From: Glenn Morton (glennmorton@entouch.net)
Date: Sun Sep 07 2003 - 11:11:25 EDT
Hi Wayne,
>-----Original Message-----
>From: asa-owner@lists.calvin.edu [mailto:asa-owner@lists.calvin.edu]On
>Behalf Of Dawsonzhu@aol.com
>Sent: Sunday, September 07, 2003 8:57 AM
>But this brings me back to one thing that I brought up before. If this
>is the case, I would also think we would have to conclude that at least
>some of the claims of ESP are true, unless the human mind is completely
>and utterly non-quantum in nature.
>
>Could we also know something of the mind of God?
If your assumption is true--i.e. that MWH gives rise to ESP and ESP is true,
then I would have to ultimately agree with Steve Bishop that Christianity
then has serious problems.
>
>I'm not arguing for a strong form of
>Penrose' model of consciousness (QM driven), I think much
>of the mind is pretty much meat, but I would argue that the QM is the
>salt which makes those unique features of individuality. For lack
>of better words, provisional dualism. If our brains are strictly a
>classical
>system of chaos, then the order that comes out of them should be
>far more pedestrian. There should be no reason to desire to survive,
>no reason to need to know why we are here. A robot doesn't "care"
>if it is alive, and Penrose did at least present a persuasive argument
>that consciousness cannot be algorithmic in nature. Understanding
>simply doesn't come out of an algorithm, a mind must discover that
>understanding and program it in.
Penrose, imo, does have something in that our brains are not algorithmic.
The fact that we can know that Godelian statemens are true, but no algorithm
can prove them to be true argues that we are not algorithmic. Others, like
Lowenstein, believe in something similar to what Penrose beleives, but
chooses other parts of the anatomy than the micro-tubules.
“Now, a computer of this sort—a device subject to the laws of quantum
physics—is what Penrose postulates to be operating in the brain. This view
does not disregard the classical digital brain activity. The two
computational operations would exist side-by-side in our brain, though at
different levels of energy and matter.” Werner Lowenstein, The Touchstone of
Life, (New York: Oxford University Press, 1999), p.317
**
“However, this does not exhaust the possibilities. There are other
dielectric candidates in cells that show more promise. They form part of the
cytoplasmic ground substance, a net stretching through the interior of cells
that is made of finer filaments than the microtubules. That net, or at least
a major component of it, fulfills requisite 2 and bids fair for requisite 1.
Indeed, this is no ordinary net—its mesh holds organized water! Or perhaps I
should say the mesh organizes the water, because the protein constituents
make hydrogen bondings with the surrounding water, ordering it. But it’s not
the information in the molecular order that I am harping on, but that in the
quantum order—the information inherent in the quantum states of the hydrogen
atoms.” Werner Lowenstein, The Touchstone of Life, (New York: Oxford
University Press, 1999), p. 317-318
>
>We know that microtubules do not work very effectively, but with so many
>synapses in the brain, it may only require a very occasional success
>to have a state called "consciousness". You're claiming that we only need
>some 20000 registers to get a quantum computer to prove that there are
>other universes. As I recall, we have billions of synapses in our brains.
>If even a few of them fire in the right configuration, you have a feeble
>but practical quantum computer for that fleeting moment. If a quantum
>computer is as powerful as it is claimed, then surely a fully functioning
>quantum computer in our brains would be too much for any mind to handle.
>
>Perhaps lower forms of life also have access to this quantum state
>to a lesser extent than ourselves.
>
>So it seems to me that one of consequences that must follow with this is
>that the purported ESP also is real. If we (Waynes) are in multiple
>locations,
>we are also entangled, and that would mean that, unless the brain is 100%
>absolutely classical in its function, we should also have access to that
>information if only indirectly.
In Deutches' sense, I would believe you are saying?
>
>Another thing, following from Blake's idea.
>Salvation could come to all the
>Waynes and Glenns in the other universes where-ever they are in their
>level of sin because God's grace will keep the other Waynes from becoming
>those ax murders, embezzlers, evil dictators, etc. or make them repent and
>also accept Christ. It takes only ONE Glenn to accept Christ as a personal
>savior to save all Glenns.
But if there are circumscriptions on the nature of the other worlds, then it
isn't really the MWH we are speaking of. If in no other universes can I
become an ax-murderer, then all things consistent with the laws of physics
can't happen.
Likewise the Waynes.
>Salvation is not just the eternal life, in my opinion,
>salvation is also in this life, because a believer who _really_ walks
>obediently
>with Christ is likely to be saved from serious sin in this life.
Agreed, and that is why information theory forces salvation ot have a
physical mark--knowledge of salvation in the believer's brain.
>That may be
>as state change in the whole ensemble of Waynes. Thermodynamic potentials
>are usually sharply peaked, why not the state function of the human mind?
>If the mind is on Christ, then a snap shot in most universes could
>also show
>a Glenn who is obedient to Christ. Of course, there would be some stray
>Glenns, but they would eventually conform to the general population
>distribution. A life absorbed in sin would also be reflected in that
>distribution.
I could agree if one can hold that a particular DNA pattern makes it
incapable of rejecting Christ. That, of course would be hard to do.
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