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A crazy thought: Could causality not be real?
#11
RE: A crazy thought: Could causality not be real?
(May 13, 2014 at 12:18 pm)Chuck Wrote:
(May 13, 2014 at 4:44 am)Freedom of thought Wrote: A philosophical thought came to me while I was in the shower of all places, causality might not even be real.

According to Einstein's theory of relativity, all actions/events are relative to each other, there is no such thing as an absolute reference frame. All reference frames are just as real as another. When I throw a ball, I am causing it to move when I push it, right? Well, the reference frame on the ball says the ball isn't being pushed at all, the ball is staying still and the person who is throwing the ball is moving away. Thus, all reference frames cancel each other out, the balls frame of reference is just as real as the ball throwers frame of reference, which means there is no such thing as causality. When we push an object we think it causes it to move forward, but from the reference frame of the object, everything else is moving around it. What do you all think? Am I onto something, or am I just crazy?


Ah, No. You are confusing identity of the agent of casuality with existence of casaulity.

In this case, agent of casuality is not frame dependent. Einstein did say an accelerated frame of reference, which is what would surround the ball you throw, is not the same as an inertial frame of reference, which is what surrounds you. So they don't cancel each other out. The ball in an accelerated frame of reference will know it is in an acclerated, and not an inertial, frame of reference. Therefore you throwing the ball does not cause the ball to feel as if it was the ball that is throwing you. There will be no confusion as to the agent of casaulity

I see, so there's different types of frames of reference which can be used for this example. That clears up a lot.

(May 13, 2014 at 5:12 pm)Hegel Wrote:
(May 13, 2014 at 4:44 am)Freedom of thought Wrote: Am I onto something, or am I just crazy?


To me it simply makes no sense to say that causality is not real. Why? There are a couple of reasons. First, even if one accepts you argument, causality IS real within the frames of reference. ToR is a form of traditional realism, at least when it is generalized into a model of space time structure. And you forget that there ARE objective points of reference (inertial co-ordinates), and is it not the case that fundamentally singularity (Big Bang) is such point of reference? (I am not certain about this) In any case, time has an arrow, it is not reversible, as TD shows; but ToR is reversible... It is not the full view (there's also QM).

In any case, even if you think (like Kant) that causality, space and time are in fact a forms of "transcendental subject", still this form must be real, for you are real.

In any case ToR does not, as far I understand, imply in any sense that causality is not real, but one can make the claim that "time is not real", it is an "Illusion" or whatever. Or at least some make such claims.

So what's the point? Don't take the map (model of physics, which, if ToR is considered alone, seems to imply a kind of non-temporal picture of reality, in which time and space are totally inter-changeable) for reality. In some sense causality must be real, because it makes no sense to say it is an "illusion". I am a realist, but just as reasonable as it is to make these obscure claims that are at odds with all everyday common sense sense of reality, it would be to say reality is what we experience and those nice models of physicists are but instrumental models to predict how things go in this reality. The truth is, I guess, between these extremes.


Well, I don't think common sense has any bearing on anything. There are theories which state the universe is a hologram, and 3d space is an illusion. Just because it's intuitive doesn't mean it can't be true. Everything we think we know could easily be false. Also, I didn't say causality isn't real, I wasn't making such assertions, I was just doing some silly armchair philosophy hahaha.
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#12
RE: A crazy thought: Could causality not be real?
What causes causality? Is a cosmic finger required to flick the first domino?

I don't much go in for conspiracy theories. I prefer to double down on commons sense. Keeps me out of overly convoluted rabbit holes and life's just too short to spend it all underground.
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#13
RE: A crazy thought: Could causality not be real?
(May 14, 2014 at 1:18 am)whateverist Wrote: What causes causality? Is a cosmic finger required to flick the first domino?

I don't much go in for conspiracy theories. I prefer to double down on commons sense. Keeps me out of overly convoluted rabbit holes and life's just too short to spend it all underground.

But if Alice never went down the rabbit hole, she never would have found wonderland.
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#14
RE: A crazy thought: Could causality not be real?
Touche. On the other hand it is a pretty wonderful world topside as well.
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