Quote Originally Posted by Staurm
It's not what I am saying. Hawking plagiarised his students work in his early days. He has discovered nothing that I would describe in any way as epoch making by scientific standards. I am saying the man is not a genius, he is just really clever, and that there are other less emminent scientists in the world, a lot actually, who offer more progressive ideas.

I am not saying he doesn't have my full respect, I think he is a remarkable person. it's just that I have far greater respect and admiration for other scientist and their views. I don't think the human race will ever colonise space to the extent he seems to project in his literature. Perhaps though we all colonise the universe on a spiritual level, though, and we are about to realise this. Maybe that is what he really means.
Well I can respect that, and it would seem to me like you have many of the same thought patterns that I seem to have. Whether or not we will end up colonizing the planet as much as some people seem to think we will, I think we should still aspire towards such as that. If not, I can see us losing inspiration and imagination, and that could prove fatal for our species. This planet is fragile, and if we dont start looking towards space as an entire race, and soon, we could end up getting caught in a disaster of apocalyptic proportions with too many of us eggs in basket Earth.

Quote Originally Posted by Staurm
Isn't the scientific term for an unproven theory, a theorem?

I too am jumping in in the middle of this, I have not the time to read it all, well I do but I'd probably end up spending even more time replying to everything, and that is what I've not got the time for really.

What bothers me about the Grand Unified Theory, apart from the fact I was inspired to take the wrong career path in my university days, led by its false promise, is that it distracts attention from more exciting prospects hidden in rather more new age sciences based on chaos theory. I think its good that they are pushing these theories to the edge, even though its becoming quite apparent that there is probably not going to be a Grand Unified Theory, it is still fun to explore the madness of science, its what make science interesting.

Zen buddhism and models of life and conciousness based around chaos theory do offer some insight into why this is the case, and it seems that in order to understand this about science you have to study it to the point where you start to know less than you previously knew. But you don't have to be a hot shot scientist, you just have to know a bit about the basics.

I think this is where science is going wrong, we are using this knowledge to destructive ends, where we should all be sitting around going wow we are really never going to work all this out, and I don't want to ever work it out. It's this perpetual state of confusion that makes it all so worth thinking about. I feel as though I have pretty much underpinned what the fuck its all about, but at the same time I have had to come to terms with the fact that I will really never know, and all I have is the feeling that I am surfing the waves of light that make up the universe, and that they will keep coming and offering new insights.
I like this, it echoes many things I have pondered about, and I agree that Zen Buddhism is not to be taken lightly. The last paragraph could have been ripped directly out of my internal monologue.