I don't think naturalism has to be defined in terms of science, but rather in terms of what is immanent to human experience. — Janus
Science is only one part of human experience, so what is immanent to human experience would also include aesthetics and ethics, religion and the divine. — Janus
when you get down to the nitty-gritty, the uncertainty principle comes into play. So the more minutely you define it, the less certain it becomes.
~ Wayfarer
How is this relevant to what I am saying? — Magnus Anderson
I also disagree with your [Apokrisis] claim that reality is not composed of concrete particulars. I have to note that this claim does not follow from "the principle of indifference" either. Just because we are only ever aware of a portion of reality does not mean that what we are aware of is not reality itself. — Magnus Anderson
I am more of a Heisenberg type of a guy. — Magnus Anderson
The way in which I say the brain and mind construct the world is consistent with the scientific understanding of cognition and perception. What it challenges is scientific realism, or what I call ‘there anyway’ realism. — Wayfarer
It’s an impossible question, or at least a very difficult one. I think you can only consider such questions in the terms that the various theistic and philosophical traditions which incorporate such ideas do. — Wayfarer
There's no point in my attempting to address your arguments because they are based on starting assumptions I don't accept (the most glaring of which is that the axioms of your system are not assumptions at all but are somehow self-evident)... — Janus
If you say that you are assuming that the scientific picture is correct; i.e. that it gives us real information (or in other words shows us reality), no? — Janus
Objective Idealism accepts common sense realism (the view that independent material objects exist), but rejects Naturalism (the view that the mind and spiritual values have emerged from material things).
Plato is regarded as one of the earliest representatives of Objective Idealism.
Actually I found a quotation on a reference site about ‘objective idealism’ which puts it well: — Wayfarer
The issue that QM made inescapable was that reality could not be that well-defined; when you get down to the nitty-gritty, the uncertainty principle comes into play. So the more minutely you define it, the less certain it becomes. — Wayfarer
No signs without minds, — Wayfarer
But these two sets do not have "being a set" as an element.
— Magnus Anderson
Do these two sets belong to the set of all sets that have no elements in common? — apokrisis
As I asked Wayfarer earlier, how does considering God to be transcendent and supernatural (meaning radically separate and independent) help with explaining its role in creating and/or sustaining the world? — Janus
This view produces the problem of interaction which plagued the Cartesian picture. On the other hand an immanent (indwelling and natural) ideas about God's causal efficacy are easier to understand and elaborate, while remaining in the province of philosophy and metaphysics rather than science. — Janus
I believe that the uncertainty is due to the deficiencies of the minds and the methods being used in the attempt to understand. — Metaphysician Undercover
I believe that the uncertainty is due to the deficiencies of the minds and the methods being used in the attempt to understand. — Metaphysician Undercover
For me, it is so reasonable to assume that the photons in those experiments carry with them programs, which have been correlated in advance, telling them how to behave. This is so rational that I think that when Einstein saw that, and the others refused to see it, he was the rational man. The other people, although history has justified them, were burying their heads in the sand. I feel that Einstein's intellectual superiority over Bohr, in this instance, was enormous; a vast gulf between the man who saw clearly what was needed, and the obscurantist. So for me, it is a pity that Einstein's idea doesn't work. The reasonable thing just doesn't work.
Or have you already decided there is no interpretance without "the feeling of what it is like to be interpreting". — apokrisis
It is a perennial philosophical reflection that if one looks deeply enough into oneself, one will discover not only one’s own essence, but also the essence of the universe. For as one is a part of the universe as is everything else, the basic energies of the universe flow through oneself, as they flow through everything else. For that reason it is thought that one can come into contact with the nature of the universe if one comes into substantial contact with one’s ultimate inner being.
Which often amounts to what Thomas Nagel described as ‘the fear of religion’ in his essay ‘Evolutionary Naturalism and the Fear of Religion’. — Wayfarer
↪Magnus Anderson So you run away from the question? You don't want to risk saying your sets are the same in this regard? You pretend instead that this would be irrelevant?
Cool. ;) — apokrisis
And yet God is radically transcendent in that God's essence or nature is radically different from any essence that we encounter via sense experience, including our own essence. — Aaron R
When cast in these terms, the interaction problem simply dissolves. Or so the story goes... — Aaron R
interpretation is always done by a subject. — Wayfarer
It is that faculty which attributes or discerns meaning; which means, it actually rather close to the 'active intellect' of the classical tradition of Western philosophy. — Wayfarer
But we don't know what that 'knower' is, because it's never an object of perception, it's never a 'that' to us; trying to say what it is, is like the hand trying to grasp itself or the eye trying to see itself, which is impossible on account of the 'epistemic cut' you refer to, which is the 'gordian knot' of existence. — Wayfarer
Contemplative mysticism dissolves that knot through 'union' - in Eastern spiritual traditions, 'union' is conceived not in theistic terms of the 'unio mystica' but in (shall we say) more naturalistic terms, whereby the aspirant realises his/her own being (atma) as to be fundamentally on par with the being of the cosmos (brahman). That is the elaborated in such modern Vedanta texts as the Teachings of Ramana Maharishi. — Wayfarer
Yet another tautology. Remember that coherent debates require clear description of positions, and also reasons to back them up. In this case, if you say that your tautology contradicts my claim, you should explain why that is.If the tautology contradicts your claim, then you are wrong. — Metaphysician Undercover
Finally you explain your position, that words create forms, that "red" creates our concept of redness. You seemed to be against this position earlier, but let's move on. Does your claim apply to particular things, as well as concepts? I.e., is the existence of redness in particular things prior to us calling the thing "red"?What is at question is whether or not there is a "form of redness" prior to us calling something red. I say no, you say yes. — Metaphysician Undercover
"Clearly there is"? I understand that complex terms like "angel" or "quasar" are ambiguous terms and demand thorough thinking to remove the ambiguity; but why is it the case for simple terms like "plane", "flat" or "surface"? If you think that all words are ambiguous until they are defined, then this results in infinite regress, because definitions are made of words. Also, the statement "Ambiguity is never removed in an absolute way" is a self-contradiction because the very statement would forever remain ambiguous.My dictionary has a quarter of a page of entry under the word "plane". What is at issue here is whether or not there is ambiguity in word usage, and clearly there is. The ambiguity is reduced by producing definitions. So when you define "plane" as a flat surface, then through this definition you are reducing the possibility of ambiguity. Once it is defined as "flat surface" we can proceed toward understanding the ambiguities within "flat surface". What exactly do you mean by a surface, and what exactly constitutes 'flat". Ambiguity is never removed in an absolute way. — Metaphysician Undercover
This cannot be. See my previous response above about infinite regress. If my concept of a triangle is not the same as yours, then how could we ever (1) discover this, and (2) correct it to be the same? I could say that "triangle" = "plane" + "three straight sides", but this assumes that the concepts "plane", "three", "straight", and "sides" are the same in both of us, otherwise, we are groundless.It is not required that individuals have the same concepts in order to communicate. If that were the case, then communication could not be a learned ability. [...] Instead of accepting and promoting this absurdity, we ought to consider the proposition that communication is less than perfect. When you say something, I do not understand it exactly in the way which you intend. That is because the conceptual structure within my mind is not exactly the same as that in your mind. But this imperfection does not necessitate the conclusion that we cannot communicate. [...] If my concepts were exactly the same as yours, then whatever you said would automatically be received by me exactly in the way that you intended. [...]. — Metaphysician Undercover
I don't disagree with what you wrote, but it does not refute my claim. If Plato's intent is to determine the real nature of concepts, then the concept must be the same in all minds. Otherwise, even if successful, each person would come up with a different result according to their own concepts, and the dialogue would be pointless.Plato's intent is to go beyond this false premise of Pythagorean Idealism, to determine the real nature of concepts. That is why he worked to expose all the difficulties of it. He continually took words with very ambiguous concepts, and worked to expose that ambiguity. This is known as Platonic dialectics. This flies in the face of Pythagorean Idealism, in which ambiguity is not possible. — Metaphysician Undercover
That is right, I make no distinction between "meaning" and "concept", such that a word pointing to concept x is the same as a word meaning x. That is my position. As such, you cannot disagree that meanings are identical in all minds if the definitions coincide. As for the explanation of their existence, we simply have not got to that topic yet, and I don't remember you arguing that the existence of concepts as I describe is impossible. We can do that next.This is only according to your definition of "universal form". Your definition doesn't seem to allow a distinction between what the concept says (means) and what the concept is ( its ontological existence). This seems to be because you have no principle which allows for a concept to have any ontological existence. You take the lazy route, just assuming that concepts exist, with no principles to demonstrate how this is possible. — Metaphysician Undercover
What you're doing here is you are pretending you are comparing sets A and B when in reality you are comparing sets that are not A and B but that are sufficiently similar to A and B. Properly speaking, you are comparing sets {1, 2, 3, belongs to some other set} and {4, 5, 6, belongs to some other set}. These two sets, you are right, are not absolutely different. However, they are not sets A and B. They are different, albeit similar, sets. — Magnus Anderson
Great. You concede the point. We're getting somewhere. — apokrisis
Now if we are talking about some set of elements - actual baskets of fruit - then how do we know that the apple in one is actually an "apple"? It could be a rather unripe and round pear. — apokrisis
Pragmatism rules. As it ought. — apokrisis
That's not true. I do not concede that sets A = {1, 2, 3} and B = {4, 5, 6} have an element in common. — Magnus Anderson
Noone cares whether the fruit is ripe or unripe. In fact, noone cares whether what appears to be a fruit is a real fruit or just a toy that looks like a fruit. That's your problem. — Magnus Anderson
I think that obscurantism is a more fitting name for your position. — Magnus Anderson
God is still natural; in fact God is nature, but he is not nature as we enciounter it via the senses. — Janus
That's true because according to that story God cannot be radically separate form creation. He must be affected by his creation or else he is utterly indifferent. — Janus
The universe is either ordered in certain aspects or it is not. — Magnus Anderson
This cannot be. See my previous response above about infinite regress. If my concept of a triangle is not the same as yours, then how could we ever (1) discover this, and (2) correct it to be the same? I could say that "triangle" = "plane" + "three straight sides", but this assumes that the concepts "plane", "three", "straight", and "sides" are the same in both of us, otherwise, we are groundless. — Samuel Lacrampe
I don't disagree with what you wrote, but it does not refute my claim. If Plato's intent is to determine the real nature of concepts, then the concept must be the same in all minds. Otherwise, even if successful, each person would come up with a different result according to their own concepts, and the dialogue would be pointless. — Samuel Lacrampe
That is right, I make no distinction between "meaning" and "concept", such that a word pointing to concept x is the same as a word meaning x. That is my position. As such, you cannot disagree that meanings are identical in all minds if the definitions coincide. — Samuel Lacrampe
That every being participates in Being does not imply that Being is identical with the totality of beings, nor that beings are "part of" (in the compositional sense) Being. It simply implies that beings would not be without Being. In other words, God and nature can still be understand as ontologically distinct. The key difference between Aquinas (Monotheism) and Spinoza (Pantheism) is going to be found in their contrasting definitions of substance. — Aaron R
Unaffected does not imply indifferent. God can be immutable (unaffected) while also being good and loving, which implies nothing more than that God is always good and loving. — Aaron R
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