Yet V is defined as the universal superset composed of everything that has been, is, or will be. But claiming that V includes everything that will ever be violates the underpinning of P1, since V cannot preceed the existence of its components. If V contains things that are not yet but will be, then V is an invalid set.
The set of all states of finite state machine is quite well-defined regardless of the machine's current state; similarly, so is the set of all things that have been, is or will be.
The argument "Therefore, there must exist..." is predicated upon the assumption that there must exist a cause for V. This isn't proven, nor is it listed in the definitions which define the assumptions.
You are suggesting a noncausal phenomenon? Show me one shred of epistemological evidence that suggests the existence of noncausal phenomena and I'll accept your criticism as valid.
Either that, or you are perhaps falling back on the possibility of an infinite regression of causes. Hatcher did specifically address this point, but either I didn't get it down in time, or his argument was fallacious. You'll note that I already addressed this point in my followup post noting the proof's potential flaws. I recall him discussing it, but I also recall either not following his reasoning or not being satisfied with his explanation.
"D1. B is without cause (uncaused) if, for no A does A->B hold"
It specifically allows for the possibility of B being without cause. If one simply asserts that there is no A for which A -> V, V is therefore uncaused, there is no need to postulate G, and the rest of the proof falls apart.
I believe Hatcher made that definition merely for completeness. Epistemologically, we have no experience with noncausal phenomena and no justification to believe they have any manifestation in reality. Until we do, we must omit them from any metaphysical arguments.
You dismissed this above by deferring to the authority of physicists, but this proof isn't based upon the work of physics. It's self-contained - it depends only upon its own assumptions and definitions. It either stands or falls upon its own weight, not upon the word of physicists.
I did not argue by physics authority. I made an epistemological argument based on observation (about which physicists have simply been more thorough).
The proof is a metaphysical assertion of reality, so it cannot stand on its own two feet; it must also agree with our epistemological knowledge of the world.
There are other problems as well. Let us say that g is the set of all things which are self caused. g contains one element - G. Thus we have, by definition, G el g. Since V is the superset of all things, it follows that g el V.
Since G->V, then P2 says that G->g.
On the other hand, given G el g, P1 says that G-/->g.
So it is the case that both G->g and G-/->g, which violates P3.
This is a misapplication of P1. g is logically equivalent to G, ie. g<=>G, so P1 doesn't apply since it reduces to G->G which is already established.
The deeper theorists dig the universe appears to get more random, not less. Virtual particles appear from seemingly nothing and then disappear again without a trace. At the lowest meaningful levels it is postulated that time and space have none of the linearity that we percieve at higher levels. Will we eventually find our universe to be the clockwork world idealized by Newton? Maybe. But let's be realistic, we're nowhere near that today.
Ok, I have a few qualms with this:
1. You are talking about a model of reality as if it were real.
2. There is nothing in modern physics that says nor implies that any event, including virtual particle creation and annihilation, is noncausal. Unpredictable yes, noncausal no.
I don't believe entaglement is what he was referring to when he said that "God does not play dice with the universe".
Here's a good link explaining Einstein's philosophical difference of opinion on the interpretation quantum physics. It essentially boils down to causal determinism, and predictive determinism. While all events are causal, we cannot necessarily gather enough information to be able to predict outcomes even given a correct model of reality. I'm sure there are physicists who would adaondon all sense determinism, but it's my distinct impression they are few and far between (and not well regarded at all).
By the explanation given in the link I included, the creative force is not described as causing the big bang, they sound to be one and the same.
Not necessarily. G can give rise to E1 which can then cause E2 which can then cause the big bang. There can be any number of steps between G and the big bang. There is no reason why G cannot be the cause of V by transitive closure. As long as the intervening causal events are one-shots, ie. they merely cause the next stage of the process, I don't see why the proof would discount them.
Again, from the one who posted the proof
That being me...;-)
The poster confirms what you say that later in his book Hatcher goes more indepth about the nature of god, but he doesn't say what the nature is.
It is said he has no other attributes at all which based on that proof, somewhat rules out an "all good" or "all knowing" creative force.
To be fair, it's not at all clear to me what "non-composite" means exactly. What exactly does it mean to be a member of a set in the proof's model? I'm not sure that an "attribute" is a member of a set for instance.
This may leave open the possibility for much interpretation unfortunately.
That is not correct. Previous to quantum mechanics this was true and is exactly why Einstein was so reluctant to accept it. However, these days no legitimate physicist doubts quantum mechanics or the fact that many quantum effects are perfectly random, i.e. they have no cause.
Sorry, this is incorrect. Just because the outcome of an event cannot be predicted, does not mean it did not have a cause. The meaning of "randomness" is unpredictability, not noncausality. I challenge you to cite me a single noncausal event studied in physics (or any science for that matter, but physics is the most likely place you would find one if it exists). I myself made the mistake of believing randomness and causality were mutually exclusive when, in fact, they are not.
Einstein had trouble accepting quantum physics because of its apparent non-local effects (faster than light signalling between particles) which contradicted his theories of relativity.
No explanation is given how this very limited definition of god is anything more then the big bang.
