From: L' Ermit (lhermit@hotmail.com)
Date: Mon Jan 28 2002 - 15:54:16 MST
[Hermit 2*] A reasonable assumption is that if we cannot detect them, they
do not exist.
[ben 3] Would the same have been true 100 years ago? Of course not. And the
assumption that it is true today is giving too much credence to our current
state of technological development, and too much discredit to the
generations of scientists which are to follow. Over human history, people
have almost always been at the height of their civilization's advancement.
Any of those people could have felt that what they were perceiving was the
closest that the species had come to "truth" - and they very well may have
been right. However, to think that they were seeing as much as would ever be
seen would have obviously, in hindsight, been arrogant and incorrect. So why
should it be true now?
[Hermit 3.1] I might have more accurately said that, if we cannot detect
them, we cannot create useful hypothesis about them. But at a more
fundamental level, my answer was accurate. We are pretty certain that we do
understand the fundamental forces and particles of the Universe and we
understand which few of these the brain is able to interact with and
manipulate. The limitation is a limitation of energy levels and mechanisms.
A 120W device created from low conductivity soft tissue is simply unable to
manipulate GeV particles. Those particles and forces that the brain can
interact with, we can easily detect, at least in bulk, even using
non-invasive techniques. So it is not arrogance to say that we [b]know[/b]
that the brain does not have undetectable communications, but a simple
matter of well-understood physics.
[ben 3.1] No theory should be predicated on the existence of that which
cannot be proven - we all agree on that, I think. However the flipside of
this is that we also should not completely dismiss that which cannot be
proven false.
[Hermit 3] No hypothesis can be founded without an observation of some sort
and must be testable in such a way as to be able to be falsified. Else it is
purely non-useful speculation. As well say that dying thoughts are captured
by "angels" as that they are transferred by electromagnetic or electrostatic
coupling to somewhere unknown, by some unknown mechanism, when we
[i]know[/i] that:
[Hermit 3] at miniscule distances even an ordered signal is swamped by
background noise
[Hermit 3] The dying brain cannot produce an ordered signal, all the neurons
fire randomly as the cells die, meaning that any signal "transmitted" would
simply be noise.
[Hermit 3] In any case, from [Hermit 3.1] we know that to make the assertion
you do in [ben 3.1], that you are contradicting known science. Which
invalidates any hope of sustaining your speculation.
Regards
Hermit
PS love the topic modification, though the joke is probably lost on many
here without an explanation :-)
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