More on Our Environments (Surroundings)
Kevin R. Henke
October 14, 2022
For this debate, I defined “environment” very broadly in Henke (2022aw):
“When I talk about the environment, I’m referring to our Universe. For example, astronomers look at the chemistry of stars and see the same elements that we see on Earth (e.g., Delsemme 1998). They also see the same physics going on in distant stars and galaxies. Human societies and everything else on Earth are also part of our Universe.”
I also justified the use of this broad definition with “surroundings” in Henke (2022he).
Lundahl (2022s) does not like this definition of environment:
“Sorry, but that is NOT our environment. My environment involves a computer and two mugs of caffeinated drinks in front of me, and a wall beyond these (plus some plywood attraptions to support the computer's table and keep it from squeezing computer vires to the wall), and what is beyond the wall is no longer "environment" - that is the extent which animality could know without universal laws of reason.”
Lundahl (2022s) is defining “environment” far too narrowly for the purposes of this debate. He needs to consider far more than what’s in his immediate environment or surroundings. Rather than limiting the definition of environment to what’s around the individual, we have to take into account the “environments” of other humans and what they have discovered. Right now, my immediate surroundings include a computer and a desk in a windowless room. However, I can change my immediate surroundings. I can walk upstairs and go outside. I can call or email friends and relatives and find out about their immediate surroundings. I can discover what’s going on in even larger and more distant environments by watching the news or reading science articles. I’m not the center of the Universe.
As I stated in Henke (2022he), we need to remember that scientists have studied our Universe at scales that range from the subatomic to billions of light years, and going all the way back to the Big Bang. So, all of that has to considered as part of our “surroundings” or “environment” in the context of this debate and whether there is really something beyond our “environment.”
I continue in Henke (2022aw):
“Now, before Lundahl (2022j) can talk about anything “beyond our environment”, he first needs to demonstrate that anything actually exists beyond our environment; that is, beyond our Universe. Lewis (1960) failed to demonstrate that Heaven or any other supernatural realm exists and, so far, Mr. Lundahl has not done any better.”
Lundahl (2022s) then replies to this:
“He wasn't talking about supernatural realms, he was talking about such parts of the "universe" that are outside what normal people normally mean by our environment. The universe isn't part of it. China isn't part of my environment or of Henke's though news and products from it sometimes are. The rooms in the building beyond this wall is not part of my environment, right now. When you say "universe" you have gone very far beyond "environment" - if this was not apparent, this is because you were not attending to what C. S. L. or what I were actually arguing, you were second guessing what we mean, and such second guessing obviously destroys any communication, even from a masterful writer as C. S. Lewis. While Henke provided a review stating CSL's writing was "vague" or whatever it was, it was arguably by a natural scientist with similar communication problems on texts written outside his own very narrow culture.
The point that CSL is making is, supposing Delsemme were correct, he could only be so by successfully going beyond his environment, and any success in doing so depends on universally valid rules of logic.”
Again, Mr. Lundahl, who won’t or can’t produce any peer-reviewed publications and refuses to write clearly and spell correctly, has no basis for criticizing my reading or writing style (Henke 2022aq, Henke 2022e, Henke 2022j, Henke 2022o, Henke 2022q, etc.).
The point is, for the discussions in our debate, Mr. Lundahl’s definition of environment is too limited and inadequate. We should be discussing what we know about our Universe and determining whether or not there’s actually anything beyond it. Furthermore, the “masterful writer” Lewis (1960) discusses the Universe and Nature far more often than “environment” or “surroundings.” To be exact, on page 263, when Lewis (1960) discusses the Christian realm of Heaven, he makes no distinction between “environment” and Nature. In other words, Lundahl (2022s) continues to misinterpret what Lewis (1960) is saying (e.g., Henke 2022ch).
Nevertheless, when Delsemme (1998) and other scientists present their results on distant stars, they are demonstrating that these distant objects follow the same laws of physics and chemistry that we know about here on Earth. Mathematics and logic are universally valid because of the consistent properties of the Universe and there’s no reason for Mr. Lundahl or anyone else to inject a role for unwarranted supernatural beings into how the Universe operates.
References:
Delsemme, A. 1998. Our Cosmic Origins: From the Big Bang to the Emergence of Life and Intelligence: Cambridge University Press: Cambridge, UK, 322pp.
Lewis, C.S. 1960. Miracles, 2nd ed., printed 1974: Harper One: HarperCollinsPublishers, 294pp.