How is me suggesting that when conscious, intelligent life forms at any level. of the hierarchy - single cells, organs, people, etc. -- unite to form a larger entity, that that larger entity then that births a new singular identity in that unity, a higher consciousness. Gee, that seems to be the whole becoming greater than the parts. Your suggestion that the whole is greater than the parts seems to actually support my theory. — ken2esq

You seem to have missed the meaning of "The whole is greater than its parts".
Fractals being misused in biology.

There is scientific evidence for the notion that intelligence is fractal, that our cells are intelligent, that a collection of cells in a tissue is intelligent, that a collection of tissues in an organ is intelligent, that a collection of organs is intelligent (e.g., us), and that a collection of organisms in an organization is intelligent, and if organizations join together to work together (e.g. associations) those would be intelligent, too. — ken2esq

The whole is greater than its parts. We are called intelligent beings for a reason. An agent. If you're arguing that the parts make up what a human being is, then it sounds like you are committing the fallacy of composition.

What is the name of this study? — Saskia

Try Axiology.

I would say there's some truth in the first and a good basis on the second. An enlightened individual has an awareness of their own identity -- their way of thinking, their sense of morality and justice, and their own view of the world. There has to be some growth happening within the individual as time passes and as experience accumulates. The have to be changes taking place within the mind regardless of the external influences.

1.

This Enlightenment self is uninvolved with relationships to others, its critics claim, and is mistakenly held to be the creative center of its world and of meaning. This solitary self is an empty self, unencumbered and unsituated, an autonomous master of its own destiny through self-generated voluntary agency, by which it dominates reality. — Isaac Kramnick

2.

individuals as socially constructed, as never solitary but always involved in social relationships, selves shaped by history, tradition, and aspects of identity that society and social classes construct and over which individuals have little control. — Isaac Kramnick

The few individuals in history who we believe had made the world great have been made great because of the narrative that the great historians had written. True, these individuals had sacrificed greatly and made great contributions to the world than the average person, but because the spotlight was focused on them, we forget the others who performed the grunt work.

:blush: I know what you're referring to. I read your posts in this thread:
Culture is critical

And there's nothing wrong with your posts. You are writing with the knowledge of the American education system. I did understand what you're trying to say. One has to understand the competitiveness in that educational system to understand your posts. The background details are needed if others are to respond on point.

Yes, I can think of another way to begin the discussion but I am too discouraged. It is like I am coming from Mars with such a different point of view, no one can relate to what I am saying. I am criticized for not explaining myself but I have worked hours on those explanations only to have them rejected. I don't mean anyone is arguing against what I have said. That would require having an understanding of what I said, and there is no understanding of the information I have provided. So now what?

So what is the correct form for opening a discussion and what is the best way to keep a thread on topic? — Athena

So there, I just responded to the above question.

Suppose Camus and Sartre wrote great novels for expressing their philosophical ideas in them. — Corvus

I don't know. Accessibility comes to mind -- they want their works to be more accessible to their readers than writing nonfiction (which was peer-reviewed, academically, and published in journals). The cafè writers, as they're known, I guess.

That sounds poetic metaphor. — Corvus

It's more than that. It's actually a philosophical nuance of realism.

Can you re-state your original post?

There is a difference between your cup in the kitchen and the existence of the world. — Corvus

It only takes a grain of sand to know the world.

Does that mean that when observation is not operational, do you stop believing in the existence of the world during the time of no observation? If you keep believing in the existence when the observation stopped, what is it that forces you into the belief? — Corvus

When observation is not operational?
Sometimes the way you say things makes it a bit harder to provide an explanation. But yes, if I'm not now seeing the cup I saw in the sink earlier (because now I'm sitting in the living room), I still believe that it's in the sink unless someone else took it from there.
Nothing forces me to believe in this. It's the theory of object permanence. We naturally believe that objects continue to exist when we aren't looking at them due to our experience with the tangible world beginning at birth. Again, this supports the idea that observation is not based on logical thinking. While logic can help demonstrate that things exist, it cannot make us believe that things exist because this latter idea is developed in us overtime.

