For me, I would say concepts exist in minds; and those concept reference existent things when those things really exist. I don’t see anything problematic here nor puzzling. — Bob Ross

Odd, then, that you’ve created a long OP, and engaged in a multi page discussion, about just this fact, with no resolution apparent. Perhaps you're taking too much for granted!

If you take a platonic account (like you did in your quote here), then numbers, e.g., exist in a supersensible realm. For plato, numbers are real and exist; and specifically are real and exist in the sense that they are abstract objects in a supersensible realm. I think trying to separate ‘real’ from ‘existent’ adds unnecessary confusion: I think you could easily convey your point by noting that these abstract objects would not exist in the universe. — Bob Ross

No confusion. A moderately well-educated person will understand that there is the 'domain of natural numbers' yet this is not an 'supersensible realm' in any sense other than the metaphorical. It is not some ethereal ghostly realm. Numbers and logical principles are not physically existent and yet our reason appeals to them at practically every moment to navigate and understand the world.

:100: :ok: :pray:

I can only say that I agree with Bergson, yet I can't find proper words to endorse that effectively we are the ones who measure time, and not the clocks. — javi2541997

Because the clock itself has no awareness of the duration between two points on its face. The measuring device comprises a machine that advances a pointer at a specified interval but the observer is the one who comprehends the time between those two points as 'an interval'.

Also note that Thompson takes pains to explain the sense in which Bergson's analysis was incorrect with respect to the 'twin paradox', however, the basic point still remains, which is, in the last sentence of the article, that 'Bergson continues to remind us of something forgotten in our scientific worldview: experience is the ineliminable source of physics'.

Italics added.

The plant pot appears broken in the picture — javi2541997

I believe 'cracked' is the word you're looking for, but then, a joke explained is a joke lost.

Incidentally, for interested readers, a substantial article by Evan Thompson on the debate between Henri Bergson and Albert Einstein on the nature of time in April 1922. I've just listened to the corresponding chapter of Thompson's co-authored book on this topic. Says something philosophically important, in my view.

Bergson insisted that duration proper cannot be measured. To measure something – such as volume, length, pressure, weight, speed or temperature – we need to stipulate the unit of measurement in terms of a standard. For example, the standard metre was once stipulated to be the length of a particular 100-centimetre-long platinum bar kept in Paris. It is now defined by an atomic clock measuring the length of a path of light travelling in a vacuum over an extremely short time interval. In both cases, the standard metre is a measurement of length that itself has a length. The standard unit exemplifies the property it measures.

In Time and Free Will, Bergson argued that this procedure would not work for duration. For duration to be measured by a clock, the clock itself must have duration. It must exemplify the property it is supposed to measure. To examine the measurements involved in clock time, Bergson considers an oscillating pendulum, moving back and forth. At each moment, the pendulum occupies a different position in space, like the points on a line or the moving hands on a clockface. In the case of a clock, the current state – the current time – is what we call ‘now’. Each successive ‘now’ of the clock contains nothing of the past because each moment, each unit, is separate and distinct. But this is not how we experience time. Instead, we hold these separate moments together in our memory. We unify them. A physical clock measures a succession of moments, but only experiencing duration allows us to recognise these seemingly separate moments as a succession. Clocks don’t measure time; we do. This is why Bergson believed that clock time presupposes lived time. — Clock Time Contra Lived Time, Evan Thompson

I concur. I also believe this is concordant with Kant's description of time as a 'primary intuition'.

I have to say, this is entirely intelligible to me and (linguistically) solves a problem I've had for some time - there are clearly non-physical objects of experience. They are real, but do not exist. Thank you for clearing this up for me so succinctly. — AmadeusD

The single most important thing one can learn from philosophy in my view.

Objective Time is the underlying, universal flow that synchronizes all events across the entire universe. — Echogem222

Do you have any grounds for saying that there is such a thing?

These effects have been measured and confirmed through experiments like atomic clocks on airplanes and GPS satellites in orbit. — Echogem222

So then how can that be only ‘subjective’ as you seem to say?

