SASQUATCH
02-03-2008, 05:20 PM
I wanted to bring this subject up and would like to hear your views.
It seems our universe is a mathematical model. It is governed by rational laws that we can discover and comprehend. We interpret this mathematical model as a conglomeration of shapes, colours, movements, forces, etc.
Over the years, humans have discovered the way we experience our universe is very subjective, but what we observe is a result of natural laws that do not change. Before the twentieth century, scientists mostly believed in "absolute time". What this means is that time goes in one direction, at a constant rate, and is measured the same by all observers. If one was to be able to measure the speed of light, an observer travelling towards the source would find that the speed of light would be faster than an observer travelling in the same direction as the light. Of course, the problem of what the speed of light was relative to had to be discovered. The idea at the time was that there was a substance called the "ether", which comprised all space and would not move.
However, the idea of absolute time was put to an end by Einstein with his theory of special relativity (I believe it was 1905). Special relativity states that the speed of light is constant no matter which direction you are travelling in or how fast you are going. Each observer would have his own measure of time, which may differ from some other observer. What we experience is all from the point of view of a biological organism that was born at a finite time in the past, and will die at a finite time in the future.
Basically, what I'm getting at is that the universe is governed by a set of rational laws, but the way we perceive it is subjective and may sometimes lead us to wrong conclusions about the nature of the universe. We can try to be as objective as we can, and have done much to eliminate any subjectiveness, but there will always be a human bias in our perception of the universe.
What are your thoughts on this? ;)
It seems our universe is a mathematical model. It is governed by rational laws that we can discover and comprehend. We interpret this mathematical model as a conglomeration of shapes, colours, movements, forces, etc.
Over the years, humans have discovered the way we experience our universe is very subjective, but what we observe is a result of natural laws that do not change. Before the twentieth century, scientists mostly believed in "absolute time". What this means is that time goes in one direction, at a constant rate, and is measured the same by all observers. If one was to be able to measure the speed of light, an observer travelling towards the source would find that the speed of light would be faster than an observer travelling in the same direction as the light. Of course, the problem of what the speed of light was relative to had to be discovered. The idea at the time was that there was a substance called the "ether", which comprised all space and would not move.
However, the idea of absolute time was put to an end by Einstein with his theory of special relativity (I believe it was 1905). Special relativity states that the speed of light is constant no matter which direction you are travelling in or how fast you are going. Each observer would have his own measure of time, which may differ from some other observer. What we experience is all from the point of view of a biological organism that was born at a finite time in the past, and will die at a finite time in the future.
Basically, what I'm getting at is that the universe is governed by a set of rational laws, but the way we perceive it is subjective and may sometimes lead us to wrong conclusions about the nature of the universe. We can try to be as objective as we can, and have done much to eliminate any subjectiveness, but there will always be a human bias in our perception of the universe.
What are your thoughts on this? ;)