# Anyone got any Mind Blowing Questions?



## joelozzy

Here's a few.

People who are born deaf.
What do they sound like when they are thinking?
Are they only able to create thought through images?


Do blind people dream in colour?



Share yours 

I love trying to wrap my head around questions like this. Some answers are simple, yet some can really mind %*&^ you for hours. 

Without simply researching answers to questions like this.

Try come up with some!


Joel


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## jymellis

did hellen keller masturbate with one hand so she could moan with the other?


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## MaxOfMetal

jymellis said:


> did hellen keller masturbate with one hand so she could moan with the other?



/thread.


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## Dan

If your gran falls down the stairs and breaks her hip when no-one is around...


does she make a sound?


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## jymellis

Plug said:


> If your gran falls down the stairs and breaks her hip when no-one is around...
> 
> 
> does she make a sound?


 
not of i pushed her hard enough and she still has the gag in


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## orb451

What happens if you divide by Zero?

Why is it *bad* if we cross the streams?

Why does a buttered piece of bread always fall buttered side down?

Why does a cat always land on it's feet?

What would happen if you strapped a buttered piece of bread to the back of a cat and dropped it?

 and apologies to George Carlin.

Seriously though, your questions are interesting. Maybe people who are born deaf, still have an inner voice in their heads for thinking. Maybe their ears just don't work, but that part of the brain is still present and possibly functional, but the physical ears or ear-drums don't...

The blind people dreaming in color is interesting too, I guess that would depend on whether the brain is hard-wired with color information or if that comes only through direct perception. If it's the latter, then I guess they probably dream in black n' white, or possibly a series of dull images and rich sounds/smells/touch-sensations.

One question I'd like answered is, how can I get Synesthesia? I want to be able to *see* sounds and hear colors. That to me would be the best.


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## jymellis

orb451 said:


> Why does a cat always land on it's feet?
> 
> .


 
they don't


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## Dan

orb451 said:


> What happens if you divide by Zero?




= FUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUU



orb451 said:


> Why is it *bad* if we cross the streams?




= because crocs might eat you



orb451 said:


> Why does a buttered piece of bread always fall buttered side down?




= because butter has a natural attraction to the floor



orb451 said:


> Why does a cat always land on it's feet?




= because it doesnt have rollerskates



orb451 said:


> What would happen if you strapped a buttered piece of bread to the back of a cat and dropped it?




= Youd divide by zero..leading to FUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUU


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## vampiregenocide

When is your first concious thought?

Is evil a genetic trait?

If a dog had vocal chords like humans, could it learn our language?

If space is infinite, how do we know there wasn't more than one big bang?

And a bit of EPICurus for you:

Is God willing to prevent evil, but not able? Then he is not omnipotent. 
Is he able, but not willing? Then he is malevolent. 
Is he both able and willing? Then whence cometh evil? 
Is he neither able nor willing? Then why call him God?​


orb451 said:


> Why does a cat always land on it's feet?


 
Cats have a fluid inside their heads, near their ears, that acts like a spirit level. When the fluid isn't balanced, it send a messege to the cats brain telling it to right itself up.


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## jymellis

vampiregenocide said:


> Cats have a fluid inside their heads, near their ears, that acts like a spirit level. When the fluid isn't balanced, it send a messege to the cats brain telling it to right itself up.


 
you mean like our equalibrium


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## vampiregenocide

jymellis said:


> you mean like our equalibrium


 
Basically, but more advanced.


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## Dan

Why?


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## pink freud

If your perception of the present is colored by the past, how much of your past is colored by your present perception of it?


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## orb451

pink freud said:


> If your perception of the present is colored by the past, how much of your past is colored by your present perception of it?



Mindfuck.

My understanding was that cats land feet side down *mostly* and not when allowed around Jym  because of their tails. It helped them balance themselves out mid-air. Cut off a cats tail and from what I've heard, they can't balance as well... but that might just be bullshit. The advanced Equilibrium stuff sounds plausible too though 

As for you Vampire's questions, my feelings on God, if there is/was one is that he's BOTH good and evil. To me, it's like everywhere in nature. There's this *balance* between things. Night. Day. Dark. Light. Matter. Anti-Matter. Hot. Cold. etc. All these opposites exist and yet God is supposed to be *just* all good, all knowing, etc. He's outside the natural way of things. 

To me at least, that's why I think he/she would have to have BOTH traits. Good and Evil.


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## synrgy

orb451 said:


> Why is it *bad* if we cross the streams?





Egon said:


> Try to imagine all life as you know it stopping instantaneously and every molecule in your body exploding at the speed of light.


 


Ray said:


> Total protonic reversal.





Venkman said:


> Right. That's bad. Okay. All right. Important safety tip. Thanks, Egon.


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## TreWatson

orb451 said:


> As for you Vampire's questions, my feelings on God, if there is/was one is that he's BOTH good and evil. To me, it's like everywhere in nature. There's this *balance* between things. Night. Day. Dark. Light. Matter. Anti-Matter. Hot. Cold. etc. All these opposites exist and yet God is supposed to be *just* all good, all knowing, etc. He's outside the natural way of things.


 
the god being an all-benevolent person thing, I believe, there's this thing called Necessary evil, which is not necessarily something that opposes good.

i never believed god was this "goody-goody rainboy-flowerchild" character.

what i believed was that god was always RIGHT.

now, this suddenly made things make a lot of sense.

God did things because they're CORRECT to do, and does NOTHING because it's CORRECT to do.

good and bad are just words anyway, because look at situations like war, on both sides, they're good ( to themselves) and evil ( to each other)

that's how i have always thought,


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## techcoreriffman

Which religion, if any, are right?

That question has kept me up at night for quite awhile. Any of all the religions ever could have been right, or none of them at all.


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## orb451

techcoreriffman said:


> Any of all the religions ever could have been right, or none of them at all.



I'm just going to say that I'm in the camp that believes the latter...


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## MFB

orb451 said:


> What would happen if you strapped a buttered piece of bread to the back of a cat and dropped it?


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## vampiregenocide

orb451 said:


> Mindfuck.
> 
> My understanding was that cats land feet side down *mostly* and not when allowed around Jym  because of their tails. It helped them balance themselves out mid-air. Cut off a cats tail and from what I've heard, they can't balance as well... but that might just be bullshit. The advanced Equilibrium stuff sounds plausible too though
> 
> As for you Vampire's questions, my feelings on God, if there is/was one is that he's BOTH good and evil. To me, it's like everywhere in nature. There's this *balance* between things. Night. Day. Dark. Light. Matter. Anti-Matter. Hot. Cold. etc. All these opposites exist and yet God is supposed to be *just* all good, all knowing, etc. He's outside the natural way of things.
> 
> To me at least, that's why I think he/she would have to have BOTH traits. Good and Evil.


 
Yeah cats tails are a big part of it two, both organs work together.


And if that is true, what is the point of hell? Surely hell and Lucifer are the symbols of evil, God being good? If God can be good and evil at the same time, does that mean that the devil can also be good? If so, just how good? And what is the point to worshipping either God if they are a balance between good and evil? And if God is in fact also evil, how can he judge us? What right has he to judge the flawed if he is imperfect himself?


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## orb451

vampiregenocide said:


> Yeah cats tails are a big part of it two, both organs work together.
> 
> 
> And if that is true, what is the point of hell? Surely hell and Lucifer are the symbols of evil, God being good? If God can be good and evil at the same time, does that mean that the devil can also be good? If so, just how good? And what is the point to worshipping either God if they are a balance between good and evil? And if God is in fact also evil, how can he judge us? What right has he to judge the flawed if he is imperfect himself?



Well to me, hell is where all the fun would be. What the hell (pardon the pun) is the point of sitting around in the clouds all day if you can't do anything amusing? And yes, in my view, neither God, nor the Devil would be all "good" or all "evil". They could both be either to varying degrees. 

I don't know that the Devil would be running around saving kittens from trees or anything, but he's probably an OK guy. Same with God, he's probably fucked this shit up so fucking bad anyway, that's he's probably given up and would be like the Big Lebowski. Kind of a big, bearded, aloof kind of guy you'd like to hang out around and grab a beer with.

And yeah, he wouldn't be able to judge us.

He's like Keyser Soze in a way. A spook story crooks tell their kids about... "rat on your pop, and Keyser Soze will get ya".

And like *that* he vanishes into thin air...

Nobody's ever seen him since.


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## vampiregenocide

orb451 said:


> Well to me, hell is where all the fun would be. What the hell (pardon the pun) is the point of sitting around in the clouds all day if you can't do anything amusing? And yes, in my view, neither God, nor the Devil would be all "good" or all "evil". They could both be either to varying degrees.
> 
> I don't know that the Devil would be running around saving kittens from trees or anything, but he's probably an OK guy. Same with God, he's probably fucked this shit up so fucking bad anyway, that's he's probably given up and would be like the Big Lebowski. Kind of a big, bearded, aloof kind of guy you'd like to hang out around and grab a beer with.
> 
> And yeah, he wouldn't be able to judge us.
> 
> He's like Keyser Soze in a way. A spook story crooks tell their kids about... "rat on your pop, and Keyser Soze will get ya".
> 
> And like *that* he vanishes into thin air...
> 
> Nobody's ever seen him since.


 

So you think that the only thing different between God and the Devil is the fact that God is more disciplined, and follows a code, whereas the Devil is more about doing what is good for yourself? Being self indulgent?


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## s_k_mullins

Considering that babies haven't really had a chance to experience the world and don't really have knowledge of their environment, what they hell do they dream about? Because my 8-week-old nephew squirms and smiles and giggles the entire time he sleeps as if he's dreaming of something.
Also, what do dogs dream of? Hot chick poodles and unlimited hydrants to piss on?


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## jaretthale78

when you read to yourself, are you actually hearing something?
when you picture something in your head, are you actually seeing something?
is there such thing as other colors, (other than the ones we know about) ?


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## MaxOfMetal

Not a question, but something to think about. 

There was a theory (heard about it awhile back) that everyone's brain processes color differently. What this means is that one person's idea of green, is another person's idea of pink for example. Now, the only reason we know (in out own minds) that green is that color of the grass and yucky vegetables is that we've been told so. Though really, color is waves of light which need to be processed by the brain, and as we all know, everyone's brain is a little different. Basically, if somehow you were able to see color that was processed by my brain, things that your brain said were "yellow" would look like they were another color, orange for instance. 

I hope I explained that well. 

Now keep in mind, I'm not saying this is true, and for all I know it's complete malarkey, but it's an interesting concept.


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## Winspear

s_k_mullins said:


> Considering that babies haven't really had a chance to experience the world and don't really have knowledge of their environment, what they hell do they dream about? Because my 8-week-old nephew squirms and smiles and giggles the entire time he sleeps as if he's dreaming of something.


Vaginas.


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## orb451

vampiregenocide said:


> So you think that the only thing different between God and the Devil is the fact that God is more disciplined, and follows a code, whereas the Devil is more about doing what is good for yourself? Being self indulgent?



Kind of. I think God *needs* the Devil. In the same way the Devil needs God and the same way God *needs* man, but conversely, man doesn't *need* God.

God and the Devil need each other because they balance each other out. Neither can exist without the other. God and the Devil are essentially one in the same. Doesn't the story go, that God created everything and all was well, including Lucifer, and still, all was well, and then, Lucifer got a hair across his ass or something like that? So God created the Lucifer, but he was a good guy for a while, and then turned bad. Why? Because the world God created was out of balance. It needed the "evil" to keep things on an even keel. And if God is all-powerful, etc, then why not just stamp out the Devil at the outset? Or for that matter, why create Lucifer in the first place if he knew he was going to "fall" and turn bad? Wouldn't he see that coming? 

And so if he sees it coming and lets things play out anyway, then he must have known that having the Devil exist was necessary, to restore balance to the world. And if he didn't see things coming, then he's not omnipotent and just flying by the seat of his pants. In which case, I say the whole world's going down the shitter, so fuck it, might as well do that which makes you happy.


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## s_k_mullins

EtherealEntity said:


> Vaginas.


 This may be it, cuz vagina gives me the same reaction.


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## leandroab

DON'T TALK SHIT ABOUT TOTAL!


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## pink freud

MaxOfMetal said:


> Not a question, but something to think about.
> 
> There was a theory (heard about it awhile back) that everyone's brain processes color differently. What this means is that one person's idea of green, is another person's idea of pink for example. Now, the only reason we know (in out own minds) that green is that color of the grass and yucky vegetables is that we've been told so. Though really, color is waves of light which need to be processed by the brain, and as we all know, everyone's brain is a little different. Basically, if somehow you were able to see color that was processed by my brain, things that your brain said were "yellow" would look like they were another color, orange for instance.
> 
> I hope I explained that well.
> 
> Now keep in mind, I'm not saying this is true, and for all I know it's complete malarkey, but it's an interesting concept.



If you really want a mindfuck think about _why_ things are the color they are. Not the whole light-reflection bit, but what makes a collection of protons, neutrons and electrons yellow or green. If it due to vibration, would all matter turn black at absolute zero?


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## techcoreriffman

^ Total mindfuck.


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## liamh

Who is the bass player for Dream Theater?


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## PnKnG

@vampiregenocide and @orb451
What you have to keep in mind is that the way most peoples today picture it (eternal punishment, burning, torture...) is something that was added to the bible during the middle ages, to make people afraid and force them out of fear to join Christianity.
In old versions of the bible, hell is simply a place far away from God. No punishment or torture. Just away from God.
Another thing is that the Devil, as he is mentioned in a lot of versions of the bible, is actually Lucifer, The Fallen Angel. Once again he was "banned" from God as punishment and send to Hell. But once again Hell is just meant as a place far away from God. No torture or anything like that.
Its simply peoples imagination that turned Hell into "Hell". Since God is the representations of everything good and happy they started to think that away form God must mean the opposite.


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## FWB

Why didn't brokencyde die in that fake bus crash?

Why did Stevie Ray Vaughn have to die in a helicopter crash?


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## vampiregenocide

jaretthale78 said:


> when you read to yourself, are you actually hearing something?
> when you picture something in your head, are you actually seeing something?
> is there such thing as other colors, (other than the ones we know about) ?


 
Don't know about colour, but in terms if the light spectrum that colours make up, if you got a regular piano, each key representing a different type of light and colour, all those we know, including infared and ulltraviolet, it would be about a normal sized piano. But if you extented that piano, adding a key for each theoretical part of the spectrum we can't currently see, then those keys would stretch into space.


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## Antimatter

orb451 said:


> One question I'd like answered is, how can I get Synesthesia? I want to be able to *see* sounds and hear colors. That to me would be the best.


 
You can't 'get' synesthesia. It's something you're just born with, you can't obtain it. It's kind of like making weird shapes with your tongue.
It also happens in varying degrees, someone could see sound, but not hear colors, and vice versa. When I listen to music, every song is a certain color, and it's always that color, never something different. But if you told me what I thought a color sounded like, it wouldn't sound like anything to me. Also, it's not something you think about, you just automatically know.


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## fretninjadave

Could God microwave a frozen burito so hot even he couldnt eat it?

Where are the time travlers?


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## Chelseadevil21

This is random but I thought some of you might find this funny.
If your Uncle Jack helped you off an elephant, would you help your uncle jack off an elephant?


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## vampiregenocide

PnKnG said:


> @vampiregenocide and @orb451
> What you have to keep in mind is that the way most peoples today picture it (eternal punishment, burning, torture...) is something that was added to the bible during the middle ages, to make people afraid and force them out of fear to join Christianity.
> In old versions of the bible, hell is simply a place far away from God. No punishment or torture. Just away from God.
> Another thing is that the Devil, as he is mentioned in a lot of versions of the bible, is actually Lucifer, The Fallen Angel. Once again he was "banned" from God as punishment and send to Hell. But once again Hell is just meant as a place far away from God. No torture or anything like that.
> Its simply peoples imagination that turned Hell into "Hell". Since God is the representations of everything good and happy they started to think that away form God must mean the opposite.


 
We're assuming this is a Christian God. I smply used the term Lucifer because it sounds cool. Our debate can concern any form of God.


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## Konfyouzd

If a tree falls in the woods and no one is there to hear it... 

Who the fuck cares???


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## vampiregenocide

Konfyouzd said:


> If a tree falls in the woods and no one is there to hear it...
> 
> Who the fuck cares???


 Is this the desperate mile?
Are the seagulls hungry still?
Did the pond run out of water?
Turn into a motorway?
Did the forest see itself slaughtered and modelled into decay?
Did the kitten pur?
Did the mermaid slur?
I can't see a wind of wind of a way
We wonder then thunder
Winding road old cold abode
Under mountain snow and howling skies
Where it is grey but to survive first you must be alive
Pinch your skin and look within
Find a thought and a fish finger, baked beans upon your plate, its gotten late again
Why did the wilderness weep tonight?
Do you know the way out?
Do you know the way out?


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## jymellis

Konfyouzd said:


> If a tree falls in the woods and no one is there to hear it...
> 
> Who the fuck cares???


 
hippies


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## ittoa666

Are there more colors, and if so, how will we recognize them?


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## Winspear

vampiregenocide said:


> Is this the desperate mile?
> Are the seagulls hungry still?
> Did the pond run out of water?
> Turn into a motorway?
> Did the forest see itself slaughtered and modelled into decay?
> Did the kitten pur?
> Did the mermaid slur?
> I can't see a wind of wind of a way
> We wonder then thunder
> Winding road old cold abode
> Under mountain snow and howling skies
> Where it is grey but to survive first you must be alive
> Pinch your skin and look within
> Find a thought and a fish finger, baked beans upon your plate, its gotten late again
> Why did the wilderness weep tonight?
> Do you know the way out?
> Do you know the way out?


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## ittoa666

Would you kindly?


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## vampiregenocide

ittoa666 said:


> Would you kindly?


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## leandroab

liamh said:


> Who is the bass player for Dream Theater?



I laughed... Hard.


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## ittoa666

vampiregenocide said:


>


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## liamh

Bioshock win.


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## liamh

Sikth win.


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## Prydogga

This thread is win.


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## MorbidTravis

have you ever wondered what your last minute of life will be like?
i know mine will be pissing someone off, cuz im really good at that.


also, here is a paradox for you. a real thinker

suppose a man travelled back in time and killed his biological grandfather before the latter met the traveller's grandmother. As a result, one of the traveller's parents (and by extension the traveller himself) would never have been conceived. This would imply that he could not have travelled back in time after all, which means the grandfather would still be alive, and the traveller would have been conceived allowing him to travel back in time and kill his grandfather. Thus each possibility seems to imply its own negation.


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## vampiregenocide

MorbidTravis said:


> also, here is a paradox for you. a real thinker
> 
> suppose a man travelled back in time and killed his biological grandfather before the latter met the traveller's grandmother. As a result, one of the traveller's parents (and by extension the traveller himself) would never have been conceived. This would imply that he could not have travelled back in time after all, which means the grandfather would still be alive, and the traveller would have been conceived allowing him to travel back in time and kill his grandfather. Thus each possibility seems to imply its own negation.


 
This is presuming time works in a single stream, like a story, that can be rewritten. What if he did go back in time and killed his grandfather, but just created a tangent reality where he doesn't exist. This would simply be a branch off from the original timeline and therefore not effect events within the original timestream at all. 



If light is matter of some kind, and darkness is lack of light, therefore lack of matter, how come we cannot see through darkness, which is essentially complete nothingness?


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## MorbidTravis

my head just exploaded


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## Dan

vampiregenocide said:


> If light is matter of some kind, and darkness is lack of light, therefore lack of matter, how come we cannot see through darkness, which is essentially complete nothingness?



The question you should really try to ask yourself is do we really see what everyone else sees. If you were to look through someone elses eyes for a split second would you go completely mad? Being able to not comprehend anything you can see because it doesnt register to you as being 'normal'.


what is 'normal'


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## vampiregenocide

Plug said:


> The question you should really try to ask yourself is do we really see what everyone else sees. If you were to look through someone elses eyes for a split second would you go completely mad? Being able to not comprehend anything you can see because it doesnt register to you as being 'normal'.
> 
> 
> what is 'normal'


 
This is true. Likewise, if we spent a minute in the mind of someone who is insane and 'hallucinating', would we turn insane, or really the insane are really the sane ones? Perhaps insanity is just an elevated mental capacity that we can't comprehend, and just call illness, like people in the past called odd behaviour witchcraft.


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## Origin

If Pinochhio says his nose will grow, and he's telling the truth, it will grow.
But it can only grow if he's lying.
If he's lying, it will grow and he will be proven right.

God? What God?


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## vampiregenocide

God never asked Mary if she wanted to have Jesus, does that make God a rapist?


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## xtrustisyoursx

Origin said:


> If Pinochhio says his nose will grow, and he's telling the truth, it will grow.
> But it can only grow if he's lying.
> If he's lying, it will grow and he will be proven right.



Similar:

On the road to and from town, a magic hangman stops every person and asks why they are on the road. If they lie, he hangs them dead, and if they tell the truth, they are free to continue on. A man approaches the hangman and the hangman asks him, "Why are you travelling this road?" The man replies, "I'm here for you to hang me." What does the hangman do? If he hangs the man, the man was being truthful, meaning he shouldn't be hanged. If he lets him go, it will mean the man was lying, which means he should be hanged.


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## CFB

Hasanyone really been as far even as decided to use even go want to do look more like?


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## Randy

What really killed the dinosaurs? /fry


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## Bungle

How is babby formed?


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## Daemoniac

If I have sex while pregnant, can my babby get pregnant?


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## MrMcSick

The deaf person one is neat. If they were born def and never heard a sound they couldn't have an inner voice due to not knowing what voices sound like nor how to say or read words. I wonder if their voice is just abunch of grunts and moans that they associate with certain feelings/thoughts kinda like how we do but we have a system in which there are rules and standards that give us understanding of what the other person is trying to communicate.


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## MorbidTravis

Demoniac said:


> If I have sex while pregnant, can my babby get pregnant?



no, the baby would have to be a girl and would have to hit puberty while in the whom(if it is spelled like that)


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## xmetalhead69

Bungle said:


> How is babby formed?


 
also this thread =


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## joelozzy

Haha great input guys.

And metalhead, that picture just made me laugh for a good 5 minutes.

Cheers 

Joel


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## Nights_Blood

pink freud said:


> If your perception of the present is colored by the past, how much of your past is colored by your present perception of it?



^ Pretty weird to think about.



liamh said:


> Who is the bass player for Dream Theater?





Bungle said:


> How is babby formed?



 and 



xmetalhead69 said:


> also this thread =



Scanners win.


To contribute, how do you know when your pen runs out of invisible ink?


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## eclipsex1

joelozzy said:


> Here's a few.
> 
> People who are born deaf.
> What do they sound like when they are thinking?
> Are they only able to create thought through images?
> 
> 
> Do blind people dream in colour?
> 
> 
> 
> Share yours
> 
> I love trying to wrap my head around questions like this. Some answers are simple, yet some can really mind %*&^ you for hours.
> 
> Without simply researching answers to questions like this.
> 
> Try come up with some!
> 
> 
> Joel




In regards to this, I think in neither words spoken nor written, or pictures or anything. I think in feelings and emotions.. My thought seems to be implied. I understand it perfectly, but it's hard to explain.. So a lot of the time (especially when I spend a lot of the time isolated.. Such as summer) I find it difficult to put things into words. The only time that I'll think in images, etc. is if I'm actually trying to see something in my mind. Maybe it's possible that blind/deaf people think more so that way.


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## Prydogga

This is something I've thought about alot. Are there other colours? Because I know my colours, and my mind can't even fathom the concept of another colour, but do other people see colours different, and would it be possible to have them different, I mean. We see the purple and green and blue etc, but imagine it. I can't really even put into words the way that question makes me feel. 

It's the same with aliens. In TV shows and movies Aliens always have features similar to something on earth, using a nose or eyes, and arms and legs, but would they completely different? For some reason would they not breath? Not use eyesight, but also not hear, how would their body work, what would their understanding of the world be? 

Would there be a completely separate system of math that made as much sense to them as ours does for us? 

I love my mind sometimes.


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## JBroll

Où sont les Neigedens d'antan?

Jeff


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## Herb Dorklift

If the Devil is so evil, why does he punish bad people in hell? Surely the Devil would hail bad people and make Hell an evil person's heaven?


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## Daemoniac

JBroll said:


> comment formé sont des bébés ?
> 
> Jeff



I concur, a valid and intriguing question.


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## MrMcSick

Prydogga said:


> This is something I've thought about alot. Are there other colours? Because I know my colours, and my mind can't even fathom the concept of another colour, but do other people see colours different, and would it be possible to have them different, I mean. We see the purple and green and blue etc, but imagine it. I can't really even put into words the way that question makes me feel.
> 
> It's the same with aliens. In TV shows and movies Aliens always have features similar to something on earth, using a nose or eyes, and arms and legs, but would they completely different? For some reason would they not breath? Not use eyesight, but also not hear, how would their body work, what would their understanding of the world be?
> 
> Would there be a completely separate system of math that made as much sense to them as ours does for us?
> 
> I love my mind sometimes.


 
First part question - People do see colors differently between each other in slight variances. People have different levels of "color blind" such as myself, so I've been told. I see colors just fine I believe but when I take those color blind test's with all the dots and 1 eye closed I don't always see the image hidden in color. I mean, hey this txt is white and the background of the page are 2 different shades of gray and lots of the smiley face emoticons are yellow and blue but the test says I am slightly color blind. I can't see through someone elses eyes so I don't know.

Second question - I like how we are always looking for planetes that have the same quality as earth to see if we can find other lifeforms. That makes sense cause we already know what it takes for us to live here and similair places could sustain life like us buttttt who says aliens have to have the same qualities and requirements as us. I mean they could maybe "breath" sunlight or sustain themselves off of xrays or something. Who knows. Maybe they feed on particular particles of certain gases that are poisonous to us. Just look around on earth and life varies soooooo much. Some things breath water lol. Some don't see and just feel. Some shit freaking flies lolol. Guess we can't look for what we can't even imagine.


----------



## cwhitey2

orb451 said:


> What happens if you divide by Zero?
> 
> 
> One question I'd like answered is, how can I get Synesthesia? I want to be able to *see* sounds and hear colors. That to me would be the best.


 

one word: LSD




Should they allow blind people to drive (cars)?


----------



## vampiregenocide

Prydogga said:


> This is something I've thought about alot. Are there other colours? Because I know my colours, and my mind can't even fathom the concept of another colour, but do other people see colours different, and would it be possible to have them different, I mean. We see the purple and green and blue etc, but imagine it. I can't really even put into words the way that question makes me feel.
> 
> It's the same with aliens. In TV shows and movies Aliens always have features similar to something on earth, using a nose or eyes, and arms and legs, but would they completely different? For some reason would they not breath? Not use eyesight, but also not hear, how would their body work, what would their understanding of the world be?
> 
> Would there be a completely separate system of math that made as much sense to them as ours does for us?
> 
> I love my mind sometimes.


 
There are theorised different colours, because as I said we only see a tiny fraction of the light spectrum. Some people have conditions where somehow they can see parts of the spectrum we can't. There are actually some people who can see infrared light in everyday life. 

Well theres a concept called the universal laws of nature, which basicaly defines the fact that all life must theoretically live based on the same physics principles as us. Gravity, friction, heat etc these are all forces that do not change however far into the universe you go. Their behaviour may change, but the forces themselves are still the same. Likewise, naturual processes couldn't change. Animals would sill need to eat something, or take in energy somehow. Now obviously ecosystems could be based on a completely different elemental body. There could be organisms that breath methane and have silicon based bodies. Then theres the idea of plants; perhaps plants give off different gases and use different elements to produce energy on another planet. In which case, would they need to be green? You could have jungles full of purple, black or blue plants depending on their makeup. The thing is, the more you look to the animals we have here, the less extreme these concepts of aliens appear to be. We have animals on earth that perform mind boggling feats over nature, and it does beg the question that in different environments, how might other organisms overcome these issues? Also, might whole new branches of organisms evolve, or are the creatures we have on earth the blueprint for all life? Will there be mammals, repltiles and birds on other planets as we know them?

Lots of different civilizations have had different ways of doing maths that are as alien as you could imagine. Even now we won't entirely understand some of them.


----------



## vampiregenocide

Herb Dorklift said:


> If the Devil is so evil, why does he punish bad people in hell? Surely the Devil would hail bad people and make Hell an evil person's heaven?


 
You'd think so, if he is such a lover of self indulgence.


----------



## glassmoon0fo

if a midget trips and falls, does it hurt as much?


----------



## Scar Symmetry

Will Chuck Norris ever die?


----------



## glassmoon0fo

Scar Symmetry said:


> Will Chuck Norris ever die?


 
chuck norris died 6 years ago, Death is just too much of a pussy to come get him


----------



## Scar Symmetry

glassmoon0fo said:


> chuck norris died 6 years ago, Death is just too much of a pussy to come get him



Or maybe on that day 6 years ago he came to take him away and Chuck Norris said "NO FUCK YOU" and kicked the shit out of him


----------



## Fzau

Here's one that most of you will be happy to hear:
What is djent?


----------



## Necky379

Fzau said:


> Here's one that most of you will be happy to hear:
> What is djent?



 right or

how can i make my amp djent

how can i get a djent sound

what pups/amp/pedal is best for djent


----------



## vampiregenocide

Fzau said:


> Here's one that most of you will be happy to hear:
> What is djent?


----------



## Daemoniac

Scar Symmetry said:


> Can Chuck Norris die?



Fixed that up for ya there


----------



## MF_Kitten

if you remove foliage...

...does that mean you´re ex-foliating?


----------



## josh pelican

If mermaids are half human, shouldn't the human half be wrinkled up?


----------



## liamh

If an Emporer rules an Empire, and a King rules a Kingdom.
Who runs this country?


----------



## Sang-Drax

Plug said:


> Why?



Why not?


----------



## Randy

Is Sanford in jail right now?


----------



## xtrustisyoursx

Why do you drive in a parkway and park in a driveway?
Why is something transported by ship called cargo, and something transported by car a shipment?


----------



## pink freud

liamh said:


> If an Emporer rules an Empire, and a King rules a Kingdom.
> Who runs this country?



A count?

I know the joke answer is "cunt" but it doesn't translate into written form all that well.


----------



## leandroab

Fzau said:


> What is djent?


----------



## scottro202

joelozzy said:


> Do blind people dream in colour?



My bassist is blind. I'll be sure to ask him and edit my post with the answer

EDIT:




Prydogga said:


> This is something I've thought about alot. Are there other colours? Because I know my colours, and my mind can't even fathom the concept of another colour, but do other people see colours different, and would it be possible to have them different, I mean. We see the purple and green and blue etc, but imagine it. I can't really even put into words the way that question makes me feel.



Pry, I've been wondering this my whole life. Have you been reading my thoughts???


----------



## Herb Dorklift

leandroab said:


>



Baby don't hurt me...


----------



## Antimatter

Who paid the mailboy when he delivered to his own house?


----------



## JBroll

Jeff


----------



## Razorgrin

All the debate about Lucifer as evil ignores the fact that God _put_ him in Hell to do a job. He's not bad; he's just a misunderstood middle manager. The mediæval clerics who needed a tool to control the masses decided he made a decent scapegoat.



MaxOfMetal said:


> There was a theory (heard about it awhile back) that everyone's brain processes color differently. What this means is that one person's idea of green, is another person's idea of pink for example. Now, the only reason we know (in out own minds) that green is that color of the grass and yucky vegetables is that we've been told so. Though really, color is waves of light which need to be processed by the brain, and as we all know, everyone's brain is a little different. Basically, if somehow you were able to see color that was processed by my brain, things that your brain said were "yellow" would look like they were another color, orange for instance.


I've often wondered that myself; there's absolutely no way for me to explain to you what "red" is, so I wonder if it's the same to you.



Plug said:


> The question you should really try to ask yourself is do we really see what everyone else sees. If you were to look through someone elses eyes for a split second would you go completely mad? Being able to not comprehend anything you can see because it doesnt register to you as being 'normal'.


This ties into the above question, but I've wondered that a lot, too; if I could see out of someone else's eyes for a bit, would I just lose my mind? Would my own perceptions ("software?") correct the differences in your physiological makeup ("hardware?"), or would I be forced to experience your perceptual coloring and see things the way you do? Would I even be able to understand the input?



Herb Dorklift said:


> If the Devil is so evil, why does he punish bad people in hell? Surely the Devil would hail bad people and make Hell an evil person's heaven?


See my first point. He's just doing his job.



vampiregenocide said:


> ...we only see a tiny fraction of the light spectrum. Some people have conditions where somehow they can see parts of the spectrum we can't. There are actually some people who can see infrared light in everyday life.


16.7 million colors, given the average human eyeball/brain combo. I'm jealous of people with natural infravision, though!


----------



## BrainArt

Randy said:


> Is Sanford in jail right now?






Larn, what's that? (Kind of an inside joke, but anyone who's seen the video of Devy tracking vocals for Supercrush will get it).


----------



## Whiskey_Funeral

Is Tourettes Guy really dead? Did he even really have Tourettes?


----------



## Razorgrin

Whiskey_Funeral said:


> Is Tourettes Guy really dead? Did he even really have Tourettes?


No to the former. I guess there's some debate about the latter.


----------



## SD83

vampiregenocide said:


> If light is matter of some kind, and darkness is lack of light, therefore lack of matter, how come we cannot see through darkness, which is essentially complete nothingness?


Who says we can't? The only time we can't see through darkness is a)when therei s some kind of matter blocking the light from "behind" the darkness, air or whatever, or b)when there is nothing "behind" the nothingness...


----------



## Razorgrin

SD83 said:


> Who says we can't? The only time we can't see through darkness is a)when therei s some kind of matter blocking the light from "behind" the darkness, air or whatever, or b)when there is nothing "behind" the nothingness...


Darkness, by definition, is the absence of visible light, so those of us who can't sense IR, UV, or other kinds of radiation can't see.


----------



## vampiregenocide

SD83 said:


> Who says we can't? The only time we can't see through darkness is a)when therei s some kind of matter blocking the light from "behind" the darkness, air or whatever, or b)when there is nothing "behind" the nothingness...


 
But any alternative to that would be light of some kind. If you're in a room that is completely pitch black, and you can't see a ball, why can't you if there is nothing technically in front of it? As for seeing in different areas of the light spectrum, thats not possible for us currently so we can't see through darkness. Who knows what sort of things we'd see if we could see other parts of the spectrum? It would revolutionise the way we look at the world.








This diagram shows just how little of the spectrum we can see, and this isn't the whole thing.


----------



## tekkadon d

joelozzy said:


> Here's a few.
> Do blind people dream in colour?
> 
> 
> Joel



didnt read it all but if your born blind you dont dream i heard.


----------



## josh pelican

Why _did _the chicken cross the road?

Why does your nose run and your feet smell?

What would a burger of ham be called?

What's the deal with Chicken McNuggets? What part of the chicken are these things from?

If it's zero degrees outside today and it's supposed to be twice as cold tomorrow, how cold is it going to be?

Did Noah have woodpeckers on the ark? If he did, where did he keep them?

Why is "Charlie" short for "Charles" if they are both the same number of letters?

If you were under house arrest and you lived in a mobile home, wouldn't you be able to go anywhere you want?

Why do people pay to go up tall buildings and then put money in binoculars to look at things on the ground?

Can you cry under water?


----------



## pink freud

tekkadon d said:


> didnt read it all but if your born blind you dont dream i heard.



What you heard is wrong.


----------



## metalvince333

Uploaded with ImageShack.us

Sorry guys I just Had to


----------



## Antimatter

josh pelican said:


> If it's zero degrees outside today and it's supposed to be twice as cold tomorrow, how cold is it going to be?


 
Well, temperature is defined as how fast particles are moving in the space around you, so if they are moving half as fast as they would at 0 degrees C, it would be around -230 degrees C.


----------



## leandroab

josh pelican said:


> If it's zero degrees outside today and it's supposed to be twice as cold tomorrow, how cold is it going to be?



Well, you didn't specify the scale of your temperature...

If Celsius: -9 *
If Fahrenheit: 16 *
If Kelvin (not technically degrees): Then we were already fucked in the first place!



* I'm drunk and I have no idea if this is right ahhaha


----------



## leandroab

Whiskey_Funeral said:


> Is Tourettes Guy really dead? Did he even really have Tourettes?



I want two cheeseburgers. I want pickles and ketchup on them. And don't load it up with a bunch of bullshit...


----------



## josh pelican

If you're drunk/stoned and start talking about...


----------



## Antimatter

The more swiss cheese you have the more holes you have. Does this mean that the more cheese you have, the less cheese you have?


----------



## silentrage

Here's one, why do incredibly fine women go for fucking douchebags? lol.


----------



## Whiskey_Funeral

leandroab said:


> I want two cheeseburgers. I want pickles and ketchup on them. And don't load it up with a bunch of bullshit...



WHO WRINKLED MY RANDY TRAVIS POSTER, PISSED THE SEAT, AND HID THE KEYS?!

Why do they use sterilized needles for death by lethal injection?
Why do Kamikaze pilots wear helmets?
If someone with a split personality threatens to commit suicide, is it a hostage situation?
If the "black box" survives every plane crash, why not make the entire plane out of that stuff?
Should crematoriums give discounts for burn victims?
Why are there Braille signs on drive-up ATM's?


----------



## vampiregenocide

silentrage said:


> Here's one, why do incredibly fine women go for fucking douchebags? lol.



Mind = blown.


----------



## espman

Does God have a sole?


----------



## scottro202

pink freud said:


> What you heard is wrong.





And blind people cry, too. My bassist (who's 98% blind) loves to tell people he can't cry, and laugh at them when they believe him


----------



## Razorgrin

espman said:


> Does God have a sole?


He needs neither shoes nor fish.

One could argue that the soul is the spark of the divine imparted by a creator; thus either that creator possesses a divisible soul (or a stockpile of the stuff) or simply _is_ a soul.


----------



## Fzau

Can one simply walk into Mordor?


----------



## liamh

Fzau said:


> Can one simply walk into Mordor?


 


Scar Symmetry said:


> Will Chuck Norris ever die?


----------



## Varcolac

vampiregenocide said:


> Who knows what sort of things we'd see if we could see other parts of the spectrum? It would revolutionise the way we look at the world.









Brb, getting to the chopper.

Here's a question: if the human body contains iron, tin, copper, aluminium, titanium, nickel, tungsten and gold, why aren't more people metal?


----------



## Prydogga

silentrage said:


> Here's one, why do incredibly fine women go for fucking douchebags? lol.





If I find out a girl is an annoying, alcoholic, drug taking, bad talking mess, I could not be more turned off.


----------



## Daemoniac

EDIT: If I try to lose and succeed, does this mean I win?


----------



## vampiregenocide

What if this isn't real?





Inception = Mindfuck.


----------



## josh pelican

If God exists... does he believe in Glen Benton?

Why do companies offer free gifts if by definition a gift is free?


----------



## jaretthale78

do girls poop?


----------



## josh pelican

Why does 90% of the world's population think "arrogant" and "ignorant" mean the same thing?

Jarett - I've met quite a few girls who admit to pooping. I've also met girls who love to let one rip.


----------



## jaretthale78

josh pelican said:


> Why does 90% of the world's population think "arrogant" and "ignorant" mean the same thing?
> 
> Jarett - I've met quite a few girls who admit to pooping. I've also met girls who love to let one rip.


----------



## josh pelican

jaretthale78 said:


>



One of the farting girls is cute as hell. Want her number?


----------



## jaretthale78

josh pelican said:


> One of the farting girls is cute as hell. Want her number?


 email would be nice


----------



## Captain Axx

hmmm... mind blowing question...

how come everyone who listens to rock and metal gets passed off as an emo? (well, at my school anyway)


----------



## josh pelican

Chuck Norris versus Clint Eastwood.


----------



## jaretthale78

Captain Axx said:


> hmmm... mind blowing question...
> 
> who would win in a fight between chuck norris and chuck norris?
> 
> (silly i know, but it was the best thing i could think of.)


 chuck norris.


----------



## Captain Axx

@jarett, lol, changed the post after you quoted me! sorry! lol

but yeah, true! chuck would win!


----------



## josh pelican

Why is there braille on drive-through ATMs?


----------



## jaretthale78

how come my mom has so many guy friends over everyday and they all ways watch loud movies in her room?


----------



## Razorgrin

josh pelican said:


> Why does 90% of the world's population think "arrogant" and "ignorant" mean the same thing?


Here in the United States, those traits most often coincide.



josh pelican said:


> One of the farting girls is cute as hell. Want her number?


If he doesn't, I do.



jaretthale78 said:


> how come my mom has so many guy friends over everyday and they all ways watch loud movies in her room?


They're cinema fans! Don't judge.


----------



## josh pelican

EDIT: ...


----------



## groph

If the light from the stars took millions of years to get to Earth, we are effectively looking at the night sky as it appeared in the past, almost looking back into time.

So if this is true, then does that mean that at one point in Earth's history the night sky consisted of nothing but darkness, and then slowly, one by one, stars started popping up as their light reached the Earth?

If you and your mother are the only ones in the house and you are about to go out for the night, do you lock the door up because you love her or do you lock up to spare your peace of mind? Abraham Lincoln once rescued a bunch of drowning pigs for the latter reason, he couldn't bear to have the thought on his mind that a bunch of pigs died because he didn't take action. Kind of messes with your thoughts about the real motivations behind altruism. Do you REALLY do things for the benefit of other people?


----------



## JBroll

groph said:


> So if this is true, then does that mean that at one point in Earth's history the night sky consisted of nothing but darkness, and then slowly, one by one, stars started popping up as their light reached the Earth?



Not likely, since the Earth wasn't among the first or the most isolated space clumps to be formed.

Jeff


----------



## vampiregenocide

JBroll said:


> Not likely, since the Earth wasn't among the first or the most isolated space clumps to be formed.
> 
> Jeff


 
This. There were stars around well before earth formed.


----------



## Empryrean

When using almond butter(like peanut butter w/almonds though)
is grape jam or strawberry jam more suited to ensure that the AB&J sammy will automatically get the ladies?


----------



## MF_Kitten

JBroll said:


> Not likely, since the Earth wasn't among the first or the most isolated space clumps to be formed.
> 
> Jeff



was gunna say this 

also, the sky will one day be all empty and black, because of the speeding up of the expansion of the universe. all of our studies on the universe, all our astronomy and stuff, will all be useless, and no-one will have something to refer to anymore to see what the writings are about. it´ll just be a mythical thing. so all the stuff we discover and document now will be the only evidence of it for the distant future.

this is only if humans exist for that long, which i feel is a little unlikely...


----------



## vampiregenocide

MF_Kitten said:


> was gunna say this
> 
> also, the sky will one day be all empty and black, because of the speeding up of the expansion of the universe. all of our studies on the universe, all our astronomy and stuff, will all be useless, and no-one will have something to refer to anymore to see what the writings are about. it´ll just be a mythical thing. so all the stuff we discover and document now will be the only evidence of it for the distant future.
> 
> this is only if humans exist for that long, which i feel is a little unlikely...


 

There is a theory that the expansion of the universe will actually end up reversing, and everything will start to come back in again. Don't know exactly how and why that would work, but I remember reading it.

Plus, who is to say there aren't other big bangs that occurred? In which case more universes could overlap onto ours.


----------



## BrainArt

vampiregenocide said:


> What if this isn't real?
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Inception = Mindfuck.



*Spins Totem*
*Keeps spinning*


FUCK! 



Are Tim Burton and Johnny Depp gay lovers?


----------



## JBroll

MF_Kitten said:


> was gunna say this
> 
> also, the sky will one day be all empty and black, because of the speeding up of the expansion of the universe. all of our studies on the universe, all our astronomy and stuff, will all be useless, and no-one will have something to refer to anymore to see what the writings are about. it´ll just be a mythical thing. so all the stuff we discover and document now will be the only evidence of it for the distant future.
> 
> this is only if humans exist for that long, which i feel is a little unlikely...



I hope that your surprise at our lasting that long wouldn't be the usual Chicken Little we'llkillourselveswithnukesandbabysealclubbingandcapitalismohnoes nonsense... if so, you have a few more numbers to crunch before trying to figure out why we won't last long enough to see an empty sky above us.



vampiregenocide said:


> There is a theory that the expansion of the universe will actually end up reversing, and everything will start to come back in again. Don't know exactly how and why that would work, but I remember reading it.



The two likely are options are 'keep expanding forever' and 'don't', so you're right there.



vampiregenocide said:


> Plus, who is to say there aren't other big bangs that occurred? In which case more universes could overlap onto ours.



... exactly what does that second sentence mean?

Jeff


----------



## Wi77iam

MorbidTravis said:


> have you ever wondered what your last minute of life will be like?
> i know mine will be pissing someone off, cuz im really good at that.
> 
> 
> also, here is a paradox for you. a real thinker
> 
> suppose a man travelled back in time and killed his biological grandfather before the latter met the traveller's grandmother. As a result, one of the traveller's parents (and by extension the traveller himself) would never have been conceived. This would imply that he could not have travelled back in time after all, which means the grandfather would still be alive, and the traveller would have been conceived allowing him to travel back in time and kill his grandfather. Thus each possibility seems to imply its own negation.



 I watched Back to the Future last night.
A very similar situation for Marty.


----------



## ittoa666

What if ghosts are actually living beings and we're ghosts? 




I now, I ripped that from The Others. One of the best movie concepts that i know of.


----------



## vampiregenocide

JBroll said:


> ... exactly what does that second sentence mean?
> 
> Jeff


 
One big bang creates the universe. If more than one big bang occurred, and that second universe also expands like ours is believed to, then there could come a time when both expand to a point where they overlap.


----------



## silentrage

Space is supposed to be infinite, so two universes probably won't overlap, I think one variation of the big bang theory actually says that an infinite number of big bangs happened in every point of space simultaneously.
I mean if just one happened, then where in space did it happen at? did it happen at the center? How do you define the center of infinity? 
Ok those are 3 mind blowing questions right there. 

Here's a bonus one: if 99.999999% of all matter is vacuum, and the remaining stuff (protons and neutrons) are simply fluctuations in the quantum vacuum, then are we the emptiness in the vacuum beings' universe?

Reference:
It's confirmed: Matter is merely vacuum fluctuations - physics-math - 20 November 2008 - New Scientist


----------



## vampiregenocide

silentrage said:


> Space is supposed to be infinite, so two universes probably won't overlap, I think one variation of the big bang theory actually says that an infinite number of big bangs happened in every point of space simultaneously.
> I mean if just one happened, then where in space did it happen at? did it happen at the center? How do you define the center of infinity?
> Ok those are 3 mind blowing questions right there.
> 
> Here's a bonus one: if 99.999999% of all matter is vacuum, and the remaining stuff (protons and neutrons) are simply fluctuations in the quantum vacuum, then are we the emptiness in the vacuum beings' universe?
> 
> Reference:
> It's confirmed: Matter is merely vacuum fluctuations - physics-math - 20 November 2008 - New Scientist


 
Why not? I mean if as you say lots of big bangs occurred then surely theres a high chance some could have exploded close enough in that with time, as they expanded, they could overlap. Just because space is infinite doesn't mean they wouldn't always be spread out nicely.


----------



## silentrage

I think something to do with symmetry, supposedly at the beginning matter was highly symmetrical across space, so everything would be nice and even, and then symmetry broke down and bubbles formed into universes, don't quote me on that. ^^


----------



## MFB

Where the fuck did Silentrage go for all that time?


----------



## JBroll

vampiregenocide said:


> One big bang creates the universe. If more than one big bang occurred, and that second universe also expands like ours is believed to, then there could come a time when both expand to a point where they overlap.



You're essentially assuming that both universes are in some sort of super-universe, that this super-universe holds a configuration capable of another big bang, and that this super-universe is somehow not big enough for both of them. Where did this come from?



silentrage said:


> Space is supposed to be infinite



Not quite.

Jeff


----------



## Cadavuh

What is the meaning of meaning?


----------



## silentrage

MFB said:


> Where the fuck did Silentrage go for all that time?


I was training in this monastery on top of mount everest with a group of secret super ninjas who've controlled world politics for the last 3000 years.

I dropped out in the first year though... fucking cafeteria food



JBroll said:


> Not quite.
> Jeff



I was kinda waiting on an ass whooping from you,
so... explain.


