It's all a mystery really.....

Originally posted by twhitehead
So why didn't you simply admit that at the beginning instead of trying to defend it?

Have you now done the probability calculation?

[b]I can't understand why you are asking me to overturn such odds without any proven evidence or case to point to. It seems a leap of faith on your part.
Because you haven't got the first clue about 'odds'. You jus ...[text shortened]... ith the same laws of physics and the only difference between the two directions is entropy.[/b]

….We have two classes of known events: macro and micro.
..…

-obviously I know exactly what you mean here and I really hate to be pedantic but to avoid possible misunderstanding from knightmeister and others I think it is best not to use the word “micro” but rather “quantum” because that is obviously what we really mean here.

-confusion could arise if a reader takes “micro event” to encompass things like the event of bacteria dividing etc as these microscopic events are clearly “micro” and “events“!

Originally posted by knightmeister
It appears that macro events operate in a deterministic causal manner - up to a certain accuracy which is where the micro comes in.
Micro events are not known to have any cause.
---------whitey---------------------------------

Wrong. Millions of macro events are known and PROVEN to operate in a causal manner.

Micro events are not known to ha case of any land at all out there , not a single piece of land!!!

He was sooo lucky eh?

I didn’t notice this response of yours to twhitehead post before but it has struck me as a bit odd:

….It appears that macro events operate in a deterministic causal manner - up to a certain accuracy which is where the micro comes in.
Micro events are not known to have any cause.
---------whitey---------------------------------

WRONG. Millions of macro events are known and PROVEN to operate in a causal manner.

..… (my emphasis)

-yes -of course, and neither my or twhitehead's posts say nor imply that this wasn’t the case.

What do you mean by “WRONG” in the above? -he is actually in agreement with you!
You can see that what he said in the above which was: “…It appears that macro events operate in a deterministic causal manner…” which surely implies what you said which was “Millions of macro events are known and PROVEN to operate in a causal manner” so surely that word “WRONG” should be “RIGHT”?

….Micro events are not known to have any cause but it's also not known whether they are not made of jam. Does that mean they are made of jam?
..…

Exactly! That is good reasoning! I and, I am sure, twhitehead will totally agree with that!
( not sure if the idea of “events being made of jam” makes any sense but, obviously, I would totally agree with you that that’s totally besides the point )

Therefore, as you agree that:

1, just because it is not known whether quantum events are not made of jam that this does NOT mean that they are made of jam.

You should agree that:

2, just because it is not known whether quantum events have a cause that this does NOT mean that they have a cause.

-right?

( I use the term “quantum event” and not “micro event” because not all “micro events” are “quantum events” )

…
Why do you and hammy think that the absence of a negative PROOF constitutes a positive PROOF - this is poor thinking.
.… (my emphasis)

Neither of us do -the absence of a negative PROOF that quantum events have causes does NOT constitute positive PROOF that quantum events have causes.
-so we are all in agreement here?

Besides, I think the word “evidence” rather that “PROOF” would be more appropriate here in this context.

-this is why I think this post of yours is odd.

Originally posted by Andrew Hamilton
-obviously I know exactly what you mean here and I really hate to be pedantic but to avoid possible misunderstanding from knightmeister and others I think it is best not to use the word “micro” but rather “quantum” because that is obviously what we really mean here.

-confusion could arise if a reader takes “micro event” to encompass things ...[text shortened]... the event of bacteria dividing etc as these microscopic events are clearly “micro” and “events“!

Although I realize that I was not clear about how small my micro was intended to mean, I chose not to use the word 'quantum' for a reason.
You see all events are actually the same. There is really not distinct boundary. Heisenburgs Uncertainty Principle means that there is always some uncertainty in any event no matter how large or small. It is really just a question of which effect dominates. For very small distances or very high speeds the uncertainty begins to dominate, for larger distances and lower speeds we can calculate both past and future more accurately.

I want to make two points absolutely clear:
1. It is totally unknown whether the exact position of a given object is a function of the past state of the universe or in fact a result of any 'law' or 'cause'. All objects have a probability wave function. We simply tend to ignore that fact when the wave is very short.
2. There is no good reason to talk of 'causes' or 'causal chains' as if they operate exclusively from the past to the future. There is really no difference whatsoever between cause/effect from past to future or from future to past other than entropy. We are as much caused by the future as we are by the past.

Entropy and Heisenburgs Uncertainty Principle are intimately related.

Originally posted by twhitehead
Although I realize that I was not clear about how small my micro was intended to mean, I chose not to use the word 'quantum' for a reason.
You see all events are actually the same. There is really not distinct boundary. Heisenburgs Uncertainty Principle means that there is always some uncertainty in any event no matter how large or small. It is really ju ...[text shortened]... by the past.

