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Philosophical speaking, I wonder what the folks will think of our theories of light, time and space in the not too distant future. Much as the flat earth theor

Philosophical speaking, I wonder what the folks will think of our theories of light, time and space in the not too distant future. Much as the flat earth theories or the universe rotates around the earth, I suspect we don’t really get it yet and we’ll have other ideas in 300 years from now. Just reading here about the theories of light, fundamentally we don’t understand what light truly is. Sure we have this theory and that idea, but these seem too complex and fragile to be really it - imho. I mean no disrespect, and everyone can have their theories and opinions. But we shouldn’t forget the arrow of time continues and it’s still a long way to go.

arcfour 20d ago
I feel like we have advanced technology to the point that we can't be that far off from the truth, or at least we would look more charitably back on our views now since they're grounded in observations made with the best tools we have available to us as opposed to e.g. the flat earth where you can actually see and experience the curvature of the earth without needing any specialized tooling at all.
- Towaway69 18d ago
  > experience the curvature of the earth I'm not an historian but the curvature of the world was probably explained away by some other phenomenon because, after all, the world is flat (for those experience curvature in times of flat Earth). So to "experience" the curvature of the Earth, you first have to know the Earth is round. Much as our "bug free" software is only buggy once we find a bug, before that, the bug was a feature ;) Similar the stars were explained away as holes in a black sphere surrounding the Earth: the light points in a night skies didn't lead to a universal acceptance of the Universe. It was telescopes that made us realize that those "holes in the sphere" were actually galaxies. So my understanding would be, that it was Magellan circumnavigating the Earth that made folks actually "experience" the curvature of the Earth. This might be being pedantic but I am trying to point out that "experiences" are related to understanding and perspective. Experiences are different in different contexts: hence my experiences are different to all those around me. My interpretation of "experiences" differ according to understanding. An apple falling on my head might well have more to do with evilness of various gods than gravity before the invention of gravity. But even gravity is just another interpretation/explanation/myth to explain the "experience" falling apple.

arcfour 20d ago

I feel like we have advanced technology to the point that we can't be that far off from the truth, or at least we would look more charitably back on our views now since they're grounded in observations made with the best tools we have available to us as opposed to e.g. the flat earth where you can actually see and experience the curvature of the earth without needing any specialized tooling at all.

Towaway69 18d ago
> experience the curvature of the earth I'm not an historian but the curvature of the world was probably explained away by some other phenomenon because, after all, the world is flat (for those experience curvature in times of flat Earth). So to "experience" the curvature of the Earth, you first have to know the Earth is round. Much as our "bug free" software is only buggy once we find a bug, before that, the bug was a feature ;) Similar the stars were explained away as holes in a black sphere surrounding the Earth: the light points in a night skies didn't lead to a universal acceptance of the Universe. It was telescopes that made us realize that those "holes in the sphere" were actually galaxies. So my understanding would be, that it was Magellan circumnavigating the Earth that made folks actually "experience" the curvature of the Earth. This might be being pedantic but I am trying to point out that "experiences" are related to understanding and perspective. Experiences are different in different contexts: hence my experiences are different to all those around me. My interpretation of "experiences" differ according to understanding. An apple falling on my head might well have more to do with evilness of various gods than gravity before the invention of gravity. But even gravity is just another interpretation/explanation/myth to explain the "experience" falling apple.