Paṭiccasamuppāda and Space

[Pseudobabble]

retrofuturist



Space is a “thing” which can be twisted and distorted due to mass, hence gravity and black holes.

True, there is the objective fact of 'space', which exists independent of our perceptions, but without a concept of absence, we would not be able to construct the concept 'space' to which we each refer when we use the word 'space'.

That there is an objective correlate of the word is not actually assured. Nobody has yet solved the problem of solipsism, so there is no absolute proof of anything existing outside my (your, anyone's) mind. We do have pretty good statistical evidence for the existence of external reality, which happens to correlate with what our mathematical models say the evidence should look like, but none of this is absolute proof.

For what it's worth, Elon Musk said it's highly probable we're living in a simulation, and that he's run the numbers and that's what he believes.

There's also the multi-verse theory.

And kurzgesagt released a video on the ultimate universe extinction event, which rewrites the laws of physics so that the next universe has completely new physics unknown to us.

In short, humans actually know nothing about the universe, and may never know. We're still baffled why there's more anti-matter than matter, when it's expected to be equal.

Yep, I wouldn't be surprised.

Back before Copernicus, everyone thought the Sun went around the Earth - and given the instruments available to them at that time, all the evidence they could gather supported that conclusion. So what 'true' really means is: as far as we know.

[Pseudobabble]

I’m not implying any intelligence here..... What we know...

Who or what is this "we"? The political establishment that tells us what we must believe? The mainstream media? The new Church?

Perhaps the shadowy conspiracy of International Zionism?

[binocular]

Back before Copernicus, everyone thought the Sun went around the Earth - and given the instruments available to them at that time, all the evidence they could gather supported that conclusion.

Meh. These cosmologies come and go as the fashion blows ...

So what 'true' really means is: as far as we know.

Oh, but the self-effacement! The self-effacement!

[Pseudobabble]

So what 'true' really means is: as far as we know.

Oh, but the self-effacement! The self-effacement!

I know right. It feels so much better to say 'I know', and even better than that to say 'I know'.

EDIT: Too many uses of the word 'know' in this post. I know this edit makes it worse, but I also know that you know what I know.

[budo]

True, there is the objective fact of 'space', which exists independent of our perceptions, but without a concept of absence, we would not be able to construct the concept 'space' to which we each refer when we use the word 'space'.

That there is an objective correlate of the word is not actually assured. Nobody has yet solved the problem of solipsism, so there is no absolute proof of anything existing outside my (your, anyone's) mind. We do have pretty good statistical evidence for the existence of external reality, which happens to correlate with what our mathematical models say the evidence should look like, but none of this is absolute proof.

For what it's worth, Elon Musk said it's highly probable we're living in a simulation, and that he's run the numbers and that's what he believes.

There's also the multi-verse theory.

And kurzgesagt released a video on the ultimate universe extinction event, which rewrites the laws of physics so that the next universe has completely new physics unknown to us.

In short, humans actually know nothing about the universe, and may never know. We're still baffled why there's more anti-matter than matter, when it's expected to be equal.

Yep, I wouldn't be surprised.

Back before Copernicus, everyone thought the Sun went around the Earth - and given the instruments available to them at that time, all the evidence they could gather supported that conclusion. So what 'true' really means is: as far as we know.

It's why the Buddha said it's wrong view to think about anything but the four noble truths, as it's just mental masturbation.

It's actually kind of scary how many elements in the universe can kill you in a fingersnap that's completly outside your control.
Forget about climate change or super bacteria killing you, or an aneurism, or heart palpitations, or gamma ray bursts from the sun, in one finger snap the universe could just end with no reason.

[Dan74-MkII]

DooDoot

How is the above known as a fact?

Because the two possible “deaths” of the universe are the Big Rip or the Big Freeze. Both of those mean that space itself endures forever despite being created at the Big Bang.

I don't think space necessarily continues to exists. In the Big Crunch, space itself disappears. But yes, Big Bang is a theory, not a proven fact.

[SavakaNik]

Space is a “thing” which can be twisted and distorted due to mass, hence gravity and black holes.

“I hold that space cannot be curved, for the simple reason that it can have no properties. It might as well be said that God has properties. He has not, but only attributes and these are of our own making. Of properties we can only speak when dealing with matter filling the space. To say that in the presence of large bodies space becomes curved is equivalent to stating that something can act upon nothing. I, for one, refuse to subscribe to such a view.”

― Nikola Tesla

Tesla wasn't even a Buddhist yet he understood the absurdity.

[Pulsar]

I never thought I would read of stuff like this on DW. Now I think DW is super-cool when it comes to
space exploration.

For what it's worth, Elon Musk said it's highly probable we're living in a simulation, and that he's run the numbers and that's what he believes.

There's also the multi-verse theory.

And kurzgesagt released a video on the ultimate universe extinction event, which rewrites the laws of physics so that the next universe has completely new physics unknown to us.

In short, humans actually know nothing about the universe, and may never know. We're still baffled why there's more anti-matter than matter, when it's expected to be equal.

I gotta check on the matter-antimatter asymmetry, This thread made me super curious.
After that I will get back to the explorations on 'ending of suffering".

[budo]

I never thought I would read of stuff like this on DW. Now I think DW is super-cool when it comes to
space exploration.

For what it's worth, Elon Musk said it's highly probable we're living in a simulation, and that he's run the numbers and that's what he believes.

There's also the multi-verse theory.

And kurzgesagt released a video on the ultimate universe extinction event, which rewrites the laws of physics so that the next universe has completely new physics unknown to us.

In short, humans actually know nothing about the universe, and may never know. We're still baffled why there's more anti-matter than matter, when it's expected to be equal.

Now I have to check on the matter-antimatter asymmetry, I am super curious.
After that I will get back to the explorations on 'ending of suffering".

Glad you find this stuff interesting, but keep in mind it's more or less mental masturbation (6th sense-faculty mind stimulation).

The first book I read about simulation theory is Holographic Universe by Michael Talbot, it's one of the originals.

Kurzgesagt has a lot of summary videos about everything, although lately they've become politicized and one sided and have apologized for it, but their old videos are good.

Some interesting ones







and on antimatter and dark matter
https://physicsworld.com/a/new-particle ... ntimatter/

[chownah]

I'm wondering if some people think of space as being empty of everything.....or are they thinking that space is sometimes filled with stuff. In other words, do people differentiate between space and empty space? In other words, in the place where some physical thing abides is there no space because that place is occupied? In other words, is the presence of a physical object incompatible with space?...or are physical objects simply occupying a place in space?
chownah

[budo]

I'm wondering if some people think of space as being empty of everything.....or are they thinking that space is sometimes filled with stuff. In other words, do people differentiate between space and empty space? In other words, in the place where some physical thing abides is there no space because that place is occupied? In other words, is the presence of a physical object incompatible with space?...or are physical objects simply occupying a place in space?
chownah

Depends on the level or "zoom" you are looking at. At the quantum level then no, it's not either-or.

Your question is too vague to get a specific answer, it requires more context.

There is no definitive answer..

Starting in 2007, Hogan began thinking about how to build a device that could measure the exceedingly fine graininess of space. As it turns out, his colleagues had plenty of ideas about how to do that, drawing on technology developed to search for gravitational waves. Within two years Hogan had put together a proposal and was working with collaborators at Fermilab, the University of Chicago and other institutions to build a chunk-detecting machine, which he more elegantly calls a “holometer”. (The name is an esoteric pun, referencing both a 17th-century surveying instrument and the theory that 2D space could appear three-dimensional, analogous to a hologram.)

Beneath its layers of conceptual complexity, the holometer is technologically little more than a laser beam, a half-reflective mirror to split the laser into two perpendicular beams, and two other mirrors to bounce those beams back along a pair of 40m-long tunnels. The beams are calibrated to register the precise locations of the mirrors. If space is chunky, the locations of the mirrors would constantly wander about (strictly speaking, space itself is doing the wandering), creating a constant, random variation in their separation. When the two beams are recombined, they’d be slightly out of sync, and the amount of the discrepancy would reveal the scale of the chunks of space.

