I believe I'm saying something of the sort when I say that the a-priori is part of reality.

This can be spoken about in the language of computational theories of brain or neuroscientific models or cognitive models.

I don't have an issue with your thinking here, I think @Mww may be trying to make the distinction between empirical and epistemological knowledge such that the world is something we can point to, something which is "publicly available".

He'll correct me.

but I would disagree that these “filters”, or any conceptions a priori, are part of reality.

Reality is best conceived as an empirical domain; real is best conceived as a rational quality. Separate accordingly, I should think. — Mww

Interesting. And I can see your motivations from framing it as you do, for it is elegant. But I think things become fuzzy quite quickly in the a-priori vs. empirical domain.

Let me put it quite trivially: if whatever the a priori is that we have (in other words, whatever mechanisms actually come into play when we experience the world) is not a part of reality as such, then we can't speak of reality at all.

In effect, as you would probably agree, we can't experience the world from "a view from nowhere".

Even though we cannot see it (we cant go behind our a-priori mechanisms and see them in action) I can't say they aren't part of reality. Actually I could well be wrong here, no false humility, but I don't see how these can be separated neatly.

In any case, always nice speaking to you.

Hey! Haven't seen you around in a while. Or it could be that I've been away. I have a question for you:

What say you regarding a-priori knowledge and its status in regards to reality?

I mean, we can only have a posteriori knowledge if we have a priori "filters", so the a priori must be part of reality. But perhaps I am thinking wrongly about this.

Understanding my experience of ther world most fundamentally, I don’t see enduring objects with measurable qualities , Isee a flowing stream of constantly changing events. — Joshs

:up:

Not bad at all. And fits in with almost any field of enquiry, which is promising.

It gets tricky, quickly.

We don't know if the beaver builds a dam with intent, maybe it does is automatically, the way a baby turtle races to the ocean as soon as its born.

A cell is way more sophisticated and complex than a particle. Would we say the cell has intent? Most would not.

I think I get your point or the gist of it. It might send you down the "wrong picture" of the world to think in terms of natural vs. artificial. I think speaking of complexity and sophistication make is somewhat easier.

So we can say a mountain pass is much less complex than a beaver. A beaver's damn is more complex than a mountain, but less than a beaver, as this creature consists of billions of particles plus all the relevant biological stuff, which is quite complex in itself.

Essentially yes.

Yeah, sure. We can also be the dream of God, or the tears of a cosmic turtle or anything else. You've stipulated that there's no organic life, contrary to what we now know.

There may be places in which non-organic life exists. This just complicates things uneasily. I think it is more simple and straightforward to acknowledge that we are part of nature.

Anything else could be the case, but we are just adding unnecessary complications.

Yeah.

I don't even understand what an alternative to "natural" means. By "natural" I mean belonging to nature,
not meaning reducing everything to science, just to avoid that misunderstanding.

"Nature" is a pretty abstract term. I am not convinced the mind is part of the so called material world. — Yohan

Sure. But mind is too. Unless you assert that consciousness is only mind or exhausts the mental. If there is more to mind than experience, then mind is a broad term too.

Brains being physical and/or being the source of minds is, to me, questionable. I believe intelligence produces the appearance of so called matter, rather than the reverse. — Yohan

Produces the appearance of matter as opposed to what other appearance? It's not as if there is mind in one ontological basket and matter in another.

That is a serious flaw we continue to have regarding our intuitions: that of thinking we know what "physical stuff" encapsulates or even "mental stuff" for that matter.

Why isn't the mental natural? The mind is a part of nature.

The mental being immaterial is questionable. It arises out of brains, which are physical systems. Physical stuff is at bottom, quite insubstantial. But we still call it physical. And physical stuff is natural stuff.

Artificial things are modifications of things found in nature. Therefore, artificial things are natural things too, only that we intervened in bringing them about. But not by using some process outside of nature.

Natural explanations are those explanations that give some insight into how the world works via theoretical constructions. But far from everything can be explained theoretically, despite talk of "political theory" or "economic theory". That's another story.

Yes. Even our brains are models spun up by our experience, so it is counter-intuitive.

Believing that the ocean is blue can be said in an epistemology discussion, but like you said, it's too trivial. And it shows the impreciseness of the word "belief".

I think "understand" is a slightly better word.

This is the only Pynchon novel I've "withstood" long enough to finish. Enjoyed it though. At the time, I was also reading William Gass' The Tunnel which I very much preferred. Ever read David Markson's "novels"? If not, I highly recommend Wittgenstein's Mistress (and Springer's Progress too). :up: — 180 Proof

I couldn't finish The Tunnel when I first tried. Wasn't in to it back then, am going to have to give it another shot.

Yep, Markson's Wittgenstein's Mistress is great. Will check out Springer's Progress, that I have not seen.

Thanks!

