Archive for Physics and Cosmology

What the Higgs boson shows about rationality

Jul 04, 2012 1 Comment by

A new particle has been discovered, almost certainly the Higgs boson first predicted 48 years ago. If so, then at last the final prediction of the Standard Model has been confirmed. To be sure, there are many questions still to answer, such as how real physics deviates from the Standard Model at very high energies, [...]

Articles, Biology, Neurology, and Medicine, Logic, Mathematics, News, Philosophy, Physics and Cosmology, Religions and other Belief Systems, Sciences, World Read more

Something from nothing

Apr 05, 2012 Comments Off by

I haven’t written anything for this site in a few months because my efforts to secure a funded PhD place in the competitive field of quantum gravity have taken up all of my time. Now I’ve been granted such a place in York, I can return to writing here. What makes quantum gravity such a [...]

Articles, People, Physics and Cosmology, Religions and other Belief Systems, Richard Dawkins, Sciences Read more

Why Doesn’t Personal Experience Count As Evidence?

Jan 10, 2012 Comments Off by

I dislike categorising people into only two groups, but the conclusions I will draw in this article I find to be independent of this particular distinction, hence let us consider the assuredly religious and the decidedly non-religious. Of the many traits that separate the two groups, one which appears to be crucial, and which arises [...]

Articles, Logic, Philosophy, Physics and Cosmology, Questions and Answers, Sciences, Statements and Analysis, Uncategorized Read more

Free Will in Quantum Mechanics

Dec 19, 2011 Comments Off by

The natural laws as they were understood more than one hundred years ago were significantly different to how we know them today. The classical laws of motion described by Newton were, at the time, the ultimate guide to the future of the universe. In Newton’s universe, everything was determinable; if you knew the precise position and [...]

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Science Is Not The New Religion

Dec 19, 2011 Comments Off

There have been two significant potential discoveries in the world of physics in recent months. Firstly that neutrinos, a type of subatomic particle, seem to have been observed travelling faster than the speed of light, the universal speed limit. And secondly that the Higg’s Boson, another subatomic particle, which is responsible for the mass property [...]

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On miracles: how religious people don’t understand their own concept

Nov 22, 2011 Comments Off

In September 2011 neutrinos were apparently spotted exceeding the speed of light. This week we received confirmation a second experiment had apparently spotted the same thing. We’re far from having enough evidence to confidently say whether or not neutrinos really have broken the light speed limit, though physicists highly doubt they have because so much [...]

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Novelty in the new atheism … or theism

Oct 22, 2011 Comments Off

Post–9/11 atheist works have been characterised as the New Atheism. Many atheists have objected that atheism doesn’t come in strains; you either lack a belief in a god or gods, or you have one. They add that the arguments on both sides haven’t changed much historically either. They concede only one new aspect of atheism, [...]

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Religion-defending arguments as scientifically bad as religion

Oct 20, 2011 Comments Off

One thing I don’t recall hearing critics of religion ever saying, but which I think should be said, is that the effort by scientifically literate theists, including religious scientists, to render their religious views compatible with science often requires them to adopt views at least as empirically ridiculous as their religious views. (I will in [...]

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Not so finely tuned theist arguments for a god

Oct 13, 2011 Comments Off

I’m a new writer here, and I’m a physicist, and we scientists always react to theists trying to use the findings of our field to argue for a god by noticing their arguments get the science wrong. One of the most popular attempts of that sort nowadays concerns the “fine tuning” of physics, so my [...]

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Intuition, Causality, and Quantum Physics

Jun 19, 2011 2 Comments

One of the most popular arguments for the existence of a creator, is that the universe could not have happened of its own accord. The universe required some simpler, enduring object to create it. This is one of the favourites of our enemy William Lane Craig. It is perhaps one of the stronger arguments, simply [...]

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Confirmation Of Dark Energy

May 25, 2011 Comments Off

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-13462926 First results from a major astronomical survey using a cutting-edge technique appear to have confirmed the existence of mysterious dark energy.

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New Spacecraft Design For Deep Space Exploration

May 25, 2011 Comments Off

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-13532968 NASA has confirmed that the vehicle it will use to send astronauts to places like asteroids will be based on its Orion capsule concept.

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