any relevance?



Except "matter" is now some kind of quantum foam that doesn't even have a spatio-temporal location. As Bitbol notes materialism is a stance that outruns empiricism.

Additionally you're assuming laws of physics don't change and their imposition is due to some external pressure.

Or that there's matter at all. Or that this "stuff" has no consciousness or conscious potential. And so on...

Once you remove all these assumptions you can have an ontologically neutral science.
l signals and these are decoded into a visual experience of the tree, like light hitting a CD and decoding into electrical signals and back to light signals. The tree changes slowly so that enables the assignment of identity to it and identity is a necessary part of memory.[/quote]

Now for reasoned argument
The Degenerate Age
After the Stelliferous age, the universe is very different, for two reasons. First, stars are no longer shining. Second, galaxies which are not gravitationally bound to each other have been carried far away by the expansion of the universe. After several passes between our Milky Way and Andromeda, the two galaxies will merge. After trillions of years, all the galaxies in our Local Group will have coalesced into one big object. But all the other galaxies in the universe will have continued to move farther and farther away: by 10^(14) years in the future, even our nearest unbound neighbors will be more than one million Megaparsecs away from us.

The dominant forms of matter are now mostly dead stars, in several forms:

brown dwarfs: objects not massive enough to form stars (about the size of Jupiter)
white dwarfs: the dense, cooling remains of low-mass stars (about the size of the Earth)
neutron stars: the very dense remains of high-mass stars which ran out of fuel and suffered core-collapse (about the size of New York City)
black holes: the very very dense remains of high-mass stars whose cores were more than about three solar masses at the time of core collapse (about the size of Rochester)

The atoms in all these objects are unlike those in ordinary matter, due to their high density. Physicists call this sort of material degenerate, and that term gives its name to this Age.

Since these objects are not burning any fuel, they do not radiate light. The Degenerate Age is dark.

Over the course of this Age, gravity causes two competing effects.

Chance encounters between stellar remnants in our merged "Local Galaxy" cause some of the stars to fly off into intergalactic space, and others to fall deeper into the gravitational well of the "Local Galaxy".
If a remnant happens to pass close to a black hole, it may be torn apart. The resulting material may form an accretion disk around the black hole, spiralling inwards and emitting radiation as it goes.
See the difference?





Except there are experiments suggesting quantum particles move backwards and forwards in time. Also no one can definitively answer what the phrase "laws of physics" actually means or why the "laws" stay the same or whether they apply to the rest of the universe.
I checked and to date there are no experiemnts that have actually used substomic particles demonstrating particles moving backwards in time. Particles are allowed to time travel there are no laws that prevent them from doing that. But we can look back in time and actually see what the universe looked like long ago. We can even and have performed experiments to see if any of these laws have change and we see no indications these laws have changed to the precision we can measure. The bold is relevant.





Nobody knows. Heck I don't even know if NDEs are actually a depiction of the afterlife,
Many on this forum and elsewhere do indeed beleive they are proof of an afterlife.
I'm just trying to understand why one would assume they are real but not revise physics?
A rather presumptous statement. You are real and yet do not change the laws of physics nor the billions of other individual alone or collectively nor your indivual consciousness while alive or the collective consciousness of billions of others. So why should your singular consciousness after death change those laws? If anything it should be consciuosness that follows those laws like everything else does.

I'm hoping you'll eventualy provide a well-reasoned argument for this.



If you assume NDEs show real events of post-mortem survival there are reports of people controlling space-time, guessing at least one NDE out there has told people the soul is eternal directly or indirectly?
Citation?

I guess you could try to say that part of the NDE reports is false, that those people are deceived, but it's a bit odd to insist at the outset NDEs are true but everything that renders your question as meaningless or at least a non-concern gets excluded....
What I'm asking is if members have thought about how long consciousness last post mortem?



Observations just show results of experiments.
That's what science is observation and experimentation.
You're extrapolating and pretending you have facts about what will happen trillions of years from.
Yes, it is extrapolating, but even if you don't go all the way to the end there's still an unimaginably large span of time that needs to be considered.

It is interesting that your beliefs are "logical extrapolations" but anyone else - including physicists who don't share your faith - are just stating mere "opinions". ;)
you certainly have misunderstood this. In the words of Richard Feynman-
It doesn't matter how beautiful your theory is, it doesn't matter how smart you are. If it doesn't agree with experiment, it's wrong.
I don't think I have to translate what this means.

And I'll ask again - What's energy?

"It is important to realize that in physics today, we have no knowledge of what energy is. We do not have a picture that energy comes in little blobs of a definite amount. It is not that way. However, there are formulas for calculating some numerical quantity and when we add it together it gives “28?—always the same number. It is an abstract thing in that it does not tell us the mechanisms or the reasons for the various formulas."
-Feynman on Energy

Also, while we're at it what's entropy? Do you think the concept of entropy in information science has any relevance

Except "matter" is now some kind of quantum foam that doesn't even have a spatio-temporal location. As Bitbol notes materialism is a stance that outruns empiricism.

Additionally you're assuming laws of physics don't change and their imposition is due to some external pressure.

