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Will science ever know everything? |
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Chaser 
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Joined: April 18 2018 Location: Nottingham Status: Offline Points: 1202 |
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 Posted: May 12 2019 at 09:57 |
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I'm also not entirely convinced that mathematics can handle the very real possibility of random probability/chance i.e. can a mathematical model accurately predict the outcome of a coin toss? (the inference being that we have at best, a 50% computed chance of predicting this latent reality?) But this concept of probability or chance is simply an illusion. If I roll a normal six sided dice then it is obvious that it is impossible for me to know with certainty what the outcome will be on any one throw. But if there are six parallel universes whereby, in universe #1 the outcome of my roll is 1 In universe #2 the outcome is 2 In universe #3 it is 3, in universe #4 it is 4, in #5 it is 5, and in #6 it is 6. Then we can see that, in fact, all mathematical possibilities are played out and there is no "randomness" or "chance". "Chance" is nothing but an illusion of our own space and time. |
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Vompatti
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Posted: May 12 2019 at 09:47 |
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^ You can know everything about a particle, just not at the same time.
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omphaloskepsis
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Joined: October 19 2011 Location: Texas Status: Online Points: 6343 |
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Posted: May 12 2019 at 07:22 |
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Heisenberg's Uncertainty Principle states, "The more precisely the position of some particle is determined, the less precisely its momentum can be known, and vice versa."
Therefore, you can't know everything about a particle. Since, the material world is made up of particles, ergo we can't know everything about the materials populating space. We attempt to bridge the uncertainty gap with probabilities, which measure the likelihood that an event will occur. Instead of particle position and momentum, Heisenberg's uncertainty principle can also be expressed in terms of energy and time. Again, the more constrained one variable is, the less constrained the other is. The fact that we know, that we can't know everything about everything, is not the same thing, as knowing everything. Edited by omphaloskepsis - May 12 2019 at 08:19 |
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ExittheLemming
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Joined: October 19 2007 Location: Penal Colony Status: Offline Points: 11415 |
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Posted: May 12 2019 at 07:16 |
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I don't pretend to know enough about mathematics to flatly contradict any of that (I sucked at math in school)
 but I would speculate we can only model external reality in this manner e.g. infinite divisibility is a concept compliant with math theory but not replicable in reality where quantisation appears to hold sway. I'm also not entirely convinced that mathematics can handle the very real possibility of random probability/chance i.e. can a mathematical model accurately predict the outcome of a coin toss? (the inference being that we have at best, a 50% computed chance of predicting this latent reality?) |
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Chaser
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Joined: April 18 2018 Location: Nottingham Status: Offline Points: 1202 |
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Posted: May 12 2019 at 06:00 |
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I agree that the physical world contains extreme diversity, but I don't understand how this restricts mathematics or makes that diversity not fully quantifiable. No two snowflakes in nature are exactly alike, but that doesn't stop us creating mathematical algorithms to replicate nature and generate mathematically unique snowflakes each time we generate them on a computer. I think that, in the world that we inhabit, mathematics is the closest thing we have to demonstrable truth. The universe is highly complex and diverse, and yet we can use mathematics to land a tiny space probe on an asteroid billions of miles from earth moving at high velocity, using only mathematical calculations. Everything I do today will be governed by mathematics, with billions of calculations taking place inside my brain, even though I am not aware of them. Everything in my life is determined by mathematics, from my birth to my eventual death, and this is true for the whole universe and all other possible universes. If there is an ultimate truth then it is mathematics, although, for the reasons I gave, I do not think that humanity will ever be in possession of total knowledge of all things.
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ExittheLemming
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Posted: May 12 2019 at 03:10 |
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You seem to hold that mathematics is the source of demonstrable truth. I've always believed that mathematics can only approximate reality as no two things in the world have exactly identical properties in every quantifiable respect i.e. x ≠ y. The requirement of 'being outside everything' is just another way of saying that complete objectivity is impossible when you cannot separate the knower from the known etc
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Tillerman88
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Joined: October 31 2015 Location: Tomorrowland Status: Offline Points: 495 |
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Posted: May 11 2019 at 20:18 |
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Oh come on..... the aforementioned sense of knowing everything is such a darn fallacy, since the dualization (everything vs nothing) implies a static state of knowledge that exists only in our imagination. Our world is dynamic, as well as the laws of nature. And as such, our knowledge will always change over time.
