If true, then Hume's bundle theory is demonstrably false. It is demonstrably false because objects actually exist and are "made of" something. — Ron Cram

Hey, my bad. I guess I should slow down a bit. You do understand that Hume's bundle theory of the self basically states that there is no such thing as a permanent, or immutable, self? I presumed you do on account that you've read Book 1 of the Treatise.

But again, going at a slower pace, do you then presume that the something which objects are made of have a permanent, or immutable, core?

edit: Just in case, as quick references:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Personal_identity#Bundle_theory_of_the_self

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

You didn't quite reply to my question. But, so to address your latest post via a quote from the former:

It is a real natural law and it is never violated on cosmic scales and rarely on much smaller scales. — Ron Cram

I didn't initially reply to this aspect of the previous post mainly because in my own view Hume is very much on board with this quoted perspective. I find that he is in the sum of his works. His critique of miracles - in which he argues that all supposed miracles have as of yet unknown natural causes - comes to mind, but other potentially better examples abound.

Now, I'm not one to treat Hume as infallible, but to me, at least, in Book 1 he was addressing the logic how we justify our beliefs. His observation (I forget where it was made) that we know that tomorrow not all the leaves of all trees in the world will be on the ground - despite our not having any deductive means of evidencing this - was an epistemological observation. I don't personally find that this observation has any barrings on ontology - other than by illustrating how we know of an external world (and that tomorrow will be much like today) via non-genotypic instinct, or habits, and via induction. But not via logically sound deductions. This aspect of epistemology is to Hume universal, and so it can't be used to justify that there is no external world - not that he ever does.

As a reminder, Hume was not an adherent of Berkeley's philosophy, which devoid of Berkeley's all-perceiving god arguably does amount to the absence of an external world.

All the same, you ask in this thread of what original and good philosophical idea(s) exist in Book 1 of the Treatise.

I'm simply curious to find out how you think that Hume's bundle theory fails.

I once told a friend that I could go through Book 1 and put each of Hume's propositional statements in one or more of five categories:
1. Patently absurd
2. Demonstrably false
3. Self-contradictory
4. Intentionally obscure
5. Trivially true — Ron Cram

At the risk of being redundant, and assuming in good faith that this is to be interpreted as written, into which of these categories would you put Hume's bundle theory of the self from Book 1 of the Treatise? I guess I'd also like to know why.

No gripes with personal tastes, it's just that his bundle theory stands out to me as something both significant and worthwhile.

actually the Wiki entry on Hume has the following — Wayfarer

Ha, you beat me to it. Haven't read it in a while but in my notes-laden copy of David Hume's "Principal Writings on Religion including Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion and The Natural History of Religion" (edited by J.C.A. Gaskin; Oxford Univ. Press; 1998) not only does Hume argue against the design argument via the voice of one of his speakers, Philo, but - as summarized within an abstract within this book:

Part VIII: Investigations of a new hypothesis of cosmology, namely that the universe could be as it is through a process of natural selection operating within a large but finite physical universe: the natural selection being the persistence of forms (things) and processes (repeating chains of events) which once hit on by chance are well adapted to endure. [note: My take is that this part is tacked on because, if he'd have gotten around to publishing this while still living, he'd have been burnt at the stake for heresy without the incorporation of such statements as that which follows.] But nature is more generous, more orderly and more well adapted than this would lead us to expect. So: 'A total suspense of judgment is here our only reasonable resource.' — Abstract of Part VIII of Hume's Dialogues

emphasis mine

The Dialogues - whose style was inspired by Cicero's On the Nature of the Gods - was published in 1779. Close enough to 100 year's before Darwin's The Origin of Species was published. The rough idea of natural selection is within it - although somewhat indirectly addressed as a possibility. And I'd find it hard to believe that Darwin didn't read Hume.

Also, though the book ends by claiming that Cleanthes - who upholds the design thesis - has the best arguments, a careful reading will - or at least might - reveal many an understanding for and potential sympathy with the nature centered religions of the ancients. Hence:

Where I think both Hume and Dawkin's argument fails, is that science itself presumes an order which it doesn't explain. Science itself is based on observation and inference - but it is created on the basis of existing order, namely, 'the order of nature'. I don't think there's any sense in which science explains that order. — Wayfarer

I obviously can't prove this, but I doubt that Hume would have been in any way antagonistic to this notion.

But, at any rate, Hume wasn't keen on there being a Sky Father deity that created everything. Which is what the design argument typically is about: as with inferences made after finding a watch in the middle of a desert, since there is apparent design to the universe there then must also be an onmi- this and that designer of the universe.

Are this reconstruction of the argument and Hume’s objections to it correct? — ModernPAS

Sound good to me.