So what are our perceptions based on, if not on the logical inference? — Corvus

Ordinary observation. Or if you want a more formal word - empiric.

I don't have to refuse or agree to believe. But could I not just say I don't have a reason to believe, when there is no reason to believe? I don't deny my existence when I am awake and perceiving the world, because if I didn't exist, then the perception would be impossible.

But then again, when I am asleep, I don't have a ground to believe that I exist. Do you have reason to believe that you exist, when you are in deep sleep? If yes, what are the reasons for your belief? How can you think about the reasons that you exist while in deep sleep? — Corvus

Perception is conscious activity -- not in deep sleep. So, if you're asleep, you're not making a judgment like "I don't believe the cup exists when it's not in front of me." Let's settle on that. You're awake, and you're making a claim that you don't have a reason to believe an object exists when you're not looking at it. This is you admitting that you exist.

What are your favorite thought experiments and why? — Captain Homicide

The emperor's new clothes. Innocence and frankness is a lost quality in the way we think.

I do believe in the existence of the cup when I am perceiving it, but when I am not perceiving it, I no longer have a ground, warrant or reason to believe in the existence of it. — Corvus

I would like to see the logical and epistemic arguments laid out for the reason for believing in the existence of the world. — Corvus

Perception is not based on logical inference. So, if your reason for not believing in the existence of a cup because you're no longer perceiving it, then your reason is not better or more sound than believing in its existence while it's in front of you. And the reason for this is well-articulated by many metaphysicians. You could be mistaken in your perception.

If you're looking for the logical grounds for believing in the existence of the world, then what better way than your own thoughts in refusing to believe. Someone, like you, who refuses to believe in objects not existing is the best, surest reason for believing there's something. You exist.

My night sucked and I don't know what any of these experiences mean if They mean anything. — Massimo

I don't know -- that the people of Edmonton suck?

Then I tried apple for dishwasher at this place called the cactus club but I couldn't bring myself to do it — Massimo

This is lost in me completely. What is apple for dishwasher?

When I get out of the building I work and study in, it is around 17:30 pm or even 18:00. The sun is in the last moments of the day, — javi2541997

I cannot always leave the building in time so that I am there to witness the explosion. It's a grand show, no tickets needed.

Not surprising, then, they figure so largely in painting and literature. — Vera Mont

The break of dawn is equally beautiful. I actually prefer the break of dawn, but for this, you need to have an unobstructed view of the mountain.

The most common argument against the existence of objective morality and moral facts besides moral differences between societies is that they aren’t tangible objects found in the universe and can’t be measured scientifically. Are there any refutations or arguments against this?- — Captain Homicide

I would say that they are probably correct -- there may not be tangible or objective morality, that's why we have laws (morality and the law) to enforce morality, at least some of our moral practices.

What I'm more interested in is what then do these people who complain about the lack of objective morality or the lack of tangible factual morality conclude? What is their conclusion? That a cruel regime should exist if in their own land, cruelty is not considered immoral?

when I appreciate the sunset of my city I want to cry. This crying is not a cause of sadness, but the sublime artistic sense of the sunset. — javi2541997

Beautiful sunset. It doesn't make me feel like crying, but I smile whenever an explosion of crimson/salmon color so low that it's literally a backdrop of an otherwise plain road and buildings stops me in the middle of the road.

My favourite kind of tree is the pine. — Jamal

Good choice!

sprawling pine trees in my garden in Spain — Jamal

I've seen this done in the front yard of an apartment building. The landscaper literally trained 3 pine trees to grow lying down then curving upward. You've got to have a lot of space for this. lol.

birch, and cedar — Jamal

They're mesmerizing.

I have designed and built three, mostly with just help for the heavy or excessive time consuming stuff that I could not get done inside the time frame by myself. — Sir2u

Impressive!

Good choice! I have stained-glass in the living room. Basically, my parents put it just to prevent the savage heat of summer days, and it works pretty well, because the sunlight doesn't go through the living room. — javi2541997

Yeah, that's the effect I'm after, and of course the beauty of colors.

The OP is a fallacy of false equivalence.

