These forums have been archived and are now read-only.

The new forums are live and can be found at https://forums.eveonline.com/

Out of Pod Experience

 
  • Topic is locked indefinitely.
12Next page
 

Can anything be truly infinite?
Author
Previous Topic Next Topic
Evei Shard
Shard Industries
#1 - 2014-06-24 21:15:54 UTC
adjective
adjective: infinite

1.
limitless or endless in space, extent, or size; impossible to measure or calculate.

Over my years I've seen, read, and heard plenty about things that are infinite. Space, time, dimension, and so on. Some of it through fictional stories, others through scientific theory (which may or may not be debunked at this point), and so on.

It would seem to me that if any given aspect of our existence is truly infinite, then everything is not only possible, but guaranteed to happen. Every possible iteration of existence would be played out at some point along the line of whatever it is that is infinite (be it time, or any given dimension, or some other aspect of our universe. If, for instance, time is an infinite dimension, it would seem that even entropy cannot win.

If someone could point me to literature (factual or even theoretical) that explains why this is incorrect, I'd appreciate it. Right now I'm having a difficult time seeing how the infinite can exist without everything being cyclical, repeating forever, even down to my writing of this post.

Profit favors the prepared
Marsha Mallow
#2 - 2014-06-24 21:35:22 UTC
I'm not sure we have the capacity to understand 'infinity'. A lot of the theological debates I've seen attempt to address it but imply it is beyond our comprehension. Science seems more engaged with defining the limits or boundaries. It's a wierd concept that seems to overlap philosophy and mathematic/physics - I've seen it crop up in reading.

Maybe it's just an overused or misunderstood word. I'd be interested to see how other cultures define(d) it, the history of the concept, and what the nuances of 'infinity' in those cultures are/were.

Ripard Teg > For the morons in the room:

Sweets > U can dd my face any day
Bagrat Skalski
Koinuun Kotei
#3 - 2014-06-24 21:49:18 UTC  |  Edited by: Bagrat Skalski
Quote:
I'm having a difficult time seeing how the infinite can exist without everything being cyclical, repeating forever, even down to my writing of this post.


Infinity does not exclude the probability of you doing circles, but your next circle will be somewhere else at the time. Well, it looks more like a sine wave really but it is from a different point of view, not yours.

Custom ship skins, character creator style "repaint". Bring it!
Evei Shard
Shard Industries
#4 - 2014-06-24 21:54:33 UTC
Bagrat Skalski wrote:
Quote:
I'm having a difficult time seeing how the infinite can exist without everything being cyclical, repeating forever, even down to my writing of this post.


Infinity does not exclude the probability of you doing circles, but your next circle will be somewhere else at the time. Well, it looks more like a sine wave really.


Doesn't this assume, though, that time, as a dimension, is also infinite?

If time itself is infinite, does it not stand to reason that we will all eventually be alive again at some point?

Infinity, as I understand it, seems to imply that all variations exist at one point or another.

If time is not infinite, but height is (choose a random direction and call it "up"), eventually, if you travel far enough along that infinite dimension, you would come across a universe exactly like this one, but with the exception of your presence in it.

Profit favors the prepared
Unsuccessful At Everything
The Troll Bridge
#5 - 2014-06-24 21:57:20 UTC
There is a Yo Momma joke in here somewhere.. just waiting to be born...




Since the cessation of their usefulness is imminent, may I appropriate your belongings?
Bagrat Skalski
Koinuun Kotei
#6 - 2014-06-24 22:07:54 UTC
Quote:
does it not stand to reason that we will all eventually be alive again at some point?

It depends on how do you define life. Cool

Custom ship skins, character creator style "repaint". Bring it!
Krixtal Icefluxor
INLAND EMPIRE Galactic
#7 - 2014-06-24 22:09:11 UTC
All your answers (as best as can be figured) are right here:

Rudy Rucker "Infinity and the Mind"

I've read it twice.