Indeed, the 'creative force' would be the cause of the big bang itself.
Even if this is a valid logical proof, it doesn't appear to accomplish much of anything.
If you're looking for a valid logical proof of a creator (given you accept the assumptions), then you have one. Many people would consider that a significant step forward.
Hatcher (the originator of the proof), apparently goes on in his book to demonstrate that the god he proved was also "all good", "all knowing", etc. but I haven't read it, so don't take my word for it.
Fundamental forces don't require a more fundamental force to explain them. But if you accept fundamental forces, then you can't argue that a force requires God to explain it.
Forgot to address this...
You make a good point, and yet the G does not attempt to explain the operation of other fundamental forces, but their existence; I think we're tripping ourselves up with the word "fundamental" here. A force would be fundamental in that it cannot be explained by further reduction into an interaction between more 'fundamental' elements.
The proof implies the existence of G, an element that creates all other elements in existence, but has nothing else to do with them. The existence of G does not reduce the operation of the electromagnetic force any further, thus, EM is no less a fundamental force. If G hadn't created charged particles at all, then EM wouldn't even enter the picture.
Among other things, it assumes that everything must have a cause, which is far from proven.
Ask any physicist whether there are non-causal events; you will receive a resounding 'no'. Ask them to prove it, and you'll get funny looks.
No one can prove the non-existence of non-causal phenomenon. So, until we witness one, we operate on the premise that causality holds. I personally suspect that causality has deep roots in the foundations of logic itself, but that is merely a suspicion at this point.
It ignores the possibility of infinite regression - an infinite series of causes with no end.
Actually, it does not. The self-caused phenomenon, G, is itself an infinite 'causal loop' (if you can even think of it that way), causing itself, and the birth of the universe.
The unique, self-caused phenomenon, which Magi (Magi - wiseman, hmmm....) calls God can just as easily be called "The Universe."
The proof demonstrates that "The Universe" (as defined) cannot cause itself. If you have another definition for "The Universe" other than that presented in the proof, then perhaps you are right. The definitions in the proof are fairly basic and make sense however, so you'd be hard pressed to justify changes.
The proof also demonstrates that G, cannot be a composite element (ie. it has no constituent components), thus the universe is already ruled out since "the universe" is "the set of all things" (ie. it is a set with constituent elements).
Fundamental forces don't require a more fundamental force to explain them. But if you accept fundamental forces, then you can't argue that a force requires God to explain it.
I think you are tripping yourself up, as you are caught up in your preconceptions of "God". Why cannot God itself be a fundamental force? This is essentially what the proof demonstrates, a creative element of the universe.
The true flaws in the 'proof' are addressed in the follow-up comments. Additionally, the association of logical implication ('->') with causation seems dubious, but other than that, it is sound as a *logical* proof. The assumptions may be unsound, and any connotations of using the term 'God' to describe the 'creator' element may be dubious, but they are outside the proof's scope.
In summary, the proof itself is not flawed. The foundation upon which it is based may be however, as may be be any further associations we may wish to make of the conclusions.
>It doesn't matter whether or not the Creator is part of the Universe or not. If you can postulate that the Creator exists without cause, then you can postulate that the universe exists without cause.
> If the complexity of the universe requires a Creator, then the complexity of the Creator requires a MetaCreator as well.
Also not true. Does a fundamental force require a more fundamental force to explain it's existence? Accepting the existence of a creative force, does not imply that that force is somehow further reducible, or even necessarily complex at all. You r preconceptions of what constitutes a "creator" are causing the contradictions you see.
In the above proof by Hatcher, the "Creator", whatever it may be, is part of the universe (not oustide it), but creates the universe.
First, if you put "persistence" in the OS, the OS has to know about disks, which, otherwise, a microkernel does not.
Not necessarily. Both EROS and L4 have no knowledge of the disks in the kernel proper, yet both support transparent orthogonal persistence. Only knowledge of the memory mapping structures are needed, and the kernel needs to know of those anyway.
More significantly, "persistence" means keeping your mistakes around. Memory leaks are forever.
Until the software crashes or is killed. Then you restart the service. No different from a regular system.
OS design needs to go in the other direction, that of efficient transaction processing, where execution environments are created, used, and quickly flushed. That's better from a security and reliability standpoint.
Incidentally, both EROS and Coyotos support exactly what you suggest. Each IPC is an implicit transaction, execution contexts are extremely lightweight, and communication is blazingly fast.
The reason I become suspicious is because capability-based systems are designed to distrust the person using them, including the machine's owner.
This is simply not the case. If you search the EROS and E-lang mailing lists, you will find many examples of the active project members asserting that securing a machine against it's owner is simply impossible.
You are mistaking "the user/owner" with "the software that runs on the user's behalf", ie. the shell, browser, etc. Capability systems are designed for the user to grant the least authority to programs that run on his behalf. They enable the user to protect himself from potentially malicious software by limiting the damage they can cause (read up on confinement and POLA).
Ultimately, the owner is in complete control of the machine. However, the programs running on the machine should be properly constrained in the capabilities they receive. This is proper security.
But in all other environments, the machine should treat the owner as God and obey all commands and yield up any and all data He/She demands.
Nobody will disagree with you here.The problem is: how can the user protect themselves against potentially malicious software that must operate on their data? This is the problem we are facing today with viruses, trojans, etc. This is the problem that capability systems are very well-suited to solving simply because they trivially follow the Principle Of Least Authority (POLA).
I fear that capability-based systems will be one of the prongs media companies will use to attack Fair Use and other rights. I worry that "content providers" will demand PCs that distrust their owners and obey their commands, not mine.
It's certainly a concern, but again, any machine is simply unsecurable from its owner. Just like how mod chips were developed and widely deployed by XBox users, so will any such "media conglomerate" security measures be circumvented.
Unfortunately, transparent orthogonal persistence is pain once networking is tossed in the mix. If the code must recover from the failure of a network, then why not the failure of the machine as well? The circumstances are so alike, that it just makes sense to abandon transparent orthogonal persistence, and devise a solution that will work uniformally in both circumstances.
They're trying to create a language with ML-like semantics but with total control over data respresentation, such that it is suitable for use in writing operating system software (or any other low-level, high performance software). No garbage collection is an option for instance (since the variance in collection times is too high, it is unsuitable for real-time code).
I run gentoo SELinux on my server. SELinux is a difficult to use system, and I suspect is even less powerful than a full capability system like EROS/Coyotos/KeyKOS. The only advantage of SELinux is it's current hardware support.
Just because there is no super-user, doesn't mean that there is no way to access a person's data. Anyone with a capability to a particular resource can access that resource regardless of who they are; there is no concept of "ownership" except in that the creator of an object is the only entity holding a capability to it until he gives it to someone else.
Suppose an administrator creates a block of space he wishes to dedicate to a particular user. The act of creation returns a capability(unforgeable reference) to that object, and the admin is currently the only one holding that capability; no one else is even aware of its existence. Once he grants the capability to the user, the user now also has access to that space. The admin does not (necessarily) lose it.
One could design the system such that the admin could not access the private space in any meaningful fashion (plausible deniability/common carrier) and thus the user may use it as he wishes; or one could design it such that the admin has full access to any objects created from that space (full auditing support and higher level policy enforcement).
Capability security is simply enforced, pure object-oriented reference mechanics. Until you give B a reference to C, B cannot refer to C or induce any sort of direct changes in C (in Java and.NET VMs). Same with capabilities.
There is no direct historical relation between Multics and EROS. See The Path to Coyotos. Multics is not even capability-based, and doesn't even appear on the map of capability computation which shows the development history proceeding from Hydra, to Gnosis/KeyKOS and ending at EROS.
This has been possible in Linux (and some proprietary Unices) for some time now. Why the need for a separate OS?
You wouldn't need a separate OS... if it weren't for the fact that Posix/Linux "capabilities" are not real capabilities. Furthermore, EROS/Coyotos has much finer-grained access control, ie. a capability to a memory page, or a disk sector, rather than "capabilities" only to coarse-grained objects such as terminals as in Posix.
If you create something, it is yours. If individuals, acting in the name of The Public, choose to steal that which you've created, thats another matter. But you don't keep what is your creation by permission, you retain it untill it is stolen.
Who created numbers? Who created mathematics? Language? Ideas cannot be owned. There is no such thing as "stealing" an idea, except in the ramblings of a few confused souls. The moment you transmit an idea to someone else, whether by vocal communication, pictures, software, or the written word, you relinquish control of that idea. You no longer have control.
Patents, copyright, and trademarks (so-called IP law) were instituted to extend the owner's control past the point of transmission, to encourage them to continue creating. It is an artifical limitation placed on a person's ability (as is most law).
If you wish to retain absolute control of your ideas, then don't breath a word of it to anyone else, ever. But don't be surprised if someone else comes up with the same idea.
Ideas are not property, IP law merely treats it as such. Sometimes, this abstraction is well founded, sometimes it's not. There is no shame in discussing its failings.
However, his work does *not*, in any way, qualify for a spot on the list of Greatest Equations Ever.
It's not his equation. It's the Dirac's equation, arguably among the most important discoveries of 20th century physics.
1) convinced science is wrong
That's not too hard to believe. In fact, I'm *sure* science is wrong, and you should be too. Until we have a complete and consistent explanation for all phenomena, any model we use is incomplete at best.
2) convinced he knows the answer
Most people are convinced they are right, until proven otherwise.
3) isn't *qualified* to decide either of these things
The only qualifications necessary for a science are a logical argument supported by facts. A university can't give you that; it's a product of an inquiring mind.
So, until his work is either 1) peer reviewed and validated or 2) verified experimentally, and these experiments are repeated by other, reputable scientists, his work will continue to lack credibility, and so will be ignored.
Poof! You can prove anything you want, if you append it to an otherwise unrelated math problem.
It is not at all unrelated. This is a proof attempting construct a definition of God as defined by logic. It is not an attempt prove the existence of God as people currently conceive him to be. People's typical notion of God is rife with paradoxes anyway. This argument does prove the existence of a creative force/entity of some kind, and Hatcher attaches the label of God to it.