For the scale of chunkiness that Hogan hopes to find, he needs to measure distances to an accuracy of 10-18m, about 100m times smaller than a hydrogen atom, and collect data at a rate of about 100m readings per second. Amazingly, such an experiment is not only possible, but practical. “We were able to do it pretty cheaply because of advances in photonics, a lot of off-the-shelf parts, fast electronics and things like that,” Hogan says. “It’s a pretty speculative experiment, so you wouldn’t have done it unless it was cheap.” The holometer is currently humming away, collecting data at the target accuracy; he expects to have preliminary readings by the end of the year.

https://www.theguardian.com/news/2015/n ... physicists

[perkele]

OT:

Space is a “thing” which can be twisted and distorted due to mass, hence gravity and black holes.

“I hold that space cannot be curved, for the simple reason that it can have no properties. It might as well be said that God has properties. He has not, but only attributes and these are of our own making. Of properties we can only speak when dealing with matter filling the space. To say that in the presence of large bodies space becomes curved is equivalent to stating that something can act upon nothing. I, for one, refuse to subscribe to such a view.”

― Nikola Tesla

Tesla wasn't even a Buddhist yet he understood the absurdity.

It seems to me that Tesla simply misunderstood what was meant by "curvature" of space, because he did not have the mathematical background. He was very old at the time and apparently set in his ways of conceptualizing the physical make-up of the universe, and it seems he rejected Einstein's theory on something akin to religious reasons.
The cited quote does not contain the trace of an argument as far as I can see.

Not OT:
Regarding paticca-samupadda:

If we assume that paṭiccasamuppāda refers to external “things” and not just to how the mind constructs the world

I think it does not apply in the way assumed here. I think paṭiccasamuppāda deals with how we construe the world in our experience, shaping our individually experienced existence, and how suffering is the result. I think mathematical models of the world would belong into the category of saṅkhārā/mental formations/fabrications, which are said to be borne out of ignorance/avijjā, and from there on starts the whole cycle of suffering.

I can't say that I really understand paṭiccasamuppāda, though. So that's just part of my fallible understanding, based on my own mental formations resulting from ignorance.

[chownah]

I'm wondering if some people think of space as being empty of everything.....or are they thinking that space is sometimes filled with stuff. In other words, do people differentiate between space and empty space? In other words, in the place where some physical thing abides is there no space because that place is occupied? In other words, is the presence of a physical object incompatible with space?...or are physical objects simply occupying a place in space?
chownah

Depends on the level or "zoom" you are looking at. At the quantum level then no, it's not either-or.

Your question is too vague to get a specific answer, it requires more context.

There is no definitive answer..

I agree that there is no definitive answer....that is why I was asking the question as to which way people take it to be especially with regard to the OP. My experience is that most people think of empty space when they think of space....that is to say that space and the material of which material objects are made are sort of like opposites and that the presence of a physical object sort of negates any idea of space existing at the place where the physical presence exists. I see no reason to think (for example) that space does not exist at the center of the earth but many people have an intuitive view of space which would say that there is no space at the center of the earth.

I usually think that having a clear understanding of exactly how a term is being used can help everyone to understand points of view better.
chownah

[Sam Vara]

I agree that there is no definitive answer....that is why I was asking the question as to which way people take it to be especially with regard to the OP. My experience is that most people think of empty space when they think of space....that is to say that space and the material of which material objects are made are sort of like opposites and that the presence of a physical object sort of negates any idea of space existing at the place where the physical presence exists. I see no reason to think (for example) that space does not exist at the center of the earth but many people have an intuitive view of space which would say that there is no space at the center of the earth.

I usually think that having a clear understanding of exactly how a term is being used can help everyone to understand points of view better.
chownah

I agree. Many people talk about "space" to mean the absence of matter or the gaps in between things, but that is different from the conception which takes space to be the dimension within which all objects and possible objects must occur.

I've no idea whether this makes any difference to the points that the physicists make about properties of space, because I can't understand them.

But in terms of dependent origination, this latter conception of space could be seen as a property of experience which the mind contributes, so it could be dependently arisen.

[binocular]

I'm wondering if some people think of space as being empty of everything.....or are they thinking that space is sometimes filled with stuff. In other words, do people differentiate between space and empty space? In other words, in the place where some physical thing abides is there no space because that place is occupied? In other words, is the presence of a physical object incompatible with space?...or are physical objects simply occupying a place in space?

Space is a placeholder.