↪Wayfarer
At issue is what counts as a measurement. You presume it must involve a conscious being, because you want consciousness to be a substance within the universe. Others have different ideas. Again, mere speculation. Shut up and calculate. — Banno

Sorry to butt in again. But your disparagement of "mere speculation"*1 is a knock on theoretical Science and Philosophy, and not appropriate for a post on The Philosophy Forum. I suppose, like many TPF posters, you view Philosophy as a red-headed step-child of Materialist Science, with aberrant genes inherited from its disreputable parent of institutional Religion.

But probably views General Philosophy*2 (born in ancient times & cultures in opposition to irrational beliefs & gossipy rumors) as the parent of Modern Empirical Science, born in the 17th century in direct opposition to Authoritarian Theology, and focused on Reductive rather than General understanding.

A materialist measurement views the physical yardstick as the judge of accuracy and factuality. But who made & marked the stick with arbitrary increments (meters vs yards)? The etymology of the word "to Measure", comes from Latin "mensura", and the root "mens-"*3 refers back to the Mind that created the the concept of rational regulation of an undifferentiated world*4. So, Way is philosophically correct that, absent a "conscious being", no measurement takes place in the material world. :smile:


*1. Science and Speculation :
"Despite wide recognition that speculation is critical for successful science, philosophers have attended little to it. When they have, speculation has been characterized in narrowly epistemic terms : a hypothesis is speculative due to its lack of evidential support"
https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10670-020-00370-w

*2. General philosophy, also known as metaphysics or ontology, explores fundamental questions about the nature of reality, existence, and knowledge.
https://www.quora.com/How-can-I-distinguish-the-general-and-technical-world-of-philosophy

*3. The Latin word mens expresses the idea of "mind" and is the origin of English words like mental and dementia.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mens

*4. Measurement problem :
A thought experiment called Schrödinger's cat illustrates the measurement problem.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Measurement_problem

But if we are here to argue sensibly it seems at least reasonable to be called upon to state a clear position. My complaint about Wayfarer is that he cannot or will not do that. — Janus

Are you demanding a "clear position" expressed in Materialistic terminology? I can't speak for , but I suspect that he "cannot or will not do that", because it would completely miss the meaning of his Immaterialist*1 philosophical Position. Any "sensible" Material aspects of his worldview are covered by Science, not Philosophy. :smile:

*1. Immaterialism :
The term 'immaterialism' was introduced by George Berkeley in the third of his Three Dialogues (1713), to designate his own opinion that there was no such thing as material substance, and that bodies were not to be understood in terms of qualities that inhered in an independent, unthinking substratum, but rather as ...
https://kclpure.kcl.ac.uk › Immaterialism
Note --- This may not be how Way would characterize his views. So I show it here only as an example of an alternative worldview to Materialism, which could not be "clearly" & "sensibly" expressed in Materialist language.

No. It gathered a good bunch of people to drill into self-organising complexity in the broad sense. But then over-generalised that dynamicist viewat the expense of the further thing which biosemiotics is focused on. Dynamics regulated by information. — apokrisis

I don't follow Santa Fe Institute in general, because my interest is primarily in their work on "dynamics regulated by Information" as you put it. Here's two books by authors & editors, some affiliated with SFI, that approach Complexity and Self-Organization from an Information perspective. :smile:


From Matter to Life: Information and Causality :
Recent advances suggest that the concept of information might hold the key to unravelling the mystery of life's nature and origin.
by Sara Imari Walker, et al (Editor) SFI
https://www.amazon.com/Matter-Life-Information-Causality/dp/1107150531

Information and the Nature of Reality: From Physics To Metaphysics :
Many scientists regard mass and energy as the primary currency of nature. In recent years, however, the concept of information has gained importance. Why? In this book, eminent scientists, philosophers and theologians chart various aspects of information, from quantum information to biological and digital information, in order to understand how nature works.
https://www.amazon.com/Information-Nature-Reality-Metaphysics-Classics/dp/1107684536
Note --- It has a chapter specifically about Semiology and Biosemiotics

Do you see some spooky implications of my Energy/Information/Mind hypothesis that you would not wish for? — Gnomon
It presents Energy/Information/Mind, three quite distinct concepts, in a vague and inadequate way. — Banno

One of the most common replies on this forum is : "I don't understand what you are saying". Yet sometimes not phrased so politely. I've seen such responses to your own posts. But that's OK. If you will note specific instances of vagueness & inadequacy, I will attempt to clarify them. I have the time, if you have the interest.

Are you not able to grok my abreviated 2 or3 paragraph posts on this forum? Or my 30-page Thesis on the net? Or my multiple Blog posts on specific topics? Admittedly, it's difficult for someone to make sense of an unfamiliar, even unorthodox, concept. My posts typically include links to scientific articles that discuss relevant topics in more focused & precise ways, and in technical scientific terminology, instead of arcane philosophical language. Besides, I have no formal training in abstruse linguistic philosophy, so my writing style may be too mundane for you :smile:

Grok : to understand (something) intuitively or by empathy or profoundly.

The EnFormAction Hypothesis :
As a supplement to the mainstream materialistic (scientific) theory of Causation, EnFormAction is intended to be an evocative label for a well-known, but somewhat mysterious, feature of physics : the Emergent process of Phase Change (or state transitions) from one kind (stable form) of matter to another. These sequential emanations take the structural pattern of a logical hierarchy : from solids, to liquids, to gases, and thence to plasma, or vice-versa. But they don't follow the usual rules of direct contact causation. . . . . . . . .
https://bothandblog3.enformationism.info/page23.html

To my eye your account of energy is wishful thinking.
It certainly is not accepted physics. — Banno

My "account" is not Physics, not "wishful thinking", it's speculative Philosophy ; on a Philosophy forum, not a Physics forum. Do you see some spooky implications of my Energy/Information/Mind hypothesis that you would not wish for? Einstein didn't like some of the spooky Quantum physics that resulted from his own not-yet-proven speculations, inferred from abstract mathematics.

Even all-knowing Physics must begin with speculations & conjectures & hypotheses in the absence of hard evidence. Einstein was a Theoretical Physicist with no laboratory experience. Was he doing physics or philosophy? Were his relativity speculations, and E=MC^2, "accepted physics" in 1905? Maybe other, more insightful, "eyes" will be able to see the relationship between Information & Energy & Mind : EnFormAction. :smile:


Is it true that Albert Einstein never did any experiments? :
Albert Einstein was a Theoretical physicist, not an Experimental Physicist. The interactions of matter and energy are studied by all physicists. Experimental physicists test ideas about how these interactions take place at the atomic level and their work has applications to medicine and nuclear technologies.
https://www.quora.com/Is-it-true-that-Albert-Einstein-never-did-any-experiments

Many Scientists Studied Relativity Before Einstein :
There were a bunch of relativity principles before Einstein: Galileo had one, Newton had a slightly different one. Even Aristotle and Descartes had claims that can be taken as similar principles. I find their respective theories of mechanics almost incomprehensible, so am going to ignore them in what follows.
https://www.forbes.com/sites/quora/2016/11/03/many-scientists-studied-relativity-before-einstein-so-why-does-he-get-the-credit/

Is much of theoretical physics nothing more than speculative assumptions? :
Religion, spirituality, and other “pseudoscientific” theories are constantly seen as backwards and lacking of evidence. But if a lack of evidence before believing in something is considered irrational, why is so much of physics that is based on literally zero testable evidence taken seriously?
There is no direct evidence of a multiverse, certain interpretations of quantum mechanics, string theory, and many other things. Why are so many of these kinds of theories taken seriously?
There have been entire books written about some of these theories with people being fascinated about how intellectual they seemingly sound despite the fact that there is zero experimental evidence for any of these theories.
Should they be given the same treatment as other forms of pseudoscience?
https://philosophy.stackexchange.com/questions/100676/is-much-of-theoretical-physics-nothing-more-than-speculative-assumptions

So this becomes another overheated exercise in the Santa Fe tradition where self organising dynamics or topological order are meant to explain everything, and yet they can’t actually explain the key thing of how a molecule becomes a message and so how life and mind arise within the merely physical world.
For astrobiology perhaps especially, this is an amateur hour mistake. — apokrisis

You continue to post snarky put-downs, without any relevant reasons. Do you think the Santa Fe Institute is a bunch of amateurs?

Maybe even astrobiologists have to take baby steps. The specific stages & causes in the evolution of Matter-to-Life-to-Mind are still far from being worked-out by terrestrial biologists. Do you know of anyone who can explain "the key thing" underlying the emergence of Life from Matter and Mind from Life? I have a theory, but I'm not a Biologist, and have no credentials, which makes me an amateur. :smile:


New Concepts of Matter, Life and Mind :
In the ongoing co-evolution of matter with the vacuum's zero-point field, life emerges out of nonlife, and mind and consciousness emerge out of the higher domains of life. This evolutionary concept does not 'reduce' reality either to non-living matter (as materialism), or assimilate it to a nonmaterial mind (as idealism).
https://www.physlink.com/education/essay_laszlo.cfm
Note --- Ervin Laszlo is author of The Systems View of the World

Founded in 1984, the Santa Fe Institute was the first research institute dedicated to the study of complex adaptive systems. We are operated as an independent, nonprofit 501(c)(3) research and education center.
History. The Santa Fe Institute was founded in 1984 by scientists George Cowan, David Pines, Stirling Colgate, Murray Gell-Mann, Nick Metropolis, Herb Anderson, Peter A. Carruthers, and Richard Slansky. All but Pines and Gell-Mann were scientists with Los Alamos National Laboratory.

Just trying to work out what your claim is. So we have something like that the universe that, as it slides inevitably towards thermodynamic equilibrium, progresses towards increasing complexity & creative novelty eventually led from a hypothetical Singularity Soup (quark/gluon plasma) to the emergence of complex brains & minds?
It remains that the universe is fair and just only if those "complex brains & minds" make it so - is that right? — Banno

The title of this thread is not a "claim", but a question. In the OP, I did make one positive statement : "Although I'm not comforted by scriptural assurances that "all things work together for good", I do infer a kind of Logic to the chain of Cause & Effect in the physical world --- and an overall proportional parity between positive & negative effects". You claimed that the universe "slides inevitably toward thermodynamic equilibrium". If so, how do you explain the historical fact that the metaphorical Big Bang didn't immediately or inevitably evaporate in a puff of entropic smoke? Why, after 14 billion sol-years of wasted energy, due to disorganizing Entropy, is the "explosion" not only still expanding, but even accelerating, and creating a plethora of novel physical configurations, along with animated organisms, and a few metaphysical (mental) forms of cosmic stuff? How has the world evaded "inevitable" heat death for so long?

