Earth-like exoplanet discovered around Proxima Centauri

[SelfSim]

I would say that 'humans are a reality construct'. We don't make the universe, the universe makes us.

And you are welcome to hold that belief.

If that is not the case, then who am I communicating with now? Phantoms?

(My underline).

It may or may not be 'the case'. But what we can say, in science, is that all we can ever mean by what is 'the universe', or what are 'humans', without ceasing to be scientific, is that what we mean by these terms, is always nothing more than our current best tested models for them.

Oh, and I can verify that I am one of many 'humans' and that there is a current, best tested model for 'the universe'. Sometimes the 'reality' you mention, is a model used in a shorthand sense for convenience and expediency purposes. It is still a model held in mind though, (and there is plenty of evidence for that, too - all you have to do is look).
In terms of your 'reality' existing completely independently from our minds, well, there is zip evidence for that until someone can come up with a test which doesn't involve minds and the models they create for making sense of what we perceive.

 

[Belz...]

Then cite the test (and its results) which will conclusively demonstrate that 'reality is definitely not a human construct'

For someone who keep talking about philosophy you sure are uninitiated in it. Apparently you've missed the last couple of centuries on that topic. Better read up, then.

 

[SelfSim]

For someone who keep talking about philosophy you sure are uninitiated in it. Apparently you've missed the last couple of centuries on that topic. Better read up, then.

Is that your best shot at your assigned task?:

Please cite the test (and its results) which will conclusively demonstrate that 'reality is definitely not a human construct' .. instead of just re-asserting the claim, over and over!?

And while you're doing that, I will observe signs of your mind in action (that will be my test of my claim).

(Come on .. show us what you've got!)

 

[smartcooky]

No offence intended towards smartcooky or other skilled ham operators .. but coming at such an analysis from a ham perspective doesn't convince me that the nuances of Earth's RF spectrum, when viewed from relevant distances, constitutes a distinguishable bio-sign of Intelligence.

None taken, and the story I related wasn't mean to do anything but entertain. I merely related to show as an example that a couple of tinkerers could set up a "Rough Science" type experiment and easily communicate across a distance with a couple of old mass produced TV dishes using the tiniest fraction of a microwatt.

 

[SelfSim]

None taken, and the story I related wasn't mean to do anything but entertain. I merely related to show as an example that a couple of tinkerers could set up a "Rough Science" type experiment and easily communicate across a distance with a couple of old mass produced TV dishes using the tiniest fraction of a microwatt.

Right .. and I was about to get more into it before 'other matters' got raised.

I look forward to Jean Tate's response on Earth's uncorrelated wideband transmissions, and its detection from an ETI's vantage point.

 

[Belz...]

Is that your best shot at your assigned task?:

You must have me confused with someone who cares about you delusions about reality and philosophy. I assure you, I am not. You know full well that reality is objective and not a construct, and here's my evidence: you are still alive, and therefore you eat and otherwise act to avoid pain and death because you know they are real.

 

[JeanTate]

Right .. and I was about to get more into it before 'other matters' got raised.

I look forward to Jean Tate's response on Earth's uncorrelated wideband transmissions, and its detection from an ETI's vantage point.

Just quickly (all I have time for now)

A look at a chart of the allocations of radio frequency will show that it's sliced up into lots of pieces (this WP has a visual for the US; no doubt it's similar for the ITU etc).

The total power emitted in any slice is, obviously, an integration over all the transmitters operating in that slice. Some fraction will not escape to space; and some fraction of that will be in a relatively small solid angle (e.g. TV, which broadcasts ~towards the horizon). Viewed from afar, with a wideband receiver (such as found on many a radio astronomer's telescope), and assuming a favorable viewing angle, that slice (band) will stand out as a strong source, compared with a neighboring one where the integrated radio emission is much lower (or broadcast over a wider solid angle).

As explained in the Sullivan paper, the detected signal will be variable, because the transmitters are not spaced evenly across the globe (and for other reasons too).

Details, of course, matter.

