The concept of charity such as feeding the hungry gets neglected by a billionaires escapism for wanting to go to Mars.

It is true that there is immeasurable suffering in the world that is due to apathy from those that can help but who do not. And there’s a saying that goes something like all it takes for evil to take place is for good man to do nothing.

We have well documented examples of serial killers too who whatever their psychological motivation may be the acts themselves are nothing but evil.

As a species we may in fact be deluded or unaware of our actions and their consequences, certainly the ego holds us back there if not completely blinding us and preventing the escape from such collective delusions.

This delusion can also be called ignorance, lack of self-knowledge and ultimately lack of compassion.

How could it possibly be comprehensible, that time exists without the intellect that uses it? — Mww

It would not be comprehensible in that sense, as comprehension is something only done be a comprehensive entity, mind, consciousness etc.

But you will then have to assume a universe without such an entity, consisting only of moving bodies, atoms, matter/energy.

Events will still happen despite no observation of such events by entities such as minds etc.

Events A, B, C happening all at once removes temporal linearity, in succession reintroduces it.

So time only makes sense only in terms of actions/events occurring linearly.

It is of course a very complex notion to speak of time in terms of events occurring simultaneously as well as instantly as there was no present or past state for those events to occur in. It could be said that 3 such events being instantiated are unobservable yet if happening non-instantly they’re occurring in time although not linearly but also in space. Spacetime.

But isn’t that the Big Bang ? A huge explosion/expansion emitting forms of matter/energy all at once in all spatial directions! Simultaneous-Instanteous event in terms of origin, linear thence as the expansion itself takes time and grows outwards linearly at a measurable rate (probably faster than light but still measurable)

Our apparatus of detection of this event looks at the early entropy state of such an event, a snapshot of this simultaneous matter/energy emission at its earliest point from origin to the outwards expansion.

Before this event, the prior state leading to this simultaneous burst cannot be known due to multiple events such as A, B, C occurring all at once and also instantaneously in opposing directions or even criss-crossing as there is no linearity to speak of if such an event is a one off in terms of origin.

In the static void of such a universe prior to the big bang, how could events like this even occur if matter/space/time was created subsequently? The assumption in my last sentence has started to become slightly outdated in the current scientific realms of physics/astrophysics so truth on the matter remains a subject ripe for scientific/philosophical speculation or just plain old metaphysics.

As much as I’d enjoy arguing about the definitions of words on here, do you actually have anything to say about the OP?

Do you know what the word fringe means ?

And of course tolerant too.

Some religions then, mostly the Abrahamic, keep forgetting about the fringe religions out there. There’s Scientology too if anyone’s interested, you’d have to have deep pockets though.

In any case the scientific mindset and the religious one are not mutually exclusive, you can be both a Christian and a Scientist, in fact some of the best ones have been such as Newton, Pascal, Riemann, Lord Kelvin the list goes on.

And what other than rational agents, conceive — Mww

Your point to this line of questioning? Time exists regardless of rational agents, otherwise you’d claim nothing exists without rational conscious agents.

Science tells you how the world works to the extent it can explain it.

Religion offers no such explanations to natural phenomena apart from the claim that the world was created by God.

Science can reject the claim of religion if it has an alternative explanation to the cause of the created world or take the agnostic stance as it should when it’s uncertain.

Yet science should not seek God for it would lose its utility, in addition to probably not finding God anyway.

In general the mindset of the atheist is ignorant but maybe that’s how God wanted them. As a believer I find it hard to reconcile their stupidity to God…it must be wilful then on the part of the atheist, yet there is in them the wish to believe. If God does not exist for them they will wait for some kind of super-intelligence to be created by man, essentially God, you can see such speculations in action between the passionate atheists in this forum, imbuing such a future intelligence with all sorts of god like qualities.

Or aliens, atheists love them aliens.

So you want to know if everything is fundamental?

Cats for example are not, energy would be …
Tractors are not fundamental, fish are not fundamental either.

Most things aren’t, the parts that make them though are, that part of course being matter.

@Eugen

You’ve conflated the time of objects with the time of space — Mww

If space is everything that exists, then it would be meaningless to speak of time outside of it as there is no outside of everything that is. So time then by necessity would be a property of space and space a property of time.

All when’s belong to rational agents. Without a when belonging to rational agents, there would be no material world for them, but that is not authority to deny the material world altogether. — Mww

Time is not a quality that belongs to rational agents only, it’s on objective concept that applies to the material world as events that happen within it happen progressively rather than all at once if a material world did in fact exist without rational agents …would you agree to that ?

I think my answer just above your post should suffice as explanation. It takes care of the emergence/fundamental dichotomy that you’ve posed.

