Ezine Excellere Number 79
2010. April.
Chile, The land of earthquakes and tsunamis.
Something to rock your mind.........By...Creationist Charles.
A Treatise of Human Nature Book I, Part 4, Section 6
SECTION VI: OF PERSONAL IDENTITY
Approximately 90% or more of neural function is subliminal.
That includes the small virtual reality representation of 'self'.
'Consciousness' (another virtual representation) is a very small
part of that information structure. Thus to be 'conscious'
of 'self' is minor and only pragmatic.
Deceit works, even 'self' deceit.
Freud's unconscious is making a comeback in evolutionary science;
EvoBut to the point are you more or less agreeing with Hume that the self
is not just one thing/substance but a "bundle of impressions one after
the other and hence human identity of self is a long series of near
identical clones that give the belief or have the belief that they are
each the actual person and the others are clones if anything?
Bundle theory, originated by the 18th century Scottish philosopher
David Hume, is the ontological theory about objecthood in which an
object consists only of a collection (bundle) of properties,
relations, or tropes.
According to bundle theory, an object consists of its properties and
nothing more, thus neither can there be an object without properties
nor can one even conceive of such an object. For example, bundle
theory claims that thinking of an apple compels one also to think of
its color, its shape, the fact that it is a kind of fruit, its cells,
its taste, or at least one other of its properties. Thus, the theory
asserts that the apple is no more than the collection of its
properties. In particular, there is no substance in which the
properties inhere.
Bundle
The self: bundles and beliefs
There are at least two broadly different ways of interpreting Hume’s
views on personal identity, and these will be presented here.
According to the first view, Hume was a bundle theorist, who held that
the self is nothing but a bundle of interconnected perceptions. This
view is forwarded by, for example, Positivist interpreters, who saw
Hume as attempting to specify the “sense-contents” (roughly, bits of
sensory-experience) that we refer to when we talk about the self.[49]
This account draws on Hume’s remarks that a person is “a bundle or
collection of different perceptions”.[50][51] A modern day version of
the bundle theory of the mind has been advanced by Derek Parfit.[52]
However, some have criticised the bundle theory interpretation of Hume
on personal identity. Some account for Hume’s talk of people being
bundles of perceptions as figurative, and raise the problem for such a
view (at least in its basic form) that it is difficult to specify what
it is that makes a bundle of perceptions the perceptions of a distinct
person (for it seems that we can have similar perceptions to one
another, and that the interconnections between our own perceptions
(such as causal connections) can be shared with others’ perceptual
states too).[53]
An alternative theory is that Hume is answering an epistemological
question about the cause of people forming judgements or beliefs about
the existence of the self.[54] In support of this interpretation we
can point to passages that use causal terminology: “What then gives us
so great a propension to ascribe an identity to these successive
perceptions, and to suppose ourselves possest of an invariable and
uninterrupted existence thro' the whole course of our lives?”[55]
The problem on this way of reading Hume, then, is that experience is
interrupted and ever-changing, but somehow causes us to form a concept
of a constant self which is the subject of these experiences. And
Hume’s answer on this account is that it is the same interconnections
and relations between perceptions that force the imagination to
believe in the existence of mind-independent objects. He effectively
argues, we cannot make sense of the notion of objects existing
independently of ourselves unless we have an idea of 'ourself' as
something that occasionally becomes aware of these objects. So the
human mind, or consciousness, is thus conceived of as a field of
experience into which various different objects appear and then
disappear: "the true idea of the human mind, is to consider it as a
system of different perceptions or different existences, which are
link'd together by the relation of cause and effect, and mutually
produce, destroy, influence, and modify each other."[56]
Objection one: your position assumes without evidence that the Borg
know something.
Objection two: the probability of either receiving an some reward or
of receiving a punishment, is so small that these possible outcomes of
belief or disbelief can be discounted.
Objection three: we cannot choose our beliefs. We form our beliefs on
the basis of evidence, not on the basis of desire. No matter how much
one may want to believe that a given proposition is true, one cannot
bring oneself to do so simply through an act of will. Rather, in order
for one to come to believe that a proposition is true one requires
evidence for its truth.
