Digression: does a photon lose anything for having reflected? — James Riley

When light impacts matter it usually transfers some of its energy to the impactee. But a reflective surface, like a mirror, seems to act like rubber to bounce the light away without absorbing much of its energy. I don't know the physics behind mirrors, but I suspect it has something to do with smooth continuous surfaces and short wavelengths. A mirrored surface seems to work like the opposite of a black body, which absorbs almost all energy. :chin:

Does reflected light lose energy? :
Often it does not lose much energy on being reflected. It loses energy on being absorbed. Each reflected photon has the same energy as before. ... Light may lose or gain energy on being reflected from a moving mirror because of the Doppler shift.
https://physics.stackexchange.com/questions/373577/loss-in-energy-by-light-after-reflections

Could a photon, now or sometime in the future be found to have any data imprinted upon it recording all that which it has "hit" or ricocheted off of? — James Riley

The concept of recording historical information in waves of Photons, sounds similar to the notion of information "imprinted" upon gravitational waves of Gravitons. But since gravitons are still hypothetical, the question is moot. :chin:

Gravitational wave :
Gravitational waves transport energy as gravitational radiation, a form of radiant energy similar to electromagnetic radiation.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gravitational_wave

Many years ago, I read a sci-fi novel that was based upon the fictional-but-seemingly-plausible notion of an alien machine "The Macroscope", which could read the entire history of the universe from enformed "gravitational" waves. However, the enformed particles were dubbed "macrons". That wild conjecture opened the entire universe to exploration, and allowed the author to weave a complex story that traversed all of space & time. :nerd:

The Macroscope
___Piers Anthony
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Macroscope_(novel)

What does entanglement have to do with light. I know light can be turned into heat but I am not aware of it having spin — Gregory

Like any other quantum particles, Photons can become entangled. But I don't know if that coupled state can be used to record arbitrary information, beyond the historical fact of entanglement. Maybe you can dig deeper into the DARPA report. :smile:

Quantum entanglement :
One of the most commonly used methods is spontaneous parametric down-conversion to generate a pair of photons entangled in polarisation.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quantum_entanglement

I knew it was a "reach" but whenever I think of something as a particle, I can't help but wonder what might be gleaned from it, based upon it's experiences. — James Riley

You may be led astray by some interpretations of PanPsychism, in which every particle in the world has "experiences". But, I'm afraid that a lonely photon would experience a poverty of meaning. What does a photon remember of the "experience" of bouncing off of a proton? "Watch where you're going idiot!" :joke:

Could a photon, now or sometime in the future be found to have any data imprinted upon it recording all that which it has "hit" or ricocheted off of? — James Riley

Actually, photons are the universal "carriers of information" in a manner similar to Shannon's "bits" & "bytes". Yet a single photon (bit) is too simple & generic (all identical) to carry much info. But, if you cram a bunch of photons together (bytes), they begin to look like the EverGreen EverGiven ship in the Suez canal. :nerd:


The photon is a fundamental carrier of information, possessing numerous information carrying degrees of freedom including frequency, phase, arrival time, polarization, orbital angular momentum, linear momentum, entanglement, etc.
https://www.darpa.mil/program/information-in-a-photon

A bulk information carrier :

In layman's terms, are you saying you're an extremist? — 3017amen

"Militant Moderate". Perhaps I should have used a smilie icon after that remark, to indicate that I was kidding. :joke:

Another way to put is that, philosophically, I'm an "extreme anti-extremist". Or maybe, I'm "militantly against militancy". As bruised & battered Rodney King plaintively pleaded : "why can't we all just get along".

Actually, I am mostly apathetic about polarized politics. That's because, in most cases, "I don't have a horse in that race". So, I don't have emotional attachments to the "things of this world". Ironically, my fundamentalist religious upbringing inadvertently gave me one philosophical meme useful for dealing with the chaos of the crazy world : "I am in the world, but not of the world". The image that suggests to me is of "hovering above the fray".

My position on most topics is vaguely somewhere in the middle of the range. I am OK with some Conservative positions and with some Liberal positions, but not with their polarized extreme end-states. Unfortunately, when the shooting starts, I get caught in the crossfire. :cool:

It's a long hard climb to get above the frayed fabric of human relations :

Perhaps James was right, concerning the human condition, — 3017amen

I just noticed that, in The Moral Equivalent of War speech, William James came to the same conclusion, to explain why major wars are becoming fewer & farther between, that Steven Pinker discovered in his historical research, a century later. Human nature hasn't changed so much, but human culture has made war & conquest a less attractive way to obtain resources, than peaceful trade. :smile:

"Modern war is so expensive that we feel trade to be a better avenue to plunder;"
___W. James, 1906
http://www.uky.edu/~eushe2/Pajares/moral.html

"so the arrival of the infrastructure of trade and commerce reduces some of the sheer exploitative incentives of conquest."
___S. Pinker, 2012
https://www.vox.com/2015/6/4/8725775/pinker-capitalism

The book I was referring to was The Naked Ape, published in the mid-60's, and one of my main sources of sex education when I was about 12. It points out that h. sapiens is the sexiest beast on the planet (something I instinctively knew, somehow). Most other mammals' sexual behaviors are regulated around cycles, but humans are up for it any time. There are also major consequences from being upright bipeds. It had lots of titillating detalls and was the first place I learned about fellatio. — Wayfarer

Did you read The Human Sexes, by DM? Lots of nudity. :yikes:

One obvious takeaway was the lessons in extremism (both sides). With few exceptions, we need more moderate's in both our political and religious institutions. I think Aristotle was right — 3017amen

Yes. That's why I am a Militant Moderate.

Ironically, immoderate Trump faced-down "little rocket man", and didn't get into a shooting war with North Korea. That may be because Kim Jong Un was afraid that he was just crazy enough to push the red button. :joke:

Actually, dogs, unlike humans, only copulate when the female is in heat. Without those pheremones, dogs are not the least interested. Humans are unique in that respect. (I learned that from Desmond Morris, aged about 12.)
Other than that, I have not the least idea what you're talking about. — Wayfarer

Morris may have meant that dogs actually copulate (inseminate) only when in heat. But both male & female dogs will playfully simulate sexual intercourse almost anytime. Much like human petting and pornography. :cool:

Regarding my rambling remarks about Denial of Service Attacks : please Disregard. Apparently I didn't know what I was talking about. The stuff about CyberBunker was correct, but as it turned out, didn't have anything to do with my inability to connect to some of my regular websites. Various unhelpful diagnostics & troubleshooters led me in a spiraling circle, right back to my own erratic router. After a reboot, I'm again able to copulate, er connect, with all my favorite webpages, such as TPF, which was one of the few that worked during the 2-day downtime. :yikes:


Do Male Dogs Mate With Females Not in Heat? :
Of course a female dog in heat will attract suitors, but male dogs -- neutered or intact -- may attempt to mate with a female who's not in heat. And female dogs aren't the only potential targets of an interested dog. People, other animals and inanimate objects such as toys, pillows and stuffed animals may be on the receiving end a dog's mounting behavior. Mounting isn't just boys being boys; female dogs engage in mounting behavior as well.
https://www.cuteness.com/blog/content/do-male-dogs-mate-with-females-not-in-heat

what is the connection with the subject matter? How do you know it's not your ISP or a config issue with your home internet? — Wayfarer

I suppose this thread is talking about how bad Porn is morally. But that's not the point of my post. It was motivated mostly by frustration, because TPF is one of the few websites I can log onto tonight. Most of my regulars are timed-out, due to denial-of-service attacks. Apparently, liberal-minded philosophical sites are not considered an enemy of the free-speech porn sites. Personally, I don't concern myself with porn, because I don't have young children to be corrupted by its graphic depiction of what shameless naked animals (e.g. dogs) do in public all the time.