Astronomers, who traced the current state of affairs back to a pinpoint in the remote past, concluded that the Singularity began in a size smaller than an atom, and hotter & denser than any star. If so, how could inevitable heat-wasting Entropy produce anything more complex than a cold dark cinder? My philosophical hypothesis --- not a scientific claim --- is in agreement with anthropologist Henri Bergson's notion of Creative Evolution*1, in which he speculated that some then-unknown causal agency or principle, working counter to that of Entropy, is the explanation for the manifold exceptions to Thermodynamic Doom that we observe right here on the Blue Planet. In 400BC, Plato postulated an organizing force in the world, labelled "Logos". The term "Negentropy" was coined by Erwin Schrödinger in his 1944 book What is Life? In 1926, biologist Jan Smuts, presciently coined the term "Holism" to describe that same anti-entropy trend in natural evolution. In 2008, Gnomon, not a scientist nor a genius, coined the terms EnFormAction and Enformy to encapsulate all of the above principles.

None of these scientists relied on religious revelation for their belief in "creative evolution". Instead, they merely applied logical inferences of cause & effect, to explain how isolated things & events could combine into the whole integrated system of morphogenesis*2 (form creation) we call Evolution. Likewise, my own personal philosophical worldview is not grounded on any religious faith, but on rational reasoning from scientific & philosophical evidences. Therefore, I can agree with your assertion that "complex brains & minds make it so". But not with the implication that thermodynamic deconstruction could produce, or even allow, such complexity & consciousness by a random network of cosmic accidents. Entropy is always destructive of order, except when it is morphed into Enformy*3.

Instead, I agree with those geniuses from previous generations that there is some constructive creative agency causing positive form-change in the world. And I point the finger at the aimless Causal Force we call Energy. But energy alone can be either constructive or destructive. So, I follow those predecessors to conclude that raw Energy is directed & guided by internal cohesion & interaction to behave in coordinating cooperating Holistic ways. You next question, I suppose is : is that agency a god? My answer is : I don't know, but I currently treat it as an ordinary force of Nature, similar to abstract formles Energy, except working counter to Entropy. :nerd:


*1a. Élan Vital is a term coined by French philosopher Henri Bergson in his 1907 book Creative Evolution, in which he addresses the question of self-organisation and spontaneous morphogenesis of things in an increasingly complex manner. ____Wikipedia
*1b. Bergson's thesis is that Darwinian and Lamarkian evolution are only half the story and that there is a creative urge inherent in life that defines the direction

*2. Morphogenesis is defined as the suite of underlying biological processes orchestrating the dynamic formation of macroscopic shapes in biological matter.
https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/biochemistry-genetics-and-molecular-biology/morphogenesis

*3. Enformy :
In the Enformationism theory, Enformy is a hypothetical, holistic, meta-physical, natural trend or force, that counteracts Entropy & Randomness to produce complexity & progress.
https://blog-glossary.enformationism.info/page8.html

Did your astrobiologists remember that classic as they restated what has been well known among those who study these things for so many years. — apokrisis

What difference does that make? Do you imagine that astrobiologists are ignorant of Negentropy? Why are you trying to put-down this "new law" with nit-picky irrelevant comments? Does it contradict your personal worldview in some way? Do you read into it some outrageous religious doctrine? Is there some particular sore-point that it aggravates? Spell it out. What "well known" wheel are they reinventing?

My interest in this "new" perspective on Evolution is because it fits neatly into to my personal Holistic philosophical worldview, which underlies all of my comments on this forum. Biologist Jan Smuts, in his 1926 book Holism and Evolution, foresaw this expansion of evolutionary principles from Biology to Mineralogy and everything else : "The whole-making, holistic tendency, or Holism, . . . . is seen at all stages of existence, and is by no means confined to the biological domain, to which science has hitherto restricted it".

I doubt that the Cornell scientists "remember that classic". But they may have been influenced by its gradual percolation into the philosophical culture of science over the intervening years. Holism is currently known in science & engineering as General Systems Theory. The "missing evolutionary law" they postulated is merely one small step in the direction of a universal holistic worldview. And my renaming of the inappropriate term Negentropy as "EnFormAction", and negative Entropy as positive "Enformy" is just another increment in that trend away from classical scientific Reductionism toward general philosophical Holism*1.

Smuts asserted that Holism "is the motive force behind Evolution". It's what Bergson, grasping for a metaphor, called elan vital*2. But that was mis-interpreted as a religious concept similar to the Holy Spirit. The philosophical worldview of reductive Scientism might understandably be opposed to the notion of Holism, in that it pictures Evolution as a positive trend in Nature, instead of a downhill tumble toward entropic Heat Death. FWIW, my worldview is more optimistic. What about yours? :smile:


*1. I can't get my head around Reductionism vs Holism :
Many articles present reductionism as the whole is the sum of its parts. Holism is presented as the antithesis, that the whole is more than the sum of its parts. . . .
According to wikipedia, an example of reductionism is that the solar system can be explained in terms of planets and the gravitational forces between them. What strikes me as contradictory, is that I would have thought that the gravitional forces constitute an interaction between parts, not a part in and of itself? Therefore, this example conveys to me that reductionism is the idea that the whole is the sum of its parts and the interaction between the parts?
https://www.reddit.com/r/askphilosophy/comments/vrgba7/i_cant_get_my_head_around_reductionism_vs_holism/
Note --- The "interaction" between parts is what I call EnFormAction.

*2. Élan Vital is a term coined by French philosopher Henri Bergson in his 1907 book Creative Evolution, in which he addresses the question of self-organisation and spontaneous morphogenesis of things in an increasingly complex manner. ____Wikipedia

Refresh my memory. What have you been telling me? — Gnomon
As I say, I am officially baffled about how you deal with information. — apokrisis

I apologize for my ignorance and leaky memory. As I've mentioned before, I had no formal training in Philosophy in college, and I only began to get some experience with argumentation since I retired, and began posting on this forum. So a large percentage of your posts goes over my head, especially the long complicated ones. You use technical terminology unfamiliar to me, and refer to authors & texts I've never read. So, in many cases I just skim the posts. As you probably do with mine.

Regarding the Information and Arrow of Time graphic, I don't remember posting it, but it seems to fit my general understanding of the Evolution of Information. Can you explain to me what you think I didn't understand about it?

My personal philosophical concept of Information Theory is a departure*1*2 from that of Shannon, who seemed to equate it with disorderly devolving Entropy. Instead, I view the area between the red & blue curves in the Entropy graph as Negentropy, which is what I call EnFormAction (power to enform). You won't find that term in any science or philosophy texts, because I made it up to serve my amateur thesis of Enformationism. So, unless you are motivated to look into that unorthodox thesis, you'll probably remain "baffled by how I deal with information". :smile:

*1. The Information Philosopher :
My explanation of the cosmic creation process shows how the expansion of the universe opened up new possibilities for different possible futures. My work is based on a suggestion by Arthur Stanley Eddington and my Harvard colleague David Layzer.
https://www.informationphilosopher.com/

*2. Paul Davies on Information :
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J7EjwUp5krY

FWIW, here's my own chart of the evolution of Information (EnFormAction) since the universe began :

Is the argument then that this complexity somehow implies (leads to, causes...) a fair and just universe? — Banno

No. Where did you get that idea? One implication of this New Law of Evolution is that its progression of increasing complexity & creative novelty eventually led from a hypothetical Singularity Soup (quark/gluon plasma) to the emergence of complex brains & minds capable of asking questions about Fairness & Justice, that we world-observers call Philosophy. :smile:

This doesn't seem like some profound new law about the world to me; they just seem to be proposing another way of describing evolution as always been understood, just in a different and I guess more general way. — Apustimelogist

So, you were underwhelmed by this revelation of Causal Information as the key to universal progressive & creative Evolution from almost nothing to everything? Apparently some scientists in related fields are more impressed. :nerd:


Scientists propose 'missing' law for the evolution of everything in the universe :
# This new law identifies "universal concepts of selection" that drive systems to evolve, whether they're living or not.
# The research team behind the law, which included philosophers, astrobiologists, a theoretical physicist, a mineralogist and a data scientist, have called it "the law of increasing functional information."
# The law applies to systems that form from numerous components — such as atoms, molecules and cells —which can be arranged and rearranged repeatedly and adopt multiple different configurations, according to the statement. The law also says these configurations are selected based on function, and only a few survive.
# Theoretical biologist Stuart Kauffman, professor emeritus of biochemistry and biophysics at the University of Pennsylvania, said the study is a "superb, bold, broad, and transformational article,"
https://www.space.com/scientists-propose-missing-law-evolution-of-everything-in-the-universe

Evolution, not just survival, but novelty & creativity :
# The third and most interesting function according to the researchers is ‘novelty’ — the tendency of evolving systems to explore new configurations that sometimes lead to startling new behaviors or characteristics, like photosynthesis
https://www.sci.news/physics/law-of-increasing-functional-information-12369.html

Philosophy :
Functionalism is a theory about the nature of mental states. According to functionalists, mental states are identified by what they do rather than by what they are made of. Functionalism is the most familiar or “received” view among philosophers of mind and cognitive science.
https://iep.utm.edu/functism/
Note --- Doing is causal, not material

No. I'm pointing out how the sociology of science operates. NASA wants to remain employed by the US taxpayer. — apokrisis

What does NASA playing politics/ecomomics have to do with a scientific theory developed by Cornell University scientists? Do you think they choose to only back ideas that might be popular with voters? Is AstroBiology a popular use of taxpayer investments? Show me the aliens! :joke:

Sorry Gnomon, I don't fathom how your brain works. What else have I been telling you for at least a decade? — apokrisis

Refresh my memory. What have you been telling me? Have you been saying something like : "while as the universe ages and expands, it is becoming more organized and functional, nearly opposite to theories surrounding increasing cosmological disorder"*2. This notion is also in opposition to the presumptions of Materialism, which focuses on the Randomness & Chaos of the universe"? If so, please accept my belated welcome to the club. :grin:

One has to laugh. Astrobiology - NASA’s fund-raising publicity department - reinvents the wheel. A new law that no one ever thought of. — apokrisis

Ha! You got something against the science of Astrobiology*1? Do you think Carl Sagan was looking through his telescope for little green men? Do you think NASA is a public relations tool for some nefarious evil-genius who wants to dominate the world? Well granted, Donald Trump or Elon Musk may want to put his name on the next rocket to Mars. And, Skepticism of "new" ideas is a truth filter. But, Scoffing is a creativity suppressor.

