In the scenario I gave you, what suffering have I endured?

The actual problem is in figuring out which persistent self(s) exist. — Mijin

If at all... It may be that (as with further fact types) there is no perdurance occurring in the machines output.

You could answer the question, please good sir, instead of prevaricating.

In the scenario i just gave you, what have i suffered, without something more? It's nothing, isn't it?

I cleverly avoided this fate by never growing up. — praxis

:lol: Nice. All too telling (not about you, to be clear)..

Offense is not given. So yes, it does as that does not obtain.

At every moment, you experience things: sensations from the world, and sensations from yourself. These are facts of experience. — hypericin

You outlined facts about the teletransporter and said they obtained in those terms. If that wasn't the claim, i suggest that was incredibly unclear. But fair enough. I don't argue with the above.

one still experiences, still maintains a self concept, — hypericin

I do not think this is correct, and explains some of what I see as dead-ends in your discussion.
The facts are that you(a) walk into the machine, and someone(b) walks about. Someone experiences. The point is to figure whether you think "still" even applies to (b). Or whether the same "one" applies to (a) and (b).
Within the way the experiment is written, that someone does have the same autobiographical sense as the one who walked into the machine - that's already a given, and not something we are supposed to ascertain. The point is is sort out whether that matters. Parfit says yes. I say no for the same reasons you have outlined: MY mind stops having those experiences, even if a mind doesn't. The fact that someone thinks they are me doesn't mean they are. I gave a possible example of why that could be the case (the atom identity issue) which was unsatisfactory. I agree, it was just to point out that you can solve the issue by saying that person cannot be you for physical reasons, and ignore the mind part. But again, I also find that unsatisfactory.

The point of all this is to say that I think you've slightly misunderstood the thought experiment becuase you're not addressing certain aspects which are written in. Maybe the branch-line case is a better one for your purposes.. seems so to me.

I have just realised I've addressed much of this to Mijin, recalling their posts in kind with yours. Sorry about that - points remain, but you can ignore references to things "you" have said before.

The comic: The answer the Devil gives is not satisfactory and does not answer my potential response, despite my not being satisfied with it myself. Unless we have reason to think that each time we sleep, we are disassembled and reassembled, its a totally misconceived response, changing nothing about the intuitions involved.
The man is utterly perplexingly stupid to me, and is making wild moral miscalculations. More importantly (and demonstrably) the comic seems to ignore the biggest issue people have: "he" is not a given on the other side of the machine. There is no guaranteed "me". There is just someone, and our job in the thought is to decide what we think of that. Not whether we disagree with it. If the psychological relation is enough, that's fine. If it's not, we have work to do. I think this is fundamentally being misunderstood by a lot of people. Parfit just gives an answer I don't like, but runs the same avenues to get there as I have.

Invasion of privacy in itself causes suffering under Western jurisprudence and I would also argue just as a fact regardless of what our legal system says about it.

Which is why invasion of privacy is a crime. Of course, the suffering is once the victim knows about it. — boethius

I've asked what suffering. You've not answered.

You receive information from my personal email account (clandestine, we assume). What have I suffered ? I shall short-cut this.

I haven't. Something more is required. Most Western Law even requires harm or damage to be established before a conviction or punishment will be metered out.

But it's not really defesnible since 'emprical' refers to the shared world of phenomena. — Janus

This is where I think the problem lies. They will say "I have direct knowledge of this, as do other Christians" (or whatever sect). You and I would largely reject this, but we also do not know their phenomenal experiences. Maybe they have... (this is unserious, but hopefully illustrates).

Admittedly some of the "agreement" may be lip service only. — Janus

Yeah. Even then, I think there are some good reasons to reject this position (meaning, it seems more people are serious about it). There are, on many reliable accounts, billions who do not find rape, murder, child abuse etc.. objectionable, when posited by a religious doctrine (or, rather, required by it). I suggest this is probably more prevalent than most in the West want to accept (and here we also need take into account the types within the West who perhaps feel these ways. We have enough abusers around for whom the Law is not a deterrent it seems).

but if we allow that philosophers in general are among the smartest people — Janus

If this is just a claim to an average, I think it's empirically true. I do not think your next claim follows. Among the 'smartest' people, you're likely to get more disagreement as each can bring more nuance and see different things in the same sets of data (or, different relations). I don't think this has much to do with feeling, though I am not suggesting we can avoid feelings when deciding on theories, for instance. But assessing theories is the job of the minds which can move beyond feelings into "whether or not the feelings are reasonable" type of assessments. Plenty of people appear to be incapable of this. But we may simply have different expectations here. I'm unsure there's an answer.