. Edited by Tillerman88 - May 11 2019 at 20:19 |
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The overwhelming amount of information on a daily basis restrains people from rewinding the news record archives to refresh their memories...
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Vompatti
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Posted: May 11 2019 at 20:15 |
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Polymorphia
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Posted: May 11 2019 at 19:09 |
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Chaser
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Joined: April 18 2018 Location: Nottingham Status: Offline Points: 1202 |
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Posted: May 11 2019 at 18:00 |
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Well, it depends whether it is mathematically possible for us to know everything that there is to know.
If it is mathematically possible, then, in a multiverse of infinite universes in which every mathematical possibility is played out somewhere, then there will be a universe where we (or the "we" that exists in that universe) does know everything that there is to know. If it is not mathematically possible then it cannot exist in any universe and so the answer will be "no" it is not possible to know all that there is to know. I suspect that it is not mathematically possible to know everything that there is to know because, to do so, one would have to be outside of everything and, as we are a part of everything, we can never be outside of everything. Incidentally, in a world where everything was known, your suicide would also be known in advance of it happening, and would, therefore, almost certainly be prevented.
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twseel
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Posted: May 11 2019 at 14:54 |
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Vompatti
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Posted: May 11 2019 at 12:11 |
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^ Well, what I'm mostly wondering is what would be the conditions for knowing that you know everything.
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dr wu23
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Posted: May 11 2019 at 12:04 |
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^ LOL.......sounds like you are either a lawyer or politician...or both.
No...imho there will always be something we cannot fathom....since we are finite beings.
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One does nothing yet nothing is left undone.
Haquin |
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Vompatti
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Posted: May 11 2019 at 11:35 |
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Depends on what you mean by science and what you mean by thing.
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BaldFriede
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Joined: June 02 2005 Location: Germany Status: Offline Points: 10261 |
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Posted: May 11 2019 at 11:08 |
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I am currently having a discussion with a YouTube poster who made a
video called "4 Gaps Evolution Will Never Explain... EXPLAINED"! Here a
link to this video: In
this video the guy utters the statement that science will one day know
everything, something which I (and most leading scientists) most
definitely don't believe. I posted this comment in reply to his video: Your belief that one day scientists will know everything is not shared
by scientists themselves. The reason is that with every scientific
explanation new scientific questions come up. I highly recommend the
book "Why Aren't Black Holes Black?" by Robert M. Hazen and Maxine
Singer. In this book 14 central questions of current science are being
tackled, like for example "Perfect Symmetry: Can We Devise a Theory of
Everything?" or "Fate: Will the Universe End"? And yes, one question is
"Evolution: How Did Life On Earth Become so Varied"? Mark that this
chapter is not questioning evolution at all, it just points out that we
are still far from fully understanding evolution. The book has a foreword by Stephen J. Gould, one of the leading
scientists in the field of evolution. He takes his time to explain why
science is the endless frontier and brings up an analogy by Blaise
Pascal, who compared our knowledge with a sphere. The bigger the sphere
(our knowledge) gets the bigger the surface (our contact with the
unknown) gets. Anyone who believes that we are close to knowing everything and reads
this book with an open mind will wind up in a much more humbled state. He answered with this comment: Well, I may have mislead my position, can you provide the timestamp.
There is a point at which everything can be discovered, or at least
everything that exists within our reach. Now we(i use we as in the
scientific community) will most likely never even know what the body of
"everything" even entails. So my stance is more better explained that as
we know everything that we think there is a possibility to know, we
will find that are just more questions for us to explore and discover. I
hope I clarified my position a bit better. Thanks for the insightful
comment. To which I replied this: No, there is no such time. You really should read the book I recommended. You seem to think that more and more scientific problems are being
solved, probably supported by the press which sometimes comes up with statements like that, and
that since there is a finite number of problems one day all will be
solved.
What you apparently don't understand is that our lack of knowledge is
like the mythological Hydra: With every head being chopped off two new
heads are being formed (with every scientific problem solved at least
two new scientific problems arise). This goes as far as evolution, which non-scientists who are not
creationists believe to be a completely solved issue (and most of the
videos published against the stupidity of anti-evolutionists certainly
help in forming this false belief). However, while no serious scientist
doubts the existence of evolution we are still far from fully
understanding it. I did not even mention
the philosophical implications of such a universal knowledge. A world in
which we knew everything would be totally boring; I would immediately
commit suicide in it. Luckily we will never achieve such universal
knowledge. |
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ExittheLemming wrote: