What God, quantum mechanics and consciousness have in common

[Judi Lynn]

Last edited Wed Aug 18, 2021, 01:13 PM - Edit history (1)

By John Horgan about 7 hours ago



Concept art of quantum mechanics, theory of superstrings.(Image credit: PASIEKA via Getty Images)
In my 20s, I had a friend who was brilliant, charming, Ivy-educated and rich, heir to a family fortune. I'll call him Gallagher. He could do anything he wanted. He experimented, dabbling in neuroscience, law, philosophy and other fields. But he was so critical, so picky, that he never settled on a career. Nothing was good enough for him. He never found love for the same reason. He also disparaged his friends' choices, so much so that he alienated us. He ended up bitter and alone. At least that's my guess. I haven't spoken to Gallagher in decades.

There is such a thing as being too picky, especially when it comes to things like work, love and nourishment (even the pickiest eater has to eat something). That's the lesson I gleaned from Gallagher. But when it comes to answers to big mysteries, most of us aren't picky enough. We settle on answers for bad reasons, for example, because our parents, priests or professors believe it. We think we need to believe something, but actually we don't. We can, and should, decide that no answers are good enough. We should be agnostics.

Some people confuse agnosticism (not knowing) with apathy (not caring). Take Francis Collins, a geneticist who directs the National Institutes of Health. He is a devout Christian, who believes that Jesus performed miracles, died for our sins and rose from the dead. In his 2006 bestseller The Language of God, Collins calls agnosticism a "cop-out." When I interviewed him, I told him I am an agnostic and objected to "cop-out."

Collins apologized. "That was a put-down that should not apply to earnest agnostics who have considered the evidence and still don't find an answer," he said. "I was reacting to the agnosticism I see in the scientific community, which has not been arrived at by a careful examination of the evidence." I have examined the evidence for Christianity, and I find it unconvincing. I'm not convinced by any scientific creation stories, either, such as those that depict our cosmos as a bubble in an oceanic "multiverse."

More:
https://www.livescience.com/god-quantum-mechanics-and-consciousness-agnosticism.html?utm_source=notification

[RockRaven]

1. The other thing those three have in common is that they all are opined upon at great length

by grifters who don't know what the fuck they are talking about, but want you to believe they are saying something profound or authoritative, and oh by the way give them money or follow their directions.

[cachukis]

2. Science will work to answer the empirical.

Philosophy will work on the logic. I will juggle the two. Philosophy has a leg up on science in these matters. I suspect science will catch up with philosophy.

[yonder]

4. +1.

[NNadir]

3. One of the great joys of living past the 1970's was to live past...

...all the comparisons between quantum mechanics and "god."

It would be sad personally for me, having lived into an age of the recidivism of racism, would have to live into the recidivism of the introduction of "god" into science.

It was always depressing to find books by Paul Davies in the "science" sections of popular bookstores. As a culture, we're really not really ready for this to find its way into education, as all the University bookstores have become Barnes and Nobel outlets.