"He has mounted his hind-legs, and blown crass vapidities through the bowel of his neck."  - Ambrose Bierce on Oscar Wilde's Lecture in San Francisco 1882
Bagrat Skalski
Koinuun Kotei
#8 - 2014-06-24 22:10:27 UTC  |  Edited by: Bagrat Skalski
Quote:
you would come across a universe exactly like this one

Why? I don't have to go anywhere to experience it. I am in it. Forever. It has no boundaries, it is limitless, remember? Lol

Custom ship skins, character creator style "repaint". Bring it!
Evei Shard
Shard Industries
#9 - 2014-06-24 22:13:25 UTC
Krixtal Icefluxor wrote:
All your answers (as best as can be figured) are right here:

Rudy Rucker "Infinity and the Mind"

I've read it twice.


That looks interesting. Thank you.

Profit favors the prepared
Commissar Kate
Kesukka
#10 - 2014-06-24 23:03:58 UTC
Human stupidity seems to be infinite.

-k8

My Fanclub
Khergit Deserters
Crom's Angels
#11 - 2014-06-25 00:06:21 UTC
Bagrat Skalski wrote:
Quote:
I'm having a difficult time seeing how the infinite can exist without everything being cyclical, repeating forever, even down to my writing of this post.


Infinity does not exclude the probability of you doing circles, but your next circle will be somewhere else at the time. Well, it looks more like a sine wave really but it is from a different point of view, not yours.


That's brilliant Bagrat. And it makes me want to discuss something I'm really fascinated with, which is the physics of acoustics. Especially, in music. 'Harmonic' waveforms, "overtones" created by waves, transference of acoustic waves between different materials. And why does the brain find an A note (440 hz) followed by an E note (659.25 hz) pleasant, but not very pleasant if the A is followed by a B note (493.88 hz)?

Anyway, sorry, for another discussion someday.
Jonah Gravenstein
Machiavellian Space Bastards
#12 - 2014-06-25 00:26:55 UTC
Albert Einstein wrote:
Two things are infinite: the universe and human stupidity; and I'm not sure about the universe.

In the beginning there was nothing, which exploded.

New Player FAQ

Feyd's Survival Pack
Kaarous Aldurald
Black Hydra Consortium.
#13 - 2014-06-25 00:44:03 UTC
Jonah Gravenstein wrote:
Albert Einstein wrote:
Two things are infinite: the universe and human stupidity; and I'm not sure about the universe.


/thread

"Verily, I have often laughed at the weaklings who thought themselves good because they had no claws."

One of ours, ten of theirs.

Best Meltdown Ever.
Commissar Kate
Kesukka
#14 - 2014-06-25 00:55:38 UTC
Jonah Gravenstein wrote:
Albert Einstein wrote:
Two things are infinite: the universe and human stupidity; and I'm not sure about the universe.


I was gonna quote that but could not remember exactly how it was.

-k8

My Fanclub
Evei Shard
Shard Industries
#15 - 2014-06-25 01:37:01 UTC
Commissar Kate wrote:
Jonah Gravenstein wrote:
Albert Einstein wrote:
Two things are infinite: the universe and human stupidity; and I'm not sure about the universe.


I was gonna quote that but could not remember exactly how it was.


If any given thing, be it time, distance, temperature, or otherwise is infinite, then stupidity is also, potentially, infinite, but only because the number of humans would also be infinite. A given individual cannot be infinitely stupid. It is like saying a vacuum can contain less than zero air. At some point, a person could be determined to be completely and utterly stupid, but that's where it ends.

Profit favors the prepared
Webvan
All Kill No Skill
#16 - 2014-06-25 04:16:51 UTC
Every given moment of eternal past would need to have occurred to reach this point in time. So, it cannot be infinite in the finite sense. I would think that the infinite is such as a loop of sorts, or a singularity, of both time and space, and being at all possible points of moments within that loop. From that loop, a finite splinter can occur, the infinite and the finite co-existing yet separate; connected at a point from the infinite.

You are looking for "science" but science can't exist, as the scientific process requires observation. So you are left with theory or philosophy.

