this post was submitted on 06 Aug 2024
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Science Memes

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[–] [email protected] 9 points 3 months ago

I dont care about particles moving through walls because of science, i want to move through walls by yelling a word because of magic

[–] [email protected] 31 points 3 months ago (4 children)

As a former evangelical Christian, the natural universe we inhabit is magical and exciting and fascinating in a way that it simply isn't when you believe it was the creation of an all-powerful God as basically a training ground for Heaven or whatever.

There is so much more to learn and understand. It is fucking awesome!

[–] [email protected] 4 points 3 months ago (5 children)

I do agree but if you wanted to make to case for 'God' they could have made sure some of their creatures evolved to understand his work, assuming they did it in a logical way. I'm not a person with faith but just try and think a way is possible, though usually trying to understand weird comic and media universe type actions.

We are the way for a universe to understand itself (paraphrased from Sagan). Though his writing is much more interesting than this comment. I just think there's room for belief if it works for people, but not for the strict literal interpretations that many seem to believe.

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[–] [email protected] 8 points 3 months ago (1 children)

The rules for magic and the rules of existence in most fictional universes are significantly more defined (and, arguably, more solid) than the rules for science and existence in this world.

Even the brush off of "Its magic. I don't have to explain it," at least indicates that SOMEONE understands the effect and its relative existence.

If you find 5 people who say that they fully understand a single branch of science then I'd bet all of my money in my pocket that you found them in a padded recovery room sans shoe laces.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 3 months ago (2 children)

I always like the comparisons to how magical our world would seem to someone in an alternate reality where transistors or maybe even electricity wasn't a thing.

Like you can dumb it down to really magical sounding things like calling a cpu "runes etched in sand".

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[–] [email protected] 24 points 3 months ago (4 children)

Science is just a stepping stone to philosophy.

Actually, all roads lead to philosophy.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 3 months ago

You need philosophy to do science. So, philosophy leads to science, not the other way around.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 3 months ago (3 children)

Philosophy is just science, except without the requirement that things align with reality.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 3 months ago

TLDR: Science only exists because philosophers laid out the framework for science. The entire concept of the scientific method was designed and refined by philosophers, the whole concept of science was created by philosophers. The dangers and risks of science were identified by philosophers. It is the duty of the scientist to gather knowledge, it is the duty of the philosopher to question science.

Science runs because philosophy walked.

Philosophy of science looks at the underpinning logic of the scientific method, at what separates science from non-science, and the ethic that is implicit in science. There are basic assumptions, derived from philosophy by at least one prominent scientist, that form the base of the scientific method – namely, that reality is objective and consistent, that humans have the capacity to perceive reality accurately, and that rational explanations exist for elements of the real world. These assumptions from methodological naturalism form a basis on which science may be grounded. Logical positivist, empiricist, falsificationist, and other theories have criticized these assumptions and given alternative accounts of the logic of science, but each has also itself been criticized.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scientific_method#Philosophy_and_discourse

Francis Bacon (no direct relation to Roger Bacon, who lived 300 years earlier) was a seminal figure in philosophy of science at the time of the Scientific Revolution. In his work Novum Organum (1620)—an allusion to Aristotle's Organon—Bacon outlined a new system of logic to improve upon the old philosophical process of syllogism. Bacon's method relied on experimental histories to eliminate alternative theories. In 1637, René Descartes established** a new framework for grounding scientific knowledge in his treatise, Discourse on Method, advocating the central role of reason as opposed to sensory experience.** By contrast, in 1713, the 2nd edition of Isaac Newton's Philosophiae Naturalis Principia Mathematica argued that "... hypotheses ... have no place in experimental philosophy. In this philosophy[,] propositions are deduced from the phenomena and rendered general by induction." This passage influenced a "later generation of philosophically-inclined readers to pronounce a ban on causal hypotheses in natural philosophy". In particular, later in the 18th century, David Hume would famously articulate skepticism about the ability of science to determine causality and gave a definitive formulation of the problem of induction, though both theses would be contested by the end of the 18th century by Immanuel Kant in his Critique of Pure Reason and Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Science. In 19th century Auguste Comte made a major contribution to the theory of science. The 19th century writings of John Stuart Mill are also considered important in the formation of current conceptions of the scientific method, as well as anticipating later accounts of scientific explanation.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philosophy_of_science#Modern

Philosophy of science is the branch of philosophy concerned with the foundations, methods, and implications of science. Amongst its central questions are the difference between science and non-science, the reliability of scientific theories, and the ultimate purpose and meaning of science as a human endeavour. Philosophy of science focuses on metaphysical, epistemic and semantic aspects of scientific practice, and overlaps with metaphysics, ontology, logic, and epistemology, for example, when it explores the relationship between science and the concept of truth. Philosophy of science is both a theoretical and empirical discipline, relying on philosophical theorising as well as meta-studies of scientific practice.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philosophy_of_science

Does SCIENCE = TRUTH? (Nietzsche + Mega Man) - 8-Bit Philosophy

[–] [email protected] 2 points 3 months ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 2 points 3 months ago (2 children)
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[–] [email protected] 29 points 3 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago) (1 children)

A good illusion is still spectacular even when the illusion is broken. The magical world was boring to begin with.

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[–] [email protected] 4 points 3 months ago
[–] [email protected] 66 points 3 months ago (2 children)

As a matter of fact, reality is far more exciting than magic. Magic is limited by what our feeble human minds can dream up. Science has shown time and time again that reality is far more complex and far more interesting.

[–] [email protected] 15 points 3 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago) (5 children)

The difference between magic and science is that magic is centered on humans in the way that the entire cosmos was once thought to rotate around Earth. Both a magical universe and a scientific universe contain rules that humans can discover and tools that humans can use to influence their environment, but a magical universe is for humans and about humans whereas a scientific universe is not even indifferent to humans.

I admit that it would be nice to have gods and even the very fabric of reality care about what I want...

[–] [email protected] 22 points 3 months ago (1 children)

Sorry, hon. The magical universe may SEEM to be centered around you, but you're really just experiencing the side benefits of it being centered around me.

[–] [email protected] 12 points 3 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago) (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 3 points 3 months ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 1 points 3 months ago (1 children)

I think that's actually a question that can be taken seriously. My answer would be that a Turing-complete universe with a mechanism for decreasing local entropy would be sufficient to make it possible (not necessarily likely) that some sort of computing entity would arise and comprehend something like the anthropic principle.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 3 months ago

Pretty much everything in Terry Pratchett's oeuvre could and should be taken seriously. Praise Anoia that he also took it with a grain of salt, and with tongue stuck firmly in cheek!

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[–] [email protected] 31 points 3 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago)

God doesn’t play with dice
-Einstein

Tada!
-God

[–] [email protected] 84 points 3 months ago (5 children)

Just because you know how something works doesn't make it not magic

[–] [email protected] 30 points 3 months ago (2 children)

If you understand how quantum mechanics works, why are you keeping it a secret?

[–] [email protected] 28 points 3 months ago

Out of pure spite.

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[–] [email protected] 9 points 3 months ago (3 children)

The dictionary disagrees with you.

[–] [email protected] 11 points 3 months ago (1 children)

Sorry, but higher literature (DnD rulebooks) disagree with YOU

[–] [email protected] 1 points 3 months ago

This is Science Memes, not Fantasy Memes lol

[–] [email protected] 20 points 3 months ago

That's because it's a dic.

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[–] [email protected] 145 points 3 months ago (3 children)

Quantum mechanics unveils the spaghetti code on which our universe runs

[–] [email protected] 18 points 3 months ago

i can't wait to see the source comments

"this should NOT work, yet it does, if you touch this i will flay you alive"

[–] [email protected] 57 points 3 months ago (3 children)

String theory… further proof that breaking your spaghetti violates the fundamental laws of the universe.

[–] [email protected] 25 points 3 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago)

breaking your spaghetti

This angers the Flying Spaghetti Monster.

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[–] [email protected] 17 points 3 months ago

This is beautiful, it’s poetry.

[–] [email protected] 29 points 3 months ago (2 children)

If I watch too much fantasy world or read about it too immersively , I think about how all of their powers are normal to them. Light, fire, storms, electricity, the states of water, tides, giraffes, etc., they're all magical. We've just named them and have ways to describe how they work in an orderly, understandable, format.

[–] [email protected] 11 points 3 months ago (1 children)

Ah yes the giraffe, the most magical being

[–] [email protected] 3 points 3 months ago (1 children)

Scientists are this world's wizards

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