A similar questian as the one posed by diablodelmar.
your ideas?
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A similar questian as the one posed by diablodelmar.
your ideas?
Also a tough one. I'd list some important inventions like compass, gunpowder, steam engine, light bulb, pencilline, etc.
I think I'll have to go for the invention of the atomic bomb. Not for finishing off Japan, but for revolutionising the doctrine of warfare and for the Cold War staying cold. It's to early yet to tell what its full effects will be.
Also a tough one. I'd list some important inventions like compass, gunpowder, steam engine, light bulb, pencilline, etc.
I think I'll have to go for the invention of the atomic bomb. Not for finishing off Japan, but for revolutionising the doctrine of warfare and for the Cold War staying cold. It's to early yet to tell what its full effects will be.
the battle of Tours. where Charles Martel where he defeated the Muslims. I think if he lost perhaps many of us would be Muslim instead of Christian. (unless the empire falls and is taken over by Christians)
The invention of the printing press. Although the Chinese had had a decent stab at it, Guttenberg cracked it, and Europe set off in so many different areas - religion, politics, science etc. The widely available written word impacts on our lives in soooo many ways.
Fall of the Roman empire. Marked the beginning of the middle ages and made different kingdoms and empires.
im going to slap myself for not thinking that. ~:madQuote:
Originally Posted by Hannibal99
double post
One could argue that the rise of the empire tromps it's fall in significance, since the latter would have never happened without the former. And the rise is very important in it's own right, for it
A) Enabled Roman culture to have such big impact on history to begin with, and
B) caused the downfall of other civilizations that could have had greater impact on history had they been able to survive.
The Battle of Hastings?
That little bit of Norman conquest led to America and the British Empire. The Saxons were fairly happen on their island, thanks.
The Black Death, for the reason I listed in the other thread.
(I just finished re-reading Kim Stanley Robinson's Years of Rice and Salt, so it's on my mind)
The beggining of Christianity.
No doubt about it. People learning how to farm. This leads to surplus of food, which leads to people being able to specialize, or to do more than look for food. That set off the development of towns, and land became property. Border diputes rose, Religeon was developed to a greater degree and conquering became a 'pasttime'. The rest is, quite literally, history.
ah yes the agricultural revolution
A few candidates:
The Big Bang (18-12,000,000,000 BC)
No Big Bang, no history.
Cosmic ray zaps DNA of precursor species, resulting in mutation later known as Homo sapiens (250-200,000 BC).
Planet-wide mayhem ensues.
Natural fermentation of grain discovered (~4000 BC).
Cooperative effort required to brew beer triggers the rise of human civilization.
Big Bang of course.
Atilius: I think it's 13.7b years ago.
Second would be the formation of this solar system. If things changed a little bit, eg the Sun a bit bigger and Earth a bit closer, there might not be life on this planet. Also, if Jupiter got a bit bigger and became a star, life would be very different on this planet, if it would even exist.
03/10/84. I was born.
Really though, in terms of human history, the whole farming thing is a big contender - allowing large settlements, freeing people to go off and think/kill each other.
There's a coupla books I've come across - on a 'what if x happened' theme, quite interesting ideas in there.
Big bang is a not very well founded theory. It assumes that the universe didn't exist before it happened, which is a prejudiced opinion remaining from misconceptions of religions, and it's an assumption that has no place in science unless proven first. I doubt there was no time or room dimensions before big bang, but I think it's very likely that a big bang has happened and altered and redistributed matter and energy to some extent. But that it would be a creation of room and time dimensions seems to me completely insane. Anyway, I also doubt anything happening before the first humans were born doesn't count as history, but rather as pre-history, so big bang is an incorrect answer in any case IMO.
The incident having most impact on history was obviously humans distancing and hiding themselves from nature and starting to fear it. It was what created civilization and all the things that belong to the concept - human sacrifice, war, persecution, struggle for power by backstabbing and ugly tricks, better weapon technology that allows faster killing of more people, and science and beautiful art. All other events in history are indirectly caused by that incident, so I'd argue it's undoubtedly the incident that most heavily influenced history.
Please don't take this the wrong way; but you seem to have a rather warped understanding of the Big Bang theory and the scientific method, especially the concept of scientific theory in that method.Quote:
Originally Posted by LegioXXXUlpiaVictrix
First off, as a theory, the Big Bang theory is exactly science. It is a theory based upon observation of data. It can be disproven if future data contadicts the theory, the experiments which resulted in the data are repeatable and it is not guaranteed to be the absoute truth. As a scientific theory, it is the essence of the scientific method. It's not an assumption at all. It fits the known facts. It remains a theory, however. Your statement about needing to be proven first to have a place in science directly contradicts the scientific method as a whole.
We know that velocity and time are connected. It is an observable fact that time is not constant. Just because that seems impossible to you does not make it untrue. Because velocity is fundamentally tied to space, time too must be fundamentally tied to space. In fact, the reason that time is not constant is because it is a part of space. It's a very basic part of Einstein's theories of general and special relativity. Which have not been disproven; nor have they been proven. But they still fit all observable data. As long as they do, they will continue to be theories. When they no longer do, some other theory will take their place.
