The purpose of thermodynamics is artificial or emergent. It's like having a 12-sided dice with 11 faces having a value of 1 and only one side having a different value. — Agustino
That it's what it is Cosmic Intelligence. The Mind. — Rich
Although it's insightful to say humans live in dao as fish do in water, the insight is lost if we simply treat dao as being or some pantheistic spiritual realm. Dao remains essentially a concept of guidance, a prescriptive or normative term.
Wow it does exactly what your whole philosophy does :DThat's a spectacularly bad description as it mushes all the different aspects of a dissipative structure ontology together. — apokrisis
Yep, and like so globalised tendency, function and purpose are all mushed together into a cute word salad that is taken to be philosophy and deep understanding :BBut anyway, it should be remembered that teleology at the base cosmic level only needs to be considered a globalised tendency. At the biological level, we could talk about it being a function. Then at a psychological level, we could talk about it as a purpose. — apokrisis
Yep. So it is vague ... in relation to the definite actuality that it then gives rise to. — apokrisis
Yep. It is defined dichotomously - A and not-A. Or rather it is the prior state when there is neither A nor not-A present. That is, the PNC as yet fails to apply. So it is defined as that which must be capable of yielding the dichotomy and an actuality that is ruled by the PNC. — apokrisis
Aristotle saw that reality is a hierarchy of increasingly specified distinctions, or dichotomies/symmetry breakings. Genus begets species by critical divisions. Man is generically animal (and thus not mineral), but also more specifically rational (and thus not irrational or lacking in reason). — apokrisis
And that means that we both know - from reason - that there must be some "stuff", some "material", that gets formed in this way, and yet this material cause becomes the ultimately elusive part of reality. We can't pin it down - see it in its raw formlessness - as it only becomes something definite and "pinnable" if it has a form.
Aristotle was dealing with exactly this issue in discussing the prime matter that must underlie four elements. — apokrisis
So Anaximander understood reality in terms of an open flow action that self-organises to have emergent structure. Aristotle then showed what this reality looked like by going over to the other extreme - how we would imagine it as a system, still with hierarchical structure, but now closed and eternal. — apokrisis
Aristotle pushed for a sharper distinction. The Comos became a closed material system. There must be an underlying "prime matter" that is eternal and imperishable, endlessly taking new shape without in fact being used up, or being generated anew. And it was from that assumption that the idea of a creation event - a birth of all this imperishable matter - became a great metaphysical difficulty. — apokrisis
We no longer rely on Anaximander's admittedly very material conception of the Apeiron, nor Aristotle's maddenly elusive notion of prime matter, but understand that there is a vagueness beyond both material and formal cause. We can't grant primacy or priority to either material cause or formal cause because they themselves are the dichotomy that emerges from a "pure potential" that is both neither of these things, yet necessarily must be able to break to yield these complementary things. — apokrisis
The formulation of a conservation principle - the law of identity - is the basic step to get formal logical argument going. — apokrisis
The infinite regress of causality is asymptotic at worst. So it converges on a point. And that point both defines the limit and stands "outside" it. So this is exactly how I have argued for vagueness - as a limit which itself is formally "not real". — apokrisis
Yet the very fact that we can get arbitrarily close shows that pi "definitely exists" .... as a formal limit. — apokrisis
But the theory doesn't manifest the observables. They are what we actually measure when we apply the theory in modelling our reality.
