They’re not objects, except in the metaphorical sense of being ‘objects of thought’. — Wayfarer

Numbers are not objects themselves. That's clear. Though the number seven candle put on top of the birthday cake of my child neighbor seemed pretty real and objective. Numbers have the habit of embracing equals. The equals being objects or mental whatevers. You have to look for equals first. Whats the difference between 5 and 6 apples? One apple. Whats the difference between 356 apples and 357 apples? Still 1. But what if you cant count? Is there still a difference? How would you know the difference? By laying all apples side by side? How many apples are sqrt(-1) apples? How many are -1 apoles?

See, you're not practicing anekantavada.
Q.E.D. — baker

"Anekantavada, (Sanskrit: “non-one-sidedness” or “many-sidedness”) in Jainism, the ontological assumption that any entity is at once enduring but also undergoing change that is both constant and inevitable."

My maths isn’t great, but I can count — Wayfarer

You have learned to count. There are peoples who cant count to ten or even four.

The form "the only good (the best) X is a dead X" has wider applications. — baker

The ethnophaulism is used also in political context: "The only good commie is a dead one". But why is the best philosopher a dead one? They ask too much?

Well whatever the nature of number 7 is, we are all in perfect agreement as to what it means, — Wayfarer

But you firstly have to learn the meaning.

Who is the I? Maybe the body between inner and outer wotld. Can anyone be to blame for their thoughts in their world (physically residing in the brain but only if you look at the brain materialistically).

A book has been written that is called "We are our brain". It could have just as well be named "We are our body". The intermediate between outer world and inner world

Self and Brain(??) — Corvus

:smile: Morning (at least, here it is). I havent read that book. Is it relevant maybe for another discourse currently taking place on this forum?

And the best philosopher is a dead philosopher, eh? — baker

What do you mean by that? I cant see the connection with the comment before.

material (matter/energy) is something that can be directly observed, measured, detailed, experimented on, etc., so if thought is totally material, how comes then that they have so liitle data on it, and only on a body level? — Alkis Piskas

That's because the detailed information is hard to get. The moment you try to get that detailed information you are interfering with that process you distort it, more or less. The more if you wanna know more details. Thoughts in living creatures are very hard to study objectively.

The truth about the interpretation of QM.

The truth about the standard model.

By telling I didnt stole a thing in the supermarket (to let not wife to worry) while at the same time knowing I stole a bottle of fruity juice (these cost so much!).

Well, maybe the guitar man has a wrong attitude towards people (thinking they all listened to him; it was the first time for me, already proving him wrong). But why he thinks viva la vida is a rip-off? I fail to notice.

Wasnt it you who responded to the question about the meaning of the song viva la vida?

Was it, though — Noble Dust

Well, I cant see the connection with Chris Martin exactly. I was sitting on the toilet hearing his guitar and it sounded great. Whats the connection with Coldplay?

Also, I claim Plebeian-Removed as a future band name — Noble Dust

:grin:

Great Satriani clip, by the way!

It could be that the universe is a bunch of particles moving away from each other on a static, spatially 4d substrate, giving the illusion of expansion in our 3d space. The problem is though how to keep all that matter on the 3d manifold. But there, the structure of particles can come to the rescue.

It could be that the fluctuating quantum fields are the source of dark energy (virtual particle pairs to use a popular but quite imaginative view; it shows a classical view of particles though and how the hell can a particle and its anti companion appear like that? But for the argument the image fits as long as you remember that it is a small part of the whole of virtuality). The fluctuating fields are always there. They even represent scalar particles (total spin 0 or 1, though they not are fundamental). Dark energy curves spacetime negatively. But what "normal" particle could THAT? There are scalar mesons but they dont curve spacetime negatively. Not even virtual ones.

, what you're saying is the backwards extrapolation of matter and energy in the universe approaches a single point but never really reaches it (asymptote). :ok: — TheMadFool

The "point" is that there IS no such point.You can say that that point lays an infinite amount of time away and thus asking about the time before makes no sense but a black hole has a beginning too.

They've actually looked to see if the universe shows overall curvature, and it doesn't. — frank

How can you know that if we see only a minor part of that universe. It can be locally flat and globally curved.

