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This graph shows that the probability of observing a value of lambda equal to or greater than the measured value (dashed vertical line) is very small. The three lines represent the anthropically predicted probability density distribution as a function of R, the ratio of the cosmological constant in another part of the multiverse to that in our Universe in Starkman and Trotta's MANO scheme. T controls the cosmic time when intelligent life emerges, with T=1 representing our Universe. Credit: American Physical Society.

Cosmologists expose flaws in anthropic reasoning

1 posted on 11/28/2006 10:33:11 PM PST by SunkenCiv
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To: AdmSmith; bvw; callisto; ckilmer; dandelion; FairOpinion; ganeshpuri89; gobucks; KevinDavis; ...

2 posted on 11/28/2006 10:34:11 PM PST by SunkenCiv (I last updated my profile on Thursday, November 16, 2006 https://secure.freerepublic.com/donate/)
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To: SunkenCiv

Nothing is unaffected by being observed.


3 posted on 11/28/2006 10:36:16 PM PST by TBP
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To: SunkenCiv

bump


4 posted on 11/28/2006 10:43:02 PM PST by lesser_satan (EKTHELTHIOR!!!)
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To: SunkenCiv

http://www.iam-spirit.com/articles/article/2925041/43156.htm

"Consciousness is the singular for which there is no plural," wrote the scientist Erwin Schroedinger. Schroedinger, famous for his theoretical disappearing cat, was one of the pioneers of quantum science.

Lately, I've been contemplating the idea, if I understand it correctly (I am emphatically NOT a scientist), that things in a quantum Universe are essentially wavicles -- potentially, at least, in several places at once, achieving locality only when observed. Only when we focus on them do they show up in a specific place called here.

The essential principle is that there is an observer consciousness that is the overriding force in the world, that we all live in that consciousness and that it reveals itself through each of us. It is only when it acts as us that the quantum wave of all things collapses and it settles into an "objective" reality, all other possibilities being discarded in this experience.

Well, isn't God like that? God is everywhere. God is Omnipresent. "There is no spot where God is not," as we often say in New Thought. Yet when we go into treatment and focus on a specific aspect or quality of God, it shows up right here. The nonlocal becomes local, as the scientists say, the only difference being that it is also simultaneously local to everyone else and in different ways.

Ultimately, of course, the observer and the observed are the same thing, but the Universe is set up in such a way as to be able to observe itself. Were it not set up in this way, it could never collapse the wave of potential and nothing would then occur, according to Dr. Amit Goswami, one of the scientists featured in the movie “What the Bleep Do We Know?”. There would be no choices made, thus there would be no resulting actions. The continued unfolding of the blessings of God requires an observation and an observed to interact and get the show on the road.

In his book The Self-Aware Universe: How Consciousness Creates the Material World, Dr. Goswami produces a scientific case for the idea that consciousness drives what manifests in the world. He makes his case by means of quantum physics, but the ideas he discusses comport closely with New Thought.

Goswami defines consciousness as "the ground of being (original, self-contained, and constitutive of all things) that manifests as the subject that chooses, and experiences what it chooses, as it self-reflectively collapses the quantum wave function in the presence of brain-mind awareness."

The idea that consciousness is "original, self-contained, and constitutive of all things" and that it "manifests as the subject that chooses and experiences what it chooses" will be quite familiar to New Thoughters. This is quintessential New Thought philosophy.

Goswami discusses the quantum wave -- the existence of objects in a field of potentiality -- and the experiments that have shown that particles such as photons, even when separated by massive distances, can "communicate" and act in the same way instantly, defying the theorem that nothing can travel faster than the speed of light. These particles have been shown to be able to be in more than one place simultaneously, until observed, at which time, a choice having been made, they collapse their quantum wave and concretize into a given state which is perceived.

Does the same thing happen for people? An experiment in which people who had established a mental bond were locked in metal boxes and one was stimulated to test his response showed that the other partner responded in essentially the same way, showing that these quantum properties apply also to macro objects such as people.

This is why that which is known anywhere in consciousness is known everywhere in consciousness. That is why treatment (scientific prayer) said anywhere works right where the person is who is being prayed for.

According to Goswami, Rene Descartes got it slightly wrong when he wrote "Cogito, ergo sum." ("I think, therefore I am.") It should be "opto, ergo sum" ("I choose, therefore I am.")

In New Thought, we say that it is all about choices. We are always at choice, and the choices we make determine what happens in our lives. It's not what we want, but what we choose. Our choices are revealed by our expectations. When our choices don't work for us anymore, in the words of A Course in Miracles, we simply "Choose Once Again." As we make new choices, new circumstances follow. The formless shows up in new forms, the nonlocal takes on new locality.

The process of creation is a quantum event continually unfolding as and through you. Will you choose to direct it and make your life what you desire it to be?


5 posted on 11/28/2006 10:43:10 PM PST by TBP
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To: SunkenCiv

http://www.wie.org/j11/goswami.asp


6 posted on 11/28/2006 10:45:01 PM PST by TBP
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To: SunkenCiv

One could question the very applicability of the probabilistic conceptual framework to the anthropic principle. As an exaple of anthropic principle-like reasoning, if I have already won the lottery, then my probability of having won it is 1, and to hell with all the bozo losers. OTOH, probabilistic approach could lead to "equality of the outcomes" and 'disproportional impact". Thus it is not a good approach for the conservatives, and ought to be repudiated as such.


8 posted on 11/28/2006 10:53:11 PM PST by GSlob
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To: SunkenCiv

bookmark to read later


11 posted on 11/29/2006 12:42:36 AM PST by Talking_Mouse (wahhabi delenda est)
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To: SunkenCiv

I love graphs, just love em!! Esp this early in the morning!!


12 posted on 11/29/2006 2:10:23 AM PST by gobucks (Blissful Marriage: A result of a worldly husband's transformation into the Word's wife.)
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To: SunkenCiv

If you thought String THeory was mental masturbation, this mental masturbation with KY jelly. I call BS.


14 posted on 11/29/2006 11:44:19 AM PST by Paradox (American Conservatives: Keeping the world safe for Liberalism.)
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