That's one of the reasons I appreciate Nagel so much -- he refuses to be doctrinaire about the type of philosophy he was trained in. — J

The thing that draws me to Nagel is that while he's a professed atheist, he's critical of philosophical and scientific materialism on the grounds of reason alone, because he sees that it doesn't make sense. Which is enough for many of his professional peers to excorciate him.

Traditionally, as far as I can tell, the term ‘real’ refers to the same thing as ‘existent’. If it is real, then it exists; and if it exists, then it is real. This clearly does not hold in your schema. — Bob Ross

Does the first law of motion exist? Do numbers exist? Does the law of the excluded middle exist? Point to any of those, and you're indicating a set of symbols - f=ma, 2x2=4, etc. But the symbol is only a representation of a concept. And in what sense do concepts exist? Why, in the mind, you might say. Yet they seem to give a great deal of traction over the world at large, they seem to straddle the relationship of mind and world. I say that that such 'intelligible objects' as they are called (although the term 'object' is a little misleading) are real, but they're not existent qua phenomena. They're real as objects of thought - which is the original (as distinct from Kantian) meaning of noumenal.

Platonic Ideas and Forms are noumena, and phenomena are things displaying themselves to the senses... This dichotomy is the most characteristic feature of Plato's dualism; that noumena and the noumenal world are objects of the highest knowledge, truths, and values is Plato's principal legacy to philosophy ¹.

Which is what Kant picked up on, but then he altered the meaning of it to conform better to his schema.

Nevertheless, the basic point remains: if concepts such as number and logical laws are included, then the scope of 'what is real' far exceeds the scope of 'what exists'. That this idea is no longer intelligible to us, is due to the cultural impact of empiricism, which generally identifies what is real with what is existent, to its detriment. (See also Augustine on Intelligible Objects.)

the hippies got some of this right, yet veered off into hedonism, as a virtue. It then sabotaged anything they had to say to take this route. — Shawn

Don't I know. Not that I was ever really full-blown counter-culture, but it definitely was a major influence, and not all for the good.

But then, as you will know, at least some of the counter-culture went East and found roshis and rinpoches to practice under. And at least of those were not corrupted or led astray by the same acid bath of modernity (although some were, as I also know from experience.) But the point was, Buddhism and Vedanta, at least, and some of the Chinese religious philosophies, seem able to have carried forward elements of their culture into the modern world, in a way that Christian culture generally did not.

Rather, the historical approach found in IEP is the only option. — Banno

I thought the IEP article was pretty good, actually. One paragraph that jumped out at me was this:

Even in its earlier phases, analytic philosophy was difficult to define in terms of its intrinsic features or fundamental philosophical commitments. Consequently, it has always relied on contrasts with other approaches to philosophy—especially approaches to which it found itself fundamentally opposed—to help clarify its own nature. Initially, it was opposed to British Idealism, and then to “traditional philosophy” at large. Later, it found itself opposed both to classical Phenomenology (for example, Husserl) and its offspring, such as Existentialism (Sartre, Camus, and so forth) and also “Continental”’ or “Postmodern” philosophy (Heidegger, Foucault and Derrida).

In other words, defined by what it is opposed to. The Brits, in particular, had many very clever fellows - oh, and some gals - who's logical skills were forensic. (Didn't Ayer and Austin work for British Intelligence during the war?) So they're forensic experts in slicing and dicing substantive philosophical ideas. Withering blights. That article I once linked to, by Ray Monk, about how Gilbert Ryle took over Oxford philosophy after Collingwood's early death, and the ripple effect from that - 'no ear for tunes'. I found at UniSyd that kind of Oxbridge positivist mentality reigned supreme under D M Armstrong. Which is why I absconded to the Comparative Religion department (a.k.a. the Depatment of Mysticism and Heresy.)

(Acually, Putnam I've begun to warm to a bit. He's one of the names I've become familiar with since joining forums.)

