A Revolution in Thought: Part Two

[davidm]

Originally Posted by peacegirl

Um yes. You keep calling me this, but you haven't answered any of my refutations, so the one being willfully ignorant is a matter of opinion.

You haven't given any refutations. You are pathetically ignorant. If you could but some day find out how ignorant you are, you would cringe and cry over your pathetic display here, covering now some 1,000 pages. It is truly sad.

[thedoc]

Originally Posted by Spacemonkey

How can objects ever be absorbing any light if the full spectrum of light is always bouncing off them?

The bounce must have been so hard that it shakes the photons up and when they settle down they are back to all 7 frequencies of whole light.

[ThreeLawsSafe]

Originally Posted by thedoc

Ah, the end all, be all, of vision. This is so precise and consice its all we need to know. I really do not see how anyone could question this or have any questions about how we see.

No, not really. It's more like, "The world, our hard-wired biases, and our culturally-engrained prejudices are revealed as we look out through the eyes." Vision is a combination of all three.

[Spacemonkey]

Originally Posted by thedoc

The bounce must have been so hard that it shakes the photons up and when they settle down they are back to all 7 frequencies of whole light.

Well yes, 7 frequencies, obviously. But then what was absorbed?

[thedoc]

Originally Posted by peacegirl

And I stand by this claim.

Good for you, I just hope you are not too lonely.

I've heard that the way to tell a really good farmer is that he is out standing in his field.

[Vivisectus]

[quote]

Originally Posted by peacegirl

This is not about relativity. This is a separate discovery which has to be proven on its own merits, not using another theory to automatically negate it.

Nevertheless it has clear implications that contradict relativity. They cannot both be true.

And you still have not dealt with the problem I mentioned, which is that your entire idea happens by means that are entirely unknown.

It is very much like saying that it happens by magic.

[quote]

Originally Posted by Vivisectus

Point two: Yes we can. Just not for very long, because light is what scientists call very very fast. It has already been explained to you, speaking slowly and clearly for the hard-of-thinking, that even if an object was 200 miles away, it would take light about a thousandth of second to cross that distance. In fact, a light-second is 186000 miles.

Man, you have not been following this thread, have you? Why do we get an image of an object that is within our visual range, but don't get an image of an object that's slightly out of visual range but in a straight line?

I answered that question already. Photons start in a small area, and spread thinner and thinner until there are too thinly spaced to detect. Remember the experiment with the jar of marbles and the cups? It is really not very difficult to understand.

Being that the light has more time to travel, we should be able to get a clear image from the information in the light only. If you can't answer this legitimate question, then none of your explanations about light hold any weight as far as I'm concerned.

This does indeed happen all the time. Hence we see supernovas that are long gone. And we can tell they are long gone because we measure neutrinos at the same time... neutrinos that needed to travel at close to boring old lightspeed!

Hey presto!

Now what causes something to be too small to be seen in efferent sight? I will give you a hint: you do not know!

[davidm]

Originally Posted by peacegirl

It's not changing the observed properties of light. The only difference is when an object absorbs certain wavelengths, the non-absorbed wavelengths are instantly at the film or retina.

No, they are not. This is well known, documented and fully understood.

If you were right, the apparent position of Mars in the sky, and its actual position, would be the same. They are not. NASA uses this difference to calculate how to send spacecraft to Mars.

If you were right, we would see the moons of Jupiter in real time, but it is child's play to show that we do not.

How do you account for these matters, peacegirl?

[thedoc]

Originally Posted by LadyShea

According to standard model of sight, the light travels from the lake surface to the eye.

But first it travels from the Sun to the mountain, then to the lake, and then to the eye. You wouldn't want to forget the best part of the trip. By the time those photons bounce off the lake they are probably really tired and cranky. That's why the reflected image is a bit wiggley they are getting restless.

[davidm]

Originally Posted by ThreeLawsSafe

A very, very important point.

-Isaac Newton
-Vincent Van Gogh
-Winston Churchill
-Virginia Woolf
-Leo Tolstoy
-Ernest Hemingway

The list goes on.

Insofar as any of these people could be said to be "mentally ill" (and let's not forget that less than fifty years ago, gay people were all held to be mentally ill!), when they were ill, they achieved nothing. Van Gogh could not paint or do anything during his worst episodes. Hemingway, when he was "mentally ill" did not write, and ended up killing himself. I have no idea why the other people are even included on the list. Isaac Newton was mentally ill? Really?

Mental illness, by and large, is a socio-political category made up to stigmatize people we don't like. OTOH, there are objective brain dysfunctions, from injury for example. And there are people who have difficulty coping with the real world; often they are stigmatized as mentally ill, but really, they may be wholly sane and their "ill" response is a response to world that is insanely put together. As was famously said of Van Gogh: He was was suicided by society.