How might one respond to Hume? — ModernPAS

Waiting to find out with baited breath ...

:rofl: :joke: :cool: ciao

That there must be an event that is uncaused is reasoning that I think can only apply to linear models of the universe.

One alternative to this are the cyclical models of the universe. Here, there would be no uncaused events, for there would be an endless procession of Big Bangs followed by near ends of the universe that again result in Big Bangs, etc. ... this, again, without end or beginning. — javra

Not every event can have an event that causes it, for then we'll have an actual infinity of events and you can't have an actual infinity of anything. — Bartricks

As an aside, the unmoved mover of old time philosophies - i.e. the uncaused cause - can neither be a sentient being nor a thing: Sentience only occurs via the experience of perpetual change and, hence, movement; and things can only be in some form of process and, hence, movement. — javra

Your insistence that the uncaused causer cannot be a 'thing' is false. Certainly you've said nothing to support it. — Bartricks

Yup, we speak in different lexicons. It seems far too different to have any meaningful conversation.

Causer, cause. Whatever. Means the same and doesn't "entail a psyche". — Bartricks

Hmm, a causer does not convey "someone or something that causes"?

As an aside, the unmoved mover of old time philosophies - i.e. the uncaused cause - can neither be a sentient being nor a thing: Sentience only occurs via the experience of perpetual change and, hence, movement; and things can only be in some form of process and, hence, movement.

Still, hey, seems that we have different interpretations of terms.

And they said that there must be some events that have an uncaused causer. — Bartricks

An uncaused cause, not causer. The first doesn't entail a psyche as the second does. Makes for a very significant difference.

There must be an event - so, an occurrence, a happening - that is uncaused. — Bartricks

That there must be an event that is uncaused is reasoning that I think can only apply to linear models of the universe.

One alternative to this are the cyclical models of the universe. Here, there would be no uncaused events, for there would be an endless procession of Big Bangs followed by near ends of the universe that again result in Big Bangs, etc. ... this, again, without end or beginning.

Ah.. If the world was a guaranteed paradise and paradise meant that you can tune it into as much pain as you wanted at any given time to "grow from it", but then can stop whenever you wanted, and you can sleep for any amount of time and wake up any given time and had no needs or wants other than what you wanted to need or want at any given time? You can choose to live in a universe like ours with slogans like "growth-through-adversity" but then stop it at a whim when you find that it is relatively sucky, or then go back to it if you find it fascinating? Sure..But that is pure fantasy, as is the notion of a paradise. — schopenhauer1

Granted that the notion of non-hyperbolical paradise is fantasy, I'm still curious - this since many people of diverse backgrounds do hold onto some such notion of paradise which to them is not fantasy:

How would a never-ending obtainment of wants as they are wanted not eventually lead to an excruciating boredom with existence - and, hence, to an extreme psychological pain?

It seems to me that the overcoming of strife is part and parcel of what makes life pleasurable. This includes everything from states of fun to the obtainment of a personal dignity that is of intrinsic value (iow, rather than the winning of popularity contests, type of thing, whose value to me is extrinsic). And strife devoid of some form and degree of suffering - at minimum, an uncertainty about suffering's future occurrence - is not something I find possible.

In some more abstract versions of a "paradise" everything would be a completeness or a nothingness such that you would not have any needs or wants whatsoever.. thus even the need for need for need wouldn't matter. — schopenhauer1

Isn't this deviating from Schopenhauer and entering into Eastern belief structures? Specifically, those of actualizing Nirvana or Moksha. But I take it that you do interpret this too to be fantasy. I'm primarily asking because in a forced choice between actualizing Nirvana and actualizing an absence of all suffering via the noneixstence of all future life, I so far view the first to be less fantastical.

Reality [...] is "what you run into when you are wrong." — Ron Cram

I greatly like this statement. But I so far also don’t find anything in Hume that would at all contradict its stance. Hume was about prioritizing our experience, rather than our rationality. Yet, by establishing via non-deductive reasoning that all our reasoning is liable to some degree of error, his position to me seems to stand in firm agreement with the quoted statement. It is most often via our experiences that we discover “what we run into when we are wrong”. And even when it is via reasoning that this is discovered, to be so discovered, it will need to conform to our experiences.

