Stoicism 1 - A Critique

[From Frank Schulwolf] On Friday, July 7th, at The Villages (FL) Philosophy Club, we were offered up the philosophy of stoicism. By contemporary standards stoicism is perhaps not seen as a major philosophical movement—it is none the less deserving of a more thorough examination than the one presented.

A philosophy should deliver a good deal more than a disconnected set of floating bromides, clichés

or homilies. Philosophy studies the fundamental aspects of the nature of existence. Philosophy’s

task is providing man with a comprehensive view of life, which in turn provides a comprehensive

reference for all his action—mental or physical, psychological or existential.

Stoicism as presented was bereft of intellectual content. We learned nothing of its structural workings

as a system. No raison d'être. We are instead given selected chestnuts of wisdom (I paraphrase) “Stoics do not respond to anger with anger." Perhaps a useful tool when backed by rationale. Unanchored it is without value.

If we set aside the lighter than air presentation, we find that Stoicism holds specific views on the

nature of the universe and mans place within it. A number of these are problematic positions—

many of which if verbalized in presentation would not be likely to attract adherents. Some so repugnant, all but the numbest would head for the exits.

Stoicism is a by design/determinist philosophy, with all that implies. The philosophical equivalent of

(the movie) Ground Hog Day. In the Stoic universe, all has happened before. Because the universe

is eternal it will happen endlessly again and again. It is therefore futile and a waste of time

bemoaning ones fate. Realize instead, an unlimited acceptance of “reality” because it was all

meant to happen. That in turn means emotions are irrelevant because it was supposed to happen.

So, why not be good boys and girls, follow the rules and control your emotions. They are worse

than useless. They are irrational and therefore counter productive. Such a simplistic proposition

disregards the nature of emotions.

Emotions are the product of man’s premises, held consciously or subconsciously, explicitly or implicitly. Man’s emotional mechanism is very important component of the computer, which his mind has to program—and the programming consists of the values his mind chooses. Its main function being the integration of ideas.

If you consign your emotions to the dustbin, your disciplined emotional repression will deny your conscious mind the tools necessary to reach firm convictions. It is your conscious mind that programs the computer. If you default, if you cannot reach any firm convictions, your subconscious is programmed by chance—and you deliver yourself into the power of ideas you do not know you have accepted. A rational man knows—or makes it a point to discover—the source of his emotions, the basic premises from which they come; if his premises are wrong, he corrects them. He never acts on emotions for which he cannot account, the meaning of which he does not understand. In appraising a situation, he knows why he reacts as he does and whether he is right. He has no need to repress them.

Interestingly, while the Greeks idealized man, The Stoics degraded him by calling for the suppression

of emotion.

The philosophy of Stoicism produces the antithesis of what our founding fathers had in mind—the

individual pursuing his happiness. Determinism recognizes no individuals. A position antithetical to

our Bill of Rights. What is more, determinisms flaws lead to nightmarish ethical issues.* This from

a philosophy which proudly proclaims its dedication to reason.

Frank Schulwolf

* See Ivan’s argument in The Brothers Karamazov

My "Eight-Sided Dice" - Published in Popular Electronics When I Was a College Student

The Internet is AMAZING! Yesterday, almost by accident I found the very first article of mine published in a national magazine, POPULAR ELECTRONICS, 58 years ago, when I was a sophomore in college! My electronic DICE device is a project I designed to simulate a symmetric 8-sided polygon that is equally likely to fall on any one of its sides.

Three pairs of neon lamps flicker on and off rapidly until the user presses a button, which stops the flickering and leaves only one member of each pair on. Given three pairs of lamps, there are exactly eight combinations, since two times two times two is equal to eight. At the time, there was lots of interest in Extra-Sensory Perception (ESP), so my device could be used to test if a person could demonstrate foreknowledge of the outcome of a "random" event. It could also be used to learn about binary arithmetic, at least a bit - (pun intended!)

I "Google" myself every once in a while to check up on what people may be writing about me. (As a Guest Contributor to the worlds most popular Climate website, Watts Up With That?, I am sometimes the target of negative postings from climate alarmists who denigrate my skeptical views on Global Warming and Climate Change. I accept the basic science that Global Warming is real and that human production of carbon dioxide contributes to the warming. However, I'm convinced the amount of warming, the extent of the human contribution, and the danger of climate catastrophe has been way over-hyped.)

This time, instead of using Google, I used Bing, and searched for "Ira Glickstein". (I've never heard anyone say they were going to "Bing" something.) In any case, after looking at the first two pages of references to "Ira Glickstein", I impulsively clicked on the seventh page and there it was, a link to my 1959 article in POPULAR ELECTRONICS!  Someone had kindly scanned the entire issue and posted it for all the world to see! Here is a link to the .pdf file. I've reproduced the three-page article below.

As I look at my design from the perspective of a retired System Engineer with a long and creative career conceiving and designing complex avionics systems, I'm pretty impressed at how I, as a college sophomore, adapted the basic idea of an RC (Resistive/Capacitive) relaxation oscillator using neon lamps.

Looking at the circuit diagram above, it took me awhile to remember that neon lamps are basically two parallel wires, with a small gap between them, sealed within a neon-gas-filled glass tube. When the voltage difference between the two wires in the lamp is below a certain critical value, the effective resistance is nearly infinite. As the voltage builds up, a point is reached where electrons have enough energy to jump the gap. At that point, the neon gas glows, and the effective resistance drops. That causes the voltage across that gap to drop, and that lamp goes off. The capacitor in the circuit stores energy so that, as the voltage rises once more, the voltage across the gap in the other neon lamp of the pair will increase faster. Thus, the two lamps in a pair will alternately flicker on and off. When the user pushes the button, the two neon lamps of a pair are put in parallel, so they have the same voltage across them, which makes the neon lamp that was on stay on, and the one that was off stay off.

Since the three pairs of lamps and associated resistors and capacitors are bound to have slightly different parameters, they each oscillate at a slightly different frequency. Thus, when the user presses the button, each pair is likely to be in a different phase of the oscillation, such that the resultant final state is more or less "random", any of the eight possible combinations being equally likely. 

The final section of the article discusses use of the device to test for ESP. I actually experimented with several friends and kept track of results. Sometimes the subject would correctly guess several outcomes in a row, and I thought they really had ESP!

However, when I learned more about statistics, I realized that there was a non-zero probability for "random" coin flips to appear non-random. For example, as you know, the probability of a "fair-coin" landing "Heads" is 50%. The probability of two "Heads" in a row is 25%, three in a row is 12.5%, four in a row is 6.25%, five in a row is 3.125%, six in a row is 1.5625% and so on.

I made use of that fact when teaching a graduate course in System Engineering by asking my students to do a two-part experiment. In the first part, they were to manually make up a list of 200 "Heads" and "Tails" that they thought was "random". In the second part, they were to actually toss a coin 200 times and record the actual "Heads" and "Tails". They were to label one of their lists "A" and the other "B", recording, but not telling me, which was made up manually and which was the actual record of 200 real coin tosses. In almost every case, I was able to tell which was which!

How did I do it? Well, given 200 actual coin tosses, the chance of getting six "Heads" or six "Tails" in a row somewhere in the sequence is almost 100%. However, when someone manually makes up a list of 200 "Heads" and "Tails" they (almost) never write down a series of five or six "Heads" or "Tails" in a row, because that does not look "random" to them! So, I'd check the two lists submitted by each student, and, if one list had a sequence of six or more "Heads" or "Tails" in a row, and the other list did not, I'd know the first list was for the real coin tosses!

I don't know if my Eight-Sided Dice POPULAR ELECTRONICS article is to blame, but, after studying Einstein's General Relativity and reading about his problem with the "Copenhagen Interpretation" of Quantum Mechanics, I came out on Einstein's side, rejecting the currently accepted view that Physics is truly random. Einstein said something like "God does not play DICE with the Universe!"

Despite the fact that Quantum Mechanics based on "Heisenberg's Uncertainty" is the most successful theory for predicting the outcome of sub-atomic experiments, I cannot shake the view that there is some currently hidden, non-random process behind all of it. So, like Einstein, I believe in Strict Causality, and, therefore, Absolute Determinism. That also requires me to believe that the Universe is both Finite and Discrete.

Ira Glickstein

Dialog with Howard Pattee - Part 3 - QM and Chess Analogy

Howard Pattee's 2008 paper "Physical and functional conditions for symbols, codes, and languages" is available for download here. I recently re-read it in detail and engaged in what was for me an interesting and rewarding email dialog with Howard.

This is the third in a planned multi-part posting that includes portions of our email dialog.

Click for Part 1 - His 2008 Paper

Click for Part 2 - Determinism vs Probability

Click for Part 4 - Property Dualism

Click for Part 5 - Flatland and Higher Dimensions

INTRODUCTION

The following excerpts are from an email from Ira Glickstein to Howard Pattee (Oct 16, 3:28 PM) and his reply (Oct 16, 8:21 PM)

[IRA GLICKSTEIN] Howard: Wow! A nearly instant reply with considerable detail. THANKS.

[HOWARD PATTEE] Ira, I'm always ready to argue over fundamentals of epistemology, provided I have time. What do we know?

[IG] I read your comments and the attachment in detail. Of course, I know that my finite, discrete, determinate Universe flies in the face of all the accepted QM theory and experiments. So far, the Copenhagen interpretation of QM has done exceedingly well in all experiments and therefore I am almost certainly wrong. But, since your Universe is, at heart, probabilistic, even you have to admit there is some non-zero possibility I am right :^)

[HP] The interesting psychological question is why you persist in holding on to a belief that in your own "rational"? thinking " you agree is "almost certainly wrong." Jonathan Haidt would say it is because your belief has a sacred aspect that is more important than reason. He says this is a stronger tendency in conservatives than in liberals. Do you think he has a point?

[IG] If the Universe is really continuous in time and space, and if energy and matter can be infinitely divided, then I agree that the Universe cannot be fully determinate. So, I lose in that case.

[HP] I don't think you lose on that point. I agree with Poincaré that infinity and continuity are constructs of the human imagination that have no observable consequents.

[IG] But, has time and space really been shown to be infinitely divisible? Is energy mass infinitely divisible?

[HP] Certainly not. The evidence simply disappears in the uncertainty. relations and the quantum foam.

[IG] I like simple physical thought experiments.

[HP] But until they are checked by experiments don't bet on them. Historically they are often wrong.

[IG] Consider chess, a finite, discrete system where all possible board states may be enumerated and placed in logical time order. Any given board state may have only some relatively small number of predecessors and successors according to the rules of chess. Thus, each possible game sequence of chess may be specified, and all possible sequences of chess board states may be enumerated as a finite set.

Now consider my finite, discrete Universe as a really big multidimensional array in spacetime with a finite number of energy and mass quanta. All possible Universe states (up to a certain time since the Big Bang) may (in theory) be enumerated. Unlike chess, the Universe has no external players, so each Universe state has one and only one successor state. Thus, given perfect knowledge of the initial starting state (at the Big Bang) or any other time since that event, there is only one valid string of Universe states. The result is the past, current, and future history string of the one and only Universe we have the privilege of being a part of.

[HP] That is the issue. There is no evidence that this order of states is unique or deterministic. The Path Integral formulation or sum-over-histories of QM say otherwise. So in this case the chess game is not a good analogy. Howard

[IG] Love, and thanks for your willingness to communicate with such a misguided soul as myself. Ira

[added 9 Nov 2013] The following excerpts are from an email from Ira Glickstein to Howard Pattee (Oct 17, 12:07 AM) with my reply to Howard's reference to Jonathan Haidt and his "Five Channels of Morality".

[IG] Howard, yes, I guess my belief in determinism has a "sacred" aspect that helps me continue to be optimistic in the face of all the chaos of the world situation of continual warfare, both physical and political, and of my inevitable demise as I watch my fellow residents leave Freedom Pointe at the rate of a couple a month, some "feet first" and others to Assisted Living or skilled nursing. I know I am a lot closer to the end of my life than to the beginning, and, having no real belief in traditional religion, and having sold my shotgun and rifle ten years ago when we left NY, I apparently need something to cling to. My committed Christian political allies have their "guns or religion ..." and I would have nothing if not for my determined determinism :^)

On the other hand, I do not think either Spinoza or Einstein were particularly conservative in their attitudes towards social, political, or traditional religious matters, yet they were both strict determinists to the ends of their lives.

But I do accept Haidt's study result that conservatives are more likely to honor the sacred than liberals. We discussed Haidt's "five channels of morality" here http://tvpclub.blogspot.com/2008/11/ted-talks-five-channels-of-morality.html and he shows that conservatives value each of the five (harm, fairness, authority, ingroup and purity) about equally, while liberals tend to rate harm and fairness way above the other three, with purity at the bottom. If we equate the sacred with what Haidt calls purity, which is reasonable, then conservatives value the sacred more highly than liberals. But, both conservatives and liberals rate harm the highest.

Meanwhile, I am encouraged by your reference to Poincaré that infinity and continuity are constructs of the human imagination that have no observable consequents. That would imply that either the Universe is neither infinite nor continuous but only seems so to our limited human minds, or, that, even if it is both infinite and continuous, that would not have the random consequences I attribute to continuity.

When I ask if "time and space [have] really been shown to be infinitely divisible? Is energy mass infinitely divisible?" You reply "Certainly not. The evidence simply disappears [in QM uncertainty] ..."

So, I remain hopeful (and you and accepted physics remain uncertain - at least in the QM sense!) Ira

Ira Glickstein

Dialog with Howard Pattee - Part 2 - Determinism vs Probability

Howard Pattee's 2008 paper "Physical and functional conditions for symbols, codes, and languages" is available for download here. I recently re-read it in detail and engaged in what was for me an interesting and rewarding email dialog with Howard.

This is the second in a planned multi-part posting that includes portions of our email dialog.

Click for Part 1 - His 2008 Paper

Click for Part 3 - QM and Chess Analogy

Click for Part 4 - Property Dualism

Click for Part 5 - Flatland and Higher Dimensions

INTRODUCTION

At the time I wrote my Oct 16th email (excerpted below), I had carefully re-read the first three sections of Howard's paper.

For Blog readers who have not yet read the original paper (and to remind those who have), and to provide context regarding our long-standing differences of opinion as to causality, determinism, and the arbitrariness of symbols, here are the titles and initial paragraphs of each of the first three sections of Howard's paper:

1. Epistemology and terminology are problems for biosemiotics

There are classical epistemic problems that have troubled the greatest minds for over 2000 years without reaching any consensus. This is the case for conceptual dualisms, like discrete and continuous, chance and determinism, form and function, and especially the mind-body problem that has persistently puzzled philosophers, and is still a central issue for philosophy, psychology, artificial life, artificial intelligence, and cognitive science. It is also closely related to fundamental issues in physics, the information-energy relation and what is known as the measurement problem. All of these problems are related to a category I have generalized as symbol-matter problem.

Biosemiotics, virtually by definition, cannot escape these problems. In my view, the central difficulty with the historical mind-body problem is that philosophy approached it from the wrong end of evolution. The many concepts and terminologies that have been invented to describe thought and language at the highest evolutionary levels of human cognition are not conceptually or empirically clear enough to adequately describe symbolic control at the cellular level where this duality first appears, and where it is simple enough to understand. Because my education began as a physics student, I learned that one must thoroughly understand very simple problems before one could even think clearly about more complex problems. …

2. The rules of symbols and the laws of matter have incompatible epistemic assumptions.

Let me begin with two epistemic assumptions that are a common source of misunderstanding. Models of symbol systems and material systems are based on incompatible epistemic assumptions. Physical laws ― the laws of matter and energy ― are based on the principle that any candidate for a law must give the same results for all conceivable observers and for arbitrary changes of reference frames. These conditions are called invariance and symmetry principles. Physical laws seek to describe those relations between events over which individual agents, whether single cells or humans, ideally have no control or freedom to make changes. Laws must appear universal and inexorable. By contrast, any candidate for a symbol system is based on the condition that all individual agents, from cells to humans, ideally have complete symbol-writing freedom within the syntactic constraints of the symbol system.

