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Thread: Best of Sean Carrol, theoretical physicist & philosopher

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    Quote Originally Posted by Cypress View Post
    Dr. Sean Carrol: Atheism is a reaction against theism. It is purely a rejection of an idea. It's not a positive substantive idea about how the world is.

    Naturalism is a counterpart to theism. Theism says there’s the physical world and god. Naturalism says there’s only the natural world. There are no spirits, no deities, or anything else. Poetic naturalism emphasizes that there are many ways of talking about the natural world. The fact that the underlying laws of physics are deterministic and impersonal does not mean that at the human level we can’t talk about ideas about reasons and goals and purposes and free will.

    Naturalism says that we were not put here for any purpose. But that doesn’t mean there isn’t such thing as purpose. It just means that purpose isn’t imposed from outside. We human beings have the creative ability to give our lives purposes and meanings. Just as we have the ability to determine what is right or wrong, beautiful or ugly. That point of view is not only allowed, it is challenging and breathtaking in its scope.

    https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.wir...an-carroll/amp
    You should listen to Carroll talking with philosophers. You will learn how philosophers actually think and talk.

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    Quote Originally Posted by BidenPresident View Post
    Carroll is great. He actually understands philosophy.
    He is my favorite physicist.

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    Quote Originally Posted by BidenPresident View Post
    You should listen to Carroll talking with philosophers. You will learn how philosophers actually think and talk.
    For sure, I watch a lot of Sean Carrol, and have done so for several years.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Cypress View Post
    He is my favorite physicist.
    His "Mindscapes" podcast is worth visiting. Mostly scientists, but lots to pick from.

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    Quote Originally Posted by BidenPresident View Post
    His "Mindscapes" podcast is worth visiting. Mostly scientists, but lots to pick from.
    I watch his podcasts and his online courses.

    IMO, he is superior to Carl Sagan, Niel Degrasse Tyson, or Michio Kaku because he makes physics accessible but he doesn't dumb it down.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Cypress View Post
    I watch his podcasts and his online courses.

    IMO, he is superior to Carl Sagan, Niel Degrasse Tyson, or Michio Kaku because he makes physics accessible but he doesn't dumb it down.
    Carroll is like Niels Bohr and Heisenberg. A physicist who know how to be a philosopher. Like Leibniz.

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    Quote Originally Posted by BidenPresident View Post
    Carroll is like Niels Bohr and Heisenberg. A physicist who know how to be a philosopher. Like Leibniz.
    Sean either minored in philosophy as an undergraduate or he did a physics-philosophy double major, I cannot remember which.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Cypress View Post
    It seems to me that Dr. Carrol destroys the fine-tuning of the universe argument for theism.

    There are 20 physical constants in the Standard Model and General Relativity we cannot explain from first principles, we only know their values from experimental observation. Presumably, these constants could have taken on any range of values, rendering the universe, energy, and matter completely different from our experience and possibly rendering the universe inhospitable to life.

    According to Don Lincoln of Fermi Lab, the universe at the time of the big bang may have started in a state of quantum superposition, where all states were possible all at once. When the quantum wave function collapsed, the present configuration of the physical constants were selected.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Cypress View Post
    Sean either minored in philosophy as an undergraduate or he did a physics-philosophy double major, I cannot remember which.
    Carroll has a B.S. in Astronomy, Astrophysics and philosophy from Villanova University
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sean_M._Carroll

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    Quote Originally Posted by Cypress View Post
    Sean answers the big questions of ultimate reality.
    Was there a beginning? Or not? (Probably was no beginning)

    Why is there something rather than nothing? (Even empty space has an inherent latent energy)

    Another of the big questions: why is there order in chaos?

    Chaos theory convincingly shows that chaotic, non-linear systems which diverge from deterministic laws, can still be shown to have a deep, underlying order.

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