Nowhere it mentions the fact that humans have a sense of time, which is a subjective sense of duration.

Machines have built-in clocks -- they don't "judge" that something is taking an awfully long time to finish. The idle time, for example, in a computer is fed into the system. The user chooses 20 minutes, for example, to be long enough to be idle, the computer signs off. It's not that the computer got bored, or got tired of waiting, or got excited for the unexpected speed something has completed.

Finish building fence.
Paint roof and rest of outside walls
Replace ceiling in main bedroom.
Finish tiling and plumbing in new bathroom — Sir2u

I feel so unaccomplished reading this. I've always wanted to build a whole house,

I will change the curtains of my bedroom. They are red and black, and now I want them orange or yellow. I would like to repaint my bedroom as well. It is just white and maybe another colour would be better to my emotions. I would like to paint in dark blue or grease. — javi2541997

Funny, we seem to have the same location of project -- the bedroom. I work a lot these days, so I no longer turn on the lights in my bedroom when I get home because my mind wants to be away from the lights and I just want to cocoon in the dimmed chambre. So I started looking at stained glass. Something warm, but artsy. Yes, I ache for art pieces. Sadly, I do not (these days) yearn for nature or the wild -- rather, I desire something that's built, by hands.

I agree that Darwin's word-choice of "selection"*1, to describe how Evolution works, inadvertently implied some "agency"*2 doing the choosing from among the options, both fit & unfit, generated by random mutations. His model for "selection" was the artificial evolution of domesticated animals suitable for human purposes. But the notion of natural selection suggests some kind of universal teleological agency programming the mechanisms of Evolution to work toward an inscrutable Final Cause : the output of evolution. — Gnomon

The use of "natural selection" should not be problematic. It means adaptation and change. Phenotype can change. We're in the philosophy forum, that's why you think we should apply the scrutiny in word usage and meaning.

We should try to exercise that same self-determination in trying to untie the knots of our own personal suffering before we choose a final solution. — Nils Loc

I find it amazing how often people fail to see the point of existing. So they think of suicide as an "alternative". Once a person is an adult, their existence is their responsibility. (Note I said existence, not "life", for in the latter, one could be in a coma and is the charge of a medical team).
Suppose I then ask this person who is contemplating suicide, because there's no point in his existence, to randomly kill a dog. I bet his response would be, "I can't do that. It's an innocent animal and I don't believe in cruelty to animals"! I'd say nonsense! Because he is ready to kill himself -- that is cruelty itself. He can't see the cruelty he is about to inflict to his own existence, but he can see it through the life of a dog. True story of some random person.

That is factually incorrect. As soon as any WFF of any formal system is determined to neither be provable nor refutable in that formal system then that formal system <is> determined to be incomplete. — PL Olcott

You're applying something like Gödel's theorem to something like modal logic. No wonder we can't understand each other. Logic uses a lot of propositions that aren't theorems. The "logical status" of a statement does not need a "complete theorem" in order to be .. a logical conclusion.

In effect, we aren't claiming a "complete theorem" when we say that, to say "It is raining and it is not raining at the same time" is a contradictory statement. We also aren't claiming a complete theorem, or even an incomplete theorem when we say that "if Paul is older than Tom, then Paul must have been born earlier than Tom".

Think. Do you really need a theorem to say that a square can't be drawn like a circle? No. While it is true that the definition of the square and the definition of the circle are both theorems themselves, when we make a determination that a circle cannot be drawn like a square, our own statement is not, or does not require a formulation of a theorem itself. We make a decision based on the existing theorems.

Incompleteness <is> accepted when any WFF cannot be either proved or refuted within a formal system EVEN IF it cannot be proved or refuted in this formal system because it <is> self-contradictory in this formal system. That seems to be its huge error. — PL Olcott

If that happens, we don't judge it as incomplete -- we judge it as contingently false in this system, but not in all possible worlds. A proposition is non-contingent only if, necessarily, it cannot be the case (that is, in all possible worlds, it is false).

WFF = well formed formula.