That's the best way to read novels.

There are whole guidebooks for GR. Once it gets going it's crazy: characters appearing left and right, changes in prose from paranoiac to authoritative to funny all in a few pages. You have to be determined to finish the book, at least that's how I read it.

Mason & Dixon, on the other hand, took him something like 25 years to write, to get the language right and the like, it reads beautifully - a total mastery of the English language. But it's also very hard.

IJ is curious. Obviously Wallace could write very well, but I think he was much better in his non-fiction essays by a lot. The end notes did not enhance the experience for me.

Since this is a philosophy forum, you might want to check out Novel Explosives by Jim Gauer, it is amazing. Better than GR, imo. I have to do PR for that book, since you mentioned these two novels. ;)

I also want to try those big difficult American classics, Infinite Jest and Gravity's Rainbow. Until now, just as the thought of being stuck in an upper class manners-infested house for a whole book has put me off Jane Austen, so getting bogged down in anything to do with tennis has put me off Infinite Jest. Maybe it's because I myself was a promising tennis athlete for a short time in my adolescence, before throwing it all away. — jamalrob

It varies. Gravity's Rainbow is quite difficult. You need to be able to withstand not understanding almost anything for 240 pages, then it takes off for a good while. But the last 100-ish pages go back to obscurity. It was quite a feat finishing that. Feels like an accomplishment. But at least most things you read afterward become easy or they cease to intimidate. A unique experience, no doubt about that.

Infinite Jest, on the other hand, is much easier to read and has some creative and fun moments. But the endnotes killed me. Sure, you can skip them if you wish, but then I felt like I was cheating the book. But going back and forth all the time just became a total slog. And I wasn't enjoying it, not because it was hard, but because it was unrewarding despite some nice pages and passages. Stopped at p.400.

But some people swear on this book.

You don't know what the people who post on here do or do not do regarding the global warming issue. You also don't know how many people who don't themselves contribute read and and are influenced by what they read on this site. :roll: — Janus

:up:

Exactly.

Assuming the attitude you are replying to also tends to imply that we shouldn't really talk about anything, we're only here to kill time.

So why talk about climate change or war or the foundations of reality or knowledge or anything else? Any talk is as good as any other.

And most people browse, not posting anything.

Ducks, Newsburyport by Lucy Ellmann

Fundamentals: Ten Keys to Reality by Frank Wilczek

It's a problematic word as it is honorific in English. Like you can say there is the real deal or the real truth or even the real news.

This doesn't mean there are two different kinds of deals, truths or news. We are emphasizing something in these cases.

Would you want to exclude fictional entities from reality? Why? Fictional entities play an important role for people all over the world, so they have a kind of reality to them. Also, nature is colourless, odorless and so forth. These aspects are things we add to the stuff of nature. Yet we would not want to say that a flower is a colourless, odorless thing. So, things quickly become insurmountable.

Given these considerations, I don't think you can give a definition of "reality". All you can do is to say which aspects of reality are those which you are interested in clarifying.

Yes. Technically we can agree that we take it to the case that the ocean appears blue to us under certain conditions - not at night, for instance.

I only caution against succumbing to skepticism or skeptical arguments too frequently. Skepticism cannot be refuted. It need be acknowledged and moved on from, otherwise we will have to seriously entertain solipsism or other fruitless avenues, such as thinking that every instance of perception, we may be misperceiving everything.

We wouldn't move our fingers, much less our legs, if such were the case.

It would be better to rely on using belief too much (not never), due to its religious connotations.

It's a curious word. In other languages, there are no good translations as it is almost always attached to religious aspects of the world. At least in Spanish, this is the case and a few others.

For instance, you can say you believe in angels or God, but if you literally say, I believe the ocean is blue, something is off because belief doesn't enter into it. You understand the ocean is blue, you see it. It's not an issue of belief.

This might be one of those words that gets you stuck in a fly bottle.

I changed it today, funnily enough. Yeah, life feels like that often enough Sisyphean. But to go to anti-natalism to these extremes seems to me to color one's vison in a way that fundamentally distorts everything.

Sounds like a plan. :ok:

It's not necessarily a diversion. My point is survival and the limitations of being humans in a world, make it a non-starter that one can change the game. Transhumanism, or whatever utopia, just doesn't seem to come about any time soon, if at all. — schopenhauer1

Perhaps. It's plausible. I wouldn't hold my breathe for transhumanism. It's a noble goal. But I think they think science is like I don't know God or something. They tremendously exaggerate what we have achieved and have very confused notions of "uploading minds", that fall apart easily, I think.

But you didn't answer the question at hand which was about what you liking the game has to do with bringing more people into the game. Can't we be creative enough not to assume what others should want in such a drastic way? — schopenhauer1

You and I can, because we don't want children. You, because you are an AN. Me, because, I don't like them.