Re the SETI/SKA paper you cited: I found it was published in 2004, so no wonder it looked a bit odd. Also, it does not cite any SKA source (certainly not re the '2 OOM' improvement over then current radio astronomy facilities). I don't quite get why she doesn't quote/use a number in Jy. In any case, it's a bit misleading ... it refers more to a coverage/depth/resolution (i.e. how much of the sky is observed vs how sensitive/how faint is the faintest source detected/what's the angular resolution) question than a purely depth one. "Radio Continuum Surveys with Square Kilometre Array Pathfinders" (Norris+ 2012 PDF link) gives some idea of how this works, from a radio astronomer's perspective.

 

[SelfSim]

You must have me confused with someone who cares about you delusions about reality and philosophy. I assure you, I am not.

Ok, point taken ... A genuine 'thank you', for rising to the occasion.
(Apologies for any unnecessary 'pressure' on my part).

... reality is objective and not a construct, and here's my evidence: you are still alive, and therefore you eat and otherwise act to avoid pain and death because you know they are real.

I certainly experience sensations which my mind associates with what we mean by pain and hunger - yes. So, you are telling me that the fact I am still alive is because these sensations are real to me (and motivate me)? Yes. I agree with that ... they are real to me. In the moment I experience pain or hunger, are my sensations experienced by anyone else? Well, 'no', not exactly .. why? Because they are my individual sensations of pain and hunger .. and no-one else's. Therefore the reality of those sensations must be limited to me when I experience them. If I don't communicate them with someone else, then they wouldn't have a clue I was experiencing them. Therefore the way I related to those sensations must have made them real to me when I alone, experienced them. When I communicate them to others, using the usual meanings of 'pain' and 'hunger', they also relate to those words and 'get' my meaning. So there must be some kind of consensus reality there, too. And why not, after all, we all use our minds to communicate, don't we?

So, are these sensations objectively real? I use the term 'Objective Reality', (OR), to denote science's reality. The 'objective' term signifies that science's objective testing process was used. In science, OR means how our minds make sense of objective perceptions. Were my sensations of 'hunger' and 'pain' objective when I experienced them? No. What about when I described them to, (ok .. wrote them down for), someone else? Yes. How about when I don't eat for months on end? Are there any scientific tests that can be conducted which can verify the presence of pain and hunger? Yes .. (ie: a simple question .. weight .. vital signs, etc).

Similarly, science has objective tests for death. Can we, as individuals, experience death? Sure can, (but we obviously haven't yet). Can others experience death? Of course. Can we describe death, (using communications or shared word meanings)? Absolutely. 'Pain', 'hunger' and 'death' are also all models developed by minds and those models described in the meanings of words become how we create our sense of reality.

Ok, so we have observational evidence here of an individual reality (mind dependent), a consensus reality (also mind dependent - includes other minds) and science's Objective Reality (requires mind to define models with terms, etc and execute objective tests).

But where is the evidence of some mind independent reality here? I can't see any. The only thing we can observe going on here, is a bunch of minds creating a bunch of models, communicating them, and putting them to science's tests.

 

[Belz...]

I certainly experience sensations which my mind associates with what we mean by pain and hunger - yes. So, you are telling me that the fact I am still alive is because these sensations are real to me (and motivate me)? Yes. I agree with that ... they are real to me. In the moment I experience pain or hunger, are my sensations experienced by anyone else? Well, 'no', not exactly .. why? Because they are my individual sensations of pain and hunger .. and no-one else's.

And yet you treat other people as if they exist and as if they have these sensations also. I think you find the idea that reality is objective to be compelling, just as I do.

Therefore the reality of those sensations must be limited to me when I experience them.

Sensations can be detected by instruments. They are not subjective.

But where is the evidence of some mind independent reality here? I can't see any.

Solipsism is a defunct philosophical position precisely because the existence of the objective is evident, and because solipsism doesn't offer any solution or suggests any course of action.

Consider this: aside from what we consider to be objective reality, every single "reality", be it dreams, hallucinations, musings, works of fiction, etc. that we know to be untrue lack a characteristic that objective reality has: consistency. That is the one distinction between what we know to be false and what we think is true. I think that's a very compelling argument in favour of an independant, objective reality, but it isn't the only one.

 

[Craig B]

And yet you treat other people as if they exist and as if they have these sensations also. I think you find the idea that reality is objective to be compelling, just as I do.

Sensations can be detected by instruments. They are not subjective.

Solipsism is a defunct philosophical position precisely because the existence of the objective is evident, and because solipsism doesn't offer any solution or suggests any course of action.

Consider this: aside from what we consider to be objective reality, every single "reality", be it dreams, hallucinations, musings, works of fiction, etc. that we know to be untrue lack a characteristic that objective reality has: consistency. That is the one distinction between what we know to be false and what we think is true. I think that's a very compelling argument in favour of an independant, objective reality, but it isn't the only one.

Idealism of this sort cannot be refuted as noted by James Boswell.

After we came out of the church, we stood talking for some time together of Bishop Berkeley’s ingenious sophistry to prove the non-existence of matter, and that every thing in the universe is merely ideal. I observed, that though we are satisfied his doctrine is not true, it is impossible to refute it.​

Samuel Johnson's attempted refutation implicitly appeals to your "consistency" principle, and is thus not without merit; but it isn't conclusive.

I never shall forget the alacrity with which Johnson answered, striking his foot with mighty force against a large stone, till he rebounded from it, ‘I refute it thus.’​

 

[Belz...]

Idealism of this sort cannot be refuted as noted by James Boswell.

Not conclusively, but there are very good arguments against it. Furthermore, since solipsism is useless, even if it were true, it would still not be a philosophy to follow.

 

[SelfSim]

Just quickly (all I have time for now)

A look at a chart of the allocations of radio frequency will show that it's sliced up into lots of pieces (this WP has a visual for the US; no doubt it's similar for the ITU etc).

The total power emitted in any slice is, obviously, an integration over all the transmitters operating in that slice. Some fraction will not escape to space; and some fraction of that will be in a relatively small solid angle (e.g. TV, which broadcasts ~towards the horizon). Viewed from afar, with a wideband receiver (such as found on many a radio astronomer's telescope), and assuming a favorable viewing angle, that slice (band) will stand out as a strong source, compared with a neighboring one where the integrated radio emission is much lower (or broadcast over a wider solid angle).

As explained in the Sullivan paper, the detected signal will be variable, because the transmitters are not spaced evenly across the globe (and for other reasons too).

Details, of course, matter.

Haven't had time to read (and consime) it yet ... but I will over the next couple of days.

Re the SETI/SKA paper you cited: I found it was published in 2004, so no wonder it looked a bit odd.

Yes I did an ETA on post #156 saying the same .. the figure needs updating. It'd be interesting to see whether her prediction was good(?)

... I don't quite get why she doesn't quote/use a number in Jy. In any case, it's a bit misleading ... it refers more to a coverage/depth/resolution (i.e. how much of the sky is observed vs how sensitive/how faint is the faintest source detected/what's the angular resolution) question than a purely depth one.

What I do know is that the Jansky is a unit of flux density used for natural continuum emissions. Since continuum sources are extremely broadband, quantifying their bandwidth is difficult. The assumption is usually that they are broader than the detector bandwidth and therefore the energy is pretty well uniform across the receiver bandwidth. The total power therefore will increase with wider receiver bandwidth. This is where the Watts/m² of the collector area enters as the relevant measurement. That power measurement then gets divided by the bandwidth of the receiver, in Hertz to give the flux density in Watts per square meter per Hertz. (This gets divided by 10²⁶ to adjust for the resulting scale. This then becomes the Jansky.

(Sorry for all that .. I'm sure you already know this but its important to restate it for the next step).

The above only makes sense if the signal is spectrally broad, (ie: so that the recovered power can be assumed to be uniformly distributed across the receiver's detector bandwidth). This is valid for for continuum sources, but it isn't for the kinds of narrow-band signals being sort by SETI artificial alien technology producing sources. SETI achieves their sensitivity through digital signal processing, which makes the instantaneous channel bandwidth (ie: the bin width) very narrow, thus shutting out much of the broadband background noise. That works if the assumption is that the signal they're setting out to detect is also very narrow (and therefore by definition, it also doesn't have a uniform power distribution across the channel). I think that assumption and technique, makes the Jansky a meaningless unit for SETI narrowband signal detection(?)

The Jansky is fine for characterizing the sensitivity of radio telescopes searching the continuum for natural signals .. but it is rendered by the above assumption as an inappropriate unit of measure for classifying the sensitivity of a SETI receiver. This is why, I think(?), they opt to classify receiver sensitivity in Watts per square meter.

"Radio Continuum Surveys with Square Kilometre Array Pathfinders" (Norris+ 2012 PDF link) gives some idea of how this works, from a radio astronomer's perspective.

Ok .. will have a look when I get the chance.
Cheers

 

[SelfSim]

Oh, Jean Tate:

If we agree on the reasoning in my post #172, then perhaps too, we can then also notice exactly how the SETI assumption (ie: ETIs sending out narrowband recongisable signals), affects their ability to 'see' what there is to be seen from their scopes?

If we can agree on that reasoning, then perhaps too, you can also see my overall point about how assumed posits influence our perceptions (ie: the other simultaneous OT sub-conversation)?

(That would be very cool if we could achieve that).

 

[SelfSim]

And yet you treat other people as if they exist and as if they have these sensations also. I think you find the idea that reality is objective to be compelling, just as I do.

So that depends on what we all mean by 'exist' and what you meaning by 'objective'. Of course I treat other people as existing! I perceive them as patterns with my sensory functions, I recognise those patterns from past experience and learning, my mind then also relates those recognised patterns to a meaning I acquired since early childhood denoted by the word 'people'.

So I gave you my meaning of 'Objective Reality (OR)' (its determined by using the scientific process). What's yours?

Sensations can be detected by instruments. They are not subjective.

Well those instruments were designed by 'subjective' human minds also, no?
And they were designed to produce consistent results, which also trace back to the scientific process having been followed, (thus endowing them with that particular quality). All of the above things required minds to produced these accomplishments.

The mind's fingerprints are all over this one!

Solipsism is a defunct philosophical position precisely because the existence of the objective is evident, and because solipsism doesn't offer any solution or suggests any course of action.

Which is why the viewpoint is not Solipism. The perspective has been specifically designed to be useful (with rather surprising results which, themselves, are highly noteworthy and useful in communications, and in thinking scientifically).

I have pointed out on numerous occasions throughout this thread (see post #146) and others:

But it does indeed correspond to the solipsistic idea that the world is generated by the mind,

Which is not what I'm saying .. We generate the meaning of 'world' and 'mind' (for example). Do you see that this is fundamentally different from saying 'that the world is generated by the mind'?
...
Let me help: I certainly don't think we can know ourselves!

The above are the tools for distinguishing Solipism from the perspective I'm presenting. Its up to your as to whether your use them or not, but it cannot be said that I'm presenting solipism when I, myself, have provided the distinctions!
You actually have to look, (and read), to see them, though. (Selective blindness is a terrible thang, no?)

Consider this: aside from what we consider to be objective reality, every single "reality", be it dreams, hallucinations, musings, works of fiction, etc. that we know to be untrue lack a characteristic that objective reality has: consistency. That is the one distinction between what we know to be false and what we think is true. I think that's a very compelling argument in favour of an independant, objective reality, but it isn't the only one.

Notice my underlines .. they are all evidence that you used your mind to produce the concepts behind what you just wrote .. again, the mind's fingerprints!