[davidm]

Originally Posted by peacegirl

I've answered this. White light is constantly in motion, but when we look at an object what we see is a mirror image. Does a mirror image of a mountain on a lake travel?

How stupid!

The mirror image of a mountain on a lake is yet another refutation of Lessans! Remeber how you gabbled on ceaselessly for so long about how we see the object itself? But there IS NO mountain in the water; the image is composed of photons that glance off the water and impinge upon our eyes! That you keep using this example, which so dramatically refutes Lessans, as a confirmation of the buffoon's gobbledygook, is pathetic.

[thedoc]

Originally Posted by ThreeLawsSafe

No, not really. It's more like, "The world, our hard-wired biases, and our culturally-engrained prejudices are revealed as we look out through the eyes." Vision is a combination of all three.

But some have more than others, and some have overcome them to a degree. And I'm not sure I agree that biases are hard-wired, I know some instincts in animals are hard-wired, but Humans are a bit more flexable, at least some are.

[ThreeLawsSafe]

Originally Posted by davidm

No, they are not. This is well known, documented and fully understood.

If you were right, the apparent position of Mars in the sky, and its actual position, would be the same. They are not. NASA uses this difference to calculate how to send spacecraft to Mars.

If you were right, we would see the moons of Jupiter in real time, but it is child's play to show that we do not.

How do you account for these matters, peacegirl?

I second this motion. How does peacegirl account for NASA's fairly successful program of landers, rovers, and other probes to Mars, as well as to other planets. I mean, we landed the frikken Huygens probe into a large moon from another probe -- the Cassini. How did NASA pull off all of these astounding engineering feats with (according to peacegirl) an incorrect model of light?

Do you deny the success of the Mars probes, the Cassini, the Galileo, the Voyager probes, and all the rest, peacegirl?

[thedoc]

Originally Posted by Spacemonkey

Well yes, 7 frequencies, obviously. But then what was absorbed?

Obviously some were absorbed but after the bounce some of the photons obviously changed frequencies to fill in the gaps. Didn't you know that they could do that? Its just like changing radio stations when you want a different kind of music.

[ThreeLawsSafe]

Originally Posted by thedoc

But some have more than others, and some have overcome them to a degree. And I'm not sure I agree that biases are hard-wired, I know some instincts in animals are hard-wired, but Humans are a bit more flexable, at least some are.

If the brain isn't hard-wired to see in specific ways (ways that sometimes do not correspond with reality), then how do you explain optical illusions? How do you explain pareidolia? How do you explain the fact that people watch a two-dimensional screen (a TV) and enjoy it as a representation of 3D reality?

You think human beings don't have instincts? Whoa boy.

Here's a good book for you, both entertaining and educational:
The Blank Slate, by Steven Pinker.

[thedoc]

Originally Posted by davidm

Insofar as any of these people could be said to be "mentally ill" (and let's not forget that less than fifty years ago, gay people were all held to be mentally ill!), when they were ill, they achieved nothing. Van Gogh could not paint or do anything during his worst episodes. Hemingway, when he was "mentally ill" did not write, and ended up killing himself. I have no idea why the other people are even included on the list. Isaac Newton was mentally ill? Really?

Mental illness, by and large, is a socio-political category made up to stigmatize people we don't like. OTOH, there are objective brain dysfunctions, from injury for example. And there are people who have difficulty coping with the real world; often they are stigmatized as mentally ill, but really, they may be wholly sane and their "ill" response is a response to world that is insanely put together. As was famously said of Van Gogh: He was was suicided by society.

Well we all know the whole world is crazy, and needs to be kept confined, just ask Wonko the Sane.

[LadyShea]

All I said was that mentally ill people have things to offer. John Nash, and many artists and authors have had documented mental illnesses, and have offered the world things of value.

[Vivisectus]

Originally Posted by ThreeLawsSafe

If the brain isn't hard-wired to see in specific ways (ways that sometimes do not correspond with reality), then how do you explain optical illusions? How do you explain pareidolia? How do you explain the fact that people watch a two-dimensional screen (a TV) and enjoy it as a representation of 3D reality?

You think human beings don't have instincts? Whoa boy.

Here's a good book for you, both entertaining and educational:
The Blank Slate, by Steven Pinker.

or... why does the moon seem so big close to the horizon, but much smaller when it is higher up?

Turns out that is the brain re-working the image as well

[ThreeLawsSafe]

Originally Posted by davidm

Insofar as any of these people could be said to be "mentally ill" (and let's not forget that less than fifty years ago, gay people were all held to be mentally ill!), when they were ill, they achieved nothing. Van Gogh could not paint or do anything during his worst episodes. Hemingway, when he was "mentally ill" did not write, and ended up killing himself. I have no idea why the other people are even included on the list. Isaac Newton was mentally ill? Really?

