The ontological status of zombie universes

Wednesday May 23, 2012

ephilosopher.com is an online community dedicated to philosophical thinking. Login or become a member!

Home
Articles
Community
- Register
- Groups
- Profile
- Search
- Videos
- Events
Forums
Links
Games
Contact us
Help
Blog

Be Social

Home / Forums

News Feeds:

	Philosophy Forums	Categories Rules Help

Welcome, Guest
Please Login or Register. Lost Password?

Philosophy Forums

Metaphysics and Epistemology

The ontological status of zombie universes

(0 viewing)

Page:
<< Start < Prev 1 2 3 Next > End >>

TOPIC: The ontological status of zombie universes

Forum Tools

#173409

Mary1966

Fresh Boarder

Posts: 0

The ontological status of zombie universes 3 Years ago

Karma: 0

By zombie universe I am referring to ones that lack any kind of conscious entities. These universes may contain planets, stars and galaxies but no conscious awareness of themselves or their surroundings. Some of these universes may contain the potential for consciousness but are lacking it. Other universes may contain physical laws where consciousness is impossible.

Do these two type of universes have the same status? Does a universe where consciousness is a possibility have a stronger claim to existence than a universe where consciousness is impossible? Does the latter universe even exist and can it have a collapse or splitting of its quantum wave function if there is nothing to perform the action other than an external or engulfing source?

Logged

The administrator has disabled public write access.

#173411

ljtsg

Moderator

Posts: 5294

Re: The ontological status of zombie universes 3 Years ago	Karma: 0
Nanrek, you may want to check out this article: discovermagazine.com/2009/may/01-the-bio...es-time-space-cosmos

Logged

"Spirit aint worth spit without a little exercise"- Clint Eastwood

"The great religious conceptions which haunt the imaginations of civilized mankind are scenes of solitariness: Prometheus chained to his rock, Mahomet brooding in the desert, the meditations of the Buddha, the solitary Man on the Cross. It belongs to the depth of the religious spirit to have felt forsaken, even by God." -Alfred N Whitehead

"He was one of Gods own prototypes: a high-powered mutant never even considered for mass- production. Too weird to live, too rare to die."- Hunter S. Thompson

The administrator has disabled public write access.

#173424

Mary1966

Fresh Boarder

Posts: 0

Re: The ontological status of zombie universes 3 Years ago

Karma: 0

Thanks for the reference to the article on Biocentrism. I'm becoming more convinced while retaining my skepticism that consciousness of some degree of awareness may be the source of all quantum reality. Maybe the so called mental and the physical are properties of the mathematical logic that seems to underly everything. I can envision that these mental and physical properties are mutually contributing to their higher levels complexity. They may both be necessary conditions for the instantiation of physical reality. And maybe my speculations are completely wrong!

Logged

The administrator has disabled public write access.

#173448

ljtsg

Moderator

Posts: 5294

Re: The ontological status of zombie universes 3 Years ago

Karma: 0

[quote1242656786=nanrek!]
Thanks for the reference to the article on Biocentrism. I'm becoming more convinced while retaining my skepticism that consciousness of some degree of awareness may be the source of all quantum reality. Maybe the so called mental and the physical are properties of the mathematical logic that seems to underly everything. I can envision that these mental and physical properties are mutually contributing to their higher levels complexity. They may both be necessary conditions for the instantiation of physical reality. And maybe my speculations are completely wrong!
[/quote1242656786]

I think the truth is more profound than we can possibly imagine.

Logged

The administrator has disabled public write access.

#173453

Mary1966

Fresh Boarder

Posts: 0

Re: The ontological status of zombie universes 3 Years ago

Karma: 0

[blockquote]LJ writes:
I think the truth is more profound than we can possibly imagine. [/blockquote]

I agree completely! When I am sitting around spinning out my œbig answers to the big questions, I imagine what it would be like if I was one of those parasites, spending their lives attached to the intestinal walls of pigs, looking around at their surroundings and trying to figure out the meaning of it all. Anyway, I suppose the fruitless searching for answers is more interesting than the mindless sucking of nutrients from metaphysical walls!

Logged

The administrator has disabled public write access.

#173454

ljtsg

Moderator

Posts: 5294

Re: The ontological status of zombie universes 3 Years ago

Karma: 0

[quote1242668479=nanrek!]
Thanks for the reference to the article on Biocentrism. I'm becoming more convinced while retaining my skepticism that consciousness of some degree of awareness may be the source of all quantum reality. Maybe the so called mental and the physical are properties of the mathematical logic that seems to underly everything. I can envision that these mental and physical properties are mutually contributing to their higher levels complexity. They may both be necessary conditions for the instantiation of physical reality. And maybe my speculations are completely wrong!
[/quote1242668479]

For the record, I think the most interesting part of that article is this:

Recent quantum studies help illustrate what a new biocentric science would look like. Just months? ago, Nicolas Gisin announced a new twist on his entanglement experiment; in this case, he thinks the results could be visible to the naked eye. At the University of Vienna, Anton Zeilinger™s work with huge molecules called buckyballs pushes quantum reality closer to the macroscopic world. In an exciting extension of this work”proposed by Roger Penrose, the renowned Oxford physicist”not just light but a small mirror that reflects it becomes part of an entangled quantum system, one that is billions of times larger than a buckyball. If the proposed experiment ends up confirming Penrose™s idea, it would also confirm that quantum effects apply to human-scale objects.

Logged

The administrator has disabled public write access.

Page:
<< Start < Prev 1 2 3 Next > End >>

Forum List

Philosophy Forums

Metaphysics and Epistemology

Philosophy Forums

Philosophy and ... Forums

Political Forums

Community