FINAL POST BEFORE THREAD THE FOURTH
Okay -- thank you -- just being no-z.
Hey, it says ask a physicist
anything
Does a placebo still work if you know its a placebo?
A prisoner is told on Friday that he will a) die within the next seven days, and b) be surprised when he found out he would die on that day.
He reasons that, come Friday, he hasn't been killed in the preceeding six days, and could then conclude that he must therefore be executed on that Friday. However, this would mean he wouldn't be surprised, so he
can't die on Friday.
By induction, he can't die on the Thursday either: come Thursday, he'd know he'd die on Thursday, and thus wouldn't be surprised.
By further induction, he concludes he can't die on
any day - he would never be surprised on any of the seven days.
So he's quite surprised when he dies on the Tuesday.
The moral of the story? A high-brow intellectual knowingly taking a placebo is so confident in himself he completely forgets it's a placebo, and just knows he took a pill, and thus gets better anyway.
The mind is awfully sneaky like that
Also, bonus points for spotting the criminal's flaw (and now, it's not that he got caught doing the crime!).
Well, I was speaking of the obvious miracles such as the things Jesus did (multiplying the loaves and fish, etc)...
Well, true, but the 'miracle' is rather vague to evaluate
BTW; sorry it took so long to respond... I've been w/out internet access lately
No worries, I've had protracted discussions that span months per reply
This is speaking of the original creation (where "earth" takes on a much broader meaning than just our planet), and since we do not know much, if anything, on what stands outside of spacetime, I think this is nothing that contradicts physics, but just stands outside of what we can know. Even the singularity at the beginning must have been surrounded by something; and what that was physics has no direct knowledge of... for all we know the universe could have been formed out of water and in water
It could well have been, but it seems rather strained to squeeze a literal interpretation of Genesis around the gaps of human knowledge - such as, for instance, reinterpreting 'Earth' to "take on a much broader meaning than just our planet"

. Why not reinterpret 'water' to mean 'empty spacetime'?
Funny, I think this verse gives us an indication of the Author of the bible being far advanced in understanding of our universe. Spacetime is more than just emptiness, it is actually has certain attributes... like a "fabric" as some physicists have stated. The Hebrew word for "expanse" in Genesis 1 is:
*raqia (956a); from H7554; an extended surface, expanse: - expanse
*from New American Standard Exaustive Concordance
Only after naming it thus is the word Heavens given to it, indicating a move from a natural to a spiritual description IMO. I think an "extended surface" is quite accurate for spacetime, don't you?
Not really - not only are you cherry-picking and grabbing at straws, spacetime isn't a 'surface' onto which something goes.
An extended surface which has been "stretched forth" as the Bible says (Isaiah 45:12, and elsewhere)... The word Heavens, as is used in Genesis 1 and in Isaiah 45 literally means lofty, or high, which is a spiritual meaning as well as physical. Anyways, I find it interesting that you would use this as something that contradicts physics since it is only the historic understanding of this word that is physically inaccurate, not the meaning of the Hebrew word.
The Hebrew word may have many meanings, but Hebrew cosmology is quite clear; the firmament in the sky was believed to be a crystalline dome, regardless of the other ambiguities in Hebrew. It was a very common belief at the time, and, to be fair, not that unbelievable.