h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

In case anyone visits...

I'm interested to hear from people who have mystical/deep/religious/ views of the world that they can explain in scientific terms (please note this proviso) or visa versa. They don't have to be complete or entirely sane in themselves. However the explanation must be sane and logical as far as it can be. No appeals to faith or unsupportable contradictions with established science allowed. Supportable contradictions will be welcome.

Any experts in particle physics, complexity, conciousness, non linear dynamics, cosmology or classical guitar who have the time to waste chatting to a non specialist will be made most welcome. As will anyone who thinks they can write good song lyrics.

To kick things off I'll stick my neck out. Does it mean anything to anyone that there appears to be a strong case, under certain quite common conditions, for saying that one plus one equals not two, but either one or three, or some mixture of one and three? I could elaborate but for now am interested in whether this creates any replies without an explanation. I suppose it's a kind of sanity check.

Fascinating. And no, I'm saying that like Spock does. Well okay, maybe a little.

Anyhoo, I wandered in here after I read a post of yours that seemed to bear a great deal of similarity to my own philosophy on ... well, science and religion, actually. Think it was the "Science is Crap" conversation ...

But, to answer your question, I was thinking a bit about your statement ... that "one plus one equals not two, but one or three or some mixture of one and three" ... in a sense, I can see part of that statement having some valid thought processes behind it What I mean is, it has to do with how one defines numbers. For example, assuming "one" is defined as a singular whole, and the action of "plus" is defined as a combination/conjunction operation, "equals" means the result of the operation, then you have to decide on what to call the end result. Defining it in terms of "one" and "something else" simply write a definition for the result - you can call it whatever you like, but the fact is that it is the combination of "one plus one" that we're talking about. Two is such a combination - namely of "one plus one" - but there are others. In fact, "three" (which I shall suddenly define as "one plus one plus one") combined with NEGATIVE "one" (or a debt of "one") is the same as "one plus one" which, because I'm tired of writing all this out, will suddenly call "two." Oh dear, I've gone and said "two."

So, I dunno how this helps your "sanity check" at all. I am not an expert in particle physics, non-linear dynamics, or cosmology, but I am a nuclear safety engineer (not *quite* an expert at it yet - it's only been five years) and I do play classical (as well as flamenco) guitar. I also play my other guitars quite a lot, and I pretend to know what I'm doing with synthesizers, though I prefer analog devices possibly because they are so wonderfully quirky and frustrating that they do not merely encourage spontaneity but in fact apply the much-ballyhooed Chaos Theory of the Mathematics of complex systems to their contol circuits in effect REQUIRING that every single time one sits down to make a sound it winds up totally different than planned. I'm long-winded sometimes, so forgive the rambling. Well, that's about it. Feel free to click on my initials and wander on over to my own page. Pleased to meet ya, for what it's worth. Wanna talk about guitars? Heh.

Hi JD. Good to hear from you.

What you write about the 1+1 thing isn't what I had in mind but it's not unconnected, and I'm impressed that you had a crack at it. I'm not sure I can explain it well but...

the point is that 'one' is a concept or a thing (I suspect the two are the same). To have two concepts/things to add together they must be different If they are wholly identical they must be the same thing in the same place, in other words one thing. So in that case 1+1 is not really a sensible expression, or it is the tautology 1+1=1.

If they are different then they are not identical in the same way that 1 and 1 are identical. So in this case added together, as concepts/things, they form a third concept/thing. So 1+1=3 in the sense that there must be two concepts in order to perform 1+1, and the action of adding creates a third. Any two concepts added together creates a third. So to the extent that they are similar 1+1=1, and to the extent that they are different 1+1=3. However they never sum to 2!

This may seem a mildly insane train of thought. But we understand the world in terms of our concepts of it. What this says, if you follow it through, is that the first concept gave rise to all the rest. The first concept was the first axiom, the rest of our Universe follows from it. Another way - any two conceptions of opposites, hot/cold, light/dark, existence/non-existence, will, when combined, give rise to third, and a chain reaction starts which creates all the rest. Because any combination of two gives rise to another.

This is much like mathematics. The first axiom gives rise to the whole structure. Once you have, say, the concept of zero all other numbers follow from it, and all relationships from pi to calculus.

Thoughts? Anyway - keep going with the album. I also play clasical guitar. Used to play electric in bands but found more substance in Bach. I run a recording studio and label, among other stuff, so I'm interested in most aspects of music and the biz.

I envy you Los Alamos but walking is also great here in Yorkshire, England, just a lot wetter.

Oh yeah - I agree - the Simpsons is (American) humour and writing at its best - some days I think it's the best thing on television. I'm in awe at the creativity.