Since I came into this thread saying that "sentences" aren't clear expressions of thoughts — Dawnstorm

I’m designing a new language. I’ve reached the limits of conventional languages, and now they frustrate my attempts to progress further. They lack the power to express concepts that I need, and even in their own domain, they’re imprecise and unwieldy. They’re hardly fit for speech, let alone thought. — Ted Chiang

But did they really occur in isolation? What do you mean by isolated? It seems to me that the isolation is a mental projection onto the thinking process just as we project our categorical boundaries onto other natural processes. And each thought shares a property with the thought before it. — Harry Hindu

I don't see how one isolates a thought from the process of thinking. It would be like trying to isolate the stomach from digestion, and I don't see how that would get us any closer to how thoughts are caused. — Harry Hindu

Would you agree that conclusions are caused by reasons? Have you ever reached a conclusion without a reason? Would that still qualify as reasoning (thinking)? — Harry Hindu

It seems more important to lay out what we mean by "cause" so even understand how it happens in the physical realm to understand how it might apply to the mental. — Harry Hindu

So my initial question is now: “Can one J-thought cause another — J

and if so, is this by virtue of a World 2 relationship, a World 3 relationship, or some combination?” — J

If causation isn’t a very good model of what happens when we think J-thoughts, then can we come up with a better description, something more contentful than merely “association” or “affinity”? — J

They're most definitely causing the trains to show up. The proof of that if that if those people would stop showing up, the trains would eventually also stop showing up :wink: — Pierre-Normand

So what was my thought process here? What's clear is that, even though I was prompted to "retrieve 12" and I knew I was prompted such, I didn't bother to retrieve twelve. — Dawnstorm

I think you misunderstand my position. "Thought" is what's going on in when we're thinking. The process; the stream of consciousness (or part of it, whatever we're willing to count as thinking). "A thought" is unit that occurs with that process. It's perfectly possible to be thinking, but there's no good way to break what's going on apart to isolate "a single unit that makes up a thought". — Dawnstorm

I'm suggesting we need a model of what type of thoughts can reasonable compared to each other on a level that's relevant to causation. I'm sorry for being so convoluted, but that's just how I... think. — Dawnstorm

Finally, thought in the context of cause and effect needs certain traits amenable to cause. What are they? — Dawnstorm

It's not causation. It's memory retrieval. — L'éléphant

Because of the operation of the mind -- thoughts are modes of thinking. If a thought can cause you another thought, are you not removing the mind from the equation? — L'éléphant

The only line I'd draw in the sand would be: We mustn't talk as if we already understand this issue, or as if there is no issue. — J

Another problem: 5+7=12 is usually just memorised, — Dawnstorm

Take "7+5". In what ways is that even thught? If I read "7+5" and think "12" then I might just cover this with a stimulus-response model without ever invoking the concept of "a thought". — Dawnstorm

Take "432 + 493 = 925". If you were to see "432 + 493" and you recognise this as addition. You may solve, or you may shrug and walk away. These are two responses: do any of those involve thought? Is shrugging and walking away less of a thought than mumbling "Who cares?" and walking away, because the latter includes language and the former doesn't? — Dawnstorm

Is the recognition of addition already thought, given that it's implied but not expressed in either reactions? — Dawnstorm

And if thought happens is there anything you could usefully demarcate into "a thought"? — Dawnstorm

Given that I myself have never really had cause to wonder whether thoughts can cause thoughts before reading this thread (I actually might have read similar threads in the past, but for simplicity's sake let's pretend I haven't) so I have no intuitive substratus here. I'm still trying to figure out what the topic is. — Dawnstorm

Try to construct an explanation, assuming a sincere questioner asked you, "What caused you to think that sentence?" I wonder what you'd get. Would you wind up denying causality completely?
17h — J

(And of course it's ambiguous: Giant festival, or festival featuring giant mushrooms?) — J

Try to construct an explanation, assuming a sincere questioner asked you, "What caused you to think that sentence?" I wonder what you'd get. Would you wind up denying causality completely? — J

This highlights a problem with "cause" language in this context. Certainly "7 + 5" is not a necessary cause of "12" (assuming it's causal at all). Nor is it a sufficient cause, though, as has been argued, it's a very likely one. If we end up saying that whatever follows from the thought of "7 + 5" has been caused by that thought, doesn't this amount to saying that only a W2 thought can be causative? That is, the propositional or meaning content of the thought can lead to anything, so no causation is involved at that level. — J

I haven't heard of that one; thanks for bringing it up. I was vaguely aware of research, but nothing drug related. — Dawnstorm

I think we can reasonably say that the thought "7 + 5" may lead to the thought "12", or it may lead to the thought "5 +7" or "7-5" or "7 divided by 5" or "these two prime numbers do not sum to a prime" or whatever. — Janus

I'm often aware that I comprehend a particular thought I'm having much faster than I could have said it in words, even thinking them to myself. And looking back on such an experience, it seems to me that what I mean by "a particular thought" is not a linguistic unit at all . . . nor is it quite an image or a structure . . . it's a thought, something with a content or meaning I can understand, while the medium that may convey it is completely unclear. — J

When you think a word, you think the sign-body as well as the meaning. It depends on the person how you internally think the signbody: some people might hear it said (they literally have a word in the head), some people might just think the word purely abstractly - I don't know if that is possible; for me, thinking a word is performative - I believe I can sometimes - not always - detect micro movements of the speech aparatus (the vocal chords are probably not involved, I'm more thinking about the tongue, palate etc.) — Dawnstorm

This much, at least, we know, phenomenologically -- this is certainly how it appears. Or if this isn't true, I'd say the burden of proof is on the denier to say why not, even in the absence of a good explanation for it. — J

If I'm right that you see a clear explanatory connection between Thought A ("7 + 5") and Thought B ("12), can you say more about the causation involved? How does A cause B? Where does such a relation occur? — J

I don’t know what mass is. I don’t know what electric charge is. What I do know is that mass produces and responds to a gravitational force, and electric charge produces and responds to an electromagnetic force. So while I can’t tell you what these features of particles are, I can tell you what these features do. — Brian Greene

Great. That's exactly what I'd like to hear about: Can we give a sense of causality to entailment or logical equivalence? — J

Over the weekend, almost seven million people in several thousand communities here in the US got together to celebrate our anniversary...among other things. — T Clark

All of us meet in Times Square in New York City. We can borrow that ball they use at New Years. — T Clark

I don't know what double-secret probation is but — javi2541997

Consider this article a précis of 'the world-creates/embodies minds' ...

https://news.harvard.edu/gazette/story/newsplus/new-way-to-map-the-unique-brain-organization-of-individuals/ — 180 Proof

"Real" is the aware-ing organism, aware of its drives, feelings, sensations, image-ing etc. Shared by all living organisms in varying degrees — ENOAH

"mind" is not what it seems to itself — 180 Proof

Hence 'magic' is a poor tool to wield. If Chalmers' 'all material having mental properties' is actually the case, then it wouldn't be magic, it would be a property of this reality. But still totally unexplained or even described since there's no current theory that supports that view. There sort of is, but nobody formally mentions it because, being a theory, it makes predictions, and those predictions likely fail, so best not to be vocal about those predictions. — noAxioms

What would your proposed word be? — Copernicus

What 'new good things' do you think may benefit us? — Jeremy Murray

Perhaps I'd have to use a better-suited word. — Copernicus

it also has non-physical characteristics
— Patterner

If they stemmed from physical properties, then they're also physical properties, regardless of characteristics. — Copernicus