Even the scientists are against you. You guys just can’t catch a break.
After analyzing the behavior of these sub-atomic particles – which can move faster than the speed of light and have the ability to “unstick” space and matter – using technology created in 2005, Kaku concluded that the universe is a “Matrix” governed by laws and principles that could only have been designed by an intelligent being.
Let the mudslinging begin!
I wonder if we were to demonstrate that our existence was a 10 billion trillion to one long shot would we have any warrant to exclude lucky accident from the set of possible explanations?
check it out
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fermi_paradox
Is discounting accident in when the odds are 10 billion trillion to one against it an extraordinary claim?
peace
Of extraordinary claims, yes.
No, at best that would mean there’s disagreement about what a skeptic is. It might also be they’re wrong about being skeptics if they think they are, supposing extrateresstrial life existing is an extraordinary claim (but we can’t say it is, because we don’t have the information that allows us to put numbers on it).
Cool. That’s just wrong though.
So phoodoo’s cnsnews article cites this source
http://novaevolutionoficial.blogspot.com.es/2015/05/scientist-michio-kaku-surprised-with.html
…a 2015 entry from a shady blog by a mexican guy who likes to play GTA, apparently, and where you can find other gems like:
Fly to the moon in FOUR hours: The British scientist who says he’s found the secret of Star Trek’s ‘warp speed’
Are cats of extraterrestrial origin?
Looks legit.
I never agreed it was an extraordinary claim, I merely stated that there are skeptics who doubt it. I’m one of them.
Why do you say that? I’ve consistently said we don’t have the information to put numbers on it. Then we can’t say it’s likely.
I don’t hold that opinion, that’s why.
I don’t actually say this. Anywhere.
Not of anything I’ve said or done in this thread. I shouldn’t have.
Rumraket,
Geez what a load of bullshit Rumraket, you really pile it on! Throw all the shit you can think of against the wall.
“They don’t really believe in the claim of alien life, but it doesn’t hurt to look; they are not all skeptics; there is disagreement about what makes a skeptic; if they say they believe in alien life, maybe they are not really a skeptic; actually its not an extraordinary claim, so its perfectly compatible with skepticism to believe in alien life; maybe they have good evidence for alien life, so they have found the extraordinary evidence for their extraordinary claim already; not all skeptics require extraordinary evidence to believe in something extraordinary because there are all flavors of skeptics; actually there is no definition of a skeptic, and I was just making that up like I always do, because I didn’t want to admit that skeptics are really exactly as you described. I never said what you claim I said, even if I did….”
What a farce.
Everything I wrote makes perfect sense. You are just disappointed I have in point of fact given thought to this subject before and your attempt to extract a contradiction out of me has backfired spectacularly.
I await your next thread with bated breath.
¨
At least this is an interesting question. Technically no, 10 billion trillion is 10^21th power, that still means there’s at least a million more planets in the universe than those odds. AFAIK there’s at least 10^26 stars in the known universe, and there are more planets than stars.
On a more specific note regarding “ruling things out” using probability, you can’t actually do that. You can only state things in terms of probabilities (and relative probabilities, such as A is less likely than B), that means you can’t “rule them out”. It just means you can say they are “unlikely” or “very likely”, not ruled out entirely. Besides, you have to have something to replace/compete the “unlikely” thing with.
For example, the odds that life originates by “lucky accident” could be 1 in 10^30 (say) and it could also simultaneously be the case that the odds that life is created by an intelligence is 1 in 10^300. That would still make “lucky accident” the most likely option.
I take it you meant to ask whether it is an extraordinary claim that something happening by “lucky accident” if the odds are 1 in 10^21? That depends on what the odds of the alternative is. If it’s even lower, you should stick to the one having a likelyhood of 1 in 10^21th power.
And in your book that’s a bad thing, I know. Better to be gullible than skeptical. Thanks for letting us know.
Pick one thing I wrote and demonstrate it was a lie. I challenge you.
Moved a post to guano.
What a tragic blurt. Newcomers, Phoodoo is not a parody nor are his posts. Joe G / Frankie, Mung and him are an accurate portrayal of the state of ID supporters.
I wonder if anyone here would read phoodoo and FMM and wonder if Dawkins might be right about child abuse. After which, as Dawkins also wrote, “there is no sensible limit to what [these people] are capable of believing, against any amount of contrary evidence.”
I think a good argument can be built here about the catastrophic potential inherent in incompetent parenting. To think what has been done unto what could have been human beings! Seriously, this is heartbreaking.
Rich,
OK, I guess it’s time to come clean. Phoodoo is my sock. 🙂
So you don’t see a distinction between “reasonable” and “likely”? That would certainly explain a lot. Not least your habit of putting your words in other people’s mouths.
I would so like to believe that.
keiths,
Tone it down. No one is going to buy that level of backwardness.
The alternative in this case is “not an accident”.
So is it an extraordinary claim that intelligent life on earth is not an accident when the odds it was an accident are 1 in 10^21th power?
peace
First of all, we already know intelligent life on Earth is not an accident. It evolved.
But suppose we had two options, “accident” and “not an accident”. And if “not an accident” could only mean one thing, as in some specific mechanism or process. And the odds it was an accident was 10^-21. Then by definition, since life exists, and the two options are fully dichotomous (intelligent life is either an accident or it is not), then no it would not be an extraordinary claim to say that life was “not an accident” since the the probability it was not an accident would be 1 – 10^-21(which is very very close to 1).
Rumraket,
Devastating logic. Don’t expect that to sink tho. FMM, like most fundies, is immune to logic
AND has redefined “evidence” to mean “anything that can be represented as supporting my foregone conclusion. If it can not, it’s not evidence.”
There are many who don’t think that the hypothesis that there might be life on other planets is an “extraordinary” claim. It would be if you made the claim about a specific planet orbiting a specific star, but to suspect that it’s out there somewhere and is worth searching for is actually a fairly conservative viewpoint.
*edit* Ninja’d by Stormfield. I should read ahead a bit before posting.
I never thought there was any doubt about that.
Excerpts from a relevant New York Times article by astronomer Adam Frank:
That’s almost there in the transfinite zone XD
cool so we are a good way through the explanatory filter.
We have eliminated chance can we also eliminate law given fermi’s paradox and the number of habitable worlds in the universe?
peace
No we haven’t. We have not “eliminated” anything, we have just stated two relative probabilites. One is much much greater than the other and if the two options are the only two possible ones, then we should believe much more strongly in the most likely option. But they’re probabilities, not certainties. There’s a chance we could be wrong.
I think you need to read my previous post again. We just stated a hypothetical scenario with two fully dichotomous options, you can’t now suddenly introduce a third and “rule it out”.
And no, Fermi’s paradox (which is not, in fact, a paradox) is irrelevant to the scenario we invented.
Phacts are not facts.
1. Kaku is NOT a cofounder of string theory. Read his description of himself.
2. The number of hits for “primitive semi-radius tachyon,” using Google Scholar to search, is… wait for it… wait for it… ZERO. Big, phat, phucking, IDiot-ass zero.
Phoodoo needs to compose a retraction, and have Alan insert it at the beginning of his post.
ETA: I removed the quote marks from the search term, and still got zero hits. There is no scholarly publication with the words “primitive,” “semi-radius,” and “tachyon” occurring separately, let alone together.
How’s that retraction going, Phoodoo? Time to score some honesty points!
Richardthughes,
At some point maybe Tom should mention what post he is talking about, huh?
But just for fun, since neither you or Tom know what the hell you are talking about, I actually READ the link you just gave. Here is what it says:
“Dr. Michio Kaku — theoretical physicist, bestselling author, acclaimed public speaker, renowned futurist, and popularizer of science. As co-founder of String Field Theory, Dr. Kaku carries on Einstein’s quest to unite the four fundamental forces of nature into a single grand unified theory of everything.”
No I know you don’t read Richard, and even if you could, you wouldn’t understand it, but WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT??
Phoodoo: “String Theory Co-Founder”
Michio Kaku’s official website: ( http://mkaku.org/home/about/) “Dr. Michio Kaku is the co-creator of string field theory, a branch of string theory. ”
Dishonest, stupid or other, Phoodoo?
I just quoted it:
“As co-founder of String Field Theory, Dr. Kaku carries on Einstein’s quest to unite the four fundamental forces of nature into a single grand unified theory of everything.”
You are fucking high aren’t you??
You and Alan don’t know anything about molecular phylogenies, Allan doesn’t know the definition of a GA, Joe can’t name one GA that doesn’t have a search to it, Neil thinks its quote mining to quote him, and you can’t even read one simple paragraph that is stuck right in front of your face that is a fucking direct quote from the page your are supposedly referencing, but for which you haven’t read.
Holy shit, I hope you all are enjoying your hashfest. I hate to think of all of the regret when you sober up.
You left out the word “field,” phoodoo. And that’s enough to get people here in an uproar. The only reasonable explanation is that you must be dishonest.
Mung,
Yes, Richard can go fuck himself, but it still doesn’t explain this:
Who the hell is he talking about? And why??
Besides which, according to Neil, String Theory is not a theory. So its all mute apparently.
I guess the same goes for gravity.
I actually gave “stupid” as another explanation and a write-in third option.
#MungsAgainstWordLawyering.
Except the two things aren’t the same.
/Edits.
I only wish it were more mute…..
Probably a record for a post, though, being wrong after 3 words. 😀
Actually, I think we have even had this discussion about this word use here.
Words become part of language through usage.
Because saying moot means it is up for discussion, for something to be a mute point means it can’t even be discussed. They actually hold quite different conveyances. As Neil thinks string theory is not even a theory, the point is not even debatable. It is mute, not moot.
Glad its important to you though.
“Mute” is already part of language. It doesn’t mean “moot”. How’s that retraction coming?
Right back at you.
You need to reflect on this.
lol
Moot is more commonly used as an irrelevant point as in “Besides which, according to Neil, String Theory is not a theory. So its all ( whether string theory and string field theory are interchangeable) mute ( moot as in irrelevant ) apparently”
Actually Neal did not say it was “mute”, he said it was a speculative hypothesis. Generally speculation requires a non-mute discussion in order to speculate.
Wow. I thought I’d said ‘MORE mute’!