My post was only connected to the topic of this thread because CyberBunker is a host for a variety of illicit spammers, black-marketers, and political-secret sites. Porn sites merely happen to be some of their biggest cash-flow customers. In their favor though, they have scruples against child porn. But, like the mafia, they have no qualms about violently attacking their adversaries, by shutting-down half the world's websites, as collateral damage. "How bad is it?" Black-Market & Dark Web Providers like Cyberbunker may be like the Mafia, in that they opportunistically move into any money-making business that is somewhat illicit, and regulated by uptight nanny governments. At least they're not using Thompson submachine guns to massacre their opponents . . . yet. .

Even in liberal Western societies, Porn is still not good for the "clean" image of mainstream internet providers, so they resort to back-channel providers like CB. But it was the fact that a purveyor of porn, among other annoying or illicit or illegal black-market goods & services, that suggested to me a comparison with the rise of the Mafia from immigrant neighborhood gangsters to nationwide semi-legit businessmen. Is that situation morally bad, or just bad for competing legal businesses?

BTW, I know it's not just my local provider because I checked with services that keep tabs on internet outages. The link in the post above gives a graphic global image of how pervasive the problem is. :gasp:

Global Down Detector : Pingdom
https://livemap.pingdom.com/

https://insuretrust.com/worldwide-internet-slowdown-due-to-largest-cyber-attack-in-history/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CyberBunker

This site is not available at this time, due to "time out" error :
Major Internet Outage Cripples the United States ...
https://www.bectechconsultants.com › major-internet-o...
We are issuing a warning to businesses that there is a major internet outage being reported across the United States today.

PS__Just in case you accidentally stumble upon a porn site :
" The NSA gathers evidence of visits to pornographic websites as part of a plan ..." :joke:
https://www.businessinsider.com › Tech Insider › Politics

Statistics say that 25 percent of all internet searches are related to porn. Pornography laws differ from region to region. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pornography_laws_by_region — TaySan

Ironically, the Power of Porn is being revealed today (3/31/2021) on the internet. We're experiencing a worldwide (mostly US & Europe) Denial-of-Service blockage of net sites. Whenever I point my browser to a favorite website, I get "timed-out" error messages, and no email in my boxes. (note : TPF is an odd-but-welcome exception) Apparently, this is another skirmish in a long-running battle between spammers & porn-purveyors of various kinds, and the watchdogs that try to limit clogging of mailboxes with unwanted solicitations and sexploitation.

A major player in this cyber-warfare is CyberBunker, located in actual underground bunkers in Holland and Germany. In 2013, when a spamblocker site put them on their blacklist, they viciously retaliated with a global targeted denial-of-service attack (flooding email servers with spam). Some individuals were later arrested, but often got off, due to "lack of evidence", and probably to lawyers-on-retainer.

This sorry state of cyber-affairs reminds me of the US crime-wars in the US after Prohibition laws (1920s & 30s) suddenly made alcoholic beverages illegal. Since a large segment of the population had a strong desire for alcohol (for self medication of emotional problems?), some formerly small-time neighborhood thugs, quickly became multimillionaires, and semi-respectable businessmen. They capitalized on a vacated niche of legal drugs, by supplying an illegal product on the black-market. In our anything-goes modern society, is it a crime to violate "community" moral standards? Do we still have ethical communities in that medieval sense?

The "self-righteous" tee-totaling moralizers lost that "moral equivalent of war" big-time. I grew-up in a dry county, where alcohol was seldom seen in "respectable" society. But now, in the 2020s, almost 25% of grocery stores are devoted to various flavors of alcoholic beverages. And formerly illegal Marijuana is about to become legalized, after many years as the drug du jour of rougishly-romanticized devil-may-care hipsters. Now, it may become just another mundane market item -- readily available to pre-teens. Unregulated Capitalism dutifully serves its paying customers, without irrelevant moralizing. Apparently, the nanny-state can't "just say NO!" to deep-seated desires.

Will Junkmail and Pornography follow the same path to semi-legitimacy? How much longer will black-market purveyors be relegated to the ethical underworld? Not too many years ago, Cosmopolitan women's magazines, with occasional nip-slips, were covered-up on grocer store checkout counters. Now, almost anything goes. It seems that whatever is morally condemn-able, soon becomes monetarily profit-able. Just goes to show that you can't hold animal urges & desires down for long. So, your best option to deal with the spam flood is to just get a bigger mailbox. :cool:


Global Down Detector : Pingdom
https://livemap.pingdom.com/

Cats most definitely imagine the near future. — fishfry

The human advantage over cats is in the degree & detail of its imagery -- including abstract models of Probability. I assume that cats have an instinctive sense of near- future prospects, but the theory of Probability goes beyond the innate dispositions that humans share with cats, into ideal realms where the cat food doesn't require human servants with hands & can openers. What if cat food just grew on trees -- what are the chances? :joke:

Cats most definitely imagine the near future. — fishfry

The human advantage over cats is in the degree & detail of its imagery -- including abstract models of Probability. I assume that cats have an instinctive sense of future prospects, but the theory of Probability goes beyond the innate dispositions that humans share with cats, into ideal realms where the cat food doesn't require human servants with hands & can openers. What if cat food just grew on trees -- what are the chances? :joke:

↪simeonz
Thanks for the link. You are a little difficult to follow once you get going, but on the whole I was quite impressed. We agree on a systems / embodied approach. I would disagree on pantheism, but I think Gnomon would agree with you. — Pop

In a broad sense, I am OK with the general notion of Pantheism, but for my particular worldview, I call it PanEnDeism. :cool:

PanEnDeism :
Panendeism is an ontological position that explores the interrelationship between God (The Cosmic Mind) and the known attributes of the universe. Combining aspects of Panentheism and Deism, Panendeism proposes an idea of God that both embodies the universe and is transcendent of its observable physical properties.
https://panendeism.org/faq-and-questions/
Note -- PED is distinguished from general Deism, by its more specific notion of the G*D/Creation relationship; and from PanDeism by its understanding of G*D as supernatural creator rather than the emergent soul of Nature. Enformationism is a Panendeistic worldview.
http://blog-glossary.enformationism.info/page16.html
Note 2. -- Panendeism is not equivalent to the bible-god, but is an alternative to the eternal/external Multiverse theory, in which our space-time bound world is a small part of the infinite whole.