But heading back to the OP - the notion of "More evolved" is a nonsense. — Banno

If you mean "better" then I agree 100%. If you mean "more complex", I don't. By the way, people are the only beings that can cry with rears coming out. I think. Though I have to say that our puppy dog does a good job in whining when we eat. I expect her to secretely invent the weapon of tears...

Everybody likes a tit in the mouth. — James Riley

:lol:

How about "We never agree on anything."
We will have some disagreements for sure, but that's just natural. :D — Corvus

:grin:

Ha! Good one! I have to day that I'm a bit biased in my attitude towards Popper. At university I took philosophy as one of the teachhings to choose from. Physics is nice but one wants a bit more! At least, if I''m that one. A professor gave me some copied papers of some books of Feyerabend. Well, the papers weren't copied but Feyerabend's writings were on them. I dunno if I wouldn't have met Feyerabend if he hadn't give those copies (I'm sure I would) but I'm thankful he did. Feyerabend is something else and in strong disaggreement (talking of which!) with Popper. So... I have read that book of Popper you have on your shell. It's on my shell to, but to say I wipe the dust off...No. He should himself be falsified!

Anyhow, suppose I have a theory about the origin of the universe. What took place around the big bang (inflation) and before (and after). How long should I go on criticizing or trying to falsify it ( which would be a bit problematic...)?

Always nice writing with you! :smile:

Would you agree? — Pop

Hi Pop! I read this contribution with delight. My answer is almost certainly yes. I want to say something more but I got a sudden ache in mt stomach. Damned! "Pain no like!" says Prishon... I must rest a while... I will certainly elaborate later!

"Still not much difference, but enough to heat up discussion in a philosophy forum, and, of course, the wider world"

:lol:

Nietzsche was writing about a "congress of souls" instead of a unitary soul at the opening of Beyond Good and Evil long before we had MRIs. — Count Timothy von Icarus

You make my day! :smile:

Prishon must know himself/herself. Way ahead of the rest of us on his Socratic quest. — Fooloso4

:heart:

Perhaps you could ask. — Fooloso4

Prison, did you mean "Platonic solids"?

Prishon says: "Yes! How the f. did you know?"

According to Plato, it is not the objects themselves with which the mathematician deals but their images, that is, drawings or diagrams. — Fooloso4

Indeed. The forms can never be known. Like the elements of heaven. The images are not the forms, which have no form.

The Platonic forms are materializations of the corresponding eternal forms in Platonic — Prishon

Prishon must correct. With forms he probably meant solids.

They are the mathematical or eidetic models of the elements fire, water, air, and earth. — Fooloso4

The Platonic forms are materializations of the corresponding eternal forms in Platonic heaven. But they are approximations. Math describes them exactly but it doesn't privide an image of the forms. The forms are unknowable in principle. Seems reasonable that they correspond to the real elements used in the cosmogenesis. It would be nice if the Platonic solid were made from the five elements. There would be a bigger arsenal of real forms to chosen from in the construction of the solar system. Even better than atoms. ☺

We're drifting of now. So put on your safetybelt. The going is gonna be rough and bumpy. The esoteric coloring is perceived by the esoteric class. Only for those into it. But where one member of the esoteric class sees violet the other sees green ( metaphorically). The website might be European administered but still offers a way to make a difference in lifting it up. Or puting it under pressure. Making not earlier perceived colors visible can be accomodated. The educational public system is there for the public. Who knows what the public knows or is interested in? Which color esoteric water have drunk? They all can do say or make belief. They can drink new colors. Learn new colors. The administration just administers colorblindly. I might hope. What matters is the coloring oof and the being colored. In growing evolving forms on the verging brink of a Dadaist painting. As long as the administration lets colors be administered properly we wont fell into the hands of that single-sided Xenophanesian god. That sees color nor sounds. Only the objective existence of a hard solid black space. In fact with no sides at all.

The Forms are an attempt to make sense of the world. — Fooloso4

Plato's tetrahaeder, octohaeder, icosahaeder, an attempt to make sense of the world?

There ARE no other sides.

