• Pantagruel
    3.4k
    That’s a slightly different question.Michael

    It seems like it is directly entailed by the fact the OP attempts to bridge multiple domains. By the parameters of the OP, the nature of the metaphysical, the physical, and the logical are being cross-connected. It is essentially an inter-theoretic question.
  • Lionino
    2.7k
    If the person can't comprehend what has been said clearly (i.e. supported by the context), then that person certainly can't understand its justification.180 Proof

    In your head surely, the only space where being finite is not an attribute included in the concept of "human".

    A circle is infinite and finite in different respects just like a Mandelbrot set has finite area but infinite perimeter. There is no respect in which humans are or can be infinite.
  • javra
    2.6k
    Modal Logic is a branch of Logic, not Metaphysics.Corvus

    Here's a reference:

    Modal metaphysics concerns the metaphysical underpinning of our modal statements.

    There could be no formalized modal logic without an underlying modal metaphysics by which modal logic is established.

    This gets back into what was saying.

    Apropos, to Joshs:

    if I were to draw up a diagram, metaphysics would be the circle encompassing the physical and the logical.Joshs

    I agree with your take in all respects but one. To me, the possibilities/impossibilities obtained directly from laws of thought, whatever they happen to be, will encapsulate and determine all possibilities/impossibilities obtained from metaphysics and from metaphysics-bound systems of formal logic (such as that of modal logic). This would then make the laws of thought existentially fixed - again, this irrespective of what they might happen to be.

    BTW, dialetheism comes to mind as a conceivable break from the law of noncontradiction. But then again, to my knowledge, not even dialetheism questions the law of identity, which to my mind can validly be expressed as "A cannot be not-A when addressed at a singular time and in the same respect" hence equating to "A can only be A when addressed at the same time and in the same respect". But then this fits into the law of noncontradiction.
  • 180 Proof
    15.4k
    I agree, which is why I say person and not "human".
  • javra
    2.6k
    So what does the term "person" signify to you?
  • 180 Proof
    15.4k
    In this context, "person" connotes subject which suffices for my example.
  • Corvus
    3.2k
    Here's a reference:

    Modal metaphysics concerns the metaphysical underpinning of our modal statements.
    javra
    From some perspectives, everything is connected or related to everything. But from some other perspectives, they are all separate entities especially in terms of the origin of the subjects etc.
    If that was not the case, then what is the point of having different branches of the subjects? Why not just call them all under one name?
  • javra
    2.6k
    Going in circles. "Subject" is far more ambiguous then "person". But so be it.
  • Lionino
    2.7k
    What is an example of a person in which that applies?
  • javra
    2.6k
    From some perspectives, everything is connected or related to everything.Corvus

    This misses the entire point. Modal logic is founded upon metaphysics. These being two separate entities: modal logic as one specialized subset of metaphysics at large.

    As to everything being interconnected in one way or another, I should think so. Even utterly disparate possible worlds will be interconnected by one's awareness of them, if nothing else. This doesn't prevent us from distinguishing rocks from their molecules and from their environment, though - as one example.
  • Joshs
    5.7k


    A circle is infinite and finite in different respects just like a Mandelbrot set has finite area but infinite perimeter. There is no respect in which humans are or can be infinite.Lionino

    Interesting. That makes me wonder. In what respect is a circle or the Mandelbrot set infinite? In the case of a fractal, it is a non-linear series where we take the product and feed it back in as input, making it recursive. We can think of pi as an infinite series also. The further we take the computation of the series , the more accurate is the calculation of the circle’s shape. Does this mean that the infinity of pi is a kind of infinitesimal? If we take the human body as a series of shapes and contours, don’t we get into the territory of infinitesimals in mapping its topography? Aren’t coastlines fractals, and if so, isn’t the human body composed of such fractals? Another thought: since there are no perfect circles in nature, the infinite series of pi exists only as a calculative activity of the human mind. If the mind is finite, then where does the infinity of pi exist except as a hypthesis?
  • Philosophim
    2.6k


    Something to consider is that logic and metaphysics require a linguistic or numerical representation. These things can be defined incorrectly but be 'correct' while using this poor definition that has no basis in reality. So one could have an incorrectly defined logic but a correctly defined metaphysics that matches to reality.
  • Lionino
    2.7k
    In what respect is a circle or the Mandelbrot set infinite?Joshs

    Watch this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I_rw-AJqpCM
    I could work out the mathetical explanation with infinite series, but I slept only 4 hours today due to workload and skipped gym, so I will leave it for another day :mask:

    I do not know exactly in what way they referred to the circle being infinite, but you can depict a circle as a regular polygon with infinite many side.

    The one I gave ...180 Proof

    Me: What is an example of a person in which that [metaphysically impossible to be infinite but logically possible] applies?
    Him: The example I gave
    His example: an infinite person

    Thank you for the contribution, 360º Proof. Go troll another thread.
  • Corvus
    3.2k
    This misses the entire point. Modal logic is founded upon metaphysics. These being two separate entities: modal logic as one specialized subset of metaphysics at large.javra
    This seems to be tangent from the OP anyway. We are not interested in which subject is founded by which.

    As to everything being interconnected in one way or another, I should think so. Even utterly disparate possible worlds will be interconnected by one's awareness of them, if nothing else. This doesn't prevent us from distinguishing rocks from their molecules and from their environment, though - as one example.javra
    That sounds like a perspective which is associated with the fortune tellers' world view.
    In Modal Realism, all possible worlds are separate entities, to which no other worlds have access.
  • javra
    2.6k
    Touche. Your logic as to fortune tellers and such is truly out-standing.

    Me: What is an example of a person in which that [metaphysically impossible to be infinite but logically possible] applies?Lionino

    In an attempt to help out:

    Since “a person” signifies a subject, and since dogs are subjects of awareness, an example of an infinite person would be an infinite dog.