----------



## Tiger

If you treat your woman like a Queen does that make you a King or a servant?


----------



## Winspear

josh pelican said:


> Why is there braille on drive-through ATMs?



 Good one. For passengers I'd have to guess.
I always wondered why the fuck they put braille under all the signs in my college. How the hell are they meant to know where the signs are???


----------



## Antimatter

EtherealEntity said:


> Good one. For passengers I'd have to guess.
> I always wondered why the fuck they put braille under all the signs in my college. *How the hell are they meant to know where the signs are*???


 
The same way you do, they memorize the layout of the building


----------



## MF_Kitten

vampiregenocide said:


> There is a theory that the expansion of the universe will actually end up reversing, and everything will start to come back in again. Don't know exactly how and why that would work, but I remember reading it.



there are two ideas of how the universe will end, based on whether the universe is slowing down or speeding up. if it´s slowing down, then it´ll come to a halt eventually, and reverse as you say, ending up with everything being smashed to fuck in the end. if it´s speeding up, then it´ll end up pulling everything so far apart that everything cools down and freezes, and light doesn´t reach us anymore, and everything is just a desolate expanding vastness of cold emptyness.

they´ve been studying this closely, and have found out that the universe is speeding up, and so the "big chill" is how it will end. even though it´s not really an end, it´s just the death of it´s contents in a way.



JBroll said:


> I hope that your surprise at our lasting that long wouldn't be the usual Chicken Little we'llkillourselveswithnukesandbabysealclubbingandcapitalismohnoes nonsense... if so, you have a few more numbers to crunch before trying to figure out why we won't last long enough to see an empty sky above us.
> Jeff



hahah, of course not 

for starters, we´re fucked without the sun. there are many other things factored in as well that will fuck us over on the way to that point in time.

i´m no hippie, dude


----------



## ittoa666

What tuning does ______ use?


----------



## JBroll

silentrage said:


> I was kinda waiting on an ass whooping from you,
> so... explain.



There's really not much else to it. That statement is just not very well supported.

Jeff


----------



## Antimatter

How much would *could* a woodchuck chuck if a woodchuck could chuck wood?


----------



## jaretthale78

could you live off your own shit? like eat somthing, shit it out, eat it, and repeat


----------



## Razorgrin

jaretthale78 said:


> could you live off your own shit? like eat somthing, shit it out, eat it, and repeat


Not for very long. By definition, shit is waste, so your body has already gotten most of the nutrients out of it. After two or three cycles, there'll be nothing left in it worth absorbing.


----------



## jaretthale78

Razorgrin said:


> Not for very long. By definition, shit is waste, so your body has already gotten most of the nutrients out of it. After two or three cycles, there'll be nothing left in it worth absorbing.


  MY PLAN IS RUINED!!!


----------



## Varcolac

jaretthale78 said:


> could you live off your own shit? like eat somthing, shit it out, eat it, and repeat



no.

Could Professor Henry Walton Jones, Sr. take on Juan Sánchez Villa-Lobos Ramírez and win?


----------



## Razorgrin

jaretthale78 said:


> MY PLAN IS RUINED!!!


You're welcome to try. Just...don't post pics.


----------



## Antimatter

jaretthale78 said:


> could you live off your own shit? like eat somthing, shit it out, eat it, and repeat


 
Sure, if you like various forms of hepatitis and E coli infection


----------



## JBroll

... am I missing something about hepatitis, or do you need to have it already in order for your excretions to spread it?

Jeff


----------



## vampiregenocide

JBroll said:


> You're essentially assuming that both universes are in some sort of super-universe, that this super-universe holds a configuration capable of another big bang, and that this super-universe is somehow not big enough for both of them. Where did this come from?
> 
> 
> 
> Not quite.


 
I was not saying that space would not be big enough for them, I'm simply saying that it isn't unlikely if there were multiple big bangs creating multiple universes like ours in space, then there is a chance that two of those universes could be close enough in that one day with enough expansion they could overlap one another, like two ever-expanding puddles. I don't see there being much more to it than that?


And also, while I don't myself believe space is infinite, you seem to have a pretty definitive answer which intrigues me, it being such a highly debated topic and all. What do you believe space is if not infinite? I believe it is a loop, or something similar in that matter sort of comes around upon itself, like Mario in the old Mario Bros. games, when he'd run through one side of the screen and appear on the other.


----------



## JBroll

vampiregenocide said:


> I was not saying that space would not be big enough for them, I'm simply saying that it isn't unlikely if there were multiple big bangs creating multiple universes like ours in space, then there is a chance that two of those universes could be close enough in that one day with enough expansion they could overlap one another, like two ever-expanding puddles. I don't see there being much more to it than that?
> 
> 
> And also, while I don't myself believe space is infinite, you seem to have a pretty definitive answer which intrigues me, it being such a highly debated topic and all. What do you believe space is if not infinite? I believe it is a loop, or something similar in that matter sort of comes around upon itself, like Mario in the old Mario Bros. games, when he'd run through one side of the screen and appear on the other.



First... you're still essentially assuming a bigger super-universe and the initial conditions for another Big Bang and... well, honestly, it just doesn't make much sense.

As far as space being infinite... I don't have a definitive answer, and was saying (as you are) that it's still not quite settled. Also, what you're describing is what I'd imagine to be the case, but that isn't exactly what is meant by 'infinite' (which would refer to a universe not bounded and finite like a circle but unbounded like a line) - I'm under the impression that this is the position best supported by experiment (although I have to admit to believing it just because the math gets prettier).

Jeff


----------



## vampiregenocide

JBroll said:


> First... you're still essentially assuming a bigger super-universe and the initial conditions for another Big Bang and... well, honestly, it just doesn't make much sense.
> 
> As far as space being infinite... I don't have a definitive answer, and was saying (as you are) that it's still not quite settled. Also, what you're describing is what I'd imagine to be the case, but that isn't exactly what is meant by 'infinite' (which would refer to a universe not bounded and finite like a circle but unbounded like a line) - I'm under the impression that this is the position best supported by experiment (although I have to admit to believing it just because the math gets prettier).
> 
> Jeff


 
Its not a crazy idea. It doesn't make sense to think that all matter as we know it came from one point in what is a very large, if not infinite space. Its like when people used to think the earth was the centre of everything, it just seems highly improbable. If just one big bag occurred, then we have to assume that outside of our universe there is literally nothing, unless you think that universes or matter in generally can created by processes other tha big bangs, in which case that questions the origin of our own planet and this entire debate.


Ah right fair enough man, I though you had a different idea on how space is set out. Its probably best you didn't, because my head might explode.  Also you did mention the universe not being finite/infinite etc, but we're talking about space as a whole, not just the universe. Like our solar system, this universe could be part of something much bigger in a part of space as a whole (leading back to our ideas about how those individual universes are made). Though your descriptions on how space is shaped is what I agree with, I don't know if I made that appear otherwise but you nailed that bit.


----------



## tekkadon d

i dont mean to side track but i got a question. 
how does junk work? like in our body, what makes us move. ive asked people before and its always like chemical reactions and junk, well i know that but what causes them and the ones before that etc. know what i mean?


----------



## JBroll

vampiregenocide said:


> Its not a crazy idea. It doesn't make sense to think that all matter as we know it came from one point in what is a very large, if not infinite space. Its like when people used to think the earth was the centre of everything, it just seems highly improbable. If just one big bag occurred, then we have to assume that outside of our universe there is literally nothing, unless you think that universes or matter in generally can created by processes other tha big bangs, in which case that questions the origin of our own planet and this entire debate.
> 
> 
> Ah right fair enough man, I though you had a different idea on how space is set out. Its probably best you didn't, because my head might explode.  Also you did mention the universe not being finite/infinite etc, but we're talking about space as a whole, not just the universe. Like our solar system, this universe could be part of something much bigger in a part of space as a whole (leading back to our ideas about how those individual universes are made). Though your descriptions on how space is shaped is what I agree with, I don't know if I made that appear otherwise but you nailed that bit.



So there's space outside the universe...? Now you're just flatly contradicting the definition of a universe, so I have no idea where you're trying to go.

Jeff


----------



## Antimatter

tekkadon d said:


> i dont mean to side track but i got a question.
> how does junk work? like in our body, what makes us move. ive asked people before and its always like chemical reactions and junk, well i know that but what causes them and the ones before that etc. know what i mean?


 
Well actually you move because of electrical impulses sent from your brain to your muscles, which causes them to contract.


----------



## vampiregenocide

JBroll said:


> So there's space outside the universe...? Now you're just flatly contradicting the definition of a universe, so I have no idea where you're trying to go.
> 
> Jeff


 
Well yeah theres space outside the universe, the universe is everything that exists, and since space is a vaccum, and therefore doesn't technically 'exist' it is not part of the universe in the same sense the ocean has coral reefs in it, but isn't actually coral reef itself simply the area that the reef exists in. Space stretches beyond our know universe, which is the point I'm getting at. Obviously our definition for universe would have to be looked at if we found other such 'universes' like ours believed to have been created by an event like the big bang. They would both be technically the universe, though created separately and expanding of their own accord. I think they are calling them collectively the multiverse, if they even exist, it being theory n all. If that makes sense?


----------



## tekkadon d

Antimatter said:


> Well actually you move because of electrical impulses sent from your brain to your muscles, which causes them to contract.



but what causes the impulses?


----------



## silentrage

vampiregenocide said:


> Well yeah theres space outside the universe, the universe is everything that exists, and since space is a vaccum, and therefore doesn't technically 'exist' it is not part of the universe in the same sense the ocean has coral reefs in it, but isn't actually coral reef itself simply the area that the reef exists in. Space stretches beyond our know universe, which is the point I'm getting at. Obviously our definition for universe would have to be looked at if we found other such 'universes' like ours believed to have been created by an event like the big bang. They would both be technically the universe, though created separately and expanding of their own accord. I think they are calling them collectively the multiverse, if they even exist, it being theory n all. If that makes sense?



It sounds like chaotic inflation theory, or bubble universe theory, like I mentioned. And as far as we know there is no such thing as true vacuum, as in 0 matter and 0 energy, there'll always be the higgs field.


----------



## vampiregenocide

silentrage said:


> It sounds like chaotic inflation theory, or bubble universe theory, like I mentioned. And as far as we know there is no such thing as true vacuum, as in 0 matter and 0 energy, there'll always be the higgs field.


 
True, but even so a vaccum isn't technically matter or a force, its the relative abscence of matter. And so how can that be included as part of the universe? But then the exact definition of a universe is a bit touch and go when you start putting it into the context of other theorised matter.


----------



## silentrage

Right, is the universe imbedded in this thing called the vacuum, or is vacuum imbedded in the universe? Don't we have at least one astrophysicist on here? lol


----------



## vampiregenocide

silentrage said:


> Right, is the universe imbedded in this thing called the vacuum, or is vacuum imbedded in the universe? Don't we have at least one astrophysicist on here? lol


 
The universe is in space/vacuum. Space = the canvas and universe = the painting. We know there is a bigger picture because space stretches far beyond our known universe.


----------



## silentrage

How can you say that when we don't know how far our universe stretches? 


Do we?


----------



## vampiregenocide

silentrage said:


> How can you say that when we don't know how far our universe stretches?
> 
> 
> Do we?


 
We know from studies that it stretches far beyond the known universe, way out into deep space. What is beyond that no one knows, hence the theories that it is infinite etc. Thats why theres no real right or wrong here, its a case of what is more likely. We simply don't have the technology to know for certain what is out that far. Our idea of the universe and its shape is like an ant observing the world; we can only go on what we know by studying how light travels back to us, giving an indication of distance etc. I personally think theres a lot more beyond our universe, and that it isn't an isolated ocurrence. I just can't believe that its just our universe stting in empty blackness, there has to be more.


----------



## pink freud

silentrage said:


> How can you say that when we don't know how far our universe stretches?
> 
> 
> Do we?



We only know about our universe as far as we can see. There is a boundary to the "known" universe because light literally hasn't traveled past it (although the boundary is constantly expanding).


----------



## vampiregenocide

pink freud said:


> We only know about our universe as far as we can see. There is a boundary to the "known" universe because light literally hasn't traveled past it (although the boundary is constantly expanding).


 
Yeah this is probably more correct. A lot of photographs have been taken of the farthest known celestial bodies, and by filtering out certain radiation etc the size and shape of our universe has been theorised based on what we can see. We can't see beyond that so at least from what I've seen, it's widely assumed that is the edge of everything.


----------



## JBroll

vampiregenocide said:


> Well yeah theres space outside the universe, the universe is everything that exists, and since space is a vaccum, and therefore doesn't technically 'exist' it is not part of the universe in the same sense the ocean has coral reefs in it, but isn't actually coral reef itself simply the area that the reef exists in. Space stretches beyond our know universe, which is the point I'm getting at. Obviously our definition for universe would have to be looked at if we found other such 'universes' like ours believed to have been created by an event like the big bang. They would both be technically the universe, though created separately and expanding of their own accord. I think they are calling them collectively the multiverse, if they even exist, it being theory n all. If that makes sense?



You're still redefining things and need to read better sources on 'multiverses' - also, don't forget that physicists can be awful at naming things, so don't put too much weight on first impressions from a name. I'm afraid you're not making sense.

As far as the 'edge of the universe' and size constraints... although we're obviously not taking a tape measure to the farthest corners we can still tell a lot about what shapes and sizes make more sense through other means.

Jeff


----------



## Dan

I Honestly think this is probably the only way i could describe what i think on the topic of the size of the universe.


----------



## vampiregenocide

JBroll said:


> You're still redefining things and need to read better sources on 'multiverses' - also, don't forget that physicists can be awful at naming things, so don't put too much weight on first impressions from a name. I'm afraid you're not making sense.
> 
> As far as the 'edge of the universe' and size constraints... although we're obviously not taking a tape measure to the farthest corners we can still tell a lot about what shapes and sizes make more sense through other means.
> 
> Jeff


 
I'm not redefining anything, the term universe has a meaning that is somewhat open to interpretation. I've seen it used by plenty of people who know what they're talking about in different ways. As for the term multiverse, I was simply using it to better describe what I was talking about, as there is no term that I know of to describe 'two universes' if that is possible depending on your definition of the word. I don't see what doesn't make sense myself, maybe I'm not being clear enough but I believe I am.


Our planet > solar system > galaxy > universe > empty space (theoretically) 

What comes after that is unknown. Our universe as we know it could stretch further than we know, or there could be complete nothingness forever. Or, space could in turn be filled with multiple universes like this one, like our universe is filled with multiple galaxies. 

That clear up what I was trying to say?


----------



## JBroll

Why would the universe not include the (not actually!) empty space? Do *you* not include the empty space between your constituent fundamental particles? (Think of the legal ramifications of this if all else fails.)

The word itself *should mean* 'total' or 'whole', and anything else is an abuse of the term - what doesn't make sense is an actual physical realization of "Universe - now with 100% more entirety-of-all-that-is!" and since the Big Bang was an explosion *of the universe* (*of space*,*of the entirety of all that is*, whatever you want to call it) and not *in the universe* the entire thing makes about as much sense as a badger made out of purple.

Jeff


----------



## JBroll

Plug said:


> I Honestly think this is probably the only way i could describe what i think on the topic of the size of the universe.




This (ignore the heavy math in the middle) is why you need to be careful about that sort of thing.

Jeff


----------



## vampiregenocide

Okay, I think you worded most of that pretty madly, but let me explain it this way.

Our universe is a boat in the ocean, and the ocean is space. Both are separate to one another. The boat is it's own entity in a larger plane of existence, which is the ocean/space. It depends on how far you want to stretch the definition of universe. It includes all forces and matter. Vaccum/space is not a force, and it is not matter (though it can have matter _inside_ it). Thats why I don't think it can be included as part of the universe. I mean this is my opinion mind, but I can't see how it is flawed.


----------



## JBroll

I'm really not mad.

Be careful what you say about vacuums.

The problem with defining the universe as you have is that there's already a word or short phrase for what you're describing and there isn't one - apart from 'universe' - in common use for what I'm describing. Why give two words to one thing and none to the other when both will be discussed? (Also, there's the etymology and traditional use of the word itself, but that's a different story.) I understand what you're trying to call the universe, but not why you would define it in that way (especially because of that whole 'vacuum' problem) or how it helps your big-bang statements.

Jeff


----------



## vampiregenocide

JBroll said:


> I'm really not mad.
> 
> Be careful what you say about vacuums.
> 
> The problem with defining the universe as you have is that there's already a word or short phrase for what you're describing and there isn't one - apart from 'universe' - in common use for what I'm describing. Why give two words to one thing and none to the other when both will be discussed? (Also, there's the etymology and traditional use of the word itself, but that's a different story.) I understand what you're trying to call the universe, but not why you would define it in that way (especially because of that whole 'vacuum' problem) or how it helps your big-bang statements.
> 
> Jeff


 
Not saying you're mad, what you wrote was madly set out. 

And which point?

And what I am describing is the universe, its just such a term that can be open to interpretation. What is matter and what is abscence of matter? Is abscence of matter technically included in the definition of the universe, if the universe is all known matter and forces?

It fits in with what I said because I was explaining the fact our universe is not an isolated thing. If we think of our universe as a collection of matter _within_ space not part of it, then we open up the idea that there are more universes, and that it is not technically everything, but a collection of everything created in the same manner (a big bang for instance).


----------



## silentrage

JBroll said:


> This (ignore the heavy math in the middle) is why you need to be careful about that sort of thing.
> 
> Jeff



I pretty much didn't understand a single word,
can you translate this into english please. 


@vampire
Ok i think where your disagreement lie is the definition of space, 
if space is SOMETHING, then it would probably be part of the universe, if space is the ABSENCE of THINGS, then the universe is probably a part of it. 
I don't think there is scientific concensus on this matter.


----------



## pink freud

Is there gravitational forces in a vacuum? Yes (although to observe them an object must be inserted into the vacuum). A vacuum may be absent of matter, but it is not absent of all things.


----------



## vampiregenocide

pink freud said:


> Is there gravitational forces in a vacuum? Yes (although to observe them an object must be inserted into the vacuum). A vacuum may be absent of matter, but it is not absent of all things.


 
Aye, and gravity is part of the universe. However, it exists _in_ space (I don't want to keep referring to it as vacuum). Not saying it is absent of all things, but things exist within it, not as part of it.


----------



## vampiregenocide

silentrage said:


> @vampire
> Ok i think where your disagreement lie is the definition of space,
> if space is SOMETHING, then it would probably be part of the universe, if space is the ABSENCE of THINGS, then the universe is probably a part of it.
> I don't think there is scientific concensus on this matter.


 
space is the abscence of things, otherwise it isn't space, its something. and yeah thats my point; the universe is a part of space.


----------



## orb451

Vamp, I think you have it backwards. But that's just me, just my very un-scientific opinion  I think space and time are related, if not permanently entwined with one another. I think that space/time exists within our Universe. I believe the big bang was preceded by a big "crunch". I think this is why our Universe continues to expand and eventually, will contract in on itself forming a big crunch, and then another big bang, etc.

I don't know what lies outside that expansion/contraction. I don't know if it's nothingness, another dimension, more Universe's or what. But every thing, and "unthing" that we're able to see, touch, taste, measure or observe, including space, or space/time are all part of the Universe as we know it. In other words, the Universe as we know it is a container, everything is inside that container. Who knows what's outside of the container... I don't think the Universe is in space, I think space is in the Universe.

And again, this is just my *opinion*, just what *I* think, not saying I'm right or that other possibilities couldn't or don't exist.

...I now return you to your regularly scheduled discussion...


----------



## vampiregenocide

orb451 said:


> Vamp, I think you have it backwards. But that's just me, just my very un-scientific opinion  I think space and time are related, if not permanently entwined with one another. I think that space/time exists within our Universe. I believe the big bang was preceded by a big "crunch". I think this is why our Universe continues to expand and eventually, will contract in on itself forming a big crunch, and then another big bang, etc.
> 
> I don't know what lies outside that expansion/contraction. I don't know if it's nothingness, another dimension, more Universe's or what. But every thing, and "unthing" that we're able to see, touch, taste, measure or observe, including space, or space/time are all part of the Universe as we know it. In other words, the Universe as we know it is a container, everything is inside that container. Who knows what's outside of the container... I don't think the Universe is in space, I think space is in the Universe.
> 
> And again, this is just my *opinion*, just what *I* think, not saying I'm right or that other possibilities couldn't or don't exist.
> 
> ...I now return you to your regularly scheduled discussion...


 
Thats a cool idea, but there are theories abotu what preceded the big bang. One is that there was a long reaction between matter cancelling out anti-matter and creating the base elements of the universe, but I can't remember the ins and outs of it as I read it a while ago.

As for time, I never included that in my posts because I believe it to be a force like gravity, Einstein's theories look at it that way, as do Hawkin's. It is very different to space, which time sort of works through. I disagree with the universe being a container though, I believe it is far bigger than that.


----------



## orb451

vampiregenocide said:


> Thats a cool idea, but there are theories abotu what preceded the big bang. One is that there was a long reaction between matter cancelling out anti-matter and creating the base elements of the universe, but I can't remember the ins and outs of it as I read it a while ago.



Cool  Hadn't heard of that.



vampiregenocide said:


> As for time, I never included that in my posts because I believe it to be a force like gravity, Einstein's theories look at it that way, as do Hawkin's. It is very different to space, which time sort of works through. I disagree with the universe being a container though, I believe it is far bigger than that.



See I think of space/time as being fundamentally tied together. If you travel from one place to another, whether it's from one point in a room or house, to another, or from one planet to another, you're traveling through space *and* time. Those constructs exist, at least to me, within this Universe of ours. Things like Black holes, White holes, Worm holes and whatever the fuck else is out there, all exist *within* our Universe. So maybe Black holes as an example, if you could physically get through one, would lead you to another *point* in space/time *within* our Universe. Or, maybe, they punch holes straight through space/time and take you to another Universe altogether... I dunno . 

But anyway, like I said, that's just my take on it, it's unfounded and unscientific so to me at least, this whole discussion is somewhat more philosophical and less scientific...  And to each his own, I'm not saying you're wrong at all


----------



## vampiregenocide

orb451 said:


> See I think of space/time as being fundamentally tied together. If you travel from one place to another, whether it's from one point in a room or house, to another, or from one planet to another, you're traveling through space *and* time. Those constructs exist, at least to me, within this Universe of ours. Things like Black holes, White holes, Worm holes and whatever the fuck else is out there, all exist *within* our Universe. So maybe Black holes as an example, if you could physically get through one, would lead you to another *point* in space/time *within* our Universe. Or, maybe, they punch holes straight through space/time and take you to another Universe altogether... I dunno .
> 
> But anyway, like I said, that's just my take on it, it's unfounded and unscientific so to me at least, this whole discussion is somewhat more philosophical and less scientific...  And to each his own, I'm not saying you're wrong at all


 
Hmm I see what you mean, I think theres more to black holes than we know though. I don't think that we could pass through them, but they'd either destroy us or alter physics greatly. But time effects us, time changes everything. Space is just what time exists in, as does matter.

And sorry if I came across like I was trying to disprove your points man, I find what you say really interesting I'm just like playing Devil's Advocate in some cases, trying to provoke thought at ones own ideas. And I agree it is very philosophical and theoretical.


----------



## wannabguitarist

orb451 said:


> One question I'd like answered is, how can I get Synesthesia? I want to be able to *see* sounds and hear colors. That to me would be the best.



Smoke a lot of weed


----------



## JBroll

vampiregenocide said:


> Not saying you're mad, what you wrote was madly set out.
> 
> And which point?
> 
> And what I am describing is the universe, its just such a term that can be open to interpretation. What is matter and what is abscence of matter? Is abscence of matter technically included in the definition of the universe, if the universe is all known matter and forces?
> 
> It fits in with what I said because I was explaining the fact our universe is not an isolated thing. If we think of our universe as a collection of matter _within_ space not part of it, then we open up the idea that there are more universes, and that it is not technically everything, but a collection of everything created in the same manner (a big bang for instance).



Madly set out? It's as clear as I could make it - if trying to get a point across efficiently is 'mad', then I guess I'm usually pretty pissed. If I were mad I would have attacked you instead of explaining why I don't think your ideas work, and I would appreciate fewer assumptions like that about 'mad wording' when what we're talking about has nothing to do with feelings and hugs and all of that fuzzy hippie nonsense.

