Will

1. I will take you home. [assurance (of a future event)]

2. You will do as you're told. [coercion]

3. The rock will fall. [inevitable]

4. It's God's will. [desire]

Thus will is about ineluctability, like under duress, and an agency that desires that. In short, it's got to do with participation in the causal web as a cause and when that cause (agency) itself is causeless, we have free will.

:ok:

:ok:

If there are variations of ability between men then there must be some means of comparing them to each other beyond the horizon of personal experience. — Valentinus

Relativism is the nemesis of absolutism. :confused: I don't understand how the former could coexist with latter?

You will have to show how that problem of epistemology relates to Plato's actual argument in the dialogue. I don't see why I have to be the only one reading the dialogue in our discussion. — Valentinus

Sorry, I should do my homework.

:ok:

Knowledge can be a problematic word when applied to animals. Innate dispositions might be better. The have a nature such that when an object induces in the animals the relevant sensory organ, they recognize the object as food or predator or mate, etc. — Manuel

Animals know i.e. they possess knowledge (of edible food for example) but probably in ways different from humans. Now that you mention it, the definition of knowledge might need revision to accommodate this fact.

Yeah. So far as we know it's the chemical properties that cause us to smell objects the way we do. At least we have to include chemicals as an important part of the explanation.

I think Srap Tasmaner was on to an important point, which is the similarity of our reports based on different senses. We often see that sight and touch seem to agree with each other, as when we crumple up a piece of paper and aim for the garbage bin.

But sometimes the reports don't match, a piece of Tupperware may look normal to us and we would expect we could lift up with no problem. Until we touch it and feel an intense burn. — Manuel

In what sense do you mean "...reports don't match"? It implies you had an expectation, a preconception if you will of how a certain object/phenomenon should look/smell/taste/sound/feel like. Are you Alice (in wonderland)?

Depends on how you think of objects. Something lacking all sensible properties could be called nothing. — Manuel

Definitional issue, eh?

But vowels and consonants are by definition speech sounds, and written letters represent them. If there's no need to represent speech, neither consonants nor vowels are required in the alphabet or whatever. — jamalrob

Speech is being rendered into words but...a key component of speech - vowels - that seem to me absolutely necessary to distinguish words with identical consonants are missing. Why?

That proposition is addressed and deemed inadequate in the Theaetetus starting at 200d. — Valentinus

Can't be because of Gettier cases.

The future is within our grasp given the laws of nature are universal and constant - a good basketball player can, if he's skilled enough, score.
— TheMadFool

That observation is also made by Socrates to note that Protagoras' use of each person's experience as an adequate measure does not account for differences in ability amongst men. — Valentinus

Isn't that putting the cart before the horse? The differences in ability amongst men explains/supports Protagoras' stand that "man is the measure of all things".

According to the Fragments of Heraclitus, you would not be able to affirm or deny the proposition:

Hesiod distinguishes good days and bad day, not knowing every day is like every other. — Valentinus

So, "every day is like every other"? In a certain sense, yes (cyclical aspects) but in a different sense, no (acyclical aspects). I guess it depends on how we look at it aka perspective. Protagoras?

And you would be too busy fighting to care:

It should be understood that war is the common condition, that strife is justice, and that all things come to pass through the compulsion of strife. — Valentinus

Basically, the world is chaotic, pulling us in all directions.

Change is the only constant. — Heraclitus

C'mon, MF. Think a little bit. English is spoken even as a first language around the world, so what is the correct pronunciation of "schedule"? Or "controversy"? And so on. And can you understand it as it's spoken around the world? I cannot. And never mind where it's spoken as a second or third language.

Ancient Greek was a lingua franca of the ancient world from west of Sicily to the border of Afghanistan. Do you imagine in that world it was pronounced the same from one end of that world to the other?

However yhwh was pronounced, on those occasions when it was pronounced (which was when, according to your sources?), would have been correct. — tim wood

There are various, regionally peculiar, ways of pronouncing words but the issue I've raised is specific to ancient languages in and around the middle east in which case your comment is irrelvant. Too, I'm not talking about pronunciation per se (spoken word), my question is about books/documents (written word).

Based on the spoken word. — Hermeticus

Seems impossible.

So, you're saying the correct vowels would be inserted by the reader who would know that based on...???

By and large we apparently don't. I think there are really unusual boundary cases, sure, just as real people do face circumstances that can overcome their commitment to self-preservation. But the evidence says people will put up with a lot. — Srap Tasmaner

Still that "troublesome" self-preservation drive at work, I'm afraid. This is the paradox: we need to fear death to live but we have to die to...??? Why would we/God want to say, "ok, that's enough, I'm done/leaving or you have to go!" Something rather painful awaits an immortal or is life simply boring after a point?