Would a wiser more evolved living people be near defenseless? — TiredThinker

Of course not. People evolved for being free. They are born without two the features all animals share. A coat and a weapon. People are born nude and can develop their own cloths and weapons. For that we have something no animals have. A neocortex. Free imagination and thinking takes place there. Why did this evolve. Biologists, especially the Dawkinskians, see this as a response to the demands of our selfish genes who are in control over our bodies and brain. To meat the challenges other bodies, other animals, controlled by other genes, are facing us with. The only objective of these selfish genes have is to be passed on. Idem dito for memes. The only goal of memes is to be passed on.

Lamarckians put the organism in the driverseat. We control the genes. The genes are altruistic. We developed in order to meet the challenges posed by other kinds of animals. We developed freedom so we can make our own weapons agaist them. This knowledge can be passed on. Like memes. But it's not the wanting of memes to be passed on. It's us who want them to pass on, just like our genes.

Both views have their shortcomings. I think the second view fits reality better. I don't think we are controlled by genes. They are merely a matter of practicallity. How else could we evolve?

In your example of a habitat many animals have their own degree of danger. But when an animal becomes dangerous? When it needs food or will possibly be food for others. Size doesn't matter. Some have the weapon of camouflage. Some of the poison. Some of the web. Some of the teeth and strength. These can be used for defense too. Some just have wonderful escape tactics.

People have evolved so they can understand all of these animals and we can build a defense against them challenging us. ALL of us (animals and people) have evolved just to be us. People have evolved to be free in the sense of not having fixed inner thoughts or outer appearance. Ideas come whirling around in our inner worlds. We want to express them and pass them on. The aspect of animal danger is not that important. We have a multitude of ways of dealing with them. I think the present day means have gotten out of hands. Scientifically based weaponary and chemical poison have replaced tbe Natural. In that sense we are more dangerous to the Natural world than the Natural world is to us. We have even managed it to give our offspring a world with more forrest fires and floods...

So, would a wiser man be near defenseless? Not at all! If he thinks and acts wise. He could become the victim though of his own wisdom. Like the animals are already. Biodiversity has diminished by 30%! How wise we are. The rainforrest is almost gone. Leaving less animal threat...

Well, the ancient Greeks started the ball rolling. — Corvus

Right! Damned! Why don't you write things once in a while with which I don't agree?

It was Xenophanes who started the view of an objective unique reality, to be known by ratio. The scientific ratio, back then of course still primitive, though who knows what some Greeks were thinking. Archimedes found "his" law in bath, so... It was still the time of the gods and Xenophanes expressed this view of a human-independent unique reality by means of a horrible kind of god.The one and only. All knowing, all seeing, super in anything. It didnt posses a list of qualities as qualities are subjective. Plato beleived in a mathematical heaven of unchanging forms. I think it was this kind of thinking, together with Xenophanes' view became to be the reality that only science can adress or at least approximately komen. Falsificationalism is based on this. Popper "expanded" endless falsification as the real thing will never get reached; tiring indeed. Why not saying that after falsifying, criticizing, falsifying, criticizing, ...ad inf. that you theory is "it"?

Del?
— Prishon
Eated — Yohan

You mean you ate it?

"Anti-vaxxin. Is it right?"


Maybe right, maybe left. You have to examine it.

Fallacies are invalid inferences (i.e. premise -> conclusion), and calling a personal remark that doesn't form a premise in an argument or inference "ad hominem" is just a category mistake. — Seppo

I couldn't agree more...

The crackpot infallacy. You know what I mean. Or is that a fallacy?

A = {B}, B = {C}, and this is where it gets interesting, C = {A} — TheMadFool

The snake biting its tail. It would be a vacuous snake though.

Did you miss that mental content (as contained) is unaffected by physical matter? — Mark Nyquist

Huh? Mental content unaffected by physical matters? Dont think so.

The senses, it seems, can't see past the particulars but the mind grasps the essences, another name for universals. — TheMadFool

Dont put a thump up for a definition of the essence, please. You are playing God.

So, the form (universals) individuates in objects (particulars). The senses, it seems, can't see past the particulars but the mind grasps the essences, another name for universals. :up: — TheMadFool

No. The senses can look at ALL forms. There simply are no universals. The essence is no name for universals. The essence simply cant be defined.