Pascal’s Wager seeks to justify Christian faith by considering the
various possible consequences of belief and disbelief in the God of
Christianity. If we believe in the Christian God, the argument runs,
then if he exists then we will receive an infinitely great reward in
heaven while if he does not then we will have lost little or nothing.
If we do not believe in the Christian God, the argument continues,
then if he exists then we will receive an infinitely great punishment
in hell while if he does not then we will have gained little or
nothing. The possible outcomes of belief in the Christian God, then,
are on balance better than the possible outcomes of disbelief in the
Christian God. It is better to either receive an infinitely great
reward in heaven or lose little or nothing than it is to either
receive an infinitely great punishment in hell or gain little or
nothing.
The conclusion that Pascal’s Wager draws from this is that belief in
the Christian God is the rational course of action, even if there is
no evidence that he exists. If the Christian God does not exist then
it is of little importance whether we believe or disbelieve in him. If
the Christian God does exist then it is of great importance that we do
believe in him. In order to cover ourselves in all circumstances,
therefore, we ought to believe that the Christian God exists. A formal
statement of this argument might be constructed as follows:
Pascal’s Wager
(1) It is possible that the Christian God exists and it is possible
that the Christian God does not exist.
(2) If one believes in the Christian God then if he exists then one
receives an infinitely great reward and if he does not exist then one
loses little or nothing.
(3) If one does not believe in the Christian God then if he exists
then one receives an infinitely great punishment and if he does not
exist then one gains little or nothing.
(4) It is better to either receive an infinitely great reward or lose
little or nothing than it is to either receive an infinitely great
punishment or gain little or nothing.
Therefore:
(5) It is better to believe in the Christian God than it is to
disbelieve in the Christian God.
(6) If one course of action is better than another then it is rational
to follow that course of action and irrational to follow the other.
Therefore:
(7) It is rational to believe in the Christian God and irrational to
disbelieve in the Christian God.
Three common objections to this argument will be considered here. A
more detailed discussion of each can be found by following the
appropriate link.
OBJECTION 1:
The first of these objections targets the third premise of the
argument as it is stated above. It is the objection that Pascal’s
Wager illicitly assumes a Christian view of the criteria for entrance
into heaven, i.e. it illicitly assumes that if there are infinite
rewards and punishments to be had then they will be distributed on the
basis of belief or disbelief in the Christian god. There are many
possible ways in which such rewards and punishments might be
distributed; they might be distributed on the basis of belief in the
Christian God, or on the basis of good deeds, or on the basis of
belief in the Muslim God, for instance. In fact, distribution of
heavenly rewards and infernal punishments on almost any basis
imaginable appears to be possible. It is only, however, if such
rewards and punishments are distributed on the basis of belief in the
Christian God that belief in the Christian God is in our interests. On
many of the other possible distributive schemes, it is by disbelieving
in the Christian God that one receives a heavenly reward. If any of
those distributive schemes were the true scheme, though, then the
third premise of Pascal’s Wager would be false. It would not be the
case that if one does not believe in the Christian God and the
Christian God does not exist then one gains little or nothing, for if
such a distributive scheme were the true scheme then one might gain a
great deal (i.e. an infinite reward in heaven) by disbelieving in the
Christian God. In order to demonstrate that the third premise of his
argument is true, then, the advocate of Pascal’s Wager must
demonstrate that the only possible criterion for entrance into heaven
is belief in the Christian God and the only possible criterion for
entrance into hell is disbelief in the Christian God. This, the
objector suggests, cannot be demonstrated, for it is false.