Hume's idea that causation cannot be observed is counter to our everyday experience and completely irrational. — Ron Cram

Causation is an abstract concept or reasoning and, as such, is not directly observable via the physiological senses. To Hume, we form understandings of causation as abstract concept via an accumulation of experiences that hold uniformity. Yet Hume never denied that we hold instincts (in the broader, non-genotypic sense) via which we interact causally:

If constant conjunctions were all that is involved, my thoughts about aspirin and headaches would only be hypothetical. For belief, one of the conjoined objects must be present to my senses or memories; I must be taking, or just have taken, an aspirin. In these circumstances, believing that my headache will soon be relieved is as unavoidable as feeling affection for a close friend, or anger when someone harms us. “All these operations are species of natural instincts, which no reasoning … is able either to produce or prevent” (EHU 5.1.8/46–47). — SEP - David Hume - 5.3 Belief

For example, Aristotle's physics are terrible. He was wrong about many things. But he is also the author of deductive logic. — Ron Cram

Am I correct in presuming that you dislike Hume's, here paraphrased, affirmation that all logically sound arguments are founded upon non-deductively obtained premises? Premises that thereby hold a possibility of error?

That there are no infallible premises and, thereby, infallible conclusions is not to me irrational - though it might offend many a rationalist, granted. Instead, this conclusion, to me seems to be what honest reasoning is about.

As just one implication of such reasoning, Hume is basically saying (without name calling): "Hey guys, think twice about Cartesian philosophy, for our reasoning cannot ever be infallible, as Descartes claims it can be; also, yes, Berkley said this and that, but Berkley's reasoning by no means establishes the absence of an external world and, in fact, we can't help but live with beliefs (instinctive or otherwise) that an external world exists - which makes the external world as solid as anything else, given that nothing is infallible."

Hume's "sensible scepticism" is really just an admission that his philosophy is irrational and unlivable. — Ron Cram

One might be overlooking contexts. Hume’s Treatise was in many a way a reply to both Descartes and Berkeley. Understand the logic used by these two predecessors and one might, maybe, hold a more empathetic view of Hume’s logic, for it serves to counteract the effects of Cartesian skepticism and that of Berkeley’s subjective idealism. This by illustrating how all our knowledge is built out of habituated thoughts inductively put together – thereby impelling one to reappraise the logic used by both Descartes and Berkeley. But I get it; Hume’s not to your liking. To each their own. And no, I've no interest in composing a thesis to support the just mentioned perspective.

As to what is both original and good in Book 1 of the Treatise, good to whom? This possible trick question has some degree of importance to it.

Hume’s detailed musings on what would nowadays be most properly termed experientialism (and not empiricism) and of what he termed probabilistic reasoning (due to the possibility of error – which is nothing else but the pragmatist notion of fallibilism) are original in the details they present, but I take it you don’t deem them to be good. So be it.

On the other hand, bundle theory (which you’ve alluded to) was originated in the western world via book 1 of the Treatise – Hume’s noted dissatisfaction with it at the end of the treatise aside. This theory has persisted as an important ontological hypothesis since. So it is both original to at least western thought and good to a large number of individuals.

But again, by what standards do you demarcate the goodness of ideas?

:grin: cheers

I was hoping that he would at least explain what he means by saying that Reason is a sentient (if not sapient) subject; but even there, disappointingly, nothing was forthcoming. — Janus

I think I saw Reason once. Far away and hunched over a bit as though engaged in some activity. I approached but then the bastard turned a corner in the street - and I never got to find out what the guy was up to.

Um, so it’s known, the above is my sense of dry humor … with a bit of self-deprecation thrown in, granted.

I like what javra said. He pointed out that the laws of thought are universal. Despite his intentions for doing that not being clear to me it brings to relief the fact that nature's patterns are, if anything, universal in character. — TheMadFool

Yup, that was my intention.

I think we can actually ask a simple question: "Why don't we think alike?" — TheMadFool

So, given that the laws of thought are universal, in this sense alone, we do all think alike.

But I get it, you're asking why there are variations in our thoughts. And, I acknowledge, my previous train of thought can't address this.

By universal I mean the laws of nature apply to any and all without exception. — TheMadFool

Curios to see where this question leads. It could be a really abrupt dead-end.

Do you take the laws of thought to be laws of nature?

I'd like to strike-through the word "thought" in "laws of thought", but I can't. But to be explicit, I'm here considering the law of identity, the law of noncontradiction, and, possibly, the law of the excluded middle. I'm here also supposing that these laws of thought do apply to any and all without exception - which is about as good a supposition as any (other?) law of nature.

And, granting that these three laws of thought hold ubiquitous application:

If not, why not? We - the ones aware of these laws of thought - are but energy and matter, right?

What triggers Hate? Do you embrace it?

Is hate a good or evil attribute for us to have?

Is it a Yin that we must have, to go with our Yang, --- to be at our best? — Gnostic Christian Bishop

I don’t find that love and hate mutually necessitate each other. Up and down, or left and right, these are dyads where the presence of one necessitates the presence of the other; the two are in truth two aspects of the same given. However, if hate is extreme dislike - that can lead to enmity and, in turn, hostility toward that which is hated - then hatred will always necessitate some type and degree of self-love from whose reference point the dislike commences. In other words, it is impossible to hate in the complete absence of love.

