SRL Archive - Discussions & Debates

This is worth reading. It will get you thinking. This is genuinely a paradox i have thought up myself. If you cant be bothered reading the first bit, skip a couple of paragraphs down.

OK. So, I probably think a bit to much. I love long car journeys, because I can set my brain to muddle through these kind of questions. I never get any answers, and I generally bring up a couple more questions.
Anyway. I am guessing you all know what a paradox is.
For those who don't, below is a quick (and over-used) example:
You travel back in time and kill your grandfather before he meets your grandmother which precludes your own conception and, therefore, you couldn't go back in time and kill your grandfather.
You see how that works? By doing that, the very action you just did becomes impossible. It's like going back in time and killing yourself. You couldn't have killed yourself, because in the future you came back and killed yourself, and so on and so on.

So. We know what a paradox is. You may be asking what relevance this is to the real world, because obviously we are not going to travel back in time and kill ourselves.
Now, to explain the point of this thread, you also need to know what infinity is. Infinity is… infinity. Numbers go on forever right? There is no highest or smallest number. You can always times or divide any number by two, and make it bigger/smaller.

OK. So, back to the real world. Pick up a ruler, and see how long it is.
Now, if numbers are infinite, then you can measure anything to an infinite degree of accuracy. So, that ruler might say 30cm. But, if we measured it using a more accurate ruler, it might say 30.2cm. If we did it again, with yet a more accurate ruler, it might read 30.25cm. And so on. So, how long is it really?
We cannot know. Nothing can be measured to a singular point. That ruler's real length cannot ever be determined, because every reading you take on its length can always be measured more accurately, producing a different, and more accurate result.

Another one along the same lines is time. Time moves forward right? How is it possible. For time to move forward 10 seconds it must first pass 5 seconds, and before that 2.5, and before that 1 second, and before that 0.5 seconds. Basically, time has to pass an infinite array of points to reach any given distance, and for anything to reach infinity in a finite time is impossible.
This is very similar to one of Zeno's paradox's, which when i read about it inspired me to post this.

So whatcha think. Am i crazy, or is it impossible to move anywhere and measure anything?

I really like what you wrote, although I have no answer on your question.


I hope you continue writing stuff like that.
Rep.

Its a copy of my sythe thread, and you can read the responses here:
http://sythe.org/showthread.php?t=416533

From: bobng
This is worth reading. It will get you thinking. This is genuinely a paradox i have thought up myself. If you cant be bothered reading the first bit, skip a couple of paragraphs down.

OK. So, I probably think a bit to much. I love long car journeys, because I can set my brain to muddle through these kind of questions. I never get any answers, and I generally bring up a couple more questions.
Anyway. I am guessing you all know what a paradox is.
For those who don't, below is a quick (and over-used) example:
You travel back in time and kill your grandfather before he meets your grandmother which precludes your own conception and, therefore, you couldn't go back in time and kill your grandfather.
You see how that works? By doing that, the very action you just did becomes impossible. It's like going back in time and killing yourself. You couldn't have killed yourself, because in the future you came back and killed yourself, and so on and so on.

So. We know what a paradox is. You may be asking what relevance this is to the real world, because obviously we are not going to travel back in time and kill ourselves.
Now, to explain the point of this thread, you also need to know what infinity is. Infinity is… infinity. Numbers go on forever right? There is no highest or smallest number. You can always times or divide any number by two, and make it bigger/smaller.

OK. So, back to the real world. Pick up a ruler, and see how long it is.
Now, if numbers are infinite, then you can measure anything to an infinite degree of accuracy. So, that ruler might say 30cm. But, if we measured it using a more accurate ruler, it might say 30.2cm. If we did it again, with yet a more accurate ruler, it might read 30.25cm. And so on. So, how long is it really?
We cannot know. Nothing can be measured to a singular point. That ruler's real length cannot ever be determined, because every reading you take on its length can always be measured more accurately, producing a different, and more accurate result.

Another one along the same lines is time. Time moves forward right? How is it possible. For time to move forward 10 seconds it must first pass 5 seconds, and before that 2.5, and before that 1 second, and before that 0.5 seconds. Basically, time has to pass an infinite array of points to reach any given distance, and for anything to reach infinity in a finite time is impossible.
This is very similar to one of Zeno's paradox's, which when i read about it inspired me to post this.

So whatcha think. Am i crazy, or is it impossible to move anywhere and measure anything?

a very interesting way of thinking :)

although i dont have an answer and others may not either.

