A better question is: have you been able to shape your world so that it's a paradise you roam in? Or is it a hell you constantly fight against? — frank

This where Nietzsche's aphorism of, to paraphrase, "my heaven/paradise is in the shadow of my [two sided] sword [which cuts/effects me just as it cuts/effects the other, if not the astral/abstract/above]" might be seen to come into play, depending on its interpretation. At any rate, all life shapes the world in part, be this in line with consciously willed intentions or not.

:100: I've been reading about the ideal of the mind's conformity with actuality and the distinction between 'conforms with' and 'corresponds to'. Compare with the Platonic principle 'to be, is to be intelligible.' See Eric D Perl Thinking Being. — Wayfarer

Thank you kindly. Yes, though in some ways subtle, I find the distinction quite important, both ontologically and epistemologically - in many ways related to the notion of forms/eidoi and their relation of either accordance/harmony or the converse (whereby conflict occurs in some measure). Thumbs up to the Platonic principle you quote.

I've so far gotten a "404 not found" in the link. I'll check back in later.

The questions here are, then, what is purpose (in itself), where does it come from, what is its ground? Or, what exactly gives it all meaning, makes it all worthwhile? — tim wood

As to what purpose is, I here take it to be that end for the sake of which an action, else movement, occurs or for the sake of which something is—with the latter (things) being subsumed by the former (processes) in any process theory.

That said, for the kick of it, I’ll offer an extremely pithy premise regarding the universal purpose of biological evolution—within which context our own individual cognitive purposes unfold—which I’d love to see falsified on either logical or empirical grounds:

• The steadfast global purpose to the evolution of life is that of life’s optimal conformity to that which is actual and, hence, real. *

For better clarity, this irrespective of the detailed means, e.g. via optimal biological fitness relative to individuals and groups, via occurrences of genetic drift, and via the many almost innumerable other detailed means by which biological evolution is currently known to occur. Adaptation to an ever-changing world then being one less abstract facet of this just stated purposeful process. Such that that life which sufficiently deviates from optimal conformity to what is actual/real ceases to be while the life forms which maintains such optimal conformity to what is actual/real persevere.

------

* As to some of this pithily expressed premise’s implications: The same relationship of “conformity to that which is real/actual” can well also adequately define the attribute of truth—such that when this conformity becomes complete, hence absolute (here tentatively entertaining the hypothetical that it in principle can), life then obtains a state of being wherein truth and reality/actuality become one and the same: here maybe better expresses as “Truth” with capital “T”. Also of note, as it’s been just specified, this global purpose of life will then occur in the absence of any superlative ego’s (i.e., God’s) so intending things to be—with the very notion of a purposing God being superfluous to the state of affairs specified (a God who'd furthermore also need to be subject to some end in order to act purposely, different issue though this is)—instead, here purpose in the form of ultimately becoming one with global Truth is a staple aspect of existence; i.e., it becomes a brute fact of the world. So, in a likewise somewhat informal expression, the purpose of life is here taken to be that of not only eventually discovering the quintessentially genuine (“true” in this sense) actuality/reality of being itself but of also becoming one with it. Add some measure of indeterminacy and free will into the equation and, we via our own freely willed choices then (at least at times) stand in the way of this grand end being actualized, or at least further approached; this, for one example, by preferring fictitious accounts of what is and of what will be over truths regarding the same (truths which at times can be at least initially unpleasant to accept). Other implications could then follow, such as the provision of why lies in general are to be deemed bad: they further the whole from the very end here addressed (which I might add could also be labeled as "the Good").

All that said—with all these implications being not perfectly expressed—what I’m primarily curious about is, again, any valid argument against the pithy premise regarding the global purpose of life (this via the analysis of biological evolution’s purpose/end) which was previously specified.

P.s., While I’m anticipating some degree of discord on the matter if I’m at all replied to, I likely won’t be around to reply for a number of days.

[edit: some typo's corrected]

In the singing birds song, is he saying, "another world" : perhaps a Garden of Eden? — Gnomon

Yes, he's saying "another world" - ultimately concluding with this other world being a place where "nothing ever dies". Which I think supersedes even the notion of a Garden of Eden. This is not what everybody deems to be the ultimate good - Buddhist notions of Nirvana without remainder as one (counter-)example, Plotinus's the One as another, in both these cases there being no world to speak of, but only pure being devoid of any existence (here in the sense of that which "stands out"). Still, to me at least, the song does get an emotive point across, an emotive point that many enough do share: we (most at least) do secretly want, or at least yearn for, more than the world makes possible to have even in principle. I suppose to a Buddhist, this however being indicative of not following the middle-path.

Still, at the end of the day, it's just one song among many, and I don't endorse a good portion of its perspectives. Just the part about the world being neither fair nor unfair.

My philosophical view is that the physical/material world is Monistic : a single dynamic causal force (amoral energy) that can have positive or negative effects, depending on the individual's me-centered --- or we-centered --- interpretation. That's why the Buddha preached a No-Self perspective, and the Stoics focused on self-control. Fairness & Justice are not of the world, but in the mind of the observer. The cosmos is what it is, but humans can imagine what it could be. — Gnomon

I get that, and as I've previously mentioned, my own philosophical view is not one of materialism (i.e. a monism of physicality/materiality). Yet, do you find the "mind of the observer" to be any less real than the physicality which it observes and thereby knows? And, if not, are not both then equally real aspects of that which constitutes "the world" as-is.

If so, then I find that fairness & justice (together with unfairness & injustice) are as much of the world as are the minds of observers to which these notions are requisite. This doesn't then make the world of itself either fair or unfair in total. Nor does it address that by which fairness and unfairness is determined. Yet it does seem to avoid the inconsistency of a dualism - namely, between a) fairness/justice (and of the observers to which these properties often enough apply) which is claimed to not be of the world and b) the physical world itself - occurring within an upheld monism of materialism/physicalism, this however the latter be interpreted.

:smile: Nice to hear. As the the ass so choosing, I think the disagreement between the two of you was as to whether the choice is consciously deliberated or not and, hence, whether it is a conscious choice. And it's this which I wanted to address. In sum, the ass as a total being makes the choice, yes, but the ass as a conscious agent makes no choice whatsoever since it does not deliberate.

This no more than I or you are consciously deliberating on which words to use in our expressing ourselves most of the time. Our conscious choice most of the time being strictly limited to whether or not we ought to express those concepts which we hold in mind. Nevertheless, the specific words we use (and their placement, etc.) still being chosen by us as total beings, this subconsciously.

Maybe for entertainment, as a somewhat different perspective on this matter: Most of our volitions as conscious beings—though willed freely, here in the strict sense of there being no obstruction to our consciously willing, else intending, as we do—are nevertheless not deliberative. Here, we as conscious agents effortlessly inhere into, or else with, the volition of our unconscious mind—resulting in a unified volition/will relative to the total mind concerned. This often acquired, i.e. learned, and habitual means of acting and reacting to stimuli then makes our typical behaviors quite functional in their efficacy: e.g., we don’t deliberate between alternatives on how to move our fingers, wrist, etc. when reflexively catching a ball that was thrown to us—but our so catching it will have nevertheless been freely willed/intended (hence, with disappointment resulting were our will/intention to catch the ball to not be fulfilled as willed/intended).

It is only when our unconscious mind is torn between different possible intents that we as conscious agents consciously experience alternatives (brought up to consciousness from our unconscious processes of mind), alternatives between which we as conscious agents then in one way or another choose via deliberation (this being the process of weighting two or more alternatives’ possible benefits and costs and then determining that one ought proceed with one alternative at expense of all others).

With the Buridan’s Ass thought experiment, one will typically in no way deliberate between which side to move toward but, instead, will effortlessly inhere into (or with) the subliminal volitions of one’s unconscious mind—whose reasonings for so determining to go either leftward or rightward (here granting that one’s unconscious mind is not of itself utterly irrational in its activities) will be beyond the purview of one’s conscious awareness.

Yet, were we to at any point actively deliberate between two alternatives which we at a conscious level appraise to be of equal value to our longer-term intent, I’ll venture that there will yet occur subliminal appraisals and reasons which the unconscious aspects of our total mind engages in that will tip the scale of the given deliberation. For example, maybe one side holds a background of sky and clouds (which we do not consciously appraise) that seems more inviting and hence auspicious than the other. In effect re-taking the choice from the conscious being (who finds no preference for either alternative being selected) back to the unconscious mind—whose volitions the conscious being once again effortlessly inheres with.

While clarifying and justifying all this would take a considerable amount of time and effort, I’ll simply affirm that in real life no human (or lesser animal for that matter) ever dies of hunger or thirst from an indecision between alternatives which seem to be of equal worth or import. And I find the perspective just offered to be reasonable enough as-is in providing an explanation for why this is.

Here, then, all reasoning—be it conscious or else unconscious—will yet be principled by, at the very least, the laws of thought: hence "following the rules/laws of thought". However,again, many if not most of our voluntary behaviors will not be deliberated upon at a conscious level of awareness. As regards at least some of these latter, our rational justifications for performing these, again, nondeliberative yet freely/unobstructed-ly willed behaviors will be both post hoc and ad hoc—which doesn’t necessitate that the explanations we then provide will be wrong but does allow for false conclusions to occur. E.g., a person is hypnotized to not sit down on a chair and, when asked why they don’t take a seat, provides a justification that seems rational but has nothing to do with the facts of the matter.

