Semantically this doesn't contradict the possibility of OMVs, but doesn't logically prove anything either. So Premise 2 remains unproven. As long as it's unproven, Craig cannot claim his conclusion proven, even if you both know in your minds that it's true. Even if you're right in your knowledge that god is real, you have to admit that this particular formulation of the argument fails to prove it.

The argument does not just rest upon the fact that there are UMVs, although their existence is actually positive evidence for OMVs. The reason being, UMVs are exactly what you should expect to find if OMVs do exist. You're acting like OMVs are removed from human experience, and that is not true; although they are objectively determined (by God), they are subjectively experienced. They would be in fact ingrained into human beings. Which leads to the other part of the argument, which is that we all have an innate sense of right and wrong. I apprehend an objective moral realm which imposes itself upon my moral choices. It tells me that some things are absolutely wrong, and this sense precedes my opinions. So the reason why there are UMVs is because of this innate sense of right and wrong that everyone has, which aren't determined by mere opinion. This is sufficient evidence in my opinion to establish that UMVs are OMVs, in which case premise 2 stands.

You've misread my statements. I first said that disproven beliefs/theories are not on par with unproven beliefs/theories. Demonstrating that my theories aren't proven (or even provable) doesn't make them equal with beliefs that cannot be rationally held. Then I said that many believers annoyingly think it's a victory to point out that my beliefs aren't provable in response to my doing the same to theirs, when I had never made any claim that mine were absolutely true, but they had.

This isn't a relevant issue in this discussion. I have good reasons for what I believe, which I can sufficiently demonstrate. Remember, I used to hold the same beliefs you do, or near to them, about origins and so forth. And when I became a Christian, I was willing to integrate them into my faith. I was convinced to change my mind based on the shockingly weak evidence they are founded on, not because of a leap of faith.

And by "evidence", I'm going to infer from the context that you mean "proof". Scientific theories are not proven, and most are unprovable, but there's mountains of objective evidence that "suggests" scientific theories are true, but none whatsoever to suggest any single religious belief is true. Sometimes the theories change too as their early incarnations are proven incorrect or incomplete, as Einstein did to Newton, and as the folks at CERN may be doing to Einstein right now. That's the way of science, and it's the strength of science, not the weakenss. What I'm not comfortable with is religious beliefs/theories that are internally unchallengeable due to a part of the theory itself -- it's own infallibility. Imagine if science was based on the premise that by definition none of it's theories are false. Laughable, right? That's what I think of religion.

There is plenty of evidence which suggests that God created the universe. Before the big bang theory, scientists believed in the steady state theory which postulated a static and eternal universe. Because it was accepted as fact, they would use it to scoff and ridicule anyone who dared to suggest the Universe had a beginning. Yet, they were all wrong and the creationists were right. If they had listened to them, they would have made the discovery much earlier. Robert Wilson, one of people who discovered the CMBR that confirmed the theory, said this:

"Certainly there was something that set it all off. Certainly, if you are religious, I can’t think of a better theory of the origin of the universe to match with Genesis"

This isn't science evidence and creation evidence. It's all the same evidence. The difference is that we are interpreting it differently, and that is through the lens of our respective worldviews.

You also miss out on the fact that the ultimate goal of science is to discover a theory of everything. It is seeking towards that very notion of infallibility that you are scoffing at. That Christians already claim to have it is no mark against Christianity; it would only actually be evidence of the superiority of its truth, or not. Consider this quote by Robert Jastrow, a noted Astronomer:

"Now we see how the astronomical evidence supports the biblical view of the origin of the world....the essential elements in the astronomical and biblical accounts of Genesis are the same. Consider the enormousness of the problem : Science has proved that the universe exploded into being at a certain moment. It asks: 'What cause produced this effect? Who or what put the matter or energy into the universe?' And science cannot answer these questions. "For the scientist who has lived by his faith in the power of reason, the story ends like a bad dream. He has scaled the mountain of ignorance; he is about to conquer the highest peak; as he pulls himself over the final rock, he is greeted by a band of theologians who have been sitting there for centuries."

