On Tue, 28 Jan 2003 10:39:38 -0500, Jim Muth wrote:
FOTD -- January 28, 2003 (Rating 8)
Fractal visionaries and enthusiasts:
Questions, questions, questions . . . a fool can ask more ques- tions than a wise man can answer. I'm feeling a bit foolish this morning, so I shall ask a few questions that the wise men wisely brush aside. I expect no answers, because if questions such as these could be answered in an absolute manner, they would long since have ceased to be asked. Of course there is always the chance that the questions *have* been answered but those who still ask them have failed to recognize or will not accept the answers.
Would fractals exist if there had been no intelligent beings in the universe to find them?
Yes. They cannot just have sprung into existence because someone "found" them. They might have been called something else, though.
Would the potential for fractals exist if there had been no intelligent beings to invent numbers? And what of numbers? Could they exist without having been invented by a human type of intelligence?
On the assumption that someone/thing needed/wanted to count or to prove an estimate of quantity or identity, then numbers must have existed. It would not have had to be a decimal or binary system.
Things grow more complicated. Could intelligence exist without the universe?
"In the beginning, God..." What if a few physical constants had a different value? Does the universe exist when it is not being observed? Does it exist when it *is* being observed, or is it some kind of consistent illusion. If the universe is an illusion, what is having the illusion? And if the universe is an illusion, is the same illusion common to all observers, or does each observer ob- serve his own private world. To a certain extent each observer must observes his private world, although in many/most(?) cases the experienceis, no doubt similar amongst observers. For example, people with colour deficiencies or colour blindness will see the universe differently. [cut] John -- John Lewis, jlewis@clara.net on 28/01/2003