science is backing away from naive realism to understand the world of abstract quantification. Epistemic method replaces ontic claims about what is "really out there".
To suggest information or entropy are then "the real thing in itself" is to completely misrepresent the scientific enterprise. They are not new terms for substantial being. They are part of the journey away from that kind of naive realism which deals in matter or mind as the essential qualitative categories of nature. — apokrisis
Yes. "To Conflate" means to combine two or more separate things into one concept. That's the job description of philosophical inference and holistic thinking. In this case, abstract mathematical information combined with concrete "ontic" entities into a unique unified cosmology : physics + metaphysics. Or, in other words, Energy into Matter into Mind into Weltanshauung. And that is what cutting edge Quantum theories are pointing to. Not directly, but implicitly, so someone has to do the conflation. And the Enformationism thesis combines lots of those implications into the inference : that Generic (causal) information (power to enform) is equivalent to Energy, which transforms into Matter, and eventually emerges in complex entities as Mind*1.But you now jump from a point about Shannon's definition of a bit to this guff about "meaningful mind-stuff". You conflate a mathematical claim – the epistemology of a model – with this ontic assumption about "the mind" being this kind of physically general "stuff" that has the intrinsic property of being meaningful – of having "sensory" qualities such as feelings and impressions. — apokrisis
Being, as the original impetus of philosophical reflection, is actually "consciousness of the unity of being" - i.e. abstraction, what is common to all beings across all modalities of being. — Pantagruel
I’m curious if you’re familiar with the work of any of the so-called ‘New Materialists’, such as physicist and feminist philosopher Karen Barad, and what you think of them. — Joshs
"To Conflate" means to combine two or more separate things into one concept. That's the job description of philosophical inference and holistic thinking. — Gnomon
And the Enformationism thesis combines lots of those implications into the inference : that Generic (causal) information (power to enform) is equivalent to Energy, which transforms into Matter, and eventually emerges in complex entities as Mind* — Gnomon
For example, a human brain is a complex integrated system of neural & supportive cells, that are not in themselves conscious. But working together, they produce the ontic phenomenon that we call "Awareness" or "Aboutness". — Gnomon
I didn't intend to get into a technical argument about Dialectics or Biosemiotics or Triadics. I have no expertise in those arcane fields. Following your example though, I could accuse you of "hand-waving" or babbling, due to the use of technical terminology that I am not familiar with : "You have to dichotomise and discover how this then leads to a self-stabilising asymmetry". Do I really "have to"?It definitely isn’t. Holism is about the triadic story of the unity of opposites. Dialectics. You have to break a symmetry and discover its new equilibrium balance. You have to dichotomise and discover how this then leads to a self-stabilising asymmetry - a world where thesis and antithesis can persist as balanced synthesis. . . . .
All a bunch of hand-waving glued together by the causal placeholder of “emergence”. — apokrisis
In philosophy, energy cannot be the fundamental existent as it is not a thing.Here's a brief sample of personal opinions from individual scientists saying that Energy is the fundamental principle of the universe*2. — Gnomon
In philosophy, energy cannot be the fundamental existent as it is not a thing. — L'éléphant
Assumption can be dangerous. Think deeper. Is energy a cause of ideas? I refer you to Aristotle's 4 causes.Perhaps I wasn’t clear, ideas itself require no energy themselves to be elucidated or thought yet…there must be something producing then…could that not be some type of energy? — simplyG
No. Inches & miles are conventional measures of space, not space itself.↪Gnomon
When you say that energy is the fundamental thing in the universe, it is like saying inches or miles is the fundamental thing in the universe. — L'éléphant
Yes, but for metaphysical (mental) questions, I prefer to use the more philosophical term "Cause" instead of the scientific notion of "Energy". While related, they are not the same thing. :smile:Metaphysicaly speaking of course conscious effort to think is that not energy in some form or something else entirely? — simplyG
Plato and Aristotle used the term "First Cause" to explain, without hard evidence, what causes a physical cause in the world. Apparently they simply traced the chain of causation back to a hypothetical Uncaused Cause or Unmoved Mover. So yes, the First Cause must be self-caused or self-existent. But that sounds like a God, so it will be knee-jerked as blasphemous to the Materialist/Physicalist belief system, in which the world "just is", without further philosophical conjecture. Perhaps such a metaphysical notion "comes from your unconscious", but for the Greek philosophers it was supposed to come from the conscious exercise of Reason/Logic. :smile:Cause? But what causes a cause ? I can only assume it’s self caused and material as per Aristotle though an an unconscious one. Not too sure about this though from a metaphysical perspective because I’m making an assumption that it comes from my unconscious somewhere… — simplyG
An great idea there. You have nicely tied up ontology with epistemology. Which makes perfect sense as you can’t have one without the other, especially to the grander idea of meta verse. — simplyG
How so? Energy is not a cause.But as was made clear by the four causes, 4 is the perfect answer here. — simplyG
Energy is a measure of capacity, not the thing it is measuring. It is not a cause. It cannot be a cause. It is also not a thing that exists as if it has a categorical substance. Please define "energy". If energy exists, it's because there are things!Inches & miles are conventional measures of space, not space itself. — Gnomon
I suppose you are restricting the term "cause" to some particular traditional definition. But and Gnomon are simply including a modern term from physics in the ancient notion of "causation". Because, as you say, it's not a physical thing, most attempts to define what-Energy-is are quite vague : ability, capacity, etc. Plato & Aristotle were forced to use gods or other metaphors to define their notion of Causation. Even the Wiki definition below sounds a bit mysterious or ghostly*1.But as was made clear by the four causes, 4 is the perfect answer here. — simplyG
How so? Energy is not a cause.