The assumptions are all on your side. Obviously, it is difficult for many people to grasp how time and space are so deeply connected. Your post directly refutes Einstein's theories of relativity (again, a scientific theory based on observation of fact but which remains a theory until disproven). We're going to need a little more proof from you than just an assumption and a statement of disagreement. Scientists have been looking for a better theory than Einstein's for a century. You're welcome to try; but simply stating it can't be true is about as unscientific as it gets. Yes, the mathematical foundation of the theory can be pretty esoteric and extremely difficult to grasp. Particularly in regards to string theory, which is pushing the limits of our ability to understand and observe and form hypotheses which fit the observable data.
Saying, essentially, that because you don't understand it, then it must not be true is the exact opposite of science. It's the mentality of the flat earth. It's religion. It's faith. Faith in a lack of knowledge or a lack of understanding is never science. This is how crocks like creation "science" and intelligent design end up accepted by the general population - a lack of understanding of science and the scientific method.
Whatever change in the enviroment caused our primitive ancestors to get down on the ground and walk.
Well since Aenlic dealt with you other codds wollop allow me to deal with this. Man did not begin to fear nature, man distanced him self from nature as a side effect of becoming more advanced. By farming he removed the neccessity to hunt, which meant he could live in a familiar fixed place and as such he could make it more comfortable for himself and his animals, and less comfortable for predators. Then, because life is easy one of his sons becomes a potter instead of a farmer-hunter and he learns very little about hunting, migration, spore etc.Quote:
Originally Posted by LegioXXXUlpiaVictrix
Regardless, it isn't a historical event. History is defined as starting when things begin to be written down, everything before that is pre-history.
i vote for GUNPOWDER
Quote:
Originally Posted by The Stranger
Ya killing from far away! no more swords!
I agree to space-time, but I fail to see why space and time being related means that before a big explosion of matter there wouldn't have been any matter at all. All creation theories, religious and scientific attempts, are based on the assumption that space and time once didn't exist at all. What I'm complaining about isn't the making of assumptions and theories, but the making of an assumption without any argumentation to support it. There's no argument whatsoever that suggests universe was created, and that room and time hasn't existed always.Quote:
Originally Posted by Aenlic
I consider sacrificing humans to imaginary gods to get nature's support and liking a form of fearing nature. It's also IMO distancing from nature to regard people who live close to nature as inferior beings and being ashamed of nakedness and attraction. This "man became more advanced" is BS IMO, it's a racistical way of looking down on the few remaining savages. It's also funny how people of today, and the 19th century, seemed to look down on savages. People feared savages to be, you guessed it - savage and brutal. There have been various documentaries of "advanced" humans visiting savages and have been shaking with fear, then most of the time the savages are the most loving and caring beings they have ever seen. People try to use it as an excuse for maltreating and abusing savages to call them primitive, and when they come with revenge after having realized the hidden agendas of white man and answer to white man's backstabbing by coming to kill white man with the same backstabbing and sudden aggression, white man calls them brutal. Man did not distance herself from nature for becoming more advanced, but because it was a development where tribes who embraced civilization and weapons technology could kill others and claim useful geographical parts of nature as theirs and kill all others. When the first wars thus begun, others had to either embrace the same nonsense called civilization or die. Today civilization has reached a point where there has been a counter-reaction to the fear of nature, and some sort of enlightenment has been reached again. But civilization in itself has been a cruel and horrible thing since it's foundation and perhaps for as long as up to at least the 18th century, in my opinion. Because my opinion is that mass murder, war, genocide, weapons of mass destruction, terrorism, human sacrifice, massive rape, prostitution, power struggle, money struggle, backstabbing, herd mentality in nazism, heretics hunting, witch hunting and many other things are a lot more primitive - not more advanced - than the minds of those who are called savages. There is natural life-style and enlightened civilization on one hand, and civilization on the other hand. Civilization alone is a horrible thing, while natural life-style or enlightened civilization are good things.Quote:
Originally Posted by Wigferth Ironwall
Finally history does NOT begin from the first written sources. History begins from the first human beings. For the earliest periods pre written language, archaeology is the main tool. After written language, written stuff alongside archaeological stuff becomes an important tool. But the aim of all historical research is to find out about the history since the first homo sapiens appeared.
History isn't just limited to times when humans were here.Quote:
Originally Posted by Encarta Dictionary
Also, you assume that it's just us humans wanting to perch down and grow agricultural crops when there was first civilisation. Wrong. Take a look at geography: it was the beginning of a warm period, the end of an ice age, which triggered civilisation.
Well, matter can be created, as you can see in beta decay, for example. Energy can become matter. Also, there is proof that the universe is expanding. Do you think that the universe just stayed put, and then suddenly starts to expand for no reason whatsoever?