A "measurement" is only what you say it is i can say a glerbin is the space between my hands apart… just because you can measure something to an infinite degree does not make it impossible to measure because when you measure something it eventually will end in infinite 0's…

I dont quite get the second one… doesn't seem logical to me… idk…

From: sirlaughsalot
A "measurement" is only what you say it is i can say a glerbin is the space between my hands apart… just because you can measure something to an infinite degree does not make it impossible to measure because when you measure something it eventually will end in infinite 0's…

I dont quite get the second one… doesn't seem logical to me… idk…

You can get closer and closer to the real value, but never quite reach it, just like pi, it goes on forever and never stops.
The measurement is not the point. The point is you can not know the true length/measure of anything because you can always measure it more accurately. You can measure the atoms, then the protons/electrons that make them up, then whatever makes those up.

i knew you would bring up pi but the difference is, pi is the circumference to radius ratio… the only thing that limits us is current technology, and it may be a HUGE number but it does end (not sure about pi though)…

From: sirlaughsalot
i knew you would bring up pi but the difference is, pi is the circumference to radius ratio… the only thing that limits us is current technology, and it may be a HUGE number but it does end (not sure about pi though)…

Pi never ends, because it is an irrational number. They don't end and don't repeat ever.
I was using Pi as an example. Its end can never be reached, and it's true value can never be ascertained, much like any other measurements.
Numbers are infinite. Ergo, you can 'zoom' in on anything infinitely, getting smaller and smaller. Ergo, you can never stop zooming in on something, ergo you can never stop measuring something.

But that is assuming matter goes down however far you are talking about. Numbers may be infinite but matter is finite, and it doesnt seem logical to me that you could infinitely measure a finite object…

You are confusing infinity. You are infinity narrowing down the measurement of a finite object. You are simply fine-tuning your measurement to infinity.

Think of it as a .jpeg. You zoom in, and you see the pixels. Now imagine that you could reach those pixels, you would just keep zooming and zooming forever. The picture is finite, but the level of detail you can look at is infinite.

True… i hate paradii confuse me ;_;

I really enjoyed reading this, i've had alot thoughts about this stuff before, and i just cant come up with an answer.. As Evilchicken said, i hope you write more stuff like this ;)

i think your logic is flawed if you are saying that movement is an illusion, then i would have to say you are wrong (im really trying to not get started with my own argument of "is" -,-). Just because you cannot measure down to the exact length of something doesnt mean that movement accross that object is impossible.

if i move my hand 1 ft to my calculations, then i am moving it 1 ft plus or minus (lets be generous and say) 3 inches. I know that my hand was at from point A and Point B, which is at the least 9 inches and at the most 15 inches away. That means that my hand had to have moved at least some distance.

I do agree with you on the inability to measure down to any accurate measure. All we do is estimate.

EDIT: this is my kind of thinking. I hate being limited by other people's understanding of things. It makes it impossible to explain anything.

Put it this way.

Imagine that to get from point A to Z, you had to cross all the other numbers in the alphabet (B,C,D etc). Now, imagine that between each of those letters (say B and C) there are more letters (A to Z again), and between each of those sub-letters there are yet more letters, and so on and so on to infinity.
Ergo, to cross from point A to B, you must cross past B,C and D, and in turn cross an infinite number of letters, making it impossible. But because we can move, it makes it a paradox.

i get what you're saying about the numbers, but just because you can get infinately more accurate, it doesnt necessarily mean we cant move.

EDIT: and i understand more, what you're saying now than i did in my previous post. Now i can see what you're saying. But i dont think that its a strong enough paradox to hold up an argument. The actual movement of us is "proof" enough to "disprove" it. ehh that didnt really make sense. if you were on msn or something i would find it a lot easier to argue with you :).

As far as measurement goes, there is a finite limit to what you can measure. If you're using light, then the resolution limit is the wavelength of light that you're using. If you're using an electron microscope then the finite limit of resolution is dictated by the finite wavelength of an electron beam.

So although you can theoretically imagine that you could continually "zoom in" on something to measure it more precisely, that's not true, since the resolution is limited by your measuring device, no matter how closely you look at it.

he's saying that even though you cant see it, there is accurate measure to anything that you measure.

From: tarajunky
As far as measurement goes, there is a finite limit to what you can measure. If you're using light, then the resolution limit is the wavelength of light that you're using. If you're using an electron microscope then the finite limit of resolution is dictated by the finite wavelength of an electron beam.

So although you can theoretically imagine that you could continually "zoom in" on something to measure it more precisely, that's not true, since the resolution is limited by your measuring device, no matter how closely you look at it.

Its all theoretical.

From: Dan Cardin

EDIT: and i understand more, what you're saying now than i did in my previous post. Now i can see what you're saying. But i dont think that its a strong enough paradox to hold up an argument. The actual movement of us is "proof" enough to "disprove" it. ehh that didnt really make sense. if you were on msn or something i would find it a lot easier to argue with you :).