So when asked as to where the numbers and universals are to be found if somewhere other than in human thought, no answer is forthcoming. — Janus

Huh. I've had several give me what I think is a satisfactory answer. Something like:

"real" in relation to Universals obtains in their examples. The same as "red" which is obviously real, "three" can exist in the same way: In three things. Red exists in red things. I don't see a problem?

This is important. "Real" is perfectly clear and useful in most contexts, because we know how to use it. — J

I think this is an assumption based on a curse of knowledge type thing. What is 'real' is hotly debated socially (if you have a diverse social group, anyway). That's my experience, and my experience in the online world too. I think more and more people think "metaphysically" when assessing 'the real' these days. Not very good fundamental education anymore.

I don't think that's quite true, anymore. I will resile, though, as I have given ample reason to take that seriously ("my truth").

So, what do the theists mean when they say that God or Heaven is real? — Janus

When I've asked, they mean what you go on to posit: it is an empirically real place one's soul ascends to after death (or, God, similar pseudo-physical terms get used). Not all, but that's the most common response I get.

Good luck trying to get everyone to agree on what's plausible. — Janus

I posit that thre is still going to be a 'pregnant middle'. Think of a balloon - pinch opposite sides, and stretch. The top and bottom tapers are those who hold views outside of what most consider reasonable, rational or indeed 'real'. That middle section (pregnant middle) is most people. I agree that getting everyone to agree is a fools errand. That doesn't mean that we can't at the very least, sort out which sense we mean to use the word in, and then discuss, based on that, whether we are making reasonable assertions. I do, also, agree, it's going to end up with "Yes, that's plausible" or not. This is a problem.

Can you imagine any context other than an authoritarian one, where everyone would agree — Janus

I presume the following was to indicate you want to ask about abstract, esoteric matters rather than "is gasoline running my car". I can. I can imagine a society in which there are less variant views generally. This is simply a temporal issue. in 2000 B.C it was probably quite easy, without force, to instantiate certain abstract beliefs in others, if you had a streak to do so. By that, I mean you are energized, articulate and willing to engage, no that you want to force yourself on others.

Liberal thought, especially in its modern egalitarian form, places a premium on equal dignity, autonomy, and the right to participate in discourse. — Wayfarer

This seems empirically wrong. As I see, and seems to be playing out, Liberal thought in it's modern, egalitarian form places a premium on equal outcomes and any disparity in outcome is automatically considered a result of unequal opportunity (this seems the 'woke' take though, so perhaps you're purposefully trying to shunt that off for discussion purposes. If so, that's good. Sorry I've wasted time).

then those without it may be depicted as less capable or qualified — Wayfarer

Definitely. Epistemic injustice is real, despite my extreme discomfort in ever applying it to a situation's description.

The idea of a “higher” truth here isn’t about exclusion but about cultivation — Wayfarer

You've hit the nail here. I think the problem is that there are dumber, and smarter people. Those dumber people who might actually be precluded from employing the mental techniques required for this type of refinement are going to argue that they aren't dumber, and it's you (whoever, whatever) who has prevented their achieving success. This is patent nonsense, but goes to the issues i'm speaking about I guess: If they think "real" means what they interpret their Lot as, then we can't argue with them. There's no refinement to be had.

Accordingly in a liberal setting, saying that an understandingor insight can be qualitatively better can sound like an assault on equality. — Wayfarer

I see you covered that already. :sweat:

Liberalism’s strength is inclusiveness and the prevention of abuses of authority. But Its blind spot can be a reluctance to acknowledge that some perspectives are not just different, but genuinely more coherent, integrated, or profound. — Wayfarer

Yes. I think further, though, it lends itself to not just not acknowledging this, but actively resisting any type of discussion which might describe, in rational terms, why it is true.

The idea that punctuality is racist, as an example. Fucking - no - arrive on time. Bigotry of low expectations seems the order of the day, for this particular mode of activity.

You have just said something unreasonable.

Or you're trolling. Either way, previous comments stand.

I have an answer, from someone else.

"The world is like a ride in an amusement park, and when you choose to go on it, you think it's real because that's how powerful our minds are. The ride goes up and down, all around, and it has thrills and chills, and it's very brightly colored, and it's loud, and it's fun for a while.

Many people have been on the ride for a long time, and they begin to wonder, 'Is this real, or is this just a ride?' And other people have gotten off the ride, and they come back to us and say, 'Hey, don't worry, don't be afraid, ever, because this is just a ride.'

And we kill those people. 'Shut him up! I've got a lot invested in this ride! Shut him up! Look at my [money]! Look at my [money]!' It's just a ride.