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Instead of there being an observer problem, reality is now viewed as "observer created". It comes down to being able to ask a meaningful question. — apokrisis
As I said it is a double edged sword which defeats both materialism and idealism. He demonstrates how ideas have no actual existence prior to being "discovered" by human minds. The act of discovery is an actualization. So anyone who claims that ideas exist prior to being discovered by the mind must consent to the fact that such existence is purely potential. Then he demonstrates that anything eternal must be actual. — Metaphysician Undercover
I’m not sure how to here best interpret the term “ideas”—and I have not read Aristotle’s arguments first hand. I so far find it reasonable that at least some platonic ideas (ideals / forms) can be safely presumed to exist prior to any person’s awareness of them. Though not my main interests, basic geometric forms might serve as an easy example—a triangle, for instance. More importantly to me, though, are forms such as that of the Good—which I maintain necessarily exist as actuality even were no human to be consciously aware of this platonic “idea”. — javra
Better expressed: My own present contention is that the Good as form, for example, is both actual and, in an equivocal sense, simultaneously potential. The Good thereby, imo, exists in and of itself as metaphysical actuality while, from the vantage of all actual people, existing only as a potential state of affairs yet to be obtained by any of us. Furthermore, it would hold this status even if no sentience were to be consciously aware of it so being.
For me, this is in no way intended as a defense of idealism. I’m however interested in better understanding the logics of actuality and potentiality from the vantage of a hypothetical global telos. — javra
For me, this is in no way intended as a defense of idealism. I’m however interested in better understanding the logics of actuality and potentiality from the vantage of a hypothetical global telos. — javra
So, from my point of view regarding a global telos, the telos must be a priori to all potentiality as an existent actuality—this even though its obtainment by aware agencies (these also being present actualities) can only be appraised in terms of potentiality. — javra
I’m hoping that this at least makes some sense—and it is this overlap of actuality and potentially that currently has me further contemplating the matter. Still—though I can’t yet make out if it’s due to the same reasons or not—I’m in full agreement that actuality cannot be birthed of pure potentiality, and that the latter notion is nonsensical. — javra
But remember, I use "vague" and "potential" in a different way from you. — Metaphysician Undercover
It is conditional on the nature of time, Time is passing, and because time is passing, there is a future. — Metaphysician Undercover
his allows you to posit a "beginning" point where there is no past, only future, such that the potential of the future is unconstrained by any past. But this proposition is unjustified and incoherent, because unless time is passing, the claim of a future or a past is unsupported, not grounded at all. So your proposal of a point of infinite vagueness, pure potential, as a beginning, before time starts passing, is completely incoherent. — Metaphysician Undercover
When the state has neither A nor not-A present, we can clearly make the valid claim that there is not both A and not-A present, so there is no need for the claim that the PNC does not apply. — Metaphysician Undercover
As usual, you have things backward again. The terms "genus" and "species" refer to the degrees of human understanding, they refer to concepts. Within the conceptual realm, the more specific "begets" the more general, as Aristotle explained, we move from the more well known, the particular, toward the lesser known, the more general. — Metaphysician Undercover
Again, how many times must I tell you? This is unconditionally false. Aristotle proved that the idea that "there must be an underlying 'prime matter' that is eternal and imperishable" is absolutely false. He demonstrates that anything eternal must be actual, that's why he posits eternal circular motions. — Metaphysician Undercover
There are two distinct forms of the law of identity. — Metaphysician Undercover
That is an irrational, unintelligible approach. — Metaphysician Undercover
When I suggested that the Planck scale limitations are created by the theories which are applied, you said no, the theory doesn't manifest the observables. Then you went right on to the claim that reality is observer created. When it supports your argument one rule applies, but when it supports mine, the opposite of that rule applies. — Metaphysician Undercover
Better expressed: My own present contention is that the Good as form, for example, is both actual and, in an equivocal sense, simultaneously potential. The Good thereby, imo, exists in and of itself as metaphysical actuality while, from the vantage of all actual people, existing only as a potential state of affairs yet to be obtained by any of us. Furthermore, it would hold this status even if no sentience were to be consciously aware of it so being. — javra