If you'd bothered to read some of the follow-ups, I further noted that Hatcher does go on to demonstrate other properties of "God" including goodness, love, intelligence, etc. These arguments are on much shakier ground however.
I'm an electrical engineer, which means I've studied quantum mechanics and physics as a natural course of getting my degree. Not that this matters.
Frankly, determinism has been *shown* to be false whenever you look down more deeply than just a car hitting a person. Learn about the uncertainty principle which states that the more you know about it's position, the less you know about it's velocity, and vice-versa.
Simply because the outcome of an event is unpredictable, does not mean it is non-deterministic. I am well aware of Heisenberg's Uncertainty Principle, and it does not invalidate determinism. Ask any scientist if we have ever witnessed an event which was non-causal. There are no documented cases of non-causal events. If every event has a cause, then reproducing that cause, reproduces the event deterministically.
The quantum world is not exempt from this, regardless of how counter-intuitive quantum phenomena sometimes seem.
As a side note, the precision tradeoff enforced by the uncertainty principle is between position and momentum, not velocity.
Einstein tried in his later years to disprove this, as have others, but time and time again, through experiment it is shown to be true.
Actually, Einstein tried to argue against the results of entanglement dubbed "spooky action at a distance". He thought that this contradicted the theory of relativity which limited all interactions to the speed of light. We now know that it doesn't, but he couldn't have known at the time.
That definition ends up with a major problem right there before we even begin. A causing B in one instance doesn't always end up meaning A always leads to B in every instance, as the definition implies. For example, If a car hitting a person causes that person to die, that doesn't mean that a car hitting someone will always cause death. It could merely cause injury in many cases.
This is not true. While your example *seems* to contradict the principle, it is actually invalid as the events are *not* the same. Do you really think that if all the person's and the car's particles were in the exact same positions, with identical momentums that the event would unfold differently? If so, you must have somehow disproved determinism. I'm sure the scientific community would like to hear this argument.
The fact is that minute differences can cause great changes in outcome; no one is disputing that. But your definition of identity is insufficient. One can say that your example was simply insufficiently reduced to its constituents components. But given two identical events A0 and A1, no one disputes that they do not always, without fail, result in B.
Uhm, Given the definitions so far, it's not possible for B-/->B, ever. B->B is true for all B's, because B->B was defined to mean that there is never a B without a B - which is tautologically true by definition. (This is a consequence of the bad definition I mentioned above, and one of the reasons why it's a bad definition.)
Alright, you are playing on the wording here, which granted is important, but does not in itself invalidate the argument. If the above definition were re-worded as "B invariably follows A", then the argument is re-instated. Your two points by no means invalidate the logic behind the proof.
You are simply wrong about how QAM works. I looked this up on wikipedia this is a communications technology which works on a simple one variable system.
Note the following in the wikipedia explanation "What this actually means is that the amplitude and the phase of the carrier wave are simultaneously changed according to the information you want to transmit."
QAM can transmit more information than simple AM or phase modulation because it modulates phase and amplitude of the carrier, not only one. It's a two variable system.
The reason many applications use simplistic modulation techniques which do not take full advantage of the available spectrum is the cost of the equipment. If radios had cost 3 times as much back in the 1940s simply because they decided to use FM instead of AM, radio would not have caught on as quickly. It's an economic reason, not technological. In real life, it usually is.
All indications I saw said that radio simply converts the radio waves into voltage so the entire signal can be broken down into a function of voltage as a function of time.
And everything our computers can do can be reduced to ones and zeroes. What is your point here?
There is the underlying frequency of the photons used and the frequency of the signal.
Yes, these are the carrier frequency and the modulating signal's frequency, respectively. The signal modulates the carrier in a well-defined way so that the source signal is "carried" on the transmitted frequency (ie. it's encoded in the carrier). The receiver can then decode the received transmission, and extract the original signal.
The closest analogy I can come up with on the spot would be PPPoE. PPP packets are encoded in ethernet frames, then decoded at the recipient. Any type of "tunneling"-like network protocols are similar analogies.
Perhaps your question is: why transmit on a carrier signal at all? ie. why tunnel the signal? That's a long and complicated question, but there are good reasons for it. If you're interested, read up more on signals and radio.
However, it would appear that theoretically you could generate a radio signal by specifying a unique intensity at each time and photon frequency.
What do you mean by "intensity". What you just described sounds exactly like Amplitude Modulation, which is one of the simplest transmission schemes. Unless you're suggesting we do not modulate the signal at all.
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Yet V is defined as the universal superset composed of everything that has been, is, or will be. But claiming that V includes everything that will ever be violates the underpinning of P1, since V cannot preceed the existence of its components. If V contains things that are not yet but will be, then V is an invalid set.
The set of all states of finite state machine is quite well-defined regardless of the machine's current state; similarly, so is the set of all things that have been, is or will be.
The argument "Therefore, there must exist..." is predicated upon the assumption that there must exist a cause for V. This isn't proven, nor is it listed in the definitions which define the assumptions.
You are suggesting a noncausal phenomenon? Show me one shred of epistemological evidence that suggests the existence of noncausal phenomena and I'll accept your criticism as valid.
Either that, or you are perhaps falling back on the possibility of an infinite regression of causes. Hatcher did specifically address this point, but either I didn't get it down in time, or his argument was fallacious. You'll note that I already addressed this point in my followup post noting the proof's potential flaws. I recall him discussing it, but I also recall either not following his reasoning or not being satisfied with his explanation.
As I've noted elsewhere however, infinite regression of causes interacts negatively with entropy. An adequate resolution, on way or the other, remains to be seen.
In fact, the definitions specifically say:
"D1. B is without cause (uncaused) if, for no A does A->B hold"
It specifically allows for the possibility of B being without cause. If one simply asserts that there is no A for which A -> V, V is therefore uncaused, there is no need to postulate G, and the rest of the proof falls apart.
I believe Hatcher made that definition merely for completeness. Epistemologically, we have no experience with noncausal phenomena and no justification to believe they have any manifestation in reality. Until we do, we must omit them from any metaphysical arguments.
You dismissed this above by deferring to the authority of physicists, but this proof isn't based upon the work of physics. It's self-contained - it depends only upon its own assumptions and definitions. It either stands or falls upon its own weight, not upon the word of physicists.
I did not argue by physics authority. I made an epistemological argument based on observation (about which physicists have simply been more thorough).
The proof is a metaphysical assertion of reality, so it cannot stand on its own two feet; it must also agree with our epistemological knowledge of the world.
There are other problems as well. Let us say that g is the set of all things which are self caused. g contains one element - G. Thus we have, by definition, G el g. Since V is the superset of all things, it follows that g el V.
Since G->V, then P2 says that G->g.
On the other hand, given G el g, P1 says that G-/->g.
So it is the case that both G->g and G-/->g, which violates P3.
This is a misapplication of P1. g is logically equivalent to G, ie. g<=>G, so P1 doesn't apply since it reduces to G->G which is already established.
The deeper theorists dig the universe appears to get more random, not less. Virtual particles appear from seemingly nothing and then disappear again without a trace. At the lowest meaningful levels it is postulated that time and space have none of the linearity that we percieve at higher levels. Will we eventually find our universe to be the clockwork world idealized by Newton? Maybe. But let's be realistic, we're nowhere near that today.
;-)
Ok, I have a few qualms with this:
1. You are talking about a model of reality as if it were real.
2. There is nothing in modern physics that says nor implies that any event, including virtual particle creation and annihilation, is noncausal. Unpredictable yes, noncausal no.
I don't believe entaglement is what he was referring to when he said that "God does not play dice with the universe".
Here's a good link explaining Einstein's philosophical difference of opinion on the interpretation quantum physics. It essentially boils down to causal determinism, and predictive determinism. While all events are causal, we cannot necessarily gather enough information to be able to predict outcomes even given a correct model of reality. I'm sure there are physicists who would adaondon all sense determinism, but it's my distinct impression they are few and far between (and not well regarded at all).
By the explanation given in the link I included, the creative force is not described as causing the big bang, they sound to be one and the same.
Not necessarily. G can give rise to E1 which can then cause E2 which can then cause the big bang. There can be any number of steps between G and the big bang. There is no reason why G cannot be the cause of V by transitive closure. As long as the intervening causal events are one-shots, ie. they merely cause the next stage of the process, I don't see why the proof would discount them.
Again, from the one who posted the proof
That being me...
The poster confirms what you say that later in his book Hatcher goes more indepth about the nature of god, but he doesn't say what the nature is.
It's mentioned further here (thought not in much more detail than I outlined here).
It is said he has no other attributes at all which based on that proof, somewhat rules out an "all good" or "all knowing" creative force.
To be fair, it's not at all clear to me what "non-composite" means exactly. What exactly does it mean to be a member of a set in the proof's model? I'm not sure that an "attribute" is a member of a set for instance.
This may leave open the possibility for much interpretation unfortunately.
That is not correct. Previous to quantum mechanics this was true and is exactly why Einstein was so reluctant to accept it. However, these days no legitimate physicist doubts quantum mechanics or the fact that many quantum effects are perfectly random, i.e. they have no cause.
Sorry, this is incorrect. Just because the outcome of an event cannot be predicted, does not mean it did not have a cause. The meaning of "randomness" is unpredictability, not noncausality. I challenge you to cite me a single noncausal event studied in physics (or any science for that matter, but physics is the most likely place you would find one if it exists). I myself made the mistake of believing randomness and causality were mutually exclusive when, in fact, they are not.
Einstein had trouble accepting quantum physics because of its apparent non-local effects (faster than light signalling between particles) which contradicted his theories of relativity.
No explanation is given how this very limited definition of god is anything more then the big bang.
Indeed, the 'creative force' would be the cause of the big bang itself.
Even if this is a valid logical proof, it doesn't appear to accomplish much of anything.
If you're looking for a valid logical proof of a creator (given you accept the assumptions), then you have one. Many people would consider that a significant step forward.
Hatcher (the originator of the proof), apparently goes on in his book to demonstrate that the god he proved was also "all good", "all knowing", etc. but I haven't read it, so don't take my word for it.
Fundamental forces don't require a more fundamental force to explain them. But if you accept fundamental forces, then you can't argue that a force requires God to explain it.
Forgot to address this...
You make a good point, and yet the G does not attempt to explain the operation of other fundamental forces, but their existence; I think we're tripping ourselves up with the word "fundamental" here. A force would be fundamental in that it cannot be explained by further reduction into an interaction between more 'fundamental' elements.
The proof implies the existence of G, an element that creates all other elements in existence, but has nothing else to do with them. The existence of G does not reduce the operation of the electromagnetic force any further, thus, EM is no less a fundamental force. If G hadn't created charged particles at all, then EM wouldn't even enter the picture.
Among other things, it assumes that everything must have a cause, which is far from proven.
Ask any physicist whether there are non-causal events; you will receive a resounding 'no'. Ask them to prove it, and you'll get funny looks.
No one can prove the non-existence of non-causal phenomenon. So, until we witness one, we operate on the premise that causality holds. I personally suspect that causality has deep roots in the foundations of logic itself, but that is merely a suspicion at this point.
It ignores the possibility of infinite regression - an infinite series of causes with no end.
Actually, it does not. The self-caused phenomenon, G, is itself an infinite 'causal loop' (if you can even think of it that way), causing itself, and the birth of the universe.
The unique, self-caused phenomenon, which Magi (Magi - wiseman, hmmm....) calls God can just as easily be called "The Universe."
The proof demonstrates that "The Universe" (as defined) cannot cause itself. If you have another definition for "The Universe" other than that presented in the proof, then perhaps you are right. The definitions in the proof are fairly basic and make sense however, so you'd be hard pressed to justify changes.
The proof also demonstrates that G, cannot be a composite element (ie. it has no constituent components), thus the universe is already ruled out since "the universe" is "the set of all things" (ie. it is a set with constituent elements).
Fundamental forces don't require a more fundamental force to explain them. But if you accept fundamental forces, then you can't argue that a force requires God to explain it.
I think you are tripping yourself up, as you are caught up in your preconceptions of "God". Why cannot God itself be a fundamental force? This is essentially what the proof demonstrates, a creative element of the universe.
The true flaws in the 'proof' are addressed in the follow-up comments. Additionally, the association of logical implication ('->') with causation seems dubious, but other than that, it is sound as a *logical* proof. The assumptions may be unsound, and any connotations of using the term 'God' to describe the 'creator' element may be dubious, but they are outside the proof's scope.
In summary, the proof itself is not flawed. The foundation upon which it is based may be however, as may be be any further associations we may wish to make of the conclusions.
>It doesn't matter whether or not the Creator is part of the Universe or not. If you can postulate that the Creator exists without cause, then you can postulate that the universe exists without cause.
This is not necessarily true
> If the complexity of the universe requires a Creator, then the complexity of the Creator requires a MetaCreator as well.
Also not true. Does a fundamental force require a more fundamental force to explain it's existence? Accepting the existence of a creative force, does not imply that that force is somehow further reducible, or even necessarily complex at all. You r preconceptions of what constitutes a "creator" are causing the contradictions you see.
In the above proof by Hatcher, the "Creator", whatever it may be, is part of the universe (not oustide it), but creates the universe.
Naaah, MySQL Cookbook might be free, but they only recently decided to bother installing seats in the theater.
;-)
And even then the seats were lacking backs.
First, if you put "persistence" in the OS, the OS has to know about disks, which, otherwise, a microkernel does not.
Not necessarily. Both EROS and L4 have no knowledge of the disks in the kernel proper, yet both support transparent orthogonal persistence. Only knowledge of the memory mapping structures are needed, and the kernel needs to know of those anyway.
More significantly, "persistence" means keeping your mistakes around. Memory leaks are forever.
Until the software crashes or is killed. Then you restart the service. No different from a regular system.
OS design needs to go in the other direction, that of efficient transaction processing, where execution environments are created, used, and quickly flushed. That's better from a security and reliability standpoint.
Incidentally, both EROS and Coyotos support exactly what you suggest. Each IPC is an implicit transaction, execution contexts are extremely lightweight, and communication is blazingly fast.
See the Coyotos history page for a discussion of the properties of Coyotos. Or check out Towards a Verified, General-Purpose Operating System Kernel on the docs page
The reason I become suspicious is because capability-based systems are designed to distrust the person using them, including the machine's owner.
This is simply not the case. If you search the EROS and E-lang mailing lists, you will find many examples of the active project members asserting that securing a machine against it's owner is simply impossible.
You are mistaking "the user/owner" with "the software that runs on the user's behalf", ie. the shell, browser, etc. Capability systems are designed for the user to grant the least authority to programs that run on his behalf. They enable the user to protect himself from potentially malicious software by limiting the damage they can cause (read up on confinement and POLA).
Ultimately, the owner is in complete control of the machine. However, the programs running on the machine should be properly constrained in the capabilities they receive. This is proper security.
But in all other environments, the machine should treat the owner as God and obey all commands and yield up any and all data He/She demands.
Nobody will disagree with you here.The problem is: how can the user protect themselves against potentially malicious software that must operate on their data? This is the problem we are facing today with viruses, trojans, etc. This is the problem that capability systems are very well-suited to solving simply because they trivially follow the Principle Of Least Authority (POLA).
I fear that capability-based systems will be one of the prongs media companies will use to attack Fair Use and other rights. I worry that "content providers" will demand PCs that distrust their owners and obey their commands, not mine.
It's certainly a concern, but again, any machine is simply unsecurable from its owner. Just like how mod chips were developed and widely deployed by XBox users, so will any such "media conglomerate" security measures be circumvented.
Unfortunately, transparent orthogonal persistence is pain once networking is tossed in the mix. If the code must recover from the failure of a network, then why not the failure of the machine as well? The circumstances are so alike, that it just makes sense to abandon transparent orthogonal persistence, and devise a solution that will work uniformally in both circumstances.
They're trying to create a language with ML-like semantics but with total control over data respresentation, such that it is suitable for use in writing operating system software (or any other low-level, high performance software). No garbage collection is an option for instance (since the variance in collection times is too high, it is unsuitable for real-time code).
I run gentoo SELinux on my server. SELinux is a difficult to use system, and I suspect is even less powerful than a full capability system like EROS/Coyotos/KeyKOS. The only advantage of SELinux is it's current hardware support.
Just because there is no super-user, doesn't mean that there is no way to access a person's data. Anyone with a capability to a particular resource can access that resource regardless of who they are; there is no concept of "ownership" except in that the creator of an object is the only entity holding a capability to it until he gives it to someone else.
.NET VMs). Same with capabilities.
Suppose an administrator creates a block of space he wishes to dedicate to a particular user. The act of creation returns a capability(unforgeable reference) to that object, and the admin is currently the only one holding that capability; no one else is even aware of its existence. Once he grants the capability to the user, the user now also has access to that space. The admin does not (necessarily) lose it.
One could design the system such that the admin could not access the private space in any meaningful fashion (plausible deniability/common carrier) and thus the user may use it as he wishes; or one could design it such that the admin has full access to any objects created from that space (full auditing support and higher level policy enforcement).
Capability security is simply enforced, pure object-oriented reference mechanics. Until you give B a reference to C, B cannot refer to C or induce any sort of direct changes in C (in Java and
There is no direct historical relation between Multics and EROS. See The Path to Coyotos. Multics is not even capability-based, and doesn't even appear on the map of capability computation which shows the development history proceeding from Hydra, to Gnosis/KeyKOS and ending at EROS.
This has been possible in Linux (and some proprietary Unices) for some time now. Why the need for a separate OS?
You wouldn't need a separate OS... if it weren't for the fact that Posix/Linux "capabilities" are not real capabilities. Furthermore, EROS/Coyotos has much finer-grained access control, ie. a capability to a memory page, or a disk sector, rather than "capabilities" only to coarse-grained objects such as terminals as in Posix.
I'm not the parent poster, but many of the ideas are expressed and discussed elsewhere. See especially this sub-thread on intellectual property. Also see some quotes from historical and influential figures on IP
Then you're no better off than where you started. This is not a problem with Dijjer.
If you create something, it is yours. If individuals, acting in the name of The Public, choose to steal that which you've created, thats another matter. But you don't keep what is your creation by permission, you retain it untill it is stolen.
Who created numbers? Who created mathematics? Language? Ideas cannot be owned. There is no such thing as "stealing" an idea, except in the ramblings of a few confused souls. The moment you transmit an idea to someone else, whether by vocal communication, pictures, software, or the written word, you relinquish control of that idea. You no longer have control.
Patents, copyright, and trademarks (so-called IP law) were instituted to extend the owner's control past the point of transmission, to encourage them to continue creating. It is an artifical limitation placed on a person's ability (as is most law).
If you wish to retain absolute control of your ideas, then don't breath a word of it to anyone else, ever. But don't be surprised if someone else comes up with the same idea.
Ideas are not property, IP law merely treats it as such. Sometimes, this abstraction is well founded, sometimes it's not. There is no shame in discussing its failings.
However, his work does *not*, in any way, qualify for a spot on the list of Greatest Equations Ever.
It's not his equation. It's the Dirac's equation, arguably among the most important discoveries of 20th century physics.
1) convinced science is wrong
That's not too hard to believe. In fact, I'm *sure* science is wrong, and you should be too. Until we have a complete and consistent explanation for all phenomena, any model we use is incomplete at best.
2) convinced he knows the answer
Most people are convinced they are right, until proven otherwise.
3) isn't *qualified* to decide either of these things
The only qualifications necessary for a science are a logical argument supported by facts. A university can't give you that; it's a product of an inquiring mind.
So, until his work is either 1) peer reviewed and validated or 2) verified experimentally, and these experiments are repeated by other, reputable scientists, his work will continue to lack credibility, and so will be ignored.
None of which mean he's wrong.
The foundation of all computation.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lambda_calculus
Poof! You can prove anything you want, if you append it to an otherwise unrelated math problem.