Your beliefs lack proof. But you claim yours have proof. I claim yours don't. This is the main issue raised by this video, and the only one I'm interested in laying to rest. Everything else in the other several comment threads you and I have going is just conjecture, an exchange of ideas. It's not logically sound of me to say that your beliefs are unproven simply because I have different ones. Mine might be total crap and not stand up to any scrutiny, so I don't present them here.

Well, I am sure we will come to your beliefs eventually. In the meantime, I am happy to provide evidence for what I believe, and you can evaluate it as we go along.

>>

>> ^messenger>> ^shinyblurry:
<comment reference link>

It has been theorized for a LONG time that neutrinos could exceed the speed of light. Very cool to see it backed with some solid evidence. The finding itself, to me, isn't as fascinating as what can come FROM the discovery. It opens up routes to other huge questions, namely where does Einsteins theory of relativity break down? Where does it apply? Where does it not apply? It's another data point to hopefully bridge the gap between traditional physics and quantum mechanics. The more data points, the closer to a unified theory science can hopefully get. Its quite cool. I'm going off on the edge here. But what I'd ask is: Does it really exceed the speed of light? Imagine if it really doesn't exceed the speed of light, however from our frame of reference it does. How to explain that? Some sort of dimension tunneling (lets fly off on a crazy whim here, think hyperspace or tunneling through extra dimension(s)). As theory goes, everything is relative. So while a particle in of itself may not exceed the speed of light in it's frame of reference at that speed, it may actually go faster from our dimensional perspective. Who knows why. Space-time, the speed of light, and particles can do some very strange and interesting things.

http://nirmaljoshi.wordpress.com/2010/10/03/the-elusive-theory-of-everything/

Blankfist, thanks for the definitions, I guess I have never come to terms with all the lingo; atheist, theist, religious, gnostic, agnostic etc.
I don't work well with labels. Maybe that's why I don't use them to define myself and they tend to pigeon hole me into one camp or the other.

I have an inner dislike for hierarchies of any kind, religious, political or social. To me they are all artificial archetypes and superficial. I have never been able to see past the equality of one person over another. Because of this, I can't bring myself to believe in the word "worship" which instantly relinquishes your independence and puts you under the dominance of another.

For me, I enjoy all the points of view. The possibility of creation but not by omnipotence. The possibility that we are a lost, abandoned or marooned colony. The possibility that we are spontaneous life.

SDGundamX, I still think creativity plays a role in spirituality. At the same time, I agree with you. All our life experiences are compared and refined to create our own personal dichotomy. I think we take the facts and creatively weave them together with abstract ideas and concepts in order to define them for ourselves.

In a church of 600 people, not everyone can believe that exact same thing. Some people will close off to some things, some with redefine certain meanings. Some will have certain beliefs that they keep to themselves. some parts will be believed whole-heartedly while some things will be dismissed outright.

Point being; Spirituality can be both a scientific dissection and cataloging of events in ones personal life and it can be a creative process of combining personal and world views in order to define and encompass one's own "theory of everything" however limiting or defining it may be.

Refreshness on theoretical physics should be always welcome , however to be technically careful with new proposals is mandatory !
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"Surfer dude stuns physicists with theory of everything

By Roger Highfield, Science Editor
Published: 6:02PM GMT 14 Nov 2007
Comments 596 | Comment on this article

The E8 pattern (click to enlarge), Garrett Lisi surfing (middle) and out of the water (right)
An impoverished surfer has drawn up a new theory of the universe, seen by some as the Holy Grail of physics, which has received rave reviews from scientists.
• Garrett Lisi: This surfer is no Einstein...
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Garrett Lisi, 39, has a doctorate but no university affiliation and spends most of the year surfing in Hawaii, where he has also been a hiking guide and bridge builder (when he slept in a jungle yurt).