In other words, physical laws must give the impression that events do not have alternatives and could not be otherwise (Wigner, 1964), while informational symbolic structures must give the impression that they could be otherwise, and must have innumerable ways of actually being otherwise. Semiotic events are based on an endless choice of alternatives, not only in symbol sequences but also in codes that interpret the symbols. It is just those innumerable alternatives, selected by heritable propagation, that are the prerequisites for evolution as well as for creative thought. …

3. How can symbols and codes be free of physical laws?

This question is a second common source of misunderstanding about the symbol-matter problem. It is a belief among many scientists and philosophers that because physical laws are universal and inexorable there is in principle no room for alternative behaviors, in particular, the freedom of symbolic information, and ultimately free-will. This is a belief with a psychological basis that long predates the discovery of physical laws. It is rooted in the concept of causality ―the feeling that every event must have a cause. Aristotle and Lucretius could not accept indeterminism long before Laplace and Einstein. ...

The following excerpts are from an email from Ira Glickstein to Howard Pattee (Oct 16, 8:25 AM) and his reply (Oct 16, 12:51 PM)

[IRA GLICKSTEIN] Howard: thanks for uploading this paper. I am currently reading it in detail and am up to section 4. You make a very strong case for indeterminacy and arbitrariness of symbols. Of course, I accept that our human brains, even when assisted by highest technology sensors and computers cannot determine the future of evolution and natural (or even artificial) selection.

However, if (a BIG IF) time and space are finite and discrete (as, apparently are the quanta of matter) THEN (I would like to believe and therefore I do believe), at the Big Bang when a finite amount of matter/energy and space-time and the finite, Universal, and unchanging Laws of Nature originated, there were (and therefore still are) only a finite number of possible states of the Universe. 

[HOWARD PATTEE] The issue of determinism vs probability does not depend on discreteness. It depends on the nature of laws and what we call states of a system. There is no empirical evidence that the state of a system is exact. It is a probability distribution according to most interpretations of QM. Born even argues that classical models are probability distributions. …

The laws may be unchanging but still only probabilistic, as well as the states.

[IG] Thus, the sequence of formation of our Universe and ultimately of life and it's associated symbols, were (and are) fully determined.

I guess we are each too old to modify our basic beliefs.…

[HP] At least I can claim that all of the empirical evidence that I have acquired is consistent with a probabilistic universe. I have never come across any evidence of strict determinism. I have only experienced events with very good statistics.

I agree, however, that faith in determinism and God cannot be disproved by empirical evidence.

[IG] Meanwhile, THANKS again for being such an important part of my intellectual and personal life. …

[HP] Keep thinking. Howard

 

Ira Glickstein

Einstein's Cosmological Philosophy

[Presentation to Philosophy Club, The Villages, FL, 17 Dec 2010. Download the PowerPoint charts here]

Do I have any special qualifications for giving this presentation? Well, both he and I ride bicycles, and, Einstein in German means "One Stone" while mine (German spelling: Glücksstein) means "Lucky Stone" :^).

My main source is Walter Isaacson's excellent 2007 book, Einstein, His Life and Universe. I also used Einstein's own The World as I see It (1949) and Out of My Later Years (1950), and a number of online sources including Wikipedia Einstein and Cosmology, Wikiquote, Marxists.org, and Einstein's 1427 page FBI FOIA file.

POLITICS: Was Einstein a Socialist?

Let us get this out of the way at the outset. Yes, he was a socialist. In Why Socialism? (1949) he wrote "I am convinced there is only one way to eliminate these grave evils [of capitalism], namely through the establishment of a socialist economy, … the means of production are owned by society itself and are utilized in a planned fashion. … guarantee a livelihood to every man, woman, and child. …”

However, in that same article, he cautioned "The achievement of socialism requires the solution of some extremely difficult socio-political problems: how is it possible, in view of the far-reaching centralization of political and economic power, to prevent bureaucracy from becoming all-powerful and overweening? How can the rights of the individual be protected and therewith a democratic counterweight to the power of bureaucracy be assured?"
His FBI FOIA file concludes that he "was a member, sponsor, or affiliated with thirty-four communist fronts between 1937 and 1954." IMHO the FBI was justified in denying Einstein access to classified A-Bomb information and investigating him for possible disloyalty.

Although the FBI did not discover it while he was alive, letters that became public in 1998 prove that Einstein had an affair with a Soviet spy, Margarita Konenkova, from 1941 until 1945. [Image added 24 December 2010, from Filosophando, click for larger version.]

If Einstein was alive today, I believe he would have realized, based on the subsequent history of Communism (Russia, China, ...) that his cautionary words, quoted above, were more valid than he thought they were when he uttered them in 1949. However, I also believe he would be a "social justice" western liberal/progressive and definitely not in tune with my politics.

SCIENCE: His Great Contributions
His first published paper, on the capillary forces of a straw (1901), and his second, on the thermodynamic equivalence of heat, work or particles (1902) were a non-distinguished prelude to his four amazingly breakthrough miracle year publications in 1905:

• The Photoelectric Effect (showing that light was composed of quanta rather than continuous waves, and which later led to the wave/particle duality of quantum mechanics, and for which he won a Nobel in 1921),



• Brownian Motion (kinetic theory of heat),



• The Special Theory of Relativity (that uniform motion is indistinguishable from rest, and the speed of light is the same for moving or stationary observers), and,



• The Equivalence of Mass and Energy (e = mc², and, since c, the speed of light in a vacuum is such a large number, and when you square it, it is much, much larger, a tiny abount of mass, m, is equivalent to a tremendous amount of energy, e, witness the Atom bomb)

Between 1907 and 1911 Einstein considered the equivalence of gravity and acceleration. He reasoned that a person in a closed box on Earth would, of course, experience normal gravity. However, if the closed box were transported to space, out of the influence of any nearby mass, and then accelerated to 32 ft per second squared, the person would feel the exact same effects as those of gravity on Earth.

In 1915 he published his General Theory of Relativity, showing that matter causes space-time to curve, which we experience as gravity. He predicted that the gravity of the Sun would cause the light from a star to appear to curve and this was confirmed by Eddington, during an eclipse of the Sun in 1929.

The presentation includes animated Powerpoint charts for:

• Relativity and Speed of Light (A bullet fired from a Gun on a moving train goes faster than from a stationary vehicle, yet a light beam fired from a Laser on a moving rocket does not go faster than from a stationary vehicle), and
  
• Einstein's Cosmology (Static, Oscillating, and Expanding Universes, as well as speculation on how Black Holes, predicted by Einstein in 1915, may, via Continuous Creation be the key to something like his Eternal Universe)

COSMOLOGY: Blunders or (Yet Unrecognized) Genius?
Einstein had certain strong expectations of Nature and the Universe (which, see below, he regarded as equivalent to Spinoza's God as well as his own). That led him to expect that the Universe would be static, neither expanding nor contracting, so it could be Eternal in some sense. So, in 1917, he included the Cosmological Constant (Λ) to counteract gravity. When Hubble showed that the Universe was expanding (1929), Einstein said the Cosmological Constant was his "biggest blunder" and, in that same year, adopted what is called the Friedman-Einstein oscilating Universe, which is Eternal in that the mass/energy is constant. When that became untenable, in 1932, he adopted what is called the Einstein-de Sitter Universe, which expands forever, but the rate of expansion slows down over time.

Current accepted truth is that the Universe not only expands forever, but the rate of expansion is increasing, not slowing down. (OY!) And that the Universe had a beginning in the Big Bang (OY! OY!) and it will have an end as the density of mass/energy approaches zero due to the accelerating expansion, and entropy goes to maximum (OY OY! OY!) In my presentation, I speculate (along with Fred Hoyle, Roger Penrose, and others) that black holes and multiple dimensions we cannot sense, may allow an Eternal Universe, with matter/energy continually recycled between the dimensions we can experience and the hidded dimensions, with density and entropy refreshed.

RELIGION: From Moses to Spinoza to Einstein
Young Einstein was the product of a secular family that acknowledge their Judaism. He said "As a child, I received instruction both in the Bible and in the Talmud." So, he knew about Moses and the Rabbis, but, early on, became more enamored of Science and Spinoza. The presentation includes part of his 1920 poem to Spinoza (and in the Notes below the chart, the complete text in English and the original German), and his 1929 statement "I believe in Spinoza's God, Who reveals Himself in the lawful harmony of the world, not in a God Who concerns Himself with the fate and the doings of mankind." For Einstein, God and Nature were one, writing in 1921 "Subtle is the Lord, but malicious He is not. … Nature hides her secret because of her essential loftiness, but not by means of ruse."
His dedication to determinism, in defiance of mainstream physics and the quantum mechanics whose foundation he had personally laid, was based on religious conviction that "God does not play dice with the universe" (1926). He also said, in 1931, "I am compelled to act as if free will existed …[on the other hand, I know] ‘a man can do as he wills, but not will as he wills.’" [quoting Schopenhauer]

He thought scientists needed a type of faith that springs from the religious sphere: "science can only be created by those who are thoroughly imbued with the aspiration toward truth and understanding. This source of feeling, however, springs from the sphere of religion. … the faith … that the regulations [for] the world of existence are … comprehensible to reason. I cannot conceive of a genuine scientist without that profound faith. The situation may be expressed by an image: science without religion is lame, religion without science is blind." (1941) In 1931 he defined three stages of religious belief, going back to his Jewish roots and how they led him to what he considers a higher form of faith: "Jewish scriptures admirably illustrate the development from the religion of [1] fear to [2] moral religion … but there is third state of religious experience … which I will call [3] cosmic religious feeling … which knows no dogma and no God conceived in man’s image".
He used personal terms for God, "Dear God (die Lieber Gott) ... The Old One (der Alte) ... Lord God (Herrgott)", yet he wrote in 1949: "the idea of a personal God is a childlike one. …[but] I do not share the crusading spirit of the professional atheist whose fervor is mostly due to a painful act of liberation from the fetters of religious indoctrination received in youth. I prefer an attitude of humility corresponding to the weakness of our intellectual understanding of Nature and of our own being." and in 1931 "I see a clock, but I cannot envision the clockmaker. The human mind is unable to conceive of the four dimensions, so how can it conceive of a God, before whom a thousand years and a thousand dimensions are as one?"
Perhaps his best advice for scientists, and everyone else, is "Everything should be made as simple as possible, but no simpler." (1950)

Ira Glickstein

Contradictory Models Continued

Howard said: Joel, I have always been bothered by the transition from one or two particle deterministic models to N-particle statistical models. Bohr gave the story about the boy who goes into a candy store and asks for a penny’s worth of mixed sweets. The store owner says I don’t have any mixed sweets, but here are three sweets, you can mix them yourself. Whether reality is deterministic, as Einstein and Ira believe, or whether it is stochastic, as most quantum physicists believe, is a metaphysical difference that does not make any practical or empirically testable difference in our models.

Joel responds: After thinking it through, I think you and many others have good reason to be bothered. I felt bothered too and now believe I have come to a conclusion concerning the paradox. I believe that the sign reversibility of the equations of motion has been misinterpreted as thermodynamic or mechanical reversibility. Please look at this thought experiment involving just two perfectly elastic billiard balls on a odd-shaped pool table with perfectly elastic cushions. We recognize that if one ball (A) is stationary and the other (B) is aimed at it on centers, then B will transfer its momentum to A and become stationary. If a cushion is arranged at right angle to the path of A, then A will be reflected and head back toward B. In the collision that follows, A will return its momentum to B and B will head back toward the shooter. Let another cushion be interposed at right angle to the path of B so that B is again reflected toward A. The net result of all this is that we have a reversible or naturally reversing process. We see similar approximations to this description in pendulums and celestial orbiting bodies. The reversibility of the billiard ball process is a consequence of the sign reversibility of the velocity in the momentum equation PLUS the purposeful adjustment of the cushion to reverse the sign of the velocity at some point.

Let's look at a very slightly more complicated experiment. Let everything be the same except that the first cushion is oriented to cause ball A to go off in a direction which will not cause a return collision with B. Since we have a "closed system," A will eventually strike a cushion, i.e., part of the container wall. Let this cushion be oriented so that it is at right angles to the path of A. The result is that A will be reflected and follow its same path in reverse, and striking the first wall and head back toward B. In other words, it will all be played out in reverse as the momentum (and energy equation) demand, but only because the second wall was PURPOSELY oriented to cause the reflection in the proper direction. One could extend this logic to any number of acute reflections preceding the 180 degree reversing collision.

It might seem as though only the Nth (final before reversal) wall segment has to be fixed. However, its orientation cannot be calculated without a knowledge of all the other reflections that preceded it, since the direction of ball A must be known. Hence, N wall segments are fixed by the motion of just a single collision pair. Like Monte Hall, with his knowledge of what is behind each of the doors, we must have knowledge of the entire particle path in order to design the reflecting container to insure reversal after the Nth wall collision. As long as these conditions are satisfied, mechanical reversibility and entropy are not a problem. The entropy neither increases nor decreases.

I think it would be instructive to design a wall for which an entire class of interactions will be reversible. For instance, consider a container made of two parabolas with a common axis and common foci. A collision which causes ball or particle A to travel through the focus and then continue to the wall will be reflected parallel to the axis of the parabolas, strike the opposite parabola and then back through the common focus. My gut tells me that by continuing in this vein, one would find that elastic balls in an elastic container with several degrees of freedom will spread their initial energy irreversibly with asymptotically increasing entropy. I'm going to work on such a proof. Thanks again Howard for opening Pandora's Elastic Box for me.

Wolfram Alpha - Making all systematic knowledge computable

You may have noticed something new in the right-hand column, just below the News Map. It is a live link to Wolfram Alpha. The hype for Wolfram Alpha says:

"Today's WolframAlpha is the first step in an ambitious, long-term project to make all systematic knowledge immediately computable by anyone ..."

Wolfram Alpha is not just another search engine like Google or the new Microsoft "Kumo" soon to be released. It is not Wikipedia or Google Knol. It is not Excel or any other spreadsheet. It combines aspects of all these useful tools into a grand extension of Wolfram's Mathematica. (Wolfram Alpha was released for free public use last week and I put the link on this Blog then,. It has taken a few days for it to stabilize and become reliable, so that is why I delayed this posting.)

See the Visual Gallery of Examples for how Wolfram Alpha works with Mathematics, Dates&Times, Statistics, Places&Geography, Physics, SocionomicData, Chemistry, Weather, ... and much much more!

So far I have used it a bit. Try the Wolfram Alpha window just below the News Map in the right-hand column of this Blog. You can type in a simple equation: 45.7 + 32 - 7.8 x 16 = and get the Result: -47.1. Or, try (distance earth to sun)/(distance earth to moon) = and get Result: 413.9. Or b c d e f# a = and get the musical notes and play the sound. Or, marion county fl income per capita and get Result: $17848 along with other data. Or ibm microsoft intel and get their current stock prices and other data including a comparative graph.

So far, I am a bit underwhelmed but I have confidence this will become a major Internet tool for all of us. Please share your experiences here by Commenting. advTHANKSance!

Ira Glickstein

PS: As a result of Wolfram Alpha's release, my interest in Stephen Wolfram has been piqued. I studied quite a bit of his Cellular Automata (CA) work that I used as part of my PhD studies. I also knew he made his money with a program called Mathematica. His book A New Kind of Science, which seems to be trying to prove that the Universe is a gigantic CA, is now available free online and I am up to chapter 8. I am sympathetic to the basic idea because I am a Panthiest and believe (along with Spinoza and Einstein) that the Universe is absolutely deterministic and (perhaps not along with them) that is it both finite and discrete in space, time, matter, and energy.

Causal Determinism (was "God's Warriors")

This started out as a tangent from "the God's Warrior's" main Topic thread. Perhaps all has been said in the many cross-Comments there. However (at Joel's suggestion), here is my new Topic on determinism. Although Spinoza and Einstein cannot speak for themselves, having passed away, I believe I have inherited some measure of their "spirit" and they would agree with most of my views. (Other Spinoza/Einstein fans might disagree :^)


The best and most readable scholarly treatment I've found on the topic may be found in the online Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy at: http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/determinism-causal/



DEFINITION (from Stanford):

Causal determinism is, roughly speaking, the idea that every event is necessitated by antecedent events and conditions together with the laws of nature. The idea is ancient, but first became subject to clarification and mathematical analysis in the eighteenth century. Determinism is deeply connected with our understanding of the physical sciences and their explanatory ambitions, on the one hand, and with our views about human free action on the other.

Given the "initial conditions" of the world, and the laws of nature, everything that has happened and everything that will happen, have been and are destined to occur. However, that does not imply either perfect predictability of the future (at least not by humans) nor what is ususally meant by "fate".



"Fate" is a mystical concept and sometimes the subject of fiction: Person A is "fated" to die in a certain way or on a certain date, he or she learns of that "fate" and tries to avoid it, but it happens anyway. For example, Macbeth thinks he is safe from being killed by Macduff because his "fate" is that he "cannot be killed by woman borne". Macduff tells him he was born by Cesarian section, and kills Macbeth! Or, in a modern context, a person learns he is to die on a certain day and it turns out he has airplane tickets for that day. So, he cancels his flight and stays in his apartment, only to die of an explosion due to a gas leak! The airplane on which he was scheduled to fly lands safely.



Perfect predictability depends not only upon the universe being causally deterministic (which I happen to believe it is), but also on perfect knowledge of all the laws and forces of nature and positions and velocities of all objects (which, other than in certain limited domains, is impossible for humans, even with the aid of computers, to achieve.) The Stanford link provides an 1820 quotation from Laplace that "the perfection [of] the human mind ... affords but a feeble outline of such an intelligence."



When Joel speaks of the "predictability" at the heart of the scientific method, I believe he is refering to highly controlled experiments where extra care is given to isolate the experimental chamber from the rest of the universe. If an earthquake or lightning or a clumsy assistant causes the beaker to shatter, the results are discarded and the experiment must be repeated.

Something is a scientific fact if and only if any competent scientist can replicate the experiment under the same or similar controlled conditions.



An Actual Example of Determinism With (and Without) Perfect Predictability

I mentioned my HexLife computer simulation of evolution of life forms in the previous thread. HexLife is a very well-controlled situation and the model for my concept of causal determinism. It is run within a PC and is therefore both finite and discrete.

I make use of the PC "random number generator" to determine when and where genetic mutations and crossovers occur, how much of the "sunlight energy" falls on any given location, and so on. However, I allow the user to select one of a number of pre-set "initial random seeds" (or make up his or her own). Thus, if something interesting happens during a given run, that run can be repeated and will proceed bit-for-bit in the exact sequence to allow the user to analyze and exactly recreate that interesting event. In that sense, HexLife is perfectly predictable, so long as the PC does not malfunction.


In any case, I was quite pleased when my HexLife program turned out to exhibit a logarithmic "power spectrum" of extinctions (many small extinctions, a lesser frequency of moderate extinctions, and few large extinctions) just as Stephen J. Gould ("punctuated equilibrium") says characterizes the evolutionary history of life on earth!

I did not specifically program HexLife to have extinctions. Each simulated organism lives its own life in accordance with the behaviors and asexuality or sexuality set in its genetic code and its interactions with other organisms. It absorbs energy and matter (which are conserved in the total simulation), and reproduces asexually (if it gains enough mass and energy) or sexually (if it gains enough mass and energy and happens to meet a suitable sized mate). It dies when it gets eaten by another organism, or has an accident, or of old age.



Although not specifically programmed to do so, the total living biomass increases as new organisms evolve and become more effective at exploiting the environment and other organisms. The biomass stabilizes as a balance is reached between resources (dead matter and energy available in each location). Then, as yet other organisms evolve, there are extinctions, which are noted as significant reductions in the living biomass. Extinctions are characterized on a logarithmic scale and, amazingly, each increment of the scale eventually gets about the same number of extinctions. That result indicated to me that I had captured, on a very small scale and under controlled conditions, some "true" aspect of evolutionary life.


"God" and His/Her Possible Powers

With respect to HexLife, I am "God" -- having made up all the rules for DNA codes and reproduction and energy and mass distribution and so on, and having written every line of Pascal code. (Therefore, *I* am the closest thing to "God" you may ever meet on earth, so pay attention! :^)

When I start with a different set of initial conditions and/or a different initial random seed, I cannot predict in detail what will occur. Based on prior runs with different conditions, I can predict the general results: if the simulation is started with randomly-generated genetic codes, and if it does not die out early in the run, genetic diversity (number of different genomes in live organisms at any given time) will decrease and morphologic complexity (size and variability of genetic code string) will increase. After a while, these measures will stabilize. Then, there will be an extinction during which genetic diversity will increase a bit and morphologic complexity will decrease a bit. This will go on and on in sequence and there will be a power spectrum of extinctions.

Therefore, for a new run, only the general results are more or less perfectly predictable by me, but the details are not. However, if I have run the same initial conditions before, and kept the data, I know exactly, bit-for-bit, what the detailed results will be. Assuming there is a God of the Universe separate from His/Her Creation (which, as a Pantheist I do not accept), if the Earth has not been "run" before but other biological runs have been done, God only knows the general results. On the other hand, if the Universe has been run before with the same initial conditions, God can perfectly predict each and every event that will happen in full detail.



With HexLife I can intervene during a run, increasing or decreasing the strength of the "Sun". I can also stop the run or revert it to a previous data point and add or subtract organisms and/or change the genetic codes of any organisms. During the development cycle, I rewrote the Pascal code to change the "laws of nature" within the simulation. However, when I did these things with a situation that had been run before, any specific data I had about future events became more or less moot. Thus, if there is a God separate from Creation, and He/She performs a "miracle", God cannot predict the long-term consequences perfectly. Of course, if God has access to multiple Universes, He/She could put our Universe on hold while He/She tests out a "miracle" on a doppleganger Universe and then come back and start our Universe up again with perfect predictability!


Random Number Generators and Enumerability


The random number generator that comes with the PC is pretty good and would pass most statistical tests of "randomness". However, even the best computer random number generators are not "truly random". Digital computers are "finite automata" and have a finite number of possible states. Thus, the random number sequence will, at some point, repeat itself. How often? Well, depending upon the design, it might not repeat for days or years or decades or longer -- but it *will* repeat.

Therefore, any digital computer random number generator has a sequence that is FULLY DETERMINED and ENUMERABLE. Given any initial state, it is possible to determine the exact sequence of "random" numbers that will follow and you could store each and every "random" number in that sequence on a CD or other storage medium.

Do you ever get the impression that TV programs repeat? Well, it is true. Even if you have the latest digital HDTV "1080p" (1920 x 1080 pixels, each with 12 bits for color), that is "only" about 8 billion different FULLY PRE-DETERMINED and ENUMERABLE instantaneous pictures, most of which would look like confetti and are therefore unlikely to be broadcast. Thus, there is a much smaller number of instantaneous pictures actually broadcast. Of course, there are 50 individual pictures each second and they are presented in different orders, so the number of TV programs is enormously large, but still FULLY PRE-DETERMINED and ENUMERABLE.

It is possible, at least in principle, to enumerate all 30-minute TV programs that could be broadcast in HDTV. That enumeration would include all videos broadcast so far by Osama bin Laden and all future Osama diatribes that will be presented in the future. Of course, it would also include many Osama videos that will never occur in actuality, including the one in which he appologizes for 9/11 and converts to Judiasm :^)

This reminds me of the old thought experiment of the "million monkeys randomly typing on a million typewriters for a million years". They will eventually "randomly" type out all the great literature of the world.

Of course, you would have to get a million language professors to paw through all this stuff to find the gems. Imagine one professor, after years of reading gobbledegook, picking up a sheet that starts: "To be or not to be ..." (But then, it continues: "that is the gribnick? Michan&83( jkjhs nnnneo ...")


Is the Universe Both Finite and Discrete?

Although I am not sure if philosophers have made this point, I believe causal determinism depends upon the Universe being both finite and discrete (and I believe it is).

Here is my reasoning: According to chaos theory, a tiny difference in initial conditions can result in a major difference over the long-term. The example usually given is the "butterfly effect". Imagine an experiment in which the Universe is run twice with absolutely identical conditions, except, in the first run one particular butterfly flaps its wings slightly to the right and in the second slightly to the left. Well, in the first run, six months after that butterfly flap, hurricane Katrina strikes New Orleans, while in the second run, it strikes Miami.

If the Universe is continuous, that tiny difference could be 1/infinity, which, for all practical purposes, is zero. Therefore, with a difference approaching zero, all long-term determinism goes out the window. On the other hand, if the Universe is discrete, the difference must at least one quanta of energy or matter or space or time.

There is an old thought experiment where a donkey is placed exactly midway between some food and some water and it is exactly as hungry as it is thirsty. The donkey will be exactly equally attracted in each direction and will therefore die of thirst and hunger. Of course, that experiment depends upon a level of exactness and constancy that is unlikely in the animal world. The donkey would probably sense the water before the food (or vice-versa) or, after standing motionless, would become thirsty before becoming hungry, etc.

Let's do that thought experiment a bit differently. Take a common plastic straw and stand it upright on a flat table. If there are no strong breezes or gusts, it will remain stationary, falling neither to the left or right, front or back. Now try it with a toothpick! Unless the toothpick has a flattened end, or is poked into a hole in the table, it will fall over no matter how carefully you place it. The slightest waft of air or vibration of the table will knock it over. The difference between a straw and a toothpick? One has an end with a discrete diameter, the other an end with a near-zero diameter.

As I mentioned in the previous thread, we know that energy comes in discrete quanta. Since we also know energy and matter are interchangeable, that would mean matter is also quantized. That leaves only space/time, and I believe they may also come in quanta. Thus, I think it is a good guess that the Universe is discrete.

The second requirement, a finite Universe, is, I believe fairly obvious. I think the current scientific consensus is that the Universe began with a "big bang". (The alternative -- watch your daily newspaper -- is that the consensus will change to "continuous creation" of matter which I believe also entails continuous recycling of matter to keep the balance.) In either case, there is only a limited amount of energy/matter in the Universe.

Furthermore, the Universe is curved in some or all dimensions, which would entail space/time being finite as well. (The surface of a sphere, for 2D "flatlanders" appears infinite in that they can go forever in a given direction without reaching the "end". However, we 3D-ers recognize the sphere as finite, and we explain the delusion of the 2D-ers as being the curvature of their 2D space.) Thus, to us 3D-ers, what appears to be infinite time and space may actually be finite (and would appear so to a 4D-er or higher).

Ira Glickstein