Notes
[Notebook: DB 58 Bringing god home]
[Sunday 4 December 2005 - Saturday 10 December 2005]
[page 26]
Sunday 4 December 2005
'Intuition is like reading a word
without having to spell it out. A child can't do that because it has
so little experience. But a grown up person knows the word because
they've seen it often before.' Agatha, Vicarage, p 65. Christie
The epistomological works of Agatha Christie
Since the world started with very little structure, the 'initial
singularity' we would expect the fundamental explanation of it to be
very simple. The Universe we see is a point in a space with
sufficient entropy to describe every detail of the Universe.
Use Gödel's technique, to give every particle or string of
particles in the Universe a transfinite number.
What is the entropy of a space with no constraint? We begin with
the Cantor Universe.
Monday 5 December 2005
Government for the people vs government against the people.
MOTIVATION carrot vs stick, for vs against
The Stalin model is to govern against
the people, using what you take from them to build the strength to
take more. de Jonge
Since the days of Newton and Galileo, the terms 'theology' and
theological' have gradually accumulated the connotation of
'unscientific' and people have been at pains to distinguish theology
from science, as they have been to divorce religion and politics.
[page 27]
Tuesday 6 December 2005
'That god is not observable' is a model dependent assertion, since
we can verify nothing about things which we cannot observe.
In network terms, a religion is a protocol or set of protocols
which binds a group of people into an effective whole. By effective
we mean that the members of the religion are fitter (in the Darwinian
sense) than if they were not members. We see competition between
religious groups, and we have seen, in the last two millennia, the
Roman Catholic Church and its offspring replace thousands of local
religions with something approximating a global religion, the
communications protocols of the one, holy, catholic and apostolic
church of Rome whose head office is the Vatican state.
In short let us define a community of people as a group sharing
common protocols to maintain a peaceful and secure environment in
which people may prosper. In communication terms, peace and security
are increased by decreasing the probability of errors in the network.
This problem shows up most acutely in contact situations where people
from different religions meet. The question arise as to whether this
meeting will lead to competition or cooperation or a mixture of both.
Now there is no reason why one person may not use different
protocols when communicating with different people. Care is always
necessary when moving into new territory, but one can remain at peace
in many worlds if one fits into these worlds. A corollary of this
observation is that human freedom demands that
[page 28]
no religion may require its adherents to reject the protocols of
another religion. Since religions are organizations competing for the
resources for survival, there is naturally conflict between them,
which requires members of a religion to 'stand up for their side'.
This requirement for conflict may be avoided by demonstrating that
cooperation effectively increases the fitness of all members of both
religions.
Theology and religion are an instance of the general relationship
between theory and action. The network theology developed above may
be applied to the problem of creating wealth by cooperation and
avoiding the destruction of wealth by conflict. Wealth and fitness
seem to be closely correlated, although we notice (sued contra), that
poorer people tend to have more children, perhaps because they have
fewer options in life. Many reject the difficulties and
responsibilities of reproduction and instead use their wealth to
pursue some other less biological good.
What does network theory have to say about the creation of
fitness? It shows us how to establish the sine qua non of a stable
network, the ability to detect and correct errors efficiently enough
to make the network useful and so valuable.
We take our arguments from quantum mechanics using the notion of
invariance with respect to complexity, ie recursion.
The key to error correction (and this is the theoretical
foundation for any global manifold of religions is Shannon's
theorems.
Communication is error free (in the formal sense) when the symbol
received by the receiver is invariably the same as the symbol sent by
the transmitter, so an a is an a and so on. A noisy communication is
one that is capable of changing the identity of a symbol en route
through it so that, for instance, an a is received as
[page 29]
z.
Shannon's first idea is that confusion and effort are a result of
the symbols being too close together so that the are easily
transformed or mistake. His second idea is that we can make symbols
further apart from one another by encoding strings of symbols from
the source in a special way. His third idea was to measure
information using [the probabilistic idea of entropy.]
As you probably know my ambition is to create an uber-religion
that shows that all religions are in fact instances of a certain
function, so enabling them all to live together in peace.
Always trying to reach a little further, to capture the pith of
the matter.
The quantum mechanical route to peace
was first seen by Feynman, who drew attention to a feature of quantum
mechanical formalism which clearly distinguishes it from classical
mechanics. [ie that there is a lot of processing (communication,
correlation, entanglement) going on that we cannot see] Milburn
Fitness: ability to manipulate probability currents so that events
favour one's survival and reproduction.
ACTUS PURUS = ℵ0 x h bar (Planck's constant)
Ancient theory is that pure act excludes all possibility. We see
that pure act is attended by a Cantor Universe of possibilities.
Wednesday 7 December 2005
Thursday 8 December 2005
Friday 9 December 2005
The quantum world lies 'behind' the classical world and explains
it. Can we say that all classical
[page 30]
communications are examples of quantum teleportation?
Many of the people who have left us any record seem to have
imagined a hidden force manipulating the visible world. We might see
this as a natural 'anthropomorphic' view arising from our own
awareness of the motivation and design of our conscious acts. This
invisible force sometimes conceived as a person is commonly called
god and described as divine, the subject of theology.
Quantum mechanics brought theology into the heart of physics. So
strange were the observed phenomena that many of the founding
fathers, like Heisenberg, specifically excluded attempts to
understand what was going on. We can be satisfied with the fact that
our mathematical models work.
Quantum mechanics describes the world in terms of states and
transformations between states. The mathematical home of quantum
mechanics is Hilbert space. In this space stats are represented as
vectors [or functions] that is ordered sets of symbols, and
transformations between states are performed by operators represented
as matrices, ie two dimensional arrays of symbols.
Definition of Hilbert space
State Vector
Operator
Interpretation - Born
Network - Shannon, Turing, Gödel etc.
The wave functions evolve through a 'virtual' process which
controls the outcomes and their probabilities, given various initial
conditions.
One cannot design effectively unless one can predict the
[page 31]
behaviour of the structure so designed so as to optimize it and
maximize the cost/benefit of implementing the design.
The connections between the atomic events of the Universe are
mediated by the transfinite network working beneath the surface, just
as a puppeteer gives meaning to the atomic gestures of the puppets by
selecting and ordering them into an ordered set, the puppet show.
The gulf between evolutionists and creationists is a result of the
gulf between modern cosmology a (the study of kosmos, ie ordering the
Universe) and ancient theology.
Saturday 10 December 2005
Carlyle
Sartor Resorts: Universe 'one huge dead immeasurable steam engine.'
Keynes Annie's Box p 21. Keynes
|
Related sites
Concordat Watch Revealing Vatican attempts to propagate its religion by international treaty
Copyright:
You may copy this material freely provided only that you quote fairly and provide a link (or reference) to your source.
Further readingBooks
Bernays, Edward, and Mark Crispin Miller (Introduction), Propaganda, Ig Publishing 2004 'A seminal and controversial figure in the history of political thought and public relations, Edward Bernays (1891–1995), pioneered the scientific technique of shaping and manipulating public opinion, which he famously dubbed “engineering of consent.” During World War I, he was an integral part of the U.S. Committee on Public Information (CPI), a powerful propaganda apparatus that was mobilized to package, advertise and sell the war to the American people as one that would “Make the World Safe for Democracy.” The CPI would become the blueprint in which marketing strategies for future wars would be based upon.'
Amazon
back |
Christie, Agatha, Murder at the Vicarage, Dodd Mead 1986 Amnazon customer review: 'Murder at the Vicarage, first published in 1930, is the book that first introduced the world to Miss Jane Marple and the cozy English village of St. Mary Mead. Every mystery fan in the world is or should be familiar with Christie's classic character of Miss Marple. This book presents her at her best and is required reading for any mystery fan. The writing is sharp, the plotting crisp and clever, there are many red herrings and the solution is very satisfying. This is Christie at her very best. Highly recommended.' Lisa Bahrami
Amazon
back |
de Jonge, Alex, Stalin: and the Shaping of the Soviet Union, William Morrow & Co 1986 Editorial review: From Library Journal:
'De Jonge has written a provocative biography of this major figure of Soviet history. He has drawn heavily upon emigre accounts and diplomatic reports; all the same his study is not free of superficialities. He sharply criticizes Stalin's rivals and his World War II allies, and he hides nothing of Stalin's savagery. Yet de Jonge's conclusions, sure to be challenged, are also clear: Russia could never have become a superpower without coercion (the national work ethic being what it is), and, in exercising that coercion, Stalin enjoyed support from every level of Soviet society. This biography will not replace Adam Ulam's Stalin: the man and his era (1973), but it is a useful, clear-eyed introduction for the general reader.' R.H. Johnston, History Dept., McMaster Univ., Hamilton, Ontario
Copyright 1986 Reed Business Information, Inc.
Amazon
back |
Hiaasen, Carl
Hiaasen, Stormy Weather, Grand Central Publishing 1996 From Library Journal
'Take one devastating Florida hurricane, a New York couple on their honeymoon, a skull-juggling but sensitive guy, one former governor turned Everglades hermit, two small-time con artists, a corrupt building inspector, two state troopers, a hapless insurance agent, and what do you have? The recipe for Hiaasen's (Native Tongue, LJ 9/1/91) sixth novel, a delightful romp that is by turns hilarious and moving. These strange characters maneuver through a broken landscape as if born to it, and the author's control of both style and narrative keeps the novel from slipping into silliness. The crimes plotted are minor aspects of a fiction that explores the intersection of the grotesque and the human. Buy wherever good fiction is read.'
A.J. Wright,
Amazon
back |
Jaynes, Julian, The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind, Mariner Books 2000 Jacket: 'At the heart of this book is the revolutionary idea that human consciousness did not begin far back in animal evolution but is a learned process brought into being out of an earlier hallucinatory mentality by cataclysm and catastrophe only 3000 years ago and still developing.'
Amazon
back |
Kahneman, Daniel, Thinking, Fast and Slow, Farrar, Straus and Giroux 2011 'Daniel Kahneman is among the most influential psychologists in history and certainly the most important psychologist alive today. He has a gift for uncovering remarkable features of the human mind, many of which have become textbook classics and part of the conventional wisdom. His work has reshaped social psychology, cognitive science, the study of reason and of happiness, and behavioral economics, a field that he and his collaborator Amos Tversky helped to launch. The appearance of Thinking, Fast and Slow is a major event.' —Steven Pinker
Amazon
back |
Keane, John, The Life and Death of Democracy, Pocket Books/Simon & Schuster 2009 Jacket: 'JK's The Life and Death of Democracy will inspire and shock its readers.Presenting the first grand history of democracy for well over a century, it poses along the way some tough and timely questions: can we really be sore that democracy had its origins in ancient Greece? How did democratic ideals and institutions come to have the shape they do today? . . . '
Amazon
back |
Keynes, Randal, Annie's Box: Charles Darwin, his Daughter and Human Evolution, Riverhead Hardcover 2002 Editorial Reviews
From Publishers Weekly
'In this intimate portrait of the great naturalist as devoted family man, Keynes describes how Charles Darwin's "life and his science were all of a piece." The great-great-grandson of the scientist, Keynes uses published documents as well as family papers and artifacts to show how Darwin's thinking on evolution was influenced by his deep attachment to his wife and children. In particular, his anguish over his 10-year-old daughter Annie's death sharpened his conviction that the operation of natural laws had nothing to do with divine intervention or morality. Keynes, also a descendant of economist John Maynard Keynes, shows that much of Darwin's intellectual struggle in writing On the Origin of Species and The Descent of Man arose from his efforts to understand the role of suffering and death in the natural order of the world. Early in his career, Darwin saw the indifference of natural law as an answer to the era's religious doubts about how a benevolent god could permit human misery; cruelty and pain, he argued, should not be seen as moral issues, but as inevitable outcomes of nature. After Annie's death, however, Darwin's views darkened, and in a private letter he railed against the "clumsy, wasteful, blundering low and horridly cruel works of nature!" Though Keynes doesn't break new ground about Darwin's life and work, he produces a moving tribute to a thinker who, despite intimate acquaintance with the pain inflicted by the "war of nature," could still marvel that, from this ruthless struggle, "endless forms most beautiful and most wonderful have been, and are being, evolved." ... ' Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information, Inc.
Amazon
back |
McGregor, Richard, The Party: The Secret World of China's Communist Rulers, Harper 2010 Amazon editorial review: From Publishers Weekly
'McGregor, a journalist at the Financial Times, begins his revelatory and scrupulously reported book with a provocative comparison between China's Communist Party and the Vatican for their shared cultures of secrecy, pervasive influence, and impenetrability. The author pulls back the curtain on the Party to consider its influence over the industrial economy, military, and local governments. McGregor describes a system operating on a Leninist blueprint and deeply at odds with Western standards of management and transparency. Corruption and the tension between decentralization and national control are recurring themes--and are highlighted in the Party™s handling of the disturbing Sanlu case, in which thousands of babies were poisoned by contaminated milk powder. McGregor makes a clear and convincing case that the 1989 backlash against the Party, inexorable globalization, and technological innovations in communication have made it incumbent on the Party to evolve, and this smart, authoritative book provides valuable insight into how it has--and has not--met the challenge. '
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
Amazon
back |
Milburn, Gerard J, The Feynman Processor : Quantum Entanglement and the Computing Revolution , Perseus Jacket: 'Starting with a clear and concise description of the basic principles of quantum physics, Milburn goes on to introduce some of its most amazing, newly discovered (sic) phenomena, including quantum entanglement, the strangest property of what is already the strangest field of science. Quantum entanglement - which Einstein called "spooky action at a distance" - underlies the interdimensional connections that join seemingly unrelated events and objects. He shows how conventional computers cannot go on getting smaller and faster forever and how the unpredictability of matter at this level has enabled scientists to rethink the way that we could design, build and use the new "quantum computers". Finally Milburn takes us into the near future, when physicists and computer scientists will build new and incredible devices that will deliver a world of lightning-fast computers, unbreakable codes, and even the beginning of Star-trek like matter teleportation.'