Great point! William James (aside from being one of my favorite psychologist-turned-philosopher's) was also a self proclaimed pacifist. In your view, how did he reconcile his pacifism with the so-called human need to fight wars? — 3017amen

James was both a Pacifist and a Pragmatist. Which means that, if we can't change the warlike nature of humanity, we must learn to live with it. Perhaps by channeling our aggressive instincts into less destructive activities -- such as win-win businesses. Ironically, Steven Pinker attributes our "long peace" (since WWII) to global trade -- due in part to the inherent morality of Capitalism. It's only when win-lose capitalists (I won't mention a recent example) fail to respect their trading partners, that war becomes a plausible option. :cool:

William James on Peace & War :
One hundred years ago the philosopher and psychologist William James set down his thoughts on war and peace in an essay for McClure’s magazine titled “The Moral Equivalent of War.” In that essay he examined the role of the martial virtues in keeping a society vigorous and proud and explained why pacifism, in the merely negative sense of opposition to war, could not succeed.
http://blogs.britannica.com/2010/03/william-james-on-peace-and-war/

Pinker explains ‘The Long Peace’ :
https://news.harvard.edu/gazette/story/2012/03/pinker-explains-the-long-peace/

Steven Pinker explains how capitalism is killing war :
https://www.vox.com/2015/6/4/8725775/pinker-capitalism

Capitalism and Morality : First, capitalism is moral because — unlike socialism — it respects individuals, their rights, and their pursuit of happiness. In fact, capitalism requires this respect for individuals and rights. This is why capitalism often is defined as a social system, not an economic system, which protects individual rights.
https://www.johnlocke.org/update/capitalism-and-morality/

Well, it's an awkward question, but, what in fact is probability? — denis yamunaque

Humans have an advantage over most animals, in that we can imagine the near future, and prepare to make our next move, before the future actually arrives. Most animals deal with unexpected events with automatic knee-jerk reflexes. Which serves them well, in their narrow niche of the tooth & claw jungle. But humans have created a variety of artificial niches to suit diverse specialized needs and preferences. Consequently, our "asphalt jungle" is even more complex & chaotic, and rapidly changing, than the natural habitat of other animals.

That may be why we were forced to supplement our basic animal survival instincts, with formal methods for more accurately predicting the moving targets of the future. Ancient prophecy was merely educated guessing, based on direct experience from past events and trends. But humans also learned to create abstract mathematical models of how the world works. And Probability Theory eventually emerged, ironically from Game Theory, based on long experience with gambling competitions, to give those-in-the-know an advantage over other players. For example, a card game is an abstract simulation of real-world social situations. If you can "count cards" you will have a better idea of what hand your opponent is holding, and what his next move might be. Hence, when such unknowns can be reduced to number values they can be manipulated more quickly & accurately than the nebulous social values of human communities : e.g is he bluffing?.

Therefore, what we now call "Probability" is essentially a formalized form of intuition or foresight. It allows us to calculate what is normally-to-be-expected in a well-defined situation. Hence, It gives us an edge in dealing with the unnatural exigencies of the complicated civilized world of cunning thinking animals, and with the unfamiliar uncertainties of the natural world. Probability Theory is "in fact" a new tool, like teeth & claws, for humans to use in the high-stakes game of survival. Unfortunately, Probability is still not a perfect form of Prognostication. :brow:


There are three major types of probabilities:
Theoretical Probability.
Experimental Probability.
Axiomatic Probability.

Every time the economy slowed down the US went to war; — Book273

A century ago, William James described the need for an occasional external (or internal) motivating threat to the Body Politic as the "moral equivalent of war", for reviving the spirit of national unity, and the discipline to weather the disrupting storms. Later, Jimmy Carter gave that same label to the impending climate & energy crisis. Perhaps the current Pandemic has served a similar purpose, by challenging our national political unity, and our communal resolve to repel the threat. Unfortunately, the economy seems to have come through the crisis in better shape than the union. :worry:

Moral Equivalent of War : "James considered one of the classic problems of politics: how to sustain political unity and civic virtue in the absence of war or a credible threat"
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moral_Equivalent_of_War_speech

Some scientists think consciousness is directly related to language. Hence, dependent on the typically “dominant”, “rational” and verbal left-brain. — Gnomon
Also worth knowing about Iain McGilchrist — Wayfarer

The title Master & Emissary reminded me of Jonathan Haidt's interesting metaphor of the relationship between Conscious & Subconscious mind as the Mahout (rider) and his Elephant. That may not be what McGilchrist is referring to though.

Opinions on the book were polarized. Some reviewers focused on the poor quality of an $85 book, while others praised its focus on the whole brain, and others complained about its technical denseness and "verbal diarrhea", plus one described it as "for masochists only". Is it really that off-putting for those who don't buy his holistic view?

Jayne's notion of the "invention" of consciousness placed its emergence around the time of written language. But presumably un-written verbal language evolved long before written symbols began to replace or supplement untold millennia of communication via vocalizations along with hand & body gestures, as in chimps. Surely, some form of self-other consciousness accompanied those early forms of communication of inner concepts & feelings. Perhaps what coincided with complex social communities and written language was a more modern conception of self-consciousness and individualism. :smile:


Elephant & Rider :
https://www.jch.com/jch/notes/TheElephantAndTheRiderMetaphor.html

invention of "consciousness" — Gus Lamarch

When I fist heard of Jayne's hypothesis, I thought the notion of a bicameral brain -- to explain the emergence of human-type consciousness -- was a good literary or historical metaphor, if not a scientific thesis, based on hard evidence. Unfortunately, it seems that neuroscience has not taken it very seriously. That may be because their emphasis is on the physical substrate of the mind (neurons), rather than the spiritual Cartesian res cogitans. As you said, "the mind is a nonphysical — and therefore, non-spatial — substance". If so, it might not be limited to physical spatial boundaries. Which sounds spooky to pragmatic scientists, because it might also be able to transcend the individual's brain & body. However, I assume that the conscious & subconscious Mind is not a ghostly Spirit, but merely a brain Function : Mind is a name for what the brain does -- thinking, feeling, etc.

Freud may have intuitively referred to the bicameral nature of the mind in his metaphors of Id, Ego, and Superego. In that case, the "Super-ego" might refer to the role of the dominant "conscious" chamber of the brain. But, I still doubt that General Consciousness is limited to one hemisphere. The creative-emotional "language" of the right brain seems to be a non-verbal form of conscious awareness. But only the left brain can make itself known to other minds via language. Lacking the words to express its visions and urges, schizophrenics may appear to be motivated by external demons, rather than conflicting inner emotions or drives.

Some scientists think consciousness is directly related to language. Hence, dependent on the typically “dominant”, “rational” and verbal left-brain. But that could be due to their bias toward rational thinking, and distrust of irrational motives. But both "fast" Right Brain & "slow" Left Brain modes of thinking are normal for humans. However sub-conscious thoughts & feelings are mostly concerned with emotional functions. In that case, the commanding "voices" & visions might be merely non-verbal automatic reflex urges & feelings (i.e. "Fast" thinking).

Split-brain experiments seem to result in two minds in one body, But that's difficult to parse into an understandable model of general consciousness, which might explain how the "bicameral mind" could present a consistent singular.personality . It's possible that a study of close relations to humans, e.g. chimpanzees & bonobos, could shed some light on Jayne's notion of "pre-conscious" humans. If they are driven only by inner emotional urges, chimps might be equivalent to philosophical zombies, or robots. Their inner drives would not be experienced consciously, but more like encoded instructions, blindly converted into explainable actions. Has anyone done such a study, with a view toward a bicameral explanation? :chin:

Fast vs Slow Thinking : "System 1" is fast, instinctive and emotional; "System 2" is slower, more deliberative, and more logical.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thinking,_Fast_and_Slow

Right Brain, Left Brain: A Misnomer : A More Holistic Picture
https://dana.org/article/right-brain-left-brain-really/

So, in what sense can God or M'verse be said to exist? If they are not here & now, are they Nothing? A mere figment of imagination? Or the potent Cause of all actual things? . . . . Why is there something? Because there was always the Potential for something. — Gnomon

Why is there Something Instead of Nothing?
Off-topic diversion continued . . . . chasing the elusive butterfly of Why?
Another "simple desultory philippic" ???
Feel free to ignore these rambling wonderings.
But, remember that Wonder is the philosophical emotion.

Per Actualism : "to be is to exist, and to exist is to be actual"

The weak point in that assertive affirmation is the word "Actual", which is the opposite of Potential, and implies an act of transforming a pre-existing Possibility into a currently existing Actuality. If so, our actual world is contingent, and there was also the alternative possibility of non-existence. Hence, the assertion contains the seed of its own negation. Whatever exists must have been actualized or created by some prior Power or Potential. Knowledge of that a priori Something could point toward a meaningful answer to "why?".

Another thread on this forum asserts that "Existence is infinite in extent and eternal in duration. Only nothing or nonexistence could actually limit existence". That very long post attempts to support that questionable conclusion with philosophical reasoning. Yet, "Infinity" is not a provable actuality in our real world. It's merely the conceptual negation of "Finite". So, to assert that Actual Existence (physical reality) is infinite seems to go beyond our ability to know such things. Of course, our physical universe could conceivably be unbounded in space & time, but our means of measurement are limited by the speed of light, which forms a boundary to our observations. Hence to claim that “existence” is infinite (as in Multiverse theories), sounds more like a statement of faith, than of fact. So, we could just as well assume that before the Big Bang, there was nothing Actual --- perhaps only unknowable Potential.

Therefore, this thread's topical "why" question seems to logically require some Outside (transcendent) Force, or Actualizing Agent, to convert non-existence (nothingness) into existence (somethingness). Whatever, that exotic Actor might be, it alone could provide a knowledgeable answer to the "why" question. Yet, some early human thinkers assumed, as an axiom, that their world was eternal, and didn't bother themselves with questions about origins or beginnings. But philosophers, and some scientists, are not known for leaving well-enough alone. So, they deign to ask hypothetical “why” & “how” questions. Yet, “why” questions go beyond the scope of physical science, to inquire about meta-phyical Reasons for Being. Moreover, reasons are properties of conscious agents, not aimless atoms.

In the current issue of SKEPTIC magazine, one article is entitled "How did it all begin?". Which seems to be related to the topic of this thread. The transition from Nothing to Something implies a Point of Beginning -- the locus of the act of Actualization. And the article attempts to supply a scientific & physical answer. First, it notes that "modern cosmologists cannot resist exploring models which neatly incorporate any date in the past, even one predating the beginning of our current universe." Apparently, the notion of a self-existent universe does not make sense, so they are logically motivated to explain Why there is Something. Although our current entropic universe seems to be finite, anything prior to the beginning might not be so limited.

Unfortunately, the only solution offered in the article is an imaginary scientific hypothesis, not an observation of something physically Actual. It says, "Inflation explains why there was a 'bang' and even provides a 'banger' . . . in the form of an exotic form of energy known as a quantum field". So, their answer to "how" and "why" is a barely existing exotic non-thing that was originally proposed, in desperation, as a solution to the frustrating quest for the fundamental building block of the Actual real world. An early unproven hypothesis was Atomism : something you can't see or touch is responsible for the stuff that you know as actual reality. So far, we have found no such concrete foundation, so theorists are reduced to proposing fluffy clouds of invisible intangible insubstantial potential (virtual) causal power. Which, ironically, sounds a lot like an ancient ghostly creative Deity. That being the case, have we really made progress in understanding ultimate “why” questions? :cool:

What Does Quantum Theory Actually Tell Us about Reality? : Nearly a century after its founding, physicists and philosophers still don’t know—but they’re working on it
https://blogs.scientificamerican.com/observations/what-does-quantum-theory-actually-tell-us-about-reality/

Is The Inflationary Universe A Scientific Theory? : Not Anymore
https://www.forbes.com/sites/startswithabang/2017/09/28/is-the-inflationary-universe-a-scientific-theory-not-anymore/?sh=5a88f917b45e

It's the same for paper money. It's the same for ownership of any sort.
But off topic. — Banno

Sorry. I had just read an article about Bitcoin. Hence the discursive diversion off-topic. But what if it was actually a prologue to an on-topic post, that didn't actually exist -- until now?

So, the relevance to this thread is that Bitcoin is treated as-if it's a real thing, even though the "coins", and their ownership, only exist as notions in human minds. That raised the question in my mind about its actuality -- its reality. "As-if" is not real existence, but an ideal mode of being.

I had never heard of the philosophy of Actualism, but I suppose it's a variant of Realism, and opposed to Idealism. So, I wondered if Potential money had any meaning in that philosophy. Aristotle made a distinction between Actual and Potential, but treated Potential as-if it's a potent force in the real world. Perhaps Potential exists only as a Possibility or Probability. And it would be easy to dismiss such non-existing non-actual things as equivalent to Nothing. Like Bitcoin, statistical Probability does not exist, until actualized. Yet, it's a useful & meaningful concept for those of us who are not Actualists. :smile:

OP --- "argument for existence :
1. Things (God and/or matter) either always existed or spontaneously emerged.
2. Therefore there is no Cause either way."

According to cosmologists, our space-time world did not exist, as such, prior to the Big Bang Prime Cause. But, as OP noted, logically Something must have existed, unless Spontaneous Generation is a real thing. Some call that necessary Actualizer "God" (i.e. eternal Mind), while others call it "Multiverse" (i.e. eternal Matter). The M'verse theory assumes that Matter actually existed forever, while the God theory supposes, as an axiom, that the divine Potential for our world existed eternally before the Causal act of creation. Therefore, we have a choice between an Actual material Cause and a Potential mental Cause. Hence, there must a Cause either way. No?

Per Actualism : "to be is to exist, and to exist is to be actual"
So, in what sense can God or M'verse be said to exist? If they are not here & now, are they Nothing? A mere figment of imagination? Or the potent Cause of all actual things? . . . . Why is there something? Because there was always the Potential for something. :cool:

Actualists suppose that everything that exists is actual. — Banno

That's an interesting philosophical concept. For example, in what sense is Bitcoin actual? Perhaps it becomes actualized when a coin miner cashes-in the current value of his imaginary coins. Until then though, the bitcoin "money" exists only in the form of abstract information (data) on a worldwide distributed network of mindless & soulless computers. Therefore, until actualized, Bitcoin has only Potential value. To sell your coins you must make the buyer believe that it has actual cash value. So, in what sense is your belief in the value of your abstract coins reality based? Is Bitcoin Something or Nothing? Actual or Notional? Real or Imaginary? :chin:

PS___Many years ago, my brother was convinced that the US should return to the Gold Standard, based on a similar notion : that only actual (physical) money is real. Anything else is fake-money, non-existent, like "vaporware". But, even the currency value of Gold -- beyond its intrinsic value as an industrial metal -- is based on Faith in an emotional system of human beliefs & values. Reportedly, Trump was also in favor of the Gold Standard. Perhaps, that's because it is tangible, and appeals to the physical senses with its glimmer & heft. Also, because he wouldn't have to place his faith in the integrity of fellow humans -- some of whom may be grifters & con-men, or Mexicans. Another hypothetical, if Trump became dictator of the US. he might prefer "fiat" currency, In that case, its value would be whatever he dictated by fiat. :joke:

Bitcoin : Like fiat currencies, Bitcoin is not backed by any physical commodity or precious metal.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bitcoin
Note : which is better : fiat or faith? Command or cooperation?

Vaporware : software or hardware that has been advertised but is not yet available to buy, either because it is only a concept or because it is still being written or designed.

Fiat :
1 : a command or act of will that creates something without or as if without further effort According to the Bible, the world was created by fiat. 2 : an authoritative determination : dictate a fiat of conscience. 3 : an authoritative or arbitrary order : decree government by fiat.

THE VALUE OF MONEY

What's a better candidate for an eternal thing and/or an uncaused cause, a physical universe or a god? My bet is on a god. — RogueAI

Some ancient thinkers assumed that the physical world had existed forever. But others intuited entropy, and guessed that the existing world would eventually wind down to nothing, hence they concluded that a finite world must have an infinite Cause : a creator or precursor of some kind. We now have scientific evidence that our universe has not always existed, but emerged long ago from a sudden creative event. Combine that cosmic contingency (dependence on something outside the self) with the unavoidable certainty of entropy (e.g. death), and we are forced by logic to assume some external -- outside of our knowable space-time -- cause for the existence of all physical things.

Today, we have only two plausible candidates for that First Cause : a> an eternal non-physical creator, or b> an eternal physical multiverse. Option <a> is questionable, because we have no sensible experience with entities having no extension in Time or Space. But option <b> is also dubious, because our experience with the only knowable universe indicates that dynamic creative energy (in a closed system) always runs-down to total entropy over time. So again, we are dependent on some source of power outside our world to provide the impetus for a Big Bang, or for a Genesis event. The Multiverse option tries to avoid the First Cause/Power Source solution, by claiming it's merely physical causal-turtles all the way down to . . . . what?

Sadly, any logical choice between those alternative unknowable scenarios is ultimately opaque to human experience, and rests instead on personal preference or prejudice. That being the case, we can't be certain that our chosen world creator exists in any meaningful sense. Yet, we do know that physical systems tend to fall apart over time, and that mental (meta-physical) systems are dependent upon physical substrates for their metaphysical existence. So again, the choice of Cause is a toss-up.

The related question of "why is there something rather than nothing" presupposes that there is someone to ask the question. Hence, whatever the Cause of our known "something" may be, it must have the power or potential to create something with Awareness & Willpower from some prior "thing". That much is certain. But that a priori "thing" could be a> ordinary Matter, or b> ordinary Energy, or c> extraordinary Substance as proposed by Spinoza. Therefore, I conclude that the First & Final Cause of my existence in a contingent world must be both Infinite & Eternal : call it "G*D" or "Nature" as you Will. :cool:


Metaphysical Existence : metaphysics was the “science” that studied “being as such” or “the first causes of things” or “things that do not change”.
https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/existence/
Note : Physical existence is objective : "I see it, therefore it is". Metaphysical existence is subjective : "I imagine it, therefore it's essence is". Essence (ousia) is a defining property. e.g. Mathematical properties are subjective, but derived by reason from objective physical knowledge.

Substance Monism : The most distinctive aspect of Spinoza's system is his substance monism; that is, his claim that one infinite substance—God or Nature—is the only substance that exists.
https://iep.utm.edu/spinoz-m/

What, conceptually, is probability? — denis yamunaque

The word "probability" was derived from the concept of a provable postulate or prediction. An un-provable prediction is an opinion with no testable grounds for belief. Such prophecies must be taken on faith in the soothsayer, not on any objective evidence pointing to a normal future state. Hence, the prediction may rely on the small possibility of abnormal events (black swans) or miracles (divine intervention).

Conceptually, a highly probable event doesn't have to be taken on faith, it's almost certain. But the lower the probability, the more faith is required for belief. For example, the likelihood of a tornado hitting my home may seem remote, but if the weather forecaster has a good record of reliability, you'd be wise to take his word for it, and prepare to take shelter.

Mathematical probability is a numerical evaluation of the odds that the future state predicted can be tested and found true. As a practical method, probability theory derives its power from the stability of the "normal" Bell Curve behavior of large numbers of relevant objects or trials. In other words, we predict the future based upon past experience. But, the flaw in that theory is the small probability of Black Swans, that don't conform to the Norm. Some people interpret such rare events as miracles, because their minuscule probability is hard to calculate. Nevertheless, we can still retro-compute the probability after the fact ; after the evidence has been found ; after the event has "come to pass". :smile:

The law of large numbers is a principle of probability according to which the frequencies of events with the same likelihood of occurrence even out, given enough trials or instances. As the number of experiments increases, the actual ratio of outcomes will converge on the theoretical, or expected, ratio of outcomes.
https://whatis.techtarget.com/definition/law-of-large-numbers

Black Swan theory : 2. The non-computability of the probability of the consequential rare events using scientific methods (owing to the very nature of small probabilities).
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_swan_theory

Beloved Weatherman : https://www.washingtonpost.com/weather/2021/03/25/james-spann-alabama-tornado/

True Prophets : Make predictions that “come to pass” (Jeremiah 28:9)
When a prophet speaks in the name of the Lord, if the word does not come to pass or come true, that is a word that the Lord has not spoken; the prophet has spoken it presumptuously. You need not be afraid of him. (Deuteronomy 18:20-22)
Beloved, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God, for many false prophets have gone out into the world. (1 John 4:1-6)

There is no true middle ground between physicalism and idealism. You say the nature of reality is mental and matter is the power to inform. I can not reconcile this with traditionalist materialism — Gregory

I'm sorry you feel that way. I've been enjoying my own truish middle ground for several years now. Since I gave-up pursuit of Divine Truth long ago. Perhaps you are still seeking the heavenly realm of Perfect Truth. Unfortunately, in an imperfect world, that's a path of perpetual frustration. Yet, moderation is in the mind of the beholder, not in the crazy pendulum world out there, swinging back & forth between extremes. So, when selecting beliefs for my personal worldview, I choose partial "truths" from both sides, and leave the obvious untruths behind. That method allows me to approximate the whole truth, by including both Objective and Subjective, Secular & Religious, Eastern & Western perspectives.

