Science, Statistics and the Supernatural
The issue with the supernatural is not whether it's part of the universe, but whether it is bound by the same laws as all the other elements of the universe. The bizarre claim about ghosts is that they somehow obey some laws but not others, for no obvious reasons.
Something supernatural could, in principle, interact with the universe sometimes but not at others. If it is operating outside of natural laws, that doesn't obviously preclude it from sometimes interacting with things that do obey those laws, either by its own choice to obey those laws ("186,000 miles per second, it's not just a good idea, it's the law"), or by accident in the course of some random fluctuation of its supernatural nature.
The obvious rejoinder to this, leaped upon by a bunch of people in comments, is that if the supernatural doesn't behave according to known laws of nature, that just means that the known laws are incomplete, and some more complete theory would encompass the seemingly supernatural. Which is true as far as it goes, but misses a subtle point, namely the determinability of those laws. To paraphrase a famous "law," a sufficently advanced magic might be undetectable by science.
This is, in many ways, a question of practicality. That is, in order to be able to determine the rules governing some aspect of the universe, you need to be able to show that they behave in a consistent and repeatable manner. Which requires the ability to run large numbers of experiments (or make large numbers of observations), and knowledge of all the parameters that might affect the operation of the system. If the number of tests you can do is limited, or you do not have the ability to keep track of possible confounding factors, then it can be all but impossible to figure out what's going on.
One sort-of-example of this is the thought experiment I used in to explain decoherence, which is more or less the same line I used in this old post on Many-Worlds . If you want to see quantum mechanical behavior in some system, you generally look for an interference effect of some sort, but since quantum mechanics is inherently probabilistic, that requires you to repeat the same experiment many times, and trace out an interference pattern in the probability distribution as you vary some quantity. If your system interacts with a randomly fluctuating environment, however, and those environmental interactions can shift your pattern by at least half a wavelength, you lose the ability to detect the interference, even though it's still taking place.
Its Almost Supernatural - News
It's almost time for Comic-Con 2011, and more information is being revealed about which shows, movies, and more have panels at the upcoming event. There will be some returning favorites, including a hit CW drama. The WB has announced the schedule for
The issue with the supernatural is not whether it's part of the universe, but whether it is bound by the same laws as all the other elements of the universe. The bizarre claim about ghosts is that they somehow obey some laws but not others,
A lot of noteworthy films are making their way to home video this week, including a new action movie from Liam Neeson, a family film based on the works of writer Jeff Kinney, and a supernatural drama starring Matt Damon.
Two factors set Kicking Daisies apart; their age (they were barely teenagers when they coalesced three years ago) and their almost supernatural chemistry. “That's the amazing thing. We're all different ages and we're all from different places,
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Science, Statistics and the Supernatural : Uncertain Principles
The issue with the supernatural is not whether it's part of the universe, but whether it is bound by the same laws as all the other elements of the universe. The bizarre claim about ghosts is that they somehow obey some laws but not others, for no obvious reasons.
Something supernatural could, in principle, interact with the universe sometimes but not at others. If it is operating outside of natural laws, that doesn't obviously preclude it from sometimes interacting with things that do obey those laws, either by its own choice to obey those laws ("186,000 miles per second, it's not just a good idea, it's the law"), or by accident in the course of some random fluctuation of its supernatural nature.
The obvious rejoinder to this, leaped upon by a bunch of people in comments, is that if the supernatural doesn't behave according to known laws of nature, that just means that the known laws are incomplete, and some more complete theory would encompass the seemingly supernatural. Which is true as far as it goes, but misses a subtle point, namely the determinability of those laws. To paraphrase a famous "law," a sufficently advanced magic might be undetectable by science.
This is, in many ways, a question of practicality. That is, in order to be able to determine the rules governing some aspect of the universe, you need to be able to show that they behave in a consistent and repeatable manner. Which requires the ability to run large numbers of experiments (or make large numbers of observations), and knowledge of all the parameters that might affect the operation of the system. If the number of tests you can do is limited, or you do not have the ability to keep track of possible confounding factors, then it can be all but impossible to figure out what's going on.
One sort-of-example of this is the thought experiment I used in to explain decoherence, which is more or less the same line I used in this old post on Many-Worlds . If you want to see quantum mechanical behavior in some system, you generally look for an interference effect of some sort, but since quantum mechanics is inherently probabilistic, that requires you to repeat the same experiment many times, and trace out an interference pattern in the probability distribution as you vary some quantity. If your system interacts with a randomly fluctuating environment, however, and those environmental interactions can shift your pattern by at least half a wavelength, you lose the ability to detect the interference, even though it's still taking place.
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