Naturaleza versus Libertad

Doy mis impresiones tras leer las opiniones de Juan Arana, Javier Pérez Jara, Miguel Saralegui, Francisco José Soler Gil y Santiago Collado González sobre el tema de la Naturaleza y la libertad, así como las de los nueve filósofos del libro de Arana “Los filósofos y la libertad”: Descartes, Leibniz, Wolff, Kant, Schopenhauer, Bergson, Skinner, Popper y Dennett. También añado mi punto de vista: que Naturaleza y libertad no caben en el mismo saco.I give my impressions after reading the opinions by Juan Arana, Javier Pérez Jara, Miguel Saralegui, Francisco José Soler Gil and Santiago Collado González on the subject of Nature and Freedom, as well as the positions of the nine philosophers in Arana’s book “Los filósofos y la libertad”: Descartes, Leibniz, Wolff, Kant, Schopenhauer, Bergson, Skinner, Popper and Dennett. I also add my point of view, that Nature and Freedom are incompatibl

El espíritu de la materia. Meditaciones poético-filosóficas

Estas doce breves meditaciones poético-filosóficas son un ejercicio estilístico que trata de fusionar la sabiduría y el pensamiento con la contemplación estética. Lejos de los discursos de sectas y religiones, se habla aquí del espíritu como una metáforaThese twelve and brief poetic-philosophical meditations are one stylistic exercise that tries to fuse wisdom and thought with an aesthetic contemplation. Setting aside discourses of sects and religions, the term spirit is used here as a poetic metaphor o

La negación del principio de individuación en la naturaleza, y la separabilidad y el concepto de sujeto como artificios humanos

Desde una perspectiva materialista reduccionista, el Universo es la suma de sus partes e interacciones, un todo siguiendo las mismas leyes físicas, el libre albedrío del individuo que se cree autónomo no es más que una ilusión. una única sustancia en la que no cabe hablar de individuos autónomos o individualidades pues todo está mutuamente entrelazado en un mismo modo de ser. La misma separación del Universo en sus múltiples partes obedece a criterios subjetivos relacionados con el modo en que nuestro cerebro trabaja, analiza información y adquiere conocimientos. El principio de individuación que confiere a cada ser humano una entidad-sujeto separada de las demás es también un artificio de nuestro modo de percibir la realidad. En este escenario, el libre albedrío del individuo que se cree autónomo no es más que una ilusión.From a materialist reductionist standpoint, the Universe is the sum of its parts and interactions, a whole that follows the same physical laws, a unique substance in which there is no place for autonomous individuals or individualities since all things are intertwined and share the same mode of being. The separation of the Universe itself in its multiple parts obeys subjective criteria related to the way our brain works, analyzes information and obtains knowledge. The principle of individuation which gives to each human being an entity-subject separated from others is also an artefact of our way of perceiving reality. At this stage, the free will of individuals who believe themselves to be autonomous is merely an illusion

Against free will in the contemporary natural sciences

The claim of the freedom of the will (understood as an individual who is transcendent to Nature) in the name of XXth century scientific knowledge, against the perspective of XVIIIth-XIXth century scientific materialism, is analysed and refuted in the present paper. The hypothesis of reductionism finds no obstacle within contemporary natural sciences. Determinism in classical physics is irrefutable, unless classical physics is itself refuted. From quantum mechanics, some authors argue that free will is possible because there is an ontological indeterminism in the natural laws, and that the mind is responsible for the wave function collapse of matter, which leads to a choice among the different possibilities for the body. However, here I defend the opposite thesis because indeterminism does not imply free will, and because the considerations about an autonomous mind sending orders to the body is against neuroscience or evolutionary theories about human beings. The quantum theory of measurement can be interpreted without the intervention of human minds, but other fields of science cannot contemplate the mentalist scenario. A fatalistic or materialist view, which denies the possibility of a free will, makes much more sense in scientific terms

Three-dimensional decomposition of galaxies with bulge and long bar

Some observations indicate that the Milky Way has two inner components, a bulge and a long bar, which present a misalignment of about 20 degrees that is against the predictions of some theoretical models that are based on numerical simulations. In this paper, we wish to determine whether this misalignment between the bar and the bulge can be observed in barred galaxies other than the Milky Way. For that, each galaxy of our sample was decomposed based on its Ks-band 2MASS image by fitting and modelling in a three-dimensional (3D) space the following components: a disc, a bar, and a bulge. The chi-square goodness-of-fit estimation allowed retrieving the best-fit angle values for the bar and the bulge to detect any misalignment. From the 3D decomposition of six barred galaxies, we have detected at least three galaxies (NGC 2217, NGC 3992, and NGC 4593) that present a significant misalignment between the bar and the bulge of more than 20 degrees.Comment: 8 pages, 1 figure. Accepted for publication in A&A. Corrected typo