Amazon
back |
Mungello, David E, Leibniz and Confucianism: The Search for ASccord, The University press of Hawaii 1977 Jacket: 'In the closing years of the seventeenth century, one of the mot brilliant of modern European philosophers became actively involved in the search for intellectual and spiritual accord between Europe and China. In his search, Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz entered the "Rites Controversy" on the side of the Jesuits, who had achieved positions of remarkable proximity to the Chinese throne. Yet forty years later, the optimism of their cause dimmed. Leibniz died in isolation in Hanover, the papacy ruled against the Jesuits in Rome, and in China there was growing distrust of the Christian missionaries by the monarchy.
Amazon
back |
Packard, Vance, The Hidden Persuaders, Pocket Books 1975 ' It is staggering that a book published in 1957 should remain so relevant, vibrant and important over 5 decades later. This is the story of how the consumer society was created by motivating the public to desire, consume and replace what they probably don't need and didn't know that they wanted. All the techniques described continue to be used to manipulate the public and drive an economy based on consumption, built in obsolescence and fad.
This should be essential reading for all young people in secondary school. However, unfortunately, the power of the persuaders is so great and our will, mine included, so weak that even knowing we are being manipulated for other's profit we continue to fall for it over and over again.' Bob Barr
Amazon
back |
Pope Benedict XVI, and Peter Seewald, Last Testament, Bloomsbury Continuum 2016 'Pope Benedict made history by being the first Pope in over 700 years to resign from office. The Catholic Church the world over was stunned. Worn out by corruption in the Church and by an endless series of clerical sex scandals, he decided that the resolution of all these problems was outside his power for a man of his age.'
Amazon
back |
Papers
Maddox, John, "Is biology now part of physics?", Nature, 306, 5941, 24 November 1983, page 311. "Reductionism is now almost a dirty word, especially in biology, but after 30 years of DNA it is high time that biologists paid attention to the question of what constitutes an explanation. back |
Links
Bernard Keane, The birth of modernity, 'Nearly five hundred years ago, a German theologian published a paper on an obscure doctrinal point. It started a cascade of ideas that fundamentally shaped the modern world.' back |
Domingo Faustino Sarmiento - Wikipedia, Domingo Faustino Sarmiento - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, 'Domingo Faustino Sarmiento (February 15, 1811 – September 11, 1888) was an Argentine activist, intellectual, writer, statesman and the seventh President of Argentina. His writing spanned a wide range of genres and topics, from journalism to autobiography, to political philosophy and history. He was a member of a group of intellectuals, known as the Generation of 1837, who had a great influence on nineteenth-century Argentina. He was particularly concerned with educational issues and was also an important influence on the region's literature.' back |
Maximilien Robespierre - Wikipedia, Maximilien Robespierre - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, 'Maximilien François Marie Isidore de Robespierre (6 May 1758 – 28 July 1794) was a French lawyer and politician. He was one of the best-known and most influential figures associated with period of the French Revolution and the Reign of Terror.' back |
National Snow and Ice Data Centre, AecrticIce News and Analysis, 'Read scientific analysis on Arctic sea ice conditions. We provide an update during the first week of each month, or more frequently as conditions warrant.' back |
Nicholas Morleson, By framing secular society as a Christian creation, Hanson's revival goes beyond simple racism, 'The populist right has seized on this new identity. By arguing that Muslims threaten the West’s Judeo-Christian and secular culture, it has propelled itself into positions of power in a number of countries, including Australia, France and the Netherlands.
Like its European peers, One Nation has reacted to the growing presence of Islam in Australia by emphasising Western civilisation’s Judeo-Christian and secular identity, and by demonising Muslims as belonging to a religion incompatible with secularism.' back |
|
