Home > Archive > Cobol > April 2006 > Re: US Presidents; an outside view WAS: Any comments? (Evolution - was Answers to Pet
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Re: US Presidents; an outside view WAS: Any comments? (Evolution - was Answers to Pet
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| Pete Dashwood 2006-04-27, 7:55 am |
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"Joseph Katnic" <usrr@post.no.mail> wrote in message
news:260420061808390686%usrr@post.no.mail...
> In article <1146000789.305185.254760@v46g2000cwv.googlegroups.com>,
> Richard <riplin@Azonic.co.nz> wrote:
>
>
> The resources of the universe that we can see are to all practical
> purposes infinite.
Sorry Joe, that is a prety myopic view of the Universe. It is boundless but
not infinite.
>
> All the rest is merely a "failure of the imagination" (stealing from
> A.C. Clarke).
>
Interesting idea, but not sure I can buy it.
Pete.
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| In article <4bbo05FvoqgmU1@individual.net>,
Pete Dashwood <dashwood@enternet.co.nz> wrote:
>
>"Joseph Katnic" <usrr@post.no.mail> wrote in message
>news:260420061808390686%usrr@post.no.mail...
>
>Sorry Joe, that is a prety myopic view of the Universe. It is boundless but
>not infinite.
Gah... Mr Dashwood, language is starting to break down here. 'Boundless'
is, I believe, 'without a boundary'; http://www.m-w.com/boundary shows
'something (as a line, point, or plane) that indicates or fixes a limit or
extent'.
Finite, according to http://www.m-w.com/finite, 1, is 'having definite or
definable limits'... and the 'in-' prefix used shows negation or absence,
'not infinite' = finite.
Given those definitions your statement can be rendered 'the Universe does
not have something (as a line, point, or plane) that indicates or fixes a
limit but it has definite or definable limits'.
How does something have definite or definable limits without anything to
indicate or fix said limits?
DD
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| Oliver Wong 2006-04-27, 6:55 pm |
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<docdwarf@panix.com> wrote in message news:e2qdve$hh4$1@reader1.panix.com...
> In article <4bbo05FvoqgmU1@individual.net>,
> Pete Dashwood <dashwood@enternet.co.nz> wrote:
>
> Gah... Mr Dashwood, language is starting to break down here. 'Boundless'
> is, I believe, 'without a boundary'; http://www.m-w.com/boundary shows
> 'something (as a line, point, or plane) that indicates or fixes a limit or
> extent'.
>
> Finite, according to http://www.m-w.com/finite, 1, is 'having definite or
> definable limits'... and the 'in-' prefix used shows negation or absence,
> 'not infinite' = finite.
>
> Given those definitions your statement can be rendered 'the Universe does
> not have something (as a line, point, or plane) that indicates or fixes a
> limit but it has definite or definable limits'.
>
> How does something have definite or definable limits without anything to
> indicate or fix said limits?
Imagine you're an ant on a ball that is suspended in space. You walk
along the surface of the ball, trying to find the "edge of the universe",
but no matter where you go, you will never find an edge. The surface has no
boundaries. Now let's say you start marking every location you've been to,
by painting the surface there black. After a while, you will have painted
the entire surface of the ball black, thus showing that the ball is
"finite", but "boundless".
Last time I checked (late 90s), the most popular theories were that the
universe was shaped like a hypertorus (i.e. the shape of the universe is to
3D as what a donut is to 2D), which like a sphere, has the properties of
being finite, but boundless.
- Oliver
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| In article <OD44g.813$nq3.721@clgrps12>,
Oliver Wong <owong@castortech.com> wrote:
>
><docdwarf@panix.com> wrote in message news:e2qdve$hh4$1@reader1.panix.com...
>
> Imagine you're an ant on a ball that is suspended in space.
I migh just do that, Mr Wong, when I have the desire to discuss what
conclusions I could come to were I to imagine I am an ant on a ball that
is suspended in space. Right now I'm trying to figure out how, as a human
being sharing almost the same language, Mr Dashwood would want others to
perceive a statement which, by definition(s), appears to violate the
Aristotelean principle of non-contradiction.
[snip]
> Last time I checked (late 90s), the most popular theories were that the
>universe was shaped like a hypertorus (i.e. the shape of the universe is to
>3D as what a donut is to 2D), which like a sphere, has the properties of
>being finite, but boundless.
Monodimensional string theory was popular at one time, as well... I wonder
whatever happened to that (but I don't wonder hard enough to motivate
myself to research it). The hypertorus you describe sounds like some
Lobachevskian constructs with which I might be familiar.
