Formal/final cause explains the nature of material/efficient cause in direct fashion. If you give action a definite shape, then it acts with definite direction. — apokrisis

And for a definite end. You might remind us again what that end or purpose might be, in respect of the world as a whole.

What? You need to be scandalised all over again by the notion of a cosmic Heat Death?

You've been reminded as you asked. Now squeal in horror.

I think it's relevant. I'm not sure how Aristotle conceived of the final end of human existence, but I'm fairly certain it wasn't in terms of maximisation of entropy.

And neo-Aristotelianism? The supposed subject of your OP. What does that conclude?

I understand that. I don't know if Aristotle directly addressed that question, but I do recall that there was a sense in which he said that 'the contemplation of the eternal Ideas' is the final end of life.

I noted this statement above:

an intelligible structure is being imposed on nature in emergent fashion. — apokrisis

which strikes me as contradictory - as how can something that emerges also 'impose itself'? It has to already exist in order to impose itself. Unless it is a matter of saying, something that is latent then becomes manifest - 'what is latent becomes patent' (which actually was an aphorism that my lecturer in Indian Philosophy used to say.)

So I suppose what I want to argue is that the 'top-down' nature of form, is not the consequence of any 'bottom-up' causal chain but in some sense must pre-exist it. Like, the 'constraints' aren't a consequence of the way matter behaves - matter behaves a certain way because of the constraints. But, of course, that sounds 'theistic', so is likely to be rejected on that basis. After all if the 'forms' or 'constraining structures' are indeed transcendent, then you're back with Platonism again.

But saying that, I will readily acknowledge, again, that my knowledge of the texts is patchy. This is just my intuitive take on the matter.

how can something that emerges also 'impose itself'? — Wayfarer

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rayleigh–Bénard_convection

That's not true, what I said is that infinite being is intelligible, as conceptual, and therefore it is not natural. There is no denial of infinite being unless "being" is defined in an odd way. — Metaphysician Undercover

So, there is no infinite being apart from our concepts of it or there is infinite being, but it is not natural?

Sure, organisms are "agents", but we need an agent which acts as the cause of the organism. If the material body is an organism, and semiosis is responsible for the existence of this living material body, then the agent which practises the semiosis which brings this material body into existence must be immaterial. — Metaphysician Undercover

Sorry, I have no idea what you are talking about here.

But your Aristotelian holism falters as you are deliberately arguing towards some version consistent with a transcendent theism. — apokrisis

Yes, I would say that's a good thing, not a faltering, to find consistency between various different metaphysical perspectives. Each metaphysic is going to have strong points and weak points. The strong points are where there is consistency with others and the weak points are where there is inconsistency with others, metaphysics being principally subjective. So we as metaphysicians must study various metaphysics and find the consistency which runs through them to advance our understanding of reality. This is finding agreement, which is the basis of convention.

It is true that material/efficient cause can't be itself the cause of what it is. But it doesn't help for you to assert that the cause of material/efficient cause is now something unphysical ... like a divine first cause ... which is really just another version of material/efficient cause, just removed to some place off stage and given a mind that just wants things, and whatever it wants, it gets. — apokrisis

Examination of efficient cause alone always produces the appearance of infinite regress of causation, if we do not allow for another form of causation to be the first in the chain, or cause of an efficient cause. "Material cause", if posited as the first cause renders the first cause unintelligible, due to the unintelligible nature of prime matter. We've discussed this already numerous times. However, we have much evidence in human activities, and the concept of free will, which demonstrates that final cause is an unphysical cause of efficient causes. When we apprehend a desired end, we start the chains of efficient causation which are understood to be required as the means to achieve that desired end.

So your transcendent theism claims the existence of a non-physical material/efficient cause, and heads off into complete incoherence as a result. — apokrisis

It is not a non-physical material cause, nor a non-physical efficient cause which I subscribe to. It is the non-physical final cause which is evident in the concept of freewill and intention. Without assuming a non-physical cause, freewill cannot be accounted for, and efforts to do that are compatibilist deception.

A properly physicalist understanding of Aristotle's four causes naturalism would see formal/final cause itself as the cause of material/efficient cause. — apokrisis

To group material cause and efficient cause together, as well as grouping formal cause with final cause does not demonstrate a proper understanding of Aristotle's four causes. The four are all distinct, and there is reasons why there is four rather than two. If physicalism does this grouping together, then it cannot be claimed to be based in an understanding of Aristotle's four causes. If we were to relate physicalism to the four causes, in this way, we would have to say that it is based in a misunderstanding.

So, there is no infinite being apart from our concepts of it or there is infinite being, but it is not natural? — Janus

Concepts are not necessarily "our concepts", because there is always intelligent being which is outside the collective "we". So if you remove that condition I would say both.

Sorry, I have no idea what you are talking about here. — Janus

That's OK, if you are incapable of conceiving of existence beyond what is evident to your senses, then there is really no point in me trying to explain this to you.

What "adaequatio" would refer to is an activity, a process, a movement toward equation or equality. — Metaphysician Undercover

"Adaequatio" is not a verb. It names stable a relational state between what is in our mind and reality.

I think the most common use of "truth" is in philosophy, — Metaphysician Undercover

I recall my mother, teachers and others urging me to tell the truth. Not a day goes by without a discussion of Trump and his representatives failing to tell the truth. The news reports that many deny the truth of climate change, others the truth of the holocaust. So, "truth" is very current outside of the narrow confines of philosophy and law.

I do not believe it's used to name something we have experienced in our own thought and language, it is used to make a statement about our own thought and language, or a request toward others' thought and language; statements like "I am telling the truth", "Please tell the truth" — Metaphysician Undercover

I'm not sure what substantive difference there is between me saying "truth" names "something we have experienced in our own thought and language" -- meaning that we have experienced thinking true thoughts and speaking true sentences -- and you saying "it is used to make a statement about our own thought and language." Surely statements we make about about our own thought and language arise out of our experience of our own thought and language.

Suppose I say, "Please tell the truth." Do you think I'm asking you to tell me the state of the world with the detail and accuracy known only to God? I surely do not. I expect you to give me an account adequate to my area of concern -- e.g., to tell me if you took my keys -- without describing the exact shape and alloy of each key, its precise position and orientation, etc, etc.

