Nice. The twiddly maths lost me when I looked into this some time back.

I'm assuming the interface theory is the computer desktop icon metaphor?

Don't see it. — Banno

Having said that, there's an awful lot of awfully idealist-sounding prose scattered throughout, e.g. 'Conscious realism, in direct contradiction to physicalism, takes our conscious experiences as ontologically fundamental.' If it walks like an idealist, and quacks like an idealist, then.....

If it walks like an idealist, and quacks like an idealist, then..... — Wayfarer

That's what I've been thinking. Do you suppose that perhaps Hoff is trying to avoid being too closely associated with traditional philosophy (idealism) and wants to focus on his scientific & maths credentials to help connect people to his model?

He’s a cognitive scientist but as he doesn’t subscribe to materialism so it seems suggestive of idealism. I’m going to read that critical review Banno posted.

Ah, thought you was referring to the book. That'd explain it. Past my bed time.

:yawn:

Anyone else watching the Renée Geyer Memorial?

I'm not sure how science can lead to truth when Hoff says we are hardwired by evolution to be unable to recognise reality. — Tom Storm

The position of truth would depend on how you would define "truth". If truth is correspondence, then truth is possible, but the problem is in knowing when truth has been obtained because human judgements are teleologically based, based in purposefulness (predictability etc.) rather than judgements of truth.

I think that the position is best understood as a form of pragmaticism. The way we sense the world, consequently the way that we understand the world, has been formed or shaped by some type of purposefulness. That's what Banno states as "fitness beats truth". Here "fitness" which is commonly associated with "survival" in accounts of evolutionary theory is reduced to reproductive capacity. Strong evidence for how reproductive capacity affects sensation is found in the sensual pleasure of sexual intercourse. We can understand this as a form of pragmaticism because the way that the human being perceives and understands the world is directed overall, by usefulness. And pragmaticism is based in natural teleology. The overall purpose or end for life in general (the meaning of life), escapes our grasp, but the purposefulness inherent within living systems implies that this perspective is not misdirected.

From the pragmatist perspective truth is possible, but it needs to be given priority as something which is useful. So truth does not come naturally to us because "fitness beats truth". So we must shape our priorities through moral training etc., (the classic God is Truth for example), in order to direct ourselves toward the usefulness of truth. The usefulness here being communion and social interaction, propagated by truthfulness, which in turn produces a higher knowledge and greater usefulness overall. The desire for truth has a place in the rational mind, bit it is commonly suppressed by irrational desires which are natural to living bodies, so it does not obtain a place of priority without culture.

However there must be some form of "judgement", though not rational judgement which is inherent within intuition — Metaphysician Undercover

What I am saying is that inherent within my sensibility, there is some sort of "judgement", which "decided" to present this display to me — Metaphysician Undercover

I explained in detail why it is necessary to conclude that there is some form of "judgement" occurring at a subconscious level — Metaphysician Undercover

These are declarations, mere assertions, with no detailed explanation accompanying them. And I reject anything needing quotation marks that merely substantiate its ambiguity. It’s judgement or it isn’t, such a thing as “judgement” just doesn’t say enough to be taken seriously.

Everything in general about what you call the form of “judgement” inherent in intuition, inasmuch as your exposition of it has entailed, has already been rendered in the pertinent literature as imagination, which meets the explanatory criteria for the human intellectual system as a whole in much more satisfactory manner, and, first, eliminates such notorious ambiguity as “judgement” altogether, and second, serves as sufficient reason for not realizing you are right. Like…..my employment of methodological imagination is much right-er than your employment of methodological “judgement”.

‘Nuff said.
————

the inclination to restrict "judgement" to conscious mental activity is a misunderstanding of the nature of living beings. — Metaphysician Undercover

This is an unwarranted presupposition that the nature of all living beings is imbued with conscious mental activity, all that being completely irrelevant anyway, for all I care about properly understanding, is the living being that is me. I for one, have no problem restricting judgement to conscious mental activity, for I assert without equivocation that is impossible for me to judge anything whatsoever, if I am not conscious of what is being judged.

↪Tom Storm
He’s a cognitive scientist but as he doesn’t subscribe to materialism so it seems suggestive of idealism. I’m going to read that critical review Banno posted. — Wayfarer

The current issue of Philosophy Now magazine has an article by columnist Raymond Tallis that is critical of Hoffman's theory. He accuses Hoffman of "Darwinitis" : "the claim that evolution completely explains the human person". But I didn't get that impression from The Argument Against Reality. Instead, he uses the step-by-step heuristic*1 mechanism of adaptation to illustrate how an incomplete understanding of Reality could be "good enough" for practical purposes*2 . Presumably, long-suffering Evolution is not concerned with perfect adaptations, only workable solutions. Tallis also accuses Hoffman of "self-refutation". As a truth-seeker himself, Tallis is especially critical of Hoffman's "Fitness Beats Truth" theorem. But that's how evolution works, as opposed to the one step perfection of divine creation.

Despite the messiness of reality, Philosophers like clear-cut conceptual categories. So, Tallis's put-down of Hoffman's theory seems to assume that Idealism and Realism are mutually exclusive. And that is indeed how those worldviews are typically presented, by believers in one paradigm or the other. But my BothAnd worldview treats those clashing categories as just one of many apparent paradoxes in both Philosophy (e.g. Sorites) and Physics (e.g. wave/particle). We may not like those contradictions, but we have no choice but to learn to live with them. Whether the world appears Materialistic or Idealistic depends on how you frame your perspective. Either/Or thinkers are not able to deal with the complexities & contradictions of heuristic evolution, and its hybrid offspring*3.

I wasn't familiar with the Multimodal User Interface (MUI) theory, but after a quick scan it seems reasonable*4. Human perception receives inputs of raw Data from the environment, and converts it into the meaningful information that we call Concepts. The Data represent the concrete Reality outside the Mind in terms of abstract bits of energy (photons), but the brain transforms those "particles" of energy into meaningful integrated images that are not real, but merely maps of reality. It seems that Tallis is criticizing Hoffman for making a distinction between a useful Map and the actual Terrain. :smile:


*1. Heuristic : a trial & error process that produces many imperfect candidates, and selects the ones that survive the rigors of reality to serve as candidates for the next round of trials. This error-ridden method may never reach final perfection, but it gets closer at each step. For example, biological evolution, after billions of trials, has produced the human brain as the epitome of survival fitness. Yet, the brain is still subject to imperfect representations (optical illusions), some of which may be adaptive for pragmatic purposes.

*2. Practical Adaptations are Pragmatic, not Perfect, and not Ideal. They have short-term survival value. Likewise,pragmatic Science never reaches absolute Truth, but it does get incrementally closer to truth.

*3. How hybrids have upturned evolutionary theory :
Hybrids are not an evolutionary bug. They are a feature. That knowledge is changing the way people think about evolution.
https://www.economist.com/science-and-technology/2020/10/03/how-hybrids-have-upturned-evolutionary-theory

*4. Truth and fitness, they claim, are not rival strategies, but rather the same strategy, seen from different perspectives.
https://meaningfulparticipation.org/posts/multimodal-user-interface-theory

The position of truth would depend on how you would define "truth". — Metaphysician Undercover

Sure. But my point wasn't about truth as such, it was about the nature and validity of science and empirical data, which surely has a compromised status if human senses are not able to apprehend reality.

According to Steven Schafersman, geologist and president of Texas Citizens for Science, metaphysical naturalism is a philosophy that proposes that: 1. Nature encompasses all that exists throughout space and time; 2. Nature (the universe or cosmos) consists only of natural elements, that is, of spatiotemporal physical substance—mass–energy. Non-physical or quasi-physical substance, such as information, ideas, values, logic, mathematics, intellect, and other emergent phenomena, either supervene upon the physical or can be reduced to a physical account; 3. Nature operates by the laws of physics and in principle, can be explained and understood by science and philosophy; and 4. the supernatural does not exist, i.e., only nature is real. — WIkipedia — Wayfarer

1, This is just a definitional stipulation.
2. There is a presumption here that nature is well understood, through and through. We have a comprehensive, mostly consistent and coherent body of scientific understanding of nature, nature as it presented to us, and that is really all we have. We also cannot help thinking that nature is something in itself, but that thought just establishes the realization that our understanding is necessarily limited.
It does seem that all those things which appear non or quasi-physical supervene on the physical; so that is true as far as appearances go.
3. States how thing appear to be.
4, There doesn't seem to be any credible evidence for the existence of the supernatural, if we don't count imaginings, intuitions and intimations as some kind of evidence. Should we count them as evidence? I would say they cannot count as publicly available evidence, so the answer is 'no', since we cannot corroborate them inter-subjectively.