But seriously, is there any end to consumption? Can one draw a line hard and fast over how illustrious wants can be detrimental to a person? — Shawn

Hey I’m also wrestling with all this. I often feel - actually I know - I’ve been corrupted by the society I’ve been born into. It’s a constant battle - the original meaning of jihad was spiritual struggle, although that’s been corrupted too.

One thing I do know. In my late 20's I discovered the joy of running. I never became a competitive runner or joined races or anything of the kind, but I discovered that I could run 5 or 10km regularly, and that it produced a fantastic feeling of like having had your whole body taken apart and re-assembled. I guess that was an endorphin thing, 'runner's high'. It was hugely effective as a mood stabiliser. Those days are long gone, but I still work out at gym.

Anyway, there's definitely a link between modern society and mental well-being. Hence the appeal of stoicism, paleo food, and all the other 'return to the ancients' kinds of movements, but it takes more than reading about it.

Yeah, true that, might have been a little hyperbolic on my part. Nevertheless I'm sure that it was a major element in actual Stoicism, as distinct from today's armchair versions.

I would say that on the whole the (best) Continentals are slightly more skilled at performing the necessary self-reflection involved. — J

Have you read Nagel's essay Secular Philosophy and the Religious Temperament? He makes a similar comment in that essay. I know you're interested in his writings, you can find a copy here.

There's only one way our brain works — Christoffer

Is that so? Got a manual?

I don't think that self-torture is a beneficial way to practice stoicism. — praxis

Interesting that the suggestion of physical fitness is immediately interpreted as 'self-torture' ;-)

What has been your experience with stoicism, or what do you think is the issue here? — Shawn

Do you practice any sport or fitness regimen? I suspect that is a factor. The root of 'asceticism' is actually 'askesis' meaning 'training', and I'm sure many of the classical Stoics were fighting fit. Indifference to heat and cold and to physical discomfort is not something that is acquired by thinking about it. That's one reason that modern culture is inimical to stoicism - it has accustomed us to previously unheard-of levels of pleasure and comfort and encourages only the pursuit of consumption.

(Note to self: follow your own advice! :rage: )

When I did a unit in Indian philosophy as an undergraduate, the lecturer remarked one day that in the West, when someone dies, it is said 'he gave up the ghost'. In India, it is more common to say 'he gave up the body'.

I'm not even clear what it means to say that the universe is comprehending itself. — Ludwig V

As a result of a thousand million years of evolution, the universe is becoming conscious of itself, able to understand something of its past history and its possible future. This cosmic self-‐awareness is being realized in one tiny fragment of the universe—in a few of us human beings. — Julian Huxley

(Although, mind you, we’re only ‘tiny fragments’ looked at from the outside.)

Nevertheless if one refers to ‘analytic and continental philosophy’ it is a well-understood division even if as noted above, no longer hard and fast.

I take it as analytic philosophers recognizing that the mind-body problem is not one which philosophy should grapple with anymore, and is best left to the scientist to elucidate such matters in terms of what can be said intelligibly. — Shawn

that is truly, unintentionally, hilarious. As regards Hadot, I agree that it seems challenging, but I'm a subscriber to both Medium and Substack, and they're teeming with threads dedicated to revivifying ancient philosophy in the modern world. Some of them are also really good scholars as well. My interpretation is that something about modern culture is intrinsically antagonistic to what was traditionally understood as philosophy, for various deep and intertwined reasons.

The analytic school of philosophy is the dominant way of doing philosophy, nowadays. — Shawn

Analytic method is all too prone to mistake oversimplification for clarification, banality for exactitude, and imaginative narrowness for intellectual rigor; moreover, its typical modus operandi is as often as not an unhappy combination of speculative timidity and methodological overconfidence. I do not know whether all of this is just an accident of philosophical history, and therefore corrigible within analytic tradition itself; I know only that Anglophone philosophy has produced at once the most copious and most frequently fruitless literature on the so-called mind-body problem. — Hart, David Bentley. All Things Are Full of Gods: The Mysteries of Mind and Life (pp. 18-19). Yale University Press. Kindle Edition.

Contrast with:

Pierre Hadot, classical philosopher and historian of philosophy, is best known for his conception of ancient philosophy as a bios or way of life (manière de vivre). ... According to Hadot, twentieth- and twenty-first-century academic philosophy has largely lost sight of its ancient origin in a set of spiritual practices that range from forms of dialogue, via species of meditative reflection, to theoretical contemplation. These philosophical practices, as well as the philosophical discourses the different ancient schools developed in conjunction with them, aimed primarily to form, rather than only to inform, the philosophical student. The goal of the ancient philosophies, Hadot argued, was to cultivate a specific, constant attitude toward existence, by way of the rational comprehension of the nature of humanity and its place in the cosmos. This cultivation required, specifically, that students learn to combat their passions and the illusory evaluative beliefs instilled by their passions, habits, and upbringing. — Pierre Hadot, IEP

I am not a soul, and I am not my brain. I am a whole, conscious, physical unit. — Kurt Keefner

I think the etymology of 'soul' is relevant. Originally in Greek it was 'psuche', roughly equivalent to our 'psyche' but with a broader set of meanings. It really meant something like an animating principle, or 'breath of life', and indeed was translated into Latin as 'anima' (root of 'animal' and 'animation'.)

Over history, of course, these terms changed their meaning, especially because of the religious appropriation of the term via the rubric of the immortal soul, meaning that in today's secular culture the term is considered archaic or problematic. But I take 'soul' to mean precisely 'the whole being'. Not 'person', as such, because 'person' is derived from 'persona' which were the masks worn by actors in Greek drama. It corresponds to 'ego', which is, we can say, the self's idea of itself, and refers to what we are consciously aware of as ourselves, who we ourselves think that we are.

But as depth psychology has pointed out, we also comprise sub- and un-conscious aspects which are often not available to conscious introspection, but which are also vital aspects of the whole being. It is really impossible to delimit exactly the extent of that, as a sage once said, 'The mind is a vast abyss (profunda abyssus est homo), and no man knows its depths.' Added to which there's the 'collective unconscious' which imbues us with a cultural memory and sense of identity, carrying forward memories which have been formed through many generations. Then also there are inborn proclivities, talents, dispositions, and so on, not all of which are beneficial, but which appear strongly ingrained in people. (Whence musical prodigies, for instance? Or those with other uncanny talents?)

So I take 'soul' to mean precisely 'the whole being' in that sense, comprising, but not limited to, the conscious mind. Which I think is conveyed in the popular description of shallow or merciless or mercenary types as being 'soul-less' (even if we don't nowadays believe in the soul.)

I will add, I think the phenomenological attitude is one of avoiding theoretical explanations of these factors, but exploring them through awareness of how they appear in actual life. Not trying to create a kind of theoretical superstructure to account for them.

There’s an essay pinned to the OP. Recommend a read. Also check out the level of vituperation in the early replies. Obviously hit a button.

Rather I take the flow of the argument here to be that there are a multiplicity of logics, to be applied in many and various cases — Banno

Kinda like Sliding Doors, right? Multiverse stuff? That kind of thing? Am I warm?

What is difficult for me to accept is that this means we are more than merely another kind of animal or that we are more important in any absolute sense than other animals. — Janus

I didn't say 'important', although in the sense that we hold sway over the fate of millions of species, then we are. But that is not the point I've been labouring to make, which is that we're of a different kind, due to what we're able to know.

This intuition is not, by the way, unique to Christianity. In Buddhist lore, being born in human form is an opportunity to realise liberation (a term which has no conceptual equivalent in the Western lexicon.) Buddhists are generally humane to animals, and many orders of Mahāyāna Buddhism are strictly vegetarian. But they understand that animals lack the intelligence to learn 'the way' (see David Loy, Are Humans Special? (.pdf)):

Steven Weinberg, a Nobel laureate in physics, famously claimed that “The more the universe seems comprehensible, the more it also seems pointless.” But to examine the universe objectively and conclude that it is pointless misses the point. Who is comprehending that the universe is pointless? Someone separate from it, or someone who is an inextricable part of it? If cosmologists themselves are a manifestation of the same universe that cosmologists study, with them the universe is comprehending itself. Does that change the universe? When we come to see the universe in a new way, it’s the universe that is coming to see itself in a new way. — David Loy

That leaves open other forms of ratiocination. If, as they argue, for every given logical law a counterexample can be presented, then one might induce that there are no logical laws. — Banno

It might also indicate that logic has limits, which is not the same as to say that it isn't universally applicable within those limits. Graham Priest's diathetheism comes to mind although that too I interpret as an exploration of the limitations of logic.

