Carl Sagan: Underappreciated Genius

[RedBlackAttack]

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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tIMifWU5ucU
Niel deGrasse Tyson - The Effect of Islam on Science in the Middle East - 9th-12th Century

I've seen this... Good stuff. It is especially interesting in light of current religious fundamentalists in America flexing their collective muscle and trying to stunt the growth of science.

The Middle East was the epicenter of scientific discovery for hundreds of years before the fundamentalists took over. It should be a lesson to everyone, whether you are christian or agnostic.

Tyson certainly has a way with words. He is the closest thing to Sagan that we have today.

[Heilige]

Tyson certainly has a way with words. He is the closest thing to Sagan that we have today.

What about Michio Kaku??

[RidonKs]

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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tIMifWU5ucU
Niel deGrasse Tyson - The Effect of Islam on Science in the Middle East - 9th-12th Century

wildly fascinating, but still probably the low point of that particular speech. i've watched the 15 minute 'god of the gaps' lecture right before that part more times than i care to remember, and then after the arabic bit he dives into his 'stupid design', which i quite enjoy.

we have an entertainment complex in the middle of a sewage system!

still gotta love neil. so much excitement. f*ckin al-ghazali. lol

[RedBlackAttack]

What about Michio Kaku??

Kaku is obviously a brilliant man, but the only times that I have seen him speak, it involves extra terrestrials, which isn't the area of astronomy which interests me most. I'm sure he has other content out there that I just haven't seen, so I will just say that I am more schooled on Tyson than I am Kaku.

Feel free to present your favorite Kaku links. I'd be interested in watching.

[RidonKs]

kaku has a whole pile of sh*t on string theory all over youtube that i've been meaning to watch. i'm not sure he's got the presence of tyson or sagan (each in their unique way, of course), but he certainly has the intellect.

[Take Your Lumps]

What about Michio Kaku??

While I love Michio, most of the stuff I see him talking about fall into hypotheticals (he is a theoretical physicist after all lol)

I personally respond more strongly to biologists, cosmologists, astronomers, etc.

That being said though, I love his new Sci-Fi Science series on the Science Channel. Great stuff.

EDIT: ^^oooh...string theory does give me a hard on though. i'll have to check those out.

[RidonKs]

btw, i'm posting this here instead of making a new thread - i can't stop watching it

[RidonKs]

EDIT: ^^oooh...string theory does give me a hard on though. i'll have to check those out.

i know very very little about it. have you heard tyson's, err, criticisms?

[RedBlackAttack]

wildly fascinating, but still probably the low point of that particular speech. i've watched the 15 minute 'god of the gaps' lecture right before that part more times than i care to remember, and then after the arabic bit he dives into his 'stupid design', which i quite enjoy.



still gotta love neil. so much excitement. f*ckin al-ghazali. lol

Yep... God of the Gaps is incredibly interesting... Isaac Newton invoking intelligent design? Who would have thought possibly the greatest scientific genius to ever live would do such a thing?

It is an interesting commentary on the human mind reaching its capacity... Even the greatest human minds.

[Heilige]

Kaku is obviously a brilliant man, but the only times that I have seen him speak, it involves extra terrestrials, which isn't the area of astronomy which interests me most. I'm sure he has other content out there that I just haven't seen, so I will just say that I am more schooled on Tyson than I am Kaku.

Feel free to present your favorite Kaku links. I'd be interested in watching.

No problem. This is probably my favorite. This lecture is 4 parts. Enjoy!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m5UcJ...ayer_embedded#

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m22wD...eature=channel

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9Llt4...eature=channel

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=to9Ht...eature=channel

[RidonKs]

Yep... God of the Gaps is incredibly interesting... Isaac Newton invoking intelligent design? Who would have thought possibly the greatest scientific genius to ever live would do such a thing?

It is an interesting commentary on the human mind reaching its capacity... Even the greatest human minds.

i like it because it phrases an argument that everybody already knows in a more... persuasive and documented fashion. i mean, we've all employed the "well everybody used to believe that the world was flat" and the "why is religion slowly declining in popularity" arguments. the fact that everybody, even the great scientists, used to believe vehemently in a high power isn't really a secret. but to actually hear the quotes, and then to hear tyson phrase it the way he does - very eye opening.

although when he makes his major point by screaming "why isn't this number zero", you can kind of spin it two ways. i didn't fully understand his point until i had watched the lecture twice.

should brilliant scientists accept a personal god, because that's what every famous scientist has done in history? or should they reject a personal god, because of the full knowledge that the personal god accepted by every famous scientist throughout history has chronologically been used to explain less and less as man has understood more and more?

clearly his point is the latter, but the quote is:

85% of the scientists reject a personal god. but they missed the story - the real story is, why isn't this number 0%?

i have a feeling he just misspoke here, and meant "why isnt the number of scientists who accept a personal god 0%".




that brings up a really interesting point that i only recently stumbled upon though. guys like hawking and sagan and even einstein all believed in a 'god', but that god was nothing more than the cumulation of physical laws which explained the universe. since the term 'god' is used to explain the universe, and we're steadily understanding more and more about the universe, then eventually when we DO fully understand it (hawking thinks within the next 50 years or so) - we can just call THAT understand 'god'.

hawking also brought up an interesting point. if there is a quantum theory of gravity which can essentially 'explain' the cosmos, or at least the mechanisms which drive action in the cosmos, what if a major aspect of that theory is that it leads humanity (or just general intelligent life) AWAY from the truth? then you've got a paradox in which our search for a full descriptive theory is a PART of that very full descriptive theory! and then you shoot yourself in the head.

[RidonKs]

No problem. This is probably my favorite. This lecture is 4 parts. Enjoy!

thanks for the links. definitely going to check these out over winter break.

[barne100]

I just read Demon-Haunted World and that NEEDS to be required high school reading. I have run into too many fellow students that are graduating college as I am that have simply never learned what they should have and havent dropped the silly things they never should have taken as truth in the first place.

[RedBlackAttack]

i like it because it phrases an argument that everybody already knows in a more... persuasive and documented fashion. i mean, we've all employed the "well everybody used to believe that the world was flat" and the "why is religion slowly declining in popularity" arguments. the fact that everybody, even the great scientists, used to believe vehemently in a high power isn't really a secret. but to actually hear the quotes, and then to hear tyson phrase it the way he does - very eye opening.

although when he makes his major point by screaming "why isn't this number zero", you can kind of spin it two ways. i didn't fully understand his point until i had watched the lecture twice.

I took it as, it is proven throughout human history that the greatest scientific minds will invoke 'god' when they reach the absolute limit of their knowledge. That is, unless you develop a new kind of math or a new way of thinking, you aren't going to go any further. Thus, the fact that the number is not zero indicates that there are scientists out there who have come to that point... Maybe the modern world's greatest scientists, if history is a judge?

If you have exhausted every theory and it still doesn't explain the point you have reached, 'god' becomes the only logical answer... Until, generations later, when the unexplained occurrences that were attributed to 'god' become explainable.

That is where I thought he might be going, although I was also a bit unsure... Would the belief in 'god' for our modern scientists exhibit the fact that we have, in fact, reached our limit?

that brings up a really interesting point that i only recently stumbled upon though. guys like hawking and sagan and even einstein all believed in a 'god', but that god was nothing more than the cumulation of physical laws which explained the universe. since the term 'god' is used to explain the universe, and we're steadily understanding more and more about the universe, then eventually when we DO fully understand it (hawking thinks within the next 50 years or so) - we can just call THAT understand 'god'.

hawking also brought up an interesting point. if there is a quantum theory of gravity which can essentially 'explain' the cosmos, or at least the mechanisms which drive action in the cosmos, what if a major aspect of that theory is that it leads humanity (or just general intelligent life) AWAY from the truth? then you've got a paradox in which our search for a full descriptive theory is a PART of that very full descriptive theory! and then you shoot yourself in the head.

It isn't as if there are no examples of this happening throughout human history. There are theories that were believed and generally accepted as fact (the sun revolves around the earth) for hundreds of years. They were based on what was understood at the time as full-proof scientific theories developed by the world's greatest minds.

Yet, totally false and leading us in the opposite direction of the real answer to how our solar system works and our place in it. Now, we look back on those poor souls as unevolved hacks... Will our ancestors 500 years from now look back upon Hawking the same way? A great scientist that was simply incapable of understanding the true nature of humanity and our place in the galaxy?

Time will tell and we won't be around to see it, but it is certainly interesting to think about.

[RidonKs]

have simply never learned what they should have and havent dropped the silly things they never should have taken as truth in the first place.

that came off like you had specific examples. care to share, or were you in fact just speaking generally?