OBJECTION 2:
The second objection to Pascal’s Wager targets the fourth premise of
the argument as it is stated above. It is the objection that the
probability that God exists, and so the probability of either
receiving an infinite reward in heaven or of receiving an infinite
punishment in hell, is so small that these possible outcomes of belief
or disbelief can be discounted. The choice between belief and
disbelief is thus taken to be a choice between losing little or
nothing and gaining little or nothing. As it is better to gain little
or nothing than it is to lose little or nothing, this objection
concludes that it is wagering on atheism, rather than wagering on
theism, that is the rational course of action. It is better, the
objection suggests, to take the certain benefits of disbelief (the
joys of indulging in sin and of being free from religious commitments)
by wagering that God doesn’t exist than it is to gamble on the vastly
improbable hope of a heavenly reward and almost certainly gain nothing
at all.
OBJECTION 3:
The third objection targets the inference from the fifth and sixth
premises to the conclusion. It is the objection that we cannot choose
our beliefs. We form our beliefs on the basis of evidence, not on the
basis of desire. No matter how much one may want to believe that a
given proposition is true, one cannot bring oneself to do so simply
through an act of will. Rather, in order for one to come to believe
that a proposition is true one requires evidence for its truth.
Pascal’s Wager, though, merely prescribes belief in God; it does not
provide any evidence that such a belief would be true. As such, it
asks us to do the impossible: to believe without reason.
Yeah! To believe without reason is called FAITH.
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The Planet X Saga: Science.........By Nick Obre.
As you can read at the scientist's page, Nibiru, planet X, etc., just cannot exist.
Every detail on those planets are false.
You can rest assured nothing will happen in this world in the coming thousand years.
You can sleep tight, as I was sleeping last 27 february, 2010, when a real big quake 8.8 magnitude shattered every house in Chile, where I happened to be standing, and the sea produced a tsunami who sweeps away houses, dogs and cars, people and birds, even rats- and left Chile as in 1950.
Some of us thinks hard, and produced the Why we are in the 3 world instead of at the team of the developed countries. Several times we had been on the verge of to became a developed country, and bingo, planet Earth reconsidere the matter and sent us to the bottom of the barrel.
Where we are now.
If somebody could had told me : beware with your gadgets, computers, books and things, because a big earthquake is coming... I certainly would had doned something about it. I would fasten things, the big ones on the floor, sticks to the shelves not to sway and went to the floor with everything jumping around.
I would had left the door open to be able to run to the yard, or better still, I would had told my family to stay at the yard seated on armchairs and robbed with blankets waiting for the show.
Nothing I knew, so I suffered as everyone else. My 17 computers went to the floor, the big shelves collapsed one against the other, the thousand little things were scattered to the floor, the door was not able to open with the debris from the outside of my office.
The big earthenware I bought at Pomaire (where they work in art on clay) went to the ground and were grinded there; pots and pans went to the floor, shattered after the impact.
Some other people does not loose glasses and cups, or had to take the computers from the floor and clean them with a mop. They saw their buildings collapse and were entombed among floors. Others saw their ancient big houses collapse in clouds of dust. Others, of course, saw the blackness of night became the nothingness of death.
So I ask you: could we believe nothing is going to happen in this big stone called Earth, voyaging as an arrow flies in the air, towards a ball of fire who is traveling as fast as your imagination could grasp with an unknown course nobody plotted?
The IRAS Incident Brown Dwarfs Orbits and Gravity
New (1/19/03): SOHO images Miscellaneous
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The IRAS Incident
Many people, including Mr. Hazlewood, claim that NASA actually sighted Planet X in 1983, and it was reported in the Washington Post! The article claims that two scientists named Neugebauer and Houck used the Infrared Astronomy Satellite (called IRAS) and found a Jupiter-sized object a few billion kilometers out from the Sun.
This turns out not to be the case. Rather than rely on the accuracy of a newspaper article (and you can find out how accurate those are elsewhere on this site) I did something that never occurred to the doomsayers: I sent an email to the two astronomers asking what happened back in '83. Gerry Neugebauer replied, and told me the real poop.
IRAS was designed to look in the far-infrared, well past what our eyes see. At the time, no one was really sure what it would find. To everyone's surprise, several bright point sources were found that did not correspond to anything seen on optical images taken of the same areas. In the press conference, the two scientists said that these objects could be almost anything, from a tenth planet in our solar system to distant galaxies.