We can't really say that we experience ourselves to have true beliefs, because we simply believe, and to believe that a belief is true would be redundant. — Metaphysician Undercover

We experience, introspectively, that our experience is reflected in our representation of that experience. In other words, that we have a true representation of our experience.

Beliefs are only true per accidens. So, they are only peripherally relevant here. Truth is primarily a relation between our knowledge and reality. Beliefs are not acts if intellect, but of will -- they are commitments to truth of various propositions.

Knowledge, on the other hand, is awareness of present intelligibility. Intelligible objects make themselves dynamically present by acting, directly or indirectly, on us. Since me knowing the object is (identically) the object being known by me, knowledge is based on an partial identity of knower and known. For example, an apple's action on my neural system is, identically, my neural representation of the apple. If it we not, I would not be seeing the apple.

This is a point which Aquinas makes as well, truth is a judgement which is separate from the thought — Metaphysician Undercover

This is confused. Aquinas position is that truth and falsity pertain to judgements, not concepts. He does not say that there is no truth until we judge that there is truth. And, he surely does not say that judgements are separate from thoughts, for judgements are thoughts that we can express in propositions.

[Aquinas] compares "the truth" to "the good", the good being the object of the appetite and the truth being the object of the intellect. — Metaphysician Undercover

Yes, he does. It would be absurd, then, if humans had a natural appetite (for truth) that could never be satisfied. No appetite exists merely to be frustrated.

I truly believe that non-philosophical use of "truth" mostly refers to honesty — Metaphysician Undercover

Isn't this circular? How would you define "honesty" other than expressing yourself truly? I understand that you may think something true that isn't. Still, your statement is only honest if it is a adequate reflection of your mental state -- and not of your whole mental state, but of the aspects of interest to your interlocutors

If you agree with " — Metaphysician Undercover

But no matter how you look at it, even that part, that simple truth, is missing a lot from being complete. Any statement about "what is", is always incomplete. You might say it is adequate and therefore truth, I say it's incomplete and therefore only "truth" to a degree. — Metaphysician Undercover

degrees of certitude" then why not "degrees of truth" as well?

I've already said that I see truth as an analogous concept: first, as Aquinas does, by analogy of attribution wrt Divine Truth, and second with an analogy of proportionality wrt contextual requirements. So, in a way I have, but I think "analogy" is a more precise word for this than "degrees."

If we were to say in completion, of what is, that it is, we'd have to state everything which "is" right now. — Metaphysician Undercover

If you were to do this, your use of "what is" would be equivocal wrt Aristotle's. Aristotle is discussing a particular what, you a universal what.

But no matter how you look at it, even that part, that simple truth, is missing a lot from being complete. Any statement about "what is", is always incomplete. You might say it is adequate and therefore truth, I say it's incomplete and therefore only "truth" to a degree. — Metaphysician Undercover

I agree. No human knowledge is complete or exhaustive. All human knowledge is a projection (a dimensionally diminished map) of reality. It is the real source of such a projection that Aristotle's "what is" refers to. So, we agree as to the facts.

There is no point in arguing with you over your choice of words when we agree on the relevant facts.

The principal use of "truth" is in relation to honesty, but when honesty is established, and therefore can be taken for granted, we move on to use "truth" to express a high degree of certitude. — Metaphysician Undercover

How often we use "truth" to mean "really so," "honest," or "certain" is a statistical question that I don't know any research on. I think that most people mean "really so" -- not exhaustively, but wrt to the relevant issue.

The symbol "2" must, of necessity, equal the concept "two" or else there is no "concept". — Metaphysician Undercover

This is complete nonsense. First, concepts are prior to words, as shown when we know what we mean, but can't find the word for it. So, concepts in no way depend on their linguistic expression.

Second, strictly speaking, <equality> is a mathematical concept, describing the relation between two or more quantities. Its use here is a suggestive analogy, not to be taken literally. Neither linguistic symbols nor concepts are quantities, so they can't be "equal" in any literal way.

Third, two things equal to the same thing are equal to each other, but that is not the case here. "Dos", "zwei," and "two" all express the concept <two> when uttered and evoke it when heard by native speakers. Still, they aren't the same word, because they don't function interchangeably. (A person knowing English, but not German, will not think <two> when she hears "zwei." A person unfamiliar with Arabic numerals will not think <two> when he sees "2.")

Lastly, causal sufficiency is not equality. Reading "2" can be causally sufficient to evoke <two>, but that does not make them any more "equal" than a match and a forest fire.

You even indicate this by saying "the same concept". What you mean by "same" here is equivalence — Metaphysician Undercover

No, I mean identity. If different instances of sets of two objects evoked different concepts, I would be equivocating when I said, "These both have two units." All universal predication would fail as the first instance would instantiate <two-1>, the second <two-2>, etc., not the same concept, <two>.

If the symbol "2" means something slightly different for you than it does for me — Metaphysician Undercover

That is not my claim, nor is it relevant to your claim that the symbol and concept are equal. We are not discussing the relation between the concept <two> in me and the concept <two> in you, but the relation between a physical sign, "2," and an intentional concept, <two> -- which are of different kinds and so not interchangeable.

Your concept <two> and mine have identical information, but aren't identical because my concept <two> is me thinking of two, while your concept <two> is you thinking of two and I am not you. The information is identical because there is no individuating difference, not because the information is the same substantial object -- for information is not a substantial object.

I ask you for a 2 cm bolt and you hand me a 2.5, and say that's close enough? — Metaphysician Undercover

I'm not saying that 2.5 cm is always, or even usually, "close enough." I'm saying that what is "close enough" depends on your purpose. As a teen, I worked in my dad's machine shop making aircraft parts. What was "close enough" was spelled out on the blueprints -- typically +/- 0.003".

This is why truth consists of the proper relation between the symbol and the thing — Metaphysician Undercover

I find this hard to reconcile this with your view that truth is found only in God. God knows directly, not via symbols.

I agree that this is a reasonable statement about the truth of expressions; however, expressions are true only derivatively -- as giving voice to true judgements in our minds -- which are true or false in the primary sense.

According to Aquinas, human beings know artificial things in the same way that God knows His creation. — Metaphysician Undercover

I know of no such text. As this is a claim incompatible with Aquinas's most fundamental views, you need to supply a citation.

what we know is the result of us acting in the world, not it acting on us. — Metaphysician Undercover

Us acting in the world and the world acting on us are not incompatible operations. I may go looking for gold, but if the metal did not scatter light into our eyes, sink to the bottom of my pan and resist normal reagents, I wouldn't know I've found it. As you say, " We poke and prod the reality and see how it reacts." It's reacting is acting on us.

Are you familiar with the concepts of active and passive intellect? — Metaphysician Undercover

Of course. The active intellect is our awareness of information encoded in neural representations. Neural representations are the result of objects acting on our senses.

The active intellect acts, and passes what is created to the passive intellect which receives — Metaphysician Undercover

This is a distortion. The active intellect does not "create" information. (Creation is making something ex nihilo.) The active intellect merely actualizes intelligibility (information) encoded in the phantasm (a neural sensory representation).

Modern psychology, as a discipline, has major issues, though. — Wayfarer

All human beings practise psychology (the study of mind) when they attribute mental predicates to subjects (e.g., awareness and rationality) on the basis of their behaviour. It is how we manage personal and group relationships.

Sure, if you haven't got an argument for defining rationality in spiritual (rather than mental) terms, denigrating the entire field of psychology (which is extensive) may be a good tactic when trying to score points on a philosophy forum.

TOE — Janus

Thanks for the kind word and the references.
— apokrisis

The historical reality looks more like that they both got the essential duality of a formal principle and a material principle as the causal arche. — apokrisis

Yes, they both concentrate on two principles, but Aristotle says he and his opponents have contrasting triads: "For admitting with them that there is something divine, good, and desirable, we hold that there are two other principles, the one contrary to it, the other such as of its own nature to desire and yearn for it." Physics, i, 9.

Form is the "divine, good, and desirable" principle. The contrary principle is the privation of the new form, while the one actively desiring and yearning for it is hyle. ("The truth is that what desires the form is matter.") So, hyle has a determinate intentionality.

ontological atomism — apokrisis

Yes, Russell's views in “The Philosophy of Logical Atomism,” seem not to be reflections on our experience of being, but to originate in a desire to avoid the complexities such reflections reveal.

The material principle is that of an Apeiron or the Indefinite - chaotic action. — apokrisis

It is for Plato, but not for Aristotle. Aristotle's hyle is not unintelligible as is Plato's chora. It has a "desire" or intentional relation to a determinate form which can be known by analogy with similar cases. This intentionality makes change orderly and intelligible, echoing Jeremiah's "ordinances of heaven and earth" (33:25) and Thales' reliance on astronomical regularity, and foreshadowing Newton's universal laws of nature.

The formal principle is then the order that regulates this chaos of fluctuation. Tames it, channels it, gives it structure and intent — apokrisis

Again, in Plato.

form is a developmental outcome - the imposition of habits of regularity on a chaos of possibility, which thus always emerges as substantial actuality that is a blend of the necessary and the accidental. — apokrisis

That is the point of Physics i, 9.

I would say that you have a problem in that your reading of hyle leads you to suggest it contains form within it in some sense. — apokrisis

Yes, but that's not a problem. It's the solution of a problem. The new form in a substantial change is "in" hyle in a potential or intentional way -- as the "desired" outcome of its striving. Hyle is "such as of its own nature to desire and yearn for [the new form]."

With regard to vitalism, "life force" was me waxing poetic -- trying to emphasize the active nature of hyle vs. the pure passivity of prima materia. I did not mean to suggest, and do not think, that life is due to a unique vital principle.

On the other hand, I see physics as completely deterministic in its realm of application -- so that biogenesis and the evolution of species are both fully entailed by the laws of nature and the initial conditions of the universe. The only randomness in evolution is due to human ignorance.

So, I see no ontological role for a principle of "indefiniteness" (an Apeiron), with the possible exception of free will. But, even in free will, I see choices as sufficiently caused -- just not predetermined.

it is so hard to leave behind some notion of the material principle as already some kind of definite stuff - like a space-filling, but formless and passive, chora. — apokrisis

Indeed it is. As a physicist, l'm drawn to this idea. General relativity sees space as having observable properties (the metric tensor.) Quantum theory leads us to conclude that matter has a wave nature, leading to the supposition that waves must be cyclical modifications of some ether or chora. Still if the ether or chora is to be modified, it cannot be completely indeterminate. It must respond in a determinate way, with well-defined properties, or all would be chaos.

Thank you for an interesting discussion.

I can't speak for others, but as I understand physicalism, it is the view that all of our experience of reality can ultimately be explained by physics.

This would only hold true on an arguably superseded account of biological evolution that does not allow for any influence from the environmental to the genetic during the life of organisms. — Janus

I am not sure how you see this as rebutting my point. Whether or not environmental factors modify genetic factors, (and I think they do), it is still impossible to physically select a trait that has no physical effects.

We have a model of the world in which 'the subjective' is derivative or secondary or the merely personal - we feel as though it is easily explained by evolutionary science. — Wayfarer

Yes, there is a lot of "feeling" in contemporary philosophy -- positions that are "felt" to be true, but not rigorously examined.

When I say "subjective" in philosophical contexts, I most often mean "related to the knowing subject" in a subject-object relationship -- and not something lacking ontological status. It is little reflected upon that all knowing is both objective and subjective. There is invariably a knowing subject and a known object.

I'm still investigating the subject, and am not entirely convinced by Aristotle's arguments contra Platonic realism. — Wayfarer

Fair enough.

I don't think Aristotle ever described matter as having intentionality. — Metaphysician Undercover

He said hyle "desires" form. I quoted the text from Physics i, 9. Desire is certainly intentional.

.... The new form in a substantial change is "in" hyle in a potential or intentional way -- as the "desired" outcome of its striving. Hyle is "such as of its own nature to desire and yearn for [the new form]." — — Metaphysician Undercover

Since all causation is physical... — Dfpolis


But not all causation is physical, that's the point with free will, intention, it's non-physical causation. — Metaphysician Undercover

Dfpolis

You're just making this up, it's not Aristotelian at all, it's fiction.