But we always kill those good guys who try and tell us that, you ever notice that? And let the demons run amok. But it doesn't matter, because it's just a ride.

And we can change it anytime we want. It's only a choice. No effort, no work, no job, no savings of money. Just a simple choice, right now, between fear and love. The eyes of fear want you to believe that there is an uncrossable line of separation. The eyes of love see that there is no line.

And now, here's the kicker: The choice to be in love, to be in joy, is already yours. The choice to be in peace is already yours. The choice to be in gratitude is already yours. This is your birthright.

So, let go of the fear. Be love. Be peace. Be joy. Be grateful. Be here now.

It's just a ride."

- Bill Hicks, while dying of pancreatic cancer at the age of 32.

in demanding good manners — Athena

This seems problematic. Your concept of 'good manners' is probably not close to universal, so 'demanding' anything along those lines is probably not going to help anyone. That's not to say I have a problem with your conception of 'good manners' though. Just pointing out that if someone disagrees that your demands are reasonable, that's up to them and not you and your demands to respond to.

I have found you rather curt and unimpressive as a polite interlocutor at times. This may be an example of why this is the case. I just don't consider that a lack of 'good manners'. We simply have different views and perhaps see each other in slightly-less-than-ideal lights for various reasons.

Where this gets interesting is when someone is being any number of things which are defined as impolite. I'm thinking here of things like trolling, obtuseness, personal attacks in a context that doesn't call for it, needlessly long-winded bollocks with reference to the Co-operative Principle of conversation (Grice), lying or other forms of deceit for instance.

Are they bad manners, bad nurturing, differences in culture or ignorance? It's quite hard to say in a lot of cases, when where those words are appropriate, because we only have our own view point to judge from.

When we are offended, what is the best way to handle this. — Athena

Unfortunately, I think the 'correct' way (and this in terms of living a happy life, avoiding conflict and all the rest) is to suck it up buttercup. Offense is taken, not given. If someone has said something that gives you a bad taste, either have a discussion and try to mitigate that taste, or walk away. I see no other options.

if you are harmed, that's a difference that matters. But being offended is not being harmed.

No, I think the issue is that if we don't even agree on what's 'real' then we cannot discuss anything other than speculations. That is absolutely a cultural problem. It's not an issue of having differing views, it's about having different standards for things like claims, evidence and rationality.

Consider the phrase "my truth". You cannot discuss with someone who claims this phrase. They are not open to discussions of what is real. They are hung up (almost literally) on their sense of self-hood, to the point that other considerations beyond "what I think right now" are not relevant.

Those of us who reject this are now in a different world it seems. That's a massive problem that faces anyone from any walk of life, if instantiated in their interactions with the world. The charge of this being conservative is unsubstantiated and possibly self-serving, me thnks.

Trollish? There is no chance you're here in good faith.

As noted, you could review the exchanges where i have said things like "I do not think this is a reasonable response". But, you could also continue on with your biases, reading things in and out of the comments to your heart's content.

If you've only skimmed them, bugger off and read them properly. That might explain why you're saying unreasonable things. And again, indicates you're not here in good faith.

causes suffering in itself — boethius

What suffering?

one cannot exclude the role of Divine intervention when it comes to life! — MoK

Sure, as night pointed out, rejecting does not mean accepting it as false.

However, we can absolutely set it to one side until something even vaguely indicative comes along. So far, it hasn't, so we're almost behooved to set it to one side, currently. This has been the case for about 200 years, best I can tell. There's simply no good reason to continue entertaining it on current knowledge. Given that this is a culmination of moving away from Divine intervention as a reasonable hypothesis, the indication is that the more we know, the less likely it becomes to the point of almost assured falsity (not assured - almost assured).

If someone does not think prostitution is a legitimate job, in the same way they do not think raising one's own children is not a legitimate job, that's fine by me. It's contentious.

I personally support the rights of sex workers and the autonomy that comes with engaging in it safely. That means I support the legal frameworks that protect and, at times, encourage sex work to occur.

That said, I am firmly in the camp that going to OnlyFans instead of getting a skilled job is absolutely a cop-out and not something we can sufficiently compare as "work". This seems evidenced by the lack of reasonable responses from OnlyFans models when questioned about their work.

And no. Being good at sex, or presentation of sex is not a 'skill' the way vocational skills are skills. Yes, one could learn carpentry to build only their own home. One can have sex purely in private circumstances. But doing carpentry for someone else is a massively different thing that selling your sexual content online. Particularly if it is essentially of your private sex life (couples who sell content, eg).

