mindbrane's Journal: The Price Of Intelligence

We are the Universe on a course of self discovery. Some years ago I wrote the preceding sentence in one of my notebooks. I don't remember having come across it elsewhere and believe it's one of my twisted creations. The idea behind the sentence is twofold. First, as intelligent beings, how does our existence define the Universe, using the implications of our existence as an initial entry point to arriving at a definition of the Universe. What is information? What is knowledge? How are either dependent upon co-evolution and communication? Is science the Universe on a course of self discovery? If it can be said, we are the Universe on a course of self discovery, then, is the statement trivial? Secondly what price should we willingly pay to ensure the process that is science continues? What price is too high to pay for intelligence? Is there any price too high, short of the extinction of the species? If there is no price too high to pay for knowledge and science then can we push forward putting technological advance ahead of ecological and larger social concerns? These questions will be the focus of this Journal entry. The reason I'm making these entries is it allows me to take a break from work. :)

Science, as I understand it, suggests the statement, "We are the Universe on a course of self discovery", is trivial; but, for social animals such as ourselves, the implications of the statement being shown to be trivial are important. For my purposes I define science as a process of predictive modeling premised upon falsification. Karl Popper developed the idea of falsification as an underlying method enabling modern science, and, he also suggested modern man can be characterized as being able to let his hypotheses die in his stead. There are other important characteristics of science such as theories being non trivial, elegant, rigorous and robust, but my needs are limited to how science as an expression of intelligence can be said to warrant a value that might heavily conflict with other modern, necessary values.