I think that the distinction that you're trying to set up is clouding your judgment and you're trying to differentiate between things in an utterly nonsensical way. 'Opening up the idea that there are more universes' in this way is honestly not going to get too much done and you gain nothing (except confusion, as suggested by this more-big-bangs-whee! thing) from it. For 'the absence of things' to make sense, there are a few things that you need to be much more careful with - in any case, it just seems to have gotten in your way and befuddled matters and doesn't seem necessary.

Finally, I don't know if the questions on the third line are meant to be philosophy or if you just didn't get good enough physics texts, but in either case it's important to set out definitions like 'matter' and 'universe' from the start in order to not make the discussion completely silly (and the definitions provided by physicists for the context in question should generally be taken).



silentrage said:


> I pretty much didn't understand a single word,
> can you translate this into english please.
> 
> @vampire
> Ok i think where your disagreement lie is the definition of space,
> if space is SOMETHING, then it would probably be part of the universe, if space is the ABSENCE of THINGS, then the universe is probably a part of it.
> I don't think there is scientific concensus on this matter.



That link is a summary of a logical axiom that's (at least here) best left assumed - in set theory, which underlies just about everything (unless you've moved on to category theory, which has its own way of avoiding these problems), one of its implications is 'nothing is an element of itself', 'nothing is an element of an element of itself', 'nothing is an element of ... an element of itself' (for arbitrarily many 'an element of' in the place of '...'), and so on. To be fair, if you allow sets that are elements of ... elements of themselves, you can still make a lot of things work... but you won't enjoy it at all and you don't gain much in return for the lost intuition and 'common sense' that you're giving up (apart from perhaps something that sounds interesting under the influence of controlled substances).

As far as 'the absence of things'... there's not scientific consensus on the matter because that question isn't science - it's a definition that's trying too hard to chase its own tail and doesn't help any science get done.



orb51 said:


> Vamp, I think you have it backwards. But that's just me, just my very un-scientific opinion I think space and time are related, if not permanently entwined with one another. I think that space/time exists within our Universe



That would be closer than what he's trying to get away with - saying 'space is in time' or 'time is in space' or anything like that is no more sensible than 'left is outside up'. (This is why we need better physics education - a lot of the mess would be cleared up if we shot the pseudo-pop-physics twats in the face and had more people like Feynman who could teach physics to lay people without them realizing it.)

Jeff


----------



## pink freud

vampiregenocide said:


> space is the abscence of things, otherwise it isn't space, its something. and yeah thats my point; the universe is a part of space.



To counter that, space can be considered merely the result of four dimensions. It has a volume and a duration. Either one can possibly be infinite. Other universes would effectively be other planes of existence, as theorized by sub-atomic particles shifting in and out of our reality.


----------



## vampiregenocide

JBroll said:


> Madly set out? It's as clear as I could make it - if trying to get a point across efficiently is 'mad', then I guess I'm usually pretty pissed. If I were mad I would have attacked you instead of explaining why I don't think your ideas work, and I would appreciate fewer assumptions like that about 'mad wording' when what we're talking about has nothing to do with feelings and hugs and all of that fuzzy hippie nonsense.
> 
> I think that the distinction that you're trying to set up is clouding your judgment and you're trying to differentiate between things in an utterly nonsensical way. 'Opening up the idea that there are more universes' in this way is honestly not going to get too much done and you gain nothing (except confusion, as suggested by this more-big-bangs-whee! thing) from it. For 'the absence of things' to make sense, there are a few things that you need to be much more careful with - in any case, it just seems to have gotten in your way and befuddled matters and doesn't seem necessary.
> 
> Finally, I don't know if the questions on the third line are meant to be philosophy or if you just didn't get good enough physics texts, but in either case it's important to set out definitions like 'matter' and 'universe' from the start in order to not make the discussion completely silly (and the definitions provided by physicists for the context in question should generally be taken).


 

Just that sentence didn't come across very clearly. It's not a big deal man blimey.  But I give up because no offence but we never get anywhere talking and I'll just end up repeating what I've said a dozen times. I see no problem with any of my points, and you've never flatly said why they're wrong, just that they are. Then theres the fact you can't even prove it because we're basing these ideas on theories and ideas, not proven fact. But I'll leave you to it because we're not getting anywhere.


----------



## chimp_spanner

New rule - don't feed the Jbroll! 

**Also, 4 years and only 447 posts. That's rubbish!


----------



## JBroll

vampiregenocide said:


> Just that sentence didn't come across very clearly. It's not a big deal man blimey.  But I give up because no offence but we never get anywhere talking and I'll just end up repeating what I've said a dozen times. I see no problem with any of my points, and you've never flatly said why they're wrong, just that they are. Then theres the fact you can't even prove it because we're basing these ideas on theories and ideas, not proven fact. But I'll leave you to it because we're not getting anywhere.



I've actually said why they brought about problems and why the 'new Big Bangs' thing didn't make much sense... even though I really didn't have to since you gave no indication that your definition wasn't circular. 

Jeff


----------



## vampiregenocide

Rightio.


----------



## JBroll

I'm really not doing this to be angry or mean - the fact that you've seemed a bit lost on what the Big Bang actually was and how time stands in relation to space is cause for concern, and what's really there is so much more interesting than just about any misguided layman's misexplanation that it would be wrong to *not* try to find and fix mistakes. (Long story short: I don't dislike you, I just like physics too much.)

Jeff


----------



## vampiregenocide

JBroll said:


> I'm really not doing this to be angry or mean - the fact that you've seemed a bit lost on what the Big Bang actually was and how time stands in relation to space is cause for concern, and what's really there is so much more interesting than just about any misguided layman's misexplanation that it would be wrong to *not* try to find and fix mistakes. (Long story short: I don't dislike you, I just like physics too much.)
> 
> Jeff


 
Its alright man, its not that I don't know what it is exactly, I just don't think perhaps I was demonstrating what I know corretly.

What is your definition ofthe big bang and how do you think time relates to space?


----------



## JBroll

I don't have my own definitions because I think the physicists are the ones whose definitions should be used - to fix the biggest things that seemed odd in your earlier posts, the Big Bang was an explosion 'of' (not 'in') space (Weinberg's The First Three Minutes is well worth checking out - Weinberg is a Nobel-winning physicist and great writer, and that book is a great example of why he should be as much of a household name as Hawking or Feynman) and time is one of the 'parts' of spacetime (so it's certainly not a 'force' or a thing that goes through space... at the risk of oversimplifying, it is to the rest of space as up is to left) - spacetime is what you get when you combine space and time (so that the familiar three spatial 'directions', together with one for time, are the four 'directions' of spacetime) and has made a lot of things much simpler. 

Jeff


----------



## vampiregenocide

JBroll said:


> I don't have my own definitions because I think the physicists are the ones whose definitions should be used - to fix the biggest things that seemed odd in your earlier posts, the Big Bang was an explosion 'of' (not 'in') space (Weinberg's The First Three Minutes is well worth checking out - Weinberg is a Nobel-winning physicist and great writer, and that book is a great example of why he should be as much of a household name as Hawking or Feynman) and time is one of the 'parts' of spacetime (so it's certainly not a 'force' or a thing that goes through space... at the risk of oversimplifying, it is to the rest of space as up is to left) - spacetime is what you get when you combine space and time (so that the familiar three spatial 'directions', together with one for time, are the four 'directions' of spacetime) and has made a lot of things much simpler.
> 
> Jeff


 
Hmm I see what you mean, though I don't get the definition for the big bang. I mean, if it is an explosion _of _space, what is space in itself? Space has to exist within something if it does indeed exist and isn't just volume which matter resides in.


----------



## JBroll

Well, it looks like we've found the problem. I assume for the sake of argument that the phrase 'exist in something' makes sense (a debatable assumption at best).

Consider the so-called 'principle of explosion', which I'll paraphrase as "If one assumes nonsense, anything is provable" for now. It should be clear why you should check the assumption in the last sentence *very carefully* with that in mind, because if anything is provable then nothing is better than anything else and there's nowhere for a discussion to go.

Suppose that space has to exist in something - call it superspace, just for the hell of it. Does superspace have to exist in something? 

If not, why does superspace *not* have to exist in something when space does, and why would one not just define space to be what is currently being called superspace?

If superspace must exist in something, does supersuperspace have to exist in something?

(repeat as long as necessary to show the problem.)

The conclusion is that if only finitely many super...superspaces are necessary, then the cutoff is entirely arbitrary and silly, and if infinitely many are needed then spaces 'existing in something' are no more sensible and well-founded than before *and* we've introduced infinitely many super...superspaces for no good reason.

Your assumption then makes no more sense than thinking that a god must have existed to create the universe. I'd strongly recommend a good physics book to clear up problems of this sort.

Jeff


----------



## vampiregenocide

JBroll said:


> Well, it looks like we've found the problem. I assume for the sake of argument that the phrase 'exist in something' makes sense (a debatable assumption at best).
> 
> Consider the so-called 'principle of explosion', which I'll paraphrase as "If one assumes nonsense, anything is provable" for now. It should be clear why you should check the assumption in the last sentence *very carefully* with that in mind, because if anything is provable then nothing is better than anything else and there's nowhere for a discussion to go.
> 
> Suppose that space has to exist in something - call it superspace, just for the hell of it. Does superspace have to exist in something?
> 
> If not, why does superspace *not* have to exist in something when space does, and why would one not just define space to be what is currently being called superspace?
> 
> If superspace must exist in something, does supersuperspace have to exist in something?
> 
> (repeat as long as necessary to show the problem.)
> 
> Your assumption then makes no more sense than thinking that a god must have existed to create the universe. I'd strongly recommend a good physics book to clear up problems of this sort.
> 
> Jeff


 
No no you've made my post far more complicated than it is. Space, superspace or whatever you want to call it does not have to exist in anything. It is simply abscence of matter which is then filled by matter e.g our universe. A fish tank is filled with fish, and tank is the perimiter inside which those fish exist. There does not need to be another tank, because theoretically this tank is infinite, as we presume space to be. Its just...nothing, filled by something. There is no supernothing, no alternate dimension of nothing. 

Exist in something makes perfect sense. You fill a box with something. Space is filled by the universe. Does that not make sense?


----------



## JBroll

vampiregenocide said:


> Space has to exist within something ...





vampiregenocide said:


> Space, superspace or whatever you want to call it does not have to exist in anything.




Before you object to what I omitted from the first post, any defense from those grounds would boil down to an argument over what it means to exist and that'll just get nowhere. I have complicated nothing any more than your original statements - I've just taken their consequences and shown how they didn't work. The problem is that your definitions make sense only if you already assume them to make sense, and that's no way to define things. If there is a way to separate space from the universe, it doesn't look like you've found it.

Jeff


----------



## MF_Kitten

Chimp: it IS rubbish! you SUCK at being a forumite! hang here more so we can marvel at your presence more! 

JBroll, we need more awesome physics/science/cool shit threads from you. you always get into arguments, and spew awesome sentences all over the place, but i haven´t seen threads from you lately. make some threads on things that interest you! we like it! you make yourself heard in the awesomest of ways, and as such are a great teacher


----------



## vampiregenocide

JBroll said:


> Before you object to what I omitted from the first post, any defense from those grounds would boil down to an argument over what it means to exist and that'll just get nowhere. I have complicated nothing any more than your original statements - I've just taken their consequences and shown how they didn't work. The problem is that your definitions make sense only if you already assume them to make sense, and that's no way to define things. If there is a way to separate space from the universe, it doesn't look like you've found it.
> 
> Jeff


 
I can't find where I said that first bit but whatever I said it looks like I was incorrect there. Getting my points confused. I am posting a lot of shit mostly at 1 in the morning. 

And I disagree, you haven't stated exactly why they don't work. I've not seen anything to prove that. I think we are essentially arguing over what it means to exist, and that is where our ideas are conflicting. To me, my ideas make perfect sense and I see no logical or scientific reason why they could be considered wrong. I could agree there are other possible alternatives, but I don't think it is wrong. I don't know, I just honestly can't understand what you're arguing against and your actual reasons.


----------



## vampiregenocide

I'm gna give up either way dude sorry, this thread is keeping me up and I can't keep posting here.  I understand your points, and while I disagree I also understand why you disagree with me. I'm half asleep now so I'mpulling out.


----------



## JBroll

There will still be something left over in the morning, don't worry.

You're assuming (quite incorrectly) that space is 'outside' of things and can be separated from everything else - this would have been at best debatable before the 20th century began and is flatly contradicted by relativity. The aquarium analogy fails for exactly this reason - everything 'in' space interacts with space itself! The space that you're assuming to be this big void, like a blank sheet of paper that the universe is 'drawn on', has its own geometry, its own interaction with the things inside it, its own bizarre properties... it changes and is changed by the things that you think are strictly inside (and not interacting with) it! You have assumed - entirely without justification - that this separation you're making is possible and you have yet to demonstrate why this is the case - for this reason, I didn't even need to give an argument against your redefinitions in the first place. What you're saying is simply not possible, at least in the form you've presented. 

Hopefully this clarifies why your angle doesn't work (again, long story short, it is interacting with 'the universe' too much to be separated from it in any coherent way)... and, if not, at least why you still have a great deal of work to do if you want to establish anything on your assumptions. You're assuming far too much, even in the face of things (like that relativity business) that show quite clearly that your assumptions aren't very sensible or justifiable, and so the burden of proof is entirely on you.



MF_Kitten said:


> JBroll, we need more awesome physics/science/cool shit threads from you. you always get into arguments, and spew awesome sentences all over the place, but i haven´t seen threads from you lately. make some threads on things that interest you! we like it! you make yourself heard in the awesomest of ways, and as such are a great teacher



I've been busy moving about and studying., so I haven't been doing much of anything lately. I was tempted to have some layman's introduction-sort-of-thing for a while, but I've only recently gotten settled into my new apartment (I started the moving process in May, had a conference and classwork in June, and moved in early this month... whee!) and up to speed with the research I'm supposed to be doing. I haven't decided if I'd be interacting much with reality, but I'm really tempted to start a more geometric rambling thread and start building algebraic and topological toys in until shiny fun toys could be described.

Jeff


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## ittoa666

This thread was supposed to be funny and such, but alas, it is not.


----------



## Empryrean

Empryrean said:


> When using almond butter(like peanut butter w/almonds though)
> is grape jam or strawberry jam more suited to ensure that the AB&J sammy will automatically get the ladies?


no takers?


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## JBroll

I'd go with grape and blueberry to make the sandwich better and a meal that doesn't remind one of poverty and laziness to get the ladies.

Jeff


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## vampiregenocide

JBroll said:


> There will still be something left over in the morning, don't worry.
> 
> You're assuming (quite incorrectly) that space is 'outside' of things and can be separated from everything else - this would have been at best debatable before the 20th century began and is flatly contradicted by relativity. The aquarium analogy fails for exactly this reason - everything 'in' space interacts with space itself! The space that you're assuming to be this big void, like a blank sheet of paper that the universe is 'drawn on', has its own geometry, its own interaction with the things inside it, its own bizarre properties... it changes and is changed by the things that you think are strictly inside (and not interacting with) it! You have assumed - entirely without justification - that this separation you're making is possible and you have yet to demonstrate why this is the case - for this reason, I didn't even need to give an argument against your redefinitions in the first place. What you're saying is simply not possible, at least in the form you've presented.
> 
> Hopefully this clarifies why your angle doesn't work (again, long story short, it is interacting with 'the universe' too much to be separated from it in any coherent way)... and, if not, at least why you still have a great deal of work to do if you want to establish anything on your assumptions. You're assuming far too much, even in the face of things (like that relativity business) that show quite clearly that your assumptions aren't very sensible or justifiable, and so the burden of proof is entirely on you.


 
Just to say on that final point, the burden of proof is on anyone in an argument/debate, otherwise its just statements, which I can see mine will be seen as because I can't quote any sources.

But yeah I see your point and I understand maybe I was distancing the relationship between space and the universe too much. I realise space has properties, but it can still apply to my idea. I mean...I dunno man its hard to put into words. I know what I want to say, and if I could say it right it probably wouldn't sound so stupid. Your point has raised some flaws in mine, but hasn't completely disproved it. I'm just gna have to go with what you say for now man because I can't be arsed to argue anymore.


----------



## silentrage

@Jbroll 
It would be cool if you could help us visualize what a 4 dimension cube or sphere looks like, I've always wanted to know, hehe. ^^


----------



## vampiregenocide

silentrage said:


> @Jbroll
> It would be cool if you could help us visualize what a 4 dimension cube or sphere looks like, I've always wanted to know, hehe. ^^


 
Isn't that what a tesseract is? And theres a video of someone on youtube explaining how to turn a sphere inside out in a certain way, hurt my brain.


----------



## JBroll

vampiregenocide said:


> Just to say on that final point, the burden of proof is on anyone in an argument/debate, otherwise its just statements, which I can see mine will be seen as because I can't quote any sources.


 
In some cases this may be true, but right now you're the one making a claim and I'm waiting to see why it's valid - the usual example of 'I don't need to prove that there are no invisible pink unicorns in this room' is exactly what's going on here.



vampiregenocide said:


> But yeah I see your point and I understand maybe I was distancing the relationship between space and the universe too much. I realise space has properties, but it can still apply to my idea. I mean...I dunno man its hard to put into words. I know what I want to say, and if I could say it right it probably wouldn't sound so stupid. Your point has raised some flaws in mine, but hasn't completely disproved it. I'm just gna have to go with what you say for now man because I can't be arsed to argue anymore.



Read a good book or two on relativity and pick up Brian Greene's books and you'll get a better idea of why you can't do what you're trying to do.



silentrage said:


> @Jbroll
> It would be cool if you could help us visualize what a 4 dimension cube or sphere looks like, I've always wanted to know, hehe. ^^



For 'showing' there are better graphics than I could make outside already. The way I'd do it... I've explained the general idea (viewing a four-dimensional object by gluing together three-dimensional 'slices', the same way one could make a sphere by 'gluing' circles of appropriate diameters), once I find it I'll polish it up a bit more.

Jeff


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## Rick

I think Jeff's post count tripled in this thread.


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## vampiregenocide

JBroll said:


> Read a good book or two on relativity and pick up Brian Greene's books and you'll get a better idea of why you can't do what you're trying to do.


 
I just bought a Chuck Palanhuik and Halo book, and I don't read a great deal as it is. That's not likely to happen.


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## JBroll

You bought a Halo *book*? Halo as in the video game series? 

Jeff


----------



## josh pelican

Why do people go to tanning salons in the Summer?


----------



## jaretthale78

josh pelican said:


> Why do people go to tanning salons in the Summer?


 cuz they slutz


----------



## JBroll

The first seven words of that suit the thread well enough - there's no lower risk of cancer and tanning is overrated anyway.

Jeff


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## silentrage

A slice of a 4D shape in 3D is a 3D shape, a bunch of such slices put together would turn, say a sphere, into a tube that zips from the creation of that sphere to its demise, wouldn't it?


----------



## JBroll

I can't tell if you're onto the right idea. Making two-dimensional slices of a three-dimensional thing - like slicing a potato in a mandoline - can be 'undone' by stacking the slices back together. If you had an 'ideal' mandoline that could make slices of thickness zero, you'd have two-dimensional objects - look back at your calculus textbook for better pictures than I could give.

What's an easy example of a four-dimensional space? Spacetime (unless we're mindblowingly wrong about very fundamental things) as we observe it is going to be just that. Stand still for a moment and fix a perspective - decide, once and for all, what 'up', 'forward' and 'left' movements look like, and you have a basis for R^3 (R, as usual, denotes the real line), and deciding 'later' to be the direction in time gives, when combined with our basis for space, a basis for spacetime. (Important note: we are choosing vectors in a space, and since we want to distinguish between, say, left and right, we must choose - for each of 'up', 'forward', 'left', 'later' - a positive direction. In this way we have 'down' = -'up', 'earlier'= -'later', et cetera. Don't forget this or everything will be silly - we are doing nothing but picking a basis for the vector space R^4, which - combined with the usual ideas of 'distance' - give just about all we need to do here in a strictly mathematical sense. We can do linear algebra without a basis, but we don't want to right now.)

Once you have these choices made, you can formalize (in the usual multidimensional-integration sense) our gluing process from two to three dimensions. Arranging each slice so that it lies entirely in one 'height' (i.e. parallel to the - again idealized - floor) and ordering them as they were sliced is then the geometric idea of integration (in a special, slightly stupid case for illustrative purposes).

With what we want to do in four dimensions, we can take time to do what height was doing in the previous example - instead of having two-dimensional slices stacked vertically we can imagine three-dimensional slices 'stacked' through time. If we 'pulled out' a slice from the stack in the previous example, we'd have a simple two-dimensional object, and if we continuously browsed through the slices we'd see a bunch of circles growing or shrinking according to the position in the stack and direction being browsed - think about how in older movies a retinal scanner would draw a line across the eye, and imagine instead that we're scanning with a horizontal plane and our slices then correspond to positions of the horizontal plane. If we were already seeing four-dimensionally, doing the same would show three-dimensional objects - we can't do this yet, but we can pretend that we can (one slice at a time) by letting our 'slices' be three-dimensional figures. Suppose that we wanted to look at a four-dimensional hypersphere - it shouldn't be hard to convince yourself that if we sliced a perfectly circular potato with an idealized mandoline we'd have smoothly varying slices as we went along, and the higher dimensional case will be similar. If you were then to live entirely in a plane (the flat kind, not the flying kind) and someone were to show you each slice individually, you could imagine a sphere as a sequence of circles varying through time. In the same way, if some four-dimensional purveyor of fine hyperspheres who wanted to show you his wares, he could show you the 'slices' of his hypersphere - a continuously varying family of spheres. You could then think of a hypersphere in the following way - if you were shown a four-dimensional sphere as just described, you'd see a point, then a growing sphere, then a shrinking sphere, and finally another point (and the rate of size change is easy to calculate, as will be seen shortly) and from these it would be possible to put the hypersphere back together.

How do we know that what I'm saying isn't completely stupid? We can do this with numbers (or at least letters that want to be numbers) very easily. A two dimensional circle in the plane (say, centered at the point (0,0) and of radius 1, for simplicity) is the set of points (x,y) satisfying the equation x^2 + y^2 = 1. A sphere (centered at (0,0,0) and, again, of radius 1) is similarly described as the points (x,y,z) satisfying the equation x^2 + y^2 + z^2 = 1; a hypersphere (centered at (0,0,0,0) and, just to be unsurprising, of radius 1) is described as the set of points satisfying the equation x^2 + y^2 + z^2 + t^2 = 1. (There is one warning to make: unless your idea of a potato is hollow, I am now talking about 'idealized potato skins' - hollow balls - instead of 'real' potatoes - solid balls - because then I just have to type 'a is equal to b' and not 'a is less than or equal to b'. The idea stays the same if you just have to have solid balls - replace = above with <=.)

What I am doing is fixing one of these variables, looking at the lower-dimensional solution set, and then seeing how these solution sets vary as the previously-fixed variable changes. In the plane example, we picked a value z_0 in [0,1], plugged it in for z, and solved the simpler equation x^2+y^2 = (1-z_0^2) - since we had z fixed, the right-hand term is just a real number and the points (x,y) satisfying this equation are just the intersection of a plane (specifically the plane z = z_0) and the sphere. The intersection is, unsurprisingly, a circle of radius 1-z_0^2. In the example we really care about, I'm putting some real number in for t, looking at the resulting equation (which cuts out a sphere - except when t=1 and the equation describes a point), and then seeing how the equation (and thus the solution set - our sphere) changes as t varies. The result is that, as t takes fixed values in [0,1], we only need 3 dimensions to describe the solutions to the 'smaller' equations in x,y,z, and as t varies we can see each 'slice' of the hypersphere.

This example is very simple and easy to generalize when a simple equation like the above describes the surface in question. It can even be applied multiple times to view 5, 6, ... dimensional objects, although there are then lots of choices of things to fix and, as a result, more variables are fixed and more choices of parameters to vary come about. It is not as easy, although it is still possible (see calculus II or III notes for the three-dimensional version), to describe things that aren't smooth like this - 'hypersquares' and pentatopes get a little bit weird, and those are just four-dimensional versions of squares and triangles, respectively - but hopefully your mind's eye will get a better grasp of four-dimensional thinking through these examples and less work will be needed as practice happens.