Remember that Peirce in fact defined vagueness as that to which the PNC fails to apply. So that is the definition in contention, not something else you might make up for yourself. — apokrisis
However Peirce is very clearly asking the question of how existence could develop. And a logic of vagueness is his answer. And he says without equivocation that Firstness - being vague undifferentiated potential, pure quality without yet quantification - is generative of time and thus essentially timeless. So time (and space, and energy) only properly exist as Secondness. — apokrisis
And he says without equivocation that Firstness - being vague undifferentiated potential, pure quality without yet quantification - is generative of time and thus essentially timeless. — apokrisis
If you want to talk about time in Firstness, it is by definition vague temporality, the potential for an unfolding temporal progression. — apokrisis
So the vague is where it simply isn't clear what is the case. You can't what is going on and so there is no way to tell if it is contradictory or not. And generality is then where you can crisply tell what is going on, but being completely general, it is not doing any excluding. Everything within its purview is included. — apokrisis
Because you are so busy trying to force a scholastic reading of Aristotle on this Peircean developmental ontology, you keep missing the target. And even missing the degree to which Aristotle was arguing the same story in many places. — apokrisis
Sure, you need the "eternal mathematic forms" as the ultimate constraints on material action. They somehow do stand outside time - as future finality. But rather than being active drivers of that action (in the way genes organise a body, or intentions organise our behaviour), they are simply passively emergent regulatory principles when we are talking about physics, or the generic Cosmos. — apokrisis
Or better yet, we can understand it as a vagueness. That removes any lingering notion of "matter" -
substantiality - from the discussion. We can now see that Firstness is just the potential for matter and form. All the apparent contradictions are absorbed by making substantial being fully emergent via the logical machinery of dichotomisation. — apokrisis
Great. Perhaps you can provide a citation on this point ... if you are suggesting it is based on established authority and not something you've dreamt up on the spot. — apokrisis
Funny. That's how maths approaches irrational numbers. It is how they know they are real. — apokrisis
Therefore, that the independently existing ideas exist, cannot be known in any sense beyond an ungrounded assumption, and we must maintain this in our representation of reality, that independently existing ideas is a possibility. The next step of the problem is that an eternally existing possibility is not a real possibility due to the principle of plenitude. So eternal, immutable, independent "Ideas" is refuted in this way. — Metaphysician Undercover
But this produces a categorical separation between human ideas, which according to Aristotle's argument are of the nature of potential, and the independent Forms which are of the nature of actual. In theology the independent (actual) Forms are the divine Ideas, property of God. There is a necessary separation between these Forms, which are independent from, and prior to material existence, and human ideas, which are dependent on the human soul's union with the body. — Metaphysician Undercover
Plato demonstrated, that in nature, the form of all material things precedes the material existence of the thing, and Aristotle followed this principle with a claim of "that the thing will be" only follows from "what the thing will be". — Metaphysician Undercover
A good place to develop a firm understanding of the relationship between potency and act, is by reading Aristotle's On the Soul. All the powers of living creatures are described as potencies. But these potencies must be attributed to something actual in order to substantiate their existence. The potencies, or powers, exist as the body of the living being, the various different bodies of various living beings, are the various potencies of living beings. So the body as a collection of potencies, must be attributed to something actual, and this is the soul itself. Aristotle provides, as the primary definition of soul, the first actuality of a body having life potentially in it. This necessitates that the body has no actuality prior to having life, there is no actual body, only the potential for such. And the soul brings, or gives, actual existence to the body. — Metaphysician Undercover
This is contrary to the principles of emergence which hold that the soul, or life, emerges from the existence of the body, as if it is a potency of the body. But when this premise is taken, then we must look to a prior material existence to substantiate the actual existence of the living body. Since this prior material existence is not living, it can only substantiate the potential for life, not the actual existence of life. So the infinite regress of potential without anything to substantiate the actual, gives way to the infinite vagueness of pure potential, or apeiron. — Metaphysician Undercover
That would seem to fit with my position then. Form stands "at the end of development" as ""emergent necessity". In the end, it restricts free choice as there is only one "right" choice. — apokrisis
Now of course you can argue for the alternative - that existence is simply uncreated and eternal as some sort of always definite brute fact. It doesn't satisfy logically. But that is the other point of view — apokrisis
https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/cosmological-argument/#Obje1UnivJust
When the existence of each member of a collection is explained by reference to some other member of that very same collection, then it does not follow that the collection itself has an explanation. For it is one thing for there to be an explanation of the existence of each dependent being and quite another thing for there to be an explanation of why there are dependent beings at all. (Rowe 1975: 264)
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Peter van Inwagen (1983: 202–04) argues that the PSR must be rejected. If the PSR is true, every contingent proposition has an explanation. Suppose P is the conjunction of all contingent true propositions. Suppose also that there is a state of affairs S that provides a sufficient reason for P. S cannot itself be contingent, for then it would be a conjunct of P and entailed by P, and as both entailing and entailed by P would be P, so that it would be its own sufficient reason. But no contingent proposition can explain itself. Neither can S be necessary, for from necessary propositions only necessary propositions follow. Necessary propositions cannot explain contingent propositions, for if x sufficiently explains y, then x entails y, and if x is necessary so is y. So S cannot be either contingent or necessary, and hence the PSR is false. Thus, if the cosmological argument appeals to the PSR to establish the existence of a necessary being whose existence is expressed by a necessary proposition as an explanation for contingent beings, it fails in that it cannot account for the contingent beings it purportedly explains.
— SEP
Does Peirce provide any such demonstration as to the type of situation where the LNC does not apply, to support his definition of vagueness? — Metaphysician Undercover
“Let part of a surface be painted green while the rest remains white. What is the color of the dividing line; is it green or not? I should say that it is both green and not. ‘ But that violates the principle of contradiction, without which there can be no sense in anything’. Not at all; the principle of contradiction does not apply to possibilities”.
This is demonstrated by the fact that when time is passing there is a future, and future things are indefinite due to potential. — Metaphysician Undercover
You say that there are eternal forms, which stand outside of time, then you say that they are "emergent" — Metaphysician Undercover
Check your favourite, SEP — Metaphysician Undercover
nd uncreated and eternal? As I understand the argument for brute fact, it's really about human reasoning. It doesn't matter if existence was always here or whether it sprang from nothing. Both could be understood as brute facts, depending on the theory which included them. — t0m
You write a vagueness as origin. Would this not be a brute fact? It's really just the old question of infinite regress. Either the chain of whys stretches forever of this chain terminates in a "just because" or "I don't know." Since I think brute fact is logically necessary, I don't think it's a flaw in a metaphysical vision to acknowledge an "irrational" origin. — t0m
Yes, in the end all metaphysics must arrive at a brute fact. So my claim is that my approach demands the least possible in these terms. There will still remain the question of "why anything?", but instead of the question being "why something rather than nothing?", it becomes "why something rather than everything?". — apokrisis
f you have two things in play - the thesis and antithesis that make up the two poles of a dichotomy - then infinite regress does get terminated by a limit. We can roll back our state of somethingness - which is some yin and yang of crisply developed opposites - back towards the shared limit within which they converge. Vagueness can absorb the contradictory (or contrarieties, to be more Aristotelian) as each is folding back into its other. — apokrisis
[The philosophical term différance refers to conceptual differentiation and deferral of meaning in processes of signification. Wiki]
It confirms that the subject, and first of all the conscious and speaking subject, depends upon the system of differences and the movement of différance, that the subject is not present, nor above all present to itself before différance, that the subject is constituted only in being divided from itself, in becoming space, in temporizing, in deferral; and it confirms that, as Saussure said, "language [which consists only of differences] is not a function of the speaking subject.
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Différance is not only irreducible to any ontological or theological—ontotheological—reappropriation, but as the very opening of the space in which ontotheology—philosophy—produces its system and its history, it includes ontotheology, inscribing it and exceeding it without return.
— Derrida
Interesting. It reminds me of (without necessarily be the same as) differance. — t0m
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