The hybrid result is something close to Aristotle's Golden Mean, which eschews absolute extremes in favor of relative averages. His mentor, Plato, tended toward the extreme of perfect abstract Idealism, but Ari preferred to ground his world in imperfect tangible Realism. Likewise, I have found a way to "reconcile" the non-classical weirdness of Quantum Theory with the novelty of Information Theory, along with ancient notions of Holism & Panpsychism, to produce a personal worldview. that is not beholden to any traditional system of belief, such as Materialism versus Spiritualism, or Physicalism versus Idealism, if you prefer. I call that attainable path to truth, Enformationism. :cool:

Note : Absolutism produces a world of win-lose competition, while Relativism allows us to find the middle path of win-win cooperation.

Synonyms for a win-win attitude : accomodation, accord, concession, understanding, etc.

Consilence :
1. agreement between the approaches to a topic of different academic subjects, especially science and the humanities.
2. In science and history, consilience (also convergence of evidence or concordance of evidence) is the principle that evidence from independent, unrelated sources can "converge" on strong conclusions.

1. As I understand, Spinoza was a panpsychist, so does his metaphysics encounter the combination problem? — Eugen

One way to understand Spinoza's worldview is as an Enlightenment Era update to ancient notions of Panpsychism. However, the scientific knowledge, his model was based on, is now quite outdated. That's why, although I too hold an all-is-mind philosophy, I don't claim to be a panpsychist, in the Ancient Greek, or 17th century Enlightenment, or 20th century New Age sense. Instead, I have tried to update those old mind-is-prior-to-matter concepts in the light of modern Information Theory and Quantum Physics.

One advantage of Enformationism is that it bypasses the "combination problem", by avoiding the use of "Consciousness" to describe the "micro-experiences" of fundamental particles of nature. Instead, my thesis makes abstract Information the fundamental substance (or essence) of the physical + mental world, including human feelings. Whereas Spinoza labelled his "universal substance" as "God", my thesis uses the less metaphorically encumbered term "Information". When combined with modern Evolutionary Theory, Fundamental Information organizes & complexifies over time, so that a late development is the "recent" (cosmic timeline) emergence of human-level Consciousness. Hence, there's no need to explain how atoms and rocks "experience" their world. On the lower levels, Information exchange is equivalent to Energy emittance & absorption in matter. Any questions? :nerd:


Panpsychism : The view has a long and venerable history in philosophical traditions of both East and West, and has recently enjoyed a revival in analytic philosophy. . . . . And whilst physicalism offers a simple and unified vision of the world, this is arguably at the cost of being unable to give a satisfactory account of the emergence of human and animal consciousness. Panpsychism, strange as it may sound on first hearing, promises a satisfying account of the human mind within a unified conception of nature.
https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/panpsychism/

The Combination Problem :
The combination problem is most obviously a challenge for constitutive micropsychism, although as we shall see there are forms of it that threaten other kinds of panpsychism. According to constitutive micropsychism, micro-level entities have their own very basic forms of conscious experience, and in brains these micro-level conscious entities somehow come together to constitute human and animal consciousness. The problem is that this is very difficult to make sense of: “little” conscious subjects of experience with their micro-experiences coming together to form a “big” conscious subject with its own experiences.
https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/panpsychism/

The EnFormAction Hypothesis : Emergent Evolution
http://bothandblog3.enformationism.info/page23.html

I've read a lot of your links but I'm not getting the information stuff. Information is "facts in the mind" by definition. — Gregory

Perhaps you are reading the wrong links. Your definition was the traditional usage of the term "information", up until Shannon's Digital Information Theory abstracted away the personal meaning of those facts, and til Quantum Theory began to show that physical objects, such as your billiard table, are ultimately "fields" of mathematical Information, which we perceive as material things. Unfortunately, Shannon defined "information" in terms of Entropy, which is the negative "force" that breaks-down whole organisms into useless inert pieces of dead matter. But other scientists have shown that Information is also equivalent to Energy, which builds-up living organic matter. And Human Nature may be the current pinnacle of the evolutionary process of En-form-action.

In order to counter Shannon's devaluation of Information, I have linked to many other expert opinions, which reveal the "many faces of Information". So, the bottom line of my thesis is that everything and every thought in this world is merely one of the multiple forms of the universal "power to enform". This notion of Information is counter-intuitive like Quantum Theory, but scientists are gradually becoming accustomed to the idea that Reality is not what we see. FWIW, here are some more links to dispel your bewilderment. :nerd:

Information, What Is It? : But perhaps the most fundamental enigma is the ultimate “nature” of Information itself. The original usage of the term was primarily Functional, as the content of memory & meaning. Then Shannon turned his attention to the Physical aspects of data transmission. Now, Deacon has returned to the most puzzling aspect of mental function : Intentions & Actions.
http://bothandblog4.enformationism.info/page26.html

Information Realism : Kastrup then describes how reductive methods failed to find the definitive atom, and instead discovered only amorphous fields. “At the bottom of the chain of physical reduction there are only elusive, phantasmal entities we label as “energy” and “fields”—abstract conceptual tools for describing nature, which themselves seem to lack any real, concrete essence.” This is the conceptual conundrum that launched my own investigation into “the mental nature of reality”, which I call Enformationism.
http://bothandblog4.enformationism.info/page18.html

The basis of the universe may not be energy or matter but information :
https://bigthink.com/philip-perry/the-basis-of-the-universe-may-not-be-energy-or-matter-but-information

Reality Is Not What We Can See :
"What is the world made of?" — what philosophers would call ontology. In Newton's time, it was space, time and particles. After quantum physics and Einstein, it is spacetime and quantum fields. This is where the tension lies — and where we go to the edge of what we know, without any certainty of what comes next.
https://www.npr.org/sections/13.7/2017/02/01/512798209/reality-is-not-what-we-can-see

The many faces of Information :
Shannon info = Quantified; a verb; what it does; gain vs loss; energy.
Boltzmann info = Random-ized, absent, what was lost; entropy.
Deacon info = Referential; statistical; pointing to an absent future state.
Colloquial info = Predicate; a noun: what it's about; the meaning; what is gained; the referent.
Teleodynamic info = Semiotic; symbols; words that point to absent things; indicating Potential.

