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by flukus 2836 days ago
>That is because we could "see" it. Imagine if we were not able to see. Could we have known the existence of EM?

Probably, it has a number of physical effects, like heating up the areas that it hits, there is probably quite a lot we could have deduced about light with no eyesight, as long as we lived somewhere EM existed had a noticeable effect, which is just about everywhere.

> Or think if we were not able to hear. Could we have imagined the sensation of sound, or the concept of music?

Of course not, but that wouldn't prevent us from understanding the concept of pressure waves.

> Human beings are so pathetically stupid that they think that their intelligence and sensory capability are at the limits of what is possible.

What? We know our sensory understanding has sever limits, no one that graduated the third grade thinks our sensory capability are at the limit's of what's possible. Everyone that has ever seen an x-ray knows this. To quote Brother Cavil:

I don't want to be human! I want to see gamma rays! I want to hear X-rays! And I want to - I want to smell dark matter! Do you see the absurdity of what I am? I can't even express these things properly because I have to - I have to conceptualize complex ideas in this stupid limiting spoken language! But I know I want to reach out with something other than these prehensile paws! And feel the wind of a supernova flowing over me!

1 comments

> as long as we lived somewhere EM existed had a noticeable effect, which is just about everywhere.

You should have understood that I meant otherwise. Of course, if we could notice the effect of EM, that could trigger an investigation eventually leading to the discovery.

>we know our sensory understanding has sever limits...

Did you really think I implied that no one knows the limits of our built in senses? When I said sensory capabilities I meant the stuff we can sense, directly or indirectly (By indirectly, I mean by the help of another device, to make it very clear).

> You should have understood that I meant otherwise. Of course, if we could notice the effect of EM, that could trigger an investigation eventually leading to the discovery.

Can you suggest an environment conducive to life that isn't exposed to EM radiation? Life itself creates EM radiation.

> When I meant sensory capabilities I meant the stuff we can sense, directly or indirectly (By indirectly, I mean by the help of another device, to make it very clear).

I can't prove God doesn't exist either, but that doesn't make it logical to conclude that we will one day be able to harness the power of God for FTL communications, but this is what you're expecting. If there are fundamental forces left to be discovered then they are not having any observable effect on the world, making them unlike all other fundamental forces. This makes them unlikely to ever be discovered.

>Can you suggest an environment conducive to life that isn't exposed to EM radiation? Life itself creates EM radiation.

There is nothing in the definition of "life" that warrants an ability to observe EM radiation or create it for that matter..By the way, what is the definition of "life" that you are using here?

>there are fundamental forces left to be discovered then they are not having any observable effect on the world..

So just because we haven't discovered something, does it mean that that thing is not observable at all? We are still discovering "things" in our own body, let alone in the entire world. The fallacy that human beings are capable of detecting every observable (by observable, I did not mean observable with our current tech) phenomena in this world is exactly what I was indicating before.

> By the way, what is the definition of "life" that you are using here?

An incredible loose one. Basically any process remotely complicated enough to call life would be producing infra red radiation at least. From there the evolutionary pressure to be able to sense it is huge. Eyesight on our own planet could have evolved to see heat long before sunlight.