I acknowledge that the philosophy of mind is very complex and that this perspective only skims the surface. Still, to sum up this partial perspective in a few words: the vast majority of our voluntary behaviors—for which we yet typically hold direct responsibility for on grounds of being that which we willed/intended—are not deliberated upon at a conscious level, such that the selecting of one alternative between two alternatives that to us conscious agents appear of equal value will, most often, not be consciously made.

p.s. This, acknowledgedly incomplete, perspective in many ways accommodates what can be termed a bundle-theory of mind or, maybe more directly, of volition – taking into account both conscious and non-conscious aspects of a total mind. And this without in any way dismissing the possibility of metaphysical (i.e., libertarian) free will pertaining to us conscious agents whenever we do consciously deliberate between alternatives (hence, a free will wherein we as conscious agents solely determine the effect of the alternative which we choose, such that we as conscious agents are in practice metaphysically free to choose differently than what we will end up choosing ... but then this same libertarian free will could also be conceptually extended to the sometimes disparate volitions of one's unconscious mind, volitions with which one as conscious agent/will most often effortlessly unifies sans any conscious deliberations).

At any rate, all this being one way to address the paradox presented in the Buridan's Ass thought experiment.

Although on the whole the lyrics to this song are a bit too materialist for my tastes, I yet very much agree with its primary message: “the world, per se, is neither fair/just nor unfair/unjust, period”. (And I conclude this as someone who nevertheless upholds the reality of the Good as per Plato and Aristotle, etc – from where the very notions, or “eidoi”, of fairness (that aligned with the Good) and unfairness (that misaligned with the Good) reportedly emerge to begin with.)

At any rate, this pithy conclusion of “the world is neither fair nor unfair” as just worded might be somewhat too non-dualistic for many, but I find it in full keeping with previously mentioned notions of “the world can be fair only to the extent that we make it so”.

Thinking you might get a kick out of this song’s lyrics:

I'm not sure how helpful this is if the question is the adequacy of Aristotle's moral philosophy. The Ethics and Politics make it fairly clear what is meant by "happiness." — Count Timothy von Icarus


Right. The objection seems to be, "Someone could say that they do not desire happiness so long as they use the word 'happiness' in a way that is not in accord with what Aristotle means; therefore it is false that everyone desires happiness." This sort of objection would only make sense in a non-Aristotelian context. But this thread is literally about Aristotle and among other things Aristotle's approach to happiness and our final end. — Leontiskos

I second (or maybe, third) that. Brings to mind a poem that seems to me to illustrate the case:

A SAIL

White is the sail and lonely
On the misty infinite blue,
Flying from what in the homeland?
Seeking for what in the new?

The waves romp, and the winds whistle,
And the mast leans and creeks;
Alas! He flies not from fortune,
And no good fortune he seeks.

Beneath him the stream, luminous, azure,
Above him the sun’s golden breast;
But he, a rebel, invites the storms,
As though in the storms were rest. — Poem by Mikhail Lermontov - translation by Max Eastman

I find the poem to be fairly easy to emotively comprehend, despite the possible variations in interpretation. The personally held good aimed at here can then be said to be, to paraphrase, “the uncertainty of the storms, or of the strife, that calls out to one as though in them one finds one’s further development and, hence, one's possible future flourishing as a being, i.e. eudemonia, or being in accord with the highest virtue” - this rather than seeking a certain good fortune or the like. In the case as illustrated, one could then say that one’s intent is not that of obtaining happiness in the sense of easygoing joy or some such but, instead, the obtainment of one’s further possible flourishing despite the uncertain risks – such that were this actively held intent to pursue the uncertainty of the “storms” to become obstructed, only then would the individual addressed experience suffering. And, then, such that approaching such storms would then be in line with Aristotelian notions of happiness - this while shunning happiness in the sense of easygoing joy and so forth.

At any rate, I’m in agreement.

As is most always the case from you, words without content.

There, I've expressed.

You are making a confused argument. Anaximander posited the Apeiron as that from which a dichotomously structure ream of material complexity arises, but also then returns. Which rather nicely sums up the Big Bang with its trajectory from a quantum foam to a quantum void with right now being the Universe's high water mark of material complexity. — apokrisis

As facts go, we don't have much of Anaximander's perspectives but a few fragments of writing. And in these, we are told of a cyclical cosmology rather than the linear one which you here present and modern physics generally endorses - even though there are currently valid cyclical models of the universe. So this is not Anaximander's Apeiron - but apo's Apeiron which apo modifies from Anaximander's. Metaphysical justifications for presuming the Apeiron yet direly lacking - outside of because apo says so arguments. Till then, it might as well be magical thinking.

Likewise Peirce grounded his metaphysics in the tychism of firstness and its rational self-complexification that produces the cohesive equilibrium state of a synechic thirdness. But I would agree that he didn't offer a map of the downward unwinding that follows – the wave that builds, peaks and then disperses. He did reflect the knowledge of science and the Christian mysticism of his time in that regard. — apokrisis

What does any of this have to do with what I asked? Once again:

So from whence this metaphysical fixedness of thermodynamics as they currently are known (and as they occur) being an absolute and literally immovable/permanent grounding for absolutely everything - including notions of justice and fairness? — javra

To which I'll now add, if the Apeiron, why the emergence of thermodynamics to begin with? Other than due to magic, of course.

As you admit, you don't understand thermodynamics so how could you understand how it might or might not apply to some "ethical" question or other. — apokrisis

As my previous scoffy-ness alluded to, this type of reply pretty much parallels the authoritarian theist who knows God or else God's Word, telling me I don't understand God/God's Word so how could I understand the answer to whether or not something like the enslavement of a person is ethical?

I find no reason to uphold your interpretations of thermodynamics as sacrosanct science. I do find thermodynamics to be model(s) regarding what is that is very much open to questioning and revision, just as any other model of science is, irrespective of the maths involved. As I also find the very notion of entropy to be. In your replies you however implicitly address both of these as though they were infallible scientific knowledge of what is as they're presently interpreted. And where from this infallibility?

What don't I understand?: the maths. But wait, its not the maths that are important but the metaphysics behind them:

Only the mathematical principles of thermodynamics can possibly determine whether, or else the extents to which, fascism is more fair and just than is democracy - or else vice versa, if the two are not in fact equally so. — javra

That isn't my argument. My argument is that it is the metaphysical principles which matter. — apokrisis

Metaphysical principles which you do not justify much less address (see for example the question I've re-posted). And round and round we go.

So an impossible dilemma becomes a trivial historical example of how a deeper "mathematical" principal – scaling – is at work.

All that moral philosophy posturing and agonising and ... it turns out to be this simple. :grin: — apokrisis

Yea, no. Just words without meaning. Apropos, as to your example of opposites in this context, the opposite of women chattel for men would be not equality of worth (as is/was typical of hunter gather tribes) but that of men as chattel for women. Just as the opposite of polygamy is not monogamy but polyandry.

We can't blame things on some evil force that snuck in from outside. Demonise some elite. [...] — apokrisis

No, by any means we cannot blame others whatsoever for anything. So called (somehow always economic or else political - because cash and power-over is all that really matters in life) elites which are evidenced to either rape or else known to quite cordially mingle with those that pimp women for raping included. Not unless we introduce some Abrahamic notion of demons that somehow come from without. Poor innocent lambs that those elites are - especially when their greed succeeds in making them and their corporations too large to fail. But the poor, that's another matter altogether - the poor can be deemed biologically deranged in their misdeeds by the genes they've inherited, this as some have claimed of those incarcerated (who were obviously not "too big to fail' in their endeavors).

But just as long as it all assists entropy, hey, its all good.

( ... all this being indicative of faulty reasoning, to stupid old me at least.)

But again, I so far do not comprehend why a, in this case, global fascism ought be universally shunned on the rational grounds of the relative degrees of energy dissipation as compared to that of a global (I should add, "and earnest" rather than mere lip-service) democracy. — javra


Again, the question is does it scale? Is it a powerlaw structure with equilibrium balance that has the legs to persist and grow. Or at least persist and repair.

Is it mature rather than immature or senescent? Does it balance the resilience of youth with the wisdom of experience?

These are questions that ecologists know how to frame and to measure. — apokrisis

Ecologists as a group deal with the question of "Does it balance the resilience of youth with the wisdom of experience?" in addressing their field of research? We might be living in two disparate worlds.

And you provide no answer to my quoted question. Might as well claim only those in the thermodynamically-informed spheres of reality understand why murder is wrong ... this by mathematically addressing such questions as "did the killing of another human properly 'balance the resilience of youth with the wisdom of experience'". Which, if needs be said, is nonsensical reasoning.

Look, if my intelligence and/or sapience is beneath yours, you have two options: one is to freely choose to not talk to me - as any sane human ought to freely choose to not rationalize with a lesser animal on issues of metaphysics for example. The other is to address things at my comparatively reduced level of comprehension - this as might any sane parent explain things to their kinds. But to insist that so it is and that I should believe that it despite it making no rational sense to me is very much akin to the hallmark of authoritarianism. Your metaphysics are to me so far not rationally cogent. No math-understandings required. And your inability to make rational sense of ethics likewise follows.

As to your possibly lofty assumption that I am too far beneath you to warrant reply, don't worry. I don't name myself "javra" (i.e., "mongrel", to put it nicely) on this forum for nothing. But as mongrels go, that won't stop me from honestly expressing my views.