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In winter, he heads to the mountains near Lake Tahoe, Nevada, where he snowboards. "Being poor sucks," Lisi says. "It's hard to figure out the secrets of the universe when you're trying to figure out where you and your girlfriend are going to sleep next month."
Despite this unusual career path, his proposal is remarkable because, by the arcane standards of particle physics, it does not require highly complex mathematics.
Even better, it does not require more than one dimension of time and three of space, when some rival theories need ten or even more spatial dimensions and other bizarre concepts. And it may even be possible to test his theory, which predicts a host of new particles, perhaps even using the new Large Hadron Collider atom smasher that will go into action near Geneva next year.
Although the work of 39 year old Garrett Lisi still has a way to go to convince the establishment, let alone match the achievements of Albert Einstein, the two do have one thing in common: Einstein also began his great adventure in theoretical physics while outside the mainstream scientific establishment, working as a patent officer, though failed to achieve the Holy Grail, an overarching explanation to unite all the particles and forces of the cosmos.
Now Lisi, currently in Nevada, has come up with a proposal to do this. Lee Smolin at the Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics in Waterloo, Ontario, Canada, describes Lisi's work as "fabulous". "It is one of the most compelling unification models I've seen in many, many years," he says.
"Although he cultivates a bit of a surfer-guy image its clear he has put enormous effort and time into working the complexities of this structure out over several years," Prof Smolin tells The Telegraph.
"Some incredibly beautiful stuff falls out of Lisi's theory," adds David Ritz Finkelstein at the Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta. "This must be more than coincidence and he really is touching on something profound."
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The new theory reported today in New Scientist has been laid out in an online paper entitled "An Exceptionally Simple Theory of Everything" by Lisi, who completed his doctorate in theoretical physics in 1999 at the University of California, San Diego.
He has high hopes that his new theory could provide what he says is a "radical new explanation" for the three decade old Standard Model, which weaves together three of the four fundamental forces of nature: the electromagnetic force; the strong force, which binds quarks together in atomic nuclei; and the weak force, which controls radioactive decay.
The reason for the excitement is that Lisi's model also takes account of gravity, a force that has only successfully been included by a rival and highly fashionable idea called string theory, one that proposes particles are made up of minute strings, which is highly complex and elegant but has lacked predictions by which to do experiments to see if it works.
But some are taking a cooler view. Prof Marcus du Sautoy, of Oxford University and author of Finding Moonshine, told the Telegraph: "The proposal in this paper looks a long shot and there seem to be a lot things still to fill in."
And a colleague Eric Weinstein in America added: "Lisi seems like a hell of a guy. I'd love to meet him. But my friend Lee Smolin is betting on a very very long shot."
Lisi's inspiration lies in the most elegant and intricate shape known to mathematics, called E8 - a complex, eight-dimensional mathematical pattern with 248 points first found in 1887, but only fully understood by mathematicians this year after workings, that, if written out in tiny print, would cover an area the size of Manhattan.
E8 encapsulates the symmetries of a geometric object that is 57-dimensional and is itself is 248-dimensional. Lisi says "I think our universe is this beautiful shape."
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What makes E8 so exciting is that Nature also seems to have embedded it at the heart of many bits of physics. One interpretation of why we have such a quirky list of fundamental particles is because they all result from different facets of the strange symmetries of E8.
Lisi's breakthrough came when he noticed that some of the equations describing E8's structure matched his own. "My brain exploded with the implications and the beauty of the thing," he tells New Scientist. "I thought: 'Holy crap, that's it!'"
What Lisi had realised was that he could find a way to place the various elementary particles and forces on E8's 248 points. What remained was 20 gaps which he filled with notional particles, for example those that some physicists predict to be associated with gravity.
Physicists have long puzzled over why elementary particles appear to belong to families, but this arises naturally from the geometry of E8, he says. So far, all the interactions predicted by the complex geometrical relationships inside E8 match with observations in the real world. "How cool is that?" he says.
The crucial test of Lisi's work will come only when he has made testable predictions. Lisi is now calculating the masses that the 20 new particles should have, in the hope that they may be spotted when the Large Hadron Collider starts up.
"The theory is very young, and still in development," he told the Telegraph. "Right now, I'd assign a low (but not tiny) likelyhood to this prediction.
"For comparison, I think the chances are higher that LHC will see some of these particles than it is that the LHC will see superparticles, extra dimensions, or micro black holes as predicted by string theory. I hope to get more (and different) predictions, with more confidence, out of this E8 Theory over the next year, before the LHC comes online."

There is a new Theory of Everything Breakthrough. It exposes the flaws in both Quantum Theory and String Theory. Please see: Theory of Super Relativity at <a rel="nofollow" href="http://www.superrelativity.org/" title="Super Relativity">Super Relativity Einstein was right!

>> ^Memorare:
maybe siftbot is operating in some parallel universe where time is sped up.
In these physics videos one thing they never offer an explaination for is why the quantum level events don't scale up and occur on our macro level since everything is made up of sub-atomic particles organized as atoms. As with the Schroedinger's Cat paradox it would be kind of disappointing to finally discover a unified theory of everything, only to learn that it really doesn't matter since it doesn't scale up to mundane reality and therefore only "exists" as a theoretical concept. (personally i think the notion that the cat is both dead AND alive simultaneaously and observation determines which, is a lot of mathematical bs, ie it's not Really true except on paper but then i'm not a cosmologist or metaphysicist so what do i know)
Also, a simpler question that has an answer but i just don't know what it is...
with all the anti-matter positrons bombarding the planet via cosmic rays, don't they ever bang into some electrons and create a tiny but big enough to be measured matter/anti-matter explosion? Sure matter is mostly empty (or not so empty apparently) space and possible collisions are few, but cloud chambers indicate tons of these thigns zipping around so Howcome there's not bazillions of these tiny explosions going off all around us constantly?


Yes, the quantum world really destroyed the normal stance of science. It is when math stole the show and ruined the normal claims that science was used to making about the world. In the now, we are talking about things that exist outside of our ability to experience them. The only things that can experience them are our machines we create to measure them; and they do so in a diminished and programed method (they interpolate data). So we are left to interpret an interpretation of an event. When you start getting that convoluted then you have to make the realization that you are no longer talking about what "is", but what your machine is interpolating (The forms of the universe aren't necessarily discrete or concrete, but it will be changed by the machine so that a result can be given). We have gotten to the point where we are no longer talking about the way things "are" about the universe anymore, just about how our machines experience the different elements of phenomena in the universe (your eyes are just as much a part of this machine analogy as well, but that is a tale for another day).

I think one of the largest criticisms of the relativist camp that really sticks is there is not sufficient reason to accept the quantum model over any other model that explains things. The grounds for saying the things that exist in quantum mathematics don't lie in understanding of those elements but the claim that since the math works, then it must be true. This is putting the cart before the horse and it begs the question "why". Why not any other way that also works? We could refine Newton to incorporate some of the quantum findings and use that as the explanation of everything. There is not sufficient reason to suppose that forces are the real things in the universe, or space time warps, quantum probability matrices.

Most "old" ways of thinking just get abandon for not being popular among the new generation of scientist trying to make a name for themselves. Quine talked about this extensively. Things move in and out of popularity in this realm like any other and scientists are just like MTV peoples and everyone else of jumping on the new trend. Truly, there is not sufficient reason to believe that Aristotelian motion isn't the real method of locomotion in the universe.