    Dogs are infinite because, just like every other physical object conceivable, when they are for example mapped mathematically via geometric points, they contain an infinite quantity of geometric points.

    Infinite dogs are logically possible because they exist in possible worlds. But they are metaphysically impossible because these possible worlds don’t exist, ergo these worlds cannot contain metaphysics.

    Such is my best roundabout understanding of the perspective so far.
  • Lionino
    2.7k


    I appreciate you trying to work out the example that the troll refused to elaborate (as he does every time).

    I am either missing something very fundamental (and I blame my lack of sleep) in your elaboration or there is a glaring flaw. By the conception that dogs are infinite because they encompass/are an infinity of geometric points, they would be infinite, logically, metaphysically, physically already. So an infinite dog would not be metaphysically impossible because it is already physically possible by the constraints we chose.

    But they are metaphysically impossible because these possible worlds don’t existjavra

    Are the definitions not confused here? Something logically possibly is something that does not entail a violation of logic, while something metaphysically possible is something that exists in a possible world, and physically possible whether it violates the known laws of physics, right? Whether that world exists is then an instantiation of the subject we are talking about, but it is apart from the question of whether something is possible or not.
  • javra
    2.6k
    I duly agree with you're appraisal, and am strongly inclined toward the following conclusion in respect to the perspective I've previously outlined:

    there is a glaring flawLionino

    ... maybe more than one, actually.
  • javra
    2.6k
    All the same, if there isn't any further ado, I'll be bowing out of this discussion.
  • 180 Proof
    15.4k
    :victory: :mask:
  • javra
    2.6k
    Going back into a non-sarcastic mood, it was good chatting with you.
  • Corvus
    3.2k
    Touche. Your logic as to fortune tellers and such is truly out-standing.javra
    I recall reading in the esoteric forums sometime ago, that they believe everything under the sun is connected to each other even to all the celestial objects. So their motto is, "As above, so below". That's how they read the stars' movements to predict the future and people's fortunes.
    That was not logic at all. That was something I read, and your point reminded me of it. :)
  • javra
    2.6k
    Oh fudge, I'll reply. And if Hitler happened to be a vegetarian, then it would be a worthwhile thing to keep in mind that all vegetarians worldwide share Hitler's mindset.

    Again, I find a glaring logical flaw in this kind of association ... rewritten as some of your posts have so far been once replied to.
  • Corvus
    3.2k
    Oh fudge, I'll reply. And if Hitler happened to be a vegetarian, then it would be a worthwhile thing to keep in mind that all vegetarians worldwide share Hitler's mindset.

    Again, I find a glaring logical flaw in this kind of association ... rewritten as some of your posts have so far been once replied to.
    javra
    Not sure where you got that syllogism from, but it sounds meaningless, irrelevant and unintelligent. :)
    I am only replying to you because you have been keep replying to me.
    I have already made my points on the OP a while back, and the rest is just my replies to the questions from the interested posters.
    No need to reply to me, if you see no points or cannot follow my points.
  • 180 Proof
    15.4k
    'A child older than her parents' is metaphysically impossible and logically possible insofar as there is not a contradiction in terms but an inconsistency in temporal composition, or relation.

    addendum to:
    https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/comment/862580
  • javra
    2.6k
    A child older than her parents' is metaphysically impossible and logically possible insofar as there is not a contradiction in terms but an inconsistency in temporal composition, or relation.180 Proof

    Though I appreciate the effort, the movie The Age of Adaline, for one example, directly contradicts it not being metaphysically possible (Adaline mysteriously stops aging due to an accident and her daughter grows older than her). Otherwise, were one to go by the typical understanding of "a child's parent" and "a parent's child" with all the ordinary presumptions intact, it's as logically possible as is a "married bachelor".

    Yes, the bachelor could be married to his work, or some such, and hence not be married to a wife, but this is not in keeping with the logical contradiction that is commonly understood to be communicated by the phrasing. As can, for further example, be the case with a "circular triangle": a triangle with convex sides, which is logically possible, is not what is commonly understood by the terms - the latter understanding conveying what is logically impossible.
  • Janus
    16.3k
    My take is that what is actually possible is what is physically possible, with reference to this world. If there were other worlds where what is impossible here were possible there, then that possibility might be categorized as metaphysical possibility (although we could say that the scope of the category of physical possibility has thus been expanded instead).

    What is logically possible is anything that does not involve self-contradiction. Perhaps it could be said that there is a valid category of metaphysical possibility distinct form the category of physical possibility only in the context of positing that there might be existences which are not physical; that is not constrained by any physical law. Would they be constrained by metaphysical laws? Whatever the answer to that might be it seems impossible to imagine that they would not be constrained by logic.

    (Adaline mysteriously stops aging due to an accident and her daughter grows older than her).javra

    Should we count age as being the time of duration or physical change? Adaline has endured for a longer time than her daughter, regardless of whether her body has continually "aged". So, in durational terms she is always going to be older than her daughter, and since the very meanings of 'mother' and 'daughter' presuppose that the mother exists antecedently to the daughter, then to say that the child could be older than the mother would involve a logical contradiction.
  • Lionino
    2.7k
    then to say that the child could be older than the mother would involve a logical contradictionJanus

    Agreed. And if the daughter becomes older than the mother due to some time paradox or related, I would say it is now both metaphysically and physically possible.
  • Janus
    16.3k
    I'm not sure what exactly you have in mind by "time paradox". If travel at the speed of light were possible, someone might not age much or even at all on a thousand-year journey, but she would have endured for a thousand years if the temporal context we are considering is Earth time or even (perhaps) experiential or phenomenological time.
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