Mental illness, by and large, is a socio-political category made up to stigmatize people we don't like. OTOH, there are objective brain dysfunctions, from injury for example. And there are people who have difficulty coping with the real world; often they are stigmatized as mentally ill, but really, they may be wholly sane and their "ill" response is a response to world that is insanely put together. As was famously said of Van Gogh: He was was suicided by society.

Yeah, you really don't have a clue what you're talking about.

To say that these individuals somehow "weren't mentally ill" when they produced their best works is ridiculous. One doesn't exhibit signs of temporal lobe epilepsy, and then simply not have it. In fact, Van Gogh may very well have had bipolar disorder, and may have benefited from the manic states of his illness.

To say that mental-illness is simply socially constructed, given our current understanding of the biology of disorders and the cross-cultural pervasiveness of much of mental illness, is ignorant and uninformed. "Suicided by society" -- right.

[thedoc]

Originally Posted by ThreeLawsSafe

If the brain isn't hard-wired to see in specific ways (ways that sometimes do not correspond with reality), then how do you explain optical illusions? How do you explain pareidolia? How do you explain the fact that people watch a two-dimensional screen (a TV) and enjoy it as a representation of 3D reality?

You think human beings don't have instincts? Whoa boy.

Here's a good book for you, both entertaining and educational:
The Blank Slate, by Steven Pinker.

I think you are taking my statements a bit too far, vision is certainly hard-wired but not everything is. People have instincts but not all behavior is instinctive.

You need to read more of my posts, as far as nature or nurture i'm somewhere in the middle, I do not deny instinct or that humans are animals with some animal nature, but our brain gives us a bit more to work with and we can do things that most animals cannot.

As far as the book you linked to, I only read the discription but I would guess that I'm right there with him.

[davidm]

I think that very often, what we call "mental illness" is simply a failure to abide by or adapt to the rules of so-called civilization. For instance, somewhere along the line, no doubt owing to the largely odious heritage of Judeo-Christianity, it was decided that homosexuality was "wrong," and then later, in the age of doctors and psychiatrists, "wrong" morphed into "mentally ill." The ancient Greeks would have been very surprised by all this.

We should be very wary about labeling ANYONE as mentally ill, on the Web or in real life, though of course we can note that there are objective brain dysfunctions due to injury.

Read Focault.

[davidm]

Originally Posted by ThreeLawsSafe

Yeah, you really don't have a clue what you're talking about.

I would expect no less from someone whose career depends on labeling people mentally ill! Hey, doc, are gay people mentally ill? Because they were so classified as recently as 1969! Suddenly -- poof! -- they are no longer mentally ill? Because why? Or why were they so stigmatized to begin with, O mighty thinker?

To say that these individuals somehow "weren't mentally ill" when they produced their best works is ridiculous. One doesn't exhibit signs of temporal lobe epilepsy, and then simply not have it. In fact, Van Gogh may very well have had bipolar disorder, and may have benefited from the manic states of his illness.

It is documented rather objectively from Van Gogh's own voluminous letters and other accounts of his friends and family that when Van Gogh had his crippling episodes, he produced no work whatosever. To say that he "benefited" from his manic states of illness betrays total ignorance on your part on what an artist does (I am an artist) and also presumes to KNOW what Van Gogh's illness actually was. Van Gogh's illness has never been successfully diagnosed; the clues are simply too conflicting or insubstantial.

To say that mental-illness is simply socially constructed...

Except I didn't say that, did I, doc? Do you have a reading comprehension problem, or are you just serially dishonest and hypocritical?

[thedoc]

Originally Posted by davidm

I think that very often, what we call "mental illness" is simply a failure to abide by or adapt to the rules of so-called civilization. For instance, somewhere along the line, no doubt owing to the largely odious heritage of Judeo-Christianity, it was decided that homosexuality was "wrong," and then later, in the age of doctors and psychiatrists, "wrong" morphed into "mentally ill." The ancient Greeks would have been very surprised by all this.

We should be very wary about labeling ANYONE as mentally ill, on the Web or in real life, though of course we can note that there are objective brain dysfunctions due to injury.

Read Focault.

Even though it is fiction I think Equus could be an example of society labeling someone as mentally ill.

[The Lone Ranger]

There is indeed quite a lot of processing of visual impulses by the brain. The brain enhances contrast, exaggerates colors, adjusts color perception to match the ambient light, adjusts the apparent size of objects in the visual field, and so on, and so on.

And it's not just in the brain itself. There is quite a lot of visual processing in the retina, before the visual impulses even get to the brain.

[thedoc]

Originally Posted by davidm

Except I didn't say that, did I, doc? Do you have a reading comprehension problem, or are you just serially dishonest and hypocritical?

HEY, I'm right here, I can see that.

But that does sound like someone else I know here.

[peacegirl]

Originally Posted by ThreeLawsSafe

No, not really. It's more like, "The world, our hard-wired biases, and our culturally-engrained prejudices are revealed as we look out through the eyes." Vision is a combination of all three.

You hit the nail on the head!!!