No, they just are not relevant to what I'm pointing out. I've bene over why some of your responses are unreasonable at the time i responded to them. It doesn't seem to bare repeating.. You can review if you'd like to.

Fair enough on the second comment :P

When they see ads that trade in implicit racism or sexism, they are disappointed by the choices made. — Tom Storm

That's fine, but generally when they see this in something or other, they can just be wrong, though. Usually are. That's the problem. The majority of those who Fire and I are referencing (to be sure, I am speaking about people who fit the bill. Not trying to fit people into the bill - I think that is what the Woke do).

The response to this ad campaign is just not justified in these terms. You have to be out of your mind to think that ad is championing White Supremacy. Utterly bereft of either sense, or cultural understanding. This is just as obvious with claims about misogyny among young people. Daily there are reels and reels of people confronting businesses or individuals over perceived slights that are plainly either invented, extremely tenuous or made-up for clicks. I'm sure you're aware of this. And that's what we're referring to. Those people are moving on feelings without any reasoning. Just some pre-recorded reaction of "hear word A, do x" I've been able to have a couple (including my wife, when we met) admit this. But it doesn't stop them from doing it (other than my wife) in my experience. That is a serious issue if we are ever to get along with one another. Given it's young people, it's an extreme worry for those of us who are not yet middle-aged.

I think having children usually changes this bent from Left to Right. And those who don't change when they have children tend to raise relatively unregulated children. A recent convert is Whitney Cummings, who was a pretty obvious darling of, at least, the non-card-carrying left. Once she had a kid, it all changed and she's been quite public about it.

Guys, let's just leave him to it. Nothing is going to move someone who is capable, in earnest, of responding to Fire's post with this:

"That, to me, is why you’re employing the bandwagon fallacy, as others have already. You think it does something to me; maybe it makes me feel lonely over here all alone. But it doesn’t. And it doesn’t do your little group any favors when you have to resort to such efforts."

This is not a person engaging in good faith, or with any reasonable basis. This is an embarrassed toddler saving face.

Double-edged. For some, surely that'll be the case. For most, they know what they know and that's all they can go on. In this way, most people probably just have more deep-seated and identity-forming notions of history, regardless of accuracy or holistic thinking.

It's probably better for institutions and worse for individuals, but I understand the opposite is the intuitive take, probably.

These same facts obtain at every moment of everyone's waking life. — hypericin

Generally speaking, we do not walk into or out of teletransporters. Can you perhaps make it a bit more explicit how those facts obtain in that way? And what of sleep?

Several things, but that wasn't what I was trying to point out. It seems, perhaps, my optimism was misplaced though: What you have quoted is my trying to have you notice that you are not getting what FireOlogist is saying. He is trying to get you to see your biases, and pointing out that AE's plan, if there was one, was to get you to do exactly what you're doing. Nothing to do with the right promoting anything. Again, you can reject this, but it seems clear to me and probably Fire.

Do you not see that what Fireologist is outlining is exactly the situation which would lead you to say this? Obviously, that doesn't close any books but I do genuinely think you're not reflecting in a reasonable way here.

Reacting to one's environment. Perhaps awareness isn't the right word, but my recollection of The Conscious Mind tells me those terms are used as noted here - where awareness is below self-awareness, or some such distinction. An amoeba can be aware, react to stimuli etc.. but has no concept of itself or "difference" more generally. It reacts, rather than responds I think is the move.
A being self-aware would be capable of both reaction, and response.

From a 3p perspective, one of those first beings does still experience. But none of them have an experience if you see the difference there...

Anything negative i've said about you personally(though, i take it I haven't, just being funny here) can be rescinded and in fact, reversed, based on this. Well done LOL

how unwoke is is. — Fire Ologist

I think it's a bit worse, though I definitely take Praxis' point (however buried it might be) that it is probably not a majority of people 'on that side' doing this, but...

The 'woke' reaction is to jump straight to 'Nazi', 'eugenics' etc.. and actually, genuinely talk about a society-wide conspiracy to ... do what? Kill all blacks? What hte heck are they even pointing to?

Turns out, its white supremacy. Which is, prima facie, an after due consideration utterly fucking preposterous to the point that I am willing to laugh in the face of the social incels who make this claim.

Is it not possible they - knew - and decided to not react to what might happen, and run the ad campaign anyway? That would have been my position on the matter. It's a good ad, and one which reflects certain trends (the Beyonce ad was extremely similar) but instantiates a return to "mainstream" images. I can't see that there is any way to impugn that tactic from a company called American Eagle without some further indication.

That it went this way is great, for them. I can't understand that they would have planned it. Shes hot, young, popular and wants to work with them. They need naught else to pull the trigger.

