I can't speak to original sin or if that's a real thing. But biology is just how energy changes forms. If a deity is limited you can't really be sure what options they have. I'm not even going to assume this god created us or started anything from scratch. — TiredThinker

Well, there are as many ways of regarding god/s as there are gods. So I'm not sure we can really say anything meaningful or coherent.

Do scientists have a gulf between theory and practice? — Art48

No idea. Probably. Science in theory is meant to help and enhance humanity and yet scientists everywhere are engaged in activities of death and destruction. From denying climate change to building and designing chemical and nuclear weapons. Is scientism another gulf between theory and practice. A case of theory overreach at the expense of truth?

Religion claims possession of the Truth (with a capital "T") but I'd say science respects the truth much more than religion. — Art48

I hear you, but some here might call that scientism. In what sense does science deal in truths? Religion deals in different truths - foundational meaning and morality. Science, as we all learn, can't give us an ought from an is.

I've been watching some videos of wildlife in Africa. An even bigger question for me is what kind of god/s design a world where suffering and blood lubricates everything in the world of animals and insects? They eat each other alive. They regularly die slowly and miserably and it's called survival. And animals are not part of original sin or a case of free choice unleashing evil. They were 'designed' to be predator and prey. They have no other options. Only a sick mind would conceive of such a thing.

:cool: :rofl:

The first thing that comes to mind would be that we or other conscious beings, have the potential to become gods in this world. — Caerulea-Lawrence

What does this mean? How might we become gods? What is your definition of a god in such a case?

When I didn't read the Bible every day, the intensity in my desire to find a quick solution dwindled. Instead, I could feel my sadness, pain, confusion and numbness. And since it was there, real, and actually spoke to me directly, I tried to listen more.
A few years later, as I was walking out from the Student library, I became aware of the wool that had been there, as I felt it evaporate. I could sense the cold, hostile space outside our atmosphere, and I felt alone and vulnerable. — Caerulea-Lawrence

Can you clarify this? The wool evaporated? Are you saying that the wool which had been pulled over your eyes by religion was removed and you saw clearly without religion?

Seems to me you are describing an emotional state, but how useful is this to understanding reality such as it is? Seems to me that confusion and vulnerability or, conversely, feelings of wellbeing and invulnerability are usually tied to beliefs and these beliefs need not be true.

Most Christians say they believe God commands us to love our enemies and forgive seventy times seven. Yet when 9/11 happened, I don't recall any Christian saying we should turn the other cheek. — Art48

And it was Islam, a religion of peace, that flew the planes into the buildings. I don't think any religion honors its tradition all that much. The gulf between theory and practice is one of the things which makes us human.

Learning how to die seems to be like becoming so ripe that one is willing to drop from the tree — green flag

Great line.

Is there not a place for articles like this, and pop philosophy in general?
Are they helpful or do they do more harm than good?
Was my initial reaction just an instance of snobbery, a kind of intellectual elitism?
Can it even be done better than the philosophers and spiritual leaders from which it derives? — Mikie

Some thinking and refection is better than none. I am bombarded by these sorts of articles every week - mainly by HR companies and my own HR and strategy team. Mindfulness comes up a lot, as does stoicism. I have yet to read anything I personally can use. Some of the management team enjoy these pieces, but they are people who do not read much and are not natural thinkers. Is snobbery or elitism always bad?

I recall a quote from Australian art critic Robert Hughes, a man of modernist, old-school inclinations.

“I am completely an elitist in the cultural but emphatically not the social sense. I prefer the good to the bad, the articulate to the mumbling, the aesthetically developed to the merely primitive, and full to partial consciousness. I love the spectacle of skill, whether it's an expert gardener at work or a good carpenter chopping dovetails. I don't think stupid or ill-read people are as good to be with as wise and fully literate ones. I would rather watch a great tennis player than a mediocre one, unless the latter is a friend or a relative

On the other hand, if Jesus is God, then of course his teachings are great and valuable, but we normal, weak, sinful human beings really can’t be faulted for not following such elevated and noble teachings. — Art48

I would think Jesus is even easier to ignore if he's just some eccentric, wandering teacher with an opinion.

Can you think of one religion which hasn't strayed from its original message, where teachings aren't ignored?

What problem are you trying to solve with this thought experiment? Which teachings of Jesus are true and which ones are ignored?

