Order:
Disambiguations
Bruce L. Gordon [3]Bruce Gordon [1]
  1. A Quantum-Theoretic Argument Against Naturalism.Bruce L. Gordon - 2011 - In Bruce Gordon & William A. Dembski (eds.), The nature of nature: examining the role of naturalism in science. Wilmington, DE: ISI Books. pp. 179-214.
    Quantum theory offers mathematical descriptions of measurable phenomena with great facility and accuracy, but it provides absolutely no understanding of why any particular quantum outcome is observed. It is the province of genuine explanations to tell us how things actually work—that is, why such descriptions hold and why such predictions are true. Quantum theory is long on the what, both mathematically and observationally, but almost completely silent on the how and the why. What is even more interesting is that, in (...)
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   4 citations  
  2. Maxwell–boltzmann statistics and the metaphysics of modality.Bruce L. Gordon - 2002 - Synthese 133 (3):393 - 417.
    Two arguments have recently been advanced that Maxwell-Boltzmann particles areindistinguishable just like Bose–Einstein and Fermi–Dirac particles. Bringing modalmetaphysics to bear on these arguments shows that ontological indistinguishabilityfor classical (MB) particles does not follow. The first argument, resting on symmetryin the occupation representation for all three cases, fails since peculiar correlationsexist in the quantum (BE and FD) context as harbingers of ontic indistinguishability,while the indistinguishability of classical particles remains purely epistemic. The secondargument, deriving from the classical limits of quantum statistical partition (...)
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   6 citations  
  3. Balloons on a String: A Critique of Multiverse Cosmology.Bruce Gordon - 2011 - In Bruce Gordon & William A. Dembski (eds.), The nature of nature: examining the role of naturalism in science. Wilmington, DE: ISI Books. pp. 558-601.
    Our examination of universal origins and fine-tuning will begin with a discussion of infl ationary scenarios grafted onto Big Bang cosmology and the proof that all infl ationary spacetimes are past-incomplete. After diverting into a lengthy critical examination of the “different physics” offered by quantum cosmologists at the past-boundary of the universe, we will proceed to dissect the inadequacies of infl ationary explanations and string-theoretic constructs in the context of three cosmological models that have received much attention: the Steinhardt-Turok cyclic (...)
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark  
  4. In Defense of Uniformitarianism.Bruce L. Gordon - 2013 - Perspectives on Science and Christian Faith 65 (2).
    The practice of science rests on the assumption of dependable regularity in the behavior of the physical world. It presumes that the world has an investigable causal structure and that scientific experimentation, observation, and theorizing provide a reliable pathway to its discernment. This much is not in dispute. What is in dispute is what warrants the metaphysical and methodological assumption—essential to the heuristic utility of science—that nature is uniform in such a way that the present can serve as a key (...)
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark