Some people believe that miracles and such are merely coincidences. The question I would like to propose is, "at what point can you finally say it wasn't just coincidence"
As an example, about 10 years ago I avoided being hit by a speeding car by 1 maybe 2 mins. At the time I was in band, and we had weekly practices. As with most other students, no one wants to stay in school longer than they have to. So it was my regular routine to be out the door as soon as our conductor finishes.
Our conductor was very picky about timing. If you were late you were late. And having such a personality he never ended practice late. So most of the time i'm out the door at the same time each day.
However, on this one occasion I was not. The conductor needed to speak to me privately for a just a couple of minutes. And the minute I finished talking I left.
Normally, the traffic light is green and ready for me run across as I leave the building. But this time I was late. So I missed it. As I was coming up to the light 2 people were smashed by a speeding car.
Later I come to find out that the car's break went out and the driver couldn't stop. Also note he was coming down a decline so was much faster than the speed limit. Of the 2 that were hit, one died of critical injuries and the other was hospitalized for 2+ months.
In this case it can easily be accredited to coincidence. But of coincidences were to happen more regularly. How many coincidences would you need to finally admit, "this can't be only coincidence"?
Two, Three, ... Ten, Twenty... A Hundred?
While I do beleive in coincidences, I also believe that maybe things sometimes DO happen for a reason. I don't really have an explanation as for why, but I don't believe they're miracles exactly.
I recommend reading a book called "The Spontaneous Fulfillment of Desire: Harnessing the Power of Coincidences in Everyday Life" by Deepak Chopra, lengthy title, yes, but great book on coicidences and Quantum such.
I believe coincidences are the Universe's way of bringing about your intended outcomes, even if you don't know your intent. So follow your coincidences, look for them, and see where they lead you.
Ever get chills after noticing some synchronistic event? It's been awhile for me but it's an amazing feeling. Good luck!
Well, I know I'll always think of something just before someone calls to tell or remind me about it.
Particularly between me and my mum.
Coincidence tracing back to common sense? Probably, but who knows.
| dlseven777 wrote: |
| Some people believe that miracles and such are merely coincidences. The question I would like to propose is, "at what point can you finally say it wasn't just coincidence" |
Well, unless there is another credible explanation one would be tempted to say that the answer is never.
You can sometimes get an idea of probabilities from the scenario. In the case you outline there are a couple of ways of looking at it.
Because you routinely passed at that time each week then any accident occurring around that time had a fairly good probability of being close to you.
The chance of an accident at that time would depend on a few factors - total accidents, time of day etc.
Also it cannot be assumed that, had you set-off at normal time, the accident would have involved you. For a moving car to hit another car there is a very small time period for the collision - much less than a second in most cases - so it is not at all likely that even had you set off as normal that you would have been the subject of the smash....By 6,000,000,000 a lot of seemingly unusual things are going to happen, simply because of the sheer number, mathematical Probability can prove that.
| Coclus wrote: |
| By 6,000,000,000 a lot of seemingly unusual things are going to happen, simply because of the sheer number, mathematical Probability can prove that. |
I'm not sure what this means....Do you mean that probabilities of 1 in 6 Billion are unusual? | dlseven777 wrote: |
Some people believe that miracles and such are merely coincidences. The question I would like to propose is, "at what point can you finally say it wasn't just coincidence"
As an example, about 10 years ago I avoided being hit by a speeding car by 1 maybe 2 mins.
In this case it can easily be accredited to coincidence. But of coincidences were to happen more regularly. How many coincidences would you need to finally admit, "this can't be only coincidence"?
Two, Three, ... Ten, Twenty... A Hundred? |
I'm not going to spout odds, or discredit strings of events that lead to outcomes almost magically, (I know these are hot words, but bear in mind, Life can have that sparkle of unknown without being unexplainable.
In the book by Deepak Chopra, the author illustrates how Quantum Physics can be accounted for in instances like these, and how in the eternal moment of NOW, past, present and future are intricately linked, almost as if there were three chess boards sitting on top of each other, future on top of present on top of past, when you move pieces on the board, all three are effected. I hope that gives some visual to help comprehension. But really my illustration not his, I recommend looking into how you can use seemingly random events to chart your course of synchrodestiny, or better understand how these events could come up at more than just random "chance". There no coincidences randomly, the literal meaning of the word, is events happening at the same time, coinciding parts of the same entrained system. ALL ONE, entangled, from the orginal creation event. | prizma wrote: |
| In the book by Deepak Chopra, the author illustrates how Quantum Physics can be accounted for in instances like these, and how in the eternal moment of NOW, past, present and future are intricately linked, almost as if there were three chess boards sitting on top of each other, future on top of present on top of past, when you move pieces on the board, all three are effected. I hope that gives some visual to help comprehension. But really my illustration not his, I recommend looking into how you can use seemingly random events to chart your course of synchrodestiny, or better understand how these events could come up at more than just random "chance". There no coincidences randomly, the literal meaning of the word, is events happening at the same time, coinciding parts of the same entrained system. ALL ONE, entangled, from the orginal creation event. |
Arghhh!!!!!!...more cheese!
Deepak Chopra is a New-Age, anti-evolutionist, creationist dingbat!
I would strongly urge reading some proper science before going anywhere near him. I don't normally criticise so strongly, so I'll demonstrate why I think he is, at best a distraction and, at worst an obscurist, misleading, double-talking pedlar of pseudo-scientific hogwash.
I'll look at 3 passages from his work on generics.
1. | Chopra wrote: |
| How does nature take creative leaps? In the fossil record there are repeated gaps that no "missing link" can fill. The most glaring is the leap by which inorganic molecules turned into DNA. For billions of years after the Big Bang, no other molecule replicated itself. No other molecule was remotely as complicated. No other molecule has the capacity to string billions of pieces of information that remain self-sustaining despite countless transformations into all the life forms that DNA has produced. |
Ding-bat, as I said.
The universe is approx 13.4 billion yrs old. The Earth is around 4.5 billion - i.e. complex molecules took over 9 billion years to appear as far as we know and were not around 'for billions of years after BB.
'Self sustaining'...'transformations'...blah blah....that is complete voodoo babble. I actually don't know what he is trying to say but it's meaningless waffle and has nothing to do with the point at hand.
'No other molecule but DNA'? Err...try RNA.
Some more wisdom :
2.
| Chopra wrote: |
| If mutations are random, why does the fossil record demonstrate so many positive mutations--those that lead to new species--and so few negative ones? Random chance should produce useless mutations thousands of times more often than positive ones. |
Duh! My Head Hurts....!! Ding-bat! Could it be that the process of 'selection' does what the name implies and selects for the fittest individuals which survive and breed? Therefore the fossil record should and does contain a record of the creatures that succeed, not the ones that failed, because they died out.
(Did I mention that Chopra is a medical man by training? In other words he is in his own area here, although not his specialism (he is the Indian equivalent of a General Practitioner I believe). This, therefore, should be something he knows about, if anything, but it appears not.)
We could go on with this issue and look at spontaneous abortions and standard expressions of harmful mutations but it's not worth it).
I'll look at one more piece of Chopra's 'wisdom' and leave it - you should, by now, have realised that this is not someone who is likely to talk much sense in scientific terms....
3.
| Chopra wrote: |
| Evolutionary biology is stuck with regard to simultaneous mutations. One kind of primordial skin cell, for example, mutated into scales, fur, and feathers. These are hugely different adaptations, and each is tremendously complex. How could one kind of cell take three different routes purely at random? |
One kind of cell? A bit like a stem cell perhaps? Check-out any embryo and it is quickly apparent that specific cell types can and do change function to carry out hundreds, if not thousands of different roles in the body. But that is minor compared to the last sneaky comment. Here we have the normal word-manipulation of the evolution basher and this can only be put down to deliberately trying to mislead the reader..no accident here.
What do I mean? Notice he introduces the word 'random' right at the end? Anyone who is claiming a serious critique of evolution looses all right to be taken seriously the moment they start talking about 'random evolution' because anyone with a GCSE in biology knows that it is NOT random. Natural Selection is, selection, selection, not pick at random.....the only random part of evolution is the original genetic mutation which occurs. After that point there is no randomness at all.
Dawkins demonstrates the underlying fallacy of this position in this video below, but the point is that this is now more than incompetence - it is now dishonesty. Nobody with any knowledge of evolution could fail to realise that this claim of 'random' has been used repeatedly by critics to confuse the public and support otherwise laughable attacks on evolution. Chopra could not be unaware of this and yet he carries on regardless and makes the same fallacious statement....
Dawkins Blind Watchmaker - Warning it is about 80meg in total.
This should put you right in case you are confused by Chopra says and tempted to think he actually has a point.
He goes on with this rubbish for some time but I can't be bothered critiquing the whole article, it would take too long. You can check out a Chopra posting here. It is good exercise to see how many fallacies and errors you can spot in this one blog.
(Remember that Chopra has a background in medicine so this is close to his own field. I dread to think what he writes about quantum physics but I'd be fairly certain it's more ding-bat tripe).
(Biologist P.Z. Myers analyses the blog above from Chopra HERE - so you can compare your findings with his and see if you agree with Myers opinion of him (non too flattering).I am not familiar with all of Chopra's other work so I can see how you get such a judgement about a man, but he is just trying to articulate what is true for him just as we all are, although I do see your point, and had considered not taking him as credible after reading or trying to rather, "How to know God", but it did have some interesting points about the levels on which people claim to know God, the saga continued with our history on the matter, All the confusion that has caused trying to know what created them.
On Quantum physics however Chopra wrote words that inspired me to learn more, that made me feel empowered to be a stronger force in the Universe, and has increased my perception of Self. At least for all our illusions about Life, we do our best to Create bigger and better ways to look at Life that will lift us up to the next stage in our evolution. Our development continues through it all, so as our theories become replaced with larger explainations about Life we grow to except those new Truths and integrate into our lives, no everything one man has said is true but that doesn't dis-credit his as a voice in the ALL, speaking to himself in hopes he may come to understand the unfathomable Truth that is our existence.
| prizma wrote: |
| On Quantum physics however Chopra wrote words that inspired me to learn more, that made me feel empowered to be a stronger force in the Universe, and has increased my perception of Self. At least for all our illusions about Life, we do our best to Create bigger and better ways to look at Life that will lift us up to the next stage in our evolution. Our development continues through it all, so as our theories become replaced with larger explainations about Life we grow to except those new Truths and integrate into our lives, no everything one man has said is true but that doesn't dis-credit his as a voice in the ALL, speaking to himself in hopes he may come to understand the unfathomable Truth that is our existence. |
Have you learned some QM then ? If so then, yes, the inspiration was fruitful. Have you actually got the basics of QM sorted out? Can you give a quick outline of what it is and what it does and where it works...not looking for details or technical stuff unless you want to supply it...just a general grasp of the basic theories and statements...I'm looking to expand my consciousness, I have hope in the Potential Possibilities for the advancement of our Power of Mind. I honestly believe that we will learn more about the way this realm works, and in turn begin to improve things on a much deeper level. I don't know where to begin to explain what feels true on the plane of creating our own existance, or the implications of really being One with everything energetically. Please don't reply shooting holes in the science of my reality, I am formulating a new way of thinking for myself, and working towards advancement that may benefit us all, just bear with me as I grow and take hold of the reigns of my mind, and experiment with what I'm capable of. I propose that impossibilities are in the mind of the beholder, and that as we begin to advance our ways of thinking we will see many things happen that we once held to be impossible. I do believe that our interpretation of reality shapes it somehow, that observation of our creations are really the creation of our creations. I think that it all is quite instant, this whole thing is still a bit hazy I admit but no need to know it all in one instant, time marches on, or does it? It is possible time is just our perspective of distance between two very similiar spaces?Could we be going from moment to moment unaware of all the subtle changes, navigating around this Quantum Field, bringing forth our Reality in direct relation to our perception of it? What are the implications of QM on a daily scale, how can the common man better harness and understand the implications and applications of this profound discovery?
| prizma wrote: |
| I'm looking to expand my consciousness, I have hope in the Potential Possibilities for the advancement of our Power of Mind. I honestly believe that we will learn more about the way this realm works, and in turn begin to improve things on a much deeper level. I don't know where to begin to explain what feels true on the plane of creating our own existance, or the implications of really being One with everything energetically. Please don't reply shooting holes in the science of my reality, I am formulating a new way of thinking for myself, and working towards advancement that may benefit us all, just bear with me as I grow and take hold of the reigns of my mind, and experiment with what I'm capable of. I propose that impossibilities are in the mind of the beholder, and that as we begin to advance our ways of thinking we will see many things happen that we once held to be impossible. I do believe that our interpretation of reality shapes it somehow, that observation of our creations are really the creation of our creations. I think that it all is quite instant, this whole thing is still a bit hazy I admit but no need to know it all in one instant, time marches on, or does it? It is possible time is just our perspective of distance between two very similiar spaces?Could we be going from moment to moment unaware of all the subtle changes, navigating around this Quantum Field, bringing forth our Reality in direct relation to our perception of it? What are the implications of QM on a daily scale, how can the common man better harness and understand the implications and applications of this profound discovery? |
What has this got to do with QM/QP? Nothing that I can see.....
What is a quantum field? (It does have a specific meaning, I just want to know if you realise that and actually know what it means).Energetically, is it not True that at a quantum level all things are one? When I say Quantum Field I loosely coin all reality, all existance as an energy soup that we move about in, and by participating in this existence, having our own personal experiences we create our Universe, our perspective from what we choose to experience out of the All that IS. I purpose that coincidences, are not random occurences but rather things that are occurring in the same instant, however distant in "time" they may seem. I believe that all moments are happening in the same instant. Coincidences are merely moments that resonate more deeply than other moments not as intrically linked. It is merely our conscious perception of certain moments that make it seem that time is linear. I feel we are Consciousness first, basically Awareness, and then choose to experience the different facets of the ALL, in "time" in order to know ourselves. I believe Science and Spirituality will soon come to an agreement, it is by the mechanics of the physical world by which WE(all consciousness) are able to experience ALL that IS.
| prizma wrote: |
| Energetically, is it not True that at a quantum level all things are one? |
No | Quote: |
| When I say Quantum Field I loosely coin all reality, all existance as an energy soup that we move about in, and by participating in this existence, having our own personal experiences we create our Universe, our perspective from what we choose to experience out of the All that IS. |
Which means that you haven't really understood the basics of Quantum Physics and would probably be better advised to learn those before extrapolating a world-view based on a faulty understanding..
Here are some websites which might help:
http://www.ptc.tugraz.at/quanten/qm-intro.html
http://www.chemistry.ohio-state.edu/betha/qm/
http://www.physics.umd.edu/perg/qm/qmcourse/NewModel/qmtuts.htm