You have neither a model nor a measure to support any claim you might make. Thus you merely have opinions and anecdotes. — apokrisis

Let's see, I ground all my metaphysics in the reality that all presently occurring sentient beings necessarily occur as individual first-person points-of-view, or better worded "of awareness". Nothing new to the old-timers hereabouts. You claim this to be merely opinion and anecdote. And then you contrast this with the metaphysical foundation of Anaximander's Apeiron which, to be as charitable as possible, you reinterpret to suit your whims.

Stupid as I might be, I sill find far more confidence in the reality that I, as a first-person point-of-view, am than I do in the reality of the Apeiron, especially in the linear cosmology version which you endorse, from which, as you affirmed in other posts, we obtain the inference that "awareness" is a rather meaningless term.

LIke many, you understand metaphysics as applied idealism – the practical reason not to have to engage with the reality of dealing with life in some properly reasoned fashion ... — apokrisis

Oh mighty unquestionable authority of reality and knower of other peoples' deepest turths and perspectives, this is emblamatic of the bullshit I addressed in a previous post I made in this thread.

Notice how I so far have not explicitly engaged in the psychobabble of what your true intentions and perspectives are as a person ... be this lack of engagement stupidity on my part or, else, some semblance of wisdom and dignity.

That isn't my argument. My argument is that it is the metaphysical principles which matter. — apokrisis

Metaphysical principles which, from previous conversations with you, inexorably start with the assumption of the Apeiron as ultimate beginning ... while with the same assumptive position at the very same time decrying the notion of a literally absolute/complete/perfect limitless state of being as ultimate end to be absurdity. Otherwise, sophomoric interpretations of the Good (which is not of itself justice but is claimed to determine justice) such as those mentioned in this following quote would not be affirmed so easily:

So justice is not reducible to thermodynamics. — Banno

Just not your idealist framing of justice as transcendent truth independent of its material basis. — apokrisis

And I'll again point to Peircean metaphysics upholding the view that the "laws of thermodynamics" will themselves evolve as the (physical) cosmos progresses in it acquired habits.

So from whence this metaphysical fixedness of thermodynamics as they currently are known (and as they occur) being an absolute and literally immovable/permanent grounding for absolutely everything - including notions of justice and fairness?

(To not even address what metaphsycial justifications there might rationally or empirically then be for the Apeiron but not for the Good as the literally limitless ultimate end, else end-state, of being, this as per the Neo-Platonic notion of "the One" as one example.)

As to my scoffy-ness, it's intended to directly address posts such as this:

How does it make sense to ask which of these is closest to thermodynamic equilibrium? — Banno

Hah. That is the problem of argument by Hallmark card cutesiness. You would have to be thermodynamically-informed enough to tell the difference between a closed Gaussian equilbrium and an open powerlaw one.

So sadly, an F. — apokrisis

I do acknowledged in being one of these "F" receivers. I do not rationally understand how thermodynamics determines that while one man will deem the absolute obedience of their wife to be just and fair another man deem an equality of worth with their wife to be emblematic of justice and fairness - nor, if this must be added, how thermodynamics then determines that one such comprehension of justice and fairness is bad/wrong/incorrect while the contradicting understanding of justice and fairness is good/right/correct. And, if not yet apparent, belief/faith in certain matters though I might have, I'm not one to have blind faith in anything or anyone. Stupid me, I'm sure some would say.

As to the rest of your post in general, there's much there for me to agree with as to what ought to be the case.

In regards to global governance, we already are under an indirect form of this - not from the UN (almost laughable seeing how laws of war are nowadays addressed by some nations, this as one example) but from the current oligarchies of neo-liberal (might as well be "neo-capatilist") economy, which is global - and is indirectly governed by said oligarchy via, again as just one blatant example, lobbyists and candidate funding at both national levels and, where applicable, individual state levels.

No doubt we will have a formal global governance sooner rather than later. Irrespective of the gripes some may express at this. The only real question is that of whether this global official governance will be Orwellian and so in some way totalitarian or, else, be one of a global democracy-by-representation.

But again, I so far do not comprehend why a, in this case, global fascism ought be universally shunned on the rational grounds of the relative degrees of energy dissipation as compared to that of a global (I should add, "and earnest" rather than mere lip-service) democracy.

Coming from a different metaphysical vantage, I do endorse democracy over fascism on account of the optimal well-being of all the individual psyches concerned, this in both short- and long-term appraisals. But, here, the consciousness that holds awareness and which can both suffer and be content if not joyful is not appraised as some willy-nilly term that holds no true or real metaphysical importance to the grand picture of things.

So justice is not reducible to thermodynamics. — Banno

Of course it is! Only the mathematical principles of thermodynamics can possibly determine whether, or else the extents to which, fascism is more fair and just than is democracy - or else vice versa, if the two are not in fact equally so. All you need to do is put in the numbers of these two competing systems into the right mathematical equations and one will obtain the scientifically valid answer.

Now, while I'm myself quite ignorant of how our sacrosanct thermodynamic laws might determine what is and is not fair and just to us, just as we are told, in one's lack of any rational comprehension one must then stringently maintain a blind faith in the absolute and global authority of thermodynamics ... and of those who espouse preach it from their high tower of infallible and hence unquestionable knowledge. Else one won't do one's best to speed up the processes of entropy toward absolute equilibrium! As we all know, this being the ultimate bad.

Then again, if the aforementioned looks like, sounds like, and smells like bullshit, I see no reason why it in fact isn't unadulterated bullshit.



So does thermodynamics determine fascism to be any more, or else less, just and fair than is democracy? Or maybe these concepts/terms too are devoid of any meaning and importance when it comes to thermodynamics - as is the case with "good" and "bad/evil". Of course, I'm an acknowledged flunker when it comes to the "mathematically sound scientific truths" regarding whatever thermodynamics might infallibly determine. Just asking you the unquestionable erudite what system of governance one ought endorse on the basis of justice and fairness so as to maximize entropy in the long haul.

What distinguishes a mere experimentalist from a physicist [...] — substantivalism

In case this might come as a news flash: physics is not equivalent to the empirical sciences - but is instead only one subset of the latter among many.

Tell you what, I've repeatedly offered what I take valid empirical science to be. You, so far, have not offered any definition of what you take it to be - and examples of what "science says" do not come close to delineating what is and is not science. Such that I so far can validly presume you're in search of "scientifically" produced infallible truths as to what is "objective". (For the record, I'm a stringent fallibilist, so I find any such search ... utterly misguided. But this would concern issues of epistemology in general rather than a definition of the sceinces as an epistemic subset of the former.)

Again, you pout about modern science but give no effort in delineating what is science or else even what it's supposed to be.

I find no point in continuing without you providing a definition of the empirical sciences - one that I expect to contradict at least parts of what I so far defined the empirical sciences as being, this on account of your repeated hostility, at least in tonality, to what I've upheld.

Care to so provide?

In short, [...] how are you supposed to be a part of the same "demos" with these (distant to you) people? How is democracy supposed to work in such a scenario (that seems very plausible in many developed countries)? — Eros1982

Or, as the title asks, "is multiculturalism compatible with democracy?"

A very resounding "yes" to this question, but only when all the differing ethnicities involved all commonly share the same non-authoritarian values upon which the notion of "democracy" is contingent.

Otherwise, what results is a bunch of opposing authoritarian values voting and electing their way into which authoritarian click/group shall despotically dictate what everyone else should do and be. After all, Nazis were elected so as to produce a fascist governance within an otherwise functional democracy, as example of this. It would be nice if we'd learn from our past so as to not repeat its mistakes ... but, sometimes, we learn nothing from history.

I want to make the point that the intellectual methods used by both are similar; metaphysicians & theoretical scientists.

They both conduct semantical clarifications, language analysis, thought experiments, construct metaphorical stories, and give pictorial analogue explanations of the world to understand it better. — substantivalism

I can find myself agreeing with this, with some (maybe not very important) caveats:

Any person which engages in contemplation will to some extent engage in these same processes at least some of the time - such that these mental faculties are for the most part part and parcel of most any theorizing on the part of humans.

Maybe more to the point of interest, whereas metaphysicians will primarily interest themselves with those aspects of reality upon which the physical is contingent, theoretical scientists (by which I presume we're here talking about people such as Einstein and Darwin) will interest themselves with at least certain aspects of the physical world itself. But yes, when you get into self-professed scientists who then feel qualified to write papers or books on how everything emerged from out of nothing (as one example) and then claim these affirmations as scientifically evidenced, this otherwise clear differentiation becomes obfuscated - I often find to the detriment of both fields' credibility. That said, both theories of metaphysics and of science ought be fully conformant to observations if they seek any integrity of theory.

Take the fact that spacetime bends. . . oh I mean a strange interpretation that is held in varieties of competing positions of interpretation irrespective of the math under the heading of substantivalists. Then there are the relationists and emergentists who seek to say something different. . . about the same exact mathematics. — substantivalism

Not sure how to best interpret the sarcasm in the first sentence. That specetime bends is not fact, but theory. It is fact that this theory of relativity currently best accounts for all observables in the field - this to the best of our knowledge. But then it is also fact that this same theory of relativity has to date not been satisfactorily combined with our best theories regarding QM - thereby logically demonstrating that something is amiss in either one of the two theories just mentioned or else with both. To affirm that specetime bends is fact is then to deny what's just been here stated.

As to the mathematics, pure mathematics is notoriously indifferent to the observable world, conformant only to mathematical axioms and the logical implications of these. If the maths don't serve to best explain the observable world (or, as is the case with probability, as a tool for best appraising the validity of observable results) they are then worthless to the empirical sciences. Take Einstein's ToR for example; he had to invent an new mathematics to properly address the theory he held in mind - namely, the Einstein field equations. Here, the maths are not sacrosanct but, rather, part of the theorizing regarding the data so far accumulated.

