"DON'T PANIC" and other important information (NEWBIE-FRIENDLY)

[EarthBound]

Originally Posted by Valandil

Is that an egocentric statement though? Just because "WE're gone" doesnt mean there's nothing... or no-one, left to do the conceptualizing now, does it...???

Excellent point. There could be many different types of beings outside of ourselves, or inside!!!!!!!!!!!! Perhaps the only thing standing in the way of complete Earth-hostile-takeover is the host body drinking beer!!!! I choose to believe this is likely. Then again, I choose to fart in public and this has proven to be a "social" retreat of some sorts........I"M ONLY KIDDING!!!!

Los Gaseous......I fart alone.......

[azalea]

Ah, I see, there hasn't been a distinction made here between reality and existance. Reality = conceptual; Existance = factual. What do you think?

Now about the color orange: pigment exists, and when light shines on things of a certain pigment, all colors save one are absorbed (this is about as scientific as I get --forgive my vocabulary). The color is there whether it is perceived or not. Just because my eyes happen to see it doesn't mean it isn't there!

(Say what?)


Anyway, for all I know there might be other properties that I can't perceive, and I fully accept the possibility that they may exist.

It seems we have two camps, the realists and non-realists. The Somethings and the Nothings.

[Starr Polish]

But how do we come to the knowledge of facts? Through our perceptions. THus, we are still perceving the things we see as factual. So, in that case, existance is still conceptual.

And pigment looks different to different creatures, so that argument doesn't really stand. Color is not a property of an object, it's only there because of the perception.

And anyway...how can we know that what orange looks like to me is the same as what orange looks like to you?

[BeardofPants]

Reality is all subjective anyway. ::shrug::

[azalea]

But I don't see how you can argue the fact that we exist. We are here in a real physical place. The sun is a REAL thing. It existed before any humans. It gave off light and for those who believe in evolution, animals developed eyes because of the light given off by the sun. It's not the other way around. Light DOES exist. Light is made up of color. It's not us "making up" light, it's that our eyes that allow us to see the colors that are important for us to see. But even if no animals had ever existed, the sun would still be giving off light, and the light would still be made the same way. Just because no living thing was experiencing it doesn't mean it wasn't there. It was! We have to exist to see it, label it, talk about it, and find out more about it, but none of those things is a prerequisite for existance, right?
Existance isn't a concept, it's pure fact. Knowing it is a fact has nothing to do with it, IMO.
BTW, I do understand what you mean by the concept of orange being subjective. Maybe we're just talking about two different things.

[Rían]

*cheers for azalea* Well said!

[Rían]

Originally Posted by BeardofPants

Reality is all subjective anyway. ::shrug::

No, it's not ::unshrug::

Originally Posted by IRex

how can you have a concept if there is nothing to conceptualize it?

Originally Posted by Val

Is that an egocentric statement though? Just because "WE're gone" doesnt mean there's nothing... or no-one, left to do the conceptualizing now, does it...???

Score one for Val! IRex slipped ... (it's hard to maintain the falsehood that humans aren't special, isn't it?! )

[Rían]

Originally Posted by brownjenkins

this is true to an extent... though "electromagnetism", "waves" and "frequencies" are all human theories that attempt to explain the properties of light

No, they're descriptions of a real thing. The names don't matter - you could call it Zappy, Wayway and Fifi, and still, Wayway would equal the reciprocal of Fifi, because that's how Zappy really is.

*needs to go take a long walk...*

the "electromagnetic wave of a certain" frequency may still exist... the color "orange", only as long as some humans do... it is just a label for a common perception of that frequency... to one who is colorblind that perception might not even exist, at least from their point of view... which is all that really matters

I had a friend who was an electrical engineer who was colorblind. You know how the little resistor-thingies are color-coded with different color bands? Even tho he couldn't tell red bands apart from green, those colors still existed, and he had to have someone sort them for him, or else his project would go boom ...

[Insidious Rex]

Originally Posted by RÃ*an

Score one for Val! IRex slipped ...

slipped? score one for biased referees you mean that choose to ignore my responses. where are the agnostic cheerleaders anyway?

(it's hard to maintain the falsehood that humans aren't special, isn't it?! )

hey i just lay it out there. perhaps its hard to deal with the insecurity that we arent.

[Rían]

Yes, slipped! Maybe you didn't mean to say it, but your wording sure looked like you assumed people were somehow "more specialer" than other beings! You fixed it after Val noticed it

Oh IRex, c'mon, you know you guys get cheered more often than my side does! So you slippped and then fixed it - so what? Your fix is noted, and I hope you can take a little ribbing. And I'll cheer for you Rah rah for IRex! Go Rexy!

[Grey_Wolf]

Here's a couple of truths.

Light cannot be seen when there is nothing to reflect it.

Sound cannot be heard when there is nothing to receive it.

[Starr Polish]

Obviously light existed before humans. Brightness, however, did not. Brightness is a sensation created by the brain.

[inked]

Originally Posted by Grey_Wolf

Here's a couple of truths.

Light cannot be seen when there is nothing to reflect it.

Sound cannot be heard when there is nothing to receive it.

Ahh, but Grey Wolf, you err!

Light has been existent since the conditions in the big bang stopped being opaque to light transmission in the visible range (witness the Hubble Space Telescope Data) and electromagnetic wavelengths other than light likewise (witness Chandra X-ray Observatory and the Spitzer Infrared Observatory).
In all the billions of years of travel these electromagnetic waves have existed.
So whether seen or not depends on the receptor. (I love to quibble so I will note that reflected light is in fact not seen or received because it is reflected .)

And if you have read SCIENCE NEWS lately or ASTRONOMY or SKY&TELESCOPE, you will have seen major summaries or articles on the existence of sound waves since the big bang conditions permitted! Same set of caveats, too!

Now, if you had meant that unobserved phenomena seem to be nonexistent until appropriate receptors detect them, I agree. But even the great observatories are merely extensions of human detectors (the senses) into realms we normally cannot sense without aids. Sometimes those detections are attributed to incorrect ideas. For instance, the cosmic background microwave radiation was thought to be due to bird poop on the antenna until the correct realization was achieved. Which leads me to my final observation,
.
.
.
.
there's always something to be discovered under the various poops of life !!!

[Grey_Wolf]

Yes, of course, light and sound can be detected with machinery but not by human eyes and ears alone if the light is not reflected from something and the sound isn't in the appropriate range of reception.

[Last Child of Ungoliant]

i think light is a figment of my imagination, or maybe not
i know maniacal-predatory-rabbits are a figment of my
imagination, or they were last time I checked!

[inked]

LCoU,

Those rabbits exist. I know I saw one on Monty Python and the Holy Grail. It even had light and Sound!

[Last Child of Ungoliant]

Originally Posted by inked

LCoU,

Those rabbits exist. I know I saw one on Monty Python and the Holy Grail. It even had light and Sound!

At least i'm not mad, then
BTW, u can call me chrys, everyone else does

[EarthBound]

While I can wax about the depth of the "why" anything exist, I attribute the great quote, "eh, why not?" to Brock, a young dairy farmer from upper NY.

While this is a reduntant thread with "why you believe what you believe" just a few pixels away, you have to admit it has great title....thanks DA!

Here's a thought...what if our universe was created as sort of "super-computer to test theories and such....or it was built more as a 'machine' to ackomplish some task(s), continual or otherwise. Exploring the otherwise, our universe might have been created, used (like a tool), and left to it's own to follow it's pertaining laws and flows. Or perhaps mankind is being grown (as a species with improving technology) not unlike an apple tree.

Just having fun, here.