In my Enformationism thesis, Generic Information is all four of Aristotle's causes. As the "First Cause", it's the program that astrophysicists call The Singularity, which existed in the mind of the Programmer. As the "Formal Cause", it's the patterns of Information that our senses interpret as material objects. As the "Material Cause", it's the ordinary matter that physicists measure in terms of Mass, which is a mental Quality. As the "Efficient Cause", it's the energy that causes all change in our evolving world. As the "Final Cause", it's the Intention of the Cosmic Programmer, who established the purpose of the evolutionary program.Is your "formal cause" in the mind (Kant) or somehow simultaneously in the mind AND in matter (Hegel)? I think this is pertinent to your position since I can't see how information can exist when no minds are around. — Gregory
Did you infer from my comments in the last post that I think Matter is unreal? Not so. As far as I know, the material world is what sentient beings know as reality. But human beings are also capable of imagining Ideality (e.g. Plato's Ideal Forms). That's why some of us get those categories confused --- providing philosophers with fertile fodder to chew on. It's the age-old Subjective / Objective dilemma.I don't see how someone can have sex without believing in the reality of matter. — Gregory
If you are interested, I can link you to several blog posts that illustrate how Formal, Material, Energetic, and Final Causes can be traced back to a single First Cause. The EnFormAction definition below gives a brief overview of the various stages of Causes & Effects in the material & mental aspects of the Real World.You listed 5 causes ( adding first causality, which wasn't Aristotle's) but I can't see how in your thesis there can be a difference between formal, material, and energetic causality. — Gregory
As a former Catholic, you might appreciate my blog review of philosopher Edward Feser's recent book : Aristotle's Revenge : The Metaphysical Foundations of Physical and Biological Science. He is a Catholic, but not a theologian. Instead of arguing religious dogma, he attempts to show that “Aristotelian metaphysics is not only compatible with modern science, but is implicitly presupposed by modern science.” Consequently, he discusses some of the same topics that have come-up in this thread. A primary Aristotelian distinction that is relevant to Physics, is his definition of Actual & Potential. For example, what physicists call "Virtual Particles" popping into & out of existence in a quantum foam, I would label them as Potential Particles that are actualized by inputs of Creative Energy : what I call En-Formation, or EnFormAction. :nerd:The bothand blog is yours? I'm definitely into this stuff. — Gregory
In my Enformationism thesis, the mysterious Enformer of our evolving world is presented in the metaphor of a Programmer. So, the First Cause could be understood as the pre-Big-Bang-Singularity, imagined as the core or kernel of an evolutionary program, containing all necessary information to "calculate" Energy, Matter, & Mind. Then, the Final Cause, would be the Programmer's intention, encoded as an ultimate question to be solved by running the program. In this analogy, all components of the evolutionary program are various forms of Generic Information, which I call EnFormAction. :smile:A lot of people say Aristotle understood the First Cause only as subsumed by the Final Cause which moves the universe towards It by being in the infinite future. — Gregory
Some philosophers do use the negative term "illusion" to describe our subjective Mental Model of the objective real world. But, I prefer to use the more positive terms "model" or "symbol" or "icon" , based on cognitive psychologist Donald Hoffman's analogy with a computer screen : "He uses the modern metaphor of computers that we “interface” (interact) with, as-if the symbolic Icons on the display screen are the actual things we want to act upon." All of these analogies & metaphors are merely updates to ancient notions of Reality, using examples from modern science. His theory is on the leading fringe of mind science, but the book is worth the price. Check it out. :cool:Subjective idealism? I've always thought this meant the world is illusion. — Gregory
Because Einstein said so. :wink:As Hume would say, how do we know mass warps space-time? — Gregory
You won't really understand the Enformationism worldview, until you've actually read the thesis, as summarized here : http://enformationism.info/enformationism.info/page11.htmlI feel like maybe the idea of reality as energy+information is vague and doesn't explain well what being is. — Gregory
What "flaw" are you referring to? Are you arguing against Einstein? Are you saying that we don't know anything about space & time? Physicists have various theories & opinions about space & time. ButI see a flaw here perhaps. General relativity shows clocks slow down, not time. As Sean Carrol admitted "we don't even know what time is." — Gregory
In physics, every human observer has a unique frame of reference, and it's always looking at the universe from the inside. Physicists always have to take into account their own movement, when they try to understand the movement of other things, including Time. But in Einstein's Block Time, which I call the "Ice Cube Universe", the only meaningful reference frame is the view from outside the universe. Which is either in the imagination of a physicist, or from the perspective of G*D. In the Enformationism thesis, the only non-moving reference point is wherever the "Unmoved Mover" is. :halo:There is no reference phrame because everything is moving even space and space's space. Does motions objects mean the same thing as the energy-information union? — Gregory
