Differences between space and time have always been an interesting topic to explore, and none is more challenging than the dimensional differences. Space, it seems, can have any number of dimensions -- at least one of several, depending on the theory -- 1, 3, 9, 25 . . . . The point is, there doesn't seem to be a problem with space having more than one dimension.
Time, by contrast, almost always has a single dimension . . in any of the theories of spatial dimensionalities ranging, as above, from one to twenty-five, time always has that one, single dimension. As recently as last year, Bradford Skow, Philosopher of Science, from MIT, in an article published in the prestigious Nous, seems to back off from explaining time's one dimensionality, though he explains myriad other attributes of space and time. (Here's Dr. Skow's page at MIT http://web.mit.edu/bskow/www/.)
It seems to me the answer is straight-forward. Time can have any number of dimensions you like, but only one per universe. In other words, the big bang is a function of time. In the beginning there was an infinitesimal cosmic egg, that exploded and over time expanded into what we now call the universe. The point is, its explosive expansion was a function of time.
Think of the many worlds interpretation of quantum mechanics. The Schrodinger wave is also a function of time. When the wave collapses upon observation into a specific set of values, then each possible value corresponds to a different universe. Then, in each of those universes, the wave starts expanding again -- i.e., a function of time. That's why in the many-worlds interpretation, you've got the splitting of the wave into discrete universes. Since the wave is a function of time, and since each universe has a single time dimension, then any time another instance of the wave is created, it must be in a separate universe.
Anyway, there's a lot to be said on all this, and I'm trying to learn to keep my blog posts short. The point is this -- that a single time dimension is the distinguishing criterion for individuating universes. The only way you can say that two things are, not the same universe, but different ones -- is that their time-dimensions are distinct -- i.e., non-overlapping.
Here's another blogger's stab at the same topic:
http://allphilosophy.com/topic/4087
More to be said, especially as regards the so-called "principle of contradiction" -- which is provable from this (and other) properties of time!
Wednesday, November 18, 2009
Monday, November 16, 2009
The hereafter . . .
There's always been so much talk about the afterlife, and whether there really is such a thing, it's occurred to me that maybe the problem is assuming there's either something like the life we live now (perhaps without a body) or else utter darkness -- oblivion. Maybe the situation would be easier to assess if we allowed other possibilities.
If there's one thing that seems to characterize life (at least ours) and distinguish it from nonlife, it is consciousness. Now, we don't really know that what we call inanimate matter really lacks consciousness, but let's just go on this assumption. There are also plenty of other distinctions between life and nonlife, like reproduction, metabolism, and a few others . . . . But for now, let's just go with consciousness.
Now, if information is written on a blackboard in chalk lettering and someone is looking at it, then the information exists twice: once as physical chalk, and another time as a conscious image. The recurrent appearance of information in this dual guise has raised questions about the nature of consciousness and its relationship to the physical world. For now, let's just say David Chalmers is right about an intimate link between consciousness and information, and that the relationship may be one of identity (that's panpsychism -- another post).
Well, information, so our physics tells us, is a conserved quantity (kind of like mass and energy). So if consciousness is information, then there is some sense in which consciousness may also be conserved. Is that what is meant by afterlife?
Another peculiar feature of consciousness is its association with the self. The self as an entity distinct from the physical world is hard to delineate precisely. Where do you end and the non-you begin? This question, which has no ready answer, can be reformulated more precisely with respect to perception (i.e., where is the boundary between perceiver and perceived), and also with respect to action (where is the boundary between controller and controlled?). These are the problems of the so-called "epistemic cut," rendered by my former graduate advisor, Howard Pattee -- very influential in my thought processes.
The boundaries (or lack thereof) pursuant to perception and action are spatial -- i.e., if there were a point delimiting the you from the non-you, that point would exist in space. Similarly, we can inquire about the temporal boundary between the self and non-self -- i.e., when does the self begin, and when does it end? The latter question involves a possible afterlife and lacks any clear answer.
Perhaps all that can be said is that even in this life, one has glimmerings of experiences of becoming part of something larger -- that one's boundaries are no longer defined by the skin, and one's experiences are no longer one's own only. Such experiences can occur as intimacy, as creativity, as spirituality. It may be that people close their eyes when they kiss and when they meditate for the same reason: by losing the visual perception of an external world, they're feeling of oneness is magnified.
Perhaps in a similar sense it is possible for the self to extend beyond the mortal body in time also. What the nature of such an existence might be is anyone's guess, though it is telling that the Vedantic word for unification is samadhi, and their word for death is mahasamadhi. Perhaps in all their meditation and introspection, they've learned something that is difficult to grasp with the analytical mind.