The Twilight of the Scientific Age

This brief article presents the introduction and draft of the fundamental ideas developed at length in the book of the same title, which gives a challenging point of view about science and its history/philosophy/sociology. Science is in decline. After centuries of great achievements, the exhaustion of new forms and fatigue have reached our culture in all of its manifestations including the pure sciences. Our society is saturated with knowledge which does not offer people any sense in their lives. There is a loss of ideals in the search for great truths and a shift towards an anodyne specialized industry

Tests and Problems of the Standard Model in Cosmology

The main foundations of the standard $\Lambda$CDM model of cosmology are that: 1) The redshifts of the galaxies are due to the expansion of the Universe plus peculiar motions; 2) The cosmic microwave background radiation and its anisotropies derive from the high energy primordial Universe when matter and radiation became decoupled; 3) The abundance pattern of the light elements is explained in terms of primordial nucleosynthesis; and 4) The formation and evolution of galaxies can be explained only in terms of gravitation within a inflation+dark matter+dark energy scenario. Numerous tests have been carried out on these ideas and, although the standard model works pretty well in fitting many observations, there are also many data that present apparent caveats to be understood with it. In this paper, I offer a review of these tests and problems, as well as some examples of alternative models.Comment: review, 64 pages, 473 references, accepted to be published in "Foundations of Physics

Feminism in science: an imposed ideology and a witch hunt

Metaphysical considerations aside, today’s inheritors of the tradition of natural philosophy are primarily scientists. However, they are oblivious to the human factor involved in science and in seeing how political, religious, and other ideologies contaminate our visions of nature. In general, philosophers observe human (historical, sociological, and psychological) processes within the construction of theories, as well as in the development of scientific activity itself. In our time, feminism—along with accompanying ideas of identity politics under the slogan “diversity, inclusion, equity”—has emerged in science policies. The vast majority of scientists (including myself) are convinced that discrimination is reprehensible. We also believe that all individuals of any sex, race, ethnic group, or ideology should be valued in academia solely based on his or her merits and potential through equality programs. However, as I will show in this article, political indoctrination has inadmissibly undertaken the struggle for equality in academic institutions in Western countries. I argue here that universities and research institutes should be politically free (neutral) to encourage academic freedom. One negative aspect of equality programs is that worldwide, scientists are harassed for expressing opinions related to the “gender” issue. This situation severely restricts scientists’ freedom of expression, even within the limits of the law. Codes of conduct extending beyond legal boundaries are examples of this issue. Scientists who express their views about “gender” are often harassed, bullied, and socially or academically excluded. Thus, we are witnessing a wave of proselytizing in research institutes and science-associated media. Today, there is widespread biased propaganda of “victimhood”. This propaganda proposes positive discrimination and increasing women’s participation in unnatural ways. It also bends the history of science by overvaluing the creations of forgotten women, offering lectures on indoctrination, organizing congresses on gender and science, and persecuting anyone who sees the subject differently. All of this covered by a multitude of associations that financially benefit from these discourses through succulent subsidies of public money. Apparently, feminism is no longer about fighting against discrimination. Instead, it is about imposing an ideology and giving more power to one group of people. Thus, we must ask whether the end justifies the means

The long bar as seen by the VVV Survey: II. Star counts

Context: There is still some debate about the presence and the morphological properties of the long bar in the inner Galaxy. Aims: We investigate the morphological properties of the long Galactic bar using the VVV survey extending star counts at least 3 mag deeper than 2MASS. Our study covers the relatively unexplored negative longitudes of the Galactic bar. We obtain a detailed description of the spatial distribution of star counts towards the long Galactic bar as well as to measure its parameters. Methods: We performed star counts towards -20<l<0 deg., |b|< 2 deg. using VVV, 2MASS, and GLIMPSE data. We applied an average interstellar extinction correction. We also adjusted latitudinal profiles to obtain the centroid variation and bar thickness. Results: We probe the structure of long Galactic bar, as well as its far edge at l=-14 deg. The differences between counts with and without extinction correction allow us to produce a crude extinction map showing regions with high extinction, mainly beyond the end of long Galactic bar. The latitudinal profiles show evidence of the centroid vertical variation with Galactic longitude reaching a minimum at l=-13.8 deg. The bar has an inclination angle 43+/-5 deg with respect to the line Sun-Galactic center. In addition, we have determined the bar parameters, such as thickness, length, and stellar distribution.Comment: Accepted for publication at Astronomy \& Astrophysics (17 pages, 17 figures). Second version: 1- Only minor changes on the abstract of the manuscript. 2- Abstract of arXiv.org modified to be in accordingly to Astronomy & Astrophysics abstract structur