On the question of whether consciousness is emergent or fundamental.

By fundamental you’d grant it the eternalism aspect that you’d grant the stuff that matter is made of such as energy reduced in vibration and represented in elementary particles such as quarks (yet to be observed).

Matter is transformational in nature, you cannot create it nor destroy it.

Thus always being an existent it still poses the question if it gave rise to consciousness, as consciousness is not something physical in nature (cannot be touched) then it must have existed eternally with matter/energy or as matter/energy and not built up on it.

That out of the way, hereunder is my basic stance on the question. Consciousness is fundamental not as a constituent of objects, but as the ground of cognition. And as all objects appear within cognition, objects (and their relations) appear for us. The million-dollar question is whether those objects are real independently of our cognition of them, or whether their reality is imputed to them, by us, on the basis of our experience of them. That is the vital point to understand, because in my view, the idealist argument is not that objects are composed from some mysterious mind-stuff as a constituent, but that whatever reality we impute to objects is dependent on our cognition of them. See the difference? — Wayfarer

There is no doubt, to the existence of such objects irrespective of cognition/consciousness itself.

In fact you can carry out an easy and cheap experiment to confirm this.

Set up a camera and let it focus on any object in the room and hit record. Now leave the room and come back after some time. Look at the footage

Does it not demonstrate what you’re arguing against this soft version of idealism?

If the notion of space loses its meaning, how could you say one object is adjacent to, far from, or contained in, another? — Mww

Space would not exist altogether then in that case.

Let me explain my reasoning:

Objects in space must also exist in time correct? In the present that is which is a manifestation of temporality.

Take away time then WHEN does space exist ?

Without a when there is no material world and so no space or objects within space, could you deny this ?

Send it to universness too, even a pisshead occasionally needs inspiration on what topics to discuss with his blow up doll.

Not too many pints now, your future AGI lover would really disapprove now wouldn’t she? Eh, little bit of responsibility there for you today

Better than getting pissed with a blowup doll. If your level of discourse is the same as on this forum even the blow up doll will get bored and deflate

Don’t forget the blow up doll, lipstick can be optional.

You’re 50% correct I’m afraid Eugen, don’t be fooled by this guy. He only cares about future robots the appearance of intelligence from him is a trick, underneath all that hes a dummy just like everybody else.

The saddest thing about this guy is he will ridicule someone’s faith but when someone ridicules his obsession with future robots he gets angry.

they’re two for the price of one, hurry up mr get one for your buddy or if you want to be selfish keep them both! Why wait for AGI eh?

Them future robots that you’ve been fantasising with 180 may be some way off.

However blow up dolls are within reach, so express your love and hate to that not the users of this forum darlin

Whatever you say universe ness monster, whatever you say, now focus on the topic at hand, maybe do a bit of wiki research and come up with something half intelligent to say.

That’s your task for the day. To win the argument or whatever you’re here for

Whatever, run along now.

I was giving eugen a heads up of your AI fetishising tendencies don’t take it to heart.

if space is removed from time then the notion of space loses meaning I’d say. Also because space is occupied by matter it leads to transformation of such matter into energy and creates entropy.

The same would apply to time if you removed space from it.

They’re co-dependent or co-existing and cannot exist without the other hence spacetime (one word)

If he says your questions don’t make sense that’s most likely because his understanding is limited on the subject so focus on forum users who offer more substantial input and better understand the nature of such inquiry.

But you’re right some people can seem like they’re smarter than you with their abrupt replies, but really they’re not they’re just condescending fools.

Also watch out for his bum chum universeness I have no doubt they’ve been fantasising about future robots in their PMs so they’ve really started to get close.

Trying to dissect consciousness is like trying to cut a river with a knife.

I’d say on appearance it seems emergent and a way for the organism to navigate its environment move eat etc.

But if it’s emergent wouldn’t it also be fundamental? In the sense that its existence was inevitable.

Would you entertain the notion finite beings don’t experience the passage of time, but rather, only experience change? And even if change makes explicit successions in time relative to each other, it remains it is not time itself that is the object experienced. — Mww

Agree with the idea that it’s not time that is being experienced but change, although the two concepts of time and change are inseparable.

We cannot experience time the best we can do is measure it, and if something like time cannot be measured can it be said to exist at all?

The continuous stream of awareness/consciousness experiencing the world or self is taking part in this infinite continuum of perpetual existence as it were. But of course it switches off at some point when death stops it yet the fabric which experience is impressed upon occurred in the infinite.

Our senses that allows us to experience the external world although pretty amazing are not anchored by a sense of time. We simply lack it hence us building clocks to tell its passage in a consistent way.

Without state intervention the stateless nature of corporations means the state gets no revenue through taxation of such entities as they could easily offshore to some tiny island with a population of 10 people whilst profiiteering of a country whose population is 500 million.

The definition of it leaves clear in my mind for the need of avoiding monopolistic tendencies of pretty much every corporation who going unchecked would leave the consumer a lack of choice and higher prices which could otherwise be provided by competitors.

We have well demonstrated examples of such corporations such as Amazon or Microsoft. The latter getting leveraged out by governments such as the UK who found their acquisition of activision blizzard uncompetitive (recently) and rightly so. Their end goal is of course total monopoly which they’ve enjoyed restricting consumer choice.

These large entities have to be kept in check, the natural course is of course to let them acquire until the consumer realises they’re essentially screwed for choice and alternative and most importantly price.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-65407005

Their bitching is understandable, they want to own every aspect of the market, developers of videogames etc

Such constructs like time and space are abstractions made real. The only limit that could be placed on it would be its origin just like if you had to count to infinity you’d start at 1 but never finish, although metaphysically time would be immune to such a starting point as it would have no starting point.

Infinity really exercises our imagination to the limit, going into the realm of the incomprehensible, our powers of conceptualising infinity hit a brick wall and even the best metaphors fail to capture their true metaphysical nature though that by no means stops a philosopher since the days of Aristotle…

Not played Go myself but I’m decent chess player so I could see how such computational power would give it an almost god-like ability in confounding the best Go grandmasters as go has an almost infinite line of combinations/moves from initial conditions.

It would be more like realising that you’d never see the acorn turn into a tree kinda thing! And that tree producing more acorns that turn into trees.

I guess the answer is easy then. Though the type of experience itself may be infinite in nature the subjects finite nature is no barrier experiencing such infinity, albeit briefly, which kinda seems counterintuitive.

He could see the progression of his project (life) at a glance and I assume past, present future all at once too. Or perhaps he would be himself limited to the linear experience of time but could snap back to non-linearity at any time to direct the course of his plan.

Hence micro managing would be uneccessary.

I’d like to add further that his creatures being granted free will means that they will err from time to time, not necessarily a bad thing as mistakes teach lessons which would otherwise shelter them from life’s harsh realities. You can’t make an omelette without breaking an egg or two.

The end goal of such a project (life) has always fascinated me because he must have had that in mind before and during creation, scripture tells us we get immortal life for the recognition of his greatness, and it would be foolish if not arrogant to dismiss the creator from creation. For if the creation of the universe if it doesn’t fill the mind of the non-believer with awe and wonder then ignorance is their fate. No beauty to be admired, recognised or respected an empty life indeed.

From this as a believer I get the vague idea that he doesn’t create purely for acknowledgement of his power but it’s his way of existing outside of himself not just a manifestation of his nature

The mode of operation of such an entity would be impervious to our discernment although I’d think such initial conditions would make the emergence of life inevitable. I would hazard a guess that loneliness would have spurred the all powerful to create life in all its guises.

As for micromanaging in real time perhaps only to direct his divine plan and intention if it goes off course or diverges from his end goal whatever that may be.

These chatGPT programs are somehow wired to make meaningful statements readable and understandable by humans which by itself is no small achievement as using language in such a way demonstrates the ability for it to understand how to construct sentences and all the grammatical and syntax that comes with it, so praise to that indeed.

I have not seen any non-sensical sentences of it so far though they may be factually incorrect in some way.

The problem with any future AI lies simply with goal-seeking behaviour which natural intelligence exhibits, current AI has none (maybe apart from self-improvement as stated on the second post here) however even that is towards no other ends rather than to produce more factually correct sentences, efficiently in terms of own resource use.

I will give it credit if it can do that though as again it means it’s self-optimising, though it has no awareness that it’s doing so ? I might be wrong if during the course of interrogation between human and machine it tells you it’s self-optimising.

In a sense this would be a big step towards some sort of level of self-awareness but not quite autonomy.

What I struggle with in terms of modern philosophy is when it get’s technical and employs technical terms such as the ones you’ve mentioned, analytic, synthetic etc. It did start with Kant in his definition and distinction between such statements namely the priori posteriori split which become split further.

Yet the question in my mind always relates to truth and truth only and these complications that came afterwards with Kant and Hegel (synthetic) although a logical or even necessary step in the evolution of philosophy was a sideways development rather than upwards progression of the concept of truth.

Not a distraction either as the distinction is important however no such terminology was employed by the Greeks.

In terms of importance to overall philosophical thought I’d say it’s minor.

I will be setting up a PayPal account soon and use two factor authentication as @Jamal suggested @javi2541997 no more excuses :lol:

Unsure about how to protect such an account after setting it up, my only concern with PayPal