Unanswered questions (General)

by dhw, Thursday, April 02, 2009, 13:06 (5502 days ago) @ George Jelliss

George: I don't acknowledge that there is some sort of "incomprehensible force" at work. Nature to my way of thinking is quite simple and thus comprehensible. I also don't see it as a "force", but simply subject to necessity. - Ah well, there was me thinking we'd found common ground between all the different positions! There is probably no way round this clash of views, and I am the one who must admit to ignorance. I don't know what caused the Big Bang, I don't know what constitutes the "dark matter" and "dark energy" that is said to make up 96% of the universe, I don't know how life and reproduction arose, I don't know how material cells can become conscious of themselves, or can generate new organs and faculties of their own accord. But if it's all simple and comprehensible, more fool me. - You continue: "The forces [or perhaps you mean "necessities" since you don't see Nature as a force] that brought life into existence from non-life can only be those known to physics and chemistry, although the precise sequence of events is not yet known." If you mean that the elements that constitute living matter must be known to us, I can hardly disagree with you, and one day perhaps we will know "the precise sequence of events", if by that you mean which bits combined with which in what order. But generations of brilliantly intelligent, conscious minds have struggled in vain to find out what forces (or necessities) made it all happen, which is odd if it's so simple and comprehensible. - I suggested that we might be cells in a superorganism, since there are so many connections on a microcosmic as well as a macrocosmic level. You ask what these connections are, and say: "There are in fact very few actual connections or interactions between distant parts of the universe." I don't know why you limit the universe to its distant parts, but in any case considering how little we know about it (see above), I'm surprised you can talk of facts in this context. I was actually thinking of the anthropic principle, which Dawkins believes bolsters his case for "why there almost certainly is no God" (see The God Delusion, Chapter 4, for details of connections), whereas theists take it as evidence for design. Wikipedia sums up the principle as follows: "Anthropic reasoning typically concludes that the stability of structures essential for life, from atomic nuclei to the whole universe, depends on delicate balances between different fundamental forces." I'm suggesting a parallel: just as my body depends on stable structures and delicate balances within itself, all acting independently of my consciousness and yet still part of me (e.g. heart, circulation, immune system, lungs etc.), maybe the universe functions in the same way. I offer it more as an image than a theory, as part of my attempt to comprehend the things you consider so simple.