:ok:

In my office and other places too, I know, at least think I do, whether a male colleague has a woman in his life - potted plants are a dead giveaway. See :point: Adam, Eve & The Tree Of Knowledge. Were you, by any chance, hinting at that? :chin:

I'm not so sure, at least not as certain as I'd have preferred, but Indian & Chinese philosophies are clubbed together as distinctly separate (eastern) from Greco-European (western) philosophies and oddly, linguistically and racially Indians are closer to Europeans than to Chinese. Something's off unless...I've got the wrong end of the stick.

Quality Of Life & Torture.

In Hell, the body count $=Nought!$ [There are things far, far worse than death]

Casilda Benegas-Gallego (b. 8 April 1907) is an Argentinian but Argentina's happiness index, let's just say, is not something Argentinians would want to talk about.

Abusrdum sans reductio! :smile:

This is not a scientific answer. It is about answering questions through experiments. In philosophy also through thought experiments.

What is then your gut feeling to dark matter? Why research? We'll just ask you — SolarWind

I merely offered my thoughts on the matter. Sorry it didn't click. Sometimes it does, it should actually but I'm just getting to learn the ropes.

Does a housefly have consciousness? — SolarWind

Let's work with gut feelings. Do you hesitate, even if only for a moment, before swatting a fly?

Does it have feelings? — SolarWind

Same question as above.

Or is it just a bio-machine? — SolarWind

Ditto.

What about plants? — SolarWind

Ditto.

No magic is needed to pull mind out of matter. — MondoR

:up: We've been wasting our time.

How on earth would we prove/disprove realism/antirealism? A thing ceases to exist when no one is perceiving it. We need to resort to a method indistinguishable from magic to do so; a buddhist monk once told me something to the effect that the point to enlightenment, nirvana, is to see (observe) without seeing (observing). Interesting. :chin:

A little something to ponder upon:

1. We don't know the answer to "are we alone?"

but,

2. If there are aliens, we know the answer to their question, "are we alone?" No, definitely not!

I propose a new question be formulated: are they (aliens) alone? No! — TheMadFool

Fitch's paradox of knowability:

1. Assumption: Everything is knowable
2. Conclusion: Everything is known

Suppose Fitch's argument is sound.

3. Everything is known (collective omniscience).
4. Not everything is known to humans.
Ergo,
5. Aliens exist.

We are not alone.

QED

Moreover, the 2nd incompleteness theorem is about formal provability of consistency and does not itself say anything directly about knowledge, which is a philosophical issue, not covered by the mere mathematics of Godel's proof.. — TonesInDeepFreeze

Fitch's Paradox Of Knowability

Assumption: Everything is knowable.
Conclusion: Everything is known.

:chin:

What's up with the liar sentence?

point still holds. You can look at a reflection of your eyes but you don't see yourself seeing. You only see — Wayfarer

[from the thread: An Analysis Of The Shadows]

What's the deal with self-reference (self-reflection)?

Yes, I think you raised an important point, the arbitrary aspect. What would be rational to expect of something to smell like? We begin (almost) already in it, we grow up to an age in which we just assume meat smells this way and no some other way, and that flowers smell like this.

But as to what they should smell like, based on how they appear, is a good question which I don't have an answer for. — Manuel

Innate knowledge? The horseness of a neigh - a neigh is part of the (Platonic) form of horses. Someone who hears a neigh a for the first time might immediately recognize it as horse's vocalization. :chin:

As I tried to point out, the chemical and physical structure of objects determine their properties. Does this answer your question or does it not? if it does then there are reasons why objects appear to us as they do - the way they look, smell, taste, sound and feel are functions of their, how shall I put it?, essence. In a sense then an object's qualities, all of them, are fundamental to them and that messes up Hume's (?) [@Srap Tasmaner] primary vs secondary qualities distinction.

Working my way through my confusion. I mean, sure, objects don't need to many properties by necessity. If you are blind and deaf and lack a sense of tactile sensations, there aren't many properties to uncover.

Properties being, properties for us: induced by objects so that we feel that way we do when we encounter them.

But to expect a property-less object is perhaps going too far. — Manuel

A property-less object? How does one distinguish that from nothing? Is this too off-topic?

:ok:

Sure, the point of this specific thread is just for that, whatever one wants to make of it. — Manuel

An open-ended question. :ok:

I think its innate, it's something they are born with, they have the disposition to recognize grass as a type of food. Similarly, baby turtles race to the ocean as soon as they hatch. There's no other explanation that an innate mechanism that makes them go to the ocean. — Manuel

The key word here is "recognition" which implies that there's a grassiness to the odor of grass - that's how herbivores identify/recognize grass (as food, edible and nutritious).

The intriguing bit is why should grass smell the way it does? It seems arbitrary, lacking a rationale and this I suppose is what bothers you. Is it that the matter is more about rationality (expecting reasons, good ones I guess, for why things are the way they are) than about reality?