Here's a note -- to myself as much as to the reader -- that next time, I'd like to talk about memory and karma, and perhaps also about the subjectivity common to information and consciousness.
If there's one thing that seems to characterize life (at least ours) and distinguish it from nonlife, it is consciousness. Now, we don't really know that what we call inanimate matter really lacks consciousness, but let's just go on this assumption. There are also plenty of other distinctions between life and nonlife, like reproduction, metabolism, and a few others . . . . But for now, let's just go with consciousness.
Now, if information is written on a blackboard in chalk lettering and someone is looking at it, then the information exists twice: once as physical chalk, and another time as a conscious image. The recurrent appearance of information in this dual guise has raised questions about the nature of consciousness and its relationship to the physical world. For now, let's just say David Chalmers is right about an intimate link between consciousness and information, and that the relationship may be one of identity (that's panpsychism -- another post).
Well, information, so our physics tells us, is a conserved quantity (kind of like mass and energy). So if consciousness is information, then there is some sense in which consciousness may also be conserved. Is that what is meant by afterlife?
Another peculiar feature of consciousness is its association with the self. The self as an entity distinct from the physical world is hard to delineate precisely. Where do you end and the non-you begin? This question, which has no ready answer, can be reformulated more precisely with respect to perception (i.e., where is the boundary between perceiver and perceived), and also with respect to action (where is the boundary between controller and controlled?). These are the problems of the so-called "epistemic cut," rendered by my former graduate advisor, Howard Pattee -- very influential in my thought processes.
The boundaries (or lack thereof) pursuant to perception and action are spatial -- i.e., if there were a point delimiting the you from the non-you, that point would exist in space. Similarly, we can inquire about the temporal boundary between the self and non-self -- i.e., when does the self begin, and when does it end? The latter question involves a possible afterlife and lacks any clear answer.
Perhaps all that can be said is that even in this life, one has glimmerings of experiences of becoming part of something larger -- that one's boundaries are no longer defined by the skin, and one's experiences are no longer one's own only. Such experiences can occur as intimacy, as creativity, as spirituality. It may be that people close their eyes when they kiss and when they meditate for the same reason: by losing the visual perception of an external world, they're feeling of oneness is magnified.
Perhaps in a similar sense it is possible for the self to extend beyond the mortal body in time also. What the nature of such an existence might be is anyone's guess, though it is telling that the Vedantic word for unification is samadhi, and their word for death is mahasamadhi. Perhaps in all their meditation and introspection, they've learned something that is difficult to grasp with the analytical mind.
Here's a note -- to myself as much as to the reader -- that next time, I'd like to talk about memory and karma, and perhaps also about the subjectivity common to information and consciousness.
Friday, November 6, 2009
Free will revisited . . it's not a unique issue . .
When "they" say that the will is free, it simply means that human action is not constrained by, say, physical laws. Another way to look at this is to see action as an interaction between mind and universe. So let's say you decide you wanna throw a ball. The conscious part of the action is the decision to throw it. The physical part is the "resultant" motion of the ball. Now, these motions are (ostensibly) determined by physical laws that are either causally closed or at least not amenable to influence by a "volitional agent." If this is so, then the will cannot be free. Conversely, if it is not so, then the will is free, because it can act independently of physical laws.
This is all a roundabout way of saying that the free-will problem hinges on the relationship between the conscious part of an action (the will to act) and the physical part (the resultant motions). Are these two "parts" of an action distinct (in which case the will may be free, owing to its ability to act independently of the physical laws), or are they really one and the same (in which case the will is not free, being immutably determined by the same physical laws that govern the ball's motion).
So far, so good. To anyone who's got any background with this type of problem, this may seem trivial so far -- and it is. Now here's the twist. This problem of separating subject and object does not apply only to human action, producing the free-will problem. It also applies to perception. Are the conscious and physical portions of a perception distinct? This is the old and familiar problem of whether the world is external to mind. If the object of perception is separate from mind, then the world is external to mind. If it's not separate (i.e., it's really part of the conscious image in the mind), then the world is really inside the mind.
So this problem really amounts to a question of whether the conscious and physical portions of an action are distinct or are really one and the same. Alternatively, are subject and object one, or are they two? But this is precisely the question we asked about action, yielding the problem of free will. So what this all leads up to is that these two classic problems of Western metaphysics are really two forms of the same problem: are subject and object really distinct.