The fact that the universe is expanding (which can be inferred from observation of the Red Shift) means that it was once very much smaller. The existence of the 3 degree K cosmic background radiation implies that the energy density of the very early universe was enormous. In fact, it is consistent with the early universe being so dense that the basic assumptions of physics (spatial isotropy, homogeneity, etc.) can't be applied and any space-time associated with it cannot be described.Quote:
Originally Posted by LegioXXXUlpiaVictrix
Everything which happened after the first few milliseconds of expansion of the early universe is entirely different from what obtained before and can fairly be considered the evolution of a new universe.
Here's a summary of the observational successes of the Big Bang Theory.
Well I will give my baised based event
The American War of Independence which was based upon the enlightenment philisophy which happened because of the development of the Printing Press which happened because the Roman Empire fell.
Occam's razor - there's a very simple explanation of all observations by using simple school knowledge of particle physics and chemistry. The random momvements used as a model for gases in a confined space explains it all - very rarely there'll be times when statistically many particles will be in one place, and they then crash together. If there are sufficiently many of them the reaction can be quite fierce, with fissions, fusions, enormous heat etc. In a not confined space it's also likely that situations occur where extreme amounts of matter statically happen to be in the same spot and cause such an explosion. In both cases, whether the universe is infinite or not, a big bang that can explain the expanding universe we see makes perfect sense. In the former case, many big bangs are likely to occur in time, in the second case the chances of big bangs decreases as time passes.Quote:
Originally Posted by Tiberius
And the cosmic background radiation is also explained by this very simple theory I just presented. The formation of galaxies etc. is also explained by the theory. Statistically, at certain points after the explosion there would be collissions between elements that were part of the big bang, and elements around. When an appropriate temperature and compression is created, and a larger body is formed, it attracts smaller particles around it. Different temperature and compression level patterns create different structures. Rotations also matter, for instance a galaxy like our own was most likely created by a form of rotational movement involved in the compression and temperature pattern.
Finally, the big bang theorists say "the universe expands", but that's based on observations today. There's nothing that says the expansion is just due to built-up momentum caused by the big bang (as you can see I agree that there was a big explosion but in my model it's importance isn't overrated), and that gravity will eventually slow down and reverse the effect, causing one or more new big bangs. We can't know if what we can see of the universe is just a small subset of the universe or if we're seeing almost everything. In a bigger perspective we might just be seeing a local expansion. If the universe is bounded similar to a gas in a confined space, there'll certainly be new big bangs. If universe is unbounded in space, it's possible that gravity will still compress stuff again and cause a big bang.
The moment our telescopes can see so many light years as the number of years since big bang, then we will have arguments to throw away certain theories and confirm others. In the meantime, I rely on Occam's razor and use the simplest explanation. Or until someone counterproves my simpler model.
Umm... no. You are describing part of the classic controversy between the concave, convex and flat descriptions the geometry of space-time. The idea that gravity will eventually slow down the expansion of the universe until it contracts into a reverse Big Bang is called the convex geometry model, or the closed or positive curvature model. On the other hand, if the universe expansion slows and then stops but does not then collapse, this is the flat geometry or open model. A third possibility postulated after Hubble was a concave, or open model which had the universe expanding forever, or the heat death model. This modeling of the universe expansion, after the Hubble Law, was considered the big problem in cosmological physics for 80 some years. The actual problem turns out to be something quite different, which I'll get to presently.Quote:
Originally Posted by LegioXXXUlpiaVictrix
Einstein added what he called the cosmological constant to his equations because the equations were predicting an expanding universe. He felt this was in error and so created the cosmological constant to fudge a static universe. At the time, the universe was thought to be static, as in unchanging, not expanding, or flat. Hubble's discovery of the red shift around 1929 or so, also known as Hubble's Law, showed that the universe was, in fact, expanding. This led to the Big Bang theory. Einstein decided he'd made a mistake in adding the cosmological constant and called it his greatest error. This appears to be where your knowledge of modern cosmology stops.
One of the most important details to Hubble's Law was that the expansion is uniform. The matter in the universe isn't expanding. Space is expanding with the matter carried along. This is a difficult concept for many to grasp. The matter in the universe didn't fly apart in the Big Bang, speading out into the universe. The universe itself flew apart in the Big Bang and continues to do so. The universe is expanding uniformly at all points away from all points. There is no edge to the universe. Another difficult concept to grasp. This was the standard view in cosmology; but it still left open the argument about convex, concave and flat curvatures.
But it gets worse. New data, within the last 6-7 years and being confirmed almost daily as our ability to observe improves, shows that the expansion of the universe, while uniform, is not constant in rate of expansion (as would be predicted in an open, concave model) or slowing down (as would be predicted by a closed, convex model or an open, flat model). The universe is expanding at an increasing rate. In other words the expansion if getting faster and faster, but is still uniform. And not only is the rate of expansion increasing; but the distribution of matter in the universe doesn't match the mathematical predictions of a uniform expansion of matter affected by gravity. There are clumps. There is missing mass, the so-called dark matter. Something is causing the universe to expand ever faster, the so-called dark energy.
The idea that the Big Bang was just one in a never ending series of expansions and contractions has been disproven by observation.
Initially, as the universe expanded, gravity acted to slow down the expansion. But... a point was reached, somewhere at about half the current age of the universe, at which something now called "dark energy" was able to exert more effect than gravity. It can almost be thought of as a repellant force. The result was that the force of the dark energy exceeded the force of gravity and the expansion of the universe began to speed up. It is still speeding up. The universe is flying apart at an ever increasing rate, exactly opposite of gravity pulling the universe back together as you stated. This dark energy, or more precisely the force which the postulated dark energy describes, was predicted by Einstein as his cosmological constant. In effect, his greatest mistake is beginning to look more and more like it was bang on.
You're about a decade or more behind in your cosmological theory, Legio. The study of Cepheid variables, the Sloan Digital Star Survey and more are all relatively recent and contradict your assumptions which seem based on decades-old theories. You're in serious need of some hard studying. Increased rate of universe expansion, dark matter, dark energy, partial dimensions, neutrinos with mass, accelerons, string theory, super string theory and more have overtaken the 70-some odd year old theory of an expanding universe affected mostly be gravity, whether convex, concave or flat. :wink:
Argh, Aenlic, you're bringing back memories of my talk from 3 weeks ago! I didn't understand half of what I said, but oh well.
Legio: What good will a telescope do? What we see now is mostly nearby stars or incredibly bright objects, such as Quasars and Blue Supergiants. When the big bang occurred, there weren't actually any objects emitting light, as far as I know. Even if there were, it would be so far away and so little light that we would not be able to see it.
Also, another simple little problem that faces your idea of pretty much the 50s-60s steady state mindset many scientists had: if the universe is an infinite constant unchanging beast, then why is the night dark? Surely if it is infinitely old, there has been enough time for light to travel infinitely far, so therefore the night sky should be as bright as the day?
Sorry, the technical definition of history is what is written down. If there are no written records it is pre-history. That is why we talk about pre-historic man, as well as the Stone, Bronze and Iron Ages, which are all pre-historic.Quote:
Originally Posted by Tiberius
Don't argue with me on this, its what I do. Its especially important here as there are no "events" before writing, only theories and constructs.
History is an Ionian Greek word and means research, inquiry but it is intrinsicially linked to writing, in the sense that you wrote it down.
"The Past" begins with humanity but "History" begins with writing.
Firstly, yes Europeans have mistreated less developed peoples and I'm sorry but no matter how nice they are they are still less developed. I notice you still call them savages, by the way.Quote:
I consider sacrificing humans to imaginary gods to get nature's support and liking a form of fearing nature. It's also IMO distancing from nature to regard people who live close to nature as inferior beings and being ashamed of nakedness and attraction. This "man became more advanced" is BS IMO, it's a racistical way of looking down on the few remaining savages. It's also funny how people of today, and the 19th century, seemed to look down on savages. People feared savages to be, you guessed it - savage and brutal. There have been various documentaries of "advanced" humans visiting savages and have been shaking with fear, then most of the time the savages are the most loving and caring beings they have ever seen. People try to use it as an excuse for maltreating and abusing savages to call them primitive, and when they come with revenge after having realized the hidden agendas of white man and answer to white man's backstabbing by coming to kill white man with the same backstabbing and sudden aggression, white man calls them brutal.
The Western mindset is a result of fierce competion for resources and it extends to North Africa, Arabia and Asia in a culturally different, yet fundamentally the same, way. The competion is a result of a population explosion, which in turn resulted from farming cerials.
The reason "primatives" did not develope in the same way is that they either didn't have cerials or they didn't have the environment to grow them prolifically. Once you get the population explosion your society has to develope to cope. The tribe gets bigger and it has to split and then eventually there isn't enough room and the different tribes start fighting over resources.
Meanwhile there are extra people with leisure time and they devote that to making new things, improving the things they have and composing poetry, painting etc.
Eventually one tribe comes out on top because they have found the best way to fight but the other tribes still have chiefs, so you need a chief-of-chiefs, a "king." Now this "king" needs to control all the tribes, so he has someone to control the people, this person makes up rules, and makes marks to record whats going on. Law and writing.
There you go, one civilisation, in the most basic way possible and hugely simplified but the pattern is repeated everywhere there is a population explosion.
As to sacrifice, Aztecs and Africans were doing it long after the European had done away with it.
Basically the savage is noble because he has to get along in his comunity, and why not, cracking heads isn't going to do him any good. If the position was reversed your beloved savages would have laid waste to Europe.