Blind people have said that they are aware that "being in the red", means losing money. Or "feeling blue" means feeling down or depressed. If they could see, would the sensation of seeing an apple or seeing the ocean resemble anything associated with the word? I suspect not. But don't know, obviously. — Manuel

You seem to flip-flop between discussing things and how their properties aren't necessary to those things and properties themselves. What's up with that?

Hedonism in re suffering has two components: Life + suffering.

While I don't think negative utilitarianism would ever recommend killing every sentient being capable of suffering, let's suppose it does. If so what we have is this: no suffering but no life either. A "solution" no doubt but ignores another possibility: Life + no suffering. That's the boo-boo unless...life + no suffering is a contradiction.

I'm going to respond to your grass example. How do horses and cattle come to know that grass is food, something to eat? Smell or sight? Does the odor of grass have a grassiness to it? I'm just freewheeling here; let's see where this goes.

As far as I have seen, which, admittedly isn't far, the inconsistencies in math are analogous to "This sentence is not true." The proof of Godel's first incompleteness theorem uses similar slight of hand to show that, as Wikipedia says:

...no consistent system of axioms whose theorems can be listed by an effective procedure (i.e., an algorithm) is capable of proving all truths about the arithmetic of natural numbers. — T Clark

Well, let's use the sour grapes technique on math - if we can't discover every truth in math because of Gödel's incompleteness theorems, maybe we can prove that all such mathematical truths are merely trivial, truisms like 1 = 1, not worth knowing at all or, more accurately, obviously true if there can be such a thing in math. I dunno.

A digression no doubt but something worth looking into, no?

From what I've read, the foofaraw about these ideas comes from the fact that they crush logician's and mathematician's dreams of a perfect formal logical system, not from any impact to any mathematical system that could have an impact on the real world.

Am I sure about this? No way, but it seems like that's what Wittgenstein was saying in the linked article that Banno provided. Is it possible I have misunderstood? You betcha. — T Clark

Is the liar statement (this sentence is false) more about language than about logic?

That's an excellent illustration of the general idea. Thanks for sharing. — Manuel

Could you kindly elaborate on the point you wish to make?

Much of our knowledge, what we know, is visual e.g. a horse is horse because it looks a certain way but is there a horseness to the way a horse looks? :chin:

This whole discussion started from the question of whether the liars paradox has any implications for the design of bridges, i.e. if the paradox undermines the basic aspects of using math to solve problems. Thoughts? — T Clark

I'm not sure but Kurt Gödel's incompleteness theorems (utilizes a variation of the liar paradox) imply that we don't know, can't prove math is consistent and while Ralph Waldo Emerson claimed "a foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds...", I'm certain that a mathematical inconsistency could cause more than just bridges to collapse.

Not quite, but it's an approximation. Assume that for some reason, you recover all your senses. Before you lacked all of them.

Before you become habituated to the world, things like the distance of objects, what sound is related to which object, how surfaces feel, would likely be completely foreign. One would have to spend some time to associate the sound of footsteps with people stepping on the floor, as opposed to someone knocking on the door, which sounds kind of similar, depending on certain conditions.

But you may be right, I may be puzzling over nothing. I just found it interesting, but am not quite able to express it well enough, maybe because I'm wrong. — Manuel

It is interesting! It's a deep question.

Movie SFX

Yes. But what about chemical composition is it that should lead it to produce the experiences that we do? When I look at a chemical, say a sleeping pill or a hallucinogenic, it isn't obvious to me that these things would cause me to feel the way I end up feeling.

We find these things natural because we are habituated to them by now.

It's the difference between the felt quality and configurations of particles which lack any apparent qualities associated with our everyday life. — Manuel

You mean to say, for instance, that the sound of footsteps in a hall should possess some footness and floorness? Why would you think that? By the way it does and that's how burglars and cops do what they do.

I don't think you're right. The sensations (smell, sound, sight, touch and taste) produced by objects are functions of the chemical composition, the density, the elasticity, basically the properties of those objects. With experience, one can learn to associate sensations to objects that produce those sensations and we're good to go in a manner of speaking.

Destroying the village in order to save the village", darthb, does not "save" it. — 180 Proof

:fire: On point O wise one!

Saving a life isn't the same as giving a life. In the former, there's the self-preservation instinct that becomes the basis for the gift view of life. In the latter, no such factor exists; plus, in this case, we need to assess the overall hedonic value of life which, in the past & the present, was/is negative. You (OP) seem to intuit this when you talk about hereditary illnesses and vegetative states.

3. Conceivably, the most effective method of minimizing suffering would be ending the life of every being that can suffer, immediately and simultaneously. — darthbarracuda

You might want to take a look at mercy killing/euthanasia - done only when it's impossible to live and not suffer extremely. Premise 3 - something's wrong with it.

I was thinking along the lines of qualities. C's black in color but circular in shape. No contradiction.

I've never retired something that was born before. [ ... ] To be born is to have a soul, I guess.
— K, a cop (Blade Runner 2049)
A Replicant-killing Replicant's 'insight' of anātman. — 180 Proof

:up: