My thesis of EnFormAction does exist "within the material world", because the observer lives in the world of tangible material objects and invisible physical forces. But I think your interpretation of the thesis is influenced by the materialistic nature of the English language*1. That's why our dialogs on the Philosophy Forum are so often fraught with harsh put-downs, when we fail to communicate on both levels. Some posters attempt to express philosophical concepts in concrete scientific language, while others use more abstract expressions when discussing topics like "Consciousness". That inherent ambiguity limits our ability to communicate, unless we understand that both Concretions and Abstractions exist side-by-side in the Real/Ideal world.To me this sounds like a description of stored energy and, therefore, I say in response: Where there's energy there's material and thus your attempt to occupy ambiguous position between material/immaterial is false. Your Enformaction, like Deacon's constitutive absence, stands squarely within the material world. — ucarr
The point of my thesis is to provide a conjunction (BothAnd) that weaves together the disjunctions of Science and Philosophy. For example, Physics is empirical, but Math is theoretical; yet both exist in the same world as different forms of the same universal substance. So, I can agree that those who "align with either", to the exclusion of the other, is playing the fool. Watch your step! :joke:The disjunction: science or philosophy, with respect to consciousness studies, runs parallel to the disjunction: physics or math, with respect to Relativity. Anyone operating within either of these two disciplines who aligns with either of these disjunctions assumes position to play the part of the fool. — ucarr
...in the case of two people who speak the same language. The sounds uttered by each individual are nothing more than sound waves with a certain structure (this includes syntax). But in themselves, these waves do not contain information... — JuanZu
...if we assume... we can isolate some sound wave and analyze it, we will not find anything other than sound -because is in abstent of relation. — JuanZu
...the sound uttered by one individual reaches the ears of another individual; This individual makes an acoustic image (just as Saussure understands it) of what he has heard; but now what appears is the language that the listener individual possesses. It means something to him: the sound uttered (one system of signs) has effects on another system of signs (the language sedimented in the listener's memory). — JuanZu
... — JuanZu
But in a communication between two persons we cannot think of this specific configuration ("hello, how are you") without a cause, and equally we cannot think of this specific configuration as something mysteriously contained in sound while it flies through the air. Given these two impossibilities, the conclusion, evidently, is that the effect suffered by the listener's is produced and not transferred. — JuanZu
The mind (i.e. mental activity) may be matter-based. Are you denying that possibility? It's not clear, but by stating this dichotomy, it seems that way.Perhaps you still haven't grasped the meaning of the BothAnd Principle. It acknowledges that our objective world is Matter-based, and that our subjective realm is Mind-based — Gnomon
Physicalist metaphysics joins the two. Earlier, you said:...disjunctions of Science and Philosophy — Gnomon
This is why I refer to "mental activities" rather then "the mind". We should be able to agree that mental activities occur. Mental activities are...activities, like running (actions are not "entities"), so I disagree with imposing an inherent reification.The only non-physical entities I'm aware of are Mental Phenomena (e.g. ideas), which I place into the philosophical category of Meta-physical. — Gnomon
Perhaps you still haven't grasped the meaning of the BothAnd Principle. — Gnomon
*3. Both/And Principle :
My coinage for the holistic principle of Complementarity, as illustrated in the Yin/Yang symbol. . . . Conceptually, the BothAnd principle is similar to Einstein's theory of Relativity, in that what you see ─ what’s true for you ─ depends on your perspective, and your frame of reference; for example, subjective or objective, religious or scientific, reductive or holistic, pragmatic or romantic, conservative or liberal, earthbound or cosmic. Ultimate or absolute reality (ideality) doesn't change, but your conception of reality does, as you re-frame the question. — Gnomon
The mind (i.e. mental activity) may be matter-based. Are you (Gnomon) denying that possibility? It's not clear, but by stating this dichotomy, it seems that way. — Relativist
both Concretions and Abstractions exist side-by-side in the Real/Ideal world. — Gnomon
I don't know where you got "reification", but I refer to the Mind as the Function of the Brain. Both are aspects of heterogeneous (diverse) Reality, but only the brain is a material object. Mind is an abstract immaterial process, closer to Energy than Matter. I make that distinction because Mind is not an empirical thing to be analyzed by Science, but an immaterial activity to be studied holistically by Philosophy . . . or by Psychology, which is mostly philosophical. :smile:This is why I refer to "mental activities" rather then "the mind". We should be able to agree that mental activities occur. Mental activities are...activities, like running (actions are not "entities"), so I disagree with imposing an inherent reification. — Relativist
Yes, both "Both" and "And" are conjunctions, so the redundancy is intentional for emphasis. But BothAnd joins the two into a single holistic concept, which is in opposition to the common Either/Or presumptions of Reductionism. :smile:Therefore, regarding the Both/And Principle, my first thought is that this is a redundancy. — ucarr
No, I don't think that the brain-function we call "Mind", or the body-function "Life", exist outside space-time. Both are simply concepts that exist in the unreal realm of Ideas. You can't put them under a microscope, but you can analyze them philosophically. Also, I don't deny that both of those immaterial functions evolved from material predecessors. They are references to "absences"*1 in Terrence Deacon's notion of "aboutness". And, like most philosophical speculations, they can't be understood from a space-time Materialist/Physicalist perspective.I join Relativist in posing this question to you. Also, I will attempt to reenforce his supposition about mind being matter-based by claiming that any phenomenon with time duration is physical because spacetime is a physical medium. Thoughts, possessing time duration, are therefore physical. — ucarr
I guess we'll just have to agree to disagree. The "parallels" are philosophical analogies, and have no basis in materialistic Science. Do you consider yourself to be a devout Materialist? If so, why are you posting on a free-thinking Philosophy Forum? :cool:I don't agree, however, that the concrete/abstract debate parallels the mind/body debate. The former is non-controversial, the latter anything but. — ucarr
I compared mental activity to running. The word "running" is an abstraction, but ontologically grounded in a material process. Mental activity may be the same. We describe the mental processes abstractly, but that doesn't preclude it being grounded in material processes.Mind is an abstract immaterial process — Gnomon
If you're claiming mental activity entails the existence of immaterial objects I'd regard that as a reification- treating an abstraction as something ontic.I don't know where you got "reification", but I refer to the Mind as the Function of the Brain. Both are aspects of heterogeneous (diverse) Reality, but only the brain is a material object.
If you're claiming mental activity entails the existence of immaterial objects I'd regard that as a reification- treating an abstraction as something ontic. — Relativist
I don't know where you got "reification" — Gnomon
I do not acknowledge that these abstractions (or any other) are part of the ontological structure of the world. Abstraction is a mental exercise, and logic is semantics.Would you acknowledge that arithmetical proofs and logical relations are real, even if not material? — Wayfarer
For the record, I'm not claiming that mental activity is a real thing (ontic), but an ideal concept (noumena). Brain processes are real & physical, but mental activities are ideal & metaphysical. Science deals with Reality and Objects, but Philosophy deals with Ideality and Subjects. The ontological being of Mind is essential, not material. You can't examine Intellect under a microscope, but you can study Reason with reasoning.If you're claiming mental activity entails the existence of immaterial objects I'd regard that as a reification- treating an abstraction as something ontic. — Relativist
Yes. Apparently is reading Reification into what I call Ideality (the state or quality of being ideal). Ironically the "res" in res cogitans is usually translated as "thing". Although non-specific, "thing" seems to imply physical object or sensory phenomenon. So I struggle to find language that doesn't sound like Reification. How do you deal with the problem of communicating immaterial-but-non-spiritual philosophical concepts in a materialist language? :smile:Reification means ‘to treat as a thing’. It is from the root ‘re-‘ (from which ‘reality’ is also derived), and which Descartes employed in his ‘res cogitans’, and by virtue of which he has been accused of reifying mind (justly, in my view). But as per my question above, I say that one may regard numbers and logical conventions as real without reifying them as things. — Wayfarer
The "parallels" are philosophical analogies, and have no basis in materialistic Science. — Gnomon
mathematics — Patterner
I do not acknowledge that these abstractions (or any other) are part of the ontological structure of the world. — Relativist
Is mathematics a mental thing? Like any thought, mathematics doesn't exist if nobody is thinking about it. — Patterner
How do you deal with the problem of communicating immaterial-but-non-spiritual philosophical concepts in a materialist language? :smile: — Gnomon
Well, you will have an issue accounting for the 'unreasonable effectiveness of mathematics in the natural sciences' (Eugene Wigner). — Wayfarer
Frege held that both the thought contents that constitute the proof-structure of mathematics and the subject matter of these thought contents (extensions, functions) exist. He also thought that these entities are non-spatial, non-temporal, causally inert, and independent for their existence and natures from any person's thinking them or thinking about them. Frege proposed a picturesque metaphor of thought contents as existing in a "third realm". This "realm" counted as "third" because it was comparable to, but different from, the realm of physical objects and the realm of mental entities. I think that Frege held, in the main body of his career, that not only thought contents, but numbers and functions were members of this third realm.
Returning to our case, ...the sound uttered by one individual reaches the ears of another individual; This individual makes an acoustic image... of what he has heard; but now what appears is the language that the listener individual possesses. — JuanZu
But in a communication between two persons we cannot think of this specific configuration ("hello, how are you") without a cause, and equally we cannot think of this specific configuration as something mysteriously contained in sound while it flies through the air. Given these two impossibilities, the conclusion, evidently, is that the effect suffered by the listener's is produced and not transferred. — JuanZu
The universe operated just fine during the billions of years it existed before there were any minds around to grasp, reason,or understand anything about it. Those physical relations among objects and phenomena were present in them, despite the absence of them being described as formulae.The point about number is that it can only be grasped by the mind. A number doesn't exist in the same way that trees and chairs do, but numerical reasoning, and reasoning more generally, are fundamental to the understanding and to science in particular — Wayfarer
The universe operated just fine during the billions of years it existed before there were any minds around to grasp, reason,or understand anything about it. — Relativist
I do take exemption from the empirical requirements of scientific rigor, when I'm discussing a topic that has no objective empirical evidence. I would like to assume that the different methodologies*1 would go without saying on The Philosophy Forum ; but Materialism/Physicalism seems to be the default metaphysics for many posters.You beg off from the arduous path of scientific rigor by drawing a hard boundary around your philosophical postulations, and yet all of them seem to be funded by the theories and experimental verifications of materialistic science. If your philosophy were authentically divested from rational materialism, I think it would be almost barren. Given this situation, it's clear to me you'd benefit greatly by investing more time in study of science with rigor, whether reductive or not. — ucarr
Yes. What you are labeling "reification", I would call an Abstract Noun. I assume that the referent of the term Consciousness is not an observable material object, but a rational inference. It does not point to a physical thing, but to a holistic behavior that we call Thinking & Reasoning. The word is an Abstract Noun, "denoting an idea, quality, or state rather than a concrete object". Would you classify Consciousness as "immaterial"? Is the denotation "figurative" or "literal"? You tell me. :smile:↪Gnomon
You're close. I used "reification" to refer to the treatment of an abstraction as a thing, where thing is something that exists (i.e. it is ontic; part of the ontological furniture of the world).
I don't think abstractions are ontic. I reject platonism, which treats ideal forms as ontic. It's still fine to talk about them figuratively as things, but it's unclear to me if you're talking figuratively or literally. Please clarify, because this thread is about the "hard problem" -which is only a problem for materialism. If your solution is to assume the existence of the immaterial, please state this. — Relativist
As an Architect, my occupation involves interpreting the client's ideas & dreams into a mathematical & graphic design language that can be erected into material structures, which not only ward-off environmental dangers (tornadoes, earthquakes), but provide sentimental satisfaction of those expressed needs & desires. So, you can see why I might be more open to immaterial concepts than a manual laborer. :smile:In my case, my occupation deals with a lot of material objects such as moving a mass from point A to point B, machine operation, operating in dangerous environments, bad weather, physical environments that are not controlled,...that sort of thing. Since my personal approach to consciousness and the material environment affects my safety I might naturally have a more materialist view than someone coming from a historical or academic view. — Mark Nyquist
FWIW, I think of Mathematics, and "mathematical relations" as mental abstractions from observation of the arrangment and dynamics of the world. For me, Math is the logical (immaterial) structure of reality. Mental Relations do exist apart from Material Objects, in the sense that Ideas are categorically distinct from the things they portray.Well, you will have an issue accounting for the 'unreasonable effectiveness of mathematics in the natural sciences' (Eugene Wigner). — Wayfarer
Not really. There are mathematical relations between the things that exist. These relations don't exist independently of the things that exhibit them. Simple example: two-ness is a property that groups of 2 have, but groups of 3 of 4 lack. This fact doesn't depend on "2" existing in a 3rd realm. — Relativist
They were. But those relationships, and the laws of physics, are not why or how we are communicating. Computers and the internet would not have spontaneously come into being. They would not exist if we had not come to describe those physical relationships in formulae, and then developed/expanded them in ways that are far beyond those relationships. Primes are not a relationship. They are the lack of relationships. There is no formula that produces them. Yet they play a vital role in how we do so many things. Yes, the universe operated just fine without us. But we have begun shaping it in ways it would not have become shaped without us.The universe operated just fine during the billions of years it existed before there were any minds around to grasp, reason,or understand anything about it. Those physical relations among objects and phenomena were present in them, despite the absence of them being described as formulae. — Relativist
But if you take mathematics as merely a naming of those aspects of the world that necessarily are attending by the former description, i'm unsure this can be said. — AmadeusD
I believe what I just said to Relativist is also largely a response to both of you. I believe we have produced a few mathematical things that were not merely names for, or grasped from, the things we are able to observe.The point about numbers and arithmetical principles is that they are not the product of thought, but can only be grasped by thought. This is the general area of Platonism in philosophy of mathematics, which is a big and contested question. — Wayfarer
Philosophers cannot agree on whether mathematical objects exist or are pure fictions — Gnomon
there are some important objections to (platonic) realism. If mathematical objects really exist, their properties are certainly very peculiar. For one, they are causally inert, meaning they cannot be the cause of anything, so you cannot literally interact with them. This is a problem because we seem to gain knowledge of an object through its impact. Dinosaurs decomposed into bones that paleontologists can see and touch, and a planet can pass in front of a star, blocking its light from our view. But a circle is an abstract object, independent of space and time. The fact that π is the ratio of the circumference to the diameter of a circle is not about a soda can or a doughnut; it refers to an abstract mathematical circle, where distances are exact and the points on the circle are infinitesimally small. Such a perfect circle is causally inert and seemingly inaccessible. So how can we learn facts about it without some type of special sixth sense?
Yet they play a vital role in how we do so many things. Yes, the universe operated just fine without us. But we have begun shaping it in ways it would not have become shaped without us. — Patterner
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