But that's just changing what we're referring to in the conversation. No one in the debate was using "free" to refer to whether a choice is a product of the agent's mental processes or not. — Terrapin Station

So you would call an act independent of and maybe even contrary to any conscious decisions an act of free will?

The thing is - the bit that actually interests me - is that we can talk very clearly about the formal aspect of substantial being, but it all goes very shifty as we try to drill down into the material aspect of substantial being. — apokrisis

Just if you look at it very superficially. The form of a cloud is very disputable, not even to speak of fog. And there are many things that look circular - but only if you do not measure too exactly...

Particle physics tells us that the electrons and quarks composing the silicon and oxygen atoms are yet again just informed substance — apokrisis

The word "particle physics" as well as the plurals you use seem to indicate a contradiction here. Afaik there are transitions between energy and matter. One could ask the question if this is really the last word on those things though.

So for the materialist, it is turtles all the way down. Yet materialists don't seem to think they have a problem. — apokrisis

I guess the problem is of another nature. Materialists do not seem to start from the smallest particles there are. The reality of the smallest things is often discussed. Maybe they are just theoretical entities, maybe the theories are incomplete. After all qualities have been destroyed there will be only numbers left in the theories. That doesn't mean that matter is numbers.

You show that "bottle" is an idea that can be imposed on other materials, like plastic or metal. And you can show that "glass" is what you are left with once you melt your bottle to a liquid puddle. — apokrisis

In other words you cannot. Saying a concrete thing was a bottle is just as aspectual as saying it is glass.

How do you point to glass OR the "bottle" in a case of a glass bottle?

I don't think you are really thinking about what you are saying. If it is "just glass" then how is it "a bottle"? — apokrisis

I don't think you are talking about the actual thing. You know to put bottles into a glass-container, no?

But I doubt you have any desire to endorse hylomorphic thinking. So how can a chair BE matter, as you state? — apokrisis

As you pay for it's disposal per kg. A bottle can easily be just glass... :)

An unattractive alternative is still an alternative. — Jamesk

But doing a bad thing is never an act of free will.

So in summary, it has to be stable stuff that can be plastically re-shaped into stable forms. Materialism is the ontology of mankind the builder. That is the pragmatically useful way of understanding nature ... so it must be true. :lol: — apokrisis

truth noun

Definition of truth
....
4 capitalized, Christian Science : GOD

We perceive material objects all of the time, we do not perceive matter. — Jamesk

That is the same as saying we do not percieve colors. We perceive a black-red screwdriver, we perceive ....
Fair enough - why would we need abstractions? We don't observe objects...

The material substratum supporting the mind independent, absolute existence of those material objects is invisible. — Jamesk

You, too, are mixing assumptions of materialism into the definition of matter. Here is a definition for you:
https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/matter

matter noun
mat·​ter | \ˈma-tər
\
Definition of matter
...
2a : the substance of which a physical object is composed

b : material substance that occupies space, has mass, and is composed predominantly of atoms consisting of protons, neutrons, and electrons, that constitutes the observable universe, and that is interconvertible with energy

....

3a : the indeterminate subject of reality especially : the element in the universe that undergoes formation and alteration

b : the formless substratum of all things which exists only potentially and upon which form acts to produce realities

...

7 Christian Science : the illusion that the objects perceived by the physical senses have the reality of substance

The difference between ideas and matter is that ideas are mind dependent and matter supposedly is not. — Jamesk

Kant, for example, could not explain it's resistiveness and preservance in other ways. There cannot be a will to lift a thing up and one to hold it on the ground in one subject at a time.
But - again - this is not part of the definition of matter.

Right, to define something is to state an idea. It doesn't indicate whether the defined thing could be observed or not - go figure.

It is the claim that the defined thing, "matter", is something observed rather than just an idea, that is what needs to be justified. — Metaphysician Undercover

I guess it is a nominalistic "We call things with those properties material." No claim - just calling names. It is not my problem that you go on and try to make the materialness a property inherent and important to the essence of the existence of everything(tm). Your are mixing up matter and materialism as well as ideas and idealism.

That's just an idea though, an assumption, not an observation. You are claiming, to paraphrase, "anything that occupies space and has weight is matter". But what we sense, and observe, is particular things occupying space and having weight, not matter. So the validity of this idea, this assumption, or claim you've made, needs to be supported. — Metaphysician Undercover

Claim? That is the established definition of the word - go figure!

matter
[mat-er]
See more synonyms for matter on Thesaurus.com
noun

the substance or substances of which any physical object consists or is composed: the matter of which the earth is made.
physical or corporeal substance in general, whether solid, liquid, or gaseous, especially as distinguished from incorporeal substance, as spirit or mind, or from qualities, actions, and the like.
something that occupies space.

Because you are trying to give some? I did so.

Of course. But that does not say anything about the definition of the thing, does it?

Speculation is not my primary buisiness.

Weight. Resistance.
Per definition: a measure of matter.

Why is that oversimplified? The basic definition of material objects was given.
Mass is a good keyword. Mass implies inertia. Reality is resistance.

Matter occupies space and - in common day life - has a weight. Anything that has these properties is made of matter. That's the definition.

We do not observe matter. — Metaphysician Undercover

Who says something like that?

My doubt is this: Does the falsity of a statement(p) necessarily imply its opposite(~p) is true? (My professor says it does imply.) — Jerin Jaison

Under which circumstances? E.g. the keywords open(and closed)-world-assumption, different modi of negations might be worth a look (for the sake of the argument).
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Non-monotonic_logic
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Negation_as_failure
In your example: The statement ~p might be interpreted as "We do not know for sure that p applies." This would leave open the factual possibility of p.
In classical logic, i.e. assumption of perfect knowledge and a closed world, ~~p <=> p holds.
For the sake of the argument, in a discussion with your professor, you can always say that any educated, reflecting being would - of course - assume incomplete, uncertain knowledge about the world. :)

Thoughts? — Kranky

Better not, as it seems.... Just forget about that kind of bullshit. Reinsure the rationality of such patterns of thought asking yourself what they are good for. As Aristoteles puts it: It is wrong to say of things, that are not, that they were. Think about this. What makes up for the being of such thoughts? Do you have reason asking yourself such stuff? Or are you just farting against the wind? Doing so may make the world stink.

Plan B: Go buy yourself some dignity.

No problem. You are the way you are... ;)

why does Reality exists? — DiegoT

Do you consider that a rational question? What should that be good for? If I was a religious person I could simply say that divine matters are not for humans. As I'm not I just ask why anyone would or should be interested in something that is - per definition - not real. Nonsense, right? We've got TV for those things. And just maybe philosophy forums.

I read your response. I am unsure what point your first paragraph is making other than many people question human knowledge. I give no weight to group opinions without rational grounds. — Dfpolis

Maybe that is part of the problem: You do not even recognize the process you are part of. How could you? It is about intentionality, as you pointed out. To someone like me the resulting contradiction is obvious. Not that there would be anything to discuss - questions are only the beginning. We are beyond this point, aren't we?

As I was talking about knowing, I assumed that you were as well. — Dfpolis

I thought, I was. For example we know even the most basic ontological basis' have been put into question numerous times with more or less impact on contemporary philosophy. We know the history and conceptual origins of the words as we use them today to a great extend. Such things weren't proven, they were said. A-priori deductions conclude from certain foundations more or less like mathematics deduces from axioms. Adorno and Horkheimer put this to a point saying at the end of enlightenment even the subject itself is no more than a substrate of the right to set itself as such. Modern society, educated as it is, recognizes this - at least when things get serious.

The partial identity of subject and object in the act of knowing is an ontological fact. Distinction belongs to the logical order. Ideas of the identical reality can be distinct if they consider that reality from different perspectives. — Dfpolis

Well, when talking about concepts mixing things (read: perspectives) up is pretty contra-productive. It may well be that a natural number is always a real number as well but that doesn't make the natural numbers the real numbers or vice versa. So, to put this to a point, if the sciences of nature managed to say what you were up to do without even asking, what importance would the insistence of being "a deciding subject" make? "You" do what you do, right? This is about perspectives only, we are talking reasons. Reasons may seem compelling or void - who should judge that? Is it enough that someone felt compelled to do something to make the reason sufficient? Is there a higher-than-individual (divine) reason that could judge? We are far away from any "knowing" if we even can argue about such things.

1. The intelligibility of the object and the capacity of the subject to be informed are both actualized by the identical act, viz. the subject's awareness of the object, and — Dfpolis

I'm not sure I can not follow you. Are you sure you answered the question? Your "intelligibility" for example either is something I could not care about less or something that science would only be concerned about as far as you pose as an object. Not even Kant would have made the mistake to call his deductions as describing a thing in itself.

2. The object informing the subject is identically the subject being informed by the object. — Dfpolis

I don't ask if you could prove that statement. I stick with the phenomenological account that you put forth the identity of subject and object on the one hand while implying a sharp distinction on the other.

I have argued previously that although all knowing is a subject-object relation, natural science begins with a fundamental abstraction that focuses on physical objects to the exclusion of the knowing subject. — Dfpolis

You are putting it to the point. You are different from the physical object observed, so... why should anyone assume you got something to do with it?

When showing that an "x" does not exist this does not extinct the letter. But this would be the case if the expression would be equal to the expressed.
If you take words like "yellow" or "green", in quantum mechanics you get "yellow=green". I sometimes wear a green tie. Can you imagine this? Under those conditions? Writing "yellow=green" is no problem. Having an idea of what this really means is - because yellow is yellow, and green is green. Or was it brown? Or blue? Sorry, I really don't get this.

If I define "x" as "a sentence that does not exist.", what do we have then?
"x" - as a letter which refers to
"x" - as the idea of it being a variable which refers to
nothing (a sentence which does not exist)

We still can talk about x and sentences that do not exist: Such x'es do not require much typing.

it is concerned with the particular thing which is identified through the use of the symbol. — Metaphysician Undercover

Correct. But the symbol "a" just establishes an abstract identity. This is why you can know that I am talking about the same symbol when I now write, "a" was introduced at an earlier time.

Elaborate on that, please. I do not quite see where. If there is a determined something the law of identity applies.

or by changing the meaning of terms mid discussion — MindForged

How would you recognize a change in meaning if the term wasn't identical to itself?
What is the difference between "a=2, b=3" and "a=2, a=3"? I for my part say that they are visually distinct.

The law of identity is not a law about reference — MindForged

Sure it is. It models that a mental object that was defined stays the same. A quantum particle, in contrast to it's definition, does not.

That I believe what I'm saying is true does not entail that it's impossible to give a coherent formalism where objects are not self-identical. — MindForged

Expressing such a formalism in itself is:

For terms of the second kind, tp t2, ..., identity is not an allowed relation. In the intended interpretation *those terms* denote non-individuals, items with no identity conditions

It'd be unclear what "those" refers to if the "terms" would not be the "terms", don't you think?

Truth-predication isn't even directly involved, I think. — MindForged

Do you mean that sentence to be taken as truth?

so that there is a failure of application when you try to assert something like "∀x(x = x)". — MindForged

How so if "∀x(x = x)" does not mean "∀x(x = x)" but something else? You cannot make a statement which does not assert itself without... an extra-ordinary amount of freedom what can be written without any possiblilty of someone marking it as an error.

This just is the difference between form and content.
Say we have a system where t denotes a binary truth-predicate: t(x, true), t(x, false)
This is contradictory. x is said to be true and false alike. We could use formalisms to deduce further things in this system if more clauses were given.
But the clauses themselves are always thought to be true if they appear in it.
If you start expanding: "p" means "p is true" you cannot express the truth-predicate using itself.
t(x, true) would mean t(t(x, true), true), which would mean t(t(t(x, true), true), true) and so on.
This is why I think you cannot formulate non-reflexive-logics using itself.
The truth-"predicate" is self-identical if "x" asserts "x".

Terms to which identity holds and terms to which it does not. — MindForged

But this is just the point: My Thesis was that the set of meaningful statements made in a discussion is just the set of the terms for which identity holds. Those do assert themselves.

Sure it does. — MindForged

So it does not necessarily. Or how is this solved?

I somewhat confused. In the part you were quoting, I was talking about whether it's possible have a logic to represent the idea that some objects might not be such that Identity is applicable to them. — MindForged

I know :)
But the question you answered to was how we could meaningful discuss things without a=a-identity. I guess we cannot as the formulation of sentences and statements does not follow the logic we find in quantum-mechanics. You could not formulate non-reflexive logic using non-reflexive logic (if I'm not wrong).

Identity appears in basically every logic (even non-classical systems), but that's not because it's impossible to modify it or do without it (it just seems like such an obvious thing to assume). Nor does it follow if you limit identity that "water=water" is false. — MindForged

The point where I can not follow this is:
If you proof p(x) - does x have the property p() then? And was p(x) proven?
You do not seem to get around the fact that writing "p" asserts "p".

The higher unemployment rate that's caused by minimum wage laws is the aggregate result of all those many varied individual decisions, or one might say a mean around which all those varied decisions tend to cluster — gurugeorge

This makes the proposition that one is willing to understand the decisions made. One does not have to and hence: why should I? Just invest less in abstract "growth" and employ them right away.

No, it's just a general observation explaining the economic logic of the situation and making a prediction, based on economic theory, which has been borne out by the facts again and again and again. — gurugeorge

I see. Than it is just a sloppy formulation not pointing out the factum in the right way:

They(Employers) are the ones who have to weigh up the costs and benefits to them — gurugeorge

It is not about how much their work would be worth objectively but how much a potential employer could profit from it.