To first clarify: One’s love of oneself – of whatever type or degree – is a requisite for the living of life. Devoid of any iota of self-love, life would terminate – be it out of apathy or due to more forceful reasons. This same self-love can, via empathy and the like, be to varying extents then expanded to include others ... I'd say almost as an extended self, such that love of other, imo, is itself impossible without some form of love of self. While this is debatable and can easily lead to complexities, my main point here is that even egotistic love is a form of love. Albeit, a rather base variant of it.

That said, take any particular moment of one’s life. When one has hated some given one has always also loved some other given. Even self-hatred stands in relation to an ideal of one’s self - of what one's self should be - that is loved, here broadly speaking. However, there are at least some occasions when one has loved some given in the complete absence of any sensed hatred. Love can exist just fine in absence of hatred and, depending on perspective, can be argued to best thrive when hatred is absent.

So, in short, love devoid of hate can be experienced. Hate devoid of love cannot. The two don’t necessitate each other as do the dyads of, for example, up and down.

To the first question: Hatred then is triggered from a desire to defend that which is loved. This typically self-defense doesn't need to be physical; most often it is not. As an aside, one can well defend oneself physically against a physical attack in the absence of experienced hatred.

As to embracing hatred – here solely interpreted as extreme dislike – if one doesn’t embrace an extreme dislike for injustice, for instance, one will more likely than not be or else become unjust. So, to me, the merits of embracing hatred are very much contingent upon what hatreds one holds.

No, we're definitely all going to die. Especially you. — frank

Right. Facts are facts for us mortal folks. Why the "especially" part?

We have all these sunk investments in coal, oil, and gas we are all loathe to abandon. — Bitter Crank

At least 6.3% of global GDP is spent on subsidizing fossil fuels (on welfare for the oil industry). And how much is spent to subsidize renewable energy?

Talk about a non-existent free market.

So the scientists of the world really are conspiring against us in diabolical ways? The so called facts of approximately 50% of the planet's tropical forests having been destroyed only within the last 70 years are all bogus? Or maybe this massive loss of flora is insignificant?

So its known, there is a connection between loss of flora and climate change. According to them scientists at any rate.

Yes, we have logical possibility and real potential. You could say real potential is actual in the sense that it is, in at least some sense, active; it can activate, bring about, change, future actualities. But what is possible - potentiality - is not yet actual; we don't want to lose that distinction. — Janus

Ah, got it. Thanks.

Yes, we have logical possibility and real potential. You could say real potential is actual in the sense that it is, in at least some sense, active; it can activate, bring about, change, future actualities. But what is possible potentially is not yet actual; we don't want to lose that distinction. — Janus

Feel like I'm being singled out here. Darn it. :yikes: Well, my limited comprehension on the matter is that there are actual potentials and potential actualities ... such that the first entails the second. A non-actual potential to me reads as "fictional potential", as in something devoid of reality, hence truth-value as expression, that someone makes up. Are not "possible potentials" liable to the same dichotomy?: that of actual possible potentials and that of non-actual possible potentials. Or maybe I misinterpret something in your post?

Besides, I could argue on and on about how nobody can know how being first started. All such stories to me are creation myths, useful in some regards, but none of which can be knowledge regarding why being is.

To sum things up though, you seem to believe that being can arise out of non-being. — javra

No. I believe that beings can arise from BEING (the power to create). G*D is non-being only in the sense that she is not a creature, but the creator. The relationship is similar to Plato's ideal FORMS as contrasted with real material instances (copies) of the unreal immaterial concept or design. — Gnomon

You lose me a bit with your terminology. All the same, from a previous post:

I do assume that the Omega Point would be Real (hence, being). And Zero represents no real things (hence, non-being). To avoid confusion, I would refer to "G*D" (BEING) as infinity, and to "Zero" as the state of the Big Bang Singularity prior to the bang (still only potential). — Gnomon

In your system of representations, is "Zero" (non-being) the same as "G*D" (infinite BEING as transcendent potential)? If yes, they why all the comments on how they are different? If no, then how do you not start off with zero/non-being so as to arrive at being?

To be honest, though, the more I reread your posts, the more confused I get about what you're trying to say. Maybe its because I'm rather tired; still, I have a hard time discussing and/or debating something which I cannot make heads or tails out of.