Guess which it turned out to be? Sure enough, much deeper images were taken, and some of the objects were found to be dense gas clouds in our own Galaxy, while others turned out to be very distant galaxies. In fact, these observations heralded the discovery of a new type of object: Ultra-luminous Infrared Galaxies (ULIRGs). These are galaxies in which there is a burst of stars being born. The cocoons of dust in which the stars are enshrouded generates copious infrared, which is what was detected by IRAS. They published these results in the prestigious Astrophysical Journal, and you can even read it yourself.
So IRAS did not see Nibiru, Planet X, or anything of the sort, despite the claims of the doomcriers. Of course, they now claim that NASA is clamping down on the press for Planet X. The original Post article, they say, was hastily retracted due to pressure from the NASA thugs. Of course, the doomcriers have absolutely no evidence of this (because, of course, this claim is wrong), but they continue to state it as if it is fact. It is nothing of the sort. They like to make claims like this for many reasons: it generates an "us vs. them" mentality, which is great for conspiracies, and it helps sell books and/or videos. But it's wrong at best and a lie at worst.
A good page with a lot of detail about the IRAS observations is written by Tom Chester, an astronomer on the original IRAS team that found the mystery sources. Straight from the horse's mouth, if you will.
You can also read more about IRAS and Planet X at the Planet X and the Pole Shift website, which also has a copy of the original Washington Post article.
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Brown Dwarfs
[Note added January 19, 2003: in this section, I originally mistakenly gave the brown dwarf a visual magnitude of 17, when in fact it's more like 25. This is a factor of about 1600 in brightness. I have made the correction in this section and fixed the math involved. While a factor of 1600 seems like a lot, it doesn't change my argument that if Planet X were a brown dwarf, it would be easily visible to the naked eye.]
Mr. Hazlewood and many others on the web claim that Planet X is a brown dwarf. As strongly as I can make this claim, this is impossible.
Why? Because of what a brown dwarf is. We are familiar with stars, which are luminous balls of gas that fuse elements in their core. Stars are massive enough that the pressure and temperature in their cores are enough to maintain fusion. Planets are smaller, cooler objects which are, in general, not self-luminous. Planets are bright because they reflect sunlight. Their mass is too small to have fusion in the core.
A brown dwarf is an object that is somewhere in the netherworld between stars and planets. By definition, a brown dwarf is an object that has a mass less than is needed to sustain fusion, and at the lower mass end they blend into planets. For more detail, you can read my pages about brown dwarfs here and here.
Brown dwarfs are born hot, since they are formed, like stars, from a collapsing cloud of gas and dust. This process makes a lot of heat, sometimes enough that even a brown dwarf can have fusion in its core, at least for a while. But they cannot maintain that fusion, and eventually cool off.
A mature brown dwarf glows in infrared. It has a temperature of something like 1000 to 2500 degrees Celsius. An object that hot puts out very little visible light, but gives off more infrared. Not that they're all that bright: they are so faint that the first brown dwarf discovered, named Gliese 229b, eluded detection until 1995! It glows feebly at about magnitude 25 in visible light. That makes it roughly 1/40,000,000th the brightness of the faintest star visible to the unaided eye, and takes a fair sized telescope to see at all.
However (and this is a big however), Gliese 229b is a long way off: about 18 light years away, or roughly 200 trillion kilometers! If we go with Mr. Hazlewood's claim that Planet X is a brown dwarf, we can assume it is much like Gliese 229b. At a distance of even Pluto's orbit, Planet X would be a billion times brighter, glowing visibly at magnitude 2, making it a relatively bright star! Mind you, as I write this (July 2002) it must be significantly closer to us than Pluto, and proportionally brighter. It would be the third brightest object in the sky (only the Moon and Sun would be brighter). We don't see it, which leads me to the conclusion that it doesn't exist.
Even if we assume that, somehow, magically, Planet X does not glow in the visible (even though Mr. Hazlewood claims many times in his book that it does indeed glow), it would still reflect sunlight. A brown dwarf has about the same size as Jupiter (due to the way planets behave, piling more mass onto Jupiter won't make it bigger, it'll make it denser). Jupiter is actually the fourth brightest object in the sky, so a reflecting brown dwarf would be similarly bright. However, again, we don't see it.
Finally, a brown dwarf may be puny compared to a star, but can be very massive compared to a planet. Ms. Lieder claims that Planet X has a mass something like 5 times the Earth's mass, which is more like a normal planet than a brown dwarf. Either way, something this massive plowing through the solar system would be greatly affecting the orbits of the outer planets. However, the planets appear to be just where they should assuming Planet X does not exist.
Conclusion: Doomsayers claim Planet X is a brown dwarf (or even a massive planet). However, it's not hard to see that there can be no such brown dwarf anywhere near the Earth. Therefore, the claims are wrong.
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Orbits and Gravity
Planet X is claimed to be on an orbit that brings it close to the Sun every 3600 years. Now, if we assume that this orbit obeys the laws of gravity, then we can calculate its distance at any given time. This depends on the math of gravity, which is pretty well understood.
However, the equations used to figure distance based on orbital velocity are not simple, but I used the method as described by Dr. Joseph Gallant, Assistant Professor of Physics at Kent State University, which allows for plug-and-chug solutions. I find that in one year, Planet X must be about 900 million kilometers away from the Earth, give or take a hundred million. This is much closer to Earth than Saturn, and just a bit farther than Jupiter!
[Note (added July 27, 2002): A small Oops here; when I did this calculation originally, I did it incorrectly, and got a distance too small by about a factor of two (I originally said 550 million kilometers). I have been more careful and got this new number.]
I have written up detailed notes on how I arrived at this figure: what assumptions I made and how I calculated it. They are on the "Planet X and Orbit Math page. There is a fair bit of math there, but hopefully I have made it clear what I did and why I did it.
So, Planet X was roughly the same distance to us a Saturn in May 2002, it should have been at least as bright as Saturn and getting brighter by the minute. Saturn is one of the brightest objects in the sky. We see nothing like this, so again I conclude Planet X does not exist.
Of course, Mr. Hazlewood claims that we do not understand gravity, but that's completely incorrect. We understand gravity well enough to calculate orbits for comets and asteroids and send probes to other planets. If Planet X doesn't obey the laws of gravity as we know them, then it's magic, and then he's wrong anyway.
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Miscellaneous
Sometimes the science abused by the doomsayers is pretty garbled. Take, for example, this passage from Mr. Hazlewood's book "Blindsided", where on page 11 he quotes a source (anonymous, of course), who says:
A whole team was contacting every observatory in France -- just sent a message. The Neuchatel observatory got it. They are very excited, wondering if it is a comet or a brown dwarf, through the latest coordinates given. The daughter of the astronomer reports that they suspect a comet or a brown dwarf on the process to becoming a pulsar since it emits "waves."
To be perfectly blunt, this quotation is just plain silly. First, a comet is easily distinguishable from a brown dwarf using an optical telescope: the brown dwarf appears as a star, while a comet has a distinctly fuzzy appearance. Second, a brown dwarf cannot become a pulsar. A pulsar is formed when a massive star (100 or more times the mass of even the largest brown dwarf) explodes as a supernova. The core collapses, forming a neutron star. This rapidly rotating ultradense object can emit two beams of light like a lighthouse does. We see these beams as rapid pulses, hence the term "pulsar". But a brown dwarf cannot form a pulsar. Third, everything emits waves. A star does, a pulsar does, a comet and brown dwarf do, you do. Anything above absolute zero emits electromagnetic waves, so that statement by Mr. Hazlewood's anonymous mole is particularly weird, and non-informative. In other words, it's meaningless. Even if this informant meant pulses from a pulsar, it's still wrong, since a brown dwarf cannot become a pulsar.
Incidentally, the Neuchatel Observatory is in Switzerland, not France. Mr. Hazlewood's informant didn't even get that part right.
ppppppppppppppppppp
Only the birds fly.