Simply put, new science don't care about whys anymore. New science is about making models of massive amounts of data. It won't ever be able to give a reason if something violates that model, it just has to re-engineer the model to incorporate the new data set. It lacks any truth to it because it is always in need of more data to continue to refine its model. It will never know when the model is complete or 100% accurate. It is actually the end road of the epistemology of empirical materialism. A constantly evolving model of data is the best "truth" you can hope from science. It will never have a why, that simply isn't a role of science. It is because "it is" and that is all they will ever be able to say; now more than ever.


edit (several times for grammar, man I sux at expressing myself)

- the Discworld series by Terry Pratchett; also Good Omens, which he wrote with Neil Gaiman
- Altered Carbon by Richard K. Morgan (first part of Takeshi Kovacs' trilogy)
- Bluebeard by Kurt Vonnegut (hard to single out any of his books, they're all great imo)
- Henderson the Rain King by Saul Bellow
- The Elementary Particles by Michel Houellebecq
- The Fabric of Reality by David Deutsch (a four-strand theory of everything)
and then some

I absolutely love listening to the great modern minds of theoretical physics talk about there fields of study. We live in such an amazing time in the history of our planet, especially in regards to physics. Science in it's own right has been like a religion for so very long(there still are a good number that fall into this category) in that scientists would defend they're given theories much like an religious zealot might. But since string theory & now m-theory have become the prominent candidates for a theory of everything and the implications of higher dimensions, non locality, uncertainty principle, and the possibility of consciousness playing a role in wave collapse are driving the more open minded people in science to consider new ideas and change the landscape, to bring entirely new possibilities into the fold that have never been openly/seriously discussed before.
This new way of thinking is what hopefully 30-100yrs. down the road will change us as a civilization, instead of looking at ourselves as individuals we will begin to see how truly connected we are to everything and everyone, instead of this horrible state we are in now.

Sorry for ranking :-D, I could go on all day about this type of stuff.

1. I never said Christians cannot/shouldn't be scientists and nor do I think so. I know several good scientists that are religious, and I respect them, even though they were indoctrinated as children and have since interpreted some of their experiences as proof of a deity. It is sad, and it all comes back to indoctrination, like I said previously. Now, supporters of ID, however, are a disgrace and they're undermining the whole concept of science. I think you'd agree that there is quite the correlation between religious fanatics and supporters of ID, wouldn't you? So it's no real surprise I assumed you might be one. I apologize for this assumption, and I'm happy you say you're not of the ID crowd.

2. I didn't attack your interests; just essentially said you should expand your knowledge in most fields - as should I and pretty much everyone. I just get annoyed when people talk about advanced sciences with great ignorance, misconstruing and making up facts on the spot, and that was what you did.

3. We are in agreement on science not making the claim of (ever) having the absolute truth; yet you seem to be one who believes this is possible via faith, that science has no truth to it at all and also, that making this claim is a good thing; this is where your logic and rationality fail. Anyone making the claim of absolute truth is wrong, and hence, it's a bad thing.

4. The mass of an atom isn't "the most simple thing in particle physics". It also isn't the smallest particle. Nor the one with least mass. It is also, in most common cases, a known, and I am at a loss how anyone could forgo this knowledge in their secondary education. Just because you lack basic knowledge in particle, no, basic, rudimentary physics, doesn't mean the scientific community does.

5. I won't argue semantics of 'fact' here. If you don't like the scientific definition, you can... well, do nothing about it. A discussion should be based on impartial principles, however, you attempt to impose your set of definitions and interpretations.

6. How is a METHOD true or false? Do you have any understanding of what a method is?

7. It appears your 'knowledge' of particle physics is drawn from http://www.videosift.com/video/Quantum-Physics-Double-Slit-Experiment-amazing-results. That's just sad, man. You should at least browse through Wikipedia before you engage in a discussion about these matters. We cannot as of yet see an electron or a photon - it has to be registered - interacted with, to determine which slit it goes through to carry this experiment out - hence the intrusion and the different results. The cool thing that baffles scientists is that it's the first time we've had a situation in which one cannot measure without interfering. That's it. That's the easy explanation. I don't think I should go into how the complementarity principle and wave-particle duality work.