I'm in it for the money

Ctrl+Alt+Shift+F12
Riyria Twinpeaks
Perkone
Caldari State
#17 - 2014-06-25 04:24:03 UTC  |  Edited by: Riyria Twinpeaks
Maybe you've heard about that saying, that, choosing a suitable encoding, we could find Shakespeare's works encoded in the decimal places of pi. Or really any other conceivable texts.
This assumption is also because of infinitiy, as pi has an ininite amount of decimal places without recurring patterns/cycles (as all transcendental numbers), but assuming the decimal digits of pi follow a somewhat random distribution. Edit: better saying "behave like a random sequence".

This is not proven, however.
Imagine you construct a number the following way:

0.10110111011110111110... and so on. After each 0 you add one more 1 than there were after the previous 0. Let it never stop.

Now you have a number with infinitely many decimal places, and without a repeating pattern/cycle, in those decimal places.

Yet you'll never find Shakespeare's texts anywhere there.


Or a very simple example: imagine "counting to infinity": 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, ... and so on.
Even though there are infinitely many numbers you'll never reach a negative number.

Infinity doesn't mean everything will happen eventually. It "only" means everything possible will happen eventually.

So you see, even if time is infinite, that doesn't mean entropy will lose.


Now, when it is about every possible iteration of existence: That's actually what the many worlds interpretation of quantum theory states, I believe: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Many-worlds_interpretation
That there are enough parallel universes so that there actually is one for every imaginable and possible state the universe could be in.
Webvan
All Kill No Skill
#18 - 2014-06-25 04:43:09 UTC
And if you really want to bend your brain about time, study the singularity. Study the event horizon. Take a ride into black hole theory. Melt your brain on that for a few short decades. From there, you can get the idea that space and time has limitation, and the rules are not set in stone. I would conclude that we have our time and space, and that there are other forms of time and space that can exist beyond our own existence. But what we know of all there is, is only our present location wherever that may be. Personally, I think we are in a sort of bubble. But not a bubble of infinite bubbles, a unique finite bubble within the infinite verse.

I'm in it for the money

Ctrl+Alt+Shift+F12
Evei Shard
Shard Industries
#19 - 2014-06-25 05:02:41 UTC
Riyria Twinpeaks wrote:
Maybe you've heard about that saying, that, choosing a suitable encoding, we could find Shakespeare's works encoded in the decimal places of pi. Or really any other conceivable texts.
This assumption is also because of infinitiy, as pi has an ininite amount of decimal places without recurring patterns/cycles (as all transcendental numbers), but assuming the decimal digits of pi follow a somewhat random distribution. Edit: better saying "behave like a random sequence".

This is not proven, however.
Imagine you construct a number the following way:

0.10110111011110111110... and so on. After each 0 you add one more 1 than there were after the previous 0. Let it never stop.

Now you have a number with infinitely many decimal places, and without a repeating pattern/cycle, in those decimal places.

Yet you'll never find Shakespeare's texts anywhere there.


Or a very simple example: imagine "counting to infinity": 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, ... and so on.
Even though there are infinitely many numbers you'll never reach a negative number.

Infinity doesn't mean everything will happen eventually. It "only" means everything possible will happen eventually.

So you see, even if time is infinite, that doesn't mean entropy will lose.


Now, when it is about every possible iteration of existence: That's actually what the many worlds interpretation of quantum theory states, I believe: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Many-worlds_interpretation
That there are enough parallel universes so that there actually is one for every imaginable and possible state the universe could be in.


Thank you. That adds a lot of clarity to it.

On a side note about the quantum theory.. that's sort of what got me started down this path. The question came to mind: "if every possible universe exists, does that mean one exists in which multiple states do not exist?"

It's silly stuff, but when one can't sleep, and when stupid internet issues make it impossible to play Eve....

Profit favors the prepared
Riyria Twinpeaks
Perkone
Caldari State
#20 - 2014-06-25 05:25:04 UTC
Evei Shard wrote:
[...]

Thank you. That adds a lot of clarity to it.

On a side note about the quantum theory.. that's sort of what got me started down this path. The question came to mind: "if every possible universe exists, does that mean one exists in which multiple states do not exist?"

It's silly stuff, but when one can't sleep, and when stupid internet issues make it impossible to play Eve....


Related
I don't really know how accurate the explanation in that video is, but I found it interesting to watch.
12Next page