I prefer a conception like human ecology to the essentialist shibboleth "human nature". — 180 Proof

I understand where you are coming from. It's that prejudice (us versus them) against Essentialism, that I have to try repeatedly to overcome in my references to the philosophical thesis of Enformationism. A key concept of that theory is that Energy ("essence of life") is a form of Enformation. Unfortunately, it's difficult for those who reject religion to overcome their negative attitude toward Essentialism, which they equate with Spiritualism. Ironically, the term "essential" is commonly used by atheist scientists in reference to the mundane phenomenon of Energy. So, the notion of Essence is not really outmoded or unimportant. :smile:

Shibboleth : a custom, principle, or belief distinguishing a particular class or group of people, especially a long-standing one regarded as outmoded or no longer important.
___Oxford Dictionary
Note -- in this case, it's not Racism, but Materialism

What is essential for all living organisms? : All living organisms need energy to grow and reproduce, maintain their structures, and respond to their environments; metabolism is the set of the processes that makes energy available for cellular processes.
https://courses.lumenlearning.com/boundless-biology/chapter/energy-and-metabolism/

I prefer a conception like human ecology to the essentialist shibboleth "human nature". — 180 Proof

I understand where you are coming from. It's that prejudice (us versus them) against Essentialism, that I have to try repeatedly to overcome in my references to the philosophical thesis of Enformationism. A key concept of that theory is that Energy ("essence of life") is a form of Enformation. Unfortunately, it's difficult for those who reject religion to overcome their negative attitude toward Essentialism, which they equate with Spiritualism. Ironically, the term "essential" is commonly used by atheist scientists in reference to the mundane phenomenon of Energy. So, the notion of Essence is not really outmoded or unimportant. :smile:

Shibboleth : a custom, principle, or belief distinguishing a particular class or group of people, especially a long-standing one regarded as outmoded or no longer important.
___Oxford Dictionary
Note -- in this case, it's not Racism, but Materialism

What is essential for all living organisms? : All living organisms need energy to grow and reproduce, maintain their structures, and respond to their environments; metabolism is the set of the processes that makes energy available for cellular processes.
https://courses.lumenlearning.com/boundless-biology/chapter/energy-and-metabolism/

If I say intellect comes from matter, it's like saying steam comes from water. It's limited to phenomena which we know. When you say that the world is information, you are saying it's less than material and given to us by a higher intellect. My position seems much simpler than yours, if I am understanding you correctly. — Gregory

How does "intellect come from matter"? Do you know what process or "force" could cause inert matter to evolve into a living thinking being? Based on Information Theory and Quantum Theory, I suggest that mind did indeed emerge from material substrates, and I propose a "mechanism" for that Phase Transition. But I don't think that mental noumena could emerge from mindless matter (phenomena), unless that matter had been enformed with the potential for mind. Since I'm neither a scientist nor an academic philosopher though, you don't have to take my word for it. You can investigate the thesis, and judge for yourself whether it sounds plausible that Enformation is a causal process & force in the real world. And "It's limited to phenomena which we know".

To say that Information is "less than material" is a negative comparison of two different categories of reality. It's like saying that your mind is "less than" a pile of sand. You might better understand the concept underlying Enformationism, if you would compare Information with Energy instead of Matter. The analogy I prefer is to say that Matter is the "clay", and Information is the "Sculptor", who transforms the amorphous mud into a meaningful image. Did that 3 dimensional form originate from the clay or from ideas (information) in the mind of the enformer (sculptor)? Michaelangelo famously quipped, "I saw the angel in the marble and carved until I set him free". Did he really "see" the angel in the rock, or in his imagination (information)?

You seem to be confusing the "phenomena we know" (objective matter) with the subjective knowledge of that stuff in the mind. When I say that the mundane information in real world minds originated in a Mind that is literally out-of-this-world, what do you imagine I'm referring to : 5th dimensional aliens, the infinite Multiverse, or the Jehovah of Genesis? Actually, none of the above. But you'd have to investigate the whole thesis, not just a few words in a post, in order to see what I'm saying. Til then, you don't "understand me correctly". :cool:

Causal Information : 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

Introduction to Enformationism : http://bothandblog6.enformationism.info/page80.html

Abstract concept (information)
transformed into concrete object

Is there any other way you have of finding out the truth? — Dharmi

Yes, by comparing different "expert's" opinions on a topic. Ancient Greeks, Hebrews, Jews, Hindus, and Buddhists addressed similar philosophical topics, and arrived at different conclusions. Yet, thousands of years later, modern philosophers continue to debate the same old "truths". So, I carefully select from among those truth-theories the ones that best fit my personal understanding of how & why the world works as it does. That's why my worldview is pretty eclectic, but not beholden to any particular school of thought. I seem to get along fine without any spirit guide or guru. Of course, I may be missing something important. So that's why I keep my antennae tuned to search for truths wherever they may originate. For me, the final arbiter of Truth is my own feeble reasoning ability. :cool:

Modern philosophy is nothing more than philodoxy, different opinions clashing with other opinions. — Dharmi

Ditto, for much of ancient philosophy, sophistry, and religion. That's why Sophisticated Skepticism is a good tool for digging-out nuggets of truth. :smile:

I think I can reason without being in spiritual infinities. — Gregory

Does that mean you think Human Reasoning is a strictly material phenomenon? If so, can you provide empirical evidence to show how material processes generate the interrelated ideas that we call Reasons?

In my own thesis, Reasons in the mind do indeed have a material substrate. But it's the invisible interactions of Enforming (to enform = to cause to exist ; to create ; to give meaningful form to) that produce the immaterial mental conceptual constructs we call "Reasons". Unfortunately, X-rays & MRIs are not able to photograph those ideas (information networks) in the brain, because they are not physical objects, (perhaps, more like geometrical angular relationships & ratios). Instead, we only know them by subjective introspection. I wouldn't call those imaginary images "spiritual", because of the religious implications. So, I refer to them merely as "Informational". Hence, they are forms of immaterial Enformation, which is not a thing, but a causal process.

Moreover, those mind-to-mind processes (meme propagation) are, as far as I know, found only in the finite real world. The only "infinities" related to the process of Enforming would be properties of the logically necessary First Cause, which for illustrative reasons I call "The Enformer". Or you could call it "The Great Reason". :smile:

Meme : a unit of cultural information, as a concept, belief, or practice, that spreads from person to person in a way analogous to the transmission of genes.

I don't see what you mean. I don't think any of it has been dumbed down at all. — Dharmi

Don't worry about it. Religious Thinkers and Philosophers often "talk past each other ". :cool:

Talk Past Each Other : Talking past each other is an English phrase describing the situation where two or more people talk about different subjects, while believing that they are talking about the same thing.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talking_past_each_other

We are Brahman, but we are not Parabrahman. We are Atman, but we are not Paratman. There's a Supreme Mind underlying our minds. — Dharmi

I don't follow the Hindu religion, but I do occasionally refer to some sublime Indian Philosophical concepts in describing my own worldview. For example, what I call "G*D", or the "Programmer" in my modernized philosophy, is similar to the abstract notion of Brahman : "creative principle which is realized in the whole world". Unfortunately, the Hindu religion has dumbed-down (anthropomorphized) that abstraction into a mere god among gods -- to make it palatable for the masses. Likewise, Hindu "Atman", and Christian "Soul", is what I call in my non-religious worldview : the human Self-image. :smile:

How it is that the higher minds of higher human beings will likely come about in the future if there is already a Highest Mind at the beginning? — PoeticUniverse

I'll preface by admitting that, like Socrates, I know nothing about such preposterous questions. But that doesn't stop me from guessing and speculating, for my own amusement. I don't expect anyone to take my guesstures as gospel truth. However, I have developed a personal worldview to take the place of the gospel of my youth. That idiosyncratic view of the world is Enformationism. And it's a mish-mash of philosophical bits & bytes from ancient history to modern futurism.

When I outgrew my religious indoctrination, I didn't immediately become an all-knowing Atheist, but an inquiring Agnostic. That's because Atheism ignores some personally important philosophical questions, such as "why is there something instead of nothing?". A typical evasive answer is "there has always been something. But the best scientishish hypothetical answer(s( to date is(are) the various versions of Multiverses or Many Worlds. So, I read those conjectures as fiction, not fact. Meanwhile, I am currently growing my own personal fictional narrative from a seed of Information/Quantum Theory. And the starting point begins before there was any material thing, hence pre-Big Bang. That Cosmic Origin is what I call "The Enformer", or "Cosmic Programmer", or sometimes as "G*D", for those who don't grok my made-up terms.

Like the Multiverse, The Enformer is assumed to be eternal & infinite. But, since my worldview is Information-based instead of Materialistic, my G*D is envisioned as a disembodied Mind. Beyond that axiomatic starting-point, I can only use limited logic to infer what other attributes the First Cause of our world must have, in order for our observed causes & effects to be what we see. For example, I don't know if the Whole Mind is conscious like all the many particular mini-minds we encounter in human-to-human communication. All I know is that the Enformer must, following Aristotelian Logic, have the Potential for Consciousness. Consequently, I don't model the Great Mind as an anthro-morphic Person, but as merely infinite Potential, for which anything is possible.

That prologue out of the way, I can refer you to some of my fictional stories, devised to explain to myself how the world we know & love came to be what it is, and where it might be headed. At this point in the evolution of the original Singularity, assumed to be programmed with EnFormAction, the human mind seems to be the penultimate form of consciousness. Yet, I can only speculate on what forms of being & knowing will emerge in the future. And my guesstures on such topics can be found under the heading of Intelligent Evolution, or Enformationism, or Cosmic Progression, etc.

To answer your question more directly : the highest mind so far in evolution is only slightly higher than that of a spineless octopus. So we have a long way to go --- to come close to being space-time gods. Teilhard deChardin concocted a semi-plausible story of what the climax of evolution (Omega Point) would be when the material world becomes so perfect that it achieves something like god-hood. That's similar to my own speculative fiction, except that my G*D is not the Christian Logos. And I don't think the part-minds will ever touch the asymptote of the Whole Mind. Does that answer your question??? :chin:


Guesstures : my made-up word for postulations based on best guesses.

The EnFormAction Hypothesis : http://bothandblog3.enformationism.info/page23.html

Introduction to Enformationism : http://bothandblog6.enformationism.info/page80.html

Intelligent Evolution : http://gnomon.enformationism.info/Essays/Intelligent%20Evolution%20Essay_Prego_120106.pdf

Cosmic Progression from Ø to ∞ : http://bothandblog3.enformationism.info/page28.html

I reject New Age philosophy also, but I think it's closer to the truth than mere naive empiricism. I don't see how a mystical answer is somehow "imaginary." — Dharmi

Some dictionary sites give "imaginary" as a synonym for "mystical". But my primary concern for mystical worldviews is the synonym "occult". Labeling some aspects of the world as "occult", or "taboo" is a traditional tactic of religious leaders to "pull the wool" over the eyes of their followers. It implies that your puny human reasoning is incapable of learning some truths. Hence, you must take on faith that your guru or mystical guide has a direct line to God or to the Akashic Field.

Long ago, I learned that Faith is a leash for "leading people around by the nose", so to speak. So, I don't trust anyone who claims to know something that is not accessible to mundane observation and reasoning (e.g .the scientific method). But, I also don't take the word of scientific priests for "truths" that are so far over my head that I have to take them on Faith. "Naive empiricism" is also a form of child-like Faith in the preternatural objectivity of scientists . Sophisticated Skepticism is like an amulet for warding-off the evil spirits of Occultism.

A comical example of New Age faith in mystical abilities is the absurd phenomenon of "Yogic Flying". Maharishi assured his Transcendental Meditators that his techniques could give them magical powers, such as the ability to fly. So, they took his folk tale literally, and sincerely tried to prove their faith by "flying" while in the cross-legged position. What you can learn from this trivial example is that Faith can lead people to do things that are "beyond reason", such as handling poisonous snakes during church services.

FWIW, I like some elements of Eastern philosophy, but most Eastern and New Age religions are just as manipulative of naive minds as Western religions. :cool:

Naive Empiricism refers to the belief that scientist should try to be as objective and neutral as possible when studying something. Scientists should approach a problem with no preconceived expectations or assumptions which have not been previously studied and justified using the scientific method.
http://encyclopedia.kids.net.au/page/na/Naive_Empiricism

Occult : supernatural, mystical, or magical beliefs, practices, or phenomena. . . .
cut off from view by interposing something.
___Oxford Dictionary
Note -- to occult (verb) is to cut off from the light --- of reason.

International Yogic Flying Competition :
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UUnxnuUVEOs

Space and time reconcile to eternity and infinity your post said. A materialist view is that it reconciles to what is finite. Seeing objects as the union of pure passivity and activity is what I mean by being. Those are what "things" are in the world. " Stuff" is what people say when speaking of more holistic approaches, putting the universe in another box — Gregory

Hmmmmm??? OK. But what does that have to do with Human Nature? :grin:

the infinite is contained in the finite so there really isn't a distinction between the two — Gregory

So, the un-bound is restricted by the bound, or the un-limited is confined within limits. Sounds like, not a paradoxical koan puzzle, but a simple contradiction in terms. If anything, I would expect the opposite relationship to be true : our finite space-time world exists within the context of Eternity & Infinity. Is there a rational interpretation of that koan? :smile:

Have you read this book? I just finished it. — Dharmi

I have read some of Wilbur's intriguing books, but not that one. I tend to agree with most of his critique of Modernism & Scientism. But, I'm not personally inclined to go to the opposite extreme of New Age mysticism. Empirical Science is imperfect and incomplete, but it has the virtue of avoiding imaginary mystical magical answers to mundane pragmatic questions. So, my position is somewhere between those polar oppositions. :cool: