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Our hard-working programmers have rigged us up a new site that is much more dynamic! Please check it out and post your thoughts there: huthex.com

Mission Statement

The Human Thought Experiment strives to answer the question of whether we can make any further progress on figuring out our existence simply by creating a movement of thought. Is it within our mental abilities to explain our situation, or will we find that the nature of the universe is truly beyond our comprehension? Although some individuals grappling with big ideas may have previously found the pursuit frustrating and fruitless, the Human Thought Experiment is meant to change that paradigm by creating a truly productive forum. At a time when science and religion are often at odds, The Human Thought Experiment offers an alternative approach and is meant to include people of all ages, all backgrounds, of all ideas, and is meant to truly revolutionize the manner in which we address our existence. The two best assets humans have are our cognition and our ability to communicate; the thoughts must come from individuals like you and the Human Thought Experiment will provide the tools of communication. There is at least a possibility that intense human thought on this subject directly could lead to greater understanding of our existence: this is that experiment.

Tuesday, March 11, 2008

This video is actually saying something



And it is relevant to what we've been talking about. Really.

While our purpose here is to try to make progress on big questions by sharing ideas and just basically thinking really hard, let's never forget that regular scientists are also looking at some pretty big stuff (and of course thinking hard while measuring it). Here's a brief excerpt from a fairly non-technical article on the entropy of the universe:
It is amusing to speculate about what will happen to the Second Law of Thermodynamics if the universe is closed, so that at some point the expansion stops and reverses.

Even more wild is the idea that if the expansion of the universe determines the direction of time's arrow, then if the universe starts to contract the direction of time will also reverse.

For our purposes, it is not only amusing to speculate about this possibility but absolutely necessary. This is a good introduction to the subject and discusses other interesting topics such as the negentropy of information in our minds, so go read the whole discussion here: Black Hole Thermodynamics

Here David Harrison proposes an interesting new concept in physics, and if you've got a new idea that could explain how our minds are relating to the physical universe, get in touch and share it with us. Physicists, please feel free to share any responses you know of that have been floating around in your community regarding the idea in the linked article.

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