All I'm suggesting is that, although exceptionalism has been all too often used by humans to justify maltreating everything else, it is also the basis for expecting better of them.
The exceptionalism that I'm opposed to is the exceptionalism that seeks to disown or set aside our animal nature, pretending that we are not animals. In a phrase, it is the idea that we have "dominion" over everything else. It has too often been interpreted as a licence for tyranny, when stewardship is called for. — Ludwig V

Really? Tell that to the Jain monks who conscientiously sweep the path they're walking along to avoid stepping on insects. Or the world's many vegetarians and vegans who decline animal products as sustenance (which doesn't include me). I think this is rather a stale caricature of Christian imperialism, even if historically accurate in some respects.

The exceptionalism I'm proposing is due to our existential condition: that we are endowed with the ability to sense meaning in a way that no other animal is able to do. There are, as a consequence, horizons of being open to us, that are not open to other animals. It's both a blessing and a curse, as consequently we have a sense of ourselves, and so also a sense of our own limitedness and finitude and the ability to lose what we cherish and also to act in ways which we ourselves know are sub-optimal. It's an unfortunate historical fact that our science-based society has swept away the symbolic forms in which that awareness was expressed. But then, it also suits a consumer society to have us believe that the pursuit and satiation of desires is an aim. Many before me have observed that the popular interpretation of the 'survival of the fittest' serve the industrial capitalist mindset very well.

None of which is to say that I don't accept that animals, like dogs, are sentient beings who feel a full range of emotions and experience joy, sadness and so on (I'm minding someone's cavoodle for a few weeks, and she's a delight). That they are demonstrably lacking the rational faculties of h.sapiens is not an expression of prejudice or bias, but a simple statement of fact, which seems inordinately difficult to accept for a lot of people.

Seems to me that logical nihilism undermines the idea of there being 'necessary truths'. But how can logical nihilism be supported by rational inference when it calls the basis of rational inference into question? If there are no unconditional facts to fall back on, is it not just meaningless verbiage?

All Things are Full of Gods - The Mysteries of Mind and Life, David Bentley Hart.

A list of the 5 levels would have been nice. — noAxioms

(Aquinas’ ‘five proofs’ and other exercises in scholastic metaphysics were never intended as polemical arguments to persuade unbelievers. They were intellectual exercises given in the context of a culture of belief, intended to provide edification for the faithful. In context where a majority believe that God is dead, these kinds of arguments will only invite hostility.)

Does this other cognitive mode happen to have a typically south-central Asian name? — Mww

It's made more explicit in them, but it's also there in the Western traditions. I often feel that in Asia there is not so much of a gap between the ancient and modern.

If the thing-in-itself is known to us as appearing objects, why is it said things-in-themselves are unknown to us?

If the thing-in-itself appears, it isn’t in-itself. It is isn’t in itself, and it is something that appears, then it must appear to us, which becomes phenomenon in us, which becomes an object of experience for us, and the entire transcendental aesthetic contradicts itself. — Mww

Check out this blog post.

Thanks. I see it's a rather delicate point. So I read that qualification as an admission, yes, there are real objects independent of our sensory grasp of them (so as not to give ground to complete solipsism or skepticism), but still, they are known by us as appearing objects under the categories etc etc. I still think there's a frequent tendency amongst those who encounter Kant to want to 'peek behind the curtain' so to speak, or penetrate the mystery of 'what really is'. But he's actually pointing out a kind of limit, or even limitation, of knowledge, which requires a certain humility to accept. A Kant primer says:

Kant's introduced the concept of the “thing in itself” to refer to reality as it is independent of our experience of it and unstructured by our cognitive constitution. The concept was harshly criticized in his own time and has been lambasted by generations of critics since. A standard objection to the notion is that Kant has no business positing it given his insistence that we can only know what lies within the limits of possible experience. But a more sympathetic reading is to see the concept of the “thing in itself” as a sort of placeholder in Kant's system; it both marks the limits of what we can know and expresses a sense of mystery that cannot be dissolved, the sense of mystery that underlies our unanswerable questions. Through both of these functions it serves to keep us humble. — Emrys Westacott

Note also that many or all of Kant's criticism of rationalism were directed at the philosophers of his day (Christian Wolff and others) who proposed various teleological, ontological and other 'proofs of the existence of God'. This kind of proof was what Kant said reason could not establish. It doesn't mean that he doesn't believe in God, but, as he said, he had to declare a limit to knowledge to make room for faith. (I personally think there is another cognitive mode altogether, connected with religious insight, but that is yet another transcendental can of worms altogether.)

Is anybody actually supporting the view of something from nothing? — noAxioms

I have an intuition which is rather difficult to articulate, but which revolves around the sense that there is a kind of infinitely fruitful nothingness at the centre of being. That is an intuition which is found in different forms in many schools of the perennial philosophy and properly philosophical (as distinct from popular) mysticism.

There is a Christian form, which I've found articulated in a post on Aquinas vs Intelligent Design. The author describes Aquinas' distinction between creation as 'a species of change' whereby something changes into something else. This is what he says that the Greek philosophers meant by their maxim 'nothing comes from nothing'. But, he points out, divine creation is of a completely different order to what the Greek philosophers might imagine:

Aquinas argued that their (i.e. the Greek's) error was a failure to distinguish between "cause" in the sense of a natural change of some kind and "cause" in the sense of an ultimate bringing into being of something from no antecedent state whatsoever. Creatio non est mutatio says Aquinas: The act of creation is not some species of change.

The Greek natural philosophers were quite correct in saying that from nothing, nothing comes. But by “comes” they meant a change from one state to another, which requires some underlying material reality. It also requires some pre-existing possibility for that change, a possibility that resides in something.

Creation, on the other hand, is the radical causing of the whole existence of whatever exists. To be the complete cause of something’s existence is not the same as producing a change in something. It is not a matter of taking something and making it into something else, as if there were some primordial matter which God had to use to create the universe. Rather, Creation is the result of the divine agency being totally responsible for the production, all at once and completely, of the whole of the universe, with all it entities and all its operations, from absolutely nothing pre-existing.

Strictly speaking, points out Aquinas, the Creator does not create something out of nothing in the sense of taking some nothing and making something out of it. This is a conceptual mistake, for it treats nothing as a something. On the contrary, the Christian doctrine of creation ex nihilo claims that God made the universe without making it out of anything. In other words, anything left entirely to itself, completely separated from the cause of its existence, would not exist—it would be absolutely nothing. The ultimate cause of the existence of anything and everything is God who creates—not out of some nothing, but from nothing at all. — Aquinas vs Intelligent Design

This also gives the lie to lot of atheist polemics, which concieve of the "first cause" as a kind of super-engineer or movie director, responsible for the literal construction of every particular (cf John Haldane's quip that 'the Lord has an inordinate fondness for beetles'.) It is why, for example, Richard Dawkins insists that whatever designed the universe must be more complex than the universe itself. The trouble with this argument is that the scientifically-inclined are so thoroughly immersed in their own anthropocentric project of attempting to reverse-engineer the universe and the origin of life that they are not equipped for any kind of insight into, or intuitive feel for, what the pre-modern cultures understood by the 'divine source of existence'. It's not a scientific concept at all.

This is why it is fallacious to think of the 'divine source of being' as simply an addition to the set of all existents, something else that exists, which is what makes it seem an infinite regress. But it is mistaken to place the divine source of being on the same ontological level as particular beings or the phenomenal universe. In actuality, the source of existence is not something that exists. 'Existence' is what 'the transcendent' is transcendent in relation to. This is the substance of an arcane Medieval text, The Periphyseon, composed by the scholar-monk John Scottus Eriugena in the middle of what we now call the Dark Ages.

Eriugena [lists] “five ways of interpreting” the manner in which things may be said to exist or not to exist. According to the first mode, things accessible to the senses and the intellect are said to exist, whereas anything which, “through the excellence of its nature”, transcends our faculties are said not to exist. According to this classification, God, because of his transcendence is said not to exist. He is “nothingness through excellence” (nihil per excellentiam).

The second mode of being and non-being is seen in the “orders and differences of created natures” (I.444a), whereby, if one level of nature is said to exist, those orders above or below it, are said not to exist:

For an affirmation concerning the lower (order) is a negation concerning the higher, and so too a negation concerning the lower (order) is an affirmation concerning the higher. ...

...This mode illustrates Eriugena’s original way of dissolving the traditional Neoplatonic hierarchy of being into a dialectic of affirmation and negation: to assert one level is to deny the others. In other words, a particular level may be affirmed to be real by those on a lower or on the same level, but the one above it is thought not to be real in the same way. If humans are thought to exist in a certain way, then angels do not exist in that way. — SEP

I don't expect this will be understood, but that's part of the point. The point being, a proper consideration of the question requires a grasp of an hierarchical ontology, that is, that there are levels and degrees of being and reality, which is the basis of the ancient mythology of the 'scala naturae' (also known as the great chain of being). This is why, in some of the contemporary materials I'm encountering an heirarchical ontology based on a revised neoplatonism is being considered. Vervaeke says one of the hallmarks of the modern mindset is a 'flat ontology' in which only sense-able existents are considered to be real. But seeing past that sense of what is real requires a completely different kind of understanding, not the accumulation of ever more facts about the dynamics of the Singularity.

(An amusing anecdote. It will be recalled that Georges Lemaître was both a Catholic priest and a cosmologist, and one of the original proponents of what is now called the 'big bang' theory. By the 1950's, when this idea had become somewhat grudgingly accepted by the scientific community, Pope Pius XII ventured the notion that Lemaître's theory might provide some validation of the doctrine of creation ex nihilo. According to a source that I read, which I can't now find, Lemaître was embarrased by this, and prevailed upon the Pope's scientific advisor to request His Holiness desist from making such remarks in future. As Wikipedia puts it 'in relation to Catholic teaching on the origin of the Universe, Lemaître viewed his theory as neutral with neither a connection nor a contradiction of the Faith; as a devoted Catholic priest, Lemaître was opposed to mixing science with religion although he held that the two fields were not in conflict'. I which such reticence were more common amongst those who wish to utilise 'scientific reasoning' to base anti-religious polemics.)

I am saying it is the thing which excites our senses — Bob Ross

The persistent error I see with this, is the idea that the ding an sich is a 'thing behind the thing', that it's 'the real thing' as opposed to 'the apparent thing'. And the reason why I think that's an error is that it attempts to take a perspective from which you're able to compare them, which, according to Kant, you can never do.

@Mww - do you concur?

Deutsch says 'our perceptions are at the end of a long chain of physical processes'. He then starts on how to explain the apparently-inexplicable 'wavefunction collapse' by saying we don't really know how we know anything except indirectly. He says 'mathematical theorems are determined by physics' and that 'Physics is a theory of the reality of the world' - ergo the world is physical. So he's completely committed to physicalism as a paradigm. Which is more or less what I said - he's committed to MWI because it obviates the need for the 'wavefunction collapse' which seems mysterious ('woo' in your language) and so, what needs to be avoided. He then accuses Copenhagen etc of 'leading to solipsism'. I think I'll leave it there, and thanks for your feedback.

The point is that the many worlds interpretation wants to deny the wavefunction collapse to preserve scientific realism. To this end it starts from the premise that every possible measurement outcome really occurs, although in the world we are in, we only see one of them. Is that not the case?

I know. That MWI fantasy is the cost of keeping realism. :party:

I'll refer to Phillip Ball, The Many Problems of Many Worlds.

What the MWI really denies is the existence of facts at all. It replaces them with an experience of pseudo-facts (we think that this happened, even though that happened too). In so doing, it eliminates any coherent notion of what we can experience, or have experienced, or are experiencing right now. We might reasonably wonder if there is any value — any meaning — in what remains, and whether the sacrifice has been worth it.


Every scientific theory (at least, I cannot think of an exception) is a formulation for explaining why things in the world are the way we perceive them to be. This assumption that a theory must recover our perceived reality is generally so obvious that it is unspoken. The theories of evolution or plate tectonics don’t have to include some element that says “you are here, observing this stuff”; we can take that for granted.

In the end, if you say everything is true (i.e. every possible outcome has happened), you have said nothing.

But the MWI refuses to grant it. Sure, it claims to explain why it looks as though “you” are here observing that the electron spin is up, not down. But actually it is not returning us to this fundamental ground truth at all. Properly conceived, it is saying that there are neither facts nor a you who observes them.

It says that our unique experience as individuals is not simply a bit imperfect, a bit unreliable and fuzzy, but is a complete illusion. If we really pursue that idea, rather than pretending that it gives us quantum siblings, we find ourselves unable to say anything about anything that can be considered a meaningful truth. We are not just suspended in language; we have denied language any agency. The MWI — if taken seriously — is unthinkable.

Its implications undermine a scientific description of the world far more seriously than do those of any of its rivals. The MWI tells you not to trust empiricism at all: Rather than imposing the observer on the scene, it destroys any credible account of what an observer can possibly be. Some Everettians insist that this is not a problem and that you should not be troubled by it. Perhaps you are not, but I am. — Phillip Ball

As I understand it - and I think I do understand it - the entire genesis of Everett's theory was the simple question: what if the wavefunction collapse doesn't occur? What would that entail?

According to an article in Scientific American, The Many Worlds of Hugh Everett (referring to a biography of him by that name).

Everett’s scientific journey began one night in 1954, he recounted two decades later, “after a slosh or two of sherry.” (Incidentally, he died an alcoholic and left instructions that his ashes be put our with the trash) He and his Princeton classmate Charles Misner and a visitor named Aage Petersen (then an assistant to Niels Bohr) were thinking up “ridiculous things about the implications of quantum mechanics.” During this session Everett had the basic idea behind the many-worlds theory, and in the weeks that followed he began developing it into a dissertation. ....

Everett addressed the measurement problem by merging the microscopic and macroscopic worlds. He made the observer an integral part of the system observed, introducing a universal wave function that links observers and objects as parts of a single quantum system. He described the macroscopic world quantum mechanically and thought of large objects as existing in quantum superpositions as well. Breaking with Bohr and Heisenberg, he dispensed with the need for the discontinuity of a wave-function collapse.

Everett’s radical new idea was to ask, What if the continuous evolution of a wave function is not interrupted by acts of measurement? What if the Schrödinger equation always applies and applies to everything—objects and observers alike? What if no elements of superpositions are ever banished from reality? What would such a world appear like to us?

Everett saw that under those assumptions, the wave function of an observer would, in effect, bifurcate at each interaction of the observer with a superposed object.

And what problem does this daring adventure in fantasy purportedly solve? Why, that would be the metaphysical issue implied by the so-called 'wavefunction collapse'. At the expense of avoiding the apparent 'woo factor' involved in the measurement problem, we simply declare that it doesn't. At a considerable cost.

I wonder what David Deutsche's (probably unconscious) metaphysical commitments are, such that he views anyone who questions MWI with about the same scorn Richard Dawkins saves for creationists. Of course, I know he's one of the Smartest People in the World, but still, I can't help but think that something is seriously amiss here.

Why thanks, kind of.

other entanglements. — Tom Storm

Your reading will instantly affect my state ;-)