To it's more like what Sartre called beneath all explanation. — green flag

Right, the mystical is beyond all explanation, whether beneath or above.

The experience that we need in order to understand logic is not that something or other is the state of things, but that something is: that, however, is not experience. — green flag

I don't understand what that sentence means.

But it is nonsense to say that I wonder at the existence of the world, because I cannot imagine it not existing. — green flag

I think we can imagine that the world might not have existed (well I can at least). And even if we could not imagine that, I don't see why existence should not elicit a feeling of wonder.

One might be tempted to say that what I am wondering at is a tautology, namely at the sky being blue or not blue. But then it's just nonsense to say that one is wondering at a tautology. — green flag

I don't understand the contingencies of existence to be tautologies, or say how they could be so understood, so I'm afraid you've lost me here

Right, the mystical is beyond all explanation, whether beneath or above. — Janus

My current way of understanding the claim is in terms of being not being itself an entity. I believe Plato made a point like this (good beyond being ? the sun ?). Kant wrote that existence is not a predicate. The world worlds. But of course it does, right ? How could it not? I tend to say 'contingency' but I'm not sure that's quite it. Why should there be a here here ? But is that question really a question ? What makes a question legitimate ? What kind of answer could we possibly expect to satisfy us ?


The experience that we need in order to understand logic is not that something or other is the state of things, but that something is: that, however, is not experience.

I don't understand what that sentence means. — Janus

I think Wittgenstein is saying that there's an experience that doesn't count as an experience in the usual sense. It's not a seeing of this or that being the case but more like seeing that anything at all is the case. 'Something is the case.' That's his most minimal mysticism maybe ?
Deep ? Dopey ? Both ?

I think we can imagine that the world might not have existed (well I can at least). And even if we could not imagine that, I don't see why existence should not elicit a feeling of wonder. — Janus

I think W is saying that there's something (somethingness, nothingness) he can't imagine away. So strip it all down to total darkness, but the darkness and void remain. As Sartre put it, the voice that can not shut up. Perhaps I can imagine that what happens to be the case is contingent. But maybe I can't think something-or-other-being-the-case as contingent. I have to read this in the context of what W wrote in the TLP. It's not how but that the world exists that is the mystic. I believe he was distantly sympathetic to what he heard of Heidegger, perhaps as another thinker thrusting against the limits of logic/language.

I don't understand the contingencies of existence to be tautologies, or say how they could be so understood, so I'm afraid you've lost me here — Janus

It is either raining outside or it is not. That is the case, the way things are. The sky is blue or it is not. We cleave the possible down the middle. But that's the situation, which is just here/there.

[It] gives. Es gibt.

<Thales falls into a well.>

Existence is not a predicate — green flag

Kant's criticism of the ontological argument.

Kant's criticism of the ontological argument. — Wayfarer

Yes, I know. I wasn't saying that it was Plato's idea but connecting dots. Plato. Kant. Heidegger. Sartre. Wittgenstein. We can add Parmenides I guess. Who else tried to point out that something was the case? And that maybe that was weird ?

Do you happen to know what Plato called it ? Was it symbolized as a sun ? I read about it recently. The good beyond being or something ?

In any case, I'm definitely cooling on Hoffman. One idea that really threw me in the long article Banno pinned, was that 'conscious agents' are not necessarily human beings, but might be completely unknown to us. :yikes: Myself, not being wedded to materialism, am quite prepared to accept that there might be immaterial intelligences, but I don't know if this is what Hoffman has in mind, in fact I don't know if he knows what he means.

One weakness in the 'desktop metaphor' is that at least a computer scientist will understand exactly the real operations that are being performed by the user interface, right down to the machine code and micro-electronics that underlie it. A scientist could explain comprehensively what the icons really are and how they work to achieve the user's purposes. I don't know if Hoffman can have any corresponding ontology of what the real connections are between perceiving subjects and objects that correspond to his metaphor of creatures manipulating icons. He says it's not real - compared to what?

In classical philosophy and theology, you will frequently encounter the notion of The One or The Good as 'beyond being'. What I think this actually means is 'beyond the vicissitudes of existence' - all material phenomena - everything that exists - is compounded, conditioned, and subject to change and decay. The search was always for that which is not subject to change and decay (which is also characteristic of mathematical knowledge in some degree as it is not subject to fluctuation or change.) The unconditoned was represented in Plato by the Ideas or the Form of the Good, which was 'beyond existence' in that sense - not coming into or passing out of being, but always so. Very much the subject of later and neo-platonism, and subsequently assimilated into Platonic Christianity. This is articulated very clearly (for such an abstruse topic!) in the SEP entry on Scotus Eriugena in a discussion of levels or planes of reality. Completely separate topic to this thread, however.

I don't know if Hoffman can have any corresponding ontology of what the real connections are between perceiving subjects and objects that correspond to his metaphor of creatures manipulating icons. He says it's not real - compared to what? — Wayfarer

Yes. That's a good point.

'conscious agents' are not necessarily human beings, but might be completely unknown to us. — Wayfarer

Hmm, I wonder... aliens? Interdimensional beings? Dissociated alters of a universal mind? Poker playing dogs?

:rofl:

These are declarations, mere assertions, with no detailed explanation accompanying them. — Mww

The explanation is in the earlier exchange with you, in my response to your claim that one cannot be deceived by one's own feelings. The gist of what I said was that since some sensations strike us directly as beautiful, pleasurable, or painful, without conscious classification to that effect, it is necessary to conclude that the "decision", or "judgement", that these sensations are of such a character is performed at a level prior to conscious judgement.

The example was when I eat something which tastes "good", but isn't really "good" because it makes me sick. The result is that we have two completely Incompatible senses of "good" here, one according to the subconscious judgement inherent within the sensibility itself, and one according to the rational thinking. To understand this more clearly, look at any so-called "bad habit". The person is directly inclined toward a specific type of act because at the subconscious level it is judged as "good" by that "judgement" performed at this level, yet the rational mind judges it as "bad".

Instead of addressing this explanation which I provided for you, you simply responded with: "This is tantamount to proposing that sensibility thinks ,,, Have it your way". I addressed the "sensibility thinks" issue by stating that this is not a form of thinking, therefore we must conclude that there is "judgement" without thinking, and I took the "have it your way" as implying that you had no reasonable rebuttal to what I presented.

Now you pretend to have rebutted.

And I reject anything needing quotation marks that merely substantiate its ambiguity. It’s judgement or it isn’t, such a thing as “judgement” just doesn’t say enough to be taken seriously. — Mww

OK then, let's just call it judgement and get on with the show. That's how most philosophers write, using words in ways that other people might not be too familiar with, without special quotation marks to indicate special usage. I thought it might assist you to understand, if I used the quotations to indicate that my usage might be one which you are not very familiar with. That would be the case if you haven't done the analysis required to find the thing which the term refers to in that context. I think of it as a courtesy which I afford for you, but if you dislike it and it appears to you like a bad habit, let me know clearly, and I'll try to refrain in future discussion.

Everything in general about what you call the form of “judgement” inherent in intuition, inasmuch as your exposition of it has entailed, has already been rendered in the pertinent literature as imagination, which meets the explanatory criteria for the human intellectual system as a whole in much more satisfactory manner, and, first, eliminates such notorious ambiguity as “judgement” altogether, and second, serves as sufficient reason for not realizing you are right. Like…..my employment of methodological imagination is much right-er than your employment of methodological “judgement”. — Mww

Incorporating this form of judgement into the more general conception of imagination does not eliminate the need for the use of the term "judgement" in reference to the various aspects of imagination. Do you understand that there is judgement, which is inherent within imagination as fundamental to it? This judgement must be independent from conscious judgement.

Take dreaming for example. Do you see that there is judgement, which is not conscious judgement, that is foundational to the dreaming process? Decisions must be made as to what will occur within the dream, otherwise the dream would be random in an absolute way. Of course dreams appear to the conscious mind as somewhat random in many ways, but not in an absolute sense. What the appearance of randomness indicates is that the judgement process involved in creating the dream is very inconsistent with the judgement process of the conscious mind, so it appears to have many random aspects.

This is analogous with the conscious judgement that something is "illogical". When one person judges another's judgement as illogical, this does not imply that the other's judgement is judged as not a judgement, it means that the judgement is not logical. Likewise, when we judge a dream as random, this does not mean that the judgements which created the dream are not judgements, it only means that these judgements are judged by us as random.

.

This is an unwarranted presupposition that the nature of all living beings is imbued with conscious mental activity, all that being completely irrelevant anyway, for all I care about properly understanding, is the living being that is me. I for one, have no problem restricting judgement to conscious mental activity, for I assert without equivocation that is impossible for me to judge anything whatsoever, if I am not conscious of what is being judged. — Mww

This is why you are wrong, and I am right. If "to judge" is defined by the capacity to judge which your own conscious mind possesses, then no one else can judge in any way other than the way that you judge . So, evidence of differing judgements induces us to allow that others judge in different ways. There are judgements, and ways of judging which are inconsistent with mine. Therefore to recognize a judgement as a judgement I need to allow that judgements are not necessarily consistent with my way of judging.

So, your assertion that it "is impossible for me to judge anything whatsoever, if I am not conscious of what is being judged" says only something about your own judgements. It says nothing about other judgements which are not made by you, judgements which may not be consistent with your judgements. And, it is clearly wrong to exclude judgements made by someone other than yourself, from the category of "judgement", just because you did not personally make that judgement, and the judgement is inconsistent with yours. And, an inconsistent judgement implies that the mode of judgement is inconsistent with yours. Therefore it is very clearly incorrect to say that since your mode of judgement is conscious judgement, all modes of judgement must be conscious judgement.

Furthermore, when we allow that there are judgements made by others, we not only encounter the problem of judgements which are inconsistent with our own, but also judgements which appear to be "illogical". Further, we see judgements which appear to be completely irrational, immoral, unprincipled, rash, irate, emotional, and even random (like in dreams).

Therefore your grounds for 'all judgement is conscious judgement' is unjustifiable by the means you propose.

Sure. But my point wasn't about truth as such, it was about the nature and validity of science and empirical data, which surely has a compromised status if human senses are not able to apprehend reality. — Tom Storm

It's not that "truth" has a compromised status. That would be a backward way of looking at things. We can still hold truth up to the highest standards. We simply need to recognize that empirical data and science are insufficient for truth.

This means that if science does not maintain truth as its goal, and receive guidance from other sources (metaphysics) its results will be less than truth. So for instance if capacity to predict replaces truth as the goal of science, it is not truth which is compromised but science which is compromised. "Truth" would only be compromised if we lowered it to what empirical data, or science provides us with. That's why I said it depends on how you define 'truth".

The gist of what I said…. — Metaphysician Undercover

I do not work with gists; proper dialectics require I work with only what is given to me, and that subjected to my own understanding.

All you’ve said here most recently, makes no mention of that which I take particular exception, that being where in the system this “judgement”, where that which “decides for me”, resides. You’ve maintained its residence to be in intuition, subsequently broadened its residence to sensibility in general. Hence, my objection that whatever you think this “judgement” is, sufficient for it to “decide for me”, being necessarily a conscious activity insofar as unconscious or subconscious decision making is inconceivable in accordance with the human intellectual system, the business of both this ambiguous form of “judgement”, and proper judgement itself, do not belong to sensibility, said objection expressed as “tantamount to proposing that sensibility thinks”.

I addressed the "sensibility thinks" issue by stating that this is not a form of thinking — Metaphysician Undercover

You said this form of “judgement” in sensibility “decides for me”. You’ll have to forgive me for thinking that the making of a decision requires some sort of conclusion derivable from some antecedent conditions, which is for all intents and purposes, a logical relation, in fact, a syllogism. If such is the case, it requires that sensibility be equipped for the construction of logical relations. So either sensibility thinks in the construction of logical relations, from which is given the necessity of two thinking faculties in the same system (what a mess that would be), or, “judgement” in sensibility which “decides for me”, is patently absurd.

By saying “judgement” which “decides for me” is not a form of thinking, thereby attempting to relieve the two thinking faculties dilemma, matters are made even worse, for now it must be told how a decision can be made for me which requires no logical relations.
—————

I used the quotations to indicate that my usage might be one which you are not very familiar with. That would be the case if you haven't done the analysis required to find the thing which the term refers to in that context. — Metaphysician Undercover

Imagination is the thing I found in the analysis of your term in your context. I analyzed “judgement” and rejected it as philosophically ambiguous. Of course I would be unfamiliar with “judgement”, given the established abstract conceptual system to which judgement necessarily belongs. To use it, or any of its derivatives, no matter how disguised, other than as that system demands, is to destroy it altogether.

I think of it as a courtesy which I afford for you…. — Metaphysician Undercover

Nahhhh, you don’t. You’re presupposing I have no idea what you’re talking about. I say that because at the end of our first set of comments here, pg 6, there’s a question for you left unaddressed, which would have given a different perspective entirely for what was initially a general agreement between us.

With that unanswered question, combined with my mentioning something about a form of judgement related to intuition and you changing that into a form of “judgement” contained in intuition…..we’ve digressed into irreconcilable differences.

All else is superfluous.

The good beyond being or something ? — green flag

This might be of interest. It is, as I piece it together, Plato's argument against knowledge of the Good.

One weakness in the 'desktop metaphor' is that at least a computer scientist will understand exactly the real operations that are being performed by the user interface, right down to the machine code and micro-electronics that underlie it. A scientist could explain comprehensively what the icons really are and how they work to achieve the user's purposes. I don't know if Hoffman can have any corresponding ontology of what the real connections are between perceiving subjects and objects that correspond to his metaphor of creatures manipulating icons. He says it's not real - compared to what? — Wayfarer

Hoffman's Interface theory is based on the mechanism of Darwinian adaptation. But I just came across a similar notion in Fire In The Mind, an overview of 20th century quantum science development. The book focused primarily on information coming out of quantum & complexity studies in Los Alamos and Santa Fe, New Mexico. In a chapter entitled The Democracy of Measurement --- after discussing the "collapse" (decoherence) of the wavefunction from superposition --- the author notes that the reason we observers normally see a classical reality, is that "the environment is monitoring everything all the time, collapsing wave functions, bringing hard-edged classicality out of quantum mushiness"*1. Therefore the Observer Problem only arises when scientists eliminate as many variables as possible (simplicity ; reductionism), in order to focus on, and measure, a single particle in an unnatural situation. But superposition is a Holistic property.

Outside the lab though, complexity rules. Hence, "In this democracy of measurement, we cannot really say which is the observer and which is the observed". Then, he quotes Wojciech Zurek, "Our senses did not evolve for the purpose of verifying quantum mechanics. . . . And when nothing can be gained from prediction, there is no evolutionary reason for perception". Based on sensory perception, the scientist observer creates an abstract (unnatural) model of quantum scale reality; which seems weird compared to Newtonian physics. To me, that quote sounded a lot like Donald Hoffman's conclusion, but drawn from a different field of evidence*2. So, regardless of any later spooky idealistic interpretations, Hoffman's basic observation rings true for me. Therefore, I'm guessing he simply means that our abstract mental models are "not real" compared to concrete*3 classical reality. :smile:


*1. How Does Classical Reality Emerge From Quantum Environments? :
It's not possible to make a sharp division between scales with quantum rules for small things and classical ones for big things— that's the real point of the Schrödinger cat thought experiment. The world is quantum, all the way up.
https://www.forbes.com/sites/chadorzel/2019/08/07/how-does-classical-reality-emerge-from-quantum-environments/?sh=341498214526

*2. The Interface Theory of Perception :
Our perceptual capacities are products of evolution and have been shaped by natural selection. It is often assumed that natural selection favors veridical perceptions, namely, perceptions that accurately describe those aspects of the environment that are crucial to survival and reproductive fitness. However, analysis of perceptual evolution using evolutionary game theory reveals that veridical perceptions are generically driven to extinction by equally complex nonveridical perceptions that are tuned to the relevant fitness functions. Veridical perceptions are not, in general, favored by natural selection. This result requires a comprehensive reframing of perceptual theory, including new accounts of illusions and hallucinations. This is the intent of the interface theory of perception, which proposes that our perceptions have been shaped by natural selection to hide objective reality and instead to give us species-specific symbols that guide adaptive behavior in our niche.
https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1002/9781119170174.epcn216

*3. Concrete : existing in a material or physical form; not abstract.
Note-- to me this definition implies that quantum physics --- as abstracted into mathematical equations by scientists --- is meta-physical. By "metaphysical", I mean non-physical mental ideas & concepts. Is that spooky, or what?

Thanks!

The Tallis article has already been the subject of discussion in this thread:

https://philosophynow.org/issues/154/An_Encounter_with_Radical_Darwinitis — Banno

Tallis' argument is clear. Hoffman claims on the one hand that "There are no such things as objects as they are usually understood as discrete items localized in space and time". But such objects are the very basis of the theory of evolution, and of science more generally. Hoffman thereby undermines the basis of his own theory.

Hoffman uses objective reality to deny objective reality.

He thinks he can do this because he thinks he can reconstruct reality. Hence his somewhat enigmatic rendering of consciousness as the PDA loop set out above, itself a rendering of his definition of "conscious agent" in terms of Markovian kernels. But exactly how conscious agents can engage in an evolutionary process that does not involve discreet individuals interacting is unclear.

If you are sympathetic, you might be able to explain Hoffman's view here.

A side note, on your suggesting that we accept paradoxes. Accepting a paradox is tantamount to accepting anything. (P & ~P) ⊃ Q. The Principle of Explosion. An explanation that contains a contradiction explains everything, and hence explains nothing. There is a reason philosophy attempts to be clear and consistent. If your theory is not clear and consistent, then it is not worth considering.

A similar, but more extensive, critique is found in

https://philpapers.org/archive/ALLHCR.pdf

Also mentioned above.

It's not that "truth" has a compromised status. That would be a backward way of looking at things. We can still hold truth up to the highest standards. We simply need to recognize that empirical data and science are insufficient for truth. — Metaphysician Undercover

Sorry mate, I don't think we're talking about the same thing. I made a small point about Hoffman's account of empiricism, not truth as such. But let's move on. :wink:

'conscious agents' are not necessarily human beings, but might be completely unknown to us.
— @Wayfarer

Hmm, I wonder... aliens? Interdimensional beings? Dissociated alters of a universal mind? Poker playing dogs? — Tom Storm

Hoffman defines consciousness in terms of PDA loops. But further, it's not this or that thing that is conscious, but that consciousness "builds" this or that thing - the rock is your view of a bunch of conscious PDA loops. Despite this appearing to be a form of idealism, Hoffman claims it is a form of realism, since the PDA loopy thingies are real even when outside of your consciousness...

So perversely, rocks are not real but PDA loopy thingies are.

But also, rocks are just PDA loopy thingies.

I don't see why we can't just go back to saying that rocks are real. Doing so sorta cuts to the chase, if you see what I mean.

That is, it seems to me that Hoffman is abusing words like "real" and "reality" in order to make good copy.

It's worth noting that he apparently consults for advertising companies.

Cool. That drills down into it a bit better for me. Appreciate this.

But also, rocks are just PDA loopy thingies. — Banno

So rocks are how the loopys appear for us so we can deal with them in our Darwinist survival world...

What then? Surely he's heading somewhere to sell us something more? :wink:

I don't see why we can't just go back to saying that rocks are real. Doing so sorta cuts to the chase, if you see what I mean. — Banno

Yes. It reminds me of the point made by some that matter isn't 'real' and that all we see and experience is excitations in quantum fields. For a human being this doesn't really get us out of the world of rocks and bad pop music....