Jeff


----------



## joelozzy




----------



## Tomo009

Couldn't understand a word of the post 2 up, but what I know is, its not really possible to conceive what a 4D object actually would like because it is out of our understanding. What we can do though is see what a 3D "shadow" of said object would be, just as we can see a 2D shadow of a 3D object.





ie. The tesseract, the shadow of a 4D "cube"


----------



## pink freud

Tomo009 said:


> Couldn't understand a word of the post 2 up, but what I know is, its not really possible to conceive what a 4D object actually would like because it is out of our understanding. What we can do though is see what a 3D "shadow" of said object would be, just as we can see a 2D shadow of a 3D object.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> ie. The tesseract, the shadow of a 4D "cube"





"Picturing" a four dimensional object (if we agree that time is the fourth dimension) is impossible because it ties into the Uncertainty Principle. You can't know the exact physical characteristics of an object while at the same time observing said object's passage through time, as said object is constantly changing at the atomic level.


----------



## Varcolac

Given quantum butterflies and whatnot; if you were to make an exact copy of the Earth circa 1935, down to the subatomic level (without getting into the whole Heisenberg observer effect thing, just to simplify matters), and run it again, without any further external input, would it arrive in the same version of 2010 that we have now? Would the carbon-copy inhabitants of this second Earth experience the same twentieth century that we did? Or would free will, or the illusion thereof, create a subtly different world? Would the Manhattan Project have been a quantum fluke in Oppenheimer's brain away from not discovering nuclear fission? Would the Enigma deciphering have been a similar chance in Turing's brain away from kicking off the computer age? Aside from the immediate impacts of these on the Second World War, what would a 20th century without nuclear power or computers look like? 

Basically, if you rewind reality and hit play again, do you get the same result? I'm hoping not, because I like the idea that my will is my own rather than a predetermined set of chemical processes, but my brain _is_ a set of chemical processes, and there's nothing else that makes me "me." Impossible to find out really, unless someone creates a way to go back in time and create a quantum xerox of the solar system.


----------



## Tomo009

Varcolac said:


> Given quantum butterflies and whatnot; if you were to make an exact copy of the Earth circa 1935, down to the subatomic level (without getting into the whole Heisenberg observer effect thing, just to simplify matters), and run it again, without any further external input, would it arrive in the same version of 2010 that we have now? Would the carbon-copy inhabitants of this second Earth experience the same twentieth century that we did? Or would free will, or the illusion thereof, create a subtly different world? Would the Manhattan Project have been a quantum fluke in Oppenheimer's brain away from not discovering nuclear fission? Would the Enigma deciphering have been a similar chance in Turing's brain away from kicking off the computer age? Aside from the immediate impacts of these on the Second World War, what would a 20th century without nuclear power or computers look like?
> 
> Basically, if you rewind reality and hit play again, do you get the same result? I'm hoping not, because I like the idea that my will is my own rather than a predetermined set of chemical processes, but my brain _is_ a set of chemical processes, and there's nothing else that makes me "me." Impossible to find out really, unless someone creates a way to go back in time and create a quantum xerox of the solar system.



But wouldn't everyone act the same way? They still have the same nsture/nurture as they are following the same string of chaos theory. So wouldn't everyone be affected and act the same? Resulting in the same events occurring?


----------



## Varcolac

I don't know. You'd have to put your Earth #2 in a different point in spacetime to the original, so the different context might subtly alter things. Even a difference in gravity or cosmic rays might have a small effect (incredibly small, but still there). It'd be interesting.


----------



## silentrage

@Jbroll
Thanks for that very lengthy write up, it's assuming the 4th dimension is time, how is it different if we assume N spatial dimensions and 1 Time dimension where N > 3? ^^

@Varcolac
Given the uncertainty principle I think it depends on the determinacy of those earth circa 1935 particles (or really the universe circa 1935 particles) under the affect of quantum fluctuations because these fluctuations exist everywhere and is believed to have affected the structure of the universe shortly after the bigbang and caused the formation of galaxies.
So I think it's safe to say if quantum fluctuations are deterministic, and you have succeeded in copying every particle of the earth in 1935, then you might have a chance of arriving at the same 2010. But if it's not, you definitely won't arrive at the same 2010, and freewill may not have had anything to do with that.


----------



## vampiregenocide

JBroll said:


> You bought a Halo *book*? Halo as in the video game series?
> 
> Jeff


 
Yeah.  They're good books.


----------



## JBroll

Tomo009 said:


> Couldn't understand a word of the post 2 up, but what I know is, its not really possible to conceive what a 4D object actually would like because it is out of our understanding. What we can do though is see what a 3D "shadow" of said object would be, just as we can see a 2D shadow of a 3D object.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> ie. The tesseract, the shadow of a 4D "cube"



This is dead wrong. I just explained how to do it. I have to do it regularly as part of my studies, and if it's not beyond my understanding I'm pretty sure most or all people can pull it off... I've already fiddled with several pentatopes and a hexateron today and I haven't even had my coffee yet.



pink freud said:


> "Picturing" a four dimensional object (if we agree that time is the fourth dimension) is impossible because it ties into the Uncertainty Principle. You can't know the exact physical characteristics of an object while at the same time observing said object's passage through time, as said object is constantly changing at the atomic level.



This is also dead wrong - the above doesn't have anything to do with the uncertainty principle.

Goddamn, I leave for one evening and it's back to physics-word salad...

Silentrage, given n+1 dimensions (n space, 1 time) you can see an n-dimensional object and 'glue' an n+1 dimensional object together in the way described above.

Jeff


----------



## pink freud

JBroll said:


> This is dead wrong. I just explained how to do it. I have to do it regularly as part of my studies, and if it's not beyond my understanding I'm pretty sure most or all people can pull it off... I've already fiddled with several pentatopes and a hexateron today and I haven't even had my coffee yet.
> 
> 
> 
> This is also dead wrong - the above doesn't have anything to do with the uncertainty principle.
> 
> Goddamn, I leave for one evening and it's back to physics-word salad...
> 
> Silentrage, given n+1 dimensions (n space, 1 time) you can see an n-dimensional object and 'glue' an n+1 dimensional object together in the way described above.
> 
> Jeff



How can one picture an object except outside of time? Unless there is zero atomic movement an object is constantly changing, thus the only way to observe an object's physical characteristics at a given point is exactly that, at a point in time. If the Uncertainty Principle states that we cannot know location while simultaneously knowing movement, it is equally true that one cannot know the exact position of every atom of an object without observing it at a single point in time.


----------



## JBroll

This stuff is *NOT REAL*. The Uncertainty Principle refers to *MEASUREMENTS OF REAL THINGS*. (On top of that, they're either tiny or oddly-moving things - ever notice how not everything looks like a fuzzy superposition of metathings?)

Because what I described was ENTIRELY IMAGINARY, and NOT REAL, the Uncertainty Principle has nothing to do with it AT ALL. If you're going to try to use physics ideas, you need to be much more careful about how and why you apply them.

Jeff


----------



## silentrage

@pink
I think you're forgetting the fact that we still don't know how the probabilities of constituent subatomic particles become the observed definite macroscopic object, one that does have a measurable position and momentum.


Ok, in the spirit of the thread, shall we include a mind-boggling question once in a while?
Here's mine, if you make boots out of vagina, would they be impossible to wear out?


----------



## Razorgrin

silentrage said:


> Here's mine, if you make boots out of vagina, would they be impossible to wear out?


Mind = blown.


----------



## MFB

Were Chuck Norris jokes ever funny?


----------



## JBroll

silentrage said:


> @pink
> I think you're forgetting the fact that we still don't know how the probabilities of constituent subatomic particles become the observed definite macroscopic object, one that does have a measurable position and momentum.



I'm not sure that's right.

MFB... Chuck Norris once told a good Chuck Norris joke.

(The real question is now whether or not jokes about Chuck Norris jokes were ever funny. Whee.)

Jeff


----------



## josh pelican

JBroll said:


> The real question is now whether or not jokes about Chuck Norris jokes were ever funny. Whee.
> 
> Jeff


 
The answer is no.

I said it.


----------



## vampiregenocide

josh pelican said:


> The answer is no.
> 
> I said it.


 
There is footage of Chuck Norris talking bout the jokes about him, and he finds them very funny, even cleared up a few facts.


----------



## joelozzy




----------



## joelozzy

MFB said:


> Were Chuck Norris jokes ever funny?


----------



## silentrage

@jbroll
i think this is the latest breakthrough on that subject?
Sign in to read: Quantum states undergo natural selection - physics-math - 25 July 2007 - New Scientist


----------



## JBroll

Do you happen to have the full article handy? Since it's from a general-audience publication and it's three years old I wouldn't be too sure that it's the latest breakthrough.

Jeff


----------



## silentrage

Ah shit, I remember seeing an article with a similar title that was just published on sciencedaily 2 weeks ago.

But anyway, what I mean is ( and maybe this is because I don't really understand decoherence or quantum mechanics at all) there seems to be no tangible or intuitively understood mechanism by which a quantum superposition of states becomes a single coherent macroscopic reality, besides the MWI which is entirely non-ontological and therefore does nothing for me.


----------



## JBroll

Let me know if you find the recent one.

Say what you want about MWI, but from what I've been told it fits phenomena like quantum computing better than the other mainstream theories - your own philosophical preferences shouldn't get in the way of science, and right now MWI is viable (despite non-physics-based complaints) and can give practical results on top of that.

Jeff


----------



## silentrage

Well I trust your opinion on that better than my own, maybe I'll know better once I study some of the math involved. 
I think what bugs me is that MWI can't really be experimentally proven, but as I guess that's not necessarily a bad thing in science as long as the math is solid and it helps to predict other experimental results?


----------



## JBroll

Strictly speaking, these interpretations aren't going to be experimentally proven - putting aside the problems with the phrase 'experimentally proven', it's not like we can find some super physics-god and ask how things were supposed to be seen. We can, however, make predictions based on what different interpretations would say in different cases, and when this was done MWI won a few rounds.

(Things like 'Quantum Mechanics And Free Will pt 5.63 Redux' will be rubbish forever, though.)

Jeff


----------



## silentrage

I thought the goal of physics was to basically, find god.


----------



## JBroll

No, it's to find out how the universe works and, in doing so, *become* gods. Why would a population comprised mostly of professionally-skeptic nonbelievers do something like that?

Jeff


----------



## Peekaboo_eeeeek

leandroab said:


>





Herb Dorklift said:


> Baby don't hurt me...




What is love!? *does the sideways-head-bang* 



Seriously...that made me laugh so hard...


----------



## Peekaboo_eeeeek

Not a question, but almost makes my mind implode when I look at it:

The Scale of the Universe


----------



## silentrage

Mmm, delicious.


----------



## KokoKat

joelozzy said:


> Here's a few.
> 
> People who are born deaf.
> What do they sound like when they are thinking?
> Are they only able to create thought through images?
> 
> 
> Do blind people dream in colour?
> 
> 
> 
> Share yours
> 
> I love trying to wrap my head around questions like this. Some answers are simple, yet some can really mind %*&^ you for hours.
> 
> Without simply researching answers to questions like this.
> 
> Try come up with some!
> 
> 
> Joel


 


Oh my god. I had the exact same question! And i also got the chance to ask a person who has been deaf their entire life about it. She told me that she doesnt hear a voice. Nor does she see sign language when she thinks. She couldnt describe it. But basically she told me that her answer was Neither.
And i dont think that they can. Because dreams are based off of what has happened to you in reality. Thats why we can not have a dream where we die. Because we dont know what happens afterward or what its like. So. I would say no because i dont think they can imagine something they have never seen. 
But thats just me.


----------



## RaceCar

Heres my list:

1. What would it be like to have 360 degree vision? Could you really see all sides of an object at once? What does that even MEAN?

2. Just how big a gogolplex?


----------



## vampiregenocide

What if our eyes don't interpret the true colour of things? What if what appears to be green to us, is actually orange? Certan animals see in different colours to us, some are even colour blind. Our entire world in reality could be completely different looking to how we imagine it.


----------



## Evil7

Would a christian think adam and eve had belly buttons / navels?


----------



## Adam Of Angels

vampiregenocide said:


> What if our eyes don't interpret the true colour of things? What if what appears to be green to us, is actually orange? Certan animals see in different colours to us, some are even colour blind. Our entire world in reality could be completely different looking to how we imagine it.



This question about colors is asked a lot.. Basically, if you see green and it's actually the way i see orange, we both understand the same color to be green no matter what it looks like to each of us.


----------



## vampiregenocide

Adam Of Angels said:


> This question about colors is asked a lot.. Basically, if you see green and it's actually the way i see orange, we both understand the same color to be green no matter what it looks like to each of us.


 
No I mean collectively, if what humans percieve as one colour is actually another. We all assume yellow is yellow because we all see it that way.


----------



## pink freud

RaceCar said:


> Heres my list:
> 
> 1. What would it be like to have 360 degree vision? Could you really see all sides of an object at once? What does that even MEAN?
> 
> 2. Just how big a gogolplex?



1: 360 degree vision would mean that you could see in every direction (based on a limited vertical degree) from a single point of observation. You wouldn't be able to see all sides of an object because that object is still a separate point from the observation point. Effectively, put your hands in front of your face until you can only see half of what is in front of you. Now remove them. Extrapolate that into further degrees of vision.

2: Off the top of my head: 1 X 10^1000.


----------



## Adam Of Angels

vampiregenocide said:


> No I mean collectively, if what humans percieve as one colour is actually another. We all assume yellow is yellow because we all see it that way.



...there's no such thing as yellow, just something we call yellow...


----------



## Adam Of Angels

...like, we just describe something as being yellow. There's no such thing as "true yellow"


----------



## pink freud

Adam Of Angels said:


> ...like, we just describe something as being yellow. There's no such thing as "true yellow"



508526 THz 570590 nm


----------



## RaceCar

pink freud said:


> Extrapolate that into further degrees of vision.



WhAT?!? So would this be the equivalent to being int he 4th dimension?

And, literally, how many universes could grains of sand fill with a gogolplex?


----------



## vampiregenocide

Well no but you see what I mean. Something that appears to be a certain colour to our eyes may be something else entirely.


----------



## Adam Of Angels

We wouldn't be wrong though, because we're just describing something.


----------



## pink freud

RaceCar said:


> WhAT?!? So would this be the equivalent to being int he 4th dimension?
> 
> And, literally, how many universes could grains of sand fill with a gogolplex?



Not at all. If your field of vision is limited to 50 degrees on the horizontal axis, and is the expanded to 90 degrees on the horizontal axis, you aren't view things in more dimensions, you are simply viewing more things from a point of observation. A 360 degree FoV simply means viewing all objects around a single point of observation at once.

As for your second question, pretty sure your using at least one of those terms wrong.


----------



## vampiregenocide

Adam Of Angels said:


> We wouldn't be wrong though, because we're just describing something.


 
No like...I don't think you're getting me.  I'm not saying we'd be 'wrong' but things may not be as we see them. We'd have a 'false' view of real life. Oceans could be orange, the sky could be green, but we see it differently.


----------



## Thaeon

orb451 said:


> Well to me, hell is where all the fun would be. What the hell (pardon the pun) is the point of sitting around in the clouds all day if you can't do anything amusing? And yes, in my view, neither God, nor the Devil would be all "good" or all "evil". They could both be either to varying degrees.
> 
> I don't know that the Devil would be running around saving kittens from trees or anything, but he's probably an OK guy. Same with God, he's probably fucked this shit up so fucking bad anyway, that's he's probably given up and would be like the Big Lebowski. Kind of a big, bearded, aloof kind of guy you'd like to hang out around and grab a beer with.
> 
> And yeah, he wouldn't be able to judge us.
> 
> He's like Keyser Soze in a way. A spook story crooks tell their kids about... "rat on your pop, and Keyser Soze will get ya".
> 
> And like *that* he vanishes into thin air...
> 
> Nobody's ever seen him since.



The way I see this particular idea, is that there is the possibility for Good or Evil in God and in the "Devil", Satan, Lucifer, whatever. It's just that half of the energy +/- is either ignored or that either side is used for its longterm effect on the balance of order and chaos because of the ability to see the infinite longterm effects. Good and Evil are still human concepts... Concievably God could do something that we would see as evil to affect some greater good that we don't understand. Trying to understand the motives of such a type of entity is futile due the human's lack of any relative longevity in the grand scheme of things. Along this train of thought, how do we know that God and the Devil aren't two names for the same entity, divided into two so that a primitive culture can digest it as a non-paradox?


----------



## Adam Of Angels

Vampire: I do get what you're saying because I've thought about it a lot myself. What I'm saying, though, is that blue, green, red, etc are all descriptions we give to things, and if the tree outside of my house is actually red, but all humans think its green, we're just describing red as green, and that's fine because there's no such thing as red or green. Our interpretation is the only thing that produces words like green and red to begin with.


----------



## silentrage

I think I get what you're saying. For example we count objects or sequences with real numbers, 1, 2, 3, 4, etc, an alien race or some different kind of intelligence may count using irrational numbers, to them 1, 2, 3, 4 would merely be gaps or anomalies.


----------



## vampiregenocide

Adam Of Angels said:


> Vampire: I do get what you're saying because I've thought about it a lot myself. What I'm saying, though, is that blue, green, red, etc are all descriptions we give to things, and if the tree outside of my house is actually red, but all humans think its green, we're just describing red as green, and that's fine because there's no such thing as red or green. Our interpretation is the only thing that produces words like green and red to begin with.


 
Well everything does have a true colour, just like I said our interpretation would be untrue. The words we choose are irrelevant.


----------



## Adam Of Angels

vampiregenocide said:


> Well everything does have a true colour, just like I said our interpretation would be untrue. The words we choose are irrelevant.



According to our interpretation, there are mathematical values that identify one color or the other, and we name them whatever we want, basically.


----------



## vampiregenocide

Adam Of Angels said:


> According to our interpretation, there are mathematical values that identify one color or the other, and we name them whatever we want, basically.


 
Yeah I know that I'm not arguing that.  Don't worry.


----------



## tacotiklah

Is there anyone on these boards that can top Jeff when it comes to physics? 

Could Tony Iommi crush Chuck Norris with the power of his E5 chord?

Why do people dream about a given scenario and then that scenario actually comes to pass? (this has happened to me numerous times and freaked me out)
-also why is it that only trivial things like random conversations come to pass and not cool shit like me getting a brand new Engl Powerball II head and Vader 4x12?

How does the nose knows where the hos goes?

Could a group of retarded monkeys write better scripts for tv shows than the tripe I've seen on Fox recently? (my guess is yes, but then my mind is blown because of the fact that retarded monkeys are able to write better scripts than the tripe I've seen on Fox recently....)


Can a mute person have tourettes? If so, then how do they spastically converse?

If mind is over matter, then is the whole matter beneath my mind?


----------



## groph

RaceCar said:


> Heres my list:
> 
> 1. What would it be like to have 360 degree vision? Could you really see all sides of an object at once? What does that even MEAN?


 
Pretty fucking crazy I'd imagine. As we are now, I wonder how we'd walk in a straight line. I guess you'd still be able to maintain your body's orientation though. Having that kind of vision would take up a LOT of brainpower.



Adam Of Angels said:


> This question about colors is asked a lot.. Basically, if you see green and it's actually the way i see orange, we both understand the same color to be green no matter what it looks like to each of us.


 
Colors are measurable as wavelengths and we have evolved rods and cones in our eyes to detect them. Aside from colorblind people, it's pretty much scientifically proven that everybody percieves color in the same way.



Adam Of Angels said:


> ...there's no such thing as yellow, just something we call yellow...


 
In the same sense that we could have called yellow "barcelona", then no, there isn't such a thing.

1. How could we set up communication with an alien race if we were to ever make first contact?


----------



## Adam Of Angels

You basically just reiterated my conclusion


----------



## vampiregenocide

groph said:


> Colors are measurable as wavelengths and we have evolved rods and cones in our eyes to detect them. Aside from colorblind people, it's pretty much scientifically proven that everybody percieves color in the same way.


 
Thats the point, what is the universal way all humans percieved colour was actually incorrect? What if we saw yellow, but in reality something was pink? We know what yellow is because we can associate certain visual properties with its position in the colour chart (the RBG ratio it has etc). But what we think we see, might be different from reality.


----------



## Adam Of Angels

...well, that still is lacking in solid logic. Try to apply that same concept to something other than color


----------



## Daemoniac

Evil7 said:


> Would a christian think adam and eve had belly buttons / navels?



[explodes]


----------



## vampiregenocide

Adam Of Angels said:


> ...well, that still is lacking in solid logic. Try to apply that same concept to something other than color


 
I really don't see what you're getting at.  It doesn't work with anything other than colour.


----------



## The Somberlain

ghstofperdition said:


> Can a mute person have tourettes? If so, then how do they spastically converse?
> 
> If mind is over matter, then is the whole matter beneath my mind?



I'll answer two: 

Tourettes applies to any involuntary response, physical or vocal, that is beyond the normal involuntary responses

David Hume essentially disproved this in An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding, but we are slaves to our perception, so anything goes...

Since we are a logocentric species, is all we know symbols and words, or do we really know and understand the wider universe?


----------



## Adam Of Angels

vampiregenocide said:


> I really don't see what you're getting at.  It doesn't work with anything other than colour.



That is what I'm getting at. If somehow our perception of things was flawed such that colors were not what they seem to us, our perception would have to be off in other ways as well. Not to say that we interpret everything perfectly, but what is it about color that would make it an exception?


----------



## vampiregenocide

Adam Of Angels said:


> That is what I'm getting at. If somehow our perception of things was flawed such that colors were not what they seem to us, our perception would have to be off in other ways as well. Not to say that we interpret everything perfectly, but what is it about color that would make it an exception?


 
Ah I see what you mean man. That I couldn't explain, I don't know _why_ it would happen, there are a lot of different ways it could. Colours are just visual aspects that we associate terms with, and aen't tangiable things (you can't hold green, or isolate some yellow in the true sense). Our eyes are actually very poorly designed as eyes go, so it could be the way we interact with light physics, our biology, who knows. I'm just saying in theory, if we didn't percieve colours truly, it would mess my head up.


----------



## Adam Of Angels

Haha, fair enough, man


----------



## vampiregenocide

We got there eventually.  Fuck this thread.


----------



## Explorer

Regarding the 360 degree vision, for a few years I had a pair of glasses which had mirrored surfaces on the inside at the edges farthest from the nose, not visible from the point of view of others. I always knew what was going on around me, and it just kind of incorporated into my view of the world. 

What was funny was, in the same way you might get out of the way of someone walking in your direction when you can see them normally, I would move in that same way with objects and people behind me. Friends sometimes remarked that it was creepy that I always knew what was going on behind me.

I don't have anything like this anymore, but things which I glance behind me still get incorporated into my worldview, and a few coworkers have commented on my talking to people behind me who just walked up, without ever appearing to look behind me. 

----

Here's some observations, and then a few related questions.

Normally, humans don't just wander off and leave their babies. They love their babies, and feel driven to take care of them by that love.

We can also observe cats and dogs taking care of their young, and since we can also see those cats and dogs dreaming and thinking much as we do, we assume that those cats and dogs love their offspring, and us as well.

We also see chickens care for their eggs, and then care for their chicks. 

And, of course, anyone who has seen "March of the Penguins" has seen the grief which overcame the mother who had lost her chick.

So, here's the questions:

*Does an ant love its queen?

Does a squid, octopus and python love its eggs when it is tending them so carefully?*


----------



## Adam Of Angels

Ants are dicks, man


----------



## groph

Yeah, screw this color debate. We see yellow, it's yellow. Good enough for us.