Dr. Michael Wong is indeed an astrobiologist, but the team included scientists from other specialties.The NASA article was just one of dozens of positive reviews of this proposed law. Besides, the linked publication doesn't mention Astrobiology. And the appellation of "new law" was applied by other science news publications. What "wheel" do you think is being re-invented here? What old law explained how Mind Functions and Human Purposes could emerge from purely materialistic evolution?

One reason I mentioned this particular scientific theory --- in this way-off-topic thread --- is that the postulated anti-entropy arrow-of-time puts Evolution in a new light. For years, scientists were able to picture Darwinian evolution as meandering, aimless, and ultimately doomed to a pathetic meaningless Heat Death. But now we have reasons for a more optimistic perspective : "his idea suggests that while as the universe ages and expands, it is becoming more organized and functional, nearly opposite to theories surrounding increasing cosmological disorder"*2. This notion is also in opposition to the presumptions of Materialism, which focuses on the Randomness & Chaos of the universe, instead of the Order & Organization that makes Science & Philosophy possible.

The other reason is that "renowned mineralogist" Robert Hazen refers to this second arrow of thermodynamics as “the law of increasing functional information”. Which dovetails into my own personal information-based worldview. Moreover, it expands Darwin's notion of biological evolution to include non-living aspects of the universe*3. Which may help to explain how the hypothetical quark-gluon Plasma of the Big Bang was able to develop into living & thinking lumps of matter, not by divine creation, but by natural processes. How could Mechanical Evolution produce creatures concerned about Fairness & Justice in the world? :nerd:


*1. Astrobiology is a scientific field within the life and environmental sciences that studies the origins, early evolution, distribution, and future of life in the universe by investigating its deterministic conditions and contingent events. ___Wikipedia

*2. Is there a second arrow of time? New research says yes
At Big Think, we introduce you to the brightest minds and boldest ideas of our time, inviting viewers to explore new ways to work, live, and understand our ever-changing world.
"Big Think challenges common sense assumptions and gives people permission to think in new ways.”
https://bigthink.com/the-well/the-second-arrow-of-time/

*3. New Law :
The core of everything we've been thinking about, in terms of the missing law, is evolution. When I say the word "evolution," you immediately think of Darwin, but this idea of selection goes much, much beyond Darwin and life. It applies to the evolution of atoms. It applies to the evolution of minerals. It applies to the evolution of planets and atmospheres and oceans. Evolution, which we see as being an increase in diversity, of patterning, in complexity of systems through time.
https://bigthink.com/the-well/the-second-arrow-of-time/

https://www.sci.news/physics/law-of-increasing-functional-information-12369.html

https://www.space.com/scientists-propose-missing-law-evolution-of-everything-in-the-universe

https://www.axios.com/2023/10/22/evolution-complexity-law

https://www.siliconrepublic.com/innovation/law-of-nature-research-selection-evolution-function-fittest-cornell-carnegie

https://www.reuters.com/science/scientists-propose-sweeping-new-law-nature-expanding-evolution-2023-10-16/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IngBEkg61_E
Three new laws of Nature, to account for complexity. Sabine is skeptical.

Is There a Second Arrow of Time?

You haven't and Wayfarer hasn't, said what that alternative form of idealism consists in. If it is only that the brain models a world, well I think that is uncontroversial. But to think that what is being modeled exists in its own right seems most plausible to me given all the evidence from our experience as it is given by everday life and by science.

If there are no mind-independent existents and if there is no collective mind to which we are all connected, then how would you explain the fact that we all perceive the same things, including at least some animals? I am yet to see even the beginnings of any such explanation coming from you or Wayfarer. — Janus

Has been explaining his alternative form of idealism on this forum, and in magazine articles, for years. But his Buddhist-based metaphors & analogies do not translate into the vocabulary of Materialism or Physicalism or Scientism. My own worldview has more to do with ancient Plato & Aristotle philosophies, and little with Buddhism, but we have arrived at similar worldviews, that focus more on intangible Ideas than on corporeal Matter. My influences were mostly in 20th & 21st century Science ; especially Quantum & Information & Complexity theories. So, instead of calling my worldview Idealism, I labeled it as Enformationism*1. But I suppose you could style it "scientifically informed Idealism".

A recent development in science has been the notion that inorganic & organic Evolution is lawful*2. It proposes "a second arrow of time" which is positive & constructive, and opposed to the second law of thermodynamics : Entropy*3. The team of scientists haven't settled on a name for this anti-entropy law, but an old ironic label --- since the arrow direction is positive & progressive --- was Negentropy. In my own Information-based thesis, I refer to that "law" of gradual emergent evolution --- from a simple beginning (Singularity) toward more complex forms (Cosmos) --- as a natural trend, and label it as Enformy*4.

The Cornell University team called their "new law" of Evolution : "the law of increasing functional information.". And one member of the team calls it "a second arrow of time", pointing in the opposite direction from devolving Entropy. He also "explains that evolution seems to not only incorporate time, but also function and purpose". That latter term is provocative, since it seems to imply a Purposer, a Motivator, an Intender, an Organizer, a Designer, a Cosmic Mind. All of which are anathema to those who view the world as directionless & meaningless and destined for Nothingness.

Throughout history, most cultures have referred to that First Cause & Prime Mover as a God or Mind of some kind. But Plato gave it the less anthro name of Logos*5. You can call it whatever makes sense to you. But it's getting harder to deny that the universe was born in a burst of Energy & Law, then evolved toward sapiential maturity, and shows no signs of devolving into icy Entropy anytime soon. The world is not now, and never has been Ideal, in the sense of perfection. But since its most important feature so far, to us idea-sharing philosophers, is the emergence of creatures with Concepts, perhaps unrealistic Idealism is not too far off the mark. But I prefer the unfamiliar term Enformationism, which has no history of philosophical politics to elicit incredulity and knee-jerk reactions. :smile:



*1. Enformationism :
A philosophical worldview or belief system grounded on the 20th century discovery that Information, rather than Matter, is the fundamental substance of everything in the universe ; including ideas.
https://blog-glossary.enformationism.info/page8.html
Note --- Several blog posts explain in what sense Information can be considered an Aristotelian Substance.

*2. Scientists propose 'missing' law for the evolution of everything in the universe :
The research team behind the law, which included philosophers, astrobiologists, a theoretical physicist, a mineralogist and a data scientist, have called it "the law of increasing functional information."
"This was a true collaboration between scientists and philosophers to address one of the most profound mysteries"
https://www.space.com/scientists-propose-missing-law-evolution-of-everything-in-the-universe
This idea suggests that while as the universe ages and expands, it is becoming more organized and functional, nearly opposite to theories surrounding increasing cosmological disorder.
https://bigthink.com/the-well/the-second-arrow-of-time/

*3. Entropy :
Refers to a state of disorder, but the term literally means Transformation. But if the Big Bang was followed only by disorder, it would have quickly disappeared in a puff of smoke. Yet, instead, the world system has gradually increased in organization, until now some of its offspring have evolved rational minds that are capable of imagining what the world was like 14 billion years ago. Many thinkers have interpreted Entropy pessimistically, to predict an eventual "heat death" in another 14 billion years. Yet, here we are, looking up at the stars, and wondering how & why we got to this point, and where we go from here.

*4 Enformy :
In the Enformationism theory, Enformy is a hypothetical, holistic, metaphysical, natural trend or force, that counteracts Entropy & Randomness to produce complexity & progress.
https://blog-glossary.enformationism.info/page8.html

*5. LOGOS :
A principle originating in classical Greek thought which refers to a universal divine reason, immanent in nature, yet transcending all oppositions and imperfections in the cosmos and humanity.
https://www.pbs.org/faithandreason/theogloss/logos-body.html

↪Gnomon
My criticism of the view that everything is mind is that we really have no idea what that could really mean. On the other hand, we know very well what it means to say that everything is material or physical, since we find ourselves in a material world, where everything, except abstract generalities, does seem to be physical. Abstract generalities can be said to only exist in their material instantiations, and we have no way of clearly conceiving and saying how they could exist in any other sense. — Janus

's article seems to agree with your assessment, that a superhuman eye-in-the-sky worldview would be materially meaningless, but insists that the abstract notion may be metaphorically*1 relevant and symbolically meaningful. Before the 20th century, humans had never seen the world beyond their local horizon. But, they could imagine a bird's-eye-view, as evidenced by some of their ancient maps of the known world. {image below}

Where Kastrup aspires to prove logically that a Cosmic Mind must exist in some meaningful sense, Way says "there is no need to introduce a literal ‘mind-at-large’ to maintain a coherent idealism" {my emphasis}. What he does posit, in the article, is that a philosophical "paradigm shift from scientific materialism to scientifically-informed idealism" is currently underway"*2. And that new paradigm would not say "Abstract generalities can be said to only exist in their material instantiations" {my emphasis}. Which only makes sense from a Materialist perspective.

So, Way presents an alternative form of Idealism, which doesn't require an actual sensable God-in-the-quad to maintain the physical world in the absence of a human observer. For instance, a "cognitive shift"*3 in the observer/imaginer can be personally meaningful, even without an "instantiation". General Concepts and Universal Principles have no material specimen, only logical structure. :smile:


*1. Metaphor is figurative, not physical :
My favorite: Metaphor is a poetically or rhetorically ambitious use of words, a figurative as opposed to literal use. It has attracted more philosophical interest and provoked more philosophical controversy than any of the other traditionally recognized figures of speech.
https://www.quora.com/What-is-your-favorite-philosophical-metaphor

*2. Excerpt from Is there a ‘mind at large’? :
Without the organising capability which consciousness brings to the universe, what exists is by definition unintelligible and unknowable. The mind brings an order to experience in light of which data is interpreted and integrated into meaningful information — this is an intrinsic aspect of the meaning of ‘being’. But the sense in which the universe exists apart from or outside that activity is by definition unknown, so there is no need to posit a ‘mind-at-large’ to account for it.
https://medium.com/@jonathan.shearman/mind-at-large-169bb5f0c3a7
Note --- Plato postulated a universal logical force (LOGOS) in the world, organizing it into the orderly lawful physical system of parts that analytical Science can make sense of.