I am not talking about squaring a circle I am talking about drawing a circle that <is> a square thus not a circle. It must be in the same two dimensional plane.

"all points on a two dimensional surface that are equidistant from the center" and these exact same points form four straight sides of equal length in the same two dimensional plane. — PL Olcott

When you started off in your OP, you wanted to make a statement that is necessarily false. Which is fine. But now I think this whole thread is just nonsense.
Do the properties of a circle hold necessarily? And do the properties of a square hold necessarily? Then it goes without saying that the circle and square have asymmetrical relations. It is necessarily false that a circle can be drawn as a square.

Thus when we plug the formalized {epistemological antinomy} of the Liar Paradox into
a similar undecidability proof, we find that this semantically unsound expression "proves"
that the formal system that contains it is incomplete. — PL Olcott

Thank god that "incompleteness" is not accepted as one of the logical status of a statement.

but then seeing the actual person switch places when they arrive still makes a person feel cheated. Any thoughts? — TiredThinker

It's called social fairness. Queuing is still one of the most basic display of equality in society -- especially in places like public services (getting your license, applying for something, etc.) Of course we now have appointments you can make online so that when you get to the location, all you need to do is check in.
But, let's stick to the old ways of getting in line. Individuals standing in line is supposed to stand in line.

Please refer to modal logic. Don't focus on the symbols, rather focus on the explanation provided by the writer for why using the terminology "logically impossible" in propositions is misguided.

The concept of contingent content
Every proposition satisfies both the Law of the Excluded Middle and the Law of Noncontradiction. The first says that every proposition is either true or false, that there is no 'middle' or third truth-value. The second law says that no proposition is both true and false. Together these two laws say that the properties of truth and falsehood are mutually exclusive and jointly exhaustive of the entire class of propositions.

Corresponding to each of these two laws just cited we can state two analogues for modal status. In the first place we can say that every proposition is either contingent or noncontingent. And in the second, we can say that no proposition is both contingent and noncontingent. The two properties, contingency and noncontingency, are mutually exclusive and jointly exhaustive of the class of propositions.

Between contingency and noncontingency there is no 'middle' or third category. Contingency and noncontingency, like truth and falsehood, do not come in degrees. No proposition is 'half contingent' or 'three-quarters noncontingent5 or any other fractional measure, just as no proposition is half or three-quarters true (or false). No contingent proposition is more contingent or less contingent than any other contingent proposition; and no noncontingent proposition is more noncontingent or less noncontingent than any other noncontingent proposition.

None of this means, however, that we cannot talk cogently of one proposition being closer to being necessarily true than another. To explicate this latter concept we shall introduce the concept of the contingent content of a proposition. And to do this we begin by noticing a curious fact about necessary truths.

Here's an excerpt from a book which I did not purchase:

such that you relive your life after you've first lived it, wouldn't that require another time dimension? — Count Timothy von Icarus

Yes, this is one possibility. Observers in another time dimension could see our past, but not us in the same time dimension.

I said it is not recognized in philosophy. Or Philosophy, for the proper name. The words "logically impossible" is never formally accepted as epistemic terms.

However, you might be thinking of "logical possibility" which the likes of Chalmers are prone to use. But we can't state the opposite: logically impossible. It's nonsense.

Contradictions are not the same as logically impossible.

@PL Olcott "logically impossible" is not recognized in philosophy. It's either "illogical" or "impossible". The two are used in different contexts.

Impossibility in philosophy is used in the physical event -- i.e. it's impossible to be in two places at the same exact time. Another one, it's impossible for humans to fly in the air.
Illogical is what you mean when you say a circle cannot be a square. Of course you would object to my description as you might think, but squares and circles are physical objects. Actually, they are conceptual objects, hence, logical in the sense of "it makes sense by definition that a circle has 360 degree rotation while the sum of the degree of the square is also 360".

I wonder if the past, in any sense, still exists. Or is the past utterly gone? — Art48

It depends on whose perspective. If ours, then it's gone. We are all traveling on the same speed of light. We are all changing and carrying with us just the memories of the past. If you used to live at A street 20 years ago, and you left that place, then your past will only exist in memory.
Recently some news announced the arrival of a radio signal that started traveling some 8 billions light years ago. If our past could be captured in some radio signal and hologram, then another life forms in another galaxy could see our past. But we wouldn't see our own past.