So, 'yes' .. I agree that there is a remarkable consistency there ... (and I can relate to what you're saying because I'm using my mind, my senses and your meanings, to do that). However, different minds also associate different meanings to what they perceive, and a vastly different mind will come up with a vastly different meaning (non-English speaking folk, mental patients, strictly religious folk, etc). No problems here ... consistency can also come from our largely shared physiology and language, and is not necessarily evidence ('compelling' or otherwise), of some mind independent reality existing 'out there'.

 

[JeanTate]

Oh, Jean Tate:

If we agree on the reasoning in my post #172, then perhaps too, we can then also notice exactly how the SETI assumption (ie: ETIs sending out narrowband recongisable signals), affects their ability to 'see' what there is to be seen from their scopes?

If we can agree on that reasoning, then perhaps too, you can also see my overall point about how assumed posits influence our perceptions (ie: the other simultaneous OT sub-conversation)?

(That would be very cool if we could achieve that).

Umm, no.

We are, IMHO, largely talking past each other.

When I get a chance, maybe some time in the next few days, I'll try to write at some length. For now, radio astronomers observe lines (and bands). In fact if you look at the frequencies reserved for radio astronomy, you'll see quite a few are around things like the 21cm H line.

 

[SelfSim]

Umm, no.

We are, IMHO, largely talking past each other.

When I get a chance, maybe some time in the next few days, I'll try to write at some length. For now, radio astronomers observe lines (and bands). In fact if you look at the frequencies reserved for radio astronomy, you'll see quite a few are around things like the 21cm H line.

Ok then ... I took my best shot on it .. the question still lingers and I'd certainly like to get to the bottom of it ... I look forward to your post.
Cheers

 

[SelfSim]

Idealism of this sort cannot be refuted as noted by James Boswell.

After we came out of the church, we stood talking for some time together of Bishop Berkeley’s ingenious sophistry to prove the non-existence of matter, and that every thing in the universe is merely ideal. I observed, that though we are satisfied his doctrine is not true, it is impossible to refute it.​

Samuel Johnson's attempted refutation implicitly appeals to your "consistency" principle, and is thus not without merit; but it isn't conclusive.

I never shall forget the alacrity with which Johnson answered, striking his foot with mighty force against a large stone, till he rebounded from it, ‘I refute it thus.’​

This is an important issue because it asks the question of: 'what is the scientific basis of the perspective I have presented?' Well, I haven't had the chance yet to properly frame the hypothesis under test, (right here). The perspective I've presented, is really two separate things, neither of which is conventional philosophy because they are both intended to be tested scientifically, and thus can be judged separately on their own evidential merits. When I get the chance, I'd be happy to reframe it as a scientific hypothesis, although as we can see, this is going to be a very drawn out sub-conversation, and folk may have noticed we are also trying to wrangle with another more-relevant-to-the-OP-topic issue(!?)

 

[Fudbucker]

Hello there.

Could I introduce you to string theory?

"Is string theory science? Physicists and cosmologists have been debating the question for the past decade. Now the community is looking to philosophy for help."
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/is-string-theory-science/

 

[Belz...]

So that depends on what we all mean by 'exist' and what you meaning by 'objective'.

No. Again: you treat them as if they are independant of your thoughts. You believe they are objective.

Well those instruments were designed by 'subjective' human minds also, no?

No.

And they were designed to produce consistent results

Which would be impossible if reality was subjective.

The mind's fingerprints are all over this one!

No, I've explained this to you already.

Which is why the viewpoint is not Solipism.

"The world is an illusion and only I exist" is solipsism, bub.

The perspective has been specifically designed to be useful

OK, how is it useful? How would this philosophy allow you to solve problems or situations, or determine a course of action, if reality's an illusion?

Notice my underlines .. they are all evidence that you used your mind to produce the concepts behind what you just wrote ..

No. They are evidence that I perceive objective reality.

However, different minds also associate different meanings to what they perceive, and a vastly different mind will come up with a vastly different meaning

And yet the thing being observed is the same. You can't use interpretation to disimss that because it's irrelevant.

 

[Brainache]

If the Universe has no existence outside of human observers, where did all the Humans come from?