DD
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| Pete Dashwood 2006-04-28, 7:55 am |
|
<docdwarf@panix.com> wrote in message news:e2qdve$hh4$1@reader1.panix.com...
> In article <4bbo05FvoqgmU1@individual.net>,
> Pete Dashwood <dashwood@enternet.co.nz> wrote:
>
> Gah... Mr Dashwood, language is starting to break down here. 'Boundless'
> is, I believe, 'without a boundary'; http://www.m-w.com/boundary shows
> 'something (as a line, point, or plane) that indicates or fixes a limit or
> extent'.
>
> Finite, according to http://www.m-w.com/finite, 1, is 'having definite or
> definable limits'... and the 'in-' prefix used shows negation or absence,
> 'not infinite' = finite.
>
> Given those definitions your statement can be rendered 'the Universe does
> not have something (as a line, point, or plane) that indicates or fixes a
> limit but it has definite or definable limits'.
Exactly.
>
> How does something have definite or definable limits without anything to
> indicate or fix said limits?
>
> DD
>
Consider the Earth (or a balloon or anything else, like the Universe,
roughly spherical)
I can wander in an infinite number of paths on the surface of any such
sphere (or through it, if that is physically possible as it is with the
Universe or, by imagination, the balloon). There is no limit to the paths I
could trace. For every path you can visualise, I can go one step further. An
infinite number of journeys. Yet I cannot move off (or out of) the sphere.
So my infinite journeys are bounded by the sphere. Yet I can go around it as
often as I like, and none of my journeys are physically stopped by the
sphere, hence, it is boundless.
Now apply that model to your statement above.
Pete.
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| In article <4bejanF119no9U4@individual.net>,
Pete Dashwood <dashwood@enternet.co.nz> wrote:
>
><docdwarf@panix.com> wrote in message news:e2qdve$hh4$1@reader1.panix.com...
[snip]
[color=darkred]
>
>Exactly.
Well... glad I got that right.
>Consider the Earth (or a balloon or anything else, like the Universe,
>roughly spherical)
>
>I can wander in an infinite number of paths on the surface of any such
>sphere (or through it, if that is physically possible as it is with the
>Universe or, by imagination, the balloon). There is no limit to the paths I
>could trace.
There is a limit, however, to the space that can be covered, ie the
surface area of the sphere. For it to be otherwise seems to be saying
that to re-trace one's steps over the same ground, constantly, constitutes
a possibility of infinity.
>For every path you can visualise, I can go one step further.
Given that you've postulated my ability to visualise as a boundary... I am
not sure how you are using 'further' here. I visualise a path, starting
at one point, one footstep wide, in a spiral. Where you begin may be
called a 'pole point'; the spiral expands as you approach the 'equator'
(full circumference) and contracts until you reach the opposite 'pole
point'.
When this occurs you have covered the entire surface, there are no more
paths to be described except those which go over areas already covered.
>An
>infinite number of journeys.
An infinite retracing or duplicating of steps (points), perhaps... but a
finite area exists.
>Yet I cannot move off (or out of) the sphere.
>So my infinite journeys are bounded by the sphere.
Only if you limit yourself to the boundary of the surface, Mr Dashwood.
In that it possible to leave the surface your journeys are not bounded.
>Yet I can go around it as
>often as I like, and none of my journeys are physically stopped by the
>sphere, hence, it is boundless.
>
>Now apply that model to your statement above.
I did... and it seems the conclusion that 'if one wishes to repeat
themselves then any area to which one wishes to confine one'sself is
infinite'... but that seems to neglects the metaphysic of choosing to
confine one'sself.
DD
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| Howard Brazee 2006-04-28, 6:55 pm |
| On Fri, 28 Apr 2006 15:55:05 +0000 (UTC), docdwarf@panix.com () wrote:
>There is a limit, however, to the space that can be covered, ie the
>surface area of the sphere. For it to be otherwise seems to be saying
>that to re-trace one's steps over the same ground, constantly, constitutes
>a possibility of infinity.
>
>
>Given that you've postulated my ability to visualise as a boundary... I am
>not sure how you are using 'further' here. I visualise a path, starting
>at one point, one footstep wide, in a spiral. Where you begin may be
>called a 'pole point'; the spiral expands as you approach the 'equator'
>(full circumference) and contracts until you reach the opposite 'pole
>point'.
Consider the difference between your limits and bounds of a jail cell,
where you can vary your pacing path as much as you want.
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