Random thoughts inspired by "Deeper Man"
This nerdy and ignorant comment is inspired by page 13 of Bennett’s “Deeper Man” regarding this notion that in the physical world, or the world of function, “we are dealing with how things behave, not with what they are.” I am trying to convince myself that this is, in fact, true.
Building block of life are elementary particles associated with either matter or force. OK, let's start with matter, how is it defined? Matter is usually defined in terms of mass and volume and something about radiation (matter emits or reflects radiation), that’s how matter can be directly observed. It’s not a good definition because there is “dark matter” which supposedly comprises 26% of the density matter in the universe (only 4% is ordinary matter, and the other 70% is “dark energy”) is not observed directly but it is detected indirectly. Can anyone define "matter" better? Or this proves that we cannot define anything in terms of essence?
Building block of life are elementary particles associated with either matter or force. OK, let's start with matter, how is it defined? Matter is usually defined in terms of mass and volume and something about radiation (matter emits or reflects radiation), that’s how matter can be directly observed. It’s not a good definition because there is “dark matter” which supposedly comprises 26% of the density matter in the universe (only 4% is ordinary matter, and the other 70% is “dark energy”) is not observed directly but it is detected indirectly. Can anyone define "matter" better? Or this proves that we cannot define anything in terms of essence?
Comment
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Comment by Yevgeniy on October 9, 2009 at 2:24pm -
Exactly, you get into a complete stupor - that just shows that he is indeed right. You get this strange blank feeling when you ask yourself what is this glass, pen, window?
We can only answer a question "What is this thing used for". Functions we can describe, processes we can describe, essence we can't. We can only give it a name - energy, the thing, building block, etc.
And unfortunately we have to live with it in the world of function.
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