Or that there's matter at all. Or that this "stuff" has no consciousness or conscious potential. And so on...

Once you remove all these assumptions you can have an ontologically neutral science.
All of the above is irrelavant because it goes well beyond the scope of the question originally asked and it because was never a question of science but of belief and if knowing this universe is going to be around for a very long time and even possibly die how would that modify what you think about the longevity of your consciousness?
 
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There's no secrecy just look it up for yourself. There have been many experiments delving into whether the laws of physics changed over time.

I want to understand what proof you have? As skeptics say it's the job of the person making the claim to provide proof.

For all I know this is something you decided is true because it appeals to some belief you want to have about reality - would be nice to know what experiments indicate heat death as well as the relevant mathematics used for extrapolation.

Go slow please - been awhile since I did probability and multivariable calculus.

You can believe whatever you want, but the logical argument has no relevance to physics or in other words a logical argument will never find the truth.

How do you know physics finds the truth?

That's what folk believe. Since post mortem consciousness is already known by some to be indicative it doesn't appear to have change the laws of physics at least to the precision current experimentation allows.

I'm just trying to understand what you're saying. NDEs are real, in that someone in a hospital bed goes to some other realm, possibly meets dead relatives, possibly talks to God, possibly shifts around in space/time via an act of consciousness....we're assuming this is all true but the NDEr is somehow mistaken?

But if we're assuming NDEs are indicative of the afterlife, why are they mistaken as to the power of their own consciousness affecting their place in space & time?

It seems like what you want to ask is "If NDEs are indicative of the afterlife, except for the parts that I don't want to accept because they make my question pointless, what's the answer to my question?"

In this question it can only be argued using what is known. Let me show you what random speculation looks like.

Now for reasoned argument.

What makes one reasoned argument and the other random speculation?

I don't think this is relevant.

But you're making a lot of assumptions in assuming these laws allow you to talk about what happens to the entire universe trillions of years from now so it seems relevant to me.

That's what folk believe on this forum. Since post mortem consciousness is already known by some to be present it doesn't appear to have change the laws of physics at least to the precision current experimentation allows.

See above.

Not sure there was anything else of relevance, the post was apparently garbled up by the forum software?
 
I want to understand what proof you have? As skeptics say it's the job of the person making the claim to provide proof.
For Pete's sake, you couldn't do a keyword search yourself? Well here you go. Please don't ask me to read these links for you too.
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/blogs/physics/2015/10/are-the-laws-of-physics-really-universal/
http://www.bbc.com/future/story/20120329-can-the-laws-of-physics-change


For all I know this is something you decided is true because it appeals to some belief you want to have about reality - would be nice to know what experiments indicate heat death as well as the relevant mathematics used for extrapolation.
Why yes it's something i thunked up all by myself because it is emotionally and intuitively appealing and it makes everything seem right.



How do you know physics finds the truth?
Start a new thread.



I'm just trying to understand what you're saying. NDEs are real, in that someone in a hospital bed goes to some other realm, possibly meets dead relatives, possibly talks to God, possibly shifts around in space/time via an act of consciousness....we're assuming this is all true but the NDEr is somehow mistaken?
I've not made any assumptions about nde in this thread. I've only used what other members have to say about the nde.

But if we're assuming NDEs are indicative of the afterlife, why are they mistaken as to the power of their own consciousness affecting their place in space & time?
I don't care. Start a new thread.

It seems like what you want to ask is "If NDEs are indicative of the afterlife, except for the parts that I don't want to accept because they make my question pointless, what's the answer to my question?"
Don't put words in my mouth.



What makes one reasoned argument and the other random speculation?
Reasoned in this example does not mean a logical argument. It is an argument based upon what we know, how we know and from that knowledge construct an explanation of what may happen. Random speculation argument is an intuitive argument. A person thinks, I believe this is true because it feels right then constructs a philosophical explanation to affirm why it's right.



But you're making a lot of assumptions in assuming these laws allow you to talk about what happens to the entire universe trillions of years from now so it seems relevant to me.
For the sake of argument I am, but it is an argument resting upon physics and astrophysics. It's not something I made up.
 
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In this question it can only be argued using what is known. Let me show you what random speculation looks like.

Science is first of all observation or gathering data. Then classification or establishing patterns in the data. Then generating hypotheses or models to explain the chain of causation that produces the patterns. Then predictions based on the hypotheses. Then experimentation to see which predictions can be confirmed thereby giving more or less confidence in the model.

My speculations weren't random but based on the patterns I've seen in the data. I'm in no position to conduct experiments though. I leave that to people like Radin.
 
Science is first of all observation or gathering data. Then classification or establishing patterns in the data. Then generating hypotheses or models to explain the chain of causation that produces the patterns. Then predictions based on the hypotheses. Then experimentation to see which predictions can be confirmed thereby giving more or less confidence in the model.

My speculations weren't random but based on the patterns I've seen in the data. I'm in no position to conduct experiments though. I leave that to people like Radin.
On subjects like these of existential importance I would expect no one to see their point of view as merely speculation, but it probably is.
 
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