The Heisenberg uncertainty principle and it's affects on western thought

himilefrontier · Aug 31st, 2003, 09:05 PM

Ok, I was thinking about this one tonight while I was delivering pizza.The Heisenberg uncertainty principle states that you cannot know where an electron is in it's orbit since it is constantly changing.This has had a profound affect on the philisphical direction of the western world.The reason being that the previous understanding of the universe was that all things had a difinitive describeable order and this seems to contradict that.The thought goes that if things are uncertain, how can there be a orderly God that put it all in motion?This leads us to the popular current philosophy of Post-Modernism.Modernism stated that absolute truth exists, but there was no requirement of a higher power to define it.Post modernism states that not only isn't there a God, but absolute truth does not exist since all people are equally qualified to make their own moral decisions in the absence of a higher power than man.I dunno.I can't figure out how else to say what I am thinking.Anyone have anything to add to this?

Playa123 · Aug 31st, 2003, 10:04 PM

Yeah i do. I think you should post this in the regular forums so at least it goes to your thread count, something of this magnitude should count as 5-6 posts. Oh and yeah, this was the most intelligent thing i thought of all day

himilefrontier · Aug 31st, 2003, 11:34 PM

The problem is that this has nothing at all to do with Nissans,so posting it elsewhere would just be an excuse for post-whoring. It is where it belongs, and hopefully I can get some more feedback on this.My intention with these posts(this and the Thermodynamics thread) is to make people think outside the box and question the common wisdom.If I do that, I have done what I set out to do.

Harris · Sep 1st, 2003, 12:06 AM

Thats when you see what scientist have to say about it. The very fact that something is so perfectly shaped as an atom with electrons following a certain orbit tells you that it was not a random event that made the atom what it is. Human limitation is why we can never tell where the electron actually is around the orbit it goes.

Indeed, there is something or someone that designed it to be so, some genius architect that had a role to play. Some call that genius "God", and some just keep on searching.

dankar · Sep 1st, 2003, 05:43 PM

It seems to me that the universe is quite ordered. How could order come from chaos as a random event? Every force has an opposing force, etc.
Maybe there are to many "modernists" with too much time on there hands to accept the obvious. God is alive. There is too much evidence to think otherwise.
I wouldnt want to be on the wrong side of the argument.

Felonious Cat Stalker · Sep 1st, 2003, 08:53 PM

I gotta back up harris on this one. Before I started enlightening myself by doing all this scientific reading on quantum theory, relativity and the origins of life in the universe, I gave little thought to the existence of a higher being.

Now though, I read some very compelling arguements for the existence of a God, from a scientific standpoint. How else would the universe be such an ordered system, with strict rules on the behavior of particles and energy?

niky · Sep 1st, 2003, 10:58 PM

it's possible without a God... personally, the conflict between quantum and particle physics has never seemed quite so strange to me... i mean, if these things average out at the scale where they become important to us... (i.e., a sufficiently high number of chaotic interactions average out to... zero change...) ...the only question is how these processes were changed from absolute chaos to include larger particles and eventually, the universe?

hey... maybe there IS a God...

...i'm not being sarcastic...

himilefrontier · Sep 2nd, 2003, 12:46 AM

I actually am a Born Again Christian(not a very perfect one though...) and come at this from that perspective.Heisenberg indeed did not disprove the existence of God, but many took his and other theories and philosophies of the late enlightenment and Modern periods and used them to do so.Also, Quantum Mechanics and particle physics are not mutually exclusive, if String theory is to be taken seriously.

niky · Sep 2nd, 2003, 01:55 AM

none of us are really perfect Christians... we wouldn't be online if we were.

string theory solves a bit, but like most forays into modern physics, it still has some holes... yes, a lot of people have tried to use science to disprove God, but this is merely a reactionary movement to people who have tried to use God to destroy science... Science and Religion are sort of like quantum and classical physics... they both have something important to tell us, but we can never get them to agree...

himilefrontier · Sep 2nd, 2003, 02:01 AM

This is true.We do not have perfect knowledge of either God or the universe.Once we know God perfectly, we will understand the universe perfectly.However, this is not possible during our biological lifetime since this universe is corrupted by the presence of sin.

niky · Sep 2nd, 2003, 02:56 AM

what's your definition of sin?

mine is:
intolerance
ignorance
the restraint or violation of the freedoms of others

sounds like the government, doesn't it?

by the way, the negation of the last one is also a concept of liberitarianism, isn't it?

himilefrontier · Sep 2nd, 2003, 03:38 AM

You are defining sin by your own worldview, and by doing so believing that God has the same set of standards that you have. The problem is, we are all equally able to define our own view of right and wrong and therefore no individual can be considered more "right" than another.Without one higher than ourselves, we are all little gods defining our own universes.In order for there to be a true right or wrong, there must be a lawgiver higher than the human race or any other force in the universe(Read C.S.Lewis' "Mere Christianity"for a good explination of why this must be)My definition of sin is anything that is rebellion against the will of God,either that which He has revealed to us in Scripture, or that which he has shown an individual that the individual decides not to obey(I.E. Jonah's refusal to go to Nineva).Ultimately, Christianity differs from other religious systems in that it requires a sacrifice, not from the convert, but from the very God who will judge the whole of humanity.Salvation is not earnable by good works, pilgrimages, sacraments , etc.These things are done by the convert not from trying to earn the individuals savation, nor is it to cleanse one from one's sins-that was already done at the Cross.Rather it is done out of love and a thankful heart for what was done at the Cross.However, while Salvation is a free gift, it does require a change of the human heart to be real.If this change is not there, the individual is not truly saved.This is where many people have a problem(myself included sometimes, and even such luminaries of the Christian faith as Martin Luther also struggled with this ). I cannot adequately explain how to overcome this problem, since it is a personal thing for each individual.Christianity in it's proper form is a personal relationship and not a religion. Hope I answered some of your question.

himilefrontier · Sep 2nd, 2003, 03:51 AM

As to libertarianism,I believe in it since I believe that each person should have some sort of right to use their own free will for self-determination.Religious beliefs are up to an individual and should not be forced upon anyone, since all have a right to their own search for empirical truth, so long as it does not impinge on the rights of others-especially those more innocent in a given situation than themselves.Pot is my good example.I do not think it is a good thing to smoke pot.However, I do not think that it should not be legal for that reason alone.It is an individual's right to use it if he wishes(and yes, I have used it and would probably have a hard time not doing so were it legal).I do not believe that it causes certain harm to an innocent party in all situations.Abortion however, if life begins at conception, ends an innocent life that did nothing to harm anyone and as such should be illegal according to my litmus test(I do not wish to debate abortion here, I am just using it as a example since it came to mind)Hope that clears up some things(or at least helps explain my worldview)

niky · Sep 2nd, 2003, 11:36 AM

actually, if we go by natural law as God's will... nothing would be a sin... but still, my personal definition of sin would be anything that hinders others from pursuing their own paths towards the ultimate truth...

you're right, any human definition of right and wrong is by definition, limited by the human viewpoint and cannot reflect God's actual morality... this is where most religions falter...

C.S. Lewis was a great man...

my beef with Christianity is that the concept of salvation by acceptance and belief has deluded millions of otherwise "good" Catholics to lead lives that are "immoral" by Christian standards...

remember the crusades, inquisitions and the like? organized religion... wherein it is forced down the throats of others is downright evil (sometimes...)...

if only all Christians would be truly Christian and not Catholic, Baptist, Adventist, Mormon or any of that dogmatic crap (sorry, all...) ...not that it's bad to be any of the above per se, but their non-acceptance of others of different faiths and cultures is so disheartening... if only we could all follow Christ's example of acceptance and tolerance...

I like the idea of libertarianism, unfortunately, as ideal as it may seem, it would most probably fail in practice, as most idealistic political systems (like communism, socialism or democracy) do... democracy only works (marginally) because self-interest provides its own checks and balances...

You're right, though... any harm done KNOWINGLY to oneself should not be illegal... it's stupid, but if it is done of free choice, so be it. Abortion has always been a borderline topic for me, but i agree that once the embryo has become an identifiable organism, it has legal rights as a human being, and should be treated as such.

himilefrontier · Sep 2nd, 2003, 12:02 PM

AAAH...but how can one define oneself as a true Christian and live a live that is counter to faith?If you are truly trusting Jesus Christ, you will attempt to follow his precepts since you believe that he loves you and has your best intrest in mind.If a person goes forward and gets saved at the altar, and then goes out and hires a prostitute, was he genuinely contrite?To say that you are saved and never make an effort to follow the law of God is hypocritical.This is not to say that a Christian cannot fall into a lifestyle of sin after a genuine conversion, but that if the person never feels giulty about it and never had a truly changed life to begin with, he has every right to question wether or not his salvation is genuine.I believe it was the Corinthian church that had this problem, and Paul wrote about it in his letters to them.

Tolerance:In Post-Modern philisophical thought there are two types of tolerance: positive tolerance and negative tolerance. Positive tolerance never passes judgement and accepts all but one thing:intolerance! Negative tolerance is live and let live too, but does pass moral judgement and will actually say something is wrong.These people are considered to be "intoloerant" to the other crowd since they believe in moral absolutes.Therefore, the Christian family that lives next to a gay couple and does them no evil and treats them nicely, but does not accept their choice of lifestyle as equivalent to their own is considered just as intolerant as the KKK people who burn a cross in someone's yard.