Is life magical or mathematical?

Question

Einstein believed that everything in life can be rationalised and reasoned! He believed that life has a pattern in which it works... it only needs to be discovered!
He said as the human mind evolves scientifically, the mysteries will cease to exist! would you agree with him?

or do you think life can never be completely understood?
that there is a supernatural dimension to life that can never be logically rationalised?

Answer 1

Neither. Life is biological.
Math is a language, the language of science - a descriptive device. Mysteries are nothing more than questions we seek to answer. There is no magic - that is a wish, a fantasy.

I think life has always been understood.

Answer 2

Let's put it this way... The fundamental laws of the universe as we know it come under either Newtonian physics or Quantum physics. We know for a fact that both are real and both are correct and yet they don't work together. They even kind of deny each other. This can only mean there is an entire realm (of physics?) which we haven't discovered yet. The role of science is to eliminate the guff and identify the facts. As long as we stick to the rules science can find all the answers but who knows where that could lead us? We have a long way to go yet but the more we learn the faster we discover new things. It's kind of exponential. As for magical or mathematical... When they discover its magical they'll prove it with a mathematical formula. You know they will. :-D

Answer 3

Wow that's an extremely loaded question with many different answers on many different levels.

I took understanding life to mean the same as figuring out the meaning to it. For if you know what something does you know and understand it at a base level. IE you know a toaster makes toast, you understand the toaster and the ultimate actions whither or not you understand why a spring is in a certain place.

If you define life as one person then its very possible for humans tend to follow patterns in their own life. You could theoretically state that a human and their life is the actions and contributions that they put forth everyday.

Now if you are asking if we will figure out the answer to the question what is the meaning of life then yes. Using Einstein himself and his theory of relativity every ones view of the world so the answer to me of what is life is correct and valid.

But if you are talking about People as a whole no we have to much interaction that can possibly change our patterns. A case of this I believe is the case of the three body problem a very complex mathematical equation. It deals with newtons three main laws as well as gravity ( I am trying to keep it simple here). This only deals with three items let alone the impact of the amount of people you interact with on a day to day basis.

As for the comment about knowing anything given infinite time. You are right and yet wrong at the same time. Right in the sense that given the amount of time anything and everything has to possibility to occur. But I would ask you if that is true understanding for as we are now and as we are then would be completely different.

Answer 4

No I do not agree with Einstein at all,though he was a creative figure,alot of science is a clever competion of egos.


Mystery is valueable and important beyond all reason.
I am not sure why scientists are so uncomfortable with the existence of mystery andwhy they want to solve her.

Nature is not a perfect machine, nor an exquisite organism, nor a rational system.Science can only explain away ideas and values…or explain human conduct in mechanistic or biological terms,not in human terms.

I dont want to understand life in biological terms or mechanistic terms.Or even in intellectual terms,I suppose one makes a choice between magic or mathematics?

Science is a system of idealised entities: atoms, electric charges, mass, energy and the like–fictions compounded out of observed uniformities…deliberately adapted to mathematical treatment that enable men to identify some of the furniture of the universe, and to predict and…control parts of it.That is it's aim.

It is not my reality, not a map, still less a picture of what we actually are.

It is an insult to human dignity,a bunch of abstractions into which men escape to avoid facing the chaos of reality.

Answer 5

What a great question..STAR!!

For once I disagree with Einstein's view in all my humbleness. The most indelible characteristic of life is its dynamism and inconsistency. When something is inconsistent at the first level, science goes to the second level to search for consistency that can explain the inconsistency of the first level. Science can only handle that which is based on some consistency at its bottom. I believe that 'life' is alive and different from the inanimate mainly due to this fact that even at the bottommost level, it is inconsistent because of its dynamism. In that sense, it is mystical such as can never be logically analyzed in totality.

Answer 6

Yes, I agree with him to a point. There are solutions that can be documented, and those that cannot be described in three-dimensional terms, just as quantum mathematics cannot be explained to someone who doesn't care. Either are learning experiences and there is a point during the evolution of an individuals human mind when all will be understood, logically, and rationally, as prescribed by the vehicle of understanding it will take to do so.

Answer 7

I wish Einstein would come back and help solve the Global warming problem.

Sorry that really didn't answer your question.

I agree with your opening sentence; however, I think people nowadays can never be completely understood. Life is logical and rational - people are not.

Answer 8

I agree with Einstein, Da Vinci, Darwin and a bunch of other smart guys with most of what they said, even the ones I haven't heard much about, because I believe they have thought much more than what I have, truly logical thinking (you say scientific, i say logical). Given enough time (infinite time), we'll understand everything (infinteness of knowledge about life).

Answer 9

I think it is both magical/mysterious and mathematical/methodical.
Intellectual and philosophical.
Mind and spirit.
With reason and feeling.
Some things are beyond all ability to understand ,
like peace, do we really need to understand the meaning of peace to experience the feeling of peace?
If you understand a mystery, you become part of it.

Answer 10

Both.

In a personalist sense, as I focus on how I sense passing events, life is magical (or miraculous).

When I have to deal with the world, in terms of survival (making a living, or whatever) life is mathematical— I have to turn to my reason to navigate many of life's crises, big or small.

I must admit that I've just been reading Martin Buber for the zillionth time — a worthwhile effort at learning. Buber very much believed and acted on the ongoing "miracle" of life, which he saw as the transcendent and ongoing work of creation. This, he said, was best lived by modeling life as a series of decisions where one strives for "I-thou" intimacy with other human beings (but also with nature and art) as a means of trying to establish relationships with God.

However, he thought that if one tried to live above life (pure mysticism) one was fleeing one's responsibilities, and to live in this world one often had to engage in "I-it" relatinships, which are bound to be manipulative (the model of human beings dealing with nature which sometimes even has to be applied to dealing with other human beings).

His attemps to reconcile these two aspects of life, and keep them in a proper relationship to each other, is very difficult, both to achieve, and to communicate. That's why every year or so I go through another period of trying to dig into Buber.