Thanks John, now I don't feel so bad. <Grin>
For what it's worth, my plain-English translations of the terms
you mention:
_mass_ = the intrinsic [its own] resistance to being pushed of
something that isn't otherwise stuck down;
_energy_ = motion, particularly as measured and accounted for in
scientific terms, ie energy is to science and engineering what
money is to economics and housekeeping;
_space-time_ = where and when everything is and happens;
_matter_ = anything that can fall to bits or otherwise
disintegrate and become dirt.
NB: I have no problem with the word 'belief'. I think we only
get into real problems if we don't acknowledge what is opinion
and belief. Ultimately belief is all for us who claim to be
aware that we exist. 'Knowledge' is just tested beliefs that
have so far proved to be the most effective and efficient
descriptions of our world. I happen to *believe* that our
experience, to the extent that we are aware of it and at least
part of the time feel sufficiently confident to call
consciousness, is constructed by and within our own brains -
with help from our friends and relations of course. A little
thought shows that, if what I am assuming is true, then by
definition all we ever have is belief and science is just the
most effective method of deriving ['constructing'] the best
descriptions for dealing with practical problems and challenges.
In particular scientific method is good where the objects of
observation and manipulation do not learn from their
experiences, unless it is only mechanisms and parts of the
learning process that are being studied.
Scientific method can assist with other methods in dealing with
people and their/our problems but memory, self-reference, and
reflection mean that we are changed by what we do and thus are
not all interchangeable like atoms and molecules are [etc].
Regards
Mark Peaty CDES
mpeaty.domain.name.hidden
http://www.arach.net.au/~mpeaty/
John Mikes wrote:
> Mark,
> let me play with your postulate (plain English) vs your text YOU wrote.
> To be translated into plain language: Mass, energy, space-time, even
> 'matter'. (The last one SOUNDS like plain English, yet not in the
> context we use it.)
> Don't take it too hard. We are used to this lingo, after the 1000th
> level of applying its consequences all assumptions sound real. We THINK
> we understand them. (Did not write: believe, because Russell does not
> take it kindly if I hint to 'religious science' beliefs.)
>
> I like your idea to call the pre-inflational 'seed' of our universe a
> very concentrated (massive?) central(?) point. I faced the problem in my
> narrative-writing to eliminate the dreamed-up 'inflation' (dreamed up -
> just to have a better fit of the equations applied by the physical(ist)
> cosmology-narrative) and ended up with the pop-up 'seed' of some
> complexity (postulated in the spaceless-timeless plenitude of everything
> - for logical reasons I do not go into now) and got assigned to form
> THIS universe - a system WITH the ordinates "space and time" (whatever
> they are). Now the transition from a spaceless construct into a 'spaced'
> one means the emergence of (a huge) space from a zero one (= no space at
> all), which could be mistaken by the cosmo- physicists as inflation.
> Glory saved.
> Time ditto, when the originating concepts formed from a timeless into a
> timed system, the forming occurrences happened in that VERY first
> instant (introducing TIME into the timelessness), explaining the
> "calculated?" times of the first BB-steps as "in the 1st - 1^-42th sec,
> or 1^-32th sec froze out this or that". Weird.
> Then came the inflation (space).
>
> All nicely calculated in the quantitative correlations deduced from our
> observations in the 'expanded' (i.e. unconcentrated) physical system's
> rules. And - propagated linearly (reversing as was linearly retrogaded)
> in the nonlinear development we live in.
>
> I don't think Brent and you are talking from the same platform. Nor do
> I. I don't know how 'densly matter-energy was packed in the early
> Universe' (it was before my time) - I don't have to assign different
> characteristics to some 'early' universe, if I accept that our ideas of
> the material world are fictive. (Some say: consciousness before matter
> and NO primitive material world).
>
> The best
>
> John M
>
>
>
> On 3/24/07, *Mark Peaty* <mpeaty.domain.name.hidden
> <mailto:mpeaty.domain.name.hidden>> wrote:
>
>
> No. I don't know of any cosmogony that postulates a massive
> central point. They generally assume zero mass-energy.
>
> Well, OK, put that into plain-English. I think that in doing so
> you have to explain why the e= m.c^2 mass-energy 'equivalence' is
> not a problem. You can 'assume zero mass-energy' to start with,
> but straight after that you did have mass and energy to spare.
> Furthermore I understand that it has been all of space-time that
> has been expanding from the 'beginning' and carrying 'matter'
> with and within it and indeed I think it is more correct to see
> matter as no more and no less than regions of concentrated,
> convoluted and self-referencing space-time. This still leaves me
> with the idea that our universe, at least prior to its
> 'inflation', WAS indescribably concentrated, and in some way
> very dense, even if we are not allowed to call this mass/energy.
> What was it?
>
> My understanding now of the Hubble red-shift is that the overall
> expansion of space-time, through which the ancient energy
> signals have been passing, is what has stretched the wave
> lengths to the extent that has been calculated. A corollary of
> this is that energy and matter were much more densely packed in
> the early universe.
>
> Regards
>
> Mark Peaty CDES
>
> mpeaty.domain.name.hidden <mailto:mpeaty.domain.name.hidden.net.au>
>
> http://www.arach.net.au/~mpeaty/
>
>
>
> >
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Received on Sun Mar 25 2007 - 06:49:21 PDT