Dark, Cold, Space. Do these exist?

[daan]

The problem basically lies in our own language ..
Recently a few language-philosophers have been analyzing our language
( they owed that to their name ).
F.e. The question: Does goed exist ?
Cant be answered, beause in order to formulate a question, according to the philosophers, you have to have defined all the components in that question.
-God- isnt defined, we dont know what god is, so the question :
"Does God exist"" cant be answered.
And if you say: God is omnipotent (he can do anything) you bump into a problem.
Because if he is omnipotent, he could create a rock so heavy, that even he cant lift it. But if he cant lift it, he's not omnipotent.. and if he cant create the rock, he isnt omnipotent either.

Another example is describing time,.. few people can define it.
A famous quote is : "If no one asks me I know, but if i have to explain it to someone who asks, I dont"
A few years ago a few scientist finally managed to give a definition of time, WIHTOUT using time related words. If you give a definition of time, you cant use words that involve time, becuase that has to be defined still.
The definition was 2 A-4 pages I believe.

So language is usually the problem.

As much as heat creates cold and vice versa, dark creates light and vice versa, it's us that create space. Space is that what's between to objects.
If there are two planets, there'll be space between them, its the consequence language puts on the fact that there are two things, and they arent in the same place.

I'm gonna stop now, I lost track of myself writing this .. have no idea what i wrote anymore [img]tongue.gif[/img] Hope it makes sense

[The Hierophant]

Originally posted by daan: The problem basically lies in our own language .. Recently a few language-philosophers have been analyzing our language ( they owed that to their name ). F.e. The question: Does goed exist ? Cant be answered, beause in order to formulate a question, according to the philosophers, you have to have defined all the components in that question. -God- isnt defined, we dont know what god is, so the question : "Does God exist"" cant be answered. And if you say: God is omnipotent (he can do anything) you bump into a problem. Because if he is omnipotent, he could create a rock so heavy, that even he cant lift it. But if he cant lift it, he's not omnipotent.. and if he cant create the rock, he isnt omnipotent either. Another example is describing time,.. few people can define it. A famous quote is : "If no one asks me I know, but if i have to explain it to someone who asks, I dont" A few years ago a few scientist finally managed to give a definition of time, WIHTOUT using time related words. If you give a definition of time, you cant use words that involve time, becuase that has to be defined still. The definition was 2 A-4 pages I believe. So language is usually the problem. As much as heat creates cold and vice versa, dark creates light and vice versa, it's us that create space. Space is that what's between to objects. If there are two planets, there'll be space between them, its the consequence language puts on the fact that there are two things, and they arent in the same place. I'm gonna stop now, I lost track of myself writing this .. have no idea what i wrote anymore [img]tongue.gif[/img] Hope it makes sense

Makes alot of sense. Very good post [img]smile.gif[/img]

[Attalus]

Those are all relative terms that describe the effect that certain physical phenomena have on our human senses, nothing more. In a Platonic sense, they cannot exist without comparative objects, and a human observer.

[daan]

Exactly,.. that was basically what took me 20 times more lines to say [img]tongue.gif[/img]
( But offcourse I felt the need to show how intelligent I was by giving a lot of examples )

Karlosevic:
Waves, be it radio or anything else .. can travel through vacuum.
Waves in vacuum travel with the speed of light ( cant go faster than that ).
The fact that they dont encounter any resistance, doesnt mean they'll go infinitely fast. Nothing can go faster than the speed of light for a lot of reasons.
1. Speed affects time, the fasten you go, the slower time goes.
This is relative ( einsteins relativity-theory ), time will pass slower for you, compared to other independant observers.
The closer you get to the speed of light, the slower time goes .. a consequence is that it takes infinitely long to go faster than the speed of light.
2. Speed increases mass, the faster you go, the heavier you become.
Closing on the speed of light, a particle would become infinitely heavy and it would take an infinite amount of energy to get him to go faster.

There are some more reasons why it's not possible, but properly explaining the last two would take me a lot of pages already, so I'll stop [img]tongue.gif[/img] .

Anywayz,.. the fact that there's a delay when you send radio-waves from A to B through space is not evidence that space is nothing or has infinitely low density.

EDIT:
And indeed, the fact that space is infinte, doesnt mean its without bounds.
It simply implies that it will continue to expand forever.
Some scientist now think the universe IS finite. We all know gravity, and we also know that gravity attracts. One mass attracts the other.
A theory is that the expanding universe now,.. is a result of the Big Bang, the planets still have some impuls left of that explosion. Eventually however, the gravity is going to counteract that and the universe will collapse on itself. At this point however, the universe is still accelerating ( expanding going faster). However, at the centre of our system, there's a Huge black hole, ( not your average black hole, but a thousand times bigger ).
So there's quite a few things pulling us back at the moment [img]smile.gif[/img]

[ 01-05-2003, 11:17 AM: Message edited by: daan ]

[Leonis]

Or to put it another, similar way;

Dark, Cold and Space exist at the very least as terms for the conditions of absences of light, heat and 'any thing'.

Therefore if the condition exists, the term for that condition is describing something that exists, and language allows us to state that 'Darkness exists' for eg. because due to language, you are really saying, 'the condition described by the word darkness, exists'.

[Gromnir]

ANOTHER VERY SIMILAR WAY:

Dark, cold, and space(Vacuum) do not exist as objects since they have no mass but instead exist as a state that something can be in.

[WillowIX]

Originally posted by Attalus: Those are all relative terms that describe the effect that certain physical phenomena have on our human senses, nothing more. In a Platonic sense, they cannot exist without comparative objects, and a human observer.

Not really true Attalus. Heat is energy. And there is always energy. Therefore there will always be heat and lack of heat. [img]graemlins/blueblink.gif[/img] Expressions like warmth and cold are human observations though. And I´m glad of them! Otherwise we would have to measure particle speed and movement to get an idea of temperature. Bah!

[Iron_Ranger]

I havent read through this whole thread, so this may have already been stated but..

I think coldness exist. There is a source of coldness. What about blizzards, chill winds and such.

The other two are pretty complex. Darkness is just lack of light, there is no source for it..And I have never really pondered the space one.

[Gromnir]

There has never been true coldness; absoolute zero has never been achieved and so every temperature felt is just a very small amount of heat energy being radiateed, no matter how cold.

[Attalus]

Originally posted by WillowIX: Not really true Attalus. Heat is energy. And there is always energy. Therefore there will always be heat and lack of heat. [img]graemlins/blueblink.gif[/img] Expressions like warmth and cold are human observations though. And I´m glad of them! Otherwise we would have to measure particle speed and movement to get an idea of temperature. Bah!

That is true, my dear Willow, and I should not have said them had the term "heat" been under consideration. But, the terms that are under discussion are "Dark, cold, and space." Which, as I said, are relative terms for lack of heat/energy, lack of light, and lack of discernable masses. [img]tongue.gif[/img]