I don't completely agree with this, because I don't see how you jump to the position of drawing any conclusions about the present. The point of the thread was to approach the present from the position of recognizing a difference between future and past. When it becomes necessary to conclude that there is a difference between these, then the conclusion of a present, as necessary to complete the separation between them becomes justified. — Metaphysician Undercover

Maybe a misstep on my part. In fairness, my point was to illustrate the difference between experience-based epistemology of time, and reasoning based appraisals of what time is ontically, this via the example of the present moment. And this as an analogy to discussions regarding the past and future. Your mention of how the bird chirp is already the past at the moment we hear it (a moment which is the experienced present, but not the experienced past) is by my appraisals one of reasoning based ontology regarding time - but, again, not a description of how the present is experienced by us: (at the risk of being repetitive) we experience the present to be the present; it's our informed reasoning that tells us that what we are aware of at any given moment occurs in the past. Nevertheless, you bring up a very established interpretation of the present - one that I don't have a desire to debate against. And this thread isn't about the present but about past and future, as you rightly point out.

What it says is that the world is such, or the reality of being, existence, is such that we can make true and false statements concerning events of the past, but we cannot make true or false statements concerning events of the future. — Metaphysician Undercover

I acknowledge that. The past is determinate; the future is in many ways contingent. Because of this, one does not place truth values on statements regarding the future in almost all cases. (I'm thinking of exceptions such as, "it's true, rather than false or else uncertain, that the natural laws will apply tomorrow as they have today," but examples such as this are likely not what you were addressing.)

But don't you agree that the determinacy of the future is distinct from the determinacy of the past, being grounded or justified in a different way? — Metaphysician Undercover

In the context of your full reply, its almost a trick question for me: yes when addressed epistemologically, but no when addressed ontologically - ontologically they're two different facets of the same overall process.

Whereas we’ve previously mostly addressed past and future epistemologically, we’re now starting to mainly address them ontologically. By analogy:

If we are to address the present epistemologically, the present is that portion of time in which we (in part) hold direct awareness of everything that is not past and future. I’ve bracketed “in part” because, on one hand, the present is also where we intend things (with intentions always extending toward the future) as well as – hopefully not making this overly complex – being a time-span during which we are also aware of the past (memories) and the future (expectations). Still, when I’m aware of a bird chirp in the present, for example, this awareness pertains to neither the past nor the future.

But once we address the present ontologically, our views should take into account and thereby encompass all individual, intra-personal, experiences of the present. Many views can be found in relation to the issue of an objective present. My own – again, very difficult to justify in a forum setting – is that the objective present is a non-deterministic version of the theory of relativity’s notion of the present: the objective present, to my understanding (here summarized), consists of pockets of causal interactions between individual observers (or agents). For example, when two or more people interact, they will ontically share the same present moment; when there is no interaction between persons, there then is no guarantee that their two or more intra-personal present moments will be synchronized. (But a) this is a mouthful and b) again, other perspectives on the ontology of the present moment can also be found.)

The jump from the epistemological to the ontological consideration of the present requires different approaches. So too with the jump from the epistemological to the ontological consideration of the past and future. I'll try to explain myself better below.

And since things are caused to change, determinacy of the future is made complex by the need to understand causation.

Both forms of determinacy are complicated, but they are made complicated by different elements. So we cannot make one determinacy-indeterminacy spectrum, we would need two, one relating to the past and one to the future. — Metaphysician Undercover

Given what we've so far discusses and in large part agreed upon, we could argue that the objective past - though stored in memories (both unconscious and consciously recalled) - is solidified (another way of saying fixed or determinate). Whether or not our experiences of the present are, for example, hallucinations also gets solidified by their noncontradictory accord to our past.* As to the future, I can only address this via my own philosophical understandings; these include a determinate, Aristotelian telos which entails certain natural laws (such as that of gravity, for one example - notice how gravity can be extrapolated to be a noncontradictory coherency between gives that produces mass to which other gives are attracted ... long story though). Epistemologically, yes, we know gravity will continue to occur due to an upheld causal continuity between past and future. But, for me at least, ontologically, gravity is as determinate a property of existence as is this Aristotelian telos. Any hypothetical personal experiences of gravity not being as it always was can only be discovered in the future to have been hallucinations. At the same time, and with the same aforementioned determinate givens, I do subscribe to a limited freedom to choose between alternative means toward goals. Keeping this as simple as I currently can: This ontological interplay between determinate, time-invariant aspects of being (which thereby persist throughout the future) and partly indeterminate decisions on the part of agents in the present, is then one facet of a reality wherein there is a mixture of interacting indeterminacy and determinacy (of chaos and order).

While I did state "stratifications" in the plural, when it comes to ontological appraisals, I also find that the determinacy of the past and of the future are two different facets of the same overall ontological process. But I get that this is imposing my own worldview into this discussions in manners that I cannot properly justify on a forum platform. Still, to provide an example of the way I think of things in relation to the past and the future:

* You see an oasis in the dessert; at this moment, your drinking of water in a little while (the future) is plausible because the present experience currently isn't contradicotry to the past. But once you arrive there and there is only sand, you now know that the experience of the oasis was only a mirage - because this conclusion is now the only one that is not contradicotory to the entirety of your solidified past. To this logic is implicit a desire to avoid the dolor of chaos that comes with extreme unpredictability. This impetus in us is not something we have a freedom to choose but is rather a predeterminate facet of our being - one that, roughly speaking, predetermines and also facilitates our capacity to choose goals and alternatives toward them - those that to us seem to optimally minimize our overall future dolor (in a mixture of both short- and long-term appraisals). Due to this determinate facet of our being, we will generally not freely choose to believe (although we could when metaphysically appraised) that a physical oasis was there but then it progressively vanished physically as we approached it. This would shatter the solidity of our past and, along with it, of our present - as well as most, if not all, our expectations of what will be in the future. And this would be exceedingly unpleasant. So, instead, we typically choose to appraise the oasis as a mirage.

Hope that example made some sense (I can easily see how it wouldn't to some/many). To try to recap, our past is solidified, determinate, fixed, though only composed of memories, for reasons aforementioned. Our future is, at least to me, a mixture of determinate and indeterminate states of affairs - in which we seek to obtain, or actualize, goals via a limited freedom of choice but, importantly for me, due to a fully determinate innate impetus to minimize overall dolor that (to me) is part and parcel of all sentient beings. And it is due to this same impetus (that is always conjoined with the future) that our past is as determinate as it is.

Now, I get that I've said a lot, and that a lot of it might be confusing, so I'll stop short and wait to see how the cookie crumbles. Short on time so I posted. I'll try to regroup if I need to.

While I admire the enthusiasm for philosophy you appear to have, I disagree with a number of your premises - as best as I can make them out. I, for example, do agree with @Metaphysician Undercover that potential devoid of actuality is technically nonsensical.

If you are referring to deChardin's Omega Point [...] — Gnomon

No, I wasn't referring to deChardin.

Awareness and Consciousness are metaphysical, and do not exist in any physical sense. But they do exist as functions (not things) within the created universe, not as disembodied souls or ghosts in some parallel universe. — Gnomon

Nor as unicorns, bears, or mountains. I take it that by expressing the sentiment I've boldfaced you presume it stands in some measure of contrast to my own views. It does not. We were talking about the awareness of lifeforms, right? Meanwhile, since the statement, "they exist as purposes (not things)," makes no sense to me, do you mean something along the line of awareness being a mathematical function? If so, yes, this is one of the premises I disagree with.

To sum things up though, you seem to believe that being can arise out of non-being. This, however, is not something I find any value in entertaining.

That's right there is a fundamental continuity, expressed in a very simply form as Newton's first law, inertia, which makes future events somewhat determinate. — Metaphysician Undercover

I conceptualize it differently. Something more akin to stratifications along a determinancy-indeterminacy spectrum. But I greatly doubt I'd be able to properly explain myself in the soundbite form that forum discussions require.

Still, as a best attempt to sum things up, one aspect of my thoughts on the matter is that certain determinate states of affairs supersede indeterminate states of affairs in their causal influence (in more Aristotelian terms, something akin to a universal telos and the natural laws it necessitates being a prime example - but this phrase may not express too much). This while indeterminate states of affairs play an active role in existence. To me, the future is partly determined by those states of affairs that supersede the causal influence of all others, and partly undetermined due to ontically indeterminate states of affairs. Kind of thing.

Here's the basic problem with "force". By Newton's fist law, a force is what interrupts the continuity of predictability. In Newton's second law, the force itself is described as being predictable according to the principles of the first law. However, the predictability of the force itself may be interrupted by another force. This produces a potential infinite regress, exposing a fundamental indeterminateness. This indeterminateness indicates that we do not really understand the nature of force. — Metaphysician Undercover

I know I have hindsight on my side, but Newton loses me with his premise that the space of the universe has a singular geometric axis point. (Nope, it doesn't.) As I've previously mentioned, I'm not a determinist, but a causal compatibilist of a Humean type (not of the type that specifies freedoms of this and that nature to be themselves fully deterministic yet still existent as freedoms - which I take to be metaphysical bs). Which is to say that I easily accept your argument against Newtonian notions of deterministic force. Yea, I'm of the view that there is an interplay of ontic chaos and order within existence. Nevertheless, imo, tackling causation in its broadest sense - to include Aristotle's four causes - is not something that is ever easy.

you might then, prefer to look at the work of someone like Amishi Jha — Isaac

Hey, cheers. Will do.