I assume you'll let me know where you disagree, if you do disagree.

Different math, different interpretations, but exactly the same observable consequences. — substantivalism

Yes, I agree.

Sometimes, if not often, newly discerned observables will then make a difference as to which interpretations are to be culled from the list. At the very least narrowing down the valid possibilities as to what in fact is.

You bring up the variable speed of light hypothesis as if the conventionality of simultaneity/geometry doesn't already make that a moot point. — substantivalism

But again, the latter is not fact but theory.

If I came up with a falsifiable hypothesis about me being a brain in vat that is in fact falsified then that doesn't mean I'm not a brain in a vat. It only means that if I am a brain in a vat that it wouldn't function as I had previously thought.

The speed of light is just one of many other such examples of unfalsifiable proposals which is showcased as if its been proven or narrowed into the corner of truth. Even modern popularized scientific YouTube videos are now talking about the impossibility of measuring this speed let alone its 'constancy'. Poincare long before Einstein was already kicking around this idea of this impossibility over a hundred years ago! — substantivalism

I'll try to generalize again: if X, Y, and Z are predicted to produce observation A but observation A does not result from X, Y, and Z, then this just mentioned hypothesis is falsified. To address commonly known examples, Newton's X, Y, and Z did not account for Mercury's movements as observation A. Einstein's X, Y, and Z does. Because of this, we acknowledge the Newton's physics (theory of the physical) is wrong, despite yet being relatively accurate for all intended purposes most of the time. We don't yet know whether or not Einstein's physics is wrong - but in absence of an even better explanation we currently maintain this latter physics, tentatively assuming it to be right (rather than knowing it to be "fact").

As to BIVs and experiment, I'll say OK, but that one BIV model that was entertained and tested for would have nevertheless been proven false via falsification.

Same then would apply to VSL, acknowledging that there are multiple variants of the theory. But again, contrast this which MWI for example, which cannot be tested for in any respect whatsoever.

I regard science, at least the hard sciences, as plagued by irresolvable immense scientific holism (dependence on parts) and conventionalism. So much so that I find it maddening at this point but not something I feel I could easily give up given my fruitless internet searching for as long as I can remember. — substantivalism

It's in a way unfortunate.

But I'll reaffirm that science (empirical science proper) was never ever a means of obtaining infallible knowledge or truths regarding what is. One of its greatest strengths is in culling possible explanations regarding what physically is in definitive - yet still technically fallible - manners. Take for example theories of life: there is no scientific manner to reintroduce the theory of Young Earth Creationism into scientific models of how life emerges and behaves - this exactly because it directly contradicts data (fossils and such) - although this is yet still not infallibly known (e.g., one can always bring in something like a Last Thursday-ist explanation of the data, as extremely non-credible as this alternative will be to both anti-YECs and YECs alike - its very logical standing, or better lack of, here tentatively overlooked). That stated, not all variations of Lamarckian interpretations of biological evolution have been falsified - this although Lamarckianism proper has. The Neo-Darwininan model we currently endorse would go through a paradigm-shift were any one of these Lamarckian possibilities valid (via further enquiry into epigenetics and the like) such that the will on the part of parents can in any way whatsoever effect the phenotype of offspring. Yet nothing even remotely adequate has been proposed in terms of any such Lamarckian-like possibility to serve as any significant threat to the Neo-Darwininan model we currently hold and hold onto to as valid representation of what is. This, however, does not make Neo-Darwinianism an established fact, though. And any potential scientific proposal to contest the currently predominant view will need to be a) empirically falsifiable and b) not falsified via any test to stand any chance of evidencing the hypothesis proposed. But if falsified, then that one particular hypothesis will then be definitively evidenced wrong.

We obtain no infallible truths via the empirical sciences, but we do narrow down the possibilities of what might in fact be true. And, the more data collected, the more we can narrow down these ever developed possibilities. This is not to claim that the possibilities pertaining to the physical world has dwindled in quantity, but is to claim that without data collection we'd be both far more ignorant of what in fact physically is and have no reason do deny the validity of far more alternatives than we currently do. As I previously mentioned, science by its very nature cannot be a panacea regarding our knowledge of what is. But it remains our best known means of obtaining knowledge regarding the perceivable world.

So, going back to the OP, because science has by now evidenced the strictly mechanistic model of the world to be erroneous, we should not "go back" to a Newtonian-physics-like understanding of the world - this, for example, no more than we as a society should go back to a Young Earth Creationist understanding of the world in general and hence of biology in particular.

Fairness is not something you we come across in the world.

It's something you we do in the world.

(Edited for ↪javra
) — Banno

Thanks, but this still dismisses a crucial facet. The relative fairness, or lack thereof, of the world we're born into - as another example - is not a result of something we do, but is what we come across.

Fairness is not something you come across in the world.

It's something you do in the world. — Banno

A bit too laconic for accuracy's sake here. Since the world consists of multiple doers and not just oneself, one can and at time does come across fairness in world - for one example, by traveling to societies, communities, or else clicks that are far more just than one's own. (For a more concrete example, it's what at the very least once upon a time made the US a place where many a foreigner desired to reside as a national: the fairness aspect to life which certain foreigners did not encounter in their own home country. This before the American Dream became strictly that of becoming rich. Different can of worms though.)

Personally, I so far like the "only if we make it so" far better as an terse but precise answer.

---------------

How does it make sense to ask which of these is in thermodynamic equilibrium? — Banno

I'll wait for an answer with bated breath. Kinda

Thanks. Glad to see we're in agreement.

Myself, I do strongly take to heart this blatant aspect of current reality as we know it, which I'll here emphasize by restating:

And to the totalitarianisms at home and abroad that are fastly catching sway as a likewise detrimental counteraction to the post-modern ethical mindset just affirmed. — javra

I like the value structures of democracy and dislike the authoritarianism I see spreading in the USA and in many another country worldwide. And, in case this needs to be at least pragmatically addressed, the "no moral facts (of ethical rights and wrongs)" approach to ethics doesn't have a chance in withstanding the oncoming slippery-slopes toward what could well become a global fascism.

... a social system that is on average fair and just? — apokrisis

A post-scarcity, demarchic [democratic] social system is as "fair and just" as I can imagine. — 180 Proof

But, wait, such as system will not be an equilibrated balance between existential opposites - namely between that democratic system the quote affirms as an extreme, on the one hand, and the totalitarian extremes wherein scarcity proliferates because the totalitarian doesn't give a shit about the people, this as the existential/conceptual opposite of the former - so it can't be what we ought strive for. We must have moderate evil in order for the good to obtain - well, not good, since this is an extreme polar that is to be shunned, but that which is optimally beneficial to us without being itself good: an ideal balance in everything ... such that none are better in any capacity than any other. After all, good as the polar extreme of what is possible in the spectrum of good and bad is the enemy of what is good! (all this is sarcasm on my part, to those who are reading this a bit too literally).

A very pertinent satire regarding this whole notion of equality between opposite extremes (rather than equality in intrinsic value despite the differences which make some better than others in different attributes ... this latter being a completely different ball park as issue) can be found in Kurt Vonnegut's short story "Harrison Bergeron". I won't be quoting the entire summary, but to get the ball rolling:

In the year 2081, the Constitution dictates that all Americans are fully equal and not allowed to be smarter, better-looking, or more physically able than anyone else. The Handicapper General's agents enforce the equality laws, forcing citizens to wear "handicaps": masks for those who are too beautiful, earpiece radios for the intelligent that broadcast loud noises meant to disrupt thoughts, and heavy weights for the strong or athletic. — https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harrison_Bergeron

... hence delivering an equilibrated balance between the best and the worst as opposite extremes pertaining to possible human attributes. A dystopia indeed.

----

Edit: just to clarify the issue of demarchy (and why putting a strike-though in the quote above might possibly have been an error made in haste by me): on second musing, to have a functional and thereby persisting lottocracy one must have all the ideal values of a democracy thoroughly instilled in, not just some, but all of the populace. Imperfect thought it was, as can be partly illustrated by Ancient Athens.

Here, though, were such an ideal state of human society to ever be obtained not just for some but for all within a society, one would no longer be able to differentiate between the literal democracy (likely no longer in any way a valid republic), a governance of anarchy (here strictly specifying a lack of any separation between the state and the people themselves, this such that governance is under the full sway of all people's voluntary cooperation at all times, even when differences occur), and, thirdly, a non-hypocritical governance of communism (wherein - as can be more or less found in kibbutz society - all economy, and hence ownership of goods, from social to personal, is in some way cooperative; resulting in a fully voluntary (rather than in any way imposed) economic system of community-ism). Considering that this state of affairs might be a bit over the top for most as to what is considered a possible global society from today's standards - while I don't claim that such system of demarchy, i.e. lottocracy, is logically impossible to fathom as an extreme form of fairness and justice - I merely prefer to sponsor strict democratic values as they can be found in any system comprised of a republic (i.e., representative democracy as democracies function in today's world).

Long story short, a "post-scarcity demarchy" might well be imaginable by some as a possible future state of being to ideally progress toward, and, if so, then there wasn't much warrant for me to replace it with the notion of "democracy". Still, I find the more general notion of a "post-scarcity democracy" to be hard enough to achieve as it is. So I used this notion instead.

All of this tangential ado mainly oriented toward @180 Proof. Just in case it might in any way matter.

What I mean by fetishizing intent is the assumption that intent can be ethically incorrect, that one can want what one shouldn’t, in addition to success or failure at intelligible sense-making. — Joshs

So ... a mass-murdering and torturing rapist's intent to torture, rape and murder as many as possible cannot be ethically incorrect. He cannot thereby want what he shouldn't. (This irrespective of the success or failure that he might have in respect to this personal "intelligible sense-making" he engages in.)

Is this what you're claiming?

Because to me this kind'a speaks to that whole bemoaning of modern-day ethical standards as being in a state of decadence, demise, or however one ought best term this. And to the totalitarianisms at home and abroad that are fastly catching sway as a likewise detrimental counteraction to the post-modern ethical mindset just affirmed.

Although I'm quite surprised by this, in a pleasant manner I'll add, I here fully endorse Banno's laconic answer (thought doubtless we'll differ on the ontological details):

Only if we make it so. — Banno

Yup.

You're still not addressing how Aristotelianism fetishizes intent over sense-making. OK, then.

I was just saying they've always had a external source of grief. — frank

Dude, have you mingled with any Jews? They too have familial troubles, etc., to not even get in trite dis-satisfactions such as being occasionally hungry or thirsty.

"Full" satisfaction in the sense of "complete" ... hence in literal lack of any want whatsoever. I was under the impression we are here addressing philosophical issues - rather than colloquial sentiments and affirmations. And, since you "understand me", who the hell ever said that literal bliss equates to oblivion? This being a rather materialist/nihilist interpretation of the issue - which I do not hold.

:rage: A mischaracterization of what I said.

If it matters to us, if it is important to our goals, then we are implicitly aware of it, even if we don’t know how to articulate it explicitly in words. — Joshs

I don't yet see how this answers the question I asked. Consider cases of non-wanton addiction where the addict consciously knows better, wants to cease the addiction, but can't on account of their total mind's goading to persist in the addiction. Yes, quitting an addiction is possible, but the greater the addiction the more difficult so doing becomes. Here, then, the conscious being in question holds a sense-making wherein quitting is deemed beneficial. But the same person's unconscious mind (to simply a complex issue) for the most part at least engages in sense-making wherein continuing the addiction is held onto as beneficial. The consciousness concerned must then navigate between the long-term good of ceasing the addiction which they consciously acknowledge and the short-term bad of experiencing a potential horde of bad consequences (from physical pain to lack of mental clarity which would then destabilize the tasks which the person knows they must do, etc.) that would result where the person to in fact cease the addiction. A thousand and one complexities and variations ensue; I know. But, to get back to my initial question:

Is any of this sense-making - both on the part of the consciousness involved and on the part of their own unconscious mind which stands in opposition to their conscious will - in any way independent of some form of intent ... and, thereby, non-intentional in quality?

If not, then I don't understand how Aristotelian-ism "fetishizes intent over sense-making" ... this since the later is then fully contingent on the occurrence of the former.

Of all of these viewpoints, the Jewish one is the only one that allows you to be satisfied with what you've got. You studied the law. You put it into practice. You're doing ok. Anyway, it's a way to analyze the emotional tones in your viewpoint. — frank

There are other ways to appraise the mentioned viewpoint, but fair enough. As to the Jewish perspective you've mentioned, full satisfaction does not occur. Otherwise there would be a complete cessation of will/desire in all respects culminating in literal bliss, which does not happen to egos.

One can allegedly ‘want’ suffering , pain or misery instead of pleasure and happiness. — Joshs

Masochism as one extreme example of this. Running a grueling marathon so as to successfully arrive at the finishing line as another. But both these cases will make ample equivocation of "happiness" and "suffering". The masochist consciously suffers only when they cannot obtain their conscious happiness in - consensually it must be added - experiencing physical pain or else some form of physiological discomfort, such as humiliation. They will however be consciously happy when their masochistic acts are fulfilled as intended. Same can be said of the marathon runner (here even placing aside the issue of runner's high). Or else of someone who desires to experience misery so as to feel repentant for what they deem to have been a former willfully committed wrong. And so forth.

One however cannot at the exact same time and in the exact same respect both consciously want X (as one's end/goal) and consciously want not-X (as one's end/goal) - as will, for example, be the case when X = one's own future misery. This irrespective of the myriad possibilities regarding the at times discordant agencies we experience as felt emotions which can on occasion occur within the preconscious or else un/subconscious mind in whole.

My objection to Aristotle’s concept of happiness as eudaemonia, and this whose ethical theories are influenced by it, is that it conflates the hedonic and the cognitive aspects of experiencing. As a result, it fetishizes intent over sense-making. — Joshs

That affirmed, are you here arguing that at least some sense-making is non-intentional (be it either conscious or unconscious)?

Your purpose is to live in accordance with your nature. — frank

For my part, although this can have a nice ring to it, it doesn't seem to accurately convey my own take. For me, my/our purpose is simply to actualize an optimal well-being, but this is not something I can in any metaphysical sense deviate from. This of itself is existentially fixed in all of us. What I can (and often enough inadvertently do) deviate from is the very actualization of this end via the choices I make. So, in the sense you are here addressing, I'd then say my purpose - in the sense of end-driven striving I consciously engage in (rather than in the sense of an end upon which all my actions are necessarily contingent) - is to remain true to the very end of an actualized optimal well-being, something that can well be deemed identical to the notion of the Good.

I could then say that this is not the consciously upheld purpose of many - toddlers for instance - even thought they are nevertheless teleologically driven by the same telos/end, even if ignorant of it on a conscious level.

So, once this overall picture is accommodated - such that the "nature" here addressed is properly understood as the "will toward optimal eudemonia" (rather than say, one's nature of either being inclined toward selfishness or selflessness, etc.) - then, and only then, I could affirm something like "my purpose is to remain true (in the sense of accurately aiming, conformant in this way) to my true (in the sense of genuine, else genuinely immutable) nature". This, furthermore, then implies that one's true nature is, underneath it all, good, for it is in tune with the actualization of the Good. And it is this underlying nature that one can deviate from due to oneself as ego and the choices oneself as ego makes - sometimes in ignorance of what is best relative to the Good as ultimate end.

All this might be in some measure of accord to what you've quoted @Bob Ross as saying - although, as per my previous post, I myself don't subscribe to having been in any way designed/created by a global designer/creator. And so I dislike the choice of words which Bob Ross has made.

More or less, yes. We are designed a particular way, and we can choose to go against it; but we will only be damaging ourselves. — Bob Ross

OK, thanks for the comment. I'll myself shy from the term "designed" for, unlike the notion of purpose/end, the concept of "designed" does to me seem to logically entail a designer in aprioristic manners (akin to a bachelor being unmarried). This ascription of a designer being a belief I so far find erroneous due to the logical contradictions I so far find in the concept.

Evidencing logical contradictions would be a far longer argument (which I'd rather not here engage in) but, to keep things simple, as I previously alluded to: A designer of me and you, etc. would yet either a) have a purpose/end in so designing or else b) not have any purpose/end whatsoever in so designing. (A) then entails there yet being an uncreated/undesigned purpose/end which the designer him/herself pursues in their designing of our own essential nature as human beings - hence yet entailing an uncreated objective Good which this designer is yet perpetually subject to, and can in no way modify. The very same existential Good which we ourselves can either approach or deviate from via our innate impetus to pursue optimal eudemonia/well-being. While this terse argument doesn't illustrate the logical contradictions of a global designer, it does evidence how such a designer is utterly superfluous to the innate purpose of our own being. So, then, why even bother with the notion of a grand designer when addressing issues of the Good? Whereas just stipulated option (b) implies chaotic/random effects stemming from the designer as cause to our being, which is incongruous to what we know about, at the very least, the static nature of our being: that of our seeking out what we best believe to be our optimal well-being in both short- and long-term appraisals.

In short, rather than stating that we are designed in a certain way, I'll rather say that "we all unalterably are a particular way (innate seekers of optimal well-being) as human beings", this despite our otherwise innumerable differences. But maybe this quibbling with words is besides the point?

What purpose do you have? — frank

As I think is in keeping with what @Bob Ross is saying:

Same purpose everyone has: the obtainment of optimal eudemonia as end. (?)

But this won't be a purpose/end which I (or you) created for ourselves, instead being something that just is in so far as being intrinsic to our being; we can't choose against it, even when granting some form of free will. Nor would it be something received from another ego (whose very ego begs the question of what end(s) it itself has) in a cosmos devoid of an overarching/superlative purposer/creator.

On the one hand your claim that this collecting of empirical data is 'objective' might be riddled with holes if only you got rather more specific on the methods or social practice science uses to collect such data. — substantivalism

Well, I didn't say "objective" but rather "in as objective a manner as currently fathomable to us humans"; the former either is or is not; the latter admits to degrees (as in "that judge was far more objective in her judgment than were the plaintiffs") This makes for a very substantial difference.

As to specificity, I've already provided an outline here (I've boldfaced what is primarily important to objectivity in data acquisition, and added notes in brackets where likely appropriate):

I try not to mistake, or else equivocate, between a) the empirical sciences as enterprise and methodology and b) the conclusions, be they popularly upheld or not, which this same enterprise has resulted in and continues to produce.

