The meaning of life is to populate the universe • Hacker News Board

Re: The meaning of life is to populate the universe

#21

Post by vl » Sat, Aug 21, 2010, 9:59 AM UTC

Locke1689 wrote: post #17

vl wrote: post #14

One thing that I don't get is what was before and what is the source of Big Bang. So Big Bang, boom, expansion, star/planet formation, red shift, evolution, selfish gene, humans - I get. But where did the Big Bang came from? Fluctuation from nothingness? Why? From something else? Why? Something existed before and produced the Big Bang? Where this thing that existed before came from then? Doesn't make any sense.

This may be a meaningless question. If the very moments of creation of the universe are indeed the moments of creation of spacetime, what does "before" mean? Moreover, if the universe is "existence," how could we begin to perceive, imagine, or study existence without existence?

>how could we begin to perceive, imagine, or study existence without existence?

Through the deduction and reasoning. We don't exactly perceive sub-atomic and many galactic processes, but just infer their existence from some or other observation. Presumably "existence" is not entirely detached from "outside".

Re: The meaning of life is to populate the universe

#22

Post by [deleted] » Sat, Aug 21, 2010, 10:08 AM UTC

zackattack wrote: post #6

zeynel1 wrote: post #4

--this is the meaning of life - there is no other-- he must be a happy person - he found the meaning of life - and he knows that there is no other either he is a total --fool-- or he knows something that we do not know

I think all "meaning" is constructed. The human brain itself is a meaning-making machine. He's stated a preference.

[deleted]

Re: The meaning of life is to populate the universe

#23

Post by Locke1689 » Sat, Aug 21, 2010, 10:20 AM UTC

vl wrote: post #21

Locke1689 wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This may be a meaningless question. If the very moments of creation of the universe are indeed the moments of creation of spacetime, what does "before" mean? Moreover, if the universe is "existence," how could we begin to perceive, imagine, or study existence without existence?

>how could we begin to perceive, imagine, or study existence without existence? Through the deduction and reasoning. We don't exactly perceive sub-atomic and many galactic processes, but just infer their existence from some or other observation. Presumably "existence" is not entirely detached from "outside".

Yes but if the universe is everything that we perceive as physical, that is the material world, how could we possibly seek to examine the nonphysical world through the physical?

Consider, even reason itself is based on the rules and inherent properties of our physical universe. How can you examine a system which may not even have "reason"? Hell, our "physically" limited brains may not fundamentally be capable of comprehending such a system.

In essence, you may as well try to describe the nature of the supersensible using the sensible. It just doesn't make sense.

Re: The meaning of life is to populate the universe

#24

Post by vl » Sat, Aug 21, 2010, 10:24 AM UTC

photon_off wrote: post #16

vl wrote: post #14

One thing that I don't get is what was before and what is the source of Big Bang. So Big Bang, boom, expansion, star/planet formation, red shift, evolution, selfish gene, humans - I get. But where did the Big Bang came from? Fluctuation from nothingness? Why? From something else? Why? Something existed before and produced the Big Bang? Where this thing that existed before came from then? Doesn't make any sense.

I suggest directing some of your curiosity towards Google. This topic has been discussed many times before. In short: Your notion of "cause and effect" is not necessarily meaningful or applicable to all aspects of nature. Time could have been created in the Big Bang. Also, it's possible that the entire process was continuous... the closer you rewind towards the big bang, the longer it takes to rewind just a little bi…

Thanks for the link, it's interesting read. Even if time is created with Big Bang, and there are probabilistic quantum processes that don't demonstrate "cause and effect" in traditional sense these explanations come down to some singularity and suggest to accept that singularities just happen.

Re: The meaning of life is to populate the universe

#25

Post by vl » Sat, Aug 21, 2010, 10:38 AM UTC

Locke1689 wrote: post #23

vl wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>how could we begin to perceive, imagine, or study existence without existence? Through the deduction and reasoning. We don't exactly perceive sub-atomic and many galactic processes, but just infer their existence from some or other observation. Presumably "existence" is not entirely detached from "outside".

Yes but if the universe is everything that we perceive as physical, that is the material world, how could we possibly seek to examine the nonphysical world through the physical? Consider, even reason itself is based on the rules and inherent properties of our physical universe. How can you examine a system which may not even have "reason"? Hell, our "physically" limited brains may not fundamentally be capable of comp…

Our brains comprehended a lot of stuff which appeared to be incomprehensible. Relativity theory, quantum mechanics, most branches of mathematics are so abstract that have no direct connection to the real-world "physical" experiences of our brains and bodies. And yet some members of humanity (although quite limited subset) develop these areas and reason within them. If "reason" in the widest sense is such a fundamental law that it extends beyond the whatever singularity took place, then it might still be possible to deduct something. (Simplistic example) Imagine creatures living in 2D world that itself is in 3D world and sometimes interacts with 3D object. Should these creatures be able to deduct some information about "outer" 3D world after prolonged study of projections that sometimes suddenly appear in their 2D world?

Re: The meaning of life is to populate the universe

#26

Post by Tycho » Sat, Aug 21, 2010, 12:14 PM UTC

You could argue that intelligent life is something that our ecosystem has evolved in order to resist mass extinction due to meteorite impacts. Last time round with the dinosaurs there was no answer but maybe next time we'll be ready. It just about makes sense if you think on then scale of whole ecosystems and meteorite impacts and many planets.

Re: The meaning of life is to populate the universe

#27

Post by Tycho » Sat, Aug 21, 2010, 12:21 PM UTC

vl wrote: post #14

One thing that I don't get is what was before and what is the source of Big Bang. So Big Bang, boom, expansion, star/planet formation, red shift, evolution, selfish gene, humans - I get. But where did the Big Bang came from? Fluctuation from nothingness? Why? From something else? Why? Something existed before and produced the Big Bang? Where this thing that existed before came from then? Doesn't make any sense.

My personal favourite explanation is that since in the beginning there was nothing, there wasn't just no matter there were no rules. So there was no rule to say 'you can't get something from nothing' so out of true nothingness things would happen. And from there it was a matter of generating the right set of rules (which could have taken an unimaginably large number of iterations) where nothing was contradictory and then viola, the universe was ready.

Re: The meaning of life is to populate the universe

#28

Post by zeynel1 » Sat, Aug 21, 2010, 12:49 PM UTC

zackattack wrote: post #6

zeynel1 wrote: post #4

--this is the meaning of life - there is no other-- he must be a happy person - he found the meaning of life - and he knows that there is no other either he is a total --fool-- or he knows something that we do not know

I think all "meaning" is constructed. The human brain itself is a meaning-making machine. He's stated a preference.

--all -meaning- is constructed--

i agree with you - and if this is true then the meaning of life is what we define it to be - only religions assert that there is only 1 true meaning and its the meaning they defined

maybe the blog writer chose the wrong word - instead of -meaning- the word -process- would have been better - in that case we may say that --the fundamental process of nature is a transformation of non-replicating into replicating--

Re: The meaning of life is to populate the universe

#29

Post by zackattack » Sun, Aug 22, 2010, 7:11 AM UTC

zeynel1 wrote: post #28

zackattack wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think all "meaning" is constructed. The human brain itself is a meaning-making machine. He's stated a preference.

--all -meaning- is constructed-- i agree with you - and if this is true then the meaning of life is what we define it to be - only religions assert that there is only 1 true meaning and its the meaning they defined maybe the blog writer chose the wrong word - instead of -meaning- the word -process- would have been better - in that case we may say that --the fundamental process of nature is a transformation of non-rep…

yeah, i don't know why you were downvoted