Edit. I am responding to the quoted line above as I understand it literally -- not some reincarnation.

But I know there is a growing community of seekers who are turning almost exclusively to modern technology for answers. — Bret Bernhoft

Historically, humans have turned, from time to time, to inanimate objects for worship -- crop circles, UFOs, the Titanic (that billionaires paid to see), the stock market. They thought they're gonna get some deep answers to the questions of life. Nothing surprising here.

And with it, will come a certain reverence for and optimism about modern technology's role in the destiny of humankind. Among, amidst both inner and outer spaces. — Bret Bernhoft

An empty prophecy -- we've always overestimated the humans' capacity to do without intuition. And we've always failed. Technology is canned goods. We reach out for human contacts and human acknowledgment because this is what's natural for us. This is what feels good and comforting.

And that's what I mean by a place for which we feel homesick - a place where we found happiness. It doesn't seem to take very much, does it? — Vera Mont

I think when we search for comfort we search for that -- a simple place.

You never get to live there: it's only available to the dead. — Vera Mont

Are you talking about the purgatory for people who were bad while on Earth?

Anyway, my ideal place actually existed years ago. I won't divulge where it was, I don't know if it still exists. There were 6 of us close friends who went out one night and they had an idea where to lounge and eat pizza. I thought, cool. It was a secret place within the group. I was the last one to know that this was their hang out. It was a second floor unit in an old city building. The place was run by guys who decorated the place like it was a seedy tavern. We had a couch, ottoman, armchair, easy chair and a coffee table in one corner. Dimmed lights. The stairs leading to that unit was narrow and steep and dark. The place was clean despite the ambience. Funny, we couldn't order alcohol, of course. We spent the night chatting, relaxing, and eating. Clean fun.

People have long thought of the "paradise". Even coming up with drawings and paintings.

@baker should be coming to this thread soon.

It seems to me like this is partially right, and partially missing something. Sans some interpretation of consciousness where mind does not emerge from or interact closely with nature, it would seem to me that our descriptive languages have a close causal relationship with nature. — Count Timothy von Icarus

To this point, I would argue that thinking of math as a "closed," system can be misleading in this context. — Count Timothy von Icarus

I don't think it's causal connection. Zero does not exist in nature. (Contrast that with "there are two apples on the table", which you could actually count) Certainly, saying that a 'nothing' exists in nature is a human invention. And the system of math did not include zero for thousands of years. Zero is a modern invention.

I don't know how to define "closed" in this context, but I agree. With over 26,000 Wikipedia pages, and counting, mathematics continues to expand its realms, especially into abstractions and generalizations. I suppose "closed" could mean based on axiomatic set theory, which it normally is, although frequently some distance from Cantor's creations. — jgill

Yes, our math is axiomatic. The initial axioms drive the succeeding mathematical formula.

For the purposes of this discussion, what is your definition of morality?

In its most broad sense, the study of that which is right and wrong (viz., what is permissible, omissable, obligatory, and impermissible). — Bob Ross

So, you don't include your own personal choice, no matter what your society's rules are? I mean, your own personhood -- the internal dialogue that goes on inside your feelings and mind about justice and compassion and fairness?

Yes, it is quite amazingly tedious and repetitive. Yes, it is cold, joyless and repugnant. But it turns out these are the things that make it so memorable and, at least in retrospect, stimulating.

I think it follows that at least some excellent works of literature are not entertaining, delightful, or enjoyable. — Jamal

I looked up the synopsis. Not my kind of book. To me an excellent work is engaging (not necessarily entertaining, for others would find gossips entertaining) and the elements of insights and unexpected turns are artfully interwoven into the narrative. It's hard to describe, but I'll know it when I come across one.

To me, there wouldn't be a clash of antagonistic judgments if I find a piece of work engaging. There is a reason why a work is boring -- the author lacked that skill. One wouldn't intentionally write a boring piece.