Reality Crowd

What would happen if people disappeared suddenly from the planet? Not in some kind of nuclear war or global warming gone wild kind of way, but simply disappeared? How long would the evidence of our existence stick around? Would the earth eventually heal itself? These thought experiments have inspired a book and now a special on the History Channel.

The book, The World Without Us by Alan Weisman examines all types of different ecological and human made systems, and how they would react if people were taken out of the equation. The results are often surprising. Weisman talks to scientists from all types of disciplines from foresters to nuclear physicists. It turns out that the things that we intuitively think of as permanent would be the first to go. Within a few years our massive infrastructure would start to crumble, and most of it would be gone within a few thousand. It’s the stuff that we don’t think of that often… like plastic, that would stick around the longest.

In addition to the book the History Channel has a special out called Life After People. Clearly inspired by Weisman’s book, the show uses special effects to help imagine what the landscape would look like and how different structures would react over time without the upkeep of people. Visit the History Channel site to see some previews.

Read on to see some videos from the History Channel and from “The World Without Us”
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The age of our universe is about 15 billion years. That’s a number so big that it is difficult to make sense of. You might as well say that it’s 2 trillion years. (Some strongly insist that the universe is only about 6,000 years old, but we’ll discuss that one in another post.)

To help us make sense of this immense span of time and how much of our own history occupies it, world renown astronomer Carl Sagan popularized a tool to see it from a human perspective. He scales our universe’s 15 billion year history into one year. Each month represents just over one billion years. The big bang occurs at midnight on January 1, and our present moment is represented by the last second of the last minute of December 31. See Carl Sagan here explaining the cosmic calendar and the surprising reality that we are but a tiny speck in the thirty-first square.

Additionally, at this page entitled The Cosmic Timeline you’ll find more information and several excellent graphic representations of our cosmic history.

It used to be that you traveled around the world to see different places and cultures. You jumped on a boat and headed to the other side of the globe and came across a place that was totally unique. Of course as travel got easier inevitably those different places started looking…a little similar. In the US at least, many cities and towns no longer have much of an identity…afterall, one highway exit ramp strip mall looks a lot like any another.

Well it seems that several countries, when faced with the challenge of building new towns and cities are opting to copy famous cities from different parts of the world. Instead of trying to create a new town that has it’s own history developing countries are simply recreating pre-existing cities. Dubai is the latest to throw their hat into the ring. They are planning to build a 700 acre version of the French city in the middle of the desert.

But Dubai is not alone of course. Las Vegas is famous for recreating famous world cities on the strip with the New York Hotel & Casino, the Venetian, and Paris Las Vegas. But those are all resorts and casinos. What happens when our cities and towns start to become carbon copies?

This looks like a picture of Paris, but it’s actually a recreation of the city being built in the area of Tianducheng in China. But that’s not the only one, the Chinese are using their newfound wealth to recreate a number of world landmarks and cities. Some other recreated cities include Venice and London.

But that’s not all. Shanghai has ambitious plans for a ring of settlements around the city based on European locations.

Perhaps in response to this growing trend, Egypt is attempting to copyright the pyramids and other recognizable landmarks. This issue will come up more and more as globalization heats up and questions about ownership of culture begin to surface.

Have an example of another cloned city? Post it in the comments!

Biblical “science” or creation “science” or “intelligent” design all attempt to put forth the same idea. That somehow despite total lack of evidence for their claims and complete disregard for the scientific method that they are somehow more scientific than science itself. We at Reality Crowd intend to examine this issue extensively as it is at the heart of what we are discussing here. Creationists, not content to have everyone accept their claims “on faith” (a rather dubious proposal) have now turned to the language of science to try to promote their ideas. The only problem is they occasionally run into real scientists:

For those who don’t recognize the voice, that is creationist Kent Hovind. The main point that we can get from this exchange is that creationists seem to have no concrete examples of what their “science” is for. It doesn’t make any reliable predictions about anything, nor does it describe in a useful way the way the physical systems of the universe work. Creationist’s version of science is merely attempting to shoehorn biblical passages into compatibility with what we know about the physical universe (but mostly the other way around).

One tactic that has been increasingly used by the religious in debates (both online and out in the “real” world) is to attempt to show that their claims are in fact backed up by science and reason. This has been the tactic of the “Intelligent” design movement and is often used by one of it’s leading proponents Kent Hovind. Essentially, their arguments are stated in a manor that makes them sound scientific. If I as a listener wanted to believe what these people are saying I would come away with the sense that they had somehow proven something to me, through reason and science.

However, when people that make arguments like these come across actual scientists, or even just people who are listening closely, their arguments are usually demonstrated to be much less solid then they would have you believe. Take Shawn (aka VenomFangX) on Youtube. Shawn has posted many videos that try to prove the existence of god, or jesus, or that dinosaurs and people were around at the same time 6000 years ago. If you don’t listen closely you might think that he makes some good points…but luckily for us a lot of people listen closely!

Here is an example of the type of argument Shawn tends to use, as well as some rational responses to it:

Sounds pretty good right? From the comments on YouTube you would think that Shawn had stumbled onto some ultimate line of reasoning that forever ended the Reality / Religion debate. After all, he even states at the end that there is no way to disprove him. I guess we can all go home and prepare for the apocalypse right? But wait:

That would seem to call into question Shawn’s rock solid “proof” of god’s existence. It also pretty much shoots down his (and all creation “scientists”) style of argument. By proclaiming that you are absolutely right without question you leave yourself wide open to being taken down, because if you are then wrong about one thing what does that indicate for everything else?

Or how about this response?

In fact, Youtube is FULL of videos of people debunking Shawn’s argument. Shawn is hiding all the negative comments on his videos (why the need if you are absolutely without question correct?). Read on for more videos addressing Shawn’s claims.

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There is a theory which states that if ever anybody discovers exactly what the Universe is for and why it is here, it will instantly disappear and be replaced by something even more bizarre and inexplicable. There is another theory which states that this has already happened.

- Douglas Adams

Read on for some more Douglas Adam Quotes
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The absolute truth of our existence will likely never be discovered. Everything we learn leads to more questions. When our species learned that matter was made of things called atoms, it appeared that we were much closer to understanding the nature of our universe. Soon, however, we learned that atoms are made of quarks and that there are structures and events existing on an even smaller scale. How do we try to make sense of our existence when every answer seems to lead to more questions?

Scientists who make it their life’s work to advance our understanding of the cosmos play a creative role finding answers. They make theories; they use their imaginations. Having a “theory,” though, means that it needs to be tested. If there really is an answer to the nature of our existence how can we be sure that it is even POSSIBLE to test it? If it can’t be tested, then it isn’t science.

That’s where philosophy comes in to save the day. Philosopher Dr. Nick Bostrom offers his own creative proposal to the nature of our existence: We could all be living in a computer simulation. Though only one of an infinite number of possibilities, his idea sparks much discussion, debate, and creative endeavors by others. His clearest argument is based on the premise that eventually the human race will create a computer that is more powerful than all human brains combined. (He is not alone in making this assertion.) Eventually, he believes, we will be able to run computer simulations in such incredible detail that the inhabitants of this simulated place would simply understand their virtual environment as the universe--the only one they’ve ever known.

It is a compelling argument if you accept that humans will eventually be able to make such a simulation. In that case it seems rather likely that we are also simulated. If you would like an expanded view of Bostrom’s Simulation Argument I have posted three links.

New York Times article:
“Our Lives, Controlled From Some Guy’s Couch”

The original Simulation Argument by Nick Bostrom:
“Are You Living in a Computer Simulation?”

Popular review of Nick Bostrom’s argument
by Brian Eggleston

Anyone that missed “A Scanner Darkly” when it came out in 2006 would be well served to check out the film. It’s the perfect combination of Richard Linklater’s Rotoscope animation style (developed on “Waking Life“) and Phillip K. Dick’s paranoid tale of drug hallucinations in a society obsessed with surveillance. The film is both highly entertaining and extremely thought provoking.

Hit the jump to see more clips from the film:
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When talking to someone about the validity of religion, out of body experiences usually come up at some point. When close to death many people have the experience of floating outside their own body and observing themselves from outside their own skin. Scientology was supposedly inspired from an out of body experience L. Ron Hubbard had while under the influence of Nitrous Oxide. These experiences would seem to lend credibility to the soul / body split that nearly all religions preach. It would seem to indicate that our “self” can be separated from our body. If I can float outside my own body, it must mean that I posses a soul…right?

Well, hold on a second. Now it seems that by using virtual reality equipment, two teams of researchers have been able to induce out of body experiences in healthy test subjects. Wearing virtual reality headsets, subjects were shown a live picture of their own back. Then, two plastic rods were used to stroke the back of the subject as well as their “virtual” back. It seems that the combination of visual and tactile input easily tricked the body into believing it was behind the actual body.

Link to the scientific American Article

Hit the jump for some videos about out of body experiences
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It turns out the coldest place in the universe is not somewhere in deep space. It’s not on the dark side of the moon or out at the far edge of the cosmos. It’s right here on earth in a lab at MIT. While it is impossible to ever reach absolute zero, scientists are excited to get as close as possible to it.

The current record holder is Wolfgang Ketterle’s lab at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge. They have achieved a temperature of just 810 trillionths of a degree above absolute zero. How did they do it? Here is an excerpt from the Smithsonian Magazine article about the achievement:

Ketterle’s achievement came out of his pursuit of an entirely new form of matter called a Bose-Einstein condensate (BEC). The condensates are not standard gases, liquids or even solids. They form when a cloud of atoms—sometimes millions or more—all enter the same quantum state and behave as one. Albert Einstein and the Indian physicist Satyendra Bose predicted in 1925 that scientists could generate such matter by subjecting atoms to temperatures approaching absolute zero. Seventy years later, Ketterle, working at M.I.T., and almost simultaneously, Carl Wieman, working at the University of Colorado at Boulder, and Eric Cornell of the National Institute of Standards and Technology in Boulder created the first Bose-Einstein condensates. The three promptly won a Nobel Prize.

What happens when matter starts to approach absolute zero? All sorts of crazy stuff. Electrical resistance disappears in some elements causing superconductivity. Liquefied gases become “superfluids” that can move through barriers that hold any other type of fluid, and defy gravity in strange ways. Other researchers pointing lasers at Bose-Einstein condensates have found that they can slow down and even stop light waves.

You can learn more about the wacky world of absolute zero at:
Nova website on Absolute Zero (PBS)
Wikipedia entry on absolute zero
BBC Four’s absolute zero documentaries

Hit the jump for some great videos about absolute zero
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