The distancing from nature is the result of developement, not the other way around. Or are you suggesting civilisation was just delivered, pre-packaged, by aliens, because thats what it sounds like.Quote:
Man did not distance herself from nature for becoming more advanced, but because it was a development where tribes who embraced civilization and weapons technology could kill others and claim useful geographical parts of nature as theirs and kill all others. When the first wars thus begun, others had to either embrace the same nonsense called civilization or die. Today civilization has reached a point where there has been a counter-reaction to the fear of nature, and some sort of enlightenment has been reached again. But civilization in itself has been a cruel and horrible thing since it's foundation and perhaps for as long as up to at least the 18th century, in my opinion. Because my opinion is that mass murder, war, genocide, weapons of mass destruction, terrorism, human sacrifice, massive rape, prostitution, power struggle, money struggle, backstabbing, herd mentality in nazism, heretics hunting, witch hunting and many other things are a lot more primitive - not more advanced - than the minds of those who are called savages. There is natural life-style and enlightened civilization on one hand, and civilization on the other hand. Civilization alone is a horrible thing, while natural life-style or enlightened civilization are good things.
I would not say the last thousand years have been great but you are mainly talking about urban culture, which was not, until 150 years ago, the norm. I would also point out that primative cultures, Saxons, Vikings, Gauls etc, were just as bloody as the more civilised peoples in more modern times.
First of all, the increased rate of expansion is pretty well explained by my own theory. It's basically that new tight collections on matter might be formed beyond the edge of what we see, causing a similar gathering of matter as the big bang again, but too far away for us to be able to see it. Secondly, it's difficult to measure expansion of the universe over the few centuries we've had access to measurement techniques, in fact it's doubtful whether we have been able to measure accurately since more than 20 years back. So there's very little material to see if the expansion is accelerating or not, and to see if it's expanding uniformly etc. Also - if it's expanding uniformly, does it do so in a spherical manner or some other shape? What exactly is meant by this "uniform" expansion? Furthermore, if universe has no edge and is expanding and there's nothing outside, then we'd probably be able to observe something strange when our telescopes could see as far as the outer parts of this expanding universe where light from big bang is supposed to be possible to see. So my theory explains all observations as far as I can see.Quote:
Originally Posted by Aenlic
That's where the basic fallacy lies - saxons, vikings, gauls etc. had civilizations, and in those civilizations they did these brutal things. All who sacrificed humans had civilizations. Enlightened civilizations (almost the same concept as those you call more advanced civilizations, but with the addition that not only a few inventors but also the masses and leaders must have good knowledge too) are mostly less cruel than not enlightened civilizations. Those who have achieved civilization but without reaching enlightenment are often (but not always, depending on which technology and ideology they have aquired in their partial aquiring of enlightened civilizations) the most horrible. Being scared that the sun would stop shining, they sacrifice a few humans, keep huge harems of sex slaves, and so on. What I've repeatedly said is that enlightened civilization is a positive thing, but believing that civilization alone will bring good life is a major fallacy. Without enlightenment, civilization is the most horrible thing ever to exist. I can't find many points where life for anyone but the kings in non-enlightened civilizations would have been better than life in a natural setting, for instance. I won't respond to the rest of your post since it just repeats my own opinion. Oh and the definition of "history" probably differs between languages. I take your word for it's meaning in English but it's not the meaning in other languages so I apologize for the misunderstanding.Quote:
Originally Posted by Wigferth Ironwall
A visual paradox or an edge would appear if we could see to the end of the universe, if the big bang theory is true. So if we can see that far we could get pretty good arguments for or against the theory. Also if time and space doesn't exist outside the edges, could you explain if this changeover from time and space existing to not existing would be firm or gradual, and if gradual, how would it look? Also if light or matter hit the edge, would it just disappear out to nowhere or would it bounce on the edge? If things are less existent the closer to the edge they come, then how do you define existence? The big bang theory starts using so complex abstract models that eventually it starts using concepts it hasn't clearly and scientifically defined, and unclearly defined concepts can't be measured, proved, or counter-proved. Thus the big bang theory is in danger of becoming just another religious creationist story rather than science.Quote:
Originally Posted by Tiberius
Light strength decreases by a factor of the cube of the distance from the light source. Furthermore, light can be absorbed by matter. If it's infinitely large, light will either move away from us or have passed us and will eventually disappear infinitely far away from ourselves.Quote:
Also, another simple little problem that faces your idea of pretty much the 50s-60s steady state mindset many scientists had: if the universe is an infinite constant unchanging beast, then why is the night dark? Surely if it is infinitely old, there has been enough time for light to travel infinitely far, so therefore the night sky should be as bright as the day?
To see the edge is impossible, because light travels slower than the universe expands.
You're also assuming that the universe is 3d.
The invention of money! The root of all evil. Promoted private property, trade, capitalism ...
To begin with, my definition is the definition of History as used by Historians, Classicists and Archaeologists worldwide. The mundane definition is what you said but its not the technical definition, which is why we have history and pre-history. Pre-history begins with Homo Sapiens SapiensQuote:
Originally Posted by LegioXXXUlpiaVictrix
I really don't see where you're looking to for this "enlightenment" my point was that the Saxons, and Gauls, the Picts and the early Scoti were all very close to the land, they weren't afraid of nature, yet they were just as bloody as the Romans or the later Europeans.