8. In response to your request (you ignored mine) - here's 7 ideas from a 200 years ago that we hold true and still use today, quite in their original form, include:

Heliocentric theory.
Narrative history.
Electromagnetic induction.
Electrolysis.
Oxidation numbers.
Kinetic theory of gases.

and finally, a dessert - Evolution. It's occurrence has finally been proved in a lab experiment. Did you know that?

9. Please, don't just talk about it, do also look the Theory of Everything up. You actually think it's a theory that tries to describe everything - which is hilarious. I hate schooling other people and doing the internet's job, but you ought to know it is a theory that would explain the 4 known fundamental forces of our universe - gravity, electromagnetic force and strong and weak nuclear forces. That's it, doing that alone has proven to be difficult enough. There may be other forces required to explain any and all physical phenomena, which is what it's geared towards, but it won't in any way try to explain, for example, why kittens are cute or why you're arguing about that which you have little to none understanding of on the internet.

All in all, I apologize for my sometimes hostile tone; it's rather challenging for me to tolerate blatant ignorance. And you saying "It is impossible to prove something truth with science.", that's just plain wrong and illustrates just to what extent you misunderstand science and its methods.

Anyway, if you think it does not further true knowledge, then why the hell are you studying science, huh?

>> ^EDD:
^Dear GeeSussFreek,
you call yourself a scientist. That is fine. However, I will warn you right away that many on this website would question your devotion to scientific method based on your username alone - tell me, is it a coincidence that it's pronounced exactly like "Jesus-Freak"? I'm asking this (rather rhetorical) question because religious fanatics claiming to be scientists are often proponents of Intelligent Design, which is (I'll be frank here) a load of steaming bull excrement. I hope you are not one of this fold, because I've had my share of "dialogue" with these folks, and it has never, ever resembled anything like a reasoned, structured discourse.
With my worries laid before you, my response is this:
there are many fields of science and from your short stay on the Sift you would apparently style yourself as a jack-of-all-trades (economics, military, political science, theoretical and quantum physics, chemistry, just to name a few of which you've shared your opinion). Yet, it would also appear that you may be master of nothing.
A scientist (especially one talking about science and scientific method) would not ever, under any circumstances, attempt to draw their own definitions of FACT. Or any concept previously and universally known, for that matter. Me, I was taught what general as well as specific definitions of 'fact' are in secondary school. It would appear your "science diploma studies" have taught you nothing of this. Scientific fact feeds directly back from scientific method, which includes fancy notions such as peer review, one which has unfortunately so far eluded the scope of ID proponents. In science, fact may at times not be the absolute truth, it's what's agreed upon by the informed public. Our knowledge in most advanced fields of study can never be perfect and complete, but the ones most often making this claim are religious folks, saying that scripture "has all the answers".
Now, mass. My oh my.
Mass, assuming we're talking about gravitational mass, not inertial-7th-grade-physics-mass here, is the interaction of gravitational fields. In other words, yes, gravity. The same concept you differentiated, indicating exactly how much you understand of this and that I have no need to go into supergravity, supersymmetry and duality and start actually looking things up. Thanks for that. Oh, and by the way - mass is not created. Neither is matter, for that matter.
Continuing on-
regarding your nonplussed ideas about quantum theories, I have to disappoint you a little bit - it's still discernible, natural science; it hasn't obliterated all previous theories in physics; in fact, I dare you name three it has. Yes, the math involved is a 'bit' harder, the conjectures deeper and at times wilder, but scientific method is still applied.
You also said: "The fact is, that science doesn't deal with facts and has no method of proving things true, only methods of proving them false."
First of all, I LOVE your use of "fact" in this sentence, just love it. Anyway, hypocrisy aside, all we need, is a YES/NO or a TRUE/FALSE experiment. Their initial assumption will either be true, and they will PROVE something to be true, or it will be wrong, and they will prove that it is wrong. Works both ways, just like logic's supposed to, in your brain.
In conclusion, I return to my initial lines:
"You call yourself a scientist. That is most definitely not fine."


So, because I am a Christian, I can not be science minded. Thats a weak assertion. Moreover, its a showing of the new bigot mind set against any of those who have a different mind set. It is the new thing. To expect me to tolerate and be tolerant of your ideas, but the same latitude is not relayed back. I wouldn't count someone out just cause they called themselves agnosticfreak, would you? But that isn't the point of this conversation.

Intelligent design is crap. I never even mentioned it here, but yet, you rolled me into an automatic assumption that I believe that...I don't, its a fundamentally bad idea of applying impartial physical interpretations of the world and using those to apply to a metaphysic's of the creators doing. This is bad, it is not even an theory, but thanks for the assumption.

And thanks for the unmerited attack on my interests, I won't return the favor.

In your third paragraph, you totally just reiterate what I always said that science has no claim to absolute truth, so I will take that as a consesion on your part, but then you automatically assume that I do agree that ID is a valid theory in which I believe, which you are wrong. So I will take your concession and your incorrect assumption and slide right by your personal attacks for the moment.

As for mass, I was trying to show that even the simple idea of where the mass of an atom, the most simple idea in particle physics; in a unknown. So in effect, the basis of our understanding of particle physics is incomplete and yet we call things on the higher level facts, and I object to the terminology, just as one might also object to a Christian saying that God being real is a fact...its just a misuse of the language. I also object to things being called laws, but it is more of language that we are talking about on these things. There is a connotative and denotative meaning obviously, but I still think the terms are misleading. So my battle was over terminology abuse in this case.

You talk about the scientific method again. I would like to bring attention to the scientific method 2 problems that very prominent people in science have had with similar instances of rules in empirical practice. First, was one of my heroes, Alan Turing. His problem was one in computer science (my field btw) where he was trying to prove or disprove the ability to make a program that could test if other programs terminate (ie not suffer from an infinite loop). The problem was, you could make such a program, but you would have to then turn that program back on itself to make sure that it also terminates. This presents a problem. Because we still don't know if the program terminates. So, the problem was that there was no way to verify the thing that was created to verify things. Thus, the proof showed that there is no way to create a program that can test of other programs terminate.

Likewise, there was formerly a school of thought that has now all but vanished called the Verification theory( I believe this was the term, correct me if you know better). The verification method heralded that unless something could be empirically verified, it is meaningless. However, the same thing that happed in Mr. Turrings proof destroyed this idea as well for when we tried to verify the Verification theory, there was no verification to be had. So, I use the same argument on the Scientific method as to show its level of truth is very low indeed. It is a Theory that can not be turned back to proof itself. It rests on arbitrary principles that seem good...and they are good for lots of things, but truth is not one of them. The Scientific theory can not show itself to be truth using the scientific method. In fact, quantum physics shows us more and more that the very act of observation changes the data. In other words, sciences attempts to claim things being the way they are might only be so because they looked, not because they are actually that way. Once again, the problem of phenomena and Noumea.

You then use a classic example of why I choose my battle of language with science. It is impossible to prove something truth with science. Things are truth in science until they are not...which is no truth at all. Can you name one idea from 200 years ago that that isn't radically different from today? In essence, those proven theories weren't proven at all, they can only be disproved. Science only deals with negative evidence, not positive. Things will always be revised in science, and more over, we never really know when they won't need to be revised again; and thus this is why science can never have a claim to have a TOE (theory of everything) because you don't ever know when you know everything...you don't know when every fact is accounted for, every essence of the whole is taken into account...it is an unknowable thing (from the standpoint of absolute knowledge).

*edited out cause Internet people can't be trusted with humility*. However, I don't think my claims are baseless, and I attempted to have a civil talk about them. If I came off as rude or condescending in my first reply, then I do apologies as this was not my intent. I have a real eagerness to talk about such topics openly and freely on the sift because we have some very intelligent people here and normally some pretty good discourse (we are many stars above the youtube crowd). I look forward to perhaps a more civil reply in the future Hopefully I have covered all your points here, I tried my best.

Edit: spelling

you know, it's a little late, but thank you for posting this comment, I actually just really read it and love it. You said what I wanted to say only better... :

In reply to this comment by kulpims:
you're all thinking in terms of rational explanations. what if there is none and the thing still works? if particle entaglement experiments have shown us anything it's that not only is all matter just energy but that everything in the universe is interconnected. the point is, we don't know shit yet. the behaviour of particles at quantum level shows bizzare results we are unable to backup properly with our newtonian ways. as we discovered that observation inevitably affects the results of experiments we were no longer just voayers looking from the outside into this newtonian rube-goldberg apparatus we call universe - we are the apparatus. our current description of reality is a sketch at best. i like the work David Bohm did with Karl Pribram on holonomic model of the brain and his ideas of the role consciencesness has in this universe. another wacko i like is David Deutsch and his four-strand theory of everything.
a quote from wiki about his theory:

"It aims not at the reduction of everything to particle physics, but rather mutual support among multiverse, computational, epistemological, and evolutionary principles."

you're all thinking in terms of rational explanations. what if there is none and the thing still works? if particle entaglement experiments have shown us anything it's that not only is all matter just energy but that everything in the universe is interconnected. the point is, we don't know shit yet. the behaviour of particles at quantum level shows bizzare results we are unable to backup properly with our newtonian ways. as we discovered that observation inevitably affects the results of experiments we were no longer just voayers looking from the outside into this newtonian rube-goldberg apparatus we call universe - we are the apparatus. our current description of reality is a sketch at best. i like the work David Bohm did with Karl Pribram on holonomic model of the brain and his ideas of the role consciencesness has in this universe. another wacko i like is David Deutsch and his four-strand theory of everything.
a quote from wiki about his theory:

"It aims not at the reduction of everything to particle physics, but rather mutual support among multiverse, computational, epistemological, and evolutionary principles."

According to the Many Worlds theory- an interpretation of quantum mechanics that is undergoing a kind of renaissance of examination- the quantum level events DO scale to the macro level, we in our universe only perceive one possible quantum outcome but all other possibilities are simultaneously occurring in other parallel universes. Therefore Schrodinger's cat may be dead in our universe, but is wholly alive in another. The waveform function of our Macro universe does not collapse at all- all possibilities exist.

In reply to this comment by Memorare:
maybe siftbot is operating in some parallel universe where time is sped up.

In these physics videos one thing they never offer an explaination for is why the quantum level events don't scale up and occur on our macro level since everything is made up of sub-atomic particles organized as atoms. As with the Schroedinger's Cat paradox it would be kind of disappointing to finally discover a unified theory of everything, only to learn that it really doesn't matter since it doesn't scale up to mundane reality and therefore only "exists" as a theoretical concept. (personally i think the notion that the cat is both dead AND alive simultaneaously and observation determines which, is a lot of mathematical bs, ie it's not Really true except on paper but then i'm not a cosmologist or metaphysicist so what do i know)

Also, a simpler question that has an answer but i just don't know what it is...
with all the anti-matter positrons bombarding the planet via cosmic rays, don't they ever bang into some electrons and create a tiny but big enough to be measured matter/anti-matter explosion? Sure matter is mostly empty (or not so empty apparently) space and possible collisions are few, but cloud chambers indicate tons of these thigns zipping around so Howcome there's not bazillions of these tiny explosions going off all around us constantly?

they don't offer an explanation for why quantum mechanics and general relativity are hard to combine - probably because nothing has been confirmed experimentally to allow for a working hypothesis. though 11-dimensional M-theory may be the real theory of everything.
an explanation for the uncertainty principle using extra dimensions seems plausible to me, if it's either just extra parameters within our universe or other real parallel universes - after all, this whole universe needs to have some kind of framework to exist in.

there's not that much anti-matter about in this part of the universe. it's being produced all the time though when cosmic rays hit our atmosphere (and in a few other natural reactions), but is annihilated almost instantly when it comes in contact with nearby matter.