I deem (a) to be grounded in the intent of an ever-improving, psychologically objective appraisal regarding that which is commonly actual to all and thereby empirically verifiable. For the science of physics, this then is the very nature of the physical world at large. Of emphasis here is the intent just mentioned and the use of the scientific method as an optimal means of bringing this same intent to fruition. Everything from falsifiable [by means of observation and, hence, data acquisition] hypotheses, confounding-variable-devoid tests of such hypotheses (or as near to such tests as we can produce), replicability [of observations by anyone would would care to look ... as well as] of these test’s results by anyone who so wants (and obviously has the means) to so test, and the very important peer-review method (which in its own way serves as a checks and balances of biases) by which the validity of all such aspects that the scientific method utilizes is optimally verified, hence optimally safeguarding against these same aspects being endowed with mistakes of some kind. — javra

Further, I don't think I disagree with this nor is this really that astounding a realization as if those in philosophical arm chairs aren't able to or in fact don't do the exact same. — substantivalism

Those in philosophical arm chairs don't do empirical science by so sitting in arm chairs. One has to be observing out in the field, as least a significant portion of the time, to engage in empirical sciences proper. A very big difference, to me at least.

Models and interpretations that do not account for all data thereby accumulated - or worse, that logically contradict this data in total or in part - will be deemed falsified — javra

I don't think scientists actually think this way as there have been past disagreements that were resolved by further observation but usually by acceptable 're-interpretation' of the data to regard inconsistences as mere appearance. — substantivalism

I'll first say that all empirical scientists I've so far encountered and been taught by do think this way, a few of which were nobel laureates (shook the hand of the guy who discovered quarks, for example, and I'll add that I'm not myself without direct experience in empirical science research ... if it's worth anything).

As to the "re-interpretations" these again only occur when models/theories do not fit the data, hence requiring at least tweaking in the models/theories/interpretations yet endorsed so as to adequately account for the data.

It doesn't have to imply anything about the veracity/falsity of theoretical entities nor some conspiracy against our methods of observation. — substantivalism

Since the scientific data obtained is verifiable by all who so cares to verify (and, again, at times, who also have the means to - especially when data obtainment requires more advanced technology, as is often the case in physics), the conspiracy part is a dud (possible issues of paranoia aside). Then, if contradiction occurs, theoretical entities with which the data contradicts are in some way necessarily wrong. I don't yet understand how it could be rationally maintained otherwise.

[edit: To further clarify, that when X, Y, and Z occurs observation A always results (or at least always results with a significant probability - this depending on what's being investigated) will be a staple aspect of scientific data for as long as our human biases don't get in the way (for which purpose the peer-review method is important in science as a means of countering human biases). What this observation signifies, or else the very import of X, Y, and Z, however, will always be open to interpretation - this, again, whenever our best interpretations/models/theories don't fit the data we've so far accumulated. I'll again mention the quantum erasure experiment as a more concrete example of this. But to go about it conversely - so as to claim that what everyone observes in like manner whenever X, Y, and Z occurs is in some means not actually observed by anyone - to me so far seems to be both delusional and counter the very spirit of the empirical sciences. In short, the data remains, but our interpretations of it is open to change - and, hence, so are our scientific models/theories open to change.]

I'm more concerned with the truly unobservable on the smallest scales and the truly inaccessible such as the past or distant parts of our universe as all of these are plagued by deep unresolvable speculation. A place where falsification provides no relief and only underdetermination of theory remains.

Falsification is a beautiful tool when there are no black boxes. When there are only black boxes then it loses its relevance besides assisting those obsessed with epicycles. — substantivalism

Yet these black boxes at the very least teeter on the non-scientific (irrespective of what the mass-hype might be). Its why the empirical sciences proper only deal with falsifiable hypotheses. As one easy to appraise illustrative example of this, science cannot address the "black box" of whether there is a small unicorn under your tabletop that turns invisible as soon as you look under - this precisely because this hypothesis is unfalsifiable [by any conceivable type of observation]. What does this have to do with physics and, more broadly, the empirical sciences in general? Same applies to myriad "theoretical entities of modern physics": e.g., M-theory, Many Worlds Interpretation, and so forth. Contrast this with something like the variable speed of light theory, which could be falsifiable where our technology to be advanced enough (last I looked into the matter). In contrast, M-theory and MWI's only worth is in providing explanations but these theories are unfalsifiable in principle (again, last I checked), and so are properly understood as non-scientific - no more or less than is the unicorn-under-tabletop theory non-scientific - this on grounds of being unfalsifiable.

But I'm not sure where to go from here. Science is not a panacea; it never was and never will be. Nothing of science is infallible to begin with, but those models which best account for our most substantiated data - substantiated via the scientific method (as previously outlined) - are far more trustworthy than anything which we as individuals might otherwise fathom. That gravity (relative to at the very least large enough mass) and biological evolution (relative to life) occur without exception as two general examples of this.

Science can collect 'observations' and data. Knowledge on the other hand requires a definition to be provided and a theory of meaning to be defended. [...] — substantivalism

Interesting point in its own right, but then the epistemological enquiries of philosophy can get very complex at times ... and I find that the scientific method (or, maybe better expressed, the philosophy of the empirical sciences to which the scientific method is requisite) was adopted more or less exactly so as to best obtain maximal knowledge regarding the perceivable world despite these very same many complexities regarding what knowledge is and consists of.

I somehow feel we yet hold significantly different understandings of what empirical science consists of. But I'm not currently sure of what these underlying differences might be.

I don't think that will help, because I can't see how saying the Universe has an overarching purpose makes any sense at all without positing a purposer. I will go further; I think saying that anything has a purpose presupposes either that it has been designed for some purpose or that it is in some sense and to some degree a self-governing agent. — Janus

Hey, I'll be maybe a little blunt.

As often happens in this place, lots of opining on what is the case which purports itself as rational demonstration of what is affirmed. All fine and dandy. But I notice that nothing in your reply evidences the logical impossibility you so far assert – and logical impossibility is not a matter of mere opinion last I checked. At least not in realms of philosophy.

To help things out, for your claim to hold any water, either demonstrate how any of the premises I’ve provided are necessarily false and hence not feasible to use or else rationally demonstrate how the premises I’ve provided can only result in the logical impossibility you so far yet claim. Without this, no logical impossibility is evidenced – and you remain wrong in your affirmation by default.

Also, so we don't equivocate on the matter of what "purpose" means, purpose here is intended as "The end for which something is done, is made or exists." (reference) Do you hold something else in mind by the word?

In something like Neo-Platonism, then, the universe can be said to exists both because of and for the Good, where the Good / the One is the ultimate end, the ultimate end for which the universe exists - and, here, the universe is thereby purposeful, i.e. serves a purpose/end (note that the One is nevertheless not a purposer, not even an agent). And, tmk, no one has been able to evidence Neo-Platonism logically impossible to date.

You’ve made a rather strong claim in saying that purpose sans purposer is logically impossible. So the impetus is now on you to rationally substantiate this claim by evidencing the logic necessary for obtaining this conclusion.

that is there cannot be, logically speaking, an overarching purpose without a transcendent purposer. — Janus

Logically there can, but one needs to make use of premises other than those of current mainstream religions (the very same with which most of today's atheists are indoctrinated and make partial rejection of).

Try to forget all about "the world was created by a creator" and, in modified general metaphysical keeping, that the universe resulted from either a first cause or else somehow emerged ex nihilo (as though indefinite nothingness of itself brought about the effect of a primordial universe as thought indefinite nothingness were of itself a cause).

Instead of these premises, entertain the premises that existence is either without initial creation or else cause or, otherwise, that no one (human or supernatural if the latter were to in any way occur) can have any knowledge of how old existence is or else of how it started if it at all ever did. Easily referenced examples of systems that do this are both Buddhism and Hinduism.

Then make use of the premise that awareness (in its many plural instantiations) is.

Then, be more concise, entertain the premise of idealism - one wherein everything that is perceptual, including everything physical, is in any number of means brought about by said awareness.

Lastly, entertain the premise that there is a final end-state to this awareness (with awareness's many instantiations) which is existentially fixed (not created, nor caused, nor in any way perishable) and which could be had were said awareness to be so wanting/intending. Quick examples could here include being at one with Brahman via Moksha, obtaining Nirvana without remainder, or to bring things back slightly into Western perspective (a global and complete) henosis with the Neo-Platonic "the One".

While this will not of itself evidence the case that physicality must necessarily then be purpose driven in manners devoid of a "purposer" (which is obviously to me taken to be a singular ego), these set of premises do at the very least allow for the logically valid obtainment of this conclusion (given far many more details and arguments to be presented and made).

For instance, were it to be upheld - such as C. S. Peirce did - that everything physical is effete mind whose natural laws (and systems of stable causality, etc.) are global habits emerging from the activities of (awareness-endowed) mind (again, neither mine nor yours but all coexisting minds in the cosmos in general), then physicality in general and all of its particular aspects will be - or at least could be here validly concluded to be - purposeful though neither holding intentions nor being so due to one single ego as "purposer". Physicality here would then adhere to the laws of thought, for one example, for it is ultimately resultant of them. And such an interpretation of physicality is in general metaphysical keeping with Heraclitus's Logos as well as that of the Stoics - wherein the laws of Nature are in their own way reasonings.

[For further illustration, here is one easy to read summation of Peirce's views:

“Matter,” he described, “is effete mind, inveterate habits becoming physical laws.” Peirce sees matter as being constructed out of habits of mind that have become so deeply ingrained that all of their fluidity has been removed until they froze into our experience of solid materiality. In this way Peirce held that there was not a sharp line between mind and matter. Instead Matter was solidified mind and so consciousness and material were part of the same continuum. — https://philosophyisnotaluxury.com/2010/09/the-inquiring-mind-of-charles-sanders-peirce/

]

Such an understanding of physicality is also in keeping with Peirce's notion of "agapism": a universal process of, well, agape, by which the cosmos in whole evolves. To which can be further conjoined "evolves toward the end-state of absolute agape". Which in turn can be deemed one and the same as, for example, the Neo-Platonic "the One".

As to scientific models of the universe, under such general interpretation of a purposeful cosmos devoid of a one superlative purposer, one could then adopt a Big Bounce model of the cosmos, which is currently a validly scientific model of cosmology regarding the beginning of the (currently known) universe that, though having its critics, has not yet be falsified by evidence.

Such that - to here use more poetic language for brevity - the evolving universe incrementally approaches this end-state of absolute agape (which again can be deemed to be the Neo-Platonic "the One") and then possibly breaks apart from it due to not getting thing perfect, in the process bringing about a new reformation of the early and far more chaotic universe which once again reformulates its progressive evolutions toward the same end-state, this till the time the awareness-driven universe (see C.S. Peirce again as example of this) gets things perfect and the end-state is obtained.

I'm not expecting these affirmations to be viewed as here being validly concluded by anyone. But this skimpily presented post regarding the matter does evidence how having a cosmos with an overarching purpose in the utter absence of a "purposer" is by no means a logical impossibility. If one works with different premises than those commonly employed in modernity.

And, of course, this terse outline of a general outlook should be given some leeway in terms of details being better defined via some modification of what's be stated.

Maybe needless to add, deny the premises addressed, and one will then deny the possible validity of all which has been expressed. But this does not then equate to a purposeful cosmos devoid of intentionality as an agent and of purposer as guiding factor being of itself logically impossible.

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Short on time at present. I'll post again if replied to in a week or so.

Got it. Thank you for the clarification. I'm in agreement.

I wonder to what extent such a non-dualistic viewpoint offers a solution to the split between materialism and idealism, as well as between atheism and theism. I am aware that there have been many debates on the topic on the forum. Also, there are various philosophical positions, including substance dualism and deism, so it is a complicated area. Here, in this thread, I am focusing on the idea of non-duality and asking do you see the idea as helpful or not in your philosophical understanding, especially in relation to the concept of God? — Jack Cummins

A thoughtful OP.

For me, non-duality is certainly helpful, if not pivotal, to my philosophical understandings. Yet this necessitates a very different perspective compared to mainstream views. Firstly, in the non-dualistic ontology which I hold onto there must - or at least should - be initially clarified different levels of reality (here more stringently interpreted as actuality): the realities/actualities that are strictly private to individual agents (e.g., the reality of the quality of what one experiences during an REM dream which one upon awakening does not share with any other; or, more broadly, the reality of what is nowadays termed one's personal umwelt - which to me currently seems incommunicable in whole); then there is the realities/actualities of mutually shared experiences or else of mutually shared information and interactions (e.g., the reality of languages, cultures, and relationships); then there is the globally singular reality/actuality of, in part, that information which is equally applicable to all coexistent agents (this being the reality of what we know of as physicality). These three distinct, though entwined, realities will however all be dualistic when technically appraised: if for no other reason, in all these there will occur a duality between self/selves and other. Then, finally, there is that reality which is non-dualistic in all conceivable senses. Maybe for obvious reasons, this ultimate reality is hard toward impossible to illustrate via examples - other than by introducing what are typically termed religious or mystical concepts found throughout cultures both past and present. But for the sake of this post, this non-dualistic ultimate reality is - at the very least for all intended purposes - logically identical to what in many a philosophy is termed the Good (Neo-Platonic notions of "the One" as just one instantiation). Once one adjusts to the notion that this ultimate non-dualistic reality is (for lack of better concise terminology) in fact the only reality that actually is in in the sense of being eternally permanent, or static, or fixed (and is thereby both uncreated and imperishable) - to further complicate matters, with this same non-dualistic ultimate reality being one and the same as an egoless awareness that is therefore utterly devoid of any limitations (the complexities of this here placed aside) which, nevertheless, comprises the very essence of any aware being - then one can then intellectually (but not experientially) look back upon the first three layers of reality previously addressed (all of them being dualistic) as a mixture of this ultimate non-dualistic reality (in the form of all co-occurringt instantiations of awareness) and the ultimately transient information it creates (either as individual agents/selves, or as societies, or, far more complexly, via the simultaneous co-occurrence of all agents/selves in the cosmos). I know this mouthful is here poorly expressed rationally, but I'm not here seeking to adequately justify my philosophical outlook, only to outline its key features. So, then, from the vantage of this non-dualistic ultimate reality, all duality will then be interpreted as various forms of maya/illusion. To include all three types of reality first expressed.

The more concise I make this outline, the more implausible or else gappy this worldview becomes. I know. But, again, I won't be expounding on what I find to be the rational consistency of this outlook in this post.

Nevertheless, once this perspective becomes comfortably upheld, one then can quite easily both have the cake and eat it too: Yes, all "form is emptiness" and there can be no thing as a self - this from the vantage of ultimate (and, in at least one sense, the only true/authentic) reality - while at the same time (but in a difference sense) fully acknowledging the truth of physicality and all that it encompasses (e.g., that there can be no living human mind if the human brain gets too badly injured or else perishes; that brain-operations fully correlate to the operations of mind - both pertaining to an individual human self which can quite safely affirm "I am" such that it is other than all which it is not (hence,forever being in a dualistic relation to the world as an I-ness/ego); and so forth). And one can likewise make sense of the Hindu notion of Brahman wherein all currently divided or else separate "witness consciousnesses" are constituents of the true, authentic, or else absolute Self of Brahman (here, though, the true self is utterly devoid of ego/I-ness). But to so comfortably interpret the just aforementioned, all four levels of reality/actuality previously mentioned need to be entertained.

I don't deem this philosophical perspective which I espouse to be either theistic or atheistic. Nor agnostic for that matter. But it is certainly non-physicalist. And it could be understood as one particular type of idealism - or else of neutral monism in so far as both mind and matter are deemed to equally be aspects of the comsic maya/illusion (which, again, shall always be dualistic).

And, as to the concept of God, God can mean many disparate things to different people. As one example of more Western beliefs regarding divinity, or else God, which can be fairly easily interpreted in non-dualistic manners is the Judaic notion of the Ein Sof that can be found in Kabbalah. But this or like notions proper are in no means anthropomorphic; God here is not an ego which creates or controls or determines or judges. Rather it is infinite (in the strictly literal, non-mathematical sense of "devoid of any limits whatsoever") awareness which holds no duality relative to anything other whatsoever yet - to here introduce Aristotelian terminology - "moves everything" despite being itself as infinite being utterly unmovable and part-less (divinely simple). To assimilate this in what I previously described of my own current philosophical perspective, this notion of God as just expressed is identical to the non-dualistic ultimate reality of the Good which I've previously mentioned. But express this same concept to most via the term "God" and most - from my experiences so far most Jews included - will wrongly assume you're thinking of a superlative and incorporeal ego that in some way or another controls everything. Which would be an utterly incorrect interpretation of what is being upheld.

Almost feel like apologizing for getting so personal into my outline of my own currently held beliefs. But then the OP does ask its leading question at a personal level.

Returning to the original topic, I do wonder how much of the success of anti-realism has to do with how people have learned to think of alternatives to it as being something like positing "objective values." The focus on "values" doesn't really fit with philosophy prior to the 19th century. In it's current usage, it's a term coming down from economics. Nietzsche seems to have been big in popularizing it, and I honestly think he uses the shift to "values" as a way to beg the question a bit in the Genealogy (to the extent that it assumes that the meaning of "good" has to do with valuation as opposed to ends). I'd agree that the idea of something being "valuable in-itself," is a little strange, since "value" itself already implies something of the marketplace, of a relative transaction or exchange. At the very least, it seems to conflate esteem with goodness, which essentially begs the question on reducing goodness to subjective taste. — Count Timothy von Icarus

In respect to this, I'd be happy to change my terminology, this in terms of my use of "value" in the context of ethics, if I thought it might be helpful in better conveying the concepts I wish to express. But I so far don't see any pragmatic reason to do so; despite being very open to change.

In today's lexicon, there is the whole branch of philosophical study of axiology, which by definition is the study of values, such that both ethics (and in some ways meta-ethics) and aesthetics are deemed subsets of axiology. In this and similar contexts, "value" is synonymous to "significance" in the sense of "the extent to which something matters and the type of quality of so mattering" (and, hence, in some ways synonymous to "importance"). As one further sub-example, in psychology the term "valence" is defined as "A one-dimensional value [emphasis mine] assigned by a person to an object, situation, or state, that can usually be positive (causing a feeling of attraction) or negative (repulsion)." (reference here). And, to further complicate issues, this just mentioned definition of valence could potentially also be interpreted in the mathematical sense of the term "value" - roughly, a quantitative and hence "mathematical object determined by being measured, computed, or otherwise defined" (reference)

I'm very sympathetic to how the term "value" can be easily interpreted in terms of marketplace exchanges and, hence, monetarily. I however find this pervasive association to be largely due to the materialistic metaphysics and quick to follow materialistic ideologies (to not here say "values") that pervade most societies today (as one possible example, the prioritizing of economy over politics; as yet another example, the thinking of success in terms of financial gains rather than in terms of intent-accomplishments).

So "intrinsic value" can well intend and thereby mean "a significance, or mattering, that has no instrumental utility but, rather, matters in and of itself to those agent(s) concerned". At least two potential examples come to mind: First, an agent's (well-)being will be of intrinsic value to the said agent; an agent's very own well-being holds no usefulness to the said agent but, instead, is that by which all usefulness to the agent is established. Secondly, for those who entertain the possibility of the Good, the Good too would then necessarily also be intrinsically valuable - and hence devoid of instrumental worth in accomplishing something else. And these two examples of intrinsic value certainly can have a lot to do with discussions regarding both ethics and metaethics - wherein multiple agents are at play.

I so far don't see any alternative terminology to that of "value" in today's world that would better serve the conveyance of these same ideas - this despite the term's many definitions and the audiences' tendency to be materialistic in its interpretation of the term. Do you?

Although I agree that the notion of "objective values" at the very least feels exceedingly misplaced.

But this is not a theory of truth. — apokrisis

The example wasn't intended as a theory or truth, but as an illustration of where I find the pragmatic theory of truth wanting (and, again, there are variations to it dependent of the system of pragmatism endorsed)

I am happy to have a technical discussion about epistemic method. If you want to talk about the social construction of everyday terms, that again is a quite different inquiry. No point mixing the two. — apokrisis

Hmm, my post pivoted around the issue of goodness, not around epistemic method.

I'd be happy if you'd answer at least some of the questions I've posed - granting that my latest post was somewhat long winded, I nevertheless did ask (at least a couple of) questions revolving around the issue of goodness throughout. But, of course, that's up to you.

Hey, my bad, just found myself with time to spare :smile: So I'll reply presently.

By some, sure, but how would this relate to the Good as that via which we, for one example, discern that a correct argument is good and an incorrect argument is bad? — javra


What else is pragmatism about as a ground for a theory of truth? — apokrisis

I see we analyze this issue via very different schemas. But to first answer your question:

Although more in depth answers would revolve around the pragmatic maxim, to answer in a single word: utility, of course. But then - that different variations of pragmatism as philosophy will address this same issue of truth differently aside - the implicitly maintained premises of this assertion have yet to be made explicit: utility to what or to whom? I here say, utility to that which seeks one or more as of yet unrealized outcomes to become manifest and hence actualized. But this directly revolves around that pesky set of terms you find problematic: "sentience" (literally, that which senses), "awareness", and the far more convoluted term of "consciousness". A rock (granting it is insentient, lacks any form of awareness, and hence holds no consciousness) will hence be in ownership of no truths. The pragmatic theory of truth, much like the correspondence theory of truth, will hence pivot on the occurrence of sentience. No sentience, no truths.

For the record, however, in a substantial number of cases I disagree with the pragmatist theory of truth. For one incomplete example, lies can be very pragmatic (in the sense of, "with a great deal of usefulness") when successfully enacted but are nevertheless not truths - even when they become believed as truths by the very same person which formally made the lie (this being one form of self-deception; e.g., many of Trump's statements and apparent beliefs). But this epistemological issue being for now overlooked:

This notion of pragmatic theory of truth neither addresses the question I've asked nor the substance of the OP. Utility - i.e, usefulness (to further make explicit what this implicitly denotes: useful to our accomplishing our goals/intents) - is itself to be deemed something good on what grounds? To better clarify via example, incorrect reasoning holds the potential to be exceedingly useful - everything from Orwellian propaganda to gaslighting and more. This then implies that incorrect reasoning is good when it is useful to satisfying the intents of, for example, tyrants, autocrats, oligarchs, despots, or authoritarians - specifically, it will be good for those just addressed (rather than those which they subjugate and manipulate via this incorrect reasoning). Yet this just addressed goodness of incorrect reasoning does not make the use of incorrect reasoning to subjugate and manipulate others (this in some respects often being a more complex form of lies told to benefit the ego of the liar, this by having those lied to hold untruths as truths) an ethical good. Or, for those of us who acknowledge global warming and its dire future perils: not changing to renewable energies is, and has always been, good (useful) for petroleum corporations, those who own stocks in petroleum, and those who value status quo stability above all else. But for those who view this usefulness as both shortsighted and egotistic, this same goodness (usefulness) is deemed to in fact be bad (if not outright evil, akin to what tobacco companies have been doing, but far worse).

I so far find nothing of physical entropy - or of physical negentropy - to ground what is deemed good, bad, or even useful for that matter. Instead finding these issues to be intimately grounded in the very nature of sentience, else awareness, else consciousness: in short, this globally applicable nature of sentience being the minimal incursion of suffering and the optimal obtainment of happiness in both short- and long-term time-spans.

You so far seem to disagree. On what grounds do you then justify good, bad, and utility resulting form the Second Law of Thermodynamics? More concretely asked, how does the Second Law of Thermodynamics constrain or else determine that incorrect arguments are bad rather than good even through they are (or at least can be) useful to those who espouse them?

Nature is its own self-balancing flow — apokrisis

That's one interpretation of what the nature of Nature is There are plenty others. I've even encountered those online who sustain that the term is utterly vacuous - this as some will say of the term "matter" (Thomas Huxley, who first coined the term "agnostic", here comes to mind) and yet others will say of the term "sentience".

It is not me that is defending good/bad as valid terms. — apokrisis

:lol: :smile: These staple terms are no more valid or invalid than any other staple term, "pragmatic" very much included. I think it's possible that you're overlooking much of what the terms good and bad signify in everyday use. You might not be stating that this just quoted affirmation of yours is good rather than bad, but via your apparently earnest expression of it you are nevertheless implicitly affirming your belief that the quoted statement is of a good, rather than bad, value - this to you if to no one else.

Besides, the very issue of this thread is the notion of pragmatism sans the Good. To which I can quote your previous affirmations regarding goodness - wherein you've addressed "good" as a valid term.

Using the word “control” was obviously a bad move on my part. You have seized on the same reductionist connotations to drag this discussion into what I see as irrelevancies. — apokrisis

OK, then please express what you intended by the term "control" so that it is not in line with the dictionary definitions I am so far aware of. Otherwise, the globalized notion you've expressed of "humans seek to control reality/Nature" is anything but irrelevant to the issues at hand.

If “good” is pragmatic balance, — apokrisis

I do not find "good" to be pragmatic balance tout court. To be both blunt and concise, I find "good" to be minimized suffering and optimal happiness/flourishing/eudemonia - maybe needless to add, of sentience, awareness, or else expressed consciousness.. And I find "the Good" to be a non-fairy-tale necessity for all forms of "good" wherein the "good" becomes quite literally perfected. The global constraint by which all instantiations of good are determined, so to speak. Else, that which constrains or else determines all actions to being either more good or less good. But yes, this so far seems to require a metaphysics quite distinct from that which you are advocating.

As to "good" being pragmatic balance between opposites, one could then state that an optimal balance between goodness and badness/evil (these two being opposites) is of itself optimally good. But this would be utterly nonsensical for more reasons than I think currently need expression. Taking the yin-yang of Taoism as one popularized example of balance as good, harmony between light and dark (etc.) is in and of itself a good that, supposedly, leads one to Wuji, this as "Wuji" was initially interpreted in the Tao Ta Ching - with Wuji being here possible to then interpret via Western notions as being "the Good". Imbalances between yin and yang lead one astray from closer proximity to Wuji and are thus always bad in due measure. But the yin-yang interpreted as a balance between good and bad will here make no sense whatsoever.

There is indeed the plasticity-stability balance as is modelled in neural network learning models and other models of neurocognition.

It is how brains are known to work. They must learn easily but also not learn too much - add too much destabilising novelty to their hard won memories, habits and skills all at once. — apokrisis

I'd say this is overly simplistic. Though more psychological than strictly philosophical, I've heard often enough among educational circles that cognitive dissonance, a form of psychological stress, is of significant benefit to learning. For example:

Meta-analysis of studies indicates that psychological interventions that provoke cognitive dissonance in order to achieve a directed conceptual change do increase students' learning in reading skills and about science.[60] — https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cognitive_dissonance#Education

So brains can well be argued know to best learn via the obtainment of cognitive equilibrium that ameliorates an actively engaged in cognitive dissonance. Without the cognitive dissonance, one simply maintains whatever beliefs one has and never gains any new perspective regarding life or reality at large. And the cognitive dissonance part is not easy.

So good/bad can be grounded in this larger thermodynamic view. That was my point. — apokrisis

By some, sure, but how would this relate to the Good as that via which we, for one example, discern that a correct argument is good and an incorrect argument is bad? More specifically, how does entropy (or even negentropy for that matter) account for the goodness or badness of particular reasoning?

Being in the flow is just being well balanced as you scoot down the slope on a pair of skis. — apokrisis

This in itself is not beyond question. But even so, the views I was referring to pertaining to what I termed "Nature" and you termed "reality" have very little to do with being in the flow. For instance, is Nature bad/evil that must be conquered or is Nature good and goodness that ought to be aligned with? This issue regarding control over nature has little if anything to do with being in the flow.

Words like sentience are a problem unless you can provide some pragmatic definition. — apokrisis

Together with words like awareness and consciousness I suppose. I'll skip this for the time being.

But anyway, if all things are in flux then that is how stability is what then evolves from that. — apokrisis

Why should stability be valued - aka be deemed good - to begin with? This question to me speaks far nearer to the heart (i.e. core) of the matter at hand.

The in jokes you've mentioned you hold regarding process theory aside, no process theory will affirm that absolute stability of physical being either is or is possible to begin with.

Have to cut this short for today. Will check back in tomorrow.