I'm quoting Aristotle's Physics i, 9 here.

As indefinite is how Aristotle actually describes matter, as potential, what may or may not be — Metaphysician Undercover

You will need to give me a text. Often he is describing the views of others.

"Potential" (dynamis) need not mean "what may or may not be." As I discuss in my paper, "dynamis" had a history of medical usage, referring to the hidden, but determinate, curative power in plants, for example. Even a fully determinate outcome is potential before it happens. So, it is an open question as to whether any particular potential needs further specification.

And intentionality is commonly associated with freewill. — Metaphysician Undercover

Association is not a logical connection. All acts of will are intentional, but not all intentional realities are acts of will.

Fully determinate systems can exhibit intentionality -- clocks, for example -- but they exhibit no intrinsic free will. Their intentionality has an extrinsic source, as noted by Jeremiah.

Since all causation is physical... — Dfpolis

But not all causation is physical, that's the point with free will, intention, it's non-physical causation. — Metaphysician Undercover

You're arguing against a position that is not mine. I do not think all causes are physical. I'm saying that if you are a physicalist, you think all causes are physical.

Concepts are not necessarily "our concepts", because there is always intelligent being which is outside the collective "we". So if you remove that condition I would say both. — Metaphysician Undercover

OK, you are assuming God, which is fair enough, but you don't actually have an argument for that assumption. You'll just say something like "It seems impossible to me that there could be anything intelligible without an infinitely intelligent being to make it so". In any case, presumably you deny that the universe is infinite?

That's OK, if you are incapable of conceiving of existence beyond what is evident to your senses, then there is really no point in me trying to explain this to you. — Metaphysician Undercover

That's a pretty weak response. I'm capable of conceiving of existence beyond what is evident to my senses, but I don't see what that has to do with my inability to discover a coherent argument in that passage of yours I was responding to. I was asking you to clarify your argument.

I am not sure how you see this as rebutting my point. Whether or not environmental factors modify genetic factors, (and I think they do), it is still impossible to physically select a trait that has no physical effects. — Dfpolis

I think it depends on whether your understanding of the physical is mechanistic or organistic. You seem to be thinking exclusively in terms of efficient or mechanical causation. If the experiences of organisms can modify DNA, and the effect of DNA itself is 'contextual', more of a "final" or "formal" kind of causation, than an "efficient" or "material" kind of causation, then consciousness could be "selected for" in a way which is not merely "efficient" and "material", without necessitating anything absolutely beyond the physical. This would be the biosemiotic argument that the physical is not 'brute' but always already informed by a semantic dimension.

This would be something like what you have described as Aristotle's view of hyle "desiring" morphe, and would be properly understood as an entirely immanent reality, with no absolutely transcendent being required. This is why I am puzzled by your rejection of naturalism, since, as I see it, naturalism is precisely, in its broadest definition, the rejection of anything supernatural. The idea of the natural is the idea of that which is completely immanent within physical reality; the idea of the supernatural is the idea of that which is radically other to physical reality. The problem with the idea of the radically other is the problem of dualism; how would such a purportedly absolutely transcendent being interact with physical nature?

That would be one kind of physicalism: the "eliminative" kind.

when trying to score points on a philosophy forum. — Galuchat

There are no points awarded here, or none worth vying for anyway. So I’m not trying to score points, merely to make one.

I recall my mother, teachers and others urging me to tell the truth. Not a day goes by without a discussion of Trump and his representatives failing to tell the truth. The news reports that many deny the truth of climate change, others the truth of the holocaust. So, "truth" is very current outside of the narrow confines of philosophy and law. — Dfpolis

The third thing I mentioned was politics. Beyond that, I said honesty, and this is what your mother meant when she said to tell the truth, be honest.

Suppose I say, "Please tell the truth." Do you think I'm asking you to tell me the state of the world with the detail and accuracy known only to God? I surely do not. I expect you to give me an account adequate to my area of concern -- e.g., to tell me if you took my keys -- without describing the exact shape and alloy of each key, its precise position and orientation, etc, etc. — Dfpolis

When you ask me to tell the truth, you are asking me to be honest, to tell you what I truly believe, and not be deceptive. You are not asking me for an account relative to your concern, it is strictly my concern which you are asking for, what I believe.

We experience, introspectively, that our experience is reflected in our representation of that experience. In other words, that we have a true representation of our experience. — Dfpolis

This is being honest with oneself.

Beliefs are only true per accidens. So, they are only peripherally relevant here. Truth is primarily a relation between our knowledge and reality. Beliefs are not acts if intellect, but of will -- they are commitments to truth of various propositions. — Dfpolis

But now you're using "truth in a completely different way, to refer to a relationship between our knowledge and reality. Above, truth is to honestly represent one's own experience, to be true to oneself, to create a true representation of one's experience, say what one truly blieves. Now you are saying that truth is a relation between knowledge and reality. If the representation of one's experience is knowledge, and to tell the truth is to produce a true representation of one's experience, but truth is also a relation between knowledge and reality, then reality must be experience. But this cannot be correct, because one does not experience all of reality. Reality is much bigger than experience. I cannot say reality is my experience.

So either truth is a true relation between experience and representation, or a true relation between knowledge and reality. If it is both, then these are two distinct uses of "truth" and we must be careful not to equivocate. We have "truth" in day to day usage which requires that we be honest, and produce a true representation of our experience, and we also have "truth" in an epistemological sense, which requires a true relation between knowledge and reality.

This is confused. Aquinas position is that truth and falsity pertain to judgements, not concepts. He does not say that there is no truth until we judge that there is truth. And, he surely does not say that judgements are separate from thoughts, for judgements are thoughts that we can express in propositions. — Dfpolis

I believe what he says is that "truth" properly speaking is the judgement that there is truth. He clearly says that a judgement that there is correspondence is required. if all that was required was correspondence, then the senses would give us truth. Here's a quote from Summa Theologica Q16 Art2;

For although sight has the likeness of the visible thing, yet it does not know the comparison which exists between the thing seen and that which itself apprehends concerning it. But the intellect can know its own conformity with the intelligible thing; yet it does not apprehend it by knowing of a thing what the thing is. When however it judges that a thing corresponds to the form that it apprehends about the thing, then first it knows and expresses truth.
...
Therefore properly speaking, truth resides in the intellect composing and dividing; and not in the senses, nor in the intellect knowing what a thing is.

Yes, he does. It would be absurd, then, if humans had a natural appetite (for truth) that could never be satisfied. No appetite exists merely to be frustrated. — Dfpolis

If any appetite were ever truly satisfied, we would never have that desire again. But this is not the case, the same desires repeat themselves over and over until we die, they even become habitualized, they are never satisfied. Virtue involves having self-restraint in relation to these desires.

degrees of certitude" then why not "degrees of truth" as well? — Dfpolis

I'm not arguing against degrees of truth, I'm arguing against "adequacy". Adequacy implies that any degree of truth might be deemed sufficient, when in reality, if truth is sought, then only the absolute ought to be considered adequate.

This is complete nonsense. First, concepts are prior to words, as shown when we know what we mean, but can't find the word for it. So, concepts in no way depend on their linguistic expression. — Dfpolis

You are conflating "meaning" with "concept". Things have meaning which are not conceptual. So meaning does not require concepts. I believe it is impossible to conceptualize something without words or other symbols, this is an essential aspect of conceptualization. You can imagine things, and things can have meaning without symbols, but conceptualization is impossible without symbols.

I know of no such text. As this is a claim incompatible with Aquinas's most fundamental views, you need to supply a citation. — Dfpolis

It's very clear, look at Q.16 art,1

Now a thing understood may be in relation to an intellect either essentially or accidentally. It is related essentially to an intellect on which it depends as regards its essence, but accidentally to an intellect by which it is knowable; even as we may say that a house is related essentially to the intellect of the architect, but accidentally to the intellect upon which it does not depend.

Now we do not judge of a thing by what is in it accidentally, but by what is in it essentially. Hence, everything is said to be true absolutely, in so far as it is related to the intellect on which it depends; and thus it is said that artificial things are said to be true as being related to our intellect. For a house is said to be true that expresses the form in the architects mind; and words are said to be true so far as they are the signs of the truth in the intellect. In the same way natural things are said to be true in so far as they express the likeness of the species in the divine mind.

See, words, as artificial things created by the speaker, are true when they properly represent what's in the speaker's mind. That's honesty.

Us acting in the world and the world acting on us are not incompatible operations. I may go looking for gold, but if the metal did not scatter light into our eyes, sink to the bottom of my pan and resist normal reagents, I wouldn't know I've found it. As you say, " We poke and prod the reality and see how it reacts." It's reacting is acting on us. — Dfpolis

No, that's not really the case. How you see gold is your act of sensation, it is not the gold acting on you. And when we do experiments in the world, and see how things react, the reacting does not act on us, we make observations and take notes of our own free will.

This is a distortion. The active intellect does not "create" information. (Creation is making something ex nihilo.) The active intellect merely actualizes intelligibility (information) encoded in the phantasm (a neural sensory representation). — Dfpolis

Human beings do not create things ex nihilo, yet they do create things. So you argument is based on a false premise. Therefore the agent intellect may, as it does, create information without doing it ex nihilo. Furthermore, your argument is pointless, because you still have to account for what creates the phantasm. It is a creation, not a reaction.

I'm quoting Aristotle's Physics i, 9 here. — Dfpolis

If you reread, you'll see that Aristotle is working to distinguish matter from privation in this passage, complaining that others did not produce a proper distinction. In this passage, it is granted to his adversaries, the Platonists, that privation is contained within matter. Desire being the result of privation is attributed to matter. But this turns out later, to be a wrong analysis. In other passages, On the Soul, and Metaphysics, you'll find that privation is formal, a lacking, or imperfection of the form. You should read On the Soul where he talks about the movements of animals. And this position, that privation is formal, is also upheld by Aquinas, where you'll find that privation is formal, in the sense that it is an imperfection of form. Therefore it is a mistake to attribute desire to matter.

Metaphysics Bk. 9 Ch.2

The reason is that science is a rational formula, and the same rational formula explains a thing and its privation, only not in the same way; and in a sense it applies to both, but in a sense it applies rather to the positive part.
...
Now since contraries do not occur in the same thing, but science is a potency which depends on the possession of a rational formula, and the soul possesses an originative source of movement; therefore while the wholesome produces only health and the calorific only heat and the frigorific only cold the scientific man produces both the contrary effects.
...
so the soul will start both processes from the same originative source... so the things whose potency are according to a rational formula act contrariwise to the things whose potency is non-rational; for the product of the former are included under one originative source, the rational formula.

You will need to give me a text. Often he is describing the views of others. — Dfpolis

I guess you haven't read Aristotle's Metaphysics. Those principles are discussed through a significant part of the book.

Association is not a logical connection. All acts of will are intentional, but not all intentional realities are acts of will.

Fully determinate systems can exhibit intentionality -- clocks, for example -- but they exhibit no intrinsic free will. Their intentionality has an extrinsic source, as noted by Jeremiah. — Dfpolis

I agree, but what we are talking about here is intrinsic intentionality, the question being whether intentionality is intrinsic to material cause or to final cause. I think that you have taken one passage from the Physics, where he criticizes Platonists for not distinguishing between matter and privation, and have ignored all the parts of Aristotle's work where he actually worked on making this distinction. So you wrongly associate intentionality with matter and material cause, rather than with final cause.

I was asking you to clarify your argument. — Janus

It seemed quite clear to me, so perhaps you could point me to the parts which seem unclear to you.

Thanks, I still think the generic properties like "brick" to its earlier visible state as "mud" "clay" would be formal causes though. The division of the efficient cause seems to be when mind is introduced into the picture.

Btw, the whale was a fairly good example and explanation for Aristotelian realism. So were the hierarchical constraints in existence prior to the big bang or were they accidents that occurred with the development of the universe?

I can't speak for others, but as I understand physicalism, it is the view that all of our experience of reality can ultimately be explained by physics. — Dfpolis

Isn't this more universal mechanism/ reductive materialism/ atomism than physicalism. For example, most people attribute the breaking of the window to a ball striking it. Though taking modern physics as having all the ontological facts would strip the ball of this causal power. It would also strip all the higher level sciences above it as simply being useful fictions or amenable to eliminativism.

As far as I can see there are three arguments a physicalist can make against it.

a) common sense- if we accept a ball breaking a pane of glass is an illusion. Then the understanding of there being "causes" at all is in question. And if we are to argue the concept of "cause" is a priori then the empiricist/physicalist is admitting defeat.
b) spooky action at a distance (QM) - this is covered in this thread by Apo and others who say holism is necessary to resolve it.
c) the binding problem, consciousness - how things appear together as a connected reality is obviously not reconcilable with reductionism which identifies everything in atomist interactional terms (Leibniz's gap).
So a physicalist may take an instrumentalist approach to the standard model but also admit consciousness and the higher level things they interact with are all physically real.

I think it depends on whether your understanding of the physical is mechanistic or organistic. You seem to be thinking exclusively in terms of efficient or mechanical causation. If the experiences of organisms can modify DNA, and the effect of DNA itself is 'contextual', more of a "final" or "formal" kind of causation, than an "efficient" or "material" kind of causation, then consciousness could be "selected for" in a way which is not merely "efficient" and "material", without necessitating anything absolutely beyond the physical. This would be the biosemiotic argument that the physical is not 'brute' but always already informed by a semantic dimension. — Janus

I am considering only mechanical causation because we are talking about the "evolution" of consciousness, and evolution is a well-defined theory, based on three principles: (1) Random variation, (2) selection of variants leading to increased reproductive success, and (3) the inheritance of selected traits.

You are free to advance principles or hypotheses in addition to standard evolutionary mechanisms, but you need to say what they are. If you would like me to agree with them they need evidentiary support. If they are to be classed as scientific, they need to be falsifiable.

You seem to be defining terms in a unique way. I understand "physical" to name the aspect of reality studied in physics, chemistry and ordinary biology (inter alia) -- in which things are seen as developing and interacting mechanically. It is a understanding in which observable states are seen as transforming into later observable states according to fixed, universal laws of nature. i think this is a useful projection of reality, but not exhaustive of what we know from experience.

So, in my view <physical> is an abstract concept, in the formation of which many notes of comprehension are left on the table. It is not synonymous with "being" or "reality," and it does not span any semantic aspects of reality.

I have well-developed views on semiotics and see it as intrinsically intentional/mental.

I do agree that their are intentional aspects of nature -- the laws of nature and human intentionality being prime examples.

So, having sketched my position, I'd like to know first, what you see as the "semantic dimension" of the "physical," and second, what your "biosemiotic argument," for the "evolution" of awareness is. It may well be that we are projecting the same reality into different conceptual spaces.

This would be something like what you have described as Aristotle's view of hyle "desiring" morphe, and would be properly understood as an entirely immanent reality, with no absolutely transcendent being required. This is why I am puzzled by your rejection of naturalism, since, as I see it, naturalism is precisely, in its broadest definition, the rejection of anything supernatural. The idea of the natural is the idea of that which is completely immanent within physical reality — Janus

First, I see "supernatural" in these contexts as an ill-defined term of opprobrium. So, I neither accept nor reject any position because it involves the "supernatural."

Second, as I point out at the beginning of my book, "naturalism" is a vaguely defined term, having different meanings to different proponents -- rather like a group of people who have not quite "got their story straight." The range of positions I find irrational includes thinking that reality is wholly
"material," that physics is adequate to the whole of reality, that philosophical analysis can either eliminate or reduce intentional concepts to physical concepts, that "idea" and "brain state" are convertible terms, that ontological randomness can give rise to order, etc, etc.

Third, for reasons first pointed out by Aristotle, changeable reality (nature) cannot be self-explaining.

the idea of the supernatural is the idea of that which is radically other to physical reality. The problem with the idea of the radically other is the problem of dualism; how would such a purportedly absolutely transcendent being interact with physical nature? — Janus

Being "radically other" does not entail dynamical separation -- only having non-overlapping definitions. So, it is quite possible to be "radically other" and still have a dynamic connection.

He said hyle "desires" form. I quoted the text from Physics i, 9. Desire is certainly intentional. — Dfpolis

Hi Df, I'd like to return to this point because I see it as the principal point of disagreement between you and I.

When Aristotle mentioned this in Physics Bk.1, ch.9, he is talking about how others, specifically Platonists, described the existence of contraries. In earlier Platonism, desire was associated with the body, as opposed to the intelligible principles of the mind, which were supposed to control bodily desires. This promoted desire being categorized with matter, and that position fostered some later mysticism such as the idea that matter is inherently evil, matter being opposed to form which is associated with the good, being a sort of deprivation.

But later Platonism, and Aristotle redefined "matter", such that it is entirely passive. In the Timaeus you'll notice that matter is a passive receptacle of form, and in Aristotle's Metaphysics you'll see that matter receives form, form being the active part of reality. When matter is conceived of as passive, it is impossible that it could contain within it, any "emotion". Emotions such as desire are described as activities of the soul. the contraries are assigned specifically to the formal aspect of reality, such that the division between form and matter is a categorical separation rather than a separation of opposition.

You'll see that later in Aristotle's Physics, and other places, that matter is defined as the underlying thing which does not change when change occurs. It is "that of which" the change is derived, and continues to persist after the change. So when change occurs there is a change in form, but no change in matter, it is passive.

So desire and intention cannot be associated with material cause, because these are active, (actual), causes of change, and are privations of form, "have not". While matter, though it is prior to change as that from which change comes, unlike privation it persists after the change. In the case of desire and intention, these are changed when the change occurs, so they cannot be material in nature. This produces the separation between material cause and final cause.

Eliminative materialism, a la Ryle and Dennett, seeks to show that there is no distinct reality corresponding to mental concepts such as <consciousness>. Ryle seeks to do this in his The Concept of Mind by showing that the concept of introspection is incoherent, but fails miserably. In Consciousness Explained, Dennett shows that our experience of awareness cannot be explained on the hypothesis of naturalism, but departs from the scientific method by rejecting the data of consciousness in favor of the theory he has just falsified.

Since eliminativists do not believe in the reality of consciousness, they see no need to show how it could have evolved.

I can't speak for others, but as I understand physicalism, it is the view that all of our experience of reality can ultimately be explained by physics. — Dfpolis


Isn't this more universal mechanism/ reductive materialism/ atomism than physicalism. — JupiterJess

These terms seem not to have universally accepted definitions. I'm giving my use of the term "physicalism" as opposed to "materialism" and "naturalism."

"For example, most people attribute the breaking of the window to a ball striking it. Though taking modern physics as having all the ontological facts would strip the ball of this causal power."

I don't think that is how physics would treat this. It would see that the ball is composed of various constituents bound together, and in virtue of being so bound, able to act as a unit.

a) common sense- if we accept a ball breaking a pane of glass is an illusion. — JupiterJess

As I indicated, I don't think physics would say the ball breaking the window is an illusion. Despite what logical atomists would have you think, physics considers binding to be very real. Describing atomic constituents is not all that physics is about.

b) spooky action at a distance (QM) - this is covered in this thread by Apo and others who say holism is necessary to resolve it. — JupiterJess

There is no spooky action at a distance. The EPRB experiment, conceived by Bohm and discussed by Bell in his famous paper, involves no action at a distance, spooky or otherwise. This can be shown by considering various frames of reference using Special Relativity. An observation is first (and so supposedly causal) in one frame of reference will be second (and supposedly an effect) in another frame. So, neither observation can cause the other. The actual explanation is rotational symmetry, which, according to Noether's theorem, guaranties conservation of angular momentum that is used to make the prediction. It precludes the emergenge of symmetry-violating states of affairs -- guaranteeing the observed result.

the binding problem, consciousness - how things appear together as a connected reality is obviously not reconcilable with reductionism which identifies everything in atomist interactional terms — JupiterJess

I discuss the neural binding problem in my book. It can be resolved by hypothesizing neural indexing mechanisms in the brain. Such indexing alleviates the need to bring all of the encoded information together in a single location in the brain.

Despite these counter arguments, physicalism fails because of the fundamental abstraction of natural science. While all knowing involves a known object and a knowing subject, at the beginning of natural science we choose to focus on the known object to the exclusion of the knowing subject, For example, we are concerned with what Ptolemy, Galileo, Newton and Hubble saw, not with their personal experience in seeing it. As a result, natural science begins by leaving data on the table -- unexamined. Since it has no data on the knowing subject as such, it cannot draw data-based conclusions about the subjective aspects of reality, e.g. consciousness. Because physics is missing data on subjectivity, it cannot model the intentional aspects of the human mind.

Another limit to physics comes from Aristotle's observation that no science can prove its own premises. Ever since Newton, physics has assumed the existence of universal laws of nature, which it seeks to describe with ever increasing accuracy. Yet, it is outside of the purview of physics to explain the essential nature of these laws, why they they exist and why they continue in operation. Reflecting on the foundations of physics is the province of metaphysics.

Despite the claims of reductionists, physics does not even have the capacity to construct higher level sciences such as biology. In considering electrons, for example, physicists abstract away the context in which the electron is found. We do not care if it is in space, in inanimate matter, or in a living organism. Thus we abstract away the very data that forms the heart of biological science.

Physics may allow organisms as possibilities, but as Claude Shannon pointed out, information is the reduction of possibility. Only biological studies, using biological methods, will inform us as to the actual organisms in nature and their ecological roles.

When you ask me to tell the truth, you are asking me to be honest, to tell you what I truly believe, and not be deceptive. You are not asking me for an account relative to your concern, it is strictly my concern which you are asking for, what I believe. — Metaphysician Undercover

Actually I'm interested in reality. I want to know where my keys really are. So, I'm not at all interested in your beliefs as beliefs However, being charitable, I accept that your knowledge may be limited and will not press you beyond your abilities.

This is being honest with oneself. — Metaphysician Undercover

That doesn't mean we can't truly know what we experienced.

But now you're using "truth in a completely different way, to refer to a relationship between our knowledge and reality. Above, truth is to honestly represent one's own experience — Metaphysician Undercover

No, I started with "truth is the adequacy of what is in the mind to reality" -- as a relation between our representations (primarily knowledge) and reality. You're the one that side-tracked into honesty.

In relation to honesty, I said that an honest statement is one that reflects the reality of what is in our mind -- again a relation between reality and representation.

then reality must be experience — Metaphysician Undercover

You are confused. Experiences are real. That does not mean reality is experience.

This is getting tedious, and we are making no progress. So I am not wasting any more time on discussing truth with you.

Actually I'm interested in reality. I want to know where my keys really are. So, I'm not at all interested in your beliefs as beliefs However, being charitable, I accept that your knowledge may be limited and will not press you beyond your abilities. — Dfpolis

So we have a difference of interpretation here. When someone asks me to tell the truth, I interpret it as them asking me what I honestly believe concerning the referred object, in reference to my experience. When someone asks you to tell the truth, you interpret it as them asking you about reality.

No, I started with "truth is the adequacy of what is in the mind to reality" -- as a relation between our representations (primarily knowledge) and reality. You're the one that side-tracked into honesty. — Dfpolis

You are the one who side-tracked, because we were talking about 'truth" as it is used in philosophy, by Aquinas in particular, and you didn't like my claims that it is an ideal, so you deferred to "truth" in common usage. In usage other than philosophy, I see 'truth" being used to refer to honesty.

In relation to honesty, I said that an honest statement is one that reflects the reality of what is in our mind -- again a relation between reality and representation. — Dfpolis

OK, so let's bring "adequacy" into this scenario of honesty. If I make a statement and we are to judge the relation between the reality of what's in my mind, and the representation (the statement) for adequacy, how are we to judge this? Do we judge it as adequate for my purpose, or adequate for your purpose? So I make a dishonest statement because my intent is to deceive you, and I believe that this is an adequate (suitable for my purpose) representation of what's in my mind. We may have a contradiction here. The statement is true by means of adequacy, but not true by means of honesty. The problem of course, being that adequate for you is not the same as adequate for me. To solve this problem, is it not necessary to refer to an ideal?

You are confused. Experiences are real. That does not mean reality is experience. — Dfpolis

As I said at the beginning of the post, when someone asks me to tell the truth, I think they want me to refer to my experience. You think that they want me to refer to reality. So I think you've reduced reality to experience, as if in telling the truth I could give you information about reality which is beyond my experience.

This is getting tedious, and we are making no progress. So I am not wasting any more time on discussing truth with you. — Dfpolis

I agree, but that was fun, and I could continue. But I think this consumes a lot of time, and we should concentrate on where we truly disagree, and that is the relation between desire, intention, and matter. Are you panpsychist?

I already know what commitments eliminative materialism consists in. My point has been that EM does not exhaust the possibilities concerning what can constitute a physicalist position.

I am considering only mechanical causation because we are talking about the "evolution" of consciousness, and evolution is a well-defined theory, based on three principles: (1) Random variation, (2) selection of variants leading to increased reproductive success, and (3) the inheritance of selected traits.

You are free to advance principles or hypotheses in addition to standard evolutionary mechanisms, but you need to say what they are. If you would like me to agree with them they need evidentiary support. If they are to be classed as scientific, they need to be falsifiable. — Dfpolis

Evolution is not a monolithic theory, though. The three principles you cited are the bases of the theory, no doubt. But, as I already touched upon the rejection of the "Lamarkian" notion that acquired characteristics can be inherited is now questioned in at least some significant quarters, apparently with substantial evidence to back up the questioning. It's not a matter of me "liking you to agree with that", you have already stated that you do agree with it. So, given that the idea that consciousness could affect the experience and responses of organisms, which in turn could modify the heritable genetic characteristics of organisms, then there would seem to be no impediment to the idea that consciousness could have evolved.

You seem to be defining terms in a unique way. I understand "physical" to name the aspect of reality studied in physics, chemistry and ordinary biology (inter alia) -- in which things are seen as developing and interacting mechanically. It is a understanding in which observable states are seen as transforming into later observable states according to fixed, universal laws of nature. i think this is a useful projection of reality, but not exhaustive of what we know from experience.

So, in my view <physical> is an abstract concept, in the formation of which many notes of comprehension are left on the table. It is not synonymous with "being" or "reality," and it does not span any semantic aspects of reality.

I have well-developed views on semiotics and see it as intrinsically intentional/mental.

It is the physical world which is studied by all disciplines, and the most overtly "physical" regularities are studied in physics and chemistry, and the other sciences of the "non-living" such as geology and meteorology. The "life sciences" are not intelligible without the languages of intentionality and purpose, and this is still more the case with the "human sciences". Contemporary semiotic thinking deals with 'biosemiosis', and some semioticians even extend its ambit to "physiosemiosis". The fact is that there is plenty of "physicalist" thinking out there today which is not eliminativist.

It is true that the concept <physical> does not equate with the concepts <being> or <reality> simply because, logically speaking, physicality is not part of their definition. But it does not follow from this that the presupposition could not be made that all being is physical being and/or that there is no reality but physical reality. And making such a presupposition does not rule out thinking that the semantic is indeed part of that being or reality. The point is that if we want to say that the semantic is something more than an aspect of the physical world, then how can that coherently be said without positing a duality of substances or kinds of being?

I do agree that their are intentional aspects of nature -- the laws of nature and human intentionality being prime examples.

So, having sketched my position, I'd like to know first, what you see as the "semantic dimension" of the "physical," and second, what your "biosemiotic argument," for the "evolution" of awareness is. It may well be that we are projecting the same reality into different conceptual spaces.

OK, so apparently you do agree that intentionality need not be thought of as supernatural? For me this would mean that there is no need to posit a transcendent origin or condition for the possibility of intentionality and semantics. The "semantic dimension" of the physical would consist in the ways in which physical entities interpret (respond to) signs. Plants respond to sunlight by photosynthesis, and to warmth by speeding up their grwoth, for example. Predators respond to the tracks or scats of prey, and so on. Whitehead, who aimed to produce a non-reductionist yet fully naturalistic metaphysics, although not specifically a semiotician, considers all relations and responses under the universal rubric of "prehension".

The biosemiotic evolution of awareness would be theorized as finding its origin in the development of the cell membrane, and the subsequent evolution of internal responses to external signs, responses which evolve to become increasingly self-regulated and creative. In this I am a novice, but there is plenty of literature available, if you are interested. @Apokrisis is far more knowledgeable than I am in this field of thought, so you could ask him for further clarification.

First, I see "supernatural" in these contexts as an ill-defined term of opprobrium. So, I neither accept nor reject any position because it involves the "supernatural."

Second, as I point out at the beginning of my book, "naturalism" is a vaguely defined term, having different meanings to different proponents -- rather like a group of people who have not quite "got their story straight." The range of positions I find irrational includes thinking that reality is wholly
"material," that physics is adequate to the whole of reality, that philosophical analysis can either eliminate or reduce intentional concepts to physical concepts, that "idea" and "brain state" are convertible terms, that ontological randomness can give rise to order, etc, etc.

Third, for reasons first pointed out by Aristotle, changeable reality (nature) cannot be self-explaining.

I don't want to become mired in all the 'folksy' associations of 'natural' and 'supernatural'; I think it's better, for the sake of clarity in defining positions, to accept them as being the central ideas in different metaphysics which rely on different presuppositions. So, for me the purported reality of the supernatural intrinsically involves the notion of actual transcendence, and hence of 'substance dualism' and thus rejects the idea of the univocity of being. On the other hand the idea that only the natural is real intrinsically involves the rejection of actual transcendence, and is committed to some kind of monism and the univocity of being.

Being "radically other" does not entail dynamical separation -- only having non-overlapping definitions. So, it is quite possible to be "radically other" and still have a dynamic connection.

The problem is we don't seem to have any examples of "dynamic connection" which are not understood to be physical, or to put it differently that could be shown to be radically non-physical, as opposed to merely non-mechanical. So, to me it seems that you are working with an outdated notion of the physical.