No, the fact we can move MAKES it a paradox. It does not disprove it. It proves that it is mathematically impossible to move.

As I understand it, according to quantum mechanics the position of matter is not static. Therefore, as you look closer and closer at an object, the position would eventually blur. So, let's say you can accurately measure an object's position to 0.25 nanometers. You could put that mark on your 1 nm ruler. Although you can continue to subdivide the measurement infinitely more, at some point you can no longer be certain that they object has not instantaneously moved or "teleported" across that distance. So it doesn't matter how many .9999999999s you add to the end if the position of the object itself is dictated by a statistical distribution that overlaps and overshadows the measurement boundary. The item would essentially be at more than one place at the same time.

So perhaps movement is created by concerted, directed quantum mechanical teleportation as the statistical distribution changes.

9.99999999999999 = 10 so doesn't matter how many .9's u add :)
but yer i like your thinking. Makes me think of stuff like that and annoys me cos i like answers and i cant answer that :P

~Spaz

From: tarajunky
As I understand it, according to quantum mechanics the position of matter is not static. Therefore, as you look closer and closer at an object, the position would eventually blur. So, let's say you can accurately measure an object's position to 0.25 nanometers. You could put that mark on your 1 nm ruler. Although you can continue to subdivide the measurement infinitely more, at some point you can no longer be certain that they object has not instantaneously moved or "teleported" across that distance. So it doesn't matter how many .9999999999s you add to the end if the position of the object itself is dictated by a statistical distribution that overlaps and overshadows the measurement boundary. The item would essentially be at more than one place at the same time.

So perhaps movement is created by concerted, directed quantum mechanical teleportation as the statistical distribution changes.

Or perhaps it's not? This paradox has been disproved by some very clever maths anyway.

Quantum particles have no real effect on the real world (i.e 'real-world' items cannot develop quantum traits) unless they are super-cooled to very very near apsolute zero, where a Boze Einsteinium Condensate is formed.

And 9.999r != 10.

Good that you figured this out, but this has already been found before.


But this does not make movement impossible, because you are still moving to a point, even though you may calculate it to an infinite accuracy. Also, when you move, you still move to a fixed point, but its you who decides where you want to stop counting the decimals.

Of course we can measure something, but only to an extent of perfectness.

Cut em2 it

Umm lets see here… *brings out bucket of quotes*

"Its all realative."

You can say something can move only by comparing it to another thing. Or you can say it didn't move whatsoever comparing it to another. Ergo… its all realative. Quantum mechanics hasn't even been touch hardly. We may never know the true ways, certainily not in my life time anyways… So you can't put a resolute point on anything. Like you said its all "theories" however, I'd like to keep a open mind and try to think "out of the box."

Guys. Your missing the point.
Of course you can move. I'm not saying you cant, because that's dumb. I'm saying that this mathematical puzzle says you can't. That makes it a paradox. Don't start proving that the quantum effects of particles vibrating and all that shit disproves it. Its a paradox.

How does it say we may not move? All I get out of it is that we may move, but to exactly where we do not know…

Because passing an infinite number of points in a finite time is impossible. Thus, you cannot move.

When you move, you move to a fixed position, one that may be figured down to the smallest amount possible. It does not mean you pass an infinity number of points, only that you can record and infinite number of points.

it does mean that you're passing through an infinate number of points. Im sad to say it but i kind of agree with you. but only kind of and i dont like it :mad:. Now give me another paradox i can agrue about! :p.

Okay then… your explanation is kinda poor and I think its a pathetic paradox then. :P
I get it, its just not a great paradox to argue.

well no paradoxes are arguable, that's why they're paradoxes :).

By definition a paradox proves itself, so there would be no argument in it.

From: R0b0t1
By definition a paradox proves itself, so there would be no argument in it.

Actually its the opposite. A paradox is a statement that disproves itself.

a statement that contradicts itself; "`I always lie' is a paradox because if it is true it must be false"

A paradox can be an apparently true statement or group of statements that leads to a contradiction or a situation which defies intuition; or it can be, seemingly opposite, an apparent contradiction that actually expresses a non-dual truth

Last time I read it it was a self proving statement that also disproves itself.

From: R0b0t1
Last time I read it it was a self proving statement that also disproves itself.

Yes. Its an apparently true statement which either renders itself false or proven facts render it false, as it is with this paradox. We can move, but this proves we can't.

A paradox can be an apparently true statement or group of statements that leads to a contradiction or a situation which defies intuition; or it can be, seemingly opposite, an apparent contradiction that actually expresses a non-dual truth