Below is Gell-Mann's Ted Talk in which he has this fascinating quotation:Now, some people call that a theory of everything. That's wrong, because the theory is quantum mechanical....
But the main thing here is that it predicts probabilities. Now, sometimes those probabilities are near certainties... But other times they're not, and you have only probabilities for different outcomes. So what that means is that the history of the universe is not determined just by the fundamental law. It's the fundamental law and this incredibly long series of accidents, or chance outcomes, that are there in addition.
And the fundamental theory doesn't include those chance outcomes; they are in addition. So it's not a theory of everything. And in fact, a huge amount of the information in the universe around us comes from those accidents, and not just from the fundamental laws.
Ultimately, fundamental theories predict probabilities that certain things will happen. On macroscopic scales these probabilities are near certainties which is why deterministic theories such as Newtonian mechanics do such a good job. As we dig deeper we find that nature is not really governed by a deterministic theory, but rather a quantum reality emerges where each event is given a probability it will happen.
Now the universe isn't an "anything goes" place. Though there are uncertainties, these fundamental theories spell out which uncertainties are possible and how often they should occur. Anything violating these restrictions is an impossibility so, though there is always uncertainty, there is also always law being obeyed.
Now, I'm not going to speculate if these uncertainties are what leads to free will/agency or not. I'll let philosophers do that. Just thought it was interesting that the universe is how it is, partly because of fundamental theory, but also because of uncertainties that, for reasons the underlying theory can't explain, the universe just happens to "choose" between. Physics is awesome!
(I'd just like to remind LDS readers who object to the end of the video that the LDS conception of God is not supernatural. By saying in one breath, "God works by natural laws" you are saying by definition: God is not a supernatural being... supernatural meaning operating beyond natural laws. I think what Gell-Mann would say, if he was LDS is "God does not need more to get more, the fundamental laws are enough to do all the great things He does." Example: He doesn't need much more than gravity to create galaxies. Gravity + matter is all He needs. He doesn't need some crazy supernatural secret, basic gravity will do just fine. I think it is a beautiful thought by the way. Great things come to pass by such exceeding simple/straightforward means.)
"(I'd just like to remind LDS readers who object to the end of the video that the LDS conception of God is not supernatural. By saying in one breath, "God works by natural laws" you are saying by definition: God is not a supernatural being... supernatural meaning operating beyond natural laws."
ReplyDeleteI think that statement, given in one breath, says that God performs his work concerning this earth via the natural laws that govern the matter of the Cosmos. The statement says nothing about the nature of God. The scriptures imply, to me at least, that the nature of God is not the nature of our physical world. God lives without the possibility of death. Jesus' resurrected body will never die. His resurrected body can pass through walls. It can hover in the air. The Father and the son, when they visited Joseph in the forest, were accompanied by a pillar of light that was above the brightness of the sun. The resurrected body of Moroni made the room "lighter than at noonday", and it also passed through walls and hovered in the air. These passages of scripture lead me to believe that resurrected people live in a world that is different than our physical world, in a different dimension if you will, and are thus supernatural. These beings are able to use the natural laws of our universe to create worlds.
Allen,
ReplyDeleteI appreciate your comment comment. First of all I admit I don't know everything and that I'm probably too biased. :)
I guess my position on these things is that more and more I see how the natural laws do the types of things we attribute to god:
1. Look at science heal the sick.
2. Look at science prolong life.
3. I admit nobody is walking through walls, but I wouldn't put it past the natural laws scientists are discovering every day. (Through inspiration of course.)
I'm not trying to claim science explains everything, just that I wouldn't be surprised if how God does the things you described is by the vary laws we are discovering in science. For example, I'll find it if you want, Elder Nelson gave a talk in which he marvels over DNA and talks about how vital it is in the resurrection.
It just could be, in my mind, that as we try to figure out "how God does it" we may miss the answers are right under our noses. I take this to be one reason why the things we learn in this life will be so important.
Again, nice to meet you, thanks for the comment.
Hi Joseph,
ReplyDeleteYou've brought out a good point. Historically, people have rationalized the existence of God to explain phenomena that they can't explain. The danger in this approach to God is that, as science learns more and more, the space for God to exist gets smaller, and in the limit there will be no space for God.
Mormonism, however, has a different approach to God. As explained in Moses 1:39, the glory of God is the exaltation of His children. That is, God exists, not to do things that we don't understand, but to create worlds without number (Moses 1:33) for the exaltation of His children. In other words, God is a user of natural laws, not the creator of natural laws. God used matter that already existed to create the earth. (Abraham 3:24)
"I'm not trying to claim science explains everything, just that I wouldn't be surprised if how God does the things you described is by the vary laws we are discovering in science. For example, I'll find it if you want, Elder Nelson gave a talk in which he marvels over DNA and talks about how vital it is in the resurrection."
ReplyDeleteOne more comment, about your statement that I quoted above. I agree. The examples of passing through walls or the emission of bright light are trivial examples. The example of a deathless but physical body is not trivial. As I'm documenting in my blog that you visited today, science is making great strides in increasing the length of human life, but, so far, at least, science has made no progress in permanently removing death from this mortal earth.
I just wanted to throw in my two cents. I also believe that God uses natural law to do his works. He may be a scientist more than most people think. However, there is one point I would like to add. I think God also uses the power of his authority.
ReplyDeleteHe can command matter and because of his authority, matter obeys. We as scientists use force to make matter obey us; we also constrain what it can do. I think God uses authority to do many things that would be very hard by force. If God sinned (which he cannot do) and lost his authority, he would cease to be God.
Just like commanding us, he doesn't command matter to do something that it can't, in the sense that it goes against natural law. I think that we are learning in life some of this power when we use the priesthood and use his authority.
I always think that when we die, we will find it remarkable how similar life in the next world will be to this one. This life is teaching us. We are training, and for some things we have training wheels, and for other things we have rocks in our pack to make us stronger.