gloucesteroldspot wrote:Snape wrote:
I disagree. There are all manner of as yet unexplained phenomena which are entirely natural. The disappearance of quantum effects (eg being in more than one place at the same time (superposition) and moving from place to place without passing through the space in between - quantum tunnelling) when objects are scaled up clearly happens as they are readily observed in tiny particles but disappear when the object is scaled up although the larger object is simply a collection of the smaller particles. At the moment there is no explanation for this effect but it is in no way supernatural we just don't understand enough yet.
Surely that is as good a definition of supernatural as any? What is 'natural' if not a predictable outcome based on our knowledge of the universe and the forces present within it? At one time man thought the sun ruled our lives as a wilful entity, and he made sacrifices to appease it. Now we know that the sun governs the environment of our planet without deliberate intent - though its importance to us is none the less for it.
As long as you stick to the concept of supernatural as being inextricably linked with sentient hauntings, spooks and ghouls, the matter rests on thin ice, but if you expand your mind to consider anything that defies explanation (which is itself limited by our understanding of the physical and psychological world) as being super natural (literally beyond nature) then the term ceases to carry dubious connotations. Maybe one day we'll understand the mechanisms behind these strange events, and look back and laugh at how ignorant 21st Century man used to be.
I essentially agree. I guess it gets into semantics but the word supernatural is too heavily loaded (as GOS suggested) with other meanings for me. Supernatural may mean 'beyond nature' but these things actually
are nature but are beyond our understanding at the present time which is entirely different.
The sun as a god (or more recently will o'the wisp) is a good example in that it was once considered supernatural but not anymore. Therefore it actually
never was supernatural (just thought to be).
As a scientist I cannot see how anything can be considered to be beyond nature as if it exists then by definition it
is natural.
Anything labelled as supernatural has either never been proved to exist or has been proved not to exist. What do we call supernatural things which have been proved to exist? Natural....
(same argument applies to alternative medicine and medicine)
Arthur C Clark summed it up nicely as "Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic."
But it is
not magic!
“Fishing is much more than fish. It is the great occasion when we may return to the fine simplicity of our forefathers,” Herbert Hoover.
`·.¸¸.·´¯`·.¸¸.·´¯`·.¸ ><((((º>