But it's a natural instinct in people. Like creativity or looking for patterns in nature or wanting company or doing something meaningful. Look, ask most teens (assuming they don't have severe mental deficiencies) if they want to live life even if life WILL include death, loss, frustration and anything you can think of. Most will say yes, they're grateful for being in the game.

You can call it delusion if you want. I call it life. But if life IS suffering, then what are we discussing here? We'll go back to you saying people are forcing others to play the game, whereas I'll reply by saying most people don't think life is "forced" on them. Granted, some do, like you, but you're an exception. Which is fine.

I have before discussed what might be deemed as "intrinsic goods". — schopenhauer1

If you can provide a link or point me to a thread, I'd look at it.

You're good! :blush: — Ozymandy

Thank you.

And welcome to the forums. May you have fun and share ideas.

:chin:

Looking forward to your eventual reply, once your done cogitating for a while. :)

I don't disagree with this, but no one has found a better way. The closest thing in a kind of scale that was massive were communist revolutions which just led to more suffering. I just think Chernobyl, Stalin, Mao, and the rest. The game is the game. One cannot escape the game. — schopenhauer1

We can play this game. I think it is evident that there is no single capitalist society which exists in the world. Same with communism. As stated by Smith and Marx and later developed by different figures, such societies could not exist.

There are examples of real democracies like the Kibbutz in Israel, or the Spanish Civil War in which people decided to work affairs out for themselves, free of "Gods and masters". Orwell speaks about this insightfully in Homage to Catalonia.

But this would be a diversion from the main point, I suspect.

And collateral damage? Why does "missed happiness" matter (if no one exists to miss it)? What are people creating more people for? If you are alive.. Be HAPPY without forcing others into the game. Why must YOUR HAPPINESS be contingent on ANOTHER PLAYER? — schopenhauer1

You are assuming by default that suffering is the end-point, be all of life. So If I tell you, where am I harming anybody by listening to a song or reading a novel? You can always say, they suffered tremendously to create such works, as they were based on frustration, sweat, disappointment, etc.

I don't think you can neatly and easily separate acts based on purity, as in this one activity involves no suffering at all. Or conversely, that this suffering can lead to happiness at the end of the process. I just say, that if you ask a random person if they would like to live life, they'd say yes. It's a miracle to be alive, given the available evidence.

But you think it's a curse. I don't think people think like this and I don't think they're deluded. You can say life is suffering. Sure. You can say life is a miracle. Yes as well. It's not a zero sum game.

Yet, if people are individuals and are not some Borg (group-mind), why should your happiness be contingent on someone else playing the game? Are we not creative enough not to involve another person having to play the game? — schopenhauer1

I don't plan on having kids, not because of AN, I just think the cost of having them outweighs the benefits they provide, including love and care as well as suffering.

I do agree that we should not put our satisfaction solely on other people. We live and die our own lives. But I think social contact is necessary for everybody, even if it entails suffering.

Try writing one post focusing on the good things in life, unironically. It would be interesting to see. Cause I get the impression you would not be able to. Prove me wrong.

Ah cool. I will take a look. Thanks. :up:

All these particle paths and interactions later constitute space. Space is that what allows all these particle trajectories. But these paths don't constitute space. — Ozymandy

Very interesting.

For my benefit, permit me to re-formulate this: So the particles move in all trajectories in these paths, these paths later constitute space, at the end of a process.

Space is what allows or permits these processes happening. So would the fields be space itself or would they be what is involved in the paths particles take?

In other words, are fields the process by which particles move in all directions, or are fields more fundamental than that?

In some of the pop-physics books I've read, people like Sean Carroll, Carlo Rovelli, Art Hobson and the like, they tend to say that a field is kind of like a space, not unlike when we think of a field ordinarily, but we abstract away all the phenomenal qualities we tend to associate with them (greenness, grass, sand, whatever).

What that image presents is a kind of curved loop area. Or am I misinterpreting the image?

I thought the whole chaos theory business began with someone trying to predict weather patterns, which a priori, looks easy enough, but turned out to be rather tricky.

But if "chaos" is what has defied explanation so far, then that's fine, though it suffers from the unjustified claim you mention.

I don't understand why it's called a theory though.

Chaos Theory.

"Chaos" is the materialist's Woo of the gaps. — Yohan

With what I've seen, it doesn't seem to lead anywhere. And I don't understand what the "theory" is supposed to be.

Would like to know. And suspect you are right.

As with many things AN, this assumes what it's trying to prove, by making suffering the end point of everything. Suffering is a part of everything, but far from the only component. Even from a pessimistic perspective one can speak of boredom, pointlessness, drudgery, repetitiveness, fear, etc., etc.

You can stipulate than all the mentioned emotions are suffering, whereas I could counter and say that they're actually not suffering but pointlessness or anything else.

Given these assumptions then by definition you are forced to play, can go broke, live a miserable life, have a devil for a boss and on and on.

A more productive way to proceed would not be condemn, full stop, those who "force" you to play, but to try to involve yourself in situations in which solutions can be brought to the fore which alleviates the suffering of those alive, which is what matters.

Of course, these always leave out or marginalize (quite severely) pleasure, joy, challenge, discovery, laughter, fun, amazement, love, music and everything that's good in life.

I think it's an empirical point you ask most people, and they love life, they want to continue living or want a better life. It may be self-deception, but I don't think that matters.

Again, I have sympathies for existential pessimism and even pointlessness, but not AN. These AN arguments aren't convincing for a reason: they're not true for most people.

Depends on what philosophy you have in mind. If it is limited to academic philosophy on mind or linguistics, then almost nothing carries over to urgency.

If you include ethical matters, as well as "big picture" thinking, then it is urgent. How, concretely? We can ask is it OK to destroy vast swaths of life just because we want to continue "growing" the economy? We all know infinite growth is not possible.

Maybe we can ask, what does it say about the only known self-reflective creature in the universe, that it is willing to, consciously, destroy the prospects of life in the very near future? Maybe self reflective creatures are not a good thing for nature, even if "she" doesn't care.

There's also plenty of work to do when it comes to clarifying word use ("freedom", "choice", "family values", "inclusivity", "community", etc., etc., etc.). Virtually every political speech you here is ripe for philosophy of language.

And on and on and on.

It's only that, all these things aren't limited to philosophers by any means.

OK about the mind, but do you need intuition or even thinking to just observe your body and be aware of the fact that you have a body and of your body itself? — Alkis Piskas

Probably. But it's hard to say with much confidence.

What is important is that there is a possibility they actually believe there's a spirit which is connected to a body. Isn't that right? — Alkis Piskas

They may actually believe that. I don't see any reason to suppose it's true. As to why it is important, that would be connected with how much comfort or solace this gives each person. But beyond that, I don't see any substantial issue, unless someone wants to speak of dualism, which is fine.

I'm not understanding. I'm saying matter can be conscious: we are conscious matter. Matter has inherently as a potential of (by way of a specific configuration) giving rise to experience.

So if it's already a potential in matter, why postulate something "extra"?

If I'm honest I'd say I don't know.

Then again why should anything in the universe be able to think at all? It seems to be the case that for the overwhelming majority of the universe's history, there was zero thinking of any kind. And then, in a fraction of a second, there is thought.

So, the only thing I can say, other than I don't really know, is that physical stuff has exquisite malleability given certain parameters.

I said I do not think it's a fact. You can speak of you eating atoms, or seeing them, or feeling them. That's a particular from of description.

You could also say that your are eating and feeling cells as well. Or even the quantum vacuum, which as far as is known, is the the deepest thing postulated in physics that I'm aware of.

I don't think my nails are conscious, nor my stomach, nor most of my body unless something hurts or tickles.

I think physical stuff is all there is. Including thoughts, imagination, etc. If certain configurations of physical stuff lead to mind, then physical stuff is richer than we initially think.

I don't think it's a fact, it's a belief. You cannot show that atoms are conscious or experience something minimal. They may or they may not.

How to solve the so called hard problem? I don't think it has a solution. Like many other issues, it'll remain a problem.

Do you mean how the body and organism works? — Alkis Piskas

No, I mean I have in mind our ordinary commonsense intuitions in which we think of ourselves as having a mind and a body. This includes the current perspective in which a woman isn't her body or the idea that he hurt his body (but not his mind), etc.

This subject brings in something else quite interesting: While persons are alive people believe that they are bodies and treat them as such, but after they die, and their body is burried or cremated, they believe that they continue to "live" and exist somewhere (as spirits, souls, etc.)? Do you think that this has someting to tell us? — Alkis Piskas

This is very closely related to one's beliefs. If someone is religious, they may think that. Heck, even a non-believer (like me) thinks about X as if they were somewhere. But this is a way of coping and behaving, it's not as if I think they are anywhere once they're gone. Much like I don't think a person is anywhere before they are born.

So I don't think this tells us much outside a persons' belief.



I believe I was quoting Alkis Piskas there, not my own words. Panpsychism is an interesting view, I don't think it's correct, but it's worth thinking about and pursuing.

I am coming more and more to the conclusion that we simply cannot shake off the folk-psychological idea of matter as "dead an stupid". But I think matter is way, way richer than our initial intuitions may say about it.

So "pure matter" includes thoughts, desires, wishes, dreams, visions, etc., etc. Quite a fascinating phenomenon, it seems to me.

Someone asked a similar question, so I'm repeating myself but I think the following book is quite good and covers a lot of territory:

Mental Reality by Galen Strawson