Entropy and Heisenburgs Uncertainty Principle are intimately related.

I agree with everything you say here 🙂

Originally posted by Andrew Hamilton
I didn’t notice this response of yours to twhitehead post before but it has struck me as a bit odd:

[b]….It appears that macro events operate in a deterministic causal manner - up to a certain accuracy which is where the micro comes in.
Micro events are not known to have any cause.
---------whitey---------------------------------

WRONG. Mi d be more appropriate here in this context.

-this is why I think this post of yours is odd.

You should agree that:

2, just because it is not known whether quantum events have a cause that this does NOT mean that they have a cause.

-------hammy------------------------------

No , you missed the point about negative proofs or evidence.

You claim that "not a single quantum event is known to have any cause" (whitey says "micro events are not known to have any cause"😉

My point is that this really says nothing because all it says is that we have been looking for causes of quantum events but have not found any. This could be because there aren't any or it could be because we haven't figured it out yet. You seem to jump to the conclusion it must be the first. It could easily be that they all have causes and we are just missing something.

In London when cholera was rife , many people looked for causes of cholera and could not find any. Until later on when someone made the connection with water supply.

Would it have been logical for them to have said "not a single case of cholera is known to have a cause therefore maybe cholera is an uncaused disease? "

All you are really stating is what is unlnown about quantum events and then treating it as evidence. That's odd , because science is about what we do know (and can prove) isn't it?

Both you and whitey use phrases like "micro events are not known to have any cause" as if they are supposed to say something significant , whereas for me I just think "micro events are not known to be be uncaused either" so what? I don't see how either of you can use what we "don't know" as evidence either way.

Originally posted by Andrew Hamilton
I agree with everything you say here 🙂

Surprising ....

Originally posted by knightmeister
You should agree that:

2, just because it is not known whether quantum events have a cause that this does NOT mean that they have a cause.

-------hammy------------------------------

No , you missed the point about negative proofs or evidence.

You claim that "not a single quantum event is known to have any cause" (whitey says "micro event n't see how either of you can use what we "don't know" as evidence either way.

….You claim that "not a single quantum event is known to have any cause" (whitey says "micro events are not known to have any cause" &ldquo😉

My point is that this really says NOTHING because all it says is that we have been looking for causes of quantum events but have not found any.
..… (my emphasis)

Reminder of your (for once) correct piece of logic:

….Micro events are not known to have any cause but it's also not known whether they are not made of jam. Does that mean they are made of jam?
..…

Exactly! And what you imply here can be restated as:

1, The fact that it is not known whether quantum events are not made of jam does NOT mean that they are made of jam.

But you should go just one small step farther here to say that the ABSENCE of evidence that it is made of jam means it is HIGHLY PROBABLE that it is not made of jam!!! -unless you think it creditably could be made of jam? 😛

Therefore, you should agree that it is the case that:

2, the fact that no quantum events are found to be made of jam, EVEN IF some people tried to find evidence that quantum events are made of jam, does NOT say “NOTHING” about whether they are made of jam but rather this ABSENCE of evidence is evidence that it is HIGHLY PROBABLE that it is not made of jam.

This is because if you claim that quantum events are made of jam, you are implicitly making the existential claim that there is jam in the quantum events. And the mere ABSENCE of evidence of an existential claim is evidence against it!!!
If that wasn’t the case then you would have to conclude that there is a credible chance that it could be made of jam! 😛 or that there is a credible chance that there is an invisible cat floating above your head right now! 😛
Note that this only applies to claims that are either explicitly or implicitly existential claims and not to non-existential claims such as “my house is 20 feet wide” etc.

Thus applying (2) to my claim that “not a single quantum event is known to have any cause” you should agree that:

3, the fact that no quantum events are found to have a cause, EVEN IF some people tried to find evidence that quantum events have a cause, does NOT say “NOTHING” about whether they have a cause but rather this ABSENCE of evidence is evidence that it is HIGHLY PROBABLE that they do not have a cause.

…Would it have been logical for them to have said "not a single case of cholera is known to have a cause therefore maybe cholera is an uncaused disease? "
.…

Cholera belongs to the category of events that are known to generally have causes thus our default position should be that any given one of these events SHOULD have a cause unless there is evidence to the contrary EVEN if that cause is yet unknown.

Quantum events belongs to a DIFFERENT category of events that not only have no known causes but belongs to a different category of events because they can be observed to have behaviour that complies with equations of PROBABILITY that assume true randomness. If you have looked at these equations like I have then you should see that this is the case. There are no alternative equations known that can correctly describe what is actually observed that are not more complex than the ones used in quantum physics thus this is a rational reason to think that, UNLIKE with other categories of events, our default position should be that the quantum event should NOT have a cause unless there in evidence to the contrary.

Originally posted by Andrew Hamilton
[b]….You claim that "not a single quantum event is known to have any cause" (whitey says "micro events are not known to have any cause" &ldquo😉

My point is that this really says NOTHING because all it says is that we have been looking for causes of quantum events but have not found any.
..… (my emphasis)

Reminder of your (for once) correct piec ...[text shortened]... that the quantum event should NOT have a cause unless there in evidence to the contrary.[/b]

could it be marmalade instead of Jam?

Originally posted by robbie carrobie
could it be marmalade instead of Jam?

-err, no. The citrus fruits are OUT OF SEASON.
And marmalade would give quantum events some idiotically bitter-tangy citrusy bits -do you really want that!!!
It has to be jam.

Originally posted by Andrew Hamilton
[b]….You claim that "not a single quantum event is known to have any cause" (whitey says "micro events are not known to have any cause" &ldquo😉

My point is that this really says NOTHING because all it says is that we have been looking for causes of quantum events but have not found any.
..… (my emphasis)

Reminder of your (for once) correct piec ...[text shortened]... that the quantum event should NOT have a cause unless there in evidence to the contrary.[/b]

But you should go just one small step farther here to say that the ABSENCE of evidence that it is made of jam means it is HIGHLY PROBABLE that it is not made of jam!!!
-----------------------hammy---------------------------------------------

But do you not see your mistake here?

The comparison with jam is flawed (even though I brought it up)

Why?

Because there is no rational reason at all to think that quantum events would be made of jam. Also , if they were made of jam we might expect some evidence of this. Therefore the absence of evidence for them being made of jam confirms our intial reasoning that they are probably not made of jam.

Saying quantum events are uncaused is different.

Why?

Because we have every logical reason ( as evidenced by millions of natural phenomena that ARE caused) to think that they might be caused events afterall. Therfore to say they are uncaused is quite a radical jump. The absence of evidence is not conclusive evidence of anything unless there is sufficient reason to think that we should have found a cause by now.

Statements about the absence of evidence for something are only significant if they are accompanied by three conditions.......


a) it is expected and it is logical that said evidence should be found and therefore this raises the question as to why it can't be found.

b) the claim that the absence of evidence is supposed to support is very reasonable.

c) the context of the issue being examined is something we know a lot about and there are few grey areas

What I want to know from you is why you think the absence of a known cause for a quantum event is significant to you.

Is it because you think that if they really had causes that we would have found one by now? Do you not think there are other perfectly rational reasons why the evidence is not there (eg like we just haven't figured it out yet? )

The statement you should be trying to argue is NOT

" there are no known quantum events that have causes"

BUT

" a cause of a quantum event should be pretty easy to find and evidence"


To me it seems just as probable that we are only just on the frontiers of understanding quantum events and maybe in 100 years time they will consider the idea that they were "uncaused" events quite quaint.

Who knows? You seem to know already event though science is littered with events with unknown causes that later became known.

Curious assumption...

Originally posted by Andrew Hamilton
[b]….You claim that "not a single quantum event is known to have any cause" (whitey says "micro events are not known to have any cause" &ldquo😉

My point is that this really says NOTHING because all it says is that we have been looking for causes of quantum events but have not found any.
..… (my emphasis)

Reminder of your (for once) correct piec ...[text shortened]... that the quantum event should NOT have a cause unless there in evidence to the contrary.[/b]

Quantum events belongs to a DIFFERENT category of events that not only have no known causes............
---------------------------hammy------------------------------------

Quantum events belong to the same catagory as all events. They are events within the known universe. These events are known to have causes. So far there is not one known and proven case of an uncaused event and millions of cases of caused events. Quantum physics is a new field but it still belongs to the set of "all events that happen in the universe" . The track record for proven caused events versus proven uncaused events is millions - 0 at this point in time.

There is a lot of work to do at half time shall we say....

The fact that quantum events have no known cause is not significant in itself. Just as the fact that chloera had no known cause was not significant.

The question I have is this.... If every catagory of event that we have explored so far in science has turned out to have an underlying cause along the way (sometimes after strenuous exploration) then why should quantum physics be different? Why should we assume a default position that they must be different just because of an absence of evidence?

