XPost: alt.agnosticism, alt.god.timothy.sutter, talk.religion.misc   
   From: a202010@lycos.com-   
      
   no animals will be hurt during   
   the course of these next   
   several sentences.   
      
   if you have a bowling ball and   
   you stick the bowling ball in   
   a cardboard box in which   
   a refrigerator came,   
      
   then you could say that you know   
   where the bowling ball is, only   
   that you don't know exactly where it is,   
      
   because you just know that it's   
   in the cardboard box somewhere.   
      
   it's in there somewhere, and given that   
   you left a lot of packing material in the box,   
      
   the ball may not be on the bottom of   
   the box, but could be anywhere in the box.   
      
   it's in there somewhere.   
      
   now, you leave the room,   
   if you feel like it,   
   but you don't have to,   
      
   and someone else comes in and takes   
   the ball out of the refrigerator box,   
   and sets it into a color television box.   
      
   now, you come back and look at the new box,   
   and you can say that you know the ball is   
   in that box somewhere,   
      
   and, seeing that the box is smaller,   
   your knowledge of where the ball is   
   is a little bit clearer,   
      
   but, it's still in there somewhere.   
      
   now, your assistant takes the ball   
   and places it into a small green   
   trash bag that -just- fits over   
   the ball, and now, you can prwactically   
   see the shape of the ball,   
      
   and you can say that you know   
   fairly well where the ball is,   
      
   it's right there in the bag.   
      
   the container -just- fits over it.   
      
   now you start working with   
   much smaller objects, and   
   what you find eventually,   
      
   is that you cannot make container   
   small enough for you to have as   
   clear an image of where the ball   
   is as you had with the bowling   
   ball in the trash bag.   
      
   this because the stuff you have   
   to work with to make a box for   
   your object, itself -contains-   
   the objects you are trying to observe.   
      
   the stuff you have for making containers   
      
   has an inherent spacial void which   
   cannot be overcome by your ingenuities.   
      
   so, for these tiny objects,   
      
   within their own tiny little containers,   
      
   you basically get back to a bowling   
   ball in a cardboard refrigerator box   
      
   and find that the best you can say is;   
      
   "it's in there somewhere"   
      
   always realizing that the container   
   is a bit larger that the object,   
      
   -but- you can get a fairly, not   
   so bad, idea of where the refrigerator box is,   
   or, in this case, the single 'atom' of tungsten.   
      
   so, you know where the little particle is.   
      
   for all practical purposes,   
    it's in the little box somewhere.   
      
   and you pretty much know where the little box is.   
      
   a bowling ball you can hold in your hand.   
      
   an electron is already in your hand.   
      
   whether there actually is such   
   an object as an electron, inasmuch   
   as you can't see it, is moot,   
      
   some set of phenomena,   
   taken together and looked   
   at independantly, seem to   
   behave as if such a thing   
   as an electron does,   
   in fact, exist.   
      
   it's somewhere in the box   
      
   and the box is right there.   
      
      
      
      
   or, like a bowling ball in a baseball stadium.   
      
   and this bowling ball is self propelled   
   and spinning around the stadium.   
      
   you know exactly where the baseball stadium is.   
      
   and the bowling ball in there   
      
   somewhere,   
      
   spinning around.   
      
   and, we don't -have- to say   
   that the baseball stadium   
      
   is the size of the perceived universe,   
      
   and that the bowling ball is -just-   
      
   "somewhere in the universe"   
      
   cuz then, of course, we'd be entirely sure,   
      
   but we can be quite sure even in baseball stadiums   
      
   that are -much- smaller that the perceived universe   
      
   and even say that in a baseball stadium   
   the size os a small glass of water,   
      
   there is a clear certainty that -many-   
   electrons are contained therein.   
      
   for a fact.   
      
   and believe it or not, we can reduce   
   the size of that baseball stadium   
   even further, and know that   
   some phenomenon   
      
   which could be likened to   
   a spinning bowling ball,   
      
   is definitely in there.   
      
      
   see, a snowflake   
      
   is your baseball stadium   
      
   and you can be sure that there are   
   quite a lot of many bowling balls   
   in that baseball stadium   
      
   because that baseball stadium is,   
   itself, -constructed- of things that   
   behave just like tiny spinning   
   bowling balls.   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)