Inches & miles are conventional measures of space, not space itself. — Gnomon
Energy is a measure of capacity, not the thing it is measuring. It is not a cause. It cannot be a cause. It is also not a thing that exists as if it has a categorical substance. Please define "energy". If energy exists, it's because there are things! — L'éléphant
How else are you defining it then?I suppose you are restricting the term "cause" to some particular traditional definition. — Gnomon
Then it fails to be a thing (being a thing would qualify it as a candidate for the fundamental reality or existent.But it's now clear that Energy does not have a material existence. Instead, it is merely a (mathematical??) relationship between things*2 — Gnomon
That's for you to explain in this thread. I'm waiting for an explanation as to why it is a cause, and why it is fundamental.If the ability or capacity or power or force that we refer to as Energy is not a Cause, what is it? Isn't Causation what Energy does? — Gnomon
If it's relative, then it cannot be a cause. It's also contradictory to "conserved".Energy is relative, but what's interesting that for any observer, it's always conserved. — Gnomon
In philosophy, energy cannot be the fundamental existent as it is not a thing. — L'éléphant
I was hoping you would tell me where you got the idea of Causation without Energy : "Energy is not a cause". Philosopher David Hume discussed the mysteries of Causation at a time before scientists had pieced together our modern notion of Energy. He referred to the producer of causation as an "illusion"*1, but Einstein might say it is a "stubborn illusion", that there is some kind of physical "connection" between Cause & Effect*2. Now we know that Energy is physical only as a subjective inference by Physicists, not an objective observation of a material substance flowing from one to the other.I suppose you are restricting the term "cause" to some particular traditional definition. — Gnomon
How else are you defining it then? — L'éléphant
Incidentally the definition of energy is 'the capacity to do work'. — Wayfarer
Apparently, the status of Energy is still debated by physicists. For example a mathematician might assert that "Energy is a derived quantity, not a fundamental one." Yet, a Physicist might insist that "Both force and energy are concepts which are frame-dependent". As a mathematical equation or physical formulation --- E=MC^2 --- that relativity might be true. But derived from what? Perhaps our physical notion of Energy is derived from observations of actual Causation. Which is still not a material thing, but the implicit invisible directional process underlying physical change.Really? I had the idea that since e=mc2 that energy - which is interchangeable with matter through said equation - was THE fundamental existent. — Wayfarer
In other words, we're talking either about hypothetical explanations for physical systems¹ or about categorical interpretations² of those explanations, respectively; the latter (metaphysics) says nothing about the objects¹ of the former (physics) but only about how to construct² a 'coherent, presuppositional / systematic synopsis' of the former. Any attempt to say 'more than physics about phusis' rather than 'generalizing from² physics about phusis' is pseudo-physics (woo) rather than metaphysics (reason). Like all X-of-the-gaps fiats (& other crackpottery), Gnomon, your so-called "Enformer" does not solve any problem in fundamental physics or cosmology and, in philosophy, merely substitutes an unknowable for a known unknown, which via infinite regress, only begs the question (Why is there anything at all? "Because the Enformer enforms all". :roll: :shade: :sweat:)... we may need to specify whether we are talking about Physics (science ;energy[experimental transformations]) or about Meta-Physics (philosophy;enformation[reflective interpretations]). — Gnomon
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