I see we have to subscribe. :rofl: — TheMadFool

Darn. Did a copy and paste on the web address from a web search and ... buggers. :grin: But I tweaked the address and now it's worked for me in the thread.

In short, the article says that we quite often learn new knowledge of what drugs work almost exclusively via trial and error, and not via improved knowledge of biology and related fields. Also, we typically learn of how drugs work only long after we find out that they do (decades sometimes), and there are well known drugs that work to which we still don't know the mechanisms.

Thanks for letting me know about the link problem

If so then I'm afraid (dull as it is) "She instinctively knew the right answer to the question." simply becomes "She automatically knew the right answer to the question." — Isaac

Thank you for the info! To my ear, though, the second sentence doesn't seem to convey the same connotations as the first - even thought the term automaticity, thus defined, does convey the intended concept. I think it's because "instinct" clearly applies only to sentient beings whereas "automaticity" sounds - at least to me - like something that an automaton or machine would do. Though you're right: it's definition is well enough established for wiktionary. I'll mull it over some. Thanks again.

Kant either uses the word "instinct" in a way which is different from what we understand to be instinctual behaviour; or else he is a moron. — god must be atheist

I used instinct as a shorthand. I am not sure Kant uses the word. What is meant is resisting said conditioned responses, among other things, in favour of a deliberative process which Kant calls rationality. — Echarmion

An open ended, somewhat tangential, question regarding proper use of terminology. “Instinct” has two senses: that of a) innate (genotypic) complex behavior and that of b) complex behavior performed in manners devoid of conscious thought. In both cases, instincts are distinguished from reflexes, these being simple behaviors.

In the first sense, to say “learned instincts” is to express a logical contradiction. In sense (b), however, all habits – for one example - are instinctive and acquired from past conscious experience (that has been somehow internalized and automated, this for use in respective contexts).

Academia – in fields of both ethology (study of animal behavior) and modern psychology – favors sense (a) of the term.

That said, sense (b) is still a valid definition of “instinct” and, importantly, there is no other word that I know of which comes close to expressing “a complex behavior that is performed in the absence of conscious reasoning”; an abstraction which can then be further categorized as either innate or leaned.

Examples of sense (b): She instinctively knew the right answer to the question. He instinctively caught the hurled ball. And both these behaviors are not innate (purely genotypic) but are contingent on former learning of how to perform activity X.

So: If use of the term “instinct” is improper to differentiate between innate and learned “complex behaviors automatically performed” - this due to its current academic usage - what alternative term would adequately convey the just quoted meaning?

Or is “instinct” the only term for this quoted meaning? In which case, the distinction of learned instincts v. innate instincts would naturally follow.

ps. I don’t feel this issue deserves its own thread, so I’m asking it at this point in this thread. Obviously, no one is obliged to answer, but opinions would be welcomed … as well as being somewhat relevant to where the thread is currently at.

In support of these posts:

One big myth about medicine: We know how drugs work - from The Washington Post

Its a bit outdated, written in 2015, but I think it helps with the officiality of it all.

In support of there being no such thing as an omni-somthing guy on top clouds: I was young, had a good childhood up to and some time after this period, and noticed that there was a hell of a lot of injustice in the world. Conclusion: no such thing as an omni-benevolent all-controlling ubiquitously-aware psyche can exist. Yes, Epicurus beat me to the punch. All the same, its a simple but quite sound argument.

But this doesn't prevent one from being earnestly spiritual in something like a Naturalistic Pantheism way. Spinoza being a good example of this. Other similar approaches can also be found.

And I second @god must be atheist's belief that @Gnostic Christian Bishop is not an atheist.

I think you mean abstract object. A number is an abstract object. — frank

Yea, abstractions we're aware of are conceptual to us.

Is that what temperature fields are? — frank

Well, you're the one who brought up temperature fields. I was only using temperature and pressure as an analogy. I thought you'd know what they are when bringing them up.

More soberly, temperature - as in cold and hot - is a cognitive abstraction relative to the particular makeup of lifeforms. Scientific models of temperature are entwined with our cognitive abstractions of cold and hot. But this bring the conversation into fields far removed from that of the thread.

Temp and pressure relate by way of volume. They only track with a constant volume. — frank

Wanted to add that they also relate by way of causation, specifically they (to the extent they are considered different) bidirectionally cause each other. But this can get into tricky issues, I think.

Cool. What kind of object is a temperature field? — frank

A conceptual object?

A temperature field is not the same thing as an electromagnetic field, though they occupy the same space. — frank

So then I'll ask: if a temperature field and an electromagnetic field occupy the exact same space at the exact same time, in which way are they two different physical givens? (Rather than being two ways of appraising the same physical given.)

