Book: What We Believe But Cannot Prove

Short essays by prominent scientists describing where science currently fails to validate common sense (even if "common sense" varies from person to person.)

Some think there must be a god. Others are sure there isn't. Some are sure there must be extraterrestrial intelligence. Like gods, others are equally sure there isn't.

Elizabeth Spelke, Harvard professor of psychology, believes all mankind is more similar than dissimilar, and if we can just find some way to prove that wars and racial enmity would cease. It's a nice sentiment.

The essay immediately following -- and not by accident -- says that climate change is real, is human-caused, and will cause "mayhem." Maybe that's the common enemy that'll finally bring mankind together?

Anthropologist Judith Rich Harris postulates that Neanderthals disappeared at the same time that CroMagnons moved in because we hunted them for meat. I don't buy that. After all, we share some Neanderthal genes.

SOME of the professors included are just unbelievably smug and self-important.  It would be laughable, if students weren't forced to listen to their lectures.

Keith Devlin wrote:

Before we can answer the question, we need to agree what we mean by proof. For instance, following Descartes, I can prove to myself that I exist, but I can't prove it to anyone else. Even to those who know me well, there is always the possibility, however remote, that I'm merely a figment of their imagination. If you want a proof, there's almost nothing beyond our own existence (whatever that means and whatever we exist as) that we can prove to ourselves, and nothing at all that we can prove to anyone else.

One essay argues that someday computers will be conscious.  The next argues that silicon can never duplicate the workings of a human brain.

Both miss the point.

"Consciousness" is not an easily defined thing.  It is a road we build, brick by brick, behind us as we travel through time but it has no meaning looking forward.

John D. Barrow wrote:

I believe but cannot prove that our universe is infinite in size, finite in age, and just one among many.

How would that work, exactly?  I'm having trouble with the concept of an infinite universe -- which sounds right to me, as we understand infinity -- having a beginning.  It seems to me if it's infinite in size, it has to be infinite in age as well. You cannot get to infinite size in finite time (unless you redefine "infinity" as bounded, which seems kinda silly...)

And the idea of many universes?  That's pure sophistry.

The universe - like everything else - cannot be infinite in size. By definition, something which is infinite in size would fill all space, thereby removing the possibility of anything else existing, as there would be no space for it to occupy.

Infinity is merely another concept which mankind has devised out of necessity or convenience. Consider dividing one by zero. Infinity is the only mathematical device we have for the answer to the problem. And why do we have it? Because we made it up to serve that purpose (among others).

As to the concept of many universes, that is only problematical if we continue to define "the" universe as containing everything in existence (i.e., infinite).