Surely the default position should be at the very least " Ok , let's wait and see , it looks wierd right now but saying an event is uncaused is very radical , we just don't know what we don't know"

Originally posted by Andrew Hamilton
[b]….You claim that "not a single quantum event is known to have any cause" (whitey says "micro events are not known to have any cause" &ldquo😉

My point is that this really says NOTHING because all it says is that we have been looking for causes of quantum events but have not found any.
..… (my emphasis)

Reminder of your (for once) correct piec that the quantum event should NOT have a cause unless there in evidence to the contrary.[/b]

IF some people tried to find evidence that quantum events have a cause, does NOT say “NOTHING” about whether they have a cause but rather this ABSENCE of evidence is evidence that it is HIGHLY PROBABLE that they do not have a cause. ---------------------------------------------------hammy-------------------------------------------------

Only if the evidence is easy to find or easy to understand.

EXAMPLE - If I look in a small desert for evidence of a large army trekking through it the day before I could say that the ABSENCE of footprints was very significant and wouild show that it was HIGHLY PROBABLE that there was no army there.

HOWEVER- Let's say I knew nothing about overnight sandstorms. Let's say i had just assumed that the footprints would be there and nothing could obscure them. I might say "if there was an army here we would have found footprints by now"


BUT

The absence of any footprints at all might infact turn out to be irrelevant - and once I found out about sandstorms I would realise this and see my mistake. The absence of footprints in the sand would infact have meant NOTHING.

So educate me - what is the quantum equivalent of the sandstorm and hwo do we know that it's not some unknown sandstirm that is obscuring the evidence?

Originally posted by knightmeister
But you should go just one small step farther here to say that the ABSENCE of evidence that it is made of jam means it is HIGHLY PROBABLE that it is not made of jam!!!
-----------------------hammy---------------------------------------------

But do you not see your mistake here?

The comparison with jam is flawed (even though I brought it up) ...[text shortened]... tered with events with unknown causes that later became known.

Curious assumption...

….ut do you not see your mistake here?

The comparison with jam is flawed (even though I brought it up)

Why?

Because there is no rational reason at all to think that quantum events would be made of jam.
..…

-and there is no rational reason at all to think that quantum events would have a “cause” for the reasons I just gave.

….Also , if they were made of jam we might expect some evidence of this.
..…

Really? What form would this evidence take?

…Therefore the absence of evidence for them being made of jam confirms our intial reasoning that they are probably not made of jam.

.…

Exactly!

…Saying quantum events are uncaused is different.

Why?

Because we have every logical reason ( as evidenced by millions of natural phenomena that ARE caused)
.…

millions of natural phenomena that ARE caused BUT they all belong to A DIFFERENT category of events for the reasons I gave in my last post and these would be the same reasons why most quantum scientists would believe this.

The rest of your reasoning is flawed because it totally ignores these facts.

Originally posted by knightmeister
Quantum events belongs to a DIFFERENT category of events that not only have no known causes............
---------------------------hammy------------------------------------

Quantum events belong to the same catagory as all events. They are events within the known universe. These events are known to have causes. So far there is not one known and pr ...[text shortened]... but saying an event is uncaused is very radical , we just don't know what we don't know"

….Quantum events belong to the same category as all events.
..…

That depends on what criteria you use to categories events but in this context it would be inappropriate to lump quantum events in with all other events for exactly the reasons I gave in my last post.

….They are events within the known universe.
..…

That is a totally arbitrary and, in this context, totally inappropriate criteria to use to categories events for the reasons indicated in my last post.

Reminder of the relevant part of that post:

“Cholera belongs to the category of events that are known to generally have causes thus our default position should be that any given one of these events SHOULD have a cause unless there is evidence to the contrary EVEN if that cause is yet unknown.

Quantum events belongs to a DIFFERENT category of events that not only have no known causes but belongs to a different category of events because they can be observed to have behaviour that complies with equations of PROBABILITY that assume true randomness. If you have looked at these equations like I have then you should see that this is the case. There are no alternative equations known that can correctly describe what is actually observed that are not more complex than the ones used in quantum physics thus this is a rational reason to think that, UNLIKE with other categories of events, our default position should be that the quantum event should NOT have a cause unless there in evidence to the contrary.
”

Please read the above carefully.

Originally posted by Andrew Hamilton
[b]….ut do you not see your mistake here?

The comparison with jam is flawed (even though I brought it up)

Why?

Because there is no rational reason at all to think that quantum events would be made of jam.
..…

-and there is no rational reason at all to think that quantum events would have a “cause” for the reasons I just gave.

...[text shortened]... ld believe this.

The rest of your reasoning is flawed because it totally ignores these facts.[/b]

-and there is no rational reason at all to think that quantum events would have a “cause” for the reasons I just gave.
------------------------hammy-------------------------------

Apart from the fact that many events in the universe work in a causal manner and it also seems illogical and inexplicable that an event would happen for no reason or cause whatsoever.