----------



## vampiregenocide

Explorer said:


> Here's some observations, and then a few related questions.
> 
> Normally, humans don't just wander off and leave their babies. They love their babies, and feel driven to take care of them by that love.
> 
> We can also observe cats and dogs taking care of their young, and since we can also see those cats and dogs dreaming and thinking much as we do, we assume that those cats and dogs love their offspring, and us as well.
> 
> We also see chickens care for their eggs, and then care for their chicks.
> 
> And, of course, anyone who has seen "March of the Penguins" has seen the grief which overcame the mother who had lost her chick.
> 
> So, here's the questions:
> 
> *Does an ant love its queen?*
> 
> *Does a squid, octopus and python love its eggs when it is tending them so carefully?*


 
No. Some animals care for their young because that is the way they have evolved to care for their offspring. Generally nature works in either quality or quantity. Mammals such as cats and dogs work on quality of care for their few children. They'll teach them vital skills, raise them and feed them until they are strong enough to fend for themselves. A lot of fish, reptiles and invertabretes work with quantity; lay enough eggs and hopefully some of them will reahc maturity. A squid lays dozens if not hundreds of eggs before it dies, knowing that only a tiny percentage of those will reach maturity. Its a numbers game. It does mean those few animals that do survive will be the strongest of that batch. They don't feel emotion in the same sense we do because it is instinct. Mammals feel emotion because they are a lot more family based, that is the way they have evolved to care for their young. Emotion isn't necessary for a snake or an ant. They know that to carry on their species they must just have as many children as possible and hope some survive. Outside of parenthood, emotions such as love have little place in nature.


----------



## silentrage

I suppose we'll have to decide on the nature of "love" before we can even begin to debate who has it and who hasn't. 

To make things easy I think a list of things that are less debatable should be established first, that might tell us whether there is love.

1. Do members of a species take actions to ensure their offsprings' birth.
2. Do they care for them, or take actions to ensure their continued survival.
3. Is there some electrical or chemical reaction taking place in the body, or brain, when they're engaged in aforementioned activities. 

There things can be measured, and objectively established, and I think most if not all vertebrates share all 3, maybe even some invertebrates.

You can speculate as to what an animal feels when it's nursing its young or defending its eggs, or simply spewing out clones of itself by the trillions, but they're just speculation. 

So if we go by that list, or one like it, we'll have to conclude that all animals can love.

If you don't believe that love is simply a set of behaviors and measurements added together, but rather an emergent phenomenon that depends on, say the number of neurons, or the complexity of the nervous system, that it's more than the sum of its parts, then you'll have to begin by establishing where the threshold is, in the brain, or the body, beyond which you can definitively that there is love.


----------



## JBroll

silentrage said:


> I think I get what you're saying. For example we count objects or sequences with real numbers, 1, 2, 3, 4, etc, an alien race or some different kind of intelligence may count using irrational numbers, to them 1, 2, 3, 4 would merely be gaps or anomalies.



If you can think of a polite, friendly way to say that something is complete and utter horseshit in a disgustingly obvious way, insert it anywhere into this post.

We begin counting with the natural numbers - we have 0, 1, and addition, and that's all we need for basic things. Given any such structure (something like 0, something like 1, something like nice addition (which we'd call a monoid if this were a math book), there's exactly one way to turn counting in the integers to counting in the other structure (unless they count different kinds of things with different coordinates and have tuples of 'counts' as their numbers, a clearly silly thing that I'll ignore from now on).

When it comes time to compare things, naturally we want to find something that we can consider subtraction - the best way to do this ('best' meaning 'give me anything else that works and I'll show you a unique way of turning mine into yours') is with the integers. (Something that looks like this - addition that is commutative and associative, subtraction, and a 0 - would be called an abelian group in a math book. Since we've ruled out an odd case above, these are, in fact, cyclic groups.)

Once we have a handle on grouping things, we need multiplication on the integers, and there's something interesting about those - given any structure R with something that looks like addition, something that looks like subtraction, something that looks like multiplication, 'nice properties' that we're used to (associativity, distributivity, commutativity), and distinguished elements '0' and '1' to stand for the additive and multiplicative identities (called a (commutative) ring in math books), there is a unique map from the integers to R that preserves addition and multiplication, so our counting will have to be a lot like theirs - so much so that they'd know every (finite) thing that we can count to in one way or another and we'd have the same rules and arithmetic operations (in the sense that we could add and multiply a collection of numbers, tell them what we think the numbers are and add and multiply them, tell them our answer, and get the same thing) for everything we have in common. (If they don't turn out to have the integers (or the integers and some other stuff), they'll have things that look like remainders of whole numbers after long division, but that's highly unlikely for anything we'd run into - there would be some number 'n' such that 1+1+...+1 ('n' copies of 1) would be 0, and that tends to make accounting bizarre.) We've already passed counting, but I'm going to go on just to rub it in some more.

What if we have division? (Adding nice division to a ring will give what's called a field.) There are two kinds of things that can happen - first, they could have 'at least' the integers, in which case the collection of fractions of integers - the rational numbers - would fit into their bunch of numbers in exactly one way. Second, there could be some number 'n' such that n copies of 1 added to itself would be 0 - in this case, n has to be a prime, and the collection of remainders after division by n will have to fit into their number system. The second case is highly unlikely, but I'm including it for completeness' sake.

What if they, like us, want to add solutions to polynomial equations? In either case above, they could get a countable (i.e. no 'larger' than the integers, in a way that we and they would have figured out and agreed upon) number system where every polynomial has a solution - in the far more likely first case, they'd have 'at least' our algebraic numbers. If they wanted to do calculus, every continuous function from the reals to the reals (or the complex numbers) is determined by what it does to the rationals (or the algebraic numbers... or, in fact, a lot less), so they're either unable to tell one of our prime numbers apart from zero (once more, *extremely* unlikely for reasons that I can explain later - but try convincing your bank that five is really zero and you'll run into a few reasons) or they're stuck with everything we have up to calculus, a lot of linear and abstract algebra, and... well, everything, as far as I can tell.

Long story short... mathematics is universal - not even 'universal' in the sense of 'in our universe but could be different if there's another one', I really mean the most general sense suggested by the word's etymology. They might discover things in a different way, for different reasons, with different names, or in a different order, but their math will be ours. They may need a dictionary to know what you mean by 'two', but that's about all that can go wrong.



ghstofperdition said:


> Is there anyone on these boards that can top Jeff when it comes to physics?



I certainly hope so.



pink freud said:


> 2: Off the top of my head: 1 X 10^1000.



I thought it was 10^(10^100). In any case, it's absurdly large - if you had a dozen colors of paint and decided to paint each elementary particle, you wouldn't even be able to find a googolplex of different configurations (unless our guesses for the number of elementary particles in the universe are so far off that said number is dwarfed by the error margin.

Racecar, describe the question properly before asking us what it means. The way you've seemed to describe it would just imply having vision of everything around you - there are cameras that can do this (and some stores you shop at probably already have several) so it's not that mind-blowing if you look in a little deeper. If you meant 'seeing all of an object at once', 360* wouldn't be enough to see all of a fermion (not that you'd look much at those anyway) and a glance from each side of an object should be enough to have the entire thing seen anyway.

EDIT:
Two things... 

First, in the paragraph where I worked subtraction into the number system, I realized that there was an ambiguity that I realized would be best cleared up separately. I meant to say that there's a 'best' way to turn a monoid into a group - that is, to take something with nice addition and make nice subtraction, not that there was only one map from the integers to another cyclic group (which is clearly false, but the 'best' ways to do so are all roughly the same).

Second, it's about time I threw in a question that'll be mind-blowing for people who haven't studied much math. Suppose that someone wanted to find your favorite number but could only do so by asking questions of the form 'is it in this collection of numbers?', and you gave a consistent collection of answers to the questions they could ask. 

Consistency will, of course, require a few things. First, if you're asked 'is it in this set S' and answered yes, then you'd have to answer yes to 'is it in this set T' if T contained every member of S. Second, if you said that the number was in a set S and also in a set T, then you'd have to say that the number is in the intersection of S and T (that is, the set consisting of numbers that are both in S and in T). Third, you couldn't say that the number was in the set consisting of no numbers. Finally, if you were asked 'is the number in the set S?' and 'is the number in the set of numbers not in S?', you'd have to say yes to exactly one of those questions.

It is clear that if you have a favorite number - say, five - you'd have to say 'yes' to the sets containing five and 'no' to the sets not containing five.

Is it possible to give a consistent collection of answers that doesn't correspond to an actual number?

END EDIT

Jeff


----------



## silentrage

^ I don't think this discussion will end well, for one thing, your post just went completely over my head, and I don't think I can catch up anytime soon.

But it does seem like you're saying that there is an empirical reality out there that all conscious entities, no matter its origin, or design could agree to, and that the language of this reality is doubtlessly mathematics. 

To suggest this you'd have to assume that A. we're right about our own observation and analysis of the universe, and that B. there is no other organizational principal that can be as pervasive, useful or intuitive as mathematics. 

It may be the case that most scientists now have reached a consensus on the gravitational constant, or the weak force, among other things, but considering how consistently we've had to change and adapt what we call laws of nature, I just don't think it's likely that we're somehow at a privileged point of time when the most fundamental, most accurate description of the universe is known to us. 

Another thing that bothers me is the anthropic, if not ecocentric act of claiming that since we found a system of organizing observable phenomenon, after a few thousand years of development, a cosmological blink of an eye, that it's the best way and possibly the only way to organize and make sense of the universe. 

However I do admit that I offer no practical alternative or convincing insight as to why other intelligent entities wouldn't use the same kind of mathematics as us. 
I just don't think anyone is qualified to state it as anything resembling established fact.


----------



## JBroll

silentrage said:


> ^ I don't think this discussion will end well, for one thing, your post just went completely over my head, and I don't think I can catch up anytime soon.



Keep asking questions for as long as you have them.



silentrage said:


> But it does seem like you're saying that there is an empirical reality out there that all conscious entities, no matter its origin, or design could agree to, and that the language of this reality is doubtlessly mathematics.



This isn't what I'm saying. What I'm saying is that if *anything* about what they're doing is even remotely recognizable as counting, it looks like ours - and, if not, then we're dealing with beings that will look at one table with a pencil to the left of a glass and another with the pencil to the right of the glass and come up with two different number-like-things (or something similar if they don't have associativity or distributivity).



silentrage said:


> To suggest this you'd have to assume that A. we're right about our own observation and analysis of the universe, and that B. there is no other organizational principal that can be as pervasive, useful or intuitive as mathematics.



I'm not assuming or suggesting anything of the sort, and you'll be convinced of this if we can clear some confusion up.



silentrage said:


> It may be the case that most scientists now have reached a consensus on the gravitational constant, or the weak force, among other things, but considering how consistently we've had to change and adapt what we call laws of nature, I just don't think it's likely that we're somehow at a privileged point of time when the most fundamental, most accurate description of the universe is known to us.



This is why I ignore reality and stick to mathematics.



silentrage said:


> Another thing that bothers me is the anthropic, if not ecocentric act of claiming that since we found a system of organizing observable phenomenon, after a few thousand years of development, a cosmological blink of an eye, that it's the best way and possibly the only way to organize and make sense of the universe.



I'm not saying that - I'm saying that I can prove, in a very simple way, that something we've found is, while perhaps not the most obvious or common device, so big and general that it captures every other possible solution and yet well-constructed enough that it doesn't have any excess baggage.



silentrage said:


> However I do admit that I offer no practical alternative or convincing insight as to why other intelligent entities wouldn't use the same kind of mathematics as us.
> I just don't think anyone is qualified to state it as anything resembling established fact.



Count the assumptions I made, and if any are unclear then bring them up. I'm not saying this from an egotistical or people-centered standpoint, I'm saying this after studying what essentially boils down to 'universal solutions' of that sort. This has nothing to do with the way we decided to start counting or the conventions we assumed arbitrarily; you *must* break one of those properties (properties that are undoubtedly *essential* to give something that we'd consider counting) to wind up with anything not fitting what I described.

Jeff


----------



## silentrage

In that case all I can do is to go study mathematics in my spare time and then see if I can understand what you're getting at.


----------



## JBroll

You know where to find me if you need anything. It seems abstract, but it really isn't hard - strange, perhaps, but not hard.

Jeff


----------



## silentrage

The thing I found hard about it wasn't the inherent difficulty in the problems, in fact the exhilaration of solving problems and the fascination of discovering new problems and new ways to solve old ones is often times enough to motivate me. My problem is getting bored of the same routine, so a resources that makes learning it fun would be of great help.


----------



## pink freud

JBroll said:


> I thought it was 10^(10^100). In any case, it's absurdly large - if you had a dozen colors of paint and decided to paint each elementary particle, you wouldn't even be able to find a googolplex of different configurations (unless our guesses for the number of elementary particles in the universe are so far off that said number is dwarfed by the error margin.



Could be. The last time I touched on that number was in the fourth grade. That was a long time ago


----------



## JBroll

silentrage said:


> The thing I found hard about it wasn't the inherent difficulty in the problems, in fact the exhilaration of solving problems and the fascination of discovering new problems and new ways to solve old ones is often times enough to motivate me.



This is what should happen.



silentrage said:


> My problem is getting bored of the same routine, so a resources that makes learning it fun would be of great help.



'The same routine' is math class, not math. If things are routine, something is very wrong - if you get the right guidance and put enough work in, you shouldn't have monotony or routine.

Jeff


----------



## silentrage

So is there a source of self learning you'd recommend over the standard math textbooks I can find in libraries? Preferably online?


----------



## JBroll

Send me a PM with what you've taken and I'll put together whatever I can (from free books, of course) when I have some free time over the weekend.

Jeff


----------



## Hollowman

Exactly how random is random?

If money is the root of all evil then what does that make it's maker?

How do we know? If everything we know is based on perception then how is it the truth?


----------



## Chickenhawk

Why is Jeff so damned smart?

mindblown


----------



## RaceCar

Is everything that could possibly be happening actually happening right now in some other universe? If space is infinite, i*s everything that is ever possibly also happening, infinitely?*

THIS ONE ALWAYS BLOWS MY GOD DAMN MIND


----------



## vampiregenocide

Just thinking about what was before the big bang makes my head hurt. Theres a theory apparently that all matter in the universe after expanding out for billions and billions and billions of years, eventually contracts inwards again, reverting back to its original state before the Big Bang. If that is the case, what if the big bang is happened before? What if there have been thousands of big bangs, of universes being created, expanding and contracting in again only to once again explode and start the process again. I mean its just an idea and theres probably no scientific founding in it, but it would be a cool thing.


----------



## silentrage

There isn't, supposedly there is an as yet unexplained force we've termed dark energy that accelerates the expansion of space, so the universe probably won't contract. 

Ideas about cyclic time has been proposed by scientists and philosophers before, buddhist believe there is no beginning nor end. 

There is a theory that our universe sits on a brane, and that it collided with a parallel universe on another brane, and the energy of the collision was the big bang, and that it could happen again. They talk about this in Through the Wormhole.


----------



## Adam Of Angels

Right. Also, what does it even mean to say that there is nothing outside of the boundaries of the universe, assuming it's finite? How could there be an end to space? What lays outside of it? Nothing?! What the hell is nothing?


----------



## vampiregenocide

silentrage said:


> There isn't, supposedly there is an as yet unexplained force we've termed dark energy that accelerates the expansion of space, so the universe probably won't contract.
> 
> Ideas about cyclic time has been proposed by scientists and philosophers before, buddhist believe there is no beginning nor end.
> 
> There is a theory that our universe sits on a brane, and that it collided with a parallel universe on another brane, and the energy of the collision was the big bang, and that it could happen again. They talk about this in Through the Wormhole.


 
The unexplained bit is key though, theres no concrete idea as to what happens when and if the universe finishes expanding. I heard another theory that space actually overlaps itself and everything would come full circle. Space wouldn't be infinite in the true sense, but more in the Super Mario way in that you run across one side of the screen and come out the other side.


----------



## RaceCar

silentrage said:


> There isn't, supposedly there is an as yet unexplained force we've termed dark energy that accelerates the expansion of space, *so the universe probably won't contract. *
> 
> Ideas about cyclic time has been proposed by scientists and philosophers before, buddhist believe there is no beginning nor end.
> 
> There is a theory that our universe sits on a brane, and that it collided with a parallel universe on another brane, and the energy of the collision was the big bang, and that it could happen again. They talk about this in *Through the Wormhole.*



Who's to know anything concrete about space? All we know is what we believe. I've heard about dark matter and dark energy and how it constitutes 74% of the universe. Who's to say it ever collapsed? I feel that I take the Buddhist approach and will say that although it's difficult for humans to grasp the concept of infinity, (no beginning, no end) doesn't mean you can render it "impossible."

Also, Through the Wormhole kicks ass, and Morgan Freeman kicks ass


----------



## silentrage

@Adam
There's no such thing as nothing. You can only say nothing when you relate the concept of nothing to something, it's a relationship. But in order to relate nothing to something, something has to exist first, and it has to exist along with nothing, you'd have relatively something vs relatively nothing. Therefore there can not be a space in which there is truly nothing. 

There always had to be something. If we assume there is a boundary around our universe outside which there is nothing, that nothing would have to be infinite, immutable, it would exist outside the bounds of time and space, it would then have no reason to confine itself outside of our universe, since it being outside implies a relationship with our universe and thus renders it not immutable and infinite anymore. It would have to be all of existence, or nonexistence to be more accurate. 

In that case we wouldn't be around to ask about it. The fact that we are, says that something always existed in some way or other. 

@vampire
That's an interest concept. I'm thinking, if we were in a space loop, and one circumference around that loop is smaller than our lightsphere, then the light from the big bang, as well as light from stars would start to loop through space. Wouldn't that mean that a bright enough object situated at the right position to us could be seen from 2 completely different directions at once?


----------



## JBroll

Hollowman666 said:


> Exactly how random is random?



True randomness is surprisingly not easy to come across. Most applications of 'random' numbers use pseudorandom number generators that can be made pretty close to truly random, but generating actual random numbers (the simplest case of randomness) is still an area of active research.



Hollowman666 said:


> How do we know? If everything we know is based on perception



It's not.



Hollowman666 said:


> then how is it the truth?



If you can separate something from your perception of it, there is no problem.



Adam Of Angels said:


> Right. Also, what does it even mean to say that there is nothing outside of the boundaries of the universe, assuming it's finite? How could there be an end to space? What lays outside of it? Nothing?! What the hell is nothing?



There may not be an 'end' to space in the way that you're imagining. (Consider a basketball - clearly finite, but you're not running into its edge anytime soon.)

Jeff


----------



## Rick

Infinity Complex said:


> Why is Jeff so damned smart?
> 
> mindblown



I've been asking that for 3 years.


----------



## Adam Of Angels

silentrage said:


> @Adam
> There's no such thing as nothing. You can only say nothing when you relate the concept of nothing to something, it's a relationship. But in order to relate nothing to something, something has to exist first, and it has to exist along with nothing, you'd have relatively something vs relatively nothing. Therefore there can not be a space in which there is truly nothing.
> 
> There always had to be something. If we assume there is a boundary around our universe outside which there is nothing, that nothing would have to be infinite, immutable, it would exist outside the bounds of time and space, it would then have no reason to confine itself outside of our universe, since it being outside implies a relationship with our universe and thus renders it not immutable and infinite anymore. It would have to be all of existence, or nonexistence to be more accurate.
> 
> In that case we wouldn't be around to ask about it. The fact that we are, says that something always existed in some way or other.



Well, my question was a rhetorical one, really, even though I was hoping for somebody to respond. You outlined my point, in any case. To think that time started at some point is silly.

"The reason for time is so that everything doesn't happen all at once."


----------



## RaceCar

Adam Of Angels said:


> "The reason for time is so that everything doesn't happen all at once."



...or IS everything happening at once, at some place or another, infinitely?

Here's a mindfuck I've been struggling with...

"Does time even exist?"

Since time is an unmeasurable variable, and a lot of physicists acknowledge "The Time Problem," makes you wonder if time isn't just the 4th dimension. 

Isn't the 4th dimension = Time?

Could time just be a made-up variable created by humans to put some kind of order in their lives??!?


----------



## Adam Of Angels

Well, the point is that we experience time so that everything doesn't seem to happen at once. I'm of the school of thought that says our reality is just one density of experience, but that many layers of reality work in unison with this one.


----------



## JBroll

RaceCar said:


> ...or IS everything happening at once, at some place or another, infinitely?
> 
> Here's a mindfuck I've been struggling with...
> 
> "Does time even exist?"
> 
> Since time is an unmeasurable variable, and a lot of physicists acknowledge "The Time Problem," makes you wonder if time isn't just the 4th dimension.
> 
> Isn't the 4th dimension = Time?
> 
> Could time just be a made-up variable created by humans to put some kind of order in their lives??!?



You simply must be joking.

Jeff


----------



## RaceCar

JBroll said:


> You simply must be joking.
> 
> Jeff



No. I'm literally being dead serious.


----------



## JBroll

So far your questions have been a combination of ill-informed, already answered, and easily found through Google, but that's the first that hit all three at once. If that still blows your mind, it may be best to leave a paperweight on your head lest it be lost to a strong wind, overzealous ceiling fan, or unfortunately-placed sneeze.

Jeff


----------



## CrushingAnvil

How was the first ruler made?







"How do we know that, that is as straight as it is going to get?"


----------



## JBroll

Simple - make it watch Moulin Rouge.

Jeff


----------



## CrushingAnvil

JBroll said:


> You simply must be joking.
> 
> Jeff





I'm glad I was *actually* joking in my post.


----------



## CrushingAnvil

JBroll said:


> Simple - make it watch Moulin Rouge.
> 
> Jeff



Pretty sure there are two paths of influence with that movie.

Become epicly gay, or, become an epic slut screwing machine.


----------



## JBroll

Infinity Complex said:


> Why is Jeff so damned smart?
> 
> mindblown



I'm not really that smart, I just know enough mathematics, physics, and formal logic to make it look like I am. It's not hard to get where I am - just take all the stuff you normally do in a day and replace it with studying, teaching, being gorgeous, and drinking heavily.

Jeff


----------



## CrushingAnvil

JBroll said:


> I'm not really that smart, I just know enough mathematics, physics, and formal logic to make it look like I am. It's not hard to get where I am - just take all the stuff you normally do in a day and replace it with studying, teaching, being *gorgeous*, and drinking heavily.
> 
> Jeff



You actually look like this vegan-christian dude I once knew...

The contrast is blinding...


----------



## Chickenhawk

JBroll said:


> I'm not really that smart, I just know enough mathematics, physics, and formal logic to make it look like I am. It's not hard to get where I am - just take all the stuff you normally do in a day and replace it with studying, teaching, being gorgeous, and drinking heavily.
> 
> Jeff




So, I must replace my current schedule of studying, being gorgeous, and drinking heavily with a different version of studying, being gorgeous, and drinking heavily?

Fuck, quantum entanglement fucks my world.


----------



## RaceCar

JBroll said:


> So far your questions have been a combination of ill-informed, already answered, and easily found through Google, but that's the first that hit all three at once. If that still blows your mind, it may be best to leave a paperweight on your head lest it be lost to a strong wind, overzealous ceiling fan, or unfortunately-placed sneeze.
> 
> Jeff



What about if you consider multiverses? If there are several, if not infinite, universes. If space is infinite, then there could be ones very similar to ours except for one slight difference, because after all there's an infinite amount of them. Who's to say right now theres a universe, SOMEWHERE, where I just got up from my desk and started playing The Mirror by Dream Theater in front of all my co-workers? If my questions are ill-informed, please enlighten me.


----------



## JBroll

Infinity Complex said:


> So, I must replace my current schedule of studying, being gorgeous, and drinking heavily with a different version of studying, being gorgeous, and drinking heavily?
> 
> Fuck, quantum entanglement fucks my world.



You haven't turned into me, so you're clearly not doing it right.



RaceCar said:


> What about if you consider multiverses? If there are several, if not infinite, universes. If space is infinite, then there could be ones very similar to ours except for one slight difference, because after all there's an infinite amount of them. Who's to say right now theres a universe, SOMEWHERE, where I just got up from my desk and started playing The Mirror by Dream Theater in front of all my co-workers? If my questions are ill-informed, please enlighten me.



... where the balls did this come from? We already discussed the answer to your last question, I've already said a few things about MWI, and I completely fail to see what this post has to do with anything.

Jeff


----------



## vampiregenocide

What if we're all in a video game, like real life Sims?


----------



## silentrage

There's a slew of topics on that already I'm pretty sure, apparently some people think if we are in a simulation, then the most probable candidate for the simulators is humans from the future.


----------



## RaceCar

JBroll said:


> You haven't turned into me, so you're clearly not doing it right.
> 
> 
> 
> ... where the balls did this come from? We already discussed the answer to your last question, I've already said a few things about MWI, and I completely fail to see what this post has to do with anything.
> 
> Jeff



Sorry didn't read through the whole thread. Didn't see it. My bad.

You seem like a pretty smart guy. That's why I was asking if you've ever heard of this concept of time not existing. I am not at all educated on this, I've only heard the basic overview through a few science magazines and shows.


----------



## JBroll

I said a few things on it earlier, but... it is completely impossible to tell how you jump from 'time is another variable'/'time is the fourth dimension' (which was previously explained) to 'time doesn't exist' (which is utter nonsense), and the many-worlds question you asked above doesn't have much of anything to do with your questions about time. The thread calls for 'mind-blowing' questions, but if your mind is easily blown then it's impolite to ask questions that a simple search could have handled easily.

Jeff


----------



## RaceCar

JBroll said:


> I said a few things on it earlier, but... it is completely impossible to tell how you jump from 'time is another variable'/'time is the fourth dimension' (which was previously explained) to 'time doesn't exist' (which is utter nonsense), and the many-worlds question you asked above doesn't have much of anything to do with your questions about time. The thread calls for 'mind-blowing' questions, but if your mind is easily blown then it's impolite to ask questions that a simple search could have handled easily.
> 
> Jeff


 
Allright smarty pants. Here's my ultimate question.

"WHAT IS TIME?!"


(ps. im kidding. relax.)


----------



## JBroll

RaceCar said:


> Allright smarty pants. Here's my ultimate question.
> 
> "WHAT IS TIME?!"



One of many things that you're wasting by asking dumb questions and not reading each and every one of my thousands of previous posts, you ignorant oaf. 



RaceCar said:


> (ps. im kidding. relax.)



(Beat you to it.)

Jeff


----------



## Mr. Big Noodles

Fucking magnets, how do they work?


----------



## silentrage

One thing I don't get is Foucault's Pendulum, how is it that a pendulum on earth is seemingly aligned with all mass in the universe, most of which is remote galaxy clusters, and not so much with earth or any of the local mass?


----------



## Hollowman

Do people on here follow trends by this I'm not talking fashion trends or musical trends. but, trends like financial and environmental? and what is your predictions for the coming years?


----------



## JBroll

silentrage said:


> a pendulum on earth is seemingly aligned with all mass in the universe, most of which is remote galaxy clusters, and not so much with earth or any of the local mass?



Figure out what the hell this is supposed to mean, or convince yourself that it doesn't mean anything and that the pendulum just moves on its own and ignores Earth's rotation, and it'll all be clear.

Jeff


----------



## Adam Of Angels

JBroll said:


> you ignorant oaf



My favorite thing that I read today


----------



## halsinden

i know this is the lounge and it's meant to be serious, but this did admittedly spring to mind when i saw this thread:



poor big'yin is clearly tortured by the clarity of his vision. brilliant.

H


----------



## Razzy

How do the oceans span beyond my sight?

Why are there a million stars way above em at night?

What's with all of the mountains, trees, the seven seas
And everything chilling underwater, please?!?!

How come when I plant a little seed, nature grows?

Where did Niagara falls and the pyramids come from?

Why are there fucking rainbows after it rains?

Pure motherfucking magic
Right?

Fucking magnets, how do they work?

How could fifteen thousand Juggalos exist, even get together?

How does a caterpillar turn into a butterfly?


----------



## JBroll

A single Juggalo is more than enough to cast doubt on the existence of any sense of justice in the universe and leave anyone of reason with no choice but to conclude that there could never be a just, loving god.

Jeff


----------



## vampiregenocide

Jeff + science threads = someone getting pissed off 

Now thats something I think we can all understand.


----------



## Adam Of Angels

It's better when Jeff gets angry.. Well that's usually what happens, but I wouldn't change it.


----------



## JBroll

I don't actually get angry.

Jeff


----------



## Adam Of Angels

In that case, don't actually get angry.


----------



## JBroll

I wasn't planning on it. 

Jeff


----------



## silentrage

Well it's obviously not following the earth, so what IS it following?


----------



## JBroll

In an 'ideal' pendulum (no friction between the rope and the frame to which it is attached, and so on) the pendulum simply swings back and forth on its own and the planet rotates under it. The swinging is of course due to gravity, and a simple calculus exercise shows that for all the pendulum cares the Earth's gravitational pull is the same as that which would occur if the Earth were replaced by a point mass located at the center of the planet's gravitational field and with the same mass as the Earth (up to some small error since the planet isn't perfectly round, which is utterly insignificant as far as we - and the pendula - are concerned), so the pendulum essentially ignores the Earth's rotation. Gravitational pull from everything else is too small to bother caring about. Why would you jump to the conclusion that it's following something?

Jeff


----------



## silentrage

Because it's meaningless to say what a motion is without providing a frame of reference. The earth is orbiting the sun, the sun orbits the milky way, the milky way moves toward its neighbour galaxy, presumably on an elliptical or otherwise curved trajectory, but if the pendulum is ignoring all this multitudes of curved trajectories and always swings back and forth in the same fashion, it still is swing back and forth in reference to something, what is it swing in reference to? 

The closer an object you compare to the pendulum's motion, the larger the deviation will be between the two object's motion because that local object would be tied to the earth's rotation, or the solar system's.
The amount of deviation starts to diminish the farther you go, a star at the opposite end of the galaxy would drift less from its initial relative position to the pendulum at the time we observe it, another galaxy far away would seem almost stationary compared to the pendulum, it would still drift from this initial relative position very slowly. 

If we take the farthest possible objects in the observable universe, a galaxy on the edge of the universe, it should always(almost) remain in a fixed relationship to the pendulum's motion. 

So it would seem, at least on the surface, that somehow the pendulum's motion is fixed relative to the farthest possible object from it. And why is that? 

Hope you get what I'm saying.


----------



## JBroll

That has nothing to do with links to distant masses. I see where the confusion is now, and it's not where you think it is.

Jeff


----------



## silentrage

I am, I'm just wondering what's the reference for its swinging motion then, it'd have to be something apart from the motion of the earth, the sun, and the galaxy. Is it fixed in some kind of absolute sense?


----------



## JBroll

I think we may have already touched on the problems with absolute reference frames. Where have you been reading about the Foucault pendulum?

Jeff


----------



## Encephalon5

vampiregenocide said:


> When is your first concious thought?
> 
> 
> If a dog had vocal chords like humans, could it learn our language?
> 
> If space is infinite, how do we know there wasn't more than one big bang?



Dogs have vocal cords. And brains that haven't evolved enough to have the mental capacity to learn a language as complex as any of the human languages.

It isn't.

Also, a person born deaf wouldn't have any internal voice as they would have no knowledge of spoken language. they would most likely think in pictures. or just the words themselves.


----------



## vampiregenocide

Encephalon5 said:


> Dogs have vocal cords. And brains that haven't evolved enough to have the mental capacity to learn a language as complex as any of the human languages.
> 
> It isn't.
> 
> Also, a person born deaf wouldn't have any internal voice as they would have no knowledge of spoken language. they would most likely think in pictures. or just the words themselves.


 
Okay vocal chords advanced enough to speak words. And parrots can learn hundreds of words and phrases, dogs are just as intelligent theres no reason they couldn't at least learn some words. Might not be able to have a proper conversation but fuck it I want a talking dog.

Not in the literal sense of going in a straight line forever and ever, but theres no 'edge' to space that has been discussed from anywhere I've seen. Its supposed to fold in over itself, or create some kind of looping form whereby you can never reach any edge.


----------



## budda

How the fuck did someone create the numerical system, and how come people can use imaginary numbers in math?


----------



## JBroll

Many people contributed little bits to what we now see as the numerical system... that's something best taken to Wikipedia.

As far as 'how come ... ?', I don't see what the objection is. How do we know that complex numbers give a sensible idea of 'things we can treat as numbers'? How do we define them? How do they gain real-world interpretations or simplify seemingly concrete, 'real' problems? The big issue will probably wind up being the name 'imaginary' itself - this name is unfortunate and a little bit nonsensical (anything more complicated than five is clearly the work of man, and I'm not so sure about two, three, or four), but it turns out that complex numbers are the 'right' numbers for things as concrete as mechanics and signal processing, as abstract as geometry, and as ridiculously overpowered as modern analysis.

Jeff


----------



## Rick

STOP FEEDING JEFF!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!


----------



## ittoa666

Can you dig it?


----------



## JBroll

Your grave? Three steps ahead of you.

Jeff


----------



## vampiregenocide

Rick said:


> STOP FEEDING JEFF!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!


 
This.


----------



## Cadavuh

Pierre grows up in France, and learns about a city called "Londres" (the same city which we call "London"). Pierre comes to believe that London is pretty, and would sincerely assent to the sentence, "Londres est jolie." 

Pierre then moves to an unattractive part of London, and learns English by picking it up from native speakers, without the help of translation. He does not know that the city he now lives in is the same city he calls "Londres". He comes to believe that the city he lives in, which he calls "London", is not pretty.

If a normal speaker of English, upon reflection, sincerely assents to 'p', then he believes that p.

If a sentence expresses a truth in one language, then a correct translation of it into any other language also expresses a truth (in that other language).

"London is pretty" is a correct translation of "Londres est jolie."

From these very plausible principles it seems to follow that Pierre both believes that London is pretty and believes that London is not pretty. This is a very counterintuitive result, though, since Pierre is not an irrational fellow, and no matter what his logical abilities he will not be able to figure out (as things now stand) that he holds contradictory beliefs.

How can we make sense of this situation?


----------



## JBroll

The initial statement "Londres est jolie" is clearly in error if he finds a part of London that isn't pretty. This has nothing to do with translation and everything to do with poor generalizations.

Jeff


----------



## Cadavuh

Well of course its erroneous on his part, the puzzle is about belief though.


----------



## JBroll

If by that you mean 'belief in generalizations taken so far that they become wrong', then yes. However, it has nothing whatsoever to do with a French boy, England, beauty, translation, or anything else but improper generalizations.

Jeff


----------



## pink freud

Cadavuh said:


> Well of course its erroneous on his part, the puzzle is about belief though.



To me, the puzzle is about ignorance. He does not simultaneously believe that London is and is not pretty. He believes London is pretty, and the city which he is in, which he believes to be not-London, is not pretty.

You scenario has differing characteristics in the juxtaposition that makes the two beliefs not equal in comparison.


----------



## Tomo009

This is still the ask/state something and be made to look stupid by Jeff thread?


----------



## JBroll

If you ask something stupid, it can be.

Jeff


----------



## Cadavuh

pink freud said:


> To me, the puzzle is about ignorance. He does not simultaneously believe that London is and is not pretty. He believes London is pretty, and the city which he is in, which he believes to be not-London, is not pretty.
> 
> You scenario has differing characteristics in the juxtaposition that makes the two beliefs not equal in comparison.



That still doesn't change the fact that the two statements he is believing are semantically identical, he is believing A and not A at the same time. 



JBroll said:


> If by that you mean 'belief in generalizations taken so far that they become wrong', then yes. However, it has nothing whatsoever to do with a French boy, England, beauty, translation, or anything else but improper generalizations.
> 
> Jeff



Jeff, regarding your first sentence, I am accusing you of sophistry . No, I don't mean that. It also does have nothing to do with any of those things you named off, the example could be restated with different variables. I think you might be overlooking the problem, that A is (semantically speaking)believing Pv~P at the same time. Sure, its not a wholly pragmatic problem, or a mind-blowing question, but there is still a puzzle involved.


----------



## JBroll

He is, by your account, believing something and its negation at the same time, and you're correct in saying this is a problem. I fail to see how there is any puzzle beyond what has already been pointed out, though... is that supposed to be the puzzle?

Jeff


----------



## ittoa666

JBroll said:


> Your grave? Three steps ahead of you.
> 
> Jeff


 
 I'm sure you don't hate all of us THAT much.

Also, eggs?


----------



## silentrage

^ No, bacon.


----------



## Cadavuh

JBroll said:


> He is, by your account, believing something and its negation at the same time, and you're correct in saying this is a problem. I fail to see how there is any puzzle beyond what has already been pointed out, though... is that supposed to be the puzzle?
> 
> Jeff



Ja, das ist correct.


----------



## Hallic

im just going speculate a bit.

Will we ever be able to define the smallest particle/or fysical subnuclues thingy, and the biggest? When considering math problem and working in dimensions, you''ll always need one dimensions more to define the first few. So if you have 4 dimensions, you'll know you have 4 from a 5th dimensional standpoint. 
does this mean that once we found a smaller particle we'll need a smaller new subparticle that will characterize the particle we then just discovers?

Is everything what is happening defined by the fysics on quatum level, even simple thing like the feeling the need for picking up yur guitar?

What will happen in ~25years when we human have completed developing an AI more intelligent than the human brain. I mean, global war for this technology? WIll the be like a 2nd type of enlightment of the human race? that new information by this AI blows are mind and will allow us to proceed further as a race, that we may enhance ourselves with DNA manipulation and mechnical/digital upgrades? 

how many planets will we have colonized by the year 2100?


----------



## JBroll

First question of the second paragraph may be already settled; the observation about dimension isn't quite right.

The third paragraph... in theory the details are all worked out, but nobody goes straight from fundamental particle interactions to the hierarchy of needs because the technical wizardry required to do so is completely infeasible and not at all worth the trouble (considering where else we could put it).

For the fourth paragraph... first, define and measure intelligence. We'll see about ~25 years... we've made amazing progress since 1985, but it hasn't gone as planned and there do seem to be obstructions to 'human-like' AI. As far as a new enlightenment... I'd honestly say that it's about time to start thinking about how far one is currently underway, rather than just pushing it forward and leaving the work to future generations.

For the last problem... 7.8 planets.

Jeff


----------



## budda

JBroll said:


> If you ask something stupid, it can be.
> 
> Jeff



QOTY?


----------



## JBroll

That depends on how many drinks you buy us and how we're feeling about our daddy issues that evening. Prospects are typically better when they haven't called in a few days to ask if we need money.

Jeff


----------



## ittoa666

silentrage said:


> ^ No, bacon.



Hard boiled eggs with bacon inside?


----------



## Captain Axx

how come i get holes in my left sock, but not my right one?


----------



## Deadnightshade

Captain Axx said:


> how come i get holes in my left sock, but not my right one?



Your left toe has an entropy accelerator , simple as that


----------



## vampiregenocide

Captain Axx said:


> how come i get holes in my left sock, but not my right one?


 
Your left leg is your dominant one? Maybe because you step forward with it, use it to support your weight more etc that might be it.


----------



## tacotiklah

Captain Axx said:


> how come i get holes in my left sock, but not my right one?



A similar question that I seem to have is:

Why do all my jeans suddenly blow out a massive hole in the crotch? Seriously, I don't understand why......


----------



## PyramidSmasher

Has anyone really been far as decided to use even go want to do look more like?


----------



## MFB

Why do so many people like the Peanuts gang and their shitty comics?


----------



## leandroab

MFB said:


> Why do so many people like the Peanuts gang and their shitty comics?



I don't. I'm allergic to peanuts.


----------



## MFB

leandroab said:


> I don't. I'm allergic to peanuts.



Peanuts GANG bro, like, the Charles Schultz comics


----------



## scherzo1928

where does the slime live?


----------



## Antimatter

Is Hobbes the tiger a real tiger?


----------



## timbaline

How the hell did someone invent beer/alcoholic drinks?
Same with bread.
Seriously, that must've been a crapload of experimentation to create. Or one hell of an accident.


----------



## scherzo1928

Someone ate a bit of fermented fruit and got buzzed.


----------



## lobee

timbaline said:


> How the hell did someone invent beer/alcoholic drinks?
> Same with bread.
> Seriously, that must've been a crapload of experimentation to create. Or one hell of an accident.


Pretty much a product of having a surplus of barley, wheat, or other fermentables stored in a hot,wet, and dirty environment. Grains need to be converted to fermentable sugar before they can become beer. This is achieved by keeping wet grains within a certain temperature range for a period of time. Once converted, the wort(converted grain juice) needs to be fermented by yeast, which eat sugar and poop out ethanol and CO2, among other things. Wild yeast is everywhere, especially in highly populated areas, so you can see how storing highly fermentable grains in hot, wet environments could be converted into alcohol when left to the wild yeast in the air. Modern beer is still made with the same processes, just more controlled. The ale and lager yeast strains used in today's beer were cultivated hundreds of years ago from wild yeast.

Ninkasi Beer & The Dawn of Civilization | Bethany's Table - Family Restaurant & Catering in Beaverton, Portland and Bethany


Yeah, I'm a 10th level beer nerd.


----------



## The McThief

leandroab said:


>



Listen to Aspiration by After The Burial while looking at this.

It lines up PERFECTLY LOL


----------



## timbaline

lobee said:


> Pretty much a product of having a surplus of barley, wheat, or other fermentables stored in a hot,wet, and dirty environment. Grains need to be converted to fermentable sugar before they can become beer. This is achieved by keeping wet grains within a certain temperature range for a period of time. Once converted, the wort(converted grain juice) needs to be fermented by yeast, which eat sugar and poop out ethanol and CO2, among other things. Wild yeast is everywhere, especially in highly populated areas, so you can see how storing highly fermentable grains in hot, wet environments could be converted into alcohol when left to the wild yeast in the air. Modern beer is still made with the same processes, just more controlled. The ale and lager yeast strains used in today's beer were cultivated hundreds of years ago from wild yeast.
> 
> Ninkasi Beer & The Dawn of Civilization | Bethany's Table - Family Restaurant & Catering in Beaverton, Portland and Bethany
> 
> 
> Yeah, I'm a 10th level beer nerd.


Alright, this is a good definite answer.



scherzo1928 said:


> Someone ate a bit of fermented fruit and got buzzed.


This is a much more entertaining answer

So how about bread? How did they discover how to make bread and why did they decide to use some grain to make bread instead of beer?


----------



## leandroab

MFB said:


> Peanuts GANG bro, like, the Charles Schultz comics



I know dude, i was fucking with ya, I'm not even allergic to peanuts!


----------



## Hollowman

Why is it that no matter how much you chew corn always comes back whole?


----------



## ZackP3750

How is the universe infinite?


----------



## vampiregenocide

ZackP3750 said:


> How is the universe infinite?


 
Apparently it might not be in the literal sense, but sort of bent in a way where you'd never be able to reach the edge, and just come around on yourself.


----------



## scherzo1928

How do you apply a finish to cocoblo?


----------



## Prydogga

Why does someone need ID to buy non-alcoholic beer.


----------



## xmetalhead69

wtf is the purpose of this chair?


----------



## scherzo1928

Prydogga said:


> Why does someone need ID to buy non-alcoholic beer.


good question. I remember on one trip I did to the US (I was 17 or 18) I asked for a beer at a TGI, and obviously didnt get one. Hours later I bought a katana in a mall without getting asked a single question... funny how things work.


----------



## Cabinet

If God doesn't believe something created it, wouldn't that make it an Atheist?


----------



## JBroll

No.

Jeff


----------



## groph

Hollowman666 said:


> Why is it that no matter how much you chew corn always comes back whole?








EDIT: About Hobbes the tiger, my understanding is that he's Calvin's imaginary friend, just like any stuffed animal is to any kid. He "comes to life" only when Calvin is around, and never when Calvin's parents or any adults or Susie Derkins or anybody besides Calvin are present. Hobbes is probably a metaphor for something. Maybe the cynicism associated with older age, despite Calvin being intellectually years ahead of other 8 year olds, as he's pretty much an eccentric personality with an incredible imagination but since he's only 8 he still doesn't "know the world" like adults do. I dunno. Bill Watterson doesn't strike me as a cartoonist who throws things on paper for the sake of it.

EDIT EDIT: Yeah, Hobbes represents the subjective nature of reality according to Bill Watterson, according to Wikipedia. Calvin sees Hobbes one way while everyone else sees him in another, basically. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hobbes_(Calvin_and_Hobbes_character)#Hobbes.27

Interesting. I didn't think I'd end up analyzing Hobbes tonight. I really need to dig up my old Calvin and Hobbes books and have a nostalgia trip. I'll probably understand the cartoons on a different, but not necessarily a "higher" level since I'm older, I'll just appreciate different things. That's probably another point behind the whole series. Fuck, I love Calvin and Hobbes.


----------



## Jedi Pirate

Not sure if this was already addressed on previous pages, and if so, ignore this, but, why FOR THE LOVE OF GOD does my pick always conveniently land somewhere where it's JUST out of reach to the point where I have to get up from my chair? wtf!


----------



## ittoa666

while we're on the topic of corn, why does corn poop happen even when I KNOW I haven't had corn in at least a week?

Also, can the characters on Family Guy understand Stewie?


----------



## vampiregenocide

If you had absolute knowledge of everything, all known processes in existence, what would you do? Would the crippling power of knowing everything give you the knowledge of foresight? You know so many variables that have an impact on an event, you can accurately predict what would happen by being able to analyze every single detail perfectly. Or would complete infinite knowledge leave you constantly yearning for something new? Leaving you in a perpetual state of boredom and seeking something beyond the realms of knowledge.


----------



## Van

vampiregenocide said:


> If you had absolute knowledge of everything, all known processes in existence, what would you do? Would the crippling power of knowing everything give you the knowledge of foresight? You know so many variables that have an impact on an event, you can accurately predict what would happen by being able to analyze every single detail perfectly. Or would complete infinite knowledge leave you constantly yearning for something new? Leaving you in a perpetual state of boredom and seeking something beyond the realms of knowledge.



I imagine it'd be like playing a video game with cheat codes: fun at first but then pretty boring. I imagine you'd cure a few diseases for humanity, then kill yourself after a while


----------



## That_One_Person

Alright... Why the fuck is mayo considered the "standard" condiment for sandwiches? I don't see why everytime I order a burger I have to say no mayo.


----------



## vampiregenocide

Van said:


> I imagine it'd be like playing a video game with cheat codes: fun at first but then pretty boring. I imagine you'd cure a few diseases for humanity, then kill yourself after a while


 
Curing diseases wouldbe childs play with that kind of knowledge. You'd have complete understanding of physics and nature as a whole aross the known universe. You could advance technology as far as you wanted in no time at all.


----------



## The Somberlain

For me, the enjoyment of life is learning more, and all organic activity is based on learning, trial and error. If one knows everything, one would not have a reason to live.


----------



## Skyblue

If you knew EVERYTHING, wouldn't it mean you could basically do anything you want? as in, become god-like in a way? 
could be fun, but probably just in the physical sense of it. I'd still love to try


----------



## Randy

If you knew everything than you'd know whether or not there's an afterlife and what it'd be like, so there'd be no escaping your omnipotence.


----------



## vampiregenocide

Randy said:


> If you knew everything than you'd know whether or not there's an afterlife and what it'd be like, so there'd be no escaping your omnipotence.


 
This is true, maybe there'd be denial and wishing for something beyond what you know.


----------



## Randy

But you'd already know whether or not those wishes will be answered. :mindexplosion:


----------



## vampiregenocide

Randy said:


> But you'd already know whether or not those wishes will be answered. :mindexplosion:


 
Thats where the denial comes in, does knowing everything mean you'd have to believe you do? Or would your perfect knowledge of human psychology mean you'd end up spending all your time trying to rationalise and explain all your own thoughts?


----------



## Randy

That's a good point. Being all knowing doesn't necessarily mean you can't deny things, as I can say I've known things with certainty but just denied them because it was the most comfortable thing to do.


----------



## scherzo1928

Well, if I knew everything, and became overwhelmed, I would know what I need to do to forget everything. I would first try and fix the things I think need fixing (in the world), cure the curable etc. Then I would write the things I know I'll need to know in the future. and bam!! ignorance is a bliss.


----------



## vampiregenocide

But what if you ended up thinking about the consequences of your actions? Would that spiral into an out-of-control mental collapse as you end up enternally tracing the effects of your own decisions? Its like Chaos Theory, one simple event starts becoming ever complex as it progresses and more variables effect it. Eventually, it becomes so incredibly complex, it is unrecognisable in regards to its original form.


----------



## Josh_Conlee

If you force a prostitute to have sex with you.....is it rape or shoplifting?


----------



## Josh_Conlee

*edit* for some reason my last post went twice


----------



## CrushingAnvil

djent_tent said:


> If you force a prostitute to have sex with you.....is it rape or shoplifting?



Holy shit that was dry


----------



## JBroll

Shoplifting involves goods from retail stores, so unless said prostitute is registered as such and you take her 'goods' (a difficult task to accomplish without tacking battery on to your list of charges) it should be pretty clear.

Jeff


----------



## vampiregenocide

If a person with multiple personalities threatens to commit suicide, is it a hostage situation?


----------



## Antimatter

Can any adult or authority figure see why kids love the taste of cinammon toast crunch?


----------



## Josh_Conlee

CrushingAnvil said:


> Holy shit that was dry



Haha just thought of that in class one day, doesn't everyone have those thoughts now and again ;D


----------



## Josh_Conlee

How about "Can Chuck Norris believe it's not butter?"


----------



## CrushingAnvil

Why?


----------



## bostjan

If you are what you eat, doesn't that unavoidably make you a cannibal?

If lighter colours absorb less light than darker colours, why do white people come from colder, darker parts of the Earth than black people?

Likewise, if the solar maximum is near green, why do plants reflect green light and absorb the rest? Wouldn't they be better off absorbing more energy for photosynthesis?

When a neutron star is formed by a collapsing star, do any protons survive? If so, does each neutron star become its own isotope/element?


----------



## Killbot

If a man is spontaneously created with no experience of anything but with fully developed internal reasoning (excuse the deus ex machinae) with a blind fold on, and learns to distinguish between a table and a chair by touch. One day his blindfold is taken off. Before he touches the table or the chair, will he know the difference by sight?


----------



## Tomo009

bostjan said:


> If lighter colours absorb less light than darker colours, why do white people come from colder, darker parts of the Earth than black people?
> 
> Likewise, if the solar maximum is near green, why do plants reflect green light and absorb the rest? Wouldn't they be better off absorbing more energy for photosynthesis?
> 
> When a neutron star is formed by a collapsing star, do any protons survive? If so, does each neutron star become its own isotope/element?



I really want to know the answer to these 3 actually


----------



## tacotiklah

Killbot said:


> If a man is spontaneously created with no experience of anything but with fully developed internal reasoning (excuse the deus ex machinae) with a blind fold on, and learns to distinguish between a table and a chair by touch. One day his blindfold is taken off. Before he touches the table or the chair, will he know the difference by sight?





I doubt it. Watch 'At First Sight' with Val Kilmer to gain an idea of what would happen. We studied this in my high school psychology class. Basically things like visual and depth perception are learned concepts (IIRC you start to learn these when you're 6 months old) as are things like visual memory.
Essentially that movie is about a man who is born blind, and has learned to view the world around him via sound and touch. Later he has surgery that fixes his eyesight, but he struggles with things like reading, balance and other things.

I normally try to not get my facts from movies, but it made more sense to me than what the teacher was saying.


----------



## josh pelican

Why does my penis get hard when I see girls in class?

Boy, being a kid sure is tough... and confusing


----------



## Varjo

bostjan said:


> Likewise, if the solar maximum is near green, why do plants reflect green light and absorb the rest? Wouldn't they be better off absorbing more energy for photosynthesis?



This one I actually know.

See, the reason plants are green is the small chloroplasts that are doing the actual photosynthesis. You know when autumn comes and all the leaves on trees go yellow or red? That's because the tree stores the chloroplasts within it's branches for next year's leaves.

Anyhoo, 

the plants reflect green light because the chloroplasts are green. And they're green because the molecules that build that singular chloroplast just so happens to be greenish to the human eye. So, it's not a question of what wavelength of light would be the best, but more of a what color are the particles that form the chloroplast that gives a plant it's green color. Change the particles, make the chloroplast, say, black for maximum absorption, and it wouldn't work anymore.

That's nature for you!


----------



## vampiregenocide

bostjan said:


> If lighter colours absorb less light than darker colours, why do white people come from colder, darker parts of the Earth than black people?


 
From wikipedia :



> The evolution of dark skin is linked intrinsically to the loss of body hair in humans. By 1.2 million years ago, all people having descendants today had the same receptor protein of today's Africans; their skin was dark, and the intense sun killed off the progeny with any lighter skin that resulted from mutational variation in the receptor protein.[4] This is significantly earlier than the speciation of _Homo sapiens_ from _Homo erectus_ some 250,000 years ago.
> Skin cancer as a result of ultraviolet light radiation causing mutations in the skin is less common among people with dark skin than it is among those with light skin.[5][6] Furthermore, dark skin prevents an essential B vitamin, folate, from being destroyed. Therefore, in the absence of modern medicine and diet, a person with dark skin in the tropics would live longer, be healthier and more likely to reproduce than a person with light skin. White Australians have some of the highest rates of skin cancer as evidence of this expectation.[7] Conversely, as dark skin prevents sunlight from penetrating the skin it hinders the production of vitamin D3. Hence when humans migrated to less sun-intensive regions in the north, low vitamin D3 levels became a problem and lighter skin colors started appearing. White people of Europe, who have low levels of melanin, naturally have an almost colorless skin pigmentation, especially when untanned. This low level of pigmentation allows the blood vessels to become visible which gives the characteristic pale pink color of white people. The loss of melanin in white people is now thought to have been caused by a mutation in just one letter out of 3.1 billion letters of DNA.[8]


----------



## bostjan

Varjo said:


> This one I actually know.
> 
> See, the reason plants are green is the small chloroplasts that are doing the actual photosynthesis. You know when autumn comes and all the leaves on trees go yellow or red? That's because the tree stores the chloroplasts within it's branches for next year's leaves.
> 
> Anyhoo,
> 
> the plants reflect green light because the chloroplasts are green. And they're green because the molecules that build that singular chloroplast just so happens to be greenish to the human eye. So, it's not a question of what wavelength of light would be the best, but more of a what color are the particles that form the chloroplast that gives a plant it's green color. Change the particles, make the chloroplast, say, black for maximum absorption, and it wouldn't work anymore.
> 
> That's nature for you!



Actually, there is a less common variation of chlorophyll that is pink, which makes more sense to me, but the plants that have this form of chlorophyll are fairly rare and still contain green chlorophyll.

Also, if animals and plants evolved from the same ancestors, why wouldn't animals have chlorophyll. It seems much easier to get energy from the sun than it does to hunt for food. Euglena have both metabolic pathways, and seem to flourish quite easily, so why aren't there higher-order creatures this way?

Also, is the fact that organic material is mostly carbon, oxygen, hydrogen, and nitrogen a direct consequence of stellar CNO cylces, or is it just lucky?


----------



## vampiregenocide

Animals can actively search for food, defend themselves, and protect their offspring. This enables them to be more proactive in their own survival. Plants are stationary, they cannot search for food and so are dependant on the quality of the soil, water and the sun. If an area dries up, plants die, but animals search for water. Plant reproduction is pretty much fire and forget, in the sense they release seeds or pollen and hopefully they get fertilised by another plant. Animals search for a mate, and sometimes look after their offspring to ensure they reach sexual maturity. Both ways have their pros and cons, but neither is better than the other. 

Theres a theory called the 'Red Queen' theory, that basically says when an organism evolves a way of getting ahead and overcoming an issue, other organisms evolve to counter this and stay in the game. This can be seen in acacia trees, which evolved poisonous barbs to stop animals eating them. Giraffes figured out it took a while for this poison to start being effective, and only eat so many leaves on a tree before moving on. The acacia trees evolved a pheromone that tells other trees when they are being eaten, and warns them to start producing poison. The giraffes in turn figured out only to eat from trees upwind. Nature is all about balance, and plants and animals constantly fight each other just to surivive. 

Think I might've gone off track...I just like talking about that shit.


----------



## bostjan

Sure, but euglena can defend themselves. Animals have skin, so why no chlorophyll in their skin? It could mean less food requirements, so better survival chance. Maybe not having chlorophyll helps make animals faster?


----------



## vampiregenocide

Animal skin is completely different to plant 'skin'. Animals have had to evolve all sorts of different cells and functions, such as sweating, different sensory organs etc, meaning theres no 'room' for chloroplasts in animal skin. Nature doesn't tend to commit to multiple ideas, it tends to branch off. Some organisms use one method to survive, anotehr animal uses another. Being kitted out for multiple things isn't as good as being specialised in one. It's like going on a hike and being bogged down with equipment, its better to take what you need. Evolution tends to cut out anything that is no longer needed, and focuses on things that work.


----------



## Varjo

bostjan said:


> Sure, but euglena can defend themselves. Animals have skin, so why no chlorophyll in their skin? It could mean less food requirements, so better survival chance. Maybe not having chlorophyll helps make animals faster?


Other than "because they don't"?

The time when animals and plants were the same go waaaaaaay back, way before you could seriously even talk about chlorophylls. Then there was plankton, and then there were plants. Fast forward millions of years and we have the first _fish_, and some million years later we have the first land walking creature. Chlorophylls came to be in a very different habitat for very different reasons than the ones evolving fish/land-walkers were facing.

Also, I'm not sure useful chlorophylls really are - do they provide enough energy to power up a complex machine? Can it do it fast enough? After all, reactions take time. A plant is a relatively simple machine, it's stable and mostly static. An animal is not. Would the "power output" of a chlorophyll-filled animal be enough?

Of course, for the sake of discussion, we could argue that "nevertheless chlorophylls would be useful in all creatures". While true, so would regeneration. And the ability to fly. And a sixth sense. And whatnot. After all, evolution doesn't work on what's handy, it works on placing different evolutionary pressures at different times, making the creatures either evolve or die. It's not always about losing what's useless, think of the human appendix. It's more of a threat than a useless appendage. As long as your species can fit through the hole evolution puts there, you're good to go as you are.

(If you really want to go HC, you can't say that evolution puts or does anything, it's not some thing doing stuff, it's just a phenomenon happening)


----------



## GATA4

If animals had chlorophyll, respiration would essentially be rendered useless and a large supply of fixable CO2 would be lost. There would probably be an atmospheric buildup of O2 or something.


----------



## vampiregenocide

Plants do respire just like animals.


----------



## GATA4

vampiregenocide said:


> Plants do respire just like animals.



YOU INTELLECTUAL, YOU

I have literally failed the educational system.

Yes, that is true. Then I have no idea. Why doesn't Kim Kardashian tuck me in every night?


----------



## bostjan

Okay, well, I'm sure there is a reason why it is the way it is, but that's what I'm asking, I thought. 

Like I said, euglena (still very simple machines) have the parts of both plants and animals. They seem to thrive in microscopic environments like pond scum. Also, some bacteria can photosynthesize and still consume other living matter. Carniferns, such as venus flytrap and pitcher plants are definately plants, but can consume living things as a source of nutrients.

Life eating other life goes back long before multicellular animals. I'm just curious why there is such a wide rift between contemporary plants and animals- why there are no animals which fix sugars from CO2? Something like a three-toed sloth doesn't really need the same kind of animalistic machinery that a tiger or human being need to hunt for food, so it doesn't seem like a stretch for me to imagine a sloth-like creature that has chlorophyll, even to help it blend in to avoid predation by jaguars or whatever.

Maybe the reason Kim Kardashian doesn't tuck you in at night is because you haven't asked her.


----------



## Varjo

bostjan said:


> Life eating other life goes back long before multicellular animals. I'm just curious why there is such a wide rift between contemporary plants and animals- why there are no animals which fix sugars from CO2? Something like a three-toed sloth doesn't really need the same kind of animalistic machinery that a tiger or human being need to hunt for food, so it doesn't seem like a stretch for me to imagine a sloth-like creature that has chlorophyll, even to help it blend in to avoid predation by jaguars or whatever.



Well I have to agree with you on your idea not being such a big stretch. That wide rift you're talking about was born in the days when amoebas/plankton/small thingamabobs started to take over the earth - starting with algae, moving up to moss and other small plant-like forms. They got chlorophyll, the other ones who stayed in the sea didn't. 

The wide gap today is based pretty much only because of that. Protists back then that invaded dry earth as plants for the first time needed some system to create energy, and they tried and died different methods until one group of these plants of the future came up with a good idea - capturing cyanobacteria, which were capable of photosynthesis - creating energy with light. So they captured (read: engulfed) cyanobacteriae, which then gave energy to these baby grass. Being such a good idea, the cyanobacterial dna got added at some point to the first plant dna and boom chloroplasts.

Getting energy by eating other little single-cell thingies was still a big hit in the sea, and continued it's style. Evolution happened. No need to start doing such silly maneuvers in the sea, there's lots of stuff to be eaten. And one day hey, let's take over the earth, and hey presto we're far too complex to suddenly start NOW engulfing cyanobacteria* or some other lame copycat idea.

The difference, thinking of simplicity (e.g. plants) vs complex machinery (e.g. animals) comes far before running after food. Just try, for example, circulatory system. Muscle system. Moving in a general sense. Heck, even breathing. Nervous system. All that needs alot, and even if chloroplasts could supply sufficient energy, all those systems had been made without them - so adding them at this point would basically mean starting all over again. And, since we're doing things the evolutionary way, this wasn't going to happen - "eating stuff" worked just fine for now. And continued to work until... oh well, it still works.

Fast forwardig hundreds of millions of years, we end up with the current day sloth. Despite being far older than the first "animals" walking - or even swimming - on earth, having countless generations and an abundance of forebearers it had descended from, it's lack of chloroplasts is all because of that one oversight that primitive life back in the soup did - dissing cyanobacteria and going on eating other life. Such dramatic changes to the DNA just aren't inserted after a certain point of complexity. And it can't either be added so easily, just as you can't exactly use a wheel from a horse cart in a Lamborghini.

Now a point of note - this does not mean that some photosynthetic system could not be introduced to animals at some time and point. Why not? All it takes is the proper evolutionary pressure.

Thinking of euglena, they're protists. Unicellular ones. That means they're made out of one single cell, making them far more simple, almost dumb-like simple in comparison to a animal or a plant. Also, theyre' _really _old ones. Kinda like exzhibits in a museum. They've done well so far, sure, but they're also single-celled and multiply by going plop and there's two of them. Oh and on a personal note, I find it maybe a bit silly saying that euglenae have parts from animals and plants, seeing that they were there before either 

What comes to the venus fly trap or such, it's not as simple as drawing a line between "plants can become carnivorous" and "animals can become photosynthetic". Plants always fight for light, nutrients and such. The venus fly trap just got it's trick my coming up with another solution to the infinite battle for resources. It still has chloroplasts. It still uses them, too, only to a lesser degree.

*) There's also some mention of the animal mitochondria being originally an engulfed bacteria, but there seems to be some debate in this case. Maybe that's the point when animals made the bad choice


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## vampiregenocide

bostjan said:


> Okay, well, I'm sure there is a reason why it is the way it is, but that's what I'm asking, I thought.
> 
> Like I said, euglena (still very simple machines) have the parts of both plants and animals. They seem to thrive in microscopic environments like pond scum. Also, some bacteria can photosynthesize and still consume other living matter. Carniferns, such as venus flytrap and pitcher plants are definately plants, but can consume living things as a source of nutrients.
> 
> Life eating other life goes back long before multicellular animals. I'm just curious why there is such a wide rift between contemporary plants and animals- why there are no animals which fix sugars from CO2? Something like a three-toed sloth doesn't really need the same kind of animalistic machinery that a tiger or human being need to hunt for food, so it doesn't seem like a stretch for me to imagine a sloth-like creature that has chlorophyll, even to help it blend in to avoid predation by jaguars or whatever.
> 
> Maybe the reason Kim Kardashian doesn't tuck you in at night is because you haven't asked her.


 
Those few organisms that do get energy by chemosynthesis or photosynthesis are often very simple bacterium or single celled organisms. A larger, more complex, moving organism probably wouldn't get a significant amount of energy from those processes. Eating other organisms enables them to take in a lot more energy at once, enabling them to do more complex things like actually moving.

If it weren't for the fact they form the basis for all food chains plants and chemosynthesising bacteria wouldn't need to exist. Animals are more efficent organisms. However, they need a basis for where they get their food from. In the deep ocean, bacteria takein chemicals from sulphuric vents and turn that into energy. This in turn, enables other animals to feed off them and start a food chain. The bacteria may be limited in terms of what it can do, but it fills its niche and therefore is necessary. I think thats all its down to at the end of the day, animals don't need to photosynthesise because they don't get enough energy from it, but they do need plants that do it because they form their food. That dependance is the sole reason they both exist, and that one hasn't overtaken the other.

As for the Venus flytrap, this is what I found.



> The Venus Flytrap's evolution was the product of a "Hobson's Choice" in which plants that did not evolve nutrient-capturing abilities in nitrogen and phosphorous-poor environments would not have survived. Their carnivorous traps were evolutionarily selected for to allow these organisms to survive their harsh environments.


 
They just faced a problem and found a way of solving it.


Varjo seems to be thinking the same lines.


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## RaceCar

vampiregenocide said:


> As for the Venus flytrap, this is what I found.
> 
> 
> 
> They just faced a problem and found a way of solving it.


 
That's bad ass


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## vampiregenocide

M. Night Shyamalan makes a film without a twist. The audience exect a twist, and when there isn't one, does the very abscence of a twist and the revelation that it was a straightforward film make it a twist?


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## JBroll

If he made a movie that wasn't rubbish, I'd have to call it a twist.

Jeff


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## vampiregenocide




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## bostjan

Is the answer to this question "no?"


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## vampiregenocide

bostjan said:


> Is the answer to this question "no?"


 
It isn't.


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## bostjan

vampiregenocide said:


> It isn't.


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## vampiregenocide

Mission accomplished.


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## joelozzy

Don't let this thread die people. Pump some more questions and theories out. Any subject will do I'm sure someone can chime in on it and relate.

Also



bostjan said:


> Is the answer to this question "no?"


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## vampiregenocide

What if the film the Matrix, was actually an artificial reality given to the machines by humans to keep them under the impression they are in power, instead of the other way around?


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## leandroab

What if :golf: didn't exist in the smileys menu?


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## JBroll

What if nobody asked this question?

JB


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## choppypony

what is going to happen next with phones is the world going to become connected in ways we cant even think of? will everyone just share a universal conciousness? will this lead to enlightenment because we will be able to see everybody in the world point of view?


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## Varcolac

choppypony said:


> what is going to happen next with phones is the world going to become connected in ways we cant even think of? will everyone just share a universal conciousness? will this lead to enlightenment because we will be able to see everybody in the world point of view?



No. The internet connects us all in ways we couldn't have imagined half a century ago, and all it seems to do is act as a reflector dish for asshattery.


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## Labrie

How do you know when you're done Little Big Planet 2?


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## vampiregenocide

With our gradually increasing average lifespan, will humans be able to learn more over the course of their lifetimes, thus becoming generally smarter and better enabled to figure out the questions it takes generations of research to figure out?


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## Randy

^
I think human beings as a whole will (as they have), take in an increasingly voluminous amount of information simply because of more/better means of delivery, however, I don't see the longer lifespan attributing to this unless strides are made extending a person's awareness/receptiveness among those extra years we've been gaining. Since people pretty much give up learning at a certain point, that'll be a hurdle to overcome.


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## vampiregenocide

This is true, but focusing rather on those more intelligent specialised people such as scientists and whatnot, who often continue working well into their lives if not in labs then in universities and as authors, then they I think could grow to know their subject better than anyone before. It's like if we played guitar our whole lives with the level of dedication Chris Broderick has, we'd end up being inhumanly good.


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## ralphy1976

if the universe is finite and expanding, what is on the other side?

where did the big-bang happen? what was its surrounding at the initial time of conception?


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## Scar Symmetry

What would the world be like if positive and negative were considered close in value?


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## JBroll

Ralphy, none of your questions make sense - understanding why will probably solve your problems, though.



Scar Symmetry said:


> What would the world be like if positive and negative were considered close in value?



What do you mean by this?

Jeff


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## joelozzy

Bumping with something I was thinking about tonight.

What if we discovered that the earth would soon come to an end via mass climate changes? Would you live your life the same way as you are? What would you do if you knew you only had a year to live?

I'd imagine most of us would answer with something along the lines of "I'd make the most of my time, I'd do the things I always dreamed of". I for one would do that, and I'd spend alot more time with my family.

Sometimes I think why the *&^% aren't you making an effort to make the most of your time now.

Anyways.

What if John Petrucci picked up an 8 string?


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## halsinden

joelozzy said:


> Bumping with something I was thinking about tonight.
> 
> What if we discovered that the earth would soon come to an end via mass climate changes? Would you live your life the same way as you are? What would you do if you knew you only had a year to live?
> 
> I'd imagine most of us would answer with something along the lines of "I'd make the most of my time, I'd do the things I always dreamed of". I for one would do that, and I'd spend alot more time with my family.
> 
> Sometimes I think why the *&^% aren't you making an effort to make the most of your time now.
> 
> Anyways.
> 
> What if John Petrucci picked up an 8 string?



i'd personally be very concerned about how difficult it would then become to make a mark on a world not only populated by people who will be too distracted with making their own mark but then also who will be actively trying to make their own at the same or higher rate of effort.

if you were told that you had a year to live, in relatively good health (ie. not depreciating as with an illness or condition), you'd be amazed what you can achieve if you have no regard for how burnt out you'd be in 20 years.

...then add to that the amount of people who would dally with the idea of murder or genocide given the total lack of threat of incarceration or even capital punishment. scary thought.

H


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## Scar Symmetry

JBroll said:


> What do you mean by this?
> 
> Jeff



What I mean is the spectrum of "good" and "bad" varies largely. If the spectrum was very shallow either side, or in fact good and bad did not exist at all and all we had was neutrality, what kind of a world would we live in? I'd be interested to hear what you think.

Also, it's rhetorical as it is impossible to answer but just for shits and giggles: if there was a parallel universe for every single variable in history since the big bang, how many would exist by now?

&#8734; is the boring answer.


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## Varcolac

Scar Symmetry said:


> What I mean is the spectrum of "good" and "bad" varies largely. If the spectrum was very shallow either side, or in fact good and bad did not exist at all and all we had was neutrality, what kind of a world would we live in? I'd be interested to hear what you think.
> 
> Also, it's rhetorical as it is impossible to answer but just for shits and giggles: if there was a parallel universe for every single variable in history since the big bang, how many would exist by now?
> 
> &#8734; is the boring answer.



I took the original question to be a banking one. If there wasn't much difference between + and -, the answer would be "global financial meltdown." Wait a minute... we live in that universe already. 

The parallel universes thing, there's clearly as many parallel universes as there were episodes of "Sliders." Including the one where all the men are wiped out and they find the heroes because they left the toilet seat up.


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## Scar Symmetry

RaceCar said:


> Who's to know anything concrete about space? All we know is what we believe. I've heard about dark matter and dark energy and how it constitutes 74% of the universe. Who's to say it ever collapsed? I feel that I take the Buddhist approach and will say that although it's difficult for humans to grasp the concept of infinity, (no beginning, no end) doesn't mean you can render it "impossible."
> 
> Also, Through the Wormhole kicks ass, and Morgan Freeman kicks ass



This post consists of win.


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## vampiregenocide

Makes me laugh when we discover something new about space, gravity etc and scientists have to basically say 'yeah...so it turns out shit desn't work how he thought it did'. Considering how frequently that happens, it makes me wonder whats going to be possible when we finally are able to grasp it.


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## joelozzy

vampiregenocide said:


> Makes me laugh when we discover something new about space, gravity etc and scientists have to basically say 'yeah...so it turns out shit desn't work how he thought it did'. Considering how frequently that happens, it makes me wonder whats going to be possible when we finally are able to grasp it.



Star Wars Mother &*(^er.

No seriously.


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## Dan_Vacant

how come the closet number to dividing 100 by 3 is 33.333333333333333333333333333333333333333333333333333333333333333333333333333333333333333333333333333333333333333333333..etc
and it has no end??


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## Tomo009

Dan_Vacant said:


> how come the closet number to dividing 100 by 3 is 33.333333333333333333333333333333333333333333333333333333333333333333333333333333333333333333333333333333333333333333333..etc
> and it has no end??



Because what you wrote isn't exact, it's a decimal estimation.


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## RhiRandom

orb451 said:


> One question I'd like answered is, how can I get Synesthesia? I want to be able to *see* sounds and hear colors. That to me would be the best.



Magic mushrooms.


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