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bjones
Skeptic Friend
Australia
82 Posts |
 Posted - 09/21/2001 : 18:11:05
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Could this be the beginning of civilization as we know it? You may familiar with Brandon Carter's Doomsday argument. I one takes into account all the people that have lived in the past and all the people that will live in the future one may not be surprised to find that there is a prominant spike in population in the at about 20th and 21st century. Now wrote everybody's name down on a token and put them in a barrel then stirred them up and pick one out out there would be a much higher probability you will pick one that was born in that large population spike in the 21st century and the bombing of the World Trade Center may well be the beginning of the end that has been perpetuated but religious zealots and will rapidly decline to more modest levels then eventually taper off to extinction maybe perhaps thousands of years in the future.
Click on this URL if like to dealve into the subject more deeply
http://www.anthropic-principle.com/preprints/inv/investigations.html
B b
Remember: when you die your philosophy dies with you
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@tomic
Administrator
USA
4607 Posts |
Posted - 09/21/2001 : 18:20:20 [Permalink]
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Huh? I don't get that at all. And you mentioned taking into account all the people that will live in the future...how is that done if I may ask? This sounds like a bunch of bull to me.
@tomic
Gravity, not just a good idea...it's the law! |
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bestonnet_00
Skeptic Friend
Australia
358 Posts |
Posted - 09/22/2001 : 00:24:42 [Permalink]
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@tomic: It is a bunch of bull based on misuse of probability and assumption that there is something special about humans.
Radioactive GM Crops.
Slightly above background.
Safe to eat.
But no activist would dare rip it out.
As they think it gives them cancer. |
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bjones
Skeptic Friend
Australia
82 Posts |
Posted - 09/22/2001 : 17:43:27 [Permalink]
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quote:
Huh? I don't get that at all. And you mentioned taking into account all the people that will live in the future...how is that done if I may ask? This sounds like a bunch of bull to me.
@tomic
Gravity, not just a good idea...it's the law!
You have to come to terms with the fact the human race/species is not immortal. Sooner or later the human species will meet its demise like the dinosaurs. Let us hope is it later rather than sooner. Fingers crossed this time, because these religious fundamentalists are really the scurge of the earth hell bent on bringing down the civilized world so they can peddle their irrational dogma.
Bob
Remember: when you die your philosophy dies with you
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Tokyodreamer
SFN Regular
USA
1447 Posts |
Posted - 09/23/2001 : 17:30:18 [Permalink]
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quote:
You have to come to terms with the fact the human race/species is not immortal. Sooner or later the human species will meet its demise like the dinosaurs.
This is not at all a given. The human race could just as easily go on living, thriving, and advancing until the last star in the universe burns itself out.
What is your evidence to the contrary? The dinosaurs? You'll need to do much better than that...
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Hope springs eternal but there's no conviction
Actions mistaken for lip service paid
All this concern is the true contradiction
The world is insane... |
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@tomic
Administrator
USA
4607 Posts |
Posted - 09/23/2001 : 17:34:39 [Permalink]
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I have to agree with tokyo here. Besides what he said, the prevailing theory on dinosaur extinction is that an asteroid or several asteroids at different times hit the Earth causing an extinction every few millions years. Who know, maybe it will happen that way to us...or not. No one knows what's going to happen.
@tomic
Gravity, not just a good idea...it's the law! |
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bjones
Skeptic Friend
Australia
82 Posts |
Posted - 09/24/2001 : 15:56:07 [Permalink]
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quote:
This is not at all a given. The human race could just as easily go on living, thriving, and advancing until the last star in the universe burns itself out.
What is your evidence to the contrary? The dinosaurs? You'll need to do much better than that...
We are in a far more precarious position than the dinosaurs. At least no species dinosaur destroyed thousands of it own species for the sake of the unfounded religious belief they will go to the magic land in the sky when they sacrificed themselves. Perhaps we are just too clever for our own good, as these people who caused all that carnage in the WTC were highly intelligent and outwitted the CIA.
Bb
Remember: when you die your philosophy dies with you
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@tomic
Administrator
USA
4607 Posts |
Posted - 09/24/2001 : 16:08:08 [Permalink]
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Still waiting for you to do better than that....
@tomic
Gravity, not just a good idea...it's the law! |
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Tokyodreamer
SFN Regular
USA
1447 Posts |
Posted - 09/24/2001 : 16:16:18 [Permalink]
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quote:
Still waiting for you to do better than that....
Ditto...
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Hope springs eternal but there's no conviction
Actions mistaken for lip service paid
All this concern is the true contradiction
The world is insane... |
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James
SFN Regular
USA
754 Posts |
Posted - 09/24/2001 : 18:59:38 [Permalink]
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It's the end of the world as we know it
It's the end of the world as we know it
It's the end of the world as we know it
And I feel fine
The way I see it, christians are godless too...they just don't know it yet. |
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Torsten
New Member
Canada
16 Posts |
Posted - 09/24/2001 : 23:43:27 [Permalink]
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Just cruising through the posts here tonight and came across this topic. It's been awhile since I contemplated the doomsday argument as a consequence of the anthropic-principle and so I'm a little rusty.