*3. The Overview Effect :
The overview effect is a cognitive shift reported by some astronauts while viewing the Earth from space. Researchers have characterized the effect as "a state of awe with self-transcendent qualities, precipitated by a particularly striking visual stimulus". The most prominent common aspects of personally experiencing the Earth from space are appreciation and perception of beauty, unexpected and even overwhelming emotion, and an increased sense of connection to other people and the Earth as a whole. The effect can cause changes in the observer's self concept and value system, and can be transformative.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Overview_effect


WORLD AS SEEN FROM ABOVE THE LOCATION OF THE MEDIEVAL IMAGINER

Wayfarer claims he doesn't agree with Kastrup's "mind at large", which I would say is itself an incoherent idea, but he apparently cannot offer any coherent alternative. — Janus
I've addressed that, in Is there 'Mind at Large'?, which I think is coherent, even if Tom Storm says it needs more detail. (I'm planning further installments. And re-visiting it, I think perhaps rather than invoking the spooky 'mind at large', I would just use the term 'some mind' or 'any mind' or 'the observer'.) — Wayfarer

seems to frequently criticize posts on the basis of incoherence. Which could mean that various statements & assertions in the post don't add-up to the postulated conclusion, or that the critic is incapable of following the implicit logic of the discussion. I Googled "philosophy -- coherence"*1 and found the page linked below. It says that "coherence" may imply Justified Belief, or may prove that the conclusion is True. I doubt that you are claiming that "Mind at Large" is provably true, but only that it is a believable possibility. So, his criticism may be saying that he doesn't agree with your conclusion, or that you haven't presented a detailed logical "system" to support your conjecture of a Universal Consciousness.

Over the millennia there have been many "systems" (theories) of philosophical Cosmic Consciousness : PanPsychism, PanTheism, PanEnDeism, . . . . ; and Kastrup's systematic & detailed worldview of Analytical Idealism is a recent addition. So, the easiest way to present a "coherent" theory pointing to the existence of some kind of intrinsic Mind in the Universe would be to simply accept one of those time-proven systems from the past as a label for your personal view. But apparently, what you have in mind is not exactly in accordance --- difference in detail --- with any of those older schemes of belief.

I'm in the same seemingly rudderless boat. Consequently, I was forced to produce my own personal thesis leading to the conclusion that our evolving world does indeed have a rudder. But few posters on this forum are willing to invest the time to plow through the details, evidences & arguments. So, they prefer to use prejudicial labels to characterize an unfamiliar system-of-thought, that they don't understand, as incoherent or simply untrue.

I continue to add "details" to my own thesis, as do you, but I doubt that any amount of itemization will convince someone who is not already inclined toward your point of view. If the general notion is abhorrent to their worldview, more particulars will not sway them. Concur? :smile:


*1. Coherentist Theories of Epistemic Justification :
According to the coherence theory of justification, also known as coherentism, a belief or set of beliefs is justified, or justifiably held, just in case the belief coheres with a set of beliefs, the set forms a coherent system or some variation on these themes. The coherence theory of justification should be distinguished from the coherence theory of truth. The former is a theory of what it means for a belief or a set of beliefs to be justified, or for a subject to be justified in holding the belief or set of beliefs. The latter is a theory of what it means for a belief or proposition to be true.
https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/justep-coherence/

As for as Kastrup’s idealism - I do question the ‘mind at large’ idea in this essay - Is there ‘mind at large’? - — Wayfarer

In my last two posts on this thread, I responded to 's and 's challenges for you to state a firm either/or (cake or eat) position on the multi-faceted concept of Idealism. And one facet that you seem to waver on is the "mind at large" notion, which seems to imply some kind of God-mind ; although even Kastrup seems to be "of two minds" regarding the nature of that hypothetical entity.

In your Mind At Large article, you distinguished Scientific Materialism from Scientifically-Informed Idealism. And the latter phrase is close to my intention when I wrote the original Enformationism thesis. Yet invariably, posters on this forum insist that I take a stand for Scientific Materialism or for Philosophical Idealism. However, what I had in mind was more like your notion of "Scientifically-Informed Idealism" (SII).

Although your interpretation of SII may not be exactly the same as mine, I suspect that we both envision a middle-ground or transition between the poles of Mind and Matter. If so, then you and I are standing firmly on the bridge in between. For me, that Mind/Matter connection is Generic Information, as exemplified in physical causal Energy Fields, which Einstein linked to Matter in his E=MC^2 equation. Mathematical Mass is not the same thing as sensable Matter, but it's how our physical senses perceive Material objects in a gravitational field : resistance ; inertia.

If my guess is correct, then you and I are not vacillating between two poles, but stably standing in the middle ground, which some philosophers believe does not, cannot, exist. But we may still be unsure of the nature of the "mind at large" which serves as a Bridge Over Troubled Waters. For me, it's definitely not the God of Theology, but more like the Way-Path (organizing principle) of Taoism, or the Logos (rational principle) of Western Philosophy. Is my reckoning even close to your standpoint? :smile:

I can't help but contrast your response to me and your response to Gnomon, here: ↪Wayfarer
. Analytical Idealism is not, so far as I can make out, a form of Epistemological idealism. So again, you seem to me to want your cake and to eat it, by answering issues I raise from the point of view of Epistemological idealism while answering issues others raise from the point of view of ontological idealism. — Banno

Your use of the Cake metaphor sounds like you think it's a bad (magical?) idea to try to have it both ways ; perhaps like Jesus multiplying five loaves of bread into enough nutriment to feed five thousand people. But I view 's broadminded worldview as a useful philosophical attitude ; that I call BothAnd*1. It's a flexible binocular perspective that combines two conceptual frames into one philosophical worldview ; where you're not forced to choose one side to stand on.

Rather than viewing the Cake as either Material/Real or Immaterial/Ideal, he can see both sides of the equation. It's based on the traditional distinction between a physical Object (Terrain) and a metaphysical Metaphor (Map) : the idea/concept/synopsis/model of the terrain. Epistemology is about our sensory knowledge of real Objects. But Ontology is about our rational inference of ideal Essences. For example, Aristotle's HyloMorph combines a real material Cake (yummy!) and an ideal mental Cake (the abstract tasteless notion of cakeness).

Empirical Science specializes in practical sensable Epistemology, while Theoretical Philosophy focuses on impractical visionary Ontology. But, on this forum, in our search for perfect all-encompassing Truth, we often cross the line between the Cake you can eat, and the Cake you can only imagine. :smile:


*1. BothAnd :
Conceptually, the BothAnd principle is similar to Einstein's theory of Relativity, in that what you see ─ what’s true for you ─ depends on your perspective, and your frame of reference; for example, subjective or objective, religious or scientific, reductive or holistic, pragmatic or romantic, conservative or liberal, earthbound or cosmic. Ultimate or absolute reality (ideality) doesn't change, but your conception of reality does. Opposing views are not right or wrong, but more or less accurate for a particular purpose.
https://blog-glossary.enformationism.info/page10.html

First job was to wind you back from confusing cognition as epistemic method with cognition as some kind of ontological mind stuff that grounds mind-independent reality. — apokrisis
If you looked at the Mind Created World piece, I explicitly state that I am not arguing for any such thing. — Wayfarer

Way off-topic :
As usual, 's discussion is over my head. But it may not be over yours. I had to Google A> "cognition as epistemic method"*1 to learn how it differs from B> "ontological mind stuff"*2. The "A" definition sounds like Ontology-as-usual, while the "B" version sounds like an Idealist interpretation of the traditional question of "what is Being?", but using a matter-based metaphor : "stuff". Which can be confusing for those who take metaphors literally.

Cognition is defined as 'mental activity", but that leaves open the question of how the human brain is able to metaphorically reach out beyond the skull into the material world, and bring back meaningful Percepts that can be transformed into useful Concepts. How do incoming photons (light energy) convey knowledge about the properties (redness) of the object that reflected the light? How does Cognition decode mathematical wavelengths into personal meanings? After several thousand years of argument and experimentation, a final answer to such questions seems as elusive as ever.

The notion of a "Mind Created World" seems to be another perennial conundrum that is not amenable to objective empirical finality. If so, is arbitrary Faith the only answer? I just read an article, in Beshara magazine, entitled Mind Over Matter*3. It's an interview with Bernardo Kastrup about his Analytical Idealism beliefs. One of his responses refers to Matter as an "extended transpersonal form of mind". Again, that sounds like Cosmic Mind-stuff (res cogitans) is a non-local ideal substance that can be molded into various forms of extended substance (res extensa).

Obviously, that universal mind-matter is not generated by my personal brain, so does it assume that the world is created by God-mind (panpsychism or cosmopsychism)*4? On one hand, Kastrup seems to deny most traditional Theology, but he is somewhat cagey about the nature of the god-mind-stuff that constitutes the world we personified-blobs-of-matter observe with our senses. If god-mind is not self-reflective, can it be intentional in its creative acts or just accidental? Sorry to unload on you, but such cosmic questions are pertinent to my own non-theological information-based philosophical theory of Evolution from cosmic Bang to local Cognition. :nerd:


*1. Epistemic cognition is knowledge about knowledge, especially knowledge about fundamental issues of justification and associated matters of objectivity, subjectivity, rationality, and truth.
https://link.springer.com/referenceworkentry/10.1007/978-1-4419-1695-2_17
Specifically, individuals engage in epistemic cognition when they activate personal beliefs about the nature of knowledge and knowing
https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/education/articles/10.3389/feduc.2021.669908/full

*2. Ontological mind stuff :
To ask about the ontology of mind, from the Greek word 'ontos', or 'being', is to inquire into the most fundamental metaphysical categories to which the mind may belong. Is the mind a physical thing, in principle like other material entities, but with more complex properties, or is it somehow immaterial?
https://media.bloomsbury.com/rep/files/Jacquette_Introduction.pdf

*3. Mind Over Matter :
I ended up as a metaphysical idealist –somebody who thinks that the whole of reality is mental in essence. It is not in your mind alone, not in my mind alone, but in an extended transpersonal form of mind which appears to us in the form that we call matter.
https://besharamagazine.org/science-technology/mind-over-matter/

*4. Cosmopsychism :
Bernardo Kastrup also tells Michael Egnor that he does not think God is self-reflective. That, he thinks, is a unique job for humans.
https://uncommondescent.com/intelligent-design/a-cosmopsychist-talks-about-the-universe-god-and-free-will/

It’s not a question of whether the ‘wave function’ is or isn’t mind-dependent. The equation describes the distribution of probabilities. When the measurement is taken the possibilities all reduce to a specific outcome. That is the ‘collapse’. Measurement is what does that, but measurement itself is not specified by the equation, and besides it leaves open the question of in what sense the particle exists prior to measurement. — Wayfarer

This thread has strayed away from the relatively simple yes/no/maybe question of a Just World --- where your opinion is just as valid as mine --- onto the open-ended (infinite ; non-empirical ; unverifiable) question of Subjective vs Objective Reality.

To Wit : Various interpretations of Quantum "collapse" seem to split along the line of another non-empirical question : is there a truly general Objective Observer to maintain the cosmos in Potential (statistical uncertainty - probability) when no specific Subjective observer is looking (measuring) to make it locally certain (Actuality)? Is it true that, the quantum waveform, and the immaterial field within which it is waving, is a generalized mathematical abstraction (mental image), not an observed real event?

seems to view Empirical Science as the closest possible approximation of perfect universal Objectivity, which trumps your ideal philosophical notion of a human-mind-independent Reality. Is there any way to resolve that Ideal/Real gap? :smile:


Gnomon reply to Wayfarer :
"I'm generally familiar with all those Observer World theories, but I'm not clear on one point. It should be obvious that observation of a physical object somehow creates a meta-physical world-view (mental image) in the mind of the observer.

But does anyone claim that your observation --- of a "collapsing" quantum event for instance --- creates the actual world that I personally routinely experience, apart from scientific experiments/measurements? Or that we collectively "participate" in creation of the world that we all more or less agree is out there?

Did Wheeler over-generalize from lab experiments to kitchen experience? Seems like we may be arguing about two different things here : my Ideal World vs everyone's Real World."
. . . . . from this Fair & Just thread

Scientific Objectivity :
The ideal of objectivity has been criticized repeatedly in philosophy of science, questioning both its desirability and its attainability.
https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/scientific-objectivity/

I’m sorry but which of these interpretations say that human minds are what cause the Universe to be? — apokrisis
Some points from the ChatGPT outline: — Wayfarer

Off-topic :
I'm generally familiar with all those Observer World theories, but I'm not clear on one point. It should be obvious that observation of a physical object somehow creates a meta-physical world-view (mental image) in the mind of the observer.

But does anyone claim that your observation --- of a "collapsing" quantum event for instance --- creates the actual world that I personally routinely experience, apart from scientific experiments/measurements? Or that we collectively "participate" in creation of the world that we all more or less agree is out there?

Did Wheeler over-generalize from lab experiments to kitchen experience? Seems like we may be arguing about two different things here : my Ideal World vs everyone's Real World. :chin:

Participation in Creation :
He would say things like 'No phenomenon is a true phenomenon until it's an observed phenomenon,'” said Robert M. Wald, a theoretical physicist at the University of Chicago who was Wheeler's doctoral student at the time. John Wheeler's “participatory universe” suggests that observers make the universe real.
https://www.quantamagazine.org/black-holes-will-destroy-all-quantum-states-researchers-argue-20230307/

Einstein to Pais :
“Do you really believe the moon is not there when you are not looking at it?”

Notice the implicit assumption in the statement that the physical world is 'the real world'. — Wayfarer

That is also my commonsense assumption, for all practical purposes. But, for philosophical purposes, I make a distinction between empirical Real world, and theoretical Ideal world. Even normally pragmatic scientists will imagine non-real scenarios as they try to make sense of the world-system as a whole. For example, since the semi-empirical Big Bang theory sounds like a taboo creation event, they may logically speculate about "what came before the Bang?" Some will dismiss it as a non-sense question, and dogmatically insist that this space-time world is one & done : no before or after. But others*1 seem to accept, as a matter of Faith/Fact, that an unverifiable/unfalsifiable Multiverse is the best answer. Presumably, in an infinity of worlds, random Good & Evil coin-flips will balance out. Some of us were just unlucky to be born into an out-of-whack alternate reality. Hence, the OP question for those of us in the contemporary world.

Since some very smart scientists accept the bizarre notion of an infinite chain of real-but-non-empirical realities, I can't find fault with ancient religious thinkers who took the "reality" of an eternal heavenly realm for granted. That unreal dual-world-view (enlightenment?) allowed them to make sense --- to balance the scales of Justice --- of their empirical temporal world. I don't think they were stupid to make such philosophical speculations. And apparently, such imaginary worlds have "made sense" to a majority of humans over millennia. They only differ, and argue, or fight, over the nit-picky details and the rules for navigating the Real and Ideal worlds. Some justice-seekers reach for the imaginary liberation of the elusive Nirvana emotional state --- picture yourself free from this suffering world ; while others piously or stoically endure the trials & tribulations of their empirical reality, in hopes of eventually enjoying eternal bliss in their imagined Paradise. Am I an idiot to entertain the optimistic notion that there's more to Reality than "first you suffer, and then you die"? :cool:



*1. Modern proponents of one or more of the multiverse hypotheses include Lee Smolin, Don Page, Brian Greene, Max Tegmark, Alan Guth, Andrei Linde, Michio Kaku, David Deutsch, Leonard Susskind, Alexander Vilenkin, Yasunori Nomura, Raj Pathria, Laura Mersini-Houghton, Neil deGrasse Tyson, Sean Carroll and Stephen Hawking.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multiverse

Partly, because the real world includes varying life conditions. We discover what's fair and what isn't, and respond accordingly, e.g. suffer, enjoy, form judgements and complain or praise the particular conditions in which we live. It takes discipline to remain indifferent to the reality of fairness. — jkop

Yes. The physical world is unbiased ; neither Just nor Unjust ; but its variety affords chances for both kinds of effects. That's why I call my worldview BothAnd : it's both Fair and Unfair, both Just and Unjust, depending on the place & time & person. So, the OP question is really about Culture, not Nature, about Psychology, not Physics. :smile:

You mention 'top down constraints' - but what is the ultimate source of those constraints? Can they be traced back to Lloyd Rees' 'six numbers'? Because that has a satisfyingly Platonist ring to it, in my view. — Wayfarer

My philosophical repertoire is limited, since I have no formal training in Philosophy or Physics. So a lot of 's discussion (and your replies) are over my head. My comments are necessarily more general and conventional --- except for my personal unorthodox ideas, of course. Besides, this diversion onto Materialism vs Metaphysics or Realism vs Idealism is off-topic for this thread. Do you think it should be moved to a new thread? I'll let you and Apo decide what to call it. And you can get as deep & techy as you like. :smile:

To dissect in more detail, matter and form are terms needing more clarification here. But they are certainly equal partners in the deal as they arise together in dichotomous fashion. Each – as one of a pair of complementary limits on enmattered and informed Being – exists to the degree it stands in sharp contrast to its "other". They form a dichotomous relation, in other words. Logically speaking, matter and form are "mutually exclusive and jointly exhaustive" as a pair of natural categories. — apokrisis

Off Topic:
Thanks for the clarification. But I like to take the dichotomous HyloMorph theory one step farther back in evolution. Even Aristotle seemed to imagine his Matter/Form*1 principle as an Essence. And, in my Information-based thesis, I labeled that essence as "Enformy"*2, working in the world as "EnFormAction" (the energy of causation), to counterbalance destructive Entropy, allowing Evolution to progress from Bang to Cosmos to Culture. Before the Bang, that creative causal essence was Monistic, like formless nameless Potential. But that's just a hypothetical postulation to explain how the chain of Causation got started from scratch. From that perspective, your "mutually exclusive" Matter/Form is not "jointly exhaustive, because it is a compound, subject to division.

My Monism is transcendent only in the sense that all abstractions and hypothetical entities transcend the realm of the senses. HyloMorph and Enformy don't exist in the real tangible world, but in the ideal realm of imagination. They are not scientific observations, but philosophical postulations. If you want a space-time model of eternal Potential, just look at the scientific notion of empty Space as brimming with Zero-Point or Vacuum Energy*3. :smile:


*1. Matterform :
The application of hylomorphism to essentialism is approached by Aristotle variously: as a way of distinguishing among changes; as a basis for the construction of scientific demonstration; as a principle of being in the science of being qua being.
https://www.degruyter.com/document/doi/10.1515/rhiz-2022-0002/pdf
Note --- As an Essence, hylomorph is not dichotomous & contradictory, but unitary & complementary concepts. In my thesis, the non-local timeless causal Potential includes the Possibility for both Matter and Form (Mind). Don't send out a space-probe looking for Potential, because it ain't there.

*2. Enformy :
In theEnformationism theory, Enformy is a hypothetical, holistic, metaphysical, natural trend or force, that counteracts Entropy & Randomness to produce complexity & progress.
https://blog-glossary.enformationism.info/page8.html

*3. Vacuum energy
An important concept in cosmology is that the 'empty space' between stars and
galaxies is not really empty at all! Today, the amount of invisible energy hidden in space is
just enough to be detected as Dark Energy, as astronomers measure the expansion speed of
the universe.
https://spacemath.gsfc.nasa.gov/universe/6Page87.pdf
Note --- This is not real detectable energy but mathematical hypothetical quantities to fill gaps in calculations. It's only indirectly detectable in the strange Casimir effect.

So you are talking in a way that takes matter for granted as that which already exists as a fact in its own ontic domain, just simply lacking the "other" of a shaping hand of a form. — apokrisis

Actually, it was not Gnomon, but Aristotle, in his HyloMorphism theory, who seemed to be taking Matter and Form for granted. As if those ideal elements of reality were sitting on a shelf, until combined by an ideal Chemist into real things. That would be a dualistic theory. But my thesis is monistic, in that there is a single precursor to all real things. It's not a thing itself, but the Potential for things. This hypothetical infinite & undefined Apeiron, somehow splits into Form (creative causation) and Matter (the stuff that is enformed & transformed). In practice, it's what I call "EnFormAction" : the power to give form to the formless. This is not just wordplay. The thesis gives some background for the logical necessity of Potential as precursor to Actual things. It includes Information Theory & Quantum Theory along with some philosophical history of Platonic Idealism and Aristotle's Causes. :nerd:

Note --- I could respond in more detail to the rest of your post, but that would take us further off-topic, and it deserves a thread of its own. Would you like to continue in a new thread & topic?

But this is a Philosophy forum, — Gnomon
Hmm. — apokrisis

Would you agree that Scientific Laws and Philosophical Principles are only "approximations" of Universal Essences? Obviously those "Ideals" are not real material things, so why do "wise" men continue to seek out such non-entities? Are they ignorant or stupid or god-smacked, or do they know something the rest of us don't? Perhaps, that there is more to the world than what meets the eye.

No need to reply. This post is just something to think about. :grin:

Note --- Irving Copi was the author of Introduction to Logic.


CAN "ESSENCE" BE A SCIENTIFIC TERM?
JACK KAMINSKY
Harpur College, State University of New York
In a recent paper Copi has argued for the admission of the term "essence" into scientific terminology. His primary reason is that the increasing adequacy of scientific theories is evidence of a gradual approximation to the real essences of things. Copi is aware that the laws of modern science are not to be taken as formulations of essences. But, he claims, "that is an ideal towards which science strives... Centuries hence wiser men will have radically different and more adequate theories, and their notions will be closer approximations than ours to the real essences of things."
https://www.jstor.org/stable/185721

Wise Man and his Essences :
Albert Einstein reinterpreted the inner workings of nature, the very essence of light, time, energy and gravity. His insights fundamentally changed the way we look at the universe--and made him the most famous scientist of the 20th century.
https://www.amnh.org/exhibitions/einstein/einstein-s-revolution

But Matter is concrete, real, and changeable (perishable) — Gnomon
Sounds a little self contradictory. Not what you would expect from an essence. More work might be needed. — apokrisis

What are you implying? That a non-space-time essential principle could not produce mundane Matter from scratch? Such a non-noumenal notion may be the basic unproveable presumption of Materialism. Hence, a materialist would not expect a material object to be derived from an immaterial essence.

Even Aristotle, the guy who proposed the notion of dualistic HyloMorphism, viewed Essence as Causal*1. What I would expect from causal Essence is that it would give Form (design) to the malleable clay of Matter. When a potter produces a beautiful pot from ordinary clay, where did the Form and the Beauty come from? Was it inherent in the clay on a river bank, or in the noumenal mind of the creator?

Perhaps your notion of a concrete & real Essence needs more work. How did Materialists*2 arrive at the conclusion that many-form Matter is the monistic fundamental substance? Did they just take it for granted*3? Even old Hylomorpher himself defined Substance*4 as Being Itself, and Matter as contingent & accidental*5. Did they, like most Reductionists, ignore the contribution of an immaterial Mind to the dualistic combination of hyle and morph? Are Minds too spooky for you? :cool:

*1. Essence as Causal :
Aristotle frequently describes essence as a “cause” or “explanation”, thus ascribing to essence some sort of causal or explanatory role. This explanatory role is often explicated by scholars in terms of essence “making the thing be what it is” or “making it the very thing that it is”.
https://philarchive.org/rec/SIREAC
Note --- The Essence (beingness) of a thing is not the particular instance, but the universal design.

*2. Materialism is a form of philosophical monism which holds that matter is the fundamental substance in nature, and that all things, including mental states and consciousness, are results of material interactions of material things. ___Wikipedia
Note --- My thesis is based on an immaterial Monism --- causal Information (energy + form + action) --- which is an essential "substance" instead of a contingent "accident".

*3. Materialism is a Belief :
a. The best argument against materialism is the observation that the word material has lost all meaning. Materialism does not exist anymore. . . . .
c. The third best argument is that syntax cannot be derived from physics and semantics cannot be derived from physics. . . . .
f. The fifth best argument is the observation that materialists, apart from not existing, do not actually argue for their cause, they merely assume it to be true.
https://www.reddit.com/r/philosophy/comments/iyyto/most_compelling_arguments_against_materialism/
Note --- I suppose he means that Materialism, over millennia, was based on Atomism. But modern Physics has whiffed on each of its "fundamental" particles of matter : elements, molecules, atoms, electrons, quarks. Now their Essential substance is a holistic mathematical Field (cartesian Plenum) with no matter in its dimensionless points. Need references?

*4. Substance is being existing in itself; accident is being existing in another as its subject. -- Being is known either as something which subsists in itself without needing to be sustained by another, or as something which needs a subject in which and by which it may exist.
https://www3.nd.edu/~maritain/jmc/etext/cp26.htm
Note --- The modern notion of "Substance as material" is a reductive corruption of the original essential concept. Modern Science is necessarily Materialistic: Philosophy not necessarily.

*5. Matter is Accidental not essential :
Aristotle made a distinction between the essential and accidental properties of a thing. For example, a chair can be made of wood or metal, but this is accidental to its being a chair: that is, it is still a chair regardless of the material from which it is made.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Accident_(philosophy)
Note --- The Essence of a chair is the concept of Chairness. Concepts are what we know with, not what we make chairs out of.

Additionally, why do sentient beings contemplate the concept of a creator? It seems like a natural thing to question, and am wondering what are your thoughts on the matter. — Shawn

Some want to analyze your question from the perspective of Anthropologists or Biologists. But this is a philosophy forum. So, why not approach your "why?" question philosophically?

I would begin with the notion of Causation as more elementary than Creation. The Greek philosophers postulated abstract impersonal First Cause and Prime Mover instead of a humanoid Creator. So that might be a good starting point. We observe Causation (ongoing change) in the world, and postulate impersonal causal forces, such as aimless Energy and space-warping Gravity. So, we imagine tracing mechanical causation all the way back to the beginning. But Creation-from-scratch implies Intention, so the mind naturally turns to the personal human experience of creative causation.

Hence, the image of a human Creator to design & implement a real ever-changing self-organizing machine-like world system, seems to be intuitive. But, is it true? Do we have any way to prove the existence of an a priori Designer/Creator? I suppose you know the answer to that. :smile:

Systems Theory is especially applicable to Philosophy.... — Gnomon
But the holistic systems view is hylomorphic rather than essentialist. There's that. — apokrisis

Off Topic :
I suppose "that" depends on whether you view Matter or Form as fundamental, or as equal partners. For Plato, Form is abstract, ideal, and timeless. But Matter is concrete, real, and changeable (perishable). So, which do you think is more Essential (absolutely necessary) : the multitude of physical Entities, or the unique metaphysical Form*1 ?

I assume you are describing Systems Science from the perspective of a pragmatic, reductive scientist. But this is a Philosophy forum, so what do you think would be the description of Holistic Systems from the perspective of a theoretical, generalizing Philosopher? Does Essence precede Instance? Is the Extension more fundamental than the Intention?

All physical systems in the real world are indeed compounds of matter & form. So, for a Chemist, the Matter (passive) may be more important than the Structure (interrelationships). But, for a Physicist, the energetic (active) component may be more important than the malleable substance. And, from a philosophical perspective, Matter is local & particular, while Form is universal & general. So, there's that. :smile:

*1. Aristotle's Causes :
Formal Cause: the essence of the object. Final Cause: the end/goal of the object, or what the object is good for.
https://www.uvm.edu/~jbailly/courses/Aristotle/notes/AristotleCausesNotes.html

*2. Systems Theory :
In essence, systems theory operates on a simple guiding principle: The whole is greater than the sum of its parts.
https://www.carepatron.com/guides/systems-theory-in-psychology
Note --- The parts may be material, but the whole is an interrelationship between parts. And it's the relations that bind the parts into an integrated system. So, which is more fundamental to the system, the interchangeable pieces or the whole puzzle picture?

If determinism is true, there can still be morality in that we can consider an action right or wrong. Further, we can still give moral reasons in a determined setting. . . .
To Gnomon's original question - in a deterministic universe, if a wrong act is committed, then the world is thoroughly unjust ↪Gnomon because any attempt to punish is itself unjust. — NotAristotle

Do I understand you correctly to mean that : if the world is Deterministic, then a single wrong act makes the whole world system unjust : "a rotten apple spoils the whole barrel". And a single act of injustice makes the whole system unjust? No personal accountability?

That sounds like Old Testament justice, in which the sins of the king justified Yahweh's punishment of the whole nation with bloody invasion and exile in a foreign land. I would expect Determinism to be more like Cause & Effect? Would Libertarian or Random Justice be a better alternative? Would "Correction" be more just than "Punishment"? Is the world collectively Deterministic, or is there some freedom for individualized Justice? Maybe us sinners should hope for a little indeterminate leniency. :smile:

Aristotle Justice :
In the context of the death penalty, Aristotle's ethical stand can be understood through the lens of justice, which he considered to be the highest virtue. According to Aristotle, justice involves giving people their due, which means that individuals should be rewarded for their virtues and punished for their vices.
https://www.classace.io/answers/what-is-an-ethical-stand-on-death-penalty-base-on-aristotles-value-ethics

If your way of thinking has any real advantage, it has to be able to lead to better answers than the scientists have already figured out. Explain what is observed in some self-consistent fashion rather than ignore the critical details that don't fit your essences story. — apokrisis

Off-Topic : My "way of thinking" is characteristic of Philosophy, not Science. I've been trying to convince you that I'm not competing with scientists to produce practical applications of physical processes : atom bombs, cell phones, etc. Instead, I'm trying to update some ancient philosophical worldviews for application to the complexities of the contemporary chaotic world. The philosophical approach to understanding is Theoretical instead of Practical ; general instead of specific ; universal instead of local ; essential instead of detailed.

The primary distinction between my worldview and that of most physicists & chemists is Holism vs Reductionism. Holism*1 is not anti-science or religious, but merely a different way of looking at the physical world. In fact, a new branch of science, Systems Theory, has arisen in the 21st century to study Complex Adaptive Systems*2, which are mostly living things with emergent*3 properties that cannot be found in their subatomic particles. The Santa Fe Institute*4 was established --- by atom bomb physicist Murray Gell-Man, et al --- primarily to study CAS*5, because most other research facilities were still focused on the parts instead of the whole systems.

Systems Theory is especially applicable to Philosophy because it studies mostly living & thinking aspects of reality instead of dead matter. The Hard sciences can still profit from the use of Reductive methods, but the Soft sciences --- psychology, sociology, philosophy, etc --- will benefit from Holistic methods to study the behavior of Systems instead of Components. Unfortunately, those who still think reductively, may object to the unfamiliar terminology and concepts.

Getting back to the topic of this thread : I'm not asking if the atoms of matter are Fair & Just, but if complex adaptive humans as a social group can behave ethically. This is an ancient question, but a Holistic/Systems approach may shed new light on those old "hard questions", that have become muddled due to putting them under a technological microscope instead of just using the natural mind's rational faculty for "seeing" interrelationships.

By the way, you may be thinking of Essence as a reference to Spiritual stuff, but the Greek word ousia merely referred to fundamental "being' and "isness". Latin "Esse" (to be) is about Ontology, the philosophical science of Being. Can we get on the same page here? :smile:



*1. Holism is the interdisciplinary idea that systems possess properties as wholes apart from the properties of their component parts. The aphorism "The whole is greater than the sum of its parts", typically attributed to Aristotle, is often given as a glib summary of this proposal.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holism

*2a. A complex adaptive system is a system that is complex in that it is a dynamic network of interactions, but the behavior of the ensemble may not be predictable according to the behavior of the components.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Complex_adaptive_system
*2b. "The study of complex adaptive systems, a subset of nonlinear dynamical systems, has recently become a major focus of interdisciplinary research in the social and natural sciences. Nonlinear systems are ubiquitous; as mathematician Stanislaw Ulam observed, to speak of "nonlinear science" is like calling zoology the study of "nonelephant animals" (quoted in Campbell et al. 1985, p. 374). The initial phase of research on nonlinear systems focused on deterministic chaos, but more recent studies have investigated the properties of self-organizing systems or anti-chaos. For mathematicians and physicists, the biggest surprise is that complexity lurks within extremely simple systems. For biologists, it is the idea that natural selection is not the sole source of order in the biological world. In the social sciences, it is suggested that emergence --- the idea that complex global patterns with new properties can emerge from local interactions --- could have a comparable impact."
https://www.santafe.edu/research/results/papers/1383-complex-adaptive-systems

*3. Emergence :
In philosophy, systems theory, science, and art, emergence occurs when a complex entity has properties or behaviors that its parts do not have on their own, and emerge only when they interact in a wider whole system.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emergence

*4. The Santa Fe Institute (SFI) is an independent, nonprofit theoretical research institute located in Santa Fe, New Mexico, United States and dedicated to the multidisciplinary study of the fundamental principles of complex adaptive systems, including physical, computational, biological, and social systems.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Santa_Fe_Institute

*5. What is Complex Systems Science?
Complexity arises in any system in which many agents interact and adapt to one another and their environments. Examples of these complex systems include the nervous system, the Internet, ecosystems, economies, cities, and civilizations. As individual agents interact and adapt within these systems, evolutionary processes and often surprising "emergent" behaviors arise at the macro level. Complexity science attempts to find common mechanisms that lead to complexity in nominally distinct physical, biological, social, and technological systems.
https://www.santafe.edu/about/overview

(1) According to physicists ... Energy is Causation, and Matter is one of its effects : Noumenal Energy transforms into Phenomenal Matter. So, Energy is the fundamental "substance" (essence)*2 of the physical world. — Gnomon
But this is simply nothing like how physics talks. You are projecting. It is your central misunderstanding.
An ontology of "stuff" is medieval science. Stuff as alchemy. Stuff as fluid stuff and corpuscular stuff. Stuff as a substance with inherent properties like gravity or levity. Stuff like calorie as the heat that flowed from one place to another.
Physics broke with this"essences" metaphysics by mathematical abstraction*6 — apokrisis

Off-topic : I normally don't reply to 's jibes, because his philosophical worldview specifically & disdainfully excludes my own. So, the sciencey stuff is necessary to provide some common ground for discussion. However, his questions were timely, as I am currently reading a book that, among other things, discusses the New Physics (Relativity & Quantum) of the 1920s.

On this forum, I am not "talking" as a physicist, but as an amateur philosopher with an unorthodox worldview : based on Holism, Quantum Observer Effects, Information Theory, and Complexity Theory. I'm not an expert in any of those fields, but I may be more knowledgeable than you think. However, as an outsider, I don't follow the official physics party line, so my presentation may sound strange to you. When I depart from standard physics language, I do so intentionally, not from ignorance.

For example, when I say "Energy is Causation"*1, it's a philosophical notion, not a conventional science concept. When I say "energy is fundamental"*2, I am including all of the various pre-material fields*3 that physicists postulate as foundational. For example, within an amorphous holistic electromagnetic field, a single Photon, the "carrier" of energy, can split into an Electron & a Positron, the primary elements of Matter*4. But, it's the energy field that is fundamental and essential, not the particles.

I am aware that modern physics carefully avoids terms such as "essence", but a mathematical quantum field is just an Essence by another name*6. Yet, I find the notion of pre-physical essences to be philosophically useful. For example, an electro-magnetic potential field of dimensionless mathematical "points" has no physical or material properties until it is converted into something real, by an "excitation", which in quantum theory may be an observation by a scientific mind. That may sound spooky, or medieval to you, but I try to accommodate such professional non-sense in my personal 21st century worldview. Ironically, some posters on this forum take a Scientism stance*5, which denigrates what philosophers do, as merely Lingustics. :smile:

PS___ Holism is another taboo term for pragmatic physics, that we can discuss at length in a separate thread, if you are so inclined.


*1. Is it true that energy is the ability to cause change?
Specifically, energy is defined as the ability to do work – which, for biology purposes, can be thought of as the ability to cause some kind of change. Energy can take many different forms: for instance, we're all familiar with light, heat, and electrical energy.
https://www.khanacademy.org/science/biology/energy-and-enzymes/the-laws-of-thermodynamics/a/types-of-energy

*2. Is energy fundamental in physics?
Energy is a derived quantity, not a fundamental one. Specifically, energy is an example of a conserved current derived from Noether's theorem. . . .
I would say that energy is more fundamental because matter is “merely” one subcategory of all types of particles/fields, while energy is not a subcategory of any broader concept.
https://www.quora.com/Is-energy-the-fundamental-basis-of-the-universe

*3. Energy Fields are Fundamental :
I would say quantum fields are more fundamental. Numbers of particles, what kind (i.e. which field they belong to), where and when they are and their state of motion, are merely ways of describing states of fields.
https://physics.stackexchange.com/questions/122570/what-is-more-fundamental-fields-or-particles

*4. Energetic Photons produce substantial Matter :
For electron-positron pair production to occur, the electromagnetic energy, in a discrete quantity called a photon, must be at least equivalent to the mass of two electrons.
https://www.britannica.com/science/pair-production

*5. The arrogance of modern physics :
I’ve just finished reading {theoretical physicist} Lee Smolin’s new book The Trouble With Physics, . . .
Smolin was of a philosophical bent, and initially put off:
The atmosphere was not philosophical; it was harsh and aggressive, dominated by people who were brash, cocky, confident, and in some cases insulting to people who disagreed with them.
https://www.math.columbia.edu/~woit/wordpress/?p=451

*6. Math is Metaphysics :
I agree with you that the sources of truth in mathematics can't be physical. For it seems clear to me that there would be mathematical truths even in a world that contained nothing physical at all (for instance, it would be true that the number of physical things in such a world is zero and therefore not greater than zero, not prime, etc.). So the sources of mathematical truth must be other than physical: if you like, metaphysical.
https://www.askphilosophers.org/question/24527

↪Gnomon
(1) If, as you claim, energy is not material, then how does it interact with the material (e.g. mass-energy equivalence) without violating fundamental conservation laws?
(2) And the philosophical corollary to the physics question: how does a non-material substance3 interact with material substance (re: substance duality)? — 180 Proof

Off Topic : You ask good philosophical questions, but you seem to expect Materialistic answers to Abstract inquiries. You expect 17th century deterministic answers, even though the foundations of post-classical physics are indeterminate. My understanding of Physics is post-classical, and entangled with Meta-Physics (the observer effect). Apparently, post-classical philosophy doesn't "make sense" to you. And your snarky (passive aggressive "sir") presentation is not good for communication.

(1) According to physicists, Energy acts on Matter because it has that "ability" --- by definition. Do you have a better answer to the "how" question? Apparently, the scientists don't.

(2) According to Einstein, Matter is a form of Energy*1 (monistic). Energy is Causation, and Matter is one of its effects : Noumenal Energy transforms into Phenomenal Matter. So, Energy is the fundamental "substance" (essence)*2 of the physical world. But "essence" is a philosophical concept, not a physical thing. It's similar to Kant's ding an sich. It's similar to Plato's Form*3, in the sense that it is pre-material.

Even more off-topic : Is your world view Nietzschean*4, in that you want to substitute phenomenal Will (local) for noumenal Essences (universal)? :nerd:


*1. Matter = Energy/C^2
"Energy equals mass times the speed of light squared." On the most basic level, the equation says that energy and mass (matter) are interchangeable; they are different forms of the same thing. Under the right conditions, energy can become mass, and vice versa.
https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/einstein/lrk-hand-emc2expl.html

*2. What is essence function in philosophy? : (Eastern Philosophy)
Essence is Absolute Reality, the fundamental "cause" or origin, while Function is manifest or relative reality, the discernible effects or manifestations of Essence.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tiyong

*3. Form = Essence
One of the elements in Plato's theory of Forms is the claim that essences, or Forms, are necessary for, and provide the basis of, all causation and explanation; a claim that, famously, he makes and defends towards the end of Phaedo (95e ff.).
https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/abs/platos-essentialism/introduction/3DA8714A3BCF69E17E6AD7B6B41615E6

*4. Nietzsche’s criticism of the Thing-in-itself :
Nietzsche's first disagreement is with Plato's ideal forms. In the parable of the cave, these forms were the ideals illuminated by the sun. Nietzsche claimed that rather than values illuminated from without, each person should make their own determination of values.
The idea that the value of something subsists in itself is Kant's thing-in-itself (das Ding an sich): noumenal essences that exist beyond human knowledge, like the forms, only shadows of which are seen in the cave.
https://philosophy.stackexchange.com/questions/88781/what-exactly-is-nietzsche-s-criticism-of-the-thing-in-itself-and-is-it-supplante

↪Gnomon
:ok: So you do not have any concrete grounds to assume or claim that energy (i.e. activity) is not material. Just checking ... — 180 Proof

Obviously you didn't take the time, or have the inclination, to "check" the off-topic & off-forum evidences presented in the thesis and blog. That's just as well, since your materialist or "immanentist" worldview might categorize the abstract, theoretical, mathematical, incorporeal grounding of Energy/Information/Qualia as over-your-head (transcendent), or off-limits (prejudice), and as the unreal, imaginary, statistical measurements of a rational mind. :joke: :cool:


Energy is not a material substance :
Explanations suggest that while some students may conceptualize energy as a substance with mass and volume, this idea is not consistently applied. In physics, energy is an abstract, non-material quantity associated with the state of a system.
Physics Education Research Central
https://www.per-central.org › wiki › File:1140

↪Gnomon
Why do you assume that energy (e.g. massless particles ... mental activity ...) is not material? — 180 Proof

It's a long off-topic story. But, if you have the time and the inclination, I have a thesis and blog to underwrite that philosophical inference. :smile:

Energy :
Scientists define “energy” as the ability to do work, but don't know what energy is. They assume it's an eternal causative force that existed prior to the Big Bang, along with mathematical laws. Philosophically, Energy is a positive or negative relationship between things, and physical Laws are limitations on the push & pull of those forces. So, all they know is what Energy does, which is to transform material objects in various ways. Energy itself is amorphous & immaterial ; you can't put it under a microscope. Therefore, if you reduce energy to its essence of information, it seems more akin to mind than matter.
https://blog-glossary.enformationism.info/page8.html
Note --- Ability is usually imputed to Agents, not Things.

How is information related to energy in physics?
Energy is the relationship between information regimes. That is, energy is manifested, at any level, between structures, processes and systems of information in all of its forms, and all entities in this universe is composed of information.
https://physics.stackexchange.com/questions/22084/how-is-information-related-to-energy-in-physics
Note --- Matter is only one of may forms of Energy. Mind is another form. Materialism ignores all those other forms of Causal Agency. In this context, Information Regime = Things.

What would your commonsense notion of Fairness or Justice look like, within this human world? Is it specifiable, exactly? — Moliere

Ha! My commonsense solution to the Fairness & Justice problem would be to have a single-sovereign-supreme-superhuman judge to arbitrate between human definitions of My Justice and Your Fairness. Something like Molière's Tartuffe, relocated to heaven. But, since I gave up my religious solution years ago, I just don't worry about it. I'm certainly not a Marxist, except in the sense that he specified the problem for his day & time. His solution was missing the heavenly father to make the children behave. At my advanced age, I'm willing to let those who are more-concerned-&-more-able work-out the details of the next Utopia. :cool:

↪Gnomon's post strikes me as someone who does not have abstracted notions, and is wanting to see the limits of thinking on the subject, so this is a perfect sort of response, isn't it? — Moliere

Since I have no formal training in philosophy, 's posts are often over my head. So, in that sense, I may not have extremely "abstracted notions". But Fairness and Justice are fairly commonsense notions aren't they? Yet some posts make it more complicated, by further abstracting the notion of what kind of world (Hegelian, Marxist) can be judged morally.

Perhaps, as you said, it would be helpful to place "limits" on our thinking : to define our terms. One definition of "world" in this context might be simply "human culture", as the relevant element of ethical concern. I'll leave it to you and Apo to define whatever abstraction you are arguing about. :joke:

Is that an indirect way of saying that you identify as a Materialist? — Gnomon
No, but it depends what you mean by "materialist". — Banno

OK. What do you mean by "materialist" or "materialism"? Is there a definition of those terms that you would apply to your own worldview? For example, I am a Materialist in the sense that I take the existence of sensible Substance for granted, for all practical purposes. However, for philosophical (theoretical) purposes the term is sometimes taken to an extreme : THE sole fundamental substance. Which no longer makes sense, since Einstein's equation of Matter with Energy and Math.

The Hard position of Materialism makes another thing-I-take-for-granted inexplicable : my own sentient Mind : the only thing I know intimately. If you assume that massy matter is the sole universal substance, whence the invisible massless things (e.g. ideas ; appearances) that we imagine to represent various parts of the non-self world? Chalmers called that question "the hard problem". But materialists call it "irrelevant". To me, it seems that Energy (E=MC^2) is a more likely precursor of both Life and Mind. Is there a philosophical monist position for an Energist? No, I'm not an Energist, but that might be closer to the truth. :smile:

Modern Materialism :
Materialism is a form of philosophical monism which holds that matter is the fundamental substance in nature, and that all things, including mental states, are results of material interactions of material things.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Materialism
Note --- "interactions" = exchanges of energy. Interrelations = exchanges of essence (ratios ; proportions).

ding an sich — Gnomon
I don't think this notion can be made coherent — Banno

To me, the notion of ding an sich, as a philosophical essence, seems coherent (rational) enough. Of course, materialist Science doesn't do essences. So the ding seems to be a Philosophy thing. That may be because essence, qualia, property are categories of our rational analysis of the perceived world. :nerd:

Why things may not be what they seem to be :
The world as it is before mediation Kant calls the noumenal world, or, in a memorable phrase, Das Ding an sich, a phrase which literally means “The thing in itself”, but whose sense would be more accurately caught by translating it as “the thing (or world) as it really is” (as distinct from how it appears to us). . . .
Kant was sure that there was a great deal more to it than that. He held that thinking in terms of causes was not a philosophical aberration, but arises out of the very essence of the way the human mind is constituted, the essence of the way it is compelled to reason.
https://philosophynow.org/issues/31/Kant_and_the_Thing_in_Itself

So a description of how things are, even if complete, does not tell us what we ought to do about it. — Banno

Yes. That's the role of Philosophy, not Science. As you noted, we will never have a complete comprehensive understanding of "how things are", or of ding an sich. All we ever know of the "real" world is the subjective sensations of our bodies, and the imagery (ideas) in our minds. But, without "objective facts", such as the contributions of physical Science, we might never be able to communicate from one mind to another.

The Facts of Science are intended to represent a hypothetical universal or god's view of "how things are". They may also be postulated as-if they are the common human experience. Unfortunately, the universal language of Science is Mathematics. Which is so abstract and idealized as to be incomprehensible to those who are not mathematically inclined. That's why a parent's smack on the rump of an unruly child is a directly sensible lesson, that can be easily understood as "you ought not to do that". It's close to a universal philosophical language. :wink:

I would not describe myself as an "immaterialist". I've argued that what are sometimes called abstract concepts are better understood as institutional facts. They manifest our intentions, so to speak. The "our" here is important. And the issues involved are complex. — Banno

Is that an indirect way of saying that you identify as a Materialist? The term I used was "immanentist", so your discussion of "immaterialist" misses the philosophical issue of Immanence vs Transcendence. I borrowed the term from another poster ; understanding it to mean something more like "realist" vs Idealist, or even "materialist" vs spiritualist in a different context. In other words, there is nothing --- no minds, no ideas, no spirits, no souls, no gods, and no philosophical metaphors --- that are not of this world : i.e. transcendent, hence not subject to verification or falsification. However, some Facts of Science (e.g. quantum quarks) are also institutional, and must be taken on Faith by those who are not members of the institution. :smile:

Immanentism :
any of several theories according to which God or an abstract mind or spirit pervades the world.
Note --- for this thread, I equate this term with "anti-supernatural", meaning that there is nothing out of this physical world. And "meta-physics" is sometimes interpreted as anti-immanent.

Institutional Facts :
In terms of Searle's theory, the facts he is puzzled by are institutional facts, i.e. facts created by assignment, performed by collective intentionality, of an agentive function of non-causal type to an object.
https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-94-010-0589-0_18
Note --- This is over my head, but it sounds like a reference to church dogma about such non-entities as The Trinity. You can't see it, or even understand it, you just have to believe it. Ironically, a three-flavored Quark is a sort of Trinity.

And clearly the Cosmos, life and mind have turned out to have just that kind of self-organising logic. And thermodynamics – as a general label for a vast field of maths and science now – is all about systems that self-organise. So thermodynamics is how we can bring 21st C precision to a metaphysics of immanence. — apokrisis

seems to be one of the most philosophically knowledgeable posters on this forum. But his arguments tend to be rather terse, as if he has a canned answer for common problems. So, some fraught terms may be trigger-words for a succinct reply. Based on his dismissal of your arguments, I suspect that he equates both "Metaphysics" and "Transcendence" with other-worldly religion and spiritualism, instead of with abstract concepts and philosophical metaphors.

My own non-religious philosophical worldview is based on the notion of a "self-organizing logic" that serves as both Cause and Coordinator of the physical and meta-physical (e.g. mental) aspects of the world. For material objects, that "logic" can be summarized as the Laws of Thermodynamics : Energy ->->-> Entropy --- order always devolves into disorder. And yet, the Big Bang has somehow produced a marvelous complex cosmos instead of just a puff of smoke.

For philosophical concepts especially, that thermodynamic metaphor could be mis-interpreted. So, I have coined a neologism -- Enformy*1 -- to describe the positive force that physicists mis-labeled as "Negentropy". My coinage combines physical Energy and Platonic Form (design), to describe the ability of Nature to integrate isolated things into whole systems, including living organisms and thinking beings. I suppose you could call it a "metaphysics of immanence". But Banno might hear it as an oxymoron or paradox. :smile:


*1. Enformy :
In the Enformationism theory, Enformy is a hypothetical, holistic, metaphysical, natural trend or force, that counteracts Entropy & Randomness to produce complexity & progress. [ see post 63 for graph ]
1. I'm not aware of any "supernatural force" in the world. But my Enformationism theory postulates that there is a meta-physical force behind Time's Arrow and the positive progress of evolution. Just as Entropy is sometimes referred to as a "force" causing energy to dissipate (negative effect), Enformy is the antithesis, which causes energy to agglomerate (additive effect).
2. Of course, neither of those phenomena is a physical Force, or a direct Cause, in the usual sense. But the term "force" is applied to such holistic causes as a metaphor drawn from our experience with physics.
3. "Entropy" and "Enformy" are scientific/technical terms. Yet, while those forces are completely natural, the ultimate source of the power behind them may be preternatural, in the sense that a First Cause logically existed before the Big Bang, to program the potential for an almost infinite Cosmos into a sub-atomic Singularity.
https://blog-glossary.enformationism.info/page8.html