Modern primatives practice canabalism and ritual murder and they are very close to the land. Primative peoples are poor, they don't have anything to lose so they don't need to be mean. Your still attached to the idea that civilisation in itself is bad, what you're missing is that it is people that are inherently bad and the more civilisation there is the greater the outlets for cruelty.
What you miss completely are the positives of the civilised people, art, law, the warrior's codes, the men throughout generations who have stood shoulder to shoulder to defend their people.
We are apparently using different definitions. My definition of civilization is distancing yourself from nature and accepting any form of religion or culture at all (which makes several other animals, especially some monkeys, being by definition on the borderline of having civilizations). The distancing from nature, whether small or large, is not a good thing unless it's an enlightened way of distancing yourself from nature, where the distancing from nature isn't the goal, but increased knowledge, convenience, and better survival is the goal, with distancing from nature being a side effect. If you don't see how distancing yourself from nature confuses your behavior and instincts and can compensate for it, the distancing from nature can lead you to commit any action - cannibalism, human sacrifice, genocide, war. The savages live close to nature, but they still live in what must be called a civilization. Human sacrifice rituals belong in civilization, not in nature. However, law, art and science belong in enlightened civilization. Interestingly enough however, much of what science discovers in enlightened civilization are things that are instinctively known in a completely natural setting, for instance everything Freud discovered. In nature the psyche isn't confused and triggered in uncontrolled ways, in enlightened civilization whatever strange triggers distancing from nature causes is compensated by insight. What is usually called "the positive things of civilization" are in reality things that are connected with enlightenment, not with the civilization concept alone. That civilization and science occur at the same time is a correlation, not a causality. The causality behind science and wisdom is enlightenment, not civilization. Civilization itself can bring just as much horrid thoughts and suffering as enlightened civilization can bring enlightenment and peace. Comparing civilization alone with both enlightened civilization and life in a completely natural setting shows that non-enlightened civilization is the by far most horrible alternative of the three.Quote:
Originally Posted by Wigferth Ironwall
And finally your definition used by most Historians worldwide is the definition of the English word history worldwide. The word history has another meaning in some other languages, but the English word history has the same meaning worldwide.
If the expansion was faster than the light speed, then you've just found counter-proof to the theory of relativity, congratulations. Also, there seems to be plenty of mix-ups between usage of a form of reference space coordinate system which doesn't move, and a moving coordinate system.Quote:
Originally Posted by Tiberius
Finally, the ideas of many dimensions are a bit strange considering that the word dimension has never been formally defined as something else than something that follows the same mathematical properties as 2 and 3 dimensions when using matrix calculations and similar. Apart from being mathematically correct according to observations made in the latest 20 years, the theoretical and qualitative big bang model doesn't follow the principle of Occam's razor in the way it's presented, and it could also use relativity - since there isn't any definition of a reference space coordinate system, any statements of an expansion is nonsense, because there's no definition of what that expansion means. Similarly if you use a space coordinate system based on particle distances, expansion would be a paradox unless extreme amounts of matter and energy would be created out of nothing at the edges. Mathematical theories are not explanations, they are tools, that can't be verified until much time has passed and a more comprehensible explanation has been made. Nobody is arguing that imaginary numbers exist, but they work well for calculations. However in none of the fields where imaginary numbers are used do people say that the model is the formula of complex numbers, but a more qualitative explanation and how it is transformed into a system of complex numbers. Would you if someone found a good formula with imaginary numbers for calculating the speed of a car based on a few observations say that that formula would be trustworthy? No, not until it got an explanation transformed into comprehensible things and tried the formula in extreme situations too. For instance a good example of this fallacy was when Black body radiation was measured. Beyond a certain level, there's a drop that wasn't predicatable using old formulas, which made scientists switch to another mathematical model. The new mathematical model follows the measured values exactly at all points, but nobody has a deeper understanding of it and it's difficult to predict if it would still hold at 10000000 degrees centigrade, just like the formerly not explanable drop wasn't discovered when the earliest formulae were formulated. Just like air resistance wasn't taken into account for movement formulae until more extreme usages begun. What made these movement formulae better than the big bang theory is that at least there were logical explanation for the measurement errors when speeds started to increase. The models were also intended for slow speeds, and thus not much of a problem. But the big bang theory is absurd in that it tries to explain and predict over billions and trillions of years, while the measurements used for it have been made over only some 20 years, and there's no explanation model that makes sense, just mathematical models without explaining how it transforms into observable phenomenons.
It philosophically makes sense that theories of cosmic stuff would be difficult to comprehend or even incomprehensible, because our brains were made by evolution to make as accurate as possible logical conclusions about the scenarios we might have encountered in our pre-civilization setting, so that any understanding of anything more than those things are just a lucky bonus that happened to come with the intended reasoning abilities - our brains basically aren't made to understand the universe so if we do it's just a bonus. But on the other hand there's nothing that says we can't explain the universe and that the universe would happen to be comprehensible. Also note that to fully explain the universe every particle would have to be known exactly, so all more general statements are approximations. The only model big bang can be is a mathematical model, but it doesn't make sense and isn't very useful when it attempts to express it's mathematical formulae in words without any deeper explanation and understanding behind those statements. Part of this attempt of a literal rather than mathematical version of the big bang theory is flawed by the idea that universe was created and hasn't always existed, or was created but not at the latest bang - an assumption which isn't supported by any argumentation.
This all goes back to your misconception about the Big Bang. Matter and energy didn't pop out into the universe with the Big Bang, as it's clear you seem to see it. The universe didn't exist until the Big Bang. The Big Bang was the universe coming into existence, not matter and energy appearing into the universe. You just don't seem t grasp this very basic difference,Legio.
We are a part of the universe. We can't observe from beyond it or to beyond it. We can no more see beyond our universe than a hypothetical denizen of a two-dimensional flat world could see us. We might be able to see effects from something interacting with our universe, as a 2 dimensional entity would see a 3 dimensional sphere passing through its universe as a point and then a circle increasing in size and then shrinking back to a point and disappearing. The question is, how would a 2 dimensional being know it was witnessing the passing of a 3rd dimensional sphere and not just an odd growing and shrinking circle? How would we recognize an effect from outside our universe as being from outside our universe?
Your point about 20 years of observations is forgetting one very important fact. Light has limited velocity. We can study the universe at different times by studying objects of different distances away from us. Do you just not see the implications of this? That is what is so important about the study of objects like the Cepheid variables and the SDSS and supernovae.
Finally, the mathematical models make sense to people capable of understanding them. And with that, I'm done discussing whether or not the world is round with someone who is convinced that the earth is flat because faulty logic suggests that we'd fall off the other side.
The problem is there's no argument for saying that matter and time and dimensions and the universe didn't exist before the big bang. Until there's any argumentation at all supporting that, I'd call it a prejudice coming into science as a remnant of our old religious creation theories, where it's stated that the universe was created.Quote:
Originally Posted by Aenlic
Also, if you measure different objects, you can't find out whether they're accelerating, can you?
Finally mathematical models are useless without a theoretical explanation to verify them with qualitative experiments too. You can easily create a formula following observed values, but that formula isn't necessarily true. Take anything in your vicinity and plot a graph, then interpolate between the points, then look for a mathematical formula that follows the resulting graph as closely as possible. Sometimes you're lucky and it follows the graph, but you have no idea of causalities and don't know under which circumstances the formula is true.
I'd say the big bang theory is the "flat earth" theory in this discussion, or a bit of The emperor's new clothes with nobody questioning the initial unsupported assumption that the entire theory is built on, and everyone being afraid of questioning it because if they do they show "they don't understand it" just like the swindlers said that those who didn't see the emperor's clothes were stupid. Again, give me proof that the universe didn't exist before the big bang. Give me proof that matter, energy, dimensions and everything else didn't exist before the big bang. I've never seen anyone give any argument whatsoever for this. Naturally, it's then difficult to accept the theory.
OK, I regret I ever mentioned the Big Bang.
I have a new candidate:
May 1, 2005
The Bartix thread is launched.
Please explain then why the universe has so much hydrogen.Quote:
Originally Posted by LegioXXXUlpiaVictrix
If the universe existed forever, which was a long standing theory approved of by the Church... in fact Mr G got in trouble for pointing out a new pin prick of light in the unchanging crystal spheres when he observed a supernova... then we would expect most of the elements to be in the stable valley near Iron.
I would vote for the following:
1. Discovery of fire by man, by which mans' lot was improved with warmth, nocturnal illumination, and better tasting food.
2. Domestication of the horse, without which man would never have traveled so far, and conqured so much, or pulled his plow so well. The debt we owe to the species Equis is immeasurable.
3. The invention of the calendar, and other time measuring devices, without which exact navigation would be very difficult at best. This would include the chronometer which allowed the calculation of longitude at sea.
4. Invention of the steam engine, which revolutionised travel, and began to put the horse out of work.
5. The invention of powered flight, which made the world so very much smaller today, and allowed for the delivery of the Atom bomb.
6. The invention of Atomic energy, which made the act of war so much more deadly than it had ever been.
PS: On the spiritual side, I would have to say the Resurrection of Jesus Christ, which for all who believe in it, there is hope that life has some meaning beyond this mortal life. I welcome all to ponder this, and mean no offense to any who may disagree.
Rotor
I would have mentioned it if you hadn't, Atilius.
Legio: look at it this way. Your idea of the steady state has been disproven a lot of times. To date, there is no evidence to disprove the Big Bang theory.
Why would everything be iron if dimensions and matter existed always? It takes extraordinary temperatures and similar to change atoms into other elements, mostly molecular compositions change at this time. Also all parts of a system doesn't need to be stable for a system to be stable, just think of equilibrium systems.Quote:
Originally Posted by Papewaio
When the dimensions were created according to this big bang theory, did they just pop up one at the time?
Another thing about a something originating from a nothing is that it contradicts the entire cause and effect principles of science. A completely internally steady object can't go through a change unless outer forces are used. So either the system has to have constant internal change, or an outer stimuli to change. Compare it to anything in nature: a human mind can only change if it goes through internal change (meditation or reasoning etc.) or through an outer stimuli. A box containing explosives can explode if it's fuse is lit. At some point the fuse goes inside the box, and the system may seem unchanging, but in fact there's internal change in the fuse that burns closer to the explosives. If A causes A, the resulting A can only cause A unless outer stimuli are added. But if A causes B, B can cause something else than A and B. B might be almost similar to A, but because it's different, it has an internal change that could give rise to a change in the next step of the chain without outer stimuli. Very few states that to the human mind seem steady in nature are steady - an equilibrium reaction in chemistry is a constant reaction of A becoming B at the same rate B becomes A, for example.
So explain to me why big bang shouldn't follow causality principles. And also consider that the big bang more than my theory suggests there must be a God or other outer force - why else would thing completely internally stable nothing you are suggesting suddenly turn into a dynamic something without any reason? Explain the reason why nothing at all suddenly turns into a big explosion and creates the universe
To me it rather seems like the big bang theory is suggesting a steady nothing state before the bang. As far as I can understand my own theory it doesn't suggest any steady state at all, rather a highly dynamic state. However the big bang theory as I said suggests a steady nothing state suddenly turning into a dynamic something state, a strange breaking of the causality principle. Perhaps the causality principle isn't universally true, but it would seem very strange to suddenly abandon the principle without any better motivation.Quote:
Originally Posted by Tiberius
Fusion and Fission... if stars existed forever then the Hydrogen would have been burnt up by now by fusion. Above iron most of the isotopes are unstable and decay towards iron. So if the universe existed for any long length of time, even if everything started out as hydrogen then it would all end up around iron eventually...kind of a cosmic age wrinkle... the more iron stable valley isotopes the older the universe is.Quote:
Originally Posted by LegioXXXUlpiaVictrix
That and the ratio of protons to neutrons is handled quite elegantly by having a time for the universe to cool off from its inception... the time determines how many decay to something else and hence the ratio of these two particles.
I think coalesced might be a more accurate discription.Quote:
Originally Posted by LegioXXXUlpiaVictrix
All the rules of a universe are decided on its inception... including space time and hence causality.Quote:
Originally Posted by LegioXXXUlpiaVictrix
If noone has mentioned this before :
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showp...9&postcount=68
Remember the heat and plasma like conditions of the big bang - many new elements were formed in the extremely heat soup of particles. Also remember that if everything became iron, this iron would float around in space according to my theory and eventually reach a new big bang state, creating a new plasma particle soup which could recreate lighter elements. That not everything is iron indicates that there must have been a bang recently, but it doesn't necessarily mean that nothing existed previously to the big bang.Quote:
Originally Posted by Papewaio
This is very similar to the circular proofs of God used in the Medieval period. You're basically saying: Before Big bang there was nothing, thus, everything that is after big bang was created by big bang. Because everything was created by the big bang, therefore, there was nothing before big bang. You're saying:Quote:
Originally Posted by Papewaio
(A=>B ^ B=>A) => (A ^ B)
which is a logical fallacy
Actually what I'm saying is not that there was nothing, that a big bang is like a complete reset to the system, zero information transfer and the rules of the game all change.
That's basically what I'm saying too - that there was a big bang, but not that room-time and matter-energy wouldn't have existed before it.Quote:
Originally Posted by Papewaio
double post.
There's your preoblem, you make distancing from nature a concious decision, it isn't. It is a very natural side-effect of any social developement. The only way to be completely in touch with nature would be to cut your self off from all other human beings and become an animal. A carniverous animal such as man would eat anything it could kill that crossed it's path and attack anything that entered its terretory. If you want to be an unthinking brute then go and live in the rain forest, on your own, with nothing. You'll very soon go mad because of lack of social interaction and your psyche will crack.Quote:
Originally Posted by LegioXXXUlpiaVictrix
Not even wolves live that low. By your definition they have a society and distance themselves from nature.
Wrong, its the technical definition of a concept recognised world wide which in English is exspessed in the word history. English is the language we are using therefore the word history is the English word.Quote:
Originally Posted by LegioXXXUlpiaVictrix
Yes it could mean other things in other languages but you are confusing the mundane English with the technical English. I'm not going to argue this as I know I am right, since I am an Archaeologist and Classacist and it is the technical definition used be all the doctors and professors I know, no matter their nationality.
This is not how you debate something. Considering this thread has slowly snowballed its way down hill, and is no longer about the impact of events; but whether theories are correct...Quote:
Originally Posted by Wigferth Ironwall
:dancinglock:
I decree so long as this lock dances, this thread shall remained closed!