A Capella Science - Bohemian Gravity!

Professional inquiries: acapellascience [at] snamanagement [dot] com.
Lyrics and arrangement by Tim Blais and A Capella Science
Original music by Queen

Lumpy or Smooth?

What's the nature of Reality: lumpy or smooth?

Concerning the answer to that question, some cosmologists have big toes; some have fat guts.

String theorists get all tied up in knots about it.
M-theorists haven’t got the branes to decide.
Relativists absolutely understand the gravity of the situation.

Light is discreet — she is made of particles, photons. No, Light is continuous — she comes in waves.

Reality is discreet: she keeps her secrets safe.
No, Reality is continuous: she has no gaps or overlaps.

Reality is smoompy, no, smumpy, no, looth.

1927 Solvay International Conference: physicists meet to discuss quantum theory. (back row L to R) A. Piccard, E. Henriot, P. Ehrenfest, E. Herzen, Th. de Donder, E. Schrödinger, J.E. Verschaffelt, W. Pauli, W. Heisenberg, R.H. Fowler, L. Brillouin; P. Debye, M. Knudsen, W.L. Bragg, H.A. Kramers, P.A.M. Dirac, A.H. Compton, L. de Broglie, M. Born, N. Bohr; (Front row) I. Langmuir, M. Planck, M. Skłodowska-Curie, H.A. Lorentz, A. Einstein, P. Langevin, Ch.-E. Guye, C.T.R. Wilson, O.W. Richardson. The only woman is Marie Curie (front, 3rd from left).

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We are all strange loops

In “I am a strange loop” (2007) Douglas Hofstadter proposes that the self -- personal consciousness -- is a pattern. Hofstadter notes that patterns exist at different levels of resolution, ie at different points on a spectrum of granularity, from coarse-grained to fine-grained.

Here’s an example: Jack and Jill are persons who know each other. Per Hofstadter’s idea, the knowledge of Jill in Jack’s mind is as much a valid part of Jill as Jill's physical body is part of Jill. But the knowledge of Jill in Jack’s mind is “low res.” compared with the knowledge of Jill in her own mind. Jill’s actual body and mind are at the highest res available.

Extending the idea: A photograph of Jill is part of Jill. And so too are letters written by Jill, letters written about Jill, clothes worn by Jill, memories of Jill in the minds of her friends: these are all parts of Jill. Every part and aspect of reality touched by Jill in any way, is part of Jill — the “Greater Jill”, the total, aggregated footprint of Jill upon Reality.

Perhaps the most significant difference between the various parts or aspects of Jill is the extent to which each is subject to change. Everything is subject to change, but some things change less than others. A digitized photograph of Jill uploaded to the internet is less subject to change than Jill’s physical body.

What is and what will never be

Animated simulation of gravitational lensing caused by a black hole going past a background galaxy. ... The maximum amplification occurs when the background galaxy ... is exactly behind the black hole. (Wikipedia 14 July 2016)

The Isthmus of Isness protrudes into the Sea
of Serendipitous Stochasticity

Generic lifeforms gambol in the quantum foam
so near yet so far from any kind of home

Indeterminate are those who lack specificity
and disrespect outlying six sigma eccentricity

Estranged the Higgs boson within a dubious ontology
makes many martyrs to a furious phenomenology

White-coated observers collapse the wave function
of many a double-slitted choiceful junction

While a black hole lurks in the depths of a cavity
where nothing escapes the malevolence of a monstrous gravity

Published in AWAREWOLF & OTHER CRHYMES AGAINST HUMANITY for kindle, tablet, smartphone or e-reader. We all hate poetry, right? But we might make an exception for this sick and twisted stuff. This devil's banquet of adults-only offal features more than 50 satanic sonnets, vitriolic verses and odious odes.

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A sharp jab in the I

Demiurge, painting by SRS, oils on canvas, 50.5 x 40.5 cm. In the context of this post, "Where's Wally" would be a better title for this painting, "Wally" being the lost and/or non-existent Self.

According to Heraclitus you can’t step in the same river twice. Why not? Because no river is ever the same; the water is never the same – there’s always new water flowing downstream. (If the water isn’t flowing, it’s not a river). In fact, not only can’t you step in the same river twice, the same you can’t step twice into a river. Why not? Because there is no “you” that stays the same.

Physically, you’re always changing. Your body is never the same. Your blood is always flowing. Your heart is always pumping. Cells die and new cells are born all the time. And living cells are changing all the time: their biochemical processes only stop when the cell dies.

Nor is your mind ever still. New thoughts, ideas, imaginings are constantly emerging then fading away. And if you think you don’t always think, think again: you’re constantly receiving information about the “outside world” via your senses. Even when you’re asleep you’re monitoring internal processes such as breathing as well as external factors such as temperature. Your brain is a perpetual motion machine – neurons are firing all the time, in sleep and in wakefulness, even in coma.

The Binding Opportunity

The so-called "binding problem" of psychologists, neuroscientists, philosophers, metaphysicians and other horse-thieves relates to the proposition that some aspects of reality are processed in some parts of the brain, and other aspects in other parts of the brain. It's believed to be a Problem because the neuromancers cannot explain how datasets from different parts of the brain combine to form an integrated, holistic consciousness--whatever that is.

According to Revonsuo and Newman (1999) the binding problem is "…the problem of how the unity of conscious perception is brought about by the distributed activities of the central nervous system."

For instance, say that Jon sees a red balloon floating across a room. The quality of "redness" is said to be processed in one part of Jon's brain, the shape of the balloon in another, the size in another, and the movement in yet another. Where then, and how, are these qualities or qualia combined to form the unified experience ("red-balloon-floating") in Jon's consciousness?

God is always right

Some people say there’s nothing but Matter
Others say everything is Energy.

Some people say everything is Information
Others say Awareness is everything.

Some people say that Love is all there is
Others say that God is all there is.

God says we’re alright:
Matter is Energy,
Energy is Information,
Information is Awareness,
Awareness is Love.
God is all ways right.

the meaning of meaning

Gaia, Primordial Deity of the Earth, painting by Anselm Feuerbach (1875)

There are distinctions and differences throughout Reality. As humans we have the ability and the desire to identify, categorise and name those distinctions. Which is fine and good and valid. But we must always be aware that the identifications, categorisations and names we create are relative, not absolute.

The various labels we apply to the infinitely rich aspects of Reality are meaningful to us, their creators. But the labels are invented by humans for use by humans in human contexts. "Life" is a particularly mercurial label, difficult to pin down. The meaning of "life" changes over time and varies from brain to brain.

Some people believe the planet Earth is alive and name her Gaia. She satisfies a number of the criteria for life established by mainstream biologists. For example, she practises homeostasis, the maintenance of a dynamic equilibrium that ensures ongoing biological existence. She self-regulates her "metabolism" through the complex interplay of multiple systems and processes including but by no means limited to those associated with climate, ocean chemistry and plate tectonics, for example. In fact the plants and animals and other lifeforms she supports are themselves part of her physiology.

where consciousness lives

A process is a frozen pattern. Consciousness is a process and cannot be found at any material address in this or any other universe or reality. Patterns, on the other hand, can be found at many material addresses, including wool, cotton, polyester and many others in the fabric of reality.

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many mansions

What do we mean by "real"? Is matter more real than energy? Is a tree more real than the idea of a tree? Is the idea of a tree real? Are ideas real? Is a sound more real than a thought? Is actuality more real than possibility?

What is an action? Is an action real? An action is not a physical thing. It is not a thought. Or is it?

Is the idea that there is (are) a god (gods) less real than the fact (assuming it is a fact) of there being a god or gods?

In my father's house (the multiverse/reality) are many mansions: the Mansion of Matter, the Mansion of Mind, the Mansion of Memory, the Mansion of Mystery, to name but a few.

You can find roast chicken in the Mansion of Matter. You can find a recipe for roasting chicken in the Mansion of Mind. You can find molecules in the Mansion of Matter. You can find ways to understand what a molecule is in the Mansion of Mind.

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