What's your point? That modern physics is non-sense? Admittedly, Quantum Physics seems pretty weird, from the common-sense perspective of the man-on-the-street. Yet, it makes sense to me, but only from an Enformationism perspective -- a model of reality in which everything is a form of Information.I don't think General Relativity stands without a good psychological and philosophical foundation, which thinkers like Hegel and Peirce might be able to provide. Common sense is not a clear set of rules,and let us take the example of a first look into a mirror. Would you instantly intuite that the reflection was an accurate one of you?Or would you have to have someone else look at your reflection and confirm it's accuracy? We can't abandon all our common sense or we get to the point where only numbers are being crunched and no understanding of what is going on is found. It's bad enough in the quantum world, but confusion about the classical world is real too — Gregory
Yes. The topic of this thread is "On Physics". But, since it's a philosophical forum, the weirdness of Quantum Physics falls under the heading of Meta-Physics. That's because the mystery is in the mind of the observer. The real world keeps-on-keeping-on whether we can make sense of Quantum Queerness or not. That's why several of the pioneers of QT, turned to Eastern Philosophy, in search of a different perspective. Classical Physics was pretty straightforward, and Euclidean Geometry was quite linear. But non-classical physics, and non-linear math have revealed some strange aspects of the real world. Remember, that Pythagoras was a geometer and a mystic. So, maybe there's nothing new in the world. :cool:This thread has become a little weird. But so are parts of physics. And math. :worry: — jgill
In my worldview, there is only one thing : Information. Which takes on the form of Matter, Energy & Mind. But, to call Consciousness "nothingness" is to trivialize the only thing we know for sure in this world (Descartes).There are two things, matter and consciousness. As I see it consciousness is ultimately nothingness. It is just experience (experience from matter). Matter comes in different forms but it all has the same principle. Einstein said a lot about how people would view things in so in so situations but you need psychology, not just physics thought experiments, to validate all this — Gregory
Please do! I can't "validate" a radical new worldview in a forum post.Positing information as having Being needs much elaboration. I will try to get to all these links you are putting out for us to read — Gregory
No! You are getting ahead of your understanding of the Enformationism worldview. Since the reach of Science ends at the Big Bang, I have no information about any properties or qualities the Programmer might have, beyond those that are logically necessary for the First Cause to have the real world effects that we observe. Since our best human thinkers can't agree on whether their fellows have freewill, I'm not going to pretend to know whether the "Creator" had any choice in He/r little hobby. But, I can't imagine what kind of power could limit the creativity of a world creator. :joke:So the "Creator" has no free will? That's Spinoza's opinion too — Gregory
No! I don't view the Real World as an "illusion", in the sense that the Buddha meant it. I do however, accept Donald Hoffman's Evolutionary Argument Against Reality. :smile:You seem to however tend towards seeing the world as Maya, which I don't believe. — Gregory
Apparently, Feser's Aristotelian definition of Matter (hylemorphism) differs from your understanding, based on modern physics (E=MC^2). But, Aristotle's definition was Meta-Physical, not Physical. Remember, he was laying the foundation for modern science almost 2500 years ago. But his book on Physics, is almost completely useless now, for modern scientific purposes. However, his second book, Meta-Physics is still relevant for modern philosophical discussions, because we continue to use the conceptual terminology he established.1) Feser believes that objects are composed of both a quasi-spiritual "form" and a "prime matter" that is so purely potential that "God" didn't even create it properly speaking. I've talked to Feser. He doesn't really understand what matter is. Descartes tried to point all this out to Aristotelians but calling matter "extension" is not precise enough on the other hand — Gregory
Some physicists accept the Block Time worldview, which can only be observed from a privileged perspective outside of the universe. Yet, some can't accept any concept of matter that implies a God, whether Spinozan "Substance" or Mosaic "Creator". What's important is how you are able to reconcile Einstein's Relativity with our commonsense notion of sequential Time. Personally, I think Block Time is essentially Eternity, which is only "real" for an observer outside of space-time, and is "ideal" for humans. :halo:2) Einstein had a vague notion of a Spinozian God who had the absolute reference frame. Latter physicists dismiss this and say there is no absolute reference frame, but I wonder how they keep matter as matter in that case — Gregory
Do you realize that you can never actually touch a material object? That's because your atoms and those in the object repel each other, so that they maintain a minimum distance. But your nerves interpret that resistance as palpable pressure. That quantum gap is also why Enformationism is so hard for most people to wrap their minds around. But, so is Quantum Theory. Both are non-sensical to common-sense. That's why philosophers have to learn to think outside the box. :smile:3) putting information as the substrate of matter seems to misunderstand matter's palpability. But again, I will get back to you on that — Gregory
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