It is not at all unrelated. This is a proof attempting construct a definition of God as defined by logic. It is not an attempt prove the existence of God as people currently conceive him to be. People's typical notion of God is rife with paradoxes anyway. This argument does prove the existence of a creative force/entity of some kind, and Hatcher attaches the label of God to it.
If you'd bothered to read some of the follow-ups, I further noted that Hatcher does go on to demonstrate other properties of "God" including goodness, love, intelligence, etc. These arguments are on much shakier ground however.
You're not a scientist are you?
I'm an electrical engineer, which means I've studied quantum mechanics and physics as a natural course of getting my degree. Not that this matters.
Frankly, determinism has been *shown* to be false whenever you look down more deeply than just a car hitting a person. Learn about the uncertainty principle which states that the more you know about it's position, the less you know about it's velocity, and vice-versa.
Simply because the outcome of an event is unpredictable, does not mean it is non-deterministic. I am well aware of Heisenberg's Uncertainty Principle, and it does not invalidate determinism. Ask any scientist if we have ever witnessed an event which was non-causal. There are no documented cases of non-causal events. If every event has a cause, then reproducing that cause, reproduces the event deterministically.
The quantum world is not exempt from this, regardless of how counter-intuitive quantum phenomena sometimes seem.
As a side note, the precision tradeoff enforced by the uncertainty principle is between position and momentum, not velocity.
Einstein tried in his later years to disprove this, as have others, but time and time again, through experiment it is shown to be true.
Actually, Einstein tried to argue against the results of entanglement dubbed "spooky action at a distance". He thought that this contradicted the theory of relativity which limited all interactions to the speed of light. We now know that it doesn't, but he couldn't have known at the time.
That definition ends up with a major problem right there before we even begin. A causing B in one instance doesn't always end up meaning A always leads to B in every instance, as the definition implies. For example, If a car hitting a person causes that person to die, that doesn't mean that a car hitting someone will always cause death. It could merely cause injury in many cases.
This is not true. While your example *seems* to contradict the principle, it is actually invalid as the events are *not* the same. Do you really think that if all the person's and the car's particles were in the exact same positions, with identical momentums that the event would unfold differently? If so, you must have somehow disproved determinism. I'm sure the scientific community would like to hear this argument.
The fact is that minute differences can cause great changes in outcome; no one is disputing that. But your definition of identity is insufficient. One can say that your example was simply insufficiently reduced to its constituents components. But given two identical events A0 and A1, no one disputes that they do not always, without fail, result in B.
Uhm, Given the definitions so far, it's not possible for B-/->B, ever. B->B is true for all B's, because B->B was defined to mean that there is never a B without a B - which is tautologically true by definition. (This is a consequence of the bad definition I mentioned above, and one of the reasons why it's a bad definition.)
Alright, you are playing on the wording here, which granted is important, but does not in itself invalidate the argument. If the above definition were re-worded as "B invariably follows A", then the argument is re-instated. Your two points by no means invalidate the logic behind the proof.
Here are lecture notes I took on Professor Hatcher's logical proof of God. It is based on a "first cause" chain of reasoning, yet does not suffer from an infinite regression of causes. This argument is probably better than anything you're likely to find, but still unconvincing.
You are simply wrong about how QAM works. I looked this up on wikipedia this is a communications technology which works on a simple one variable system.
QAM on wikipedia
Note the following in the wikipedia explanation "What this actually means is that the amplitude and the phase of the carrier wave are simultaneously changed according to the information you want to transmit."
QAM can transmit more information than simple AM or phase modulation because it modulates phase and amplitude of the carrier, not only one. It's a two variable system.
The reason many applications use simplistic modulation techniques which do not take full advantage of the available spectrum is the cost of the equipment. If radios had cost 3 times as much back in the 1940s simply because they decided to use FM instead of AM, radio would not have caught on as quickly. It's an economic reason, not technological. In real life, it usually is.
All indications I saw said that radio simply converts the radio waves into voltage so the entire signal can be broken down into a function of voltage as a function of time.
And everything our computers can do can be reduced to ones and zeroes. What is your point here?
There is the underlying frequency of the photons used and the frequency of the signal.
Yes, these are the carrier frequency and the modulating signal's frequency, respectively. The signal modulates the carrier in a well-defined way so that the source signal is "carried" on the transmitted frequency (ie. it's encoded in the carrier). The receiver can then decode the received transmission, and extract the original signal.
The closest analogy I can come up with on the spot would be PPPoE. PPP packets are encoded in ethernet frames, then decoded at the recipient. Any type of "tunneling"-like network protocols are similar analogies.
Perhaps your question is: why transmit on a carrier signal at all? ie. why tunnel the signal? That's a long and complicated question, but there are good reasons for it. If you're interested, read up more on signals and radio.
However, it would appear that theoretically you could generate a radio signal by specifying a unique intensity at each time and photon frequency.
What do you mean by "intensity". What you just described sounds exactly like Amplitude Modulation, which is one of the simplest transmission schemes. Unless you're suggesting we do not modulate the signal at all.