Hm, not my field of expertise. To simplify things for shmucks such as myself: I'd imagine that if they do occupy the same space at the same time, it would be analogous to temperature and pressure being two ways of viewing the same physical given. But not two separate physical givens.

Fine. Two fields can occupy the same space. How's that? — frank

:grin: Fields of what?

Na, I'm in general agreement with @petrichor on this one. Were two fields to occupy the exact same space at the exact same time, they'd be one and the same field. Edit: For greater precision: this for that span of time in which the exact same space is occupied, even if this now singular object is in some way a type of hybrid of it's previously two or more parent objects.

Physical objects cannot occupy the same space at the same time. — SophistiCat


They do at the center of a black hole, don't they? Time stops, so I don't know if "same time" means anything there. — frank

As does space. Gravitational singularities - the center of black holes - are currently either considered to be volumeless or unknowable in terms of space. Its part of the spacetime paradigm, from which gravitational singularities were first predicted.

At any rate, it's understood that there are no separate objects at the center of black holes. The vacuum field comes to mind, but even then, there wouldn't be individual particles in gravitational singularities - this from everything I've read up on. Their spatiotemporal location is determined by surrounding givens that are spatiotemporal.

Nevertheless, Zero could also represent Transcendence (infinity, eternity) in the sense of absence of physical objects (no real things; nothingness). — Gnomon

Hypothesize with me for a moment that the supposed omega point of existence is that of a universal Moksha, or Nirvana - a non-hyperbolic complete liberation from, or doing away with, samsara on a universal scale. In this hypothetical that borrows from Eastern concepts, causal information - a term I've been using so far that is very similar to that of EnFormAction - would no longer be when this here hypothesized omega point is actualized.

Since it is information that ratios things, that limits and binds things, that gives being(s) form(s) - and since it is a new way of addressing pre-Socratic logos when conjoined with action and/or causation - in the complete absence of information (causal or otherwise) - i.e., in the complete absence of logos - it would be logically true that what would remain would be devoid of form, of limits. It would hence be a state devoid of thing-ness.

But here is what I take to be one pivotal ontological issue: Do you understand this hypothesized omega point of Moksha/Nirvana to be non-being? (this in regard to your use of "nothingness")

Certainly, Buddhists and Hindus do not. The only pivotal gripe between these two worldviews in this respect is whether or not this omega point can be considered "a self" or not. Either way, it is what awareness is hypothesized to someday become - this contingent on the choices of agents. The awareness just specified still holds being. It is not non-being from these interpretations - but, instead, hypothesized to be perfected state of being. It is - supposedly - a perfect, boundless (hence limitless and, hence, both infinite and eternal), quantity-devoid wholesome-ness of awareness that is furthermore devoid of ego (here meaning: any and all separation/distinction between self and other). It is pure being devoid of the information that divides it - and, hence, non-hyperbolically selfless. Alternatively stated, it is pure being devoid of the samsara that is existence (existence in the sense of that which stands out to being - one of the senses of samsara is "ever-changing world"). You seem to agree with this implication in your latter posts - but I'd like to verify whether or not you do.

Secondly, again here entertaining the thought experiment just offered, do you take this omega point of Moksha/Nirvana to be unreal? (this in regard to your use of "no real things") [Tentatively upholding this view of the omega point, it is obviously not yet actualized, so it dwells only as potential; yet, if this omega point if ontically real, this potential is nevertheless all-pervasive - and, as such, is actual in its typically tacit influences upon, at the very least, all agents.]

I ask this second question because to those who uphold these or similar enough concepts, Moksha and/or Nirvana are considered to be the Real - with everything else being at best a contingent subsidiary (very much including our physical reality).

If you logically find that the hypothesized omega point is (hence, than non-being does not define it) and is thereby real (as opposed to unreal), then, in the system you're working on, 0 cannot be representative of nonbeing. Rather, I'll offer that, within this context, 0 would symbolize a universally actualized Moksha/Nirvana, or some like - a state in which samsara gets turned off, this in favor of limitless awareness, one devoid of "deaths and rebirths" as the Easterners say. Whereas 1 would symbolize not being per se but, rather, an completely integral existent that holds being (something I've yet to discover any evidence for either in contexts of philosophy or in those of the empirical sciences).

BTW, awareness never "stands out" to anybody, not even to the individual whose awareness is addressed. What stand out is various forms of information - such as information regarding my body and its motions that correlate quite well to that which I as awareness sense myself to will (I do not see my awareness when looking into a mirror, but the information that is my body). Hence, in the "stand out" sense of "existence", awareness does not exist. Instead, it strictly holds being. (Terms are of course context dependent, but since we're addressing the ontology which you've elaborated on ...)

All this, btw, mostly concerns not your latest post to me, but previous posts you've made in this thread.