Now, with that qualifier in place, it seems to me that bjones has missed an important point in introducing the doomsday argument, and that is that a probability is assigned to the survival of the human species over, say, the next century. And don't just dismiss this idea. Try to calculate the odds of a K-T type impactor hitting the Earth in the next century (astronomers may try this), or the odds of nuclear war ending the Earth as we know it (consider the doomsday clock, an attempt by the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists to estimate political tension leading to war in a nuclear world: http://www.bullatomsci.org/clock/doomsdayclock.html ). Numbers can be estimated for such things, even if they are wrong, but they are probably non-zero. In that case, the number of humans that ever existed and will exist can be estimated. And then, Bayes theorem (all about conditional probability) can be used to explore the implications of finding yourself alive at a certain point in the existance of the human race.
It potentially opens realms of discussion, if you're willing to take some time to read the arguments. Certainly, that is more than the nine minutes @tomic gave to reply to the original post.
More generally, there seems to be confusion between the anthropic principle and the argument from design. Bestonnet_00 asserts that the argument involves an assumption that there is something special about humans, but the anthropic principle as originally proposed actually suggests that observers should be skeptical of claims that they are observing from a privileged position. Further, to make what seems to be a dumb point, but something the proponents of the argument from design don't appreciate:-- we shouldn't be surprised to observe ourselves living in an improbable situation, if that is the sort of situation in which we, the observers, are most likely to exist.
Anyway, greatly disappointed by the pat dismissal of bjones. And this cheering for one another's view, what does that serve except to stifle discussion?
TK
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@tomic
Administrator
USA
4607 Posts |
Posted - 09/25/2001 : 00:46:38 [Permalink]
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While perhaps I wasn't nice in my reply to this i think I asked a fair question that received no reply. He says that one, for this doomsday argument, needs to take into account all the people that will live in the future. I have never seen this figure and frankly would be interested in seeing it and hearing how it was arrived at.
@tomic
Gravity, not just a good idea...it's the law! |
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Tokyodreamer
SFN Regular
USA
1447 Posts |
Posted - 09/25/2001 : 05:51:38 [Permalink]
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Anyway, greatly disappointed by the pat dismissal of bjones.
Well, maybe it's just me, but the original post is almost incomprehensible. I can't dimiss an idea that can't be adequately conveyed to me...
quote:
And this cheering for one another's view, what does that serve except to stifle discussion?
If you're referring to my "ditto" to @tomic, I'd hardly call that "cheering". I was simply voicing my agreement that I'd really like to know how it is possible to use the dinosaurs' extinction as evidence that another species must become extinct, just like they did.
You don't think this is a fair question?
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And if rain brings winds of change
let it rain on us forever.
I have no doubt from what I've seen
that I have never wanted more.
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marvin
Skeptic Friend
77 Posts |
Posted - 09/25/2001 : 11:13:18 [Permalink]
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According to Ronald Lee the cumulative population {ie all dead people} was projected to be 110 billion this year (2000), 6 billion of them still living, or 5.45 percent. Perhaps 6% in 2001, so if you write down all the names of the dead and the currently living mix them up and pick a name you would more than likely pick the name of a predecessor or person living before you. This is completely opposite of the first conjecture. In fact the ‘living' population would need to expand over 110 billion to have even a 50-50 chance. I may be wrong but in other words, following the name token barrel idea, currently a ‘living' name would have a ~6% chance of being picked. More importantly this number cannot increase very much in your lifetime {2050 est.~12 billion} also when the subset {finite or infinite} of future population is added the chance of selecting a ‘living' token will decrease.
The population growth rate has been dropping since 1965, while the current population may be increasing, the growth rate is on the slide {1950 = 1.47%, 2001 = 1.24%, 2044 = 0.50% est.}. That is, people are having fewer babies per couple, but the previous buildup of population will still result in a temporary net increase. The growth rate is more important to the future than the present population. The death rate will increase, eventually, with the increase in elderly population. |
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bjones
Skeptic Friend
Australia
82 Posts |
Posted - 09/25/2001 : 16:39:52 [Permalink]
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quote:
quote:
Anyway, greatly disappointed by the pat dismissal of bjones.
Well, maybe it's just me, but the original post is almost incomprehensible. I can't dimiss an idea that can't be adequately conveyed to me...
quote:
And this cheering for one another's view, what does that serve except to stifle discussion?
If you're referring to my "ditto" to @tomic, I'd hardly call that "cheering". I was simply voicing my agreement that I'd really like to know how it is possible to use the dinosaurs' extinction as evidence that another species must become extinct, just like they did.
You don't think this is a fair question?
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And if rain brings winds of change
let it rain on us forever.
I have no doubt from what I've seen
that I have never wanted more.
I think many of you will agree that some species of dinosaur very successful. If we can emulate their time on this Earth than we will be doing very well an we be still building great cities in the year 50,000,000AD. That is very optimistic.
But we must not delude ourselves into believing the the human species is immortal.
Bob
Remember: when you die your philosophy dies with you
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Tokyodreamer
SFN Regular
USA
1447 Posts |
Posted - 09/25/2001 : 17:02:17 [Permalink]
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But we must not delude ourselves into believing the the human species is immortal.
I still don't understand your certainty here. Humans certainly aren't invincible, but what is the proof that we won't continue to exist until the end of the universe (or beyond)?
What is your evidence that humans are more likely to die out than to continue prospering forever, just because the dinosaurs got a bit unlucky? After all, we have intelligence to help us survive, while they did not, and this could make all the difference.
I don't mean to sound as if I'm ridiculing your ideas, I really am curious. 
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And if rain brings winds of change
let it rain on us forever.
I have no doubt from what I've seen
that I have never wanted more.
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