I’m merely asking you to entertain for a few minutes the idea that Jesus was just a normal human being who had some good teachings about how to live. — Art48

I have generally held that if Jesus did live at any point (and we know almost nothing about this character) he was a human being who had some myths develop around him, like so many others. It would be a brave person who can identify actual teachings.

But the oblivion one emerged from is the same as one enters on death. And as you didn't suffer before being born, I suspect you will not suffer in death. — Benj96

Indeed. For most of time we were all already dead...

Also injury, disease, and violence. — green flag

Yes!

The position of truth would depend on how you would define "truth". — Metaphysician Undercover

Sure. But my point wasn't about truth as such, it was about the nature and validity of science and empirical data, which surely has a compromised status if human senses are not able to apprehend reality.

If it walks like an idealist, and quacks like an idealist, then..... — Wayfarer

That's what I've been thinking. Do you suppose that perhaps Hoff is trying to avoid being too closely associated with traditional philosophy (idealism) and wants to focus on his scientific & maths credentials to help connect people to his model?

Nice. The twiddly maths lost me when I looked into this some time back.

I'm assuming the interface theory is the computer desktop icon metaphor?

Ok then I totally don't understand what is being argued. I'm not sure how science can lead to truth when Hoff says we are hardwired by evolution to be unable to recognise reality. Maybe at some point someone can set out 7 or 8 dot points summarising the gist of it. :wink:

Your wording is confusing to me. Are you just asking, if there were a god of this world, where there is prodigious suffering and good people also suffer, what qualities would this god have?

No idea.

This is a simple misunderstanding. MUI theory is not idealism. It does not claim that all that exists are conscious perceptions. It claims that our conscious perceptions need not resemble the objective world, whatever its nature is — Donald Hoffman

Ok. Thanks.

Yeah, sorry it's not clearer. So Conscious Realism takes as fundamental some entity - he posits a particular quantum wave in some places - that can "act" in response to some "experience" which brings about a change in the "world" - and notice here he is already making use of intentional language. — Banno

Not your fault. So really Hoff's thesis is as we already gleaned - reality isn't what humans see - there is a reality but it's not apprehendable to humans in its 'actual form'. Is this not a version of Kant's noumena, etc?

Ignoring death--not being afraid of it happening, of our losing life--can look like we are focusing on "life". We are "in the moment" and pursuing "feeling alive"--Derrida refers to this, I believe, as Presence. However, if you ask any psychotherapist they will tell you that we do not fear death so much as we fear life. — Antony Nickles

Nice. Yes I think fearing life is definitely the key problem that I see in my work. But fearing life is actually fearing things like decisions, rejection, responsibility, commitment and consequences, etc.

I've tended to find that most things said about life and death by philosophers and poets leave me cold.

That's very thorough and i appreciate it. I don't really have much chance of knowing if any of this is well argued or not - that's where our comrades who know philosophy and have time to read come in. How is Hoff a realist if he is a type of idealist who agrees 90% with Kastrup. Can you explain how this works?

he PDA loop looks like a formalisation of "response to stimulus", were an experience leads to an action. Is that really all that is involved in consciousness? — Banno

Does this not sound reductive?

The inclusion of "world" worried me at first, it seemed at first Hoffman was assuming the existence of reality. But it appears that what he has in mind here is an iterative process, where "world" is replaced not by space, time and such stuff of our common acquaintance, but with other PDA loops... Not sure what to make of that. — Banno

That sounds confusing.

Thanks. I thought it was referring to having 2 or 3 sock puppets on at once...

What I don’t get is the hatred for sock puppets. — 0 thru 9

Why do people create sock puppets? What are they for?

I read once that most people will habituate to a bell that rings periodically, but that some Buddhist monks do not; their brain waves show they hear each ring, as would be expected from someone who is paying attention to the present. — Art48

That is interesting. I live two doors down from a church which has an hourly clock tower bell. I never hear it going off. Never. Perhaps if I were a Buddhist it would drive me crazy...:wink:

If everything I experience is eventually forgotten and everything I accomplish is eventually gone, then what is the point of my life? — Art48

Yes, I think that summarises my understanding of how many people feel about death. I have the reverse reaction - if life is evanescent and everything is eventually forgotten, then the moment matters more. But I have never held a view that there is any 'point' to life other than the experience you're having now.

It’s often argued that all the achievements and struggles of life mean nothing if it all ends in blackness. How so? Aren’t the moments themselves worthwhile? Is eternity the only criterion of value? — Tom Storm

:up:

Where? I’m talking about worldwide. — Mikie

No idea, but I wonder to what extent people are interested in participating in public discourse any more. Apart from the social media tosspots.

Where’s our truly original thinkers? — Mikie

Original thinkers perhaps go elsewhere?

Nagel is still alive, and Charles Taylor and John Searle and Dan Dennett — Mikie

Hmm... it's not really Mount Rushmore is it?

In my opinion the last one died in ‘76. — Mikie

Heidegger or Ryle?

Apprecaite the feedback.

My criticism is that there are no philosophers — Mikie

I hadn't even thought of this possibility. Can you say some more?

What, exactly, is matter? Excitations of a field? — RogueAI

I had an excitation in a field with a farmer's daughter years ago and it did matter.

:up: Yep. I'm happy to be a fool.

You're right; parsimony is good, but how parsimonious can we be while still being comprehensive? Can you think of ways to collapse these categories further? — Janus

Good question. When I am on here I often find myself thinking that there are only two categories - honest interlocuters and dishonest ones. Now 'dishonest' might be a bit harsh. Perhaps it's more the case that some member's monomania can get in the way of a genuine exploration of the subject at hand. Perhaps in the end we are all either fools or dilettantes...

Ha! Sure. I generally prefer category lists with no more that 4 items and I took my cue from Tony Benn's account of the three types of politicians - straight men, madmen and fixers... I was thinking not so much about the school of thought, but how they interact ( foolishly, thoughtfully or through a labyrinth of theory). I think a phenomenologist, for instance, could be a theorist in some instances and a fool in others - depending upon approach and competence. A religionist might be a fool or a monomaniac. That kind of thing.

How would living people on Earth see death and killing from this point on? — Captain Homicide

The problem with afterlife speculations is that we fill them with what we are like here on earth. How do we know what being in the afterlife for eternity is like? Will it be cafes and side walks and Sunday dinners with Grandma? Will we slip into an afterlife with all the sensibilities (boredom thresholds, jealousies and preferences) we had in life? Will there be sex in the afterlife, or shopping, or walks to the river? I suspect our imagination about this subject needs energizing. If the afterlife is just us, as we are now, living for forever, then it's bound to be stultifying.

I can only boil it down to one thing:"our love to arrive to wise statements fuels our intellectual endeavors". I find it really simple and precise. — Nickolasgaspar

I don't disagree (how can I, when I have no real view on the matter?) but I'd like to explore this with you some more if that's ok.

Is not a 'wise statement' always measured or understood against some form of value system or worldview? How do you account for the perspectival nature of such values? What is wise for some may seem like a banal nothing to others. What does philosophy tell us about identifying the wise from the faux wise?

:pray: :up:

Bunge’s ten criticisms of philosophy — Art48

I saw this a few years ago and found it fairly conventional - most of what is said here would apply to any number of subjects taught at university. There's a famous quote - a piece of hyperbole by Theodore Sturgeon from the 1950's which nevertheless holds a truism - '90% of everything is crap.'

Daniel Dennett updated the quote 50 years later with - "90% of everything is crap. That is true, whether you are talking about physics, chemistry, evolutionary psychology, sociology, medicine – you name it – rock music, country western. 90% of everything is crap."

In other words, things are done badly... but I think we already knew this, which is why most of us are on the lookout for the gems amidst the dross.

And the reason for that is that the why is not something found in the world, but consists in what we do in the world. Meaning isn't found, it is constructed by us. — Banno

:up:

Food for thought. A rose by any other name?

That said, I’m still not dismissing Hoffman out of hand. I’ll try and finish more of the book. — Wayfarer

There may well be useful nuances and details in his position which have been overlooked in our commentary. Would you mind highlighting these if you find them?

Sorry - https://philosophynow.org/issues/154/An_Encounter_with_Radical_Darwinitis — Banno

That's great - thanks.

I have no knowledge of Spinoza but my mother was 'into' him. I should have listened more closely to her...

In these arguments I general factor out (or bracket) the question of whether or not the ideas correspond to reality. Partly because I lack the expertise to discern if this is the case and partly out of wanting to steel man arguments I don't fully understand. You probably did the same thing when you were studying philosophy. As someone outside of philosophy, who is an atheist, I find these accounts of idealism fascinating.

What is the nature of your sympathy with these ideas?