Now, perception and action are known to be closely related as metaphysical ideas. Both perception and action involve interactions between mind and universe. The primary difference is direction. Perception is "incoming" (universe-to-mind) while action is "outgoing" (mind-to-universe). This relationship between perception and action is not generally given explicitly -- probably because it is too obvious to bother. In spite of this, the same exact relationship exists between the problems of the external world and of free will. This relationship should be obvious, too, but for some reason, it hasn't been noticed in the centuries these two problems have been pondered. Veritably reams have been written by Western philosophers and scientists on both of these classic problems -- without any mention that they are two forms of the same problem --
If I get a little carried away with the historical context, that's because this is an exciting discovery -- and one that seems to be strangely resistant to acknowledgment by "peer-reviewed" journals -- since after all, the peers are not getting paid, and who has time to learn a whole new take on metaphysics, when it's easier by far just to say no? I'm sure I'd do the same, in their position.
Fortunately, I'm not in their position, I'm in this position, typing my blog online, and as soon as I click the button -- it's live. Yeah, for the internet age!
BTW -- this is a unification of two problems -- it's not a solution to either one. It's kind of like when Newton showed that the motions of planets and the motions of terrestrial objects are attributable to the same set of laws. This was a unification, although it happens that he also provided the laws themselves involved in the unification. However, he could have unified these two phenomena without an explanation -- i.e., by showing that one and the same set of laws apply to both types of motion. This is what I've tried to do here -- to show that these two classic problems are both ways of asking whether subject and object are distinct -- without ever attempting to answer either question.
It's not unusual, when questions are posed that resist a clear answer over a long time, something else is going on -- perhaps a problem with the premises behind the questions. This is something I would like to address in this space some time.
Oh, BTW -- you can see me talk about this same topic on facebook and youtube.
This is all a roundabout way of saying that the free-will problem hinges on the relationship between the conscious part of an action (the will to act) and the physical part (the resultant motions). Are these two "parts" of an action distinct (in which case the will may be free, owing to its ability to act independently of the physical laws), or are they really one and the same (in which case the will is not free, being immutably determined by the same physical laws that govern the ball's motion).
So far, so good. To anyone who's got any background with this type of problem, this may seem trivial so far -- and it is. Now here's the twist. This problem of separating subject and object does not apply only to human action, producing the free-will problem. It also applies to perception. Are the conscious and physical portions of a perception distinct? This is the old and familiar problem of whether the world is external to mind. If the object of perception is separate from mind, then the world is external to mind. If it's not separate (i.e., it's really part of the conscious image in the mind), then the world is really inside the mind.
So this problem really amounts to a question of whether the conscious and physical portions of an action are distinct or are really one and the same. Alternatively, are subject and object one, or are they two? But this is precisely the question we asked about action, yielding the problem of free will. So what this all leads up to is that these two classic problems of Western metaphysics are really two forms of the same problem: are subject and object really distinct.
Now, perception and action are known to be closely related as metaphysical ideas. Both perception and action involve interactions between mind and universe. The primary difference is direction. Perception is "incoming" (universe-to-mind) while action is "outgoing" (mind-to-universe). This relationship between perception and action is not generally given explicitly -- probably because it is too obvious to bother. In spite of this, the same exact relationship exists between the problems of the external world and of free will. This relationship should be obvious, too, but for some reason, it hasn't been noticed in the centuries these two problems have been pondered. Veritably reams have been written by Western philosophers and scientists on both of these classic problems -- without any mention that they are two forms of the same problem --
If I get a little carried away with the historical context, that's because this is an exciting discovery -- and one that seems to be strangely resistant to acknowledgment by "peer-reviewed" journals -- since after all, the peers are not getting paid, and who has time to learn a whole new take on metaphysics, when it's easier by far just to say no? I'm sure I'd do the same, in their position.
Fortunately, I'm not in their position, I'm in this position, typing my blog online, and as soon as I click the button -- it's live. Yeah, for the internet age!
BTW -- this is a unification of two problems -- it's not a solution to either one. It's kind of like when Newton showed that the motions of planets and the motions of terrestrial objects are attributable to the same set of laws. This was a unification, although it happens that he also provided the laws themselves involved in the unification. However, he could have unified these two phenomena without an explanation -- i.e., by showing that one and the same set of laws apply to both types of motion. This is what I've tried to do here -- to show that these two classic problems are both ways of asking whether subject and object are distinct -- without ever attempting to answer either question.
It's not unusual, when questions are posed that resist a clear answer over a long time, something else is going on -- perhaps a problem with the premises behind the questions. This is something I would like to address in this space some time.
Oh, BTW -- you can see me talk about this same topic on facebook and youtube.
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