It seems far more likely that a company would use impugning white, blonde young women as a strategy to rile up the public, given that is:

A. More likely to piss off the right-wing and cause much more of a up-roar than that found among the slowly-declining Woke messaging mechanisms; and

B. Grabbed a demo (Woke, such as it is) that they probably had no real hooks in previously, other than by habit.

The CNN "possibly white" debacle sort of shows that companies will make utterly ridiculous, un-sound and irrational decisions in service of the above tactic. It is not possible anyone, in good faith, thought that shooter was white.

I can’t name even one wokeist or liberal that helped to promote it. — praxis

You can find compilations of wokists, including a handful of celebrities decrying the campaign, most notably Lizzo, Colbert, Doja Cat. But it is mostly non-celebrity figures. There are compilations of people breaking down calling it eugenics, calling it Nazism, facism etc.. etc.. all over the place. I cannot be bothered finding the source videos, but there's only a couple in these links I haven't seen in their natural habitat. That said, I recognize these videos are heavily biased, overall. I don't care abou the commentary, just that it brings together several examples of what I'm talking about.

AE manipulated the right into promoting the campaign — praxis

No, I don't think that's right. Besides the fact that all advertising manipulates its demo (i.e, that is not disparaging and is, in fact, a success of the campaign if so) i find it hard (as explained above) to conceive of AE caring about that particular division among the public.

But you could be right. And if so, i don't see the issue. That is what advertising does. And it worked.

Something like that strikes me as highly plausible. I think that's roughly the Chalmersian take too - but he calls awareness without experience consciousness too - I find that a hard sell, but all else about panpsychism attracts me so .. I could just be wrong LOL

I cannot help a horse put its snout in the water. I explained in extreme detail why this is the exact wrong description of what's happened. Onward, i suppose...

You are saying my slapping you across your face did not cause you to feel and hear a slap. You are saying your own brain caused these things and it is fully up to your free self to feel the slap, and/ or slap me back. Me, I am utterly not responsible for what happens in your experience. — Fire Ologist

An absolutely excellent encapsulation of the issue. Thanks for that.

I think awareness and consciousness differ, but they might be hte same genus. In that way, I can see how panpsychism could be illusory purely in the sense that we want to relate to other objects, so their "being aware" the way a eukaryote is (responds to environment etc..) is enough for us to all be on the same page, even though we do not share experiences at all.

But, I also agree with Patterner that it's going to be one or the other. Then again, I feel the same about sense data, so perhaps I'm missing a trick..

Have you had a look through the previous pages? I think much of what you might want to canvas has been brought to the table and discussed. Have fun :P

Neither response addresses why it needs to be your atoms — Mijin

I've addressed this twice. You can either review the exchange, where I noted that numerical identity bakes this aspect in (i.e there isn't a question. It is ridiculous. Why is water wet, mate?). It shouldn't be my responsibility to repeat myself over and over for you to get a point.

what if we create a mind using partially your atoms and partially others (I make a brain — Mijin

A brain isn't a mind, or at least we cannot assume that for the purposes of the discussion., You are making plenty of fundamental assumptions and then getting confused when these are up for debate. This may explain a lot. Please try to notice where you've made an assumption. I will try to b clearer when I think tihs is what's on the table.

if the only consideration is that it is the same atoms, what if the transporter does use the same atoms, however, those atoms need to spend T time unconnected. When they get reassembled afterwards, did you survive that? What if T is 1 million years? — Mijin

This would simply be the same question as "are you the same person when you awake?" Those atoms are still those atoms, and still constitute you (on this account - you still seem to be under the impression this is my position i'm defending. It is not. Please calm down). So, yes, you would, under almost all accounts that aren't further fact accounts.

Crucially, can this position be used to answer any of the questions related to the transporter that I have posed? — Mijin

It answers them all. I've been explicit about this. The only possible "interesting" change is the idea that the transporter literally beams the exact same atoms to Mars. There's questions here about whether or not unity of your atoms create anything of significance, but most people are going to assume only the brain is relevant to that consideration - thus leapfrogging the entire question of what constitutes identity (or whether it obtains at all. I say not, so most of these questions don't make sense to me). To be super, super, un-debatably clear:

If the position is that my atoms make me then there is no version of the transporter in which I survive, without your ad hoc adjustment about taking my atoms and sending them across space (note, this is not the thought experiment, but an interesting adjustment for sure). The TE postulates that a blueprint is sent and 3D-prints another body that supposedly can carry your consciousness. You'll note (and i don't reply to this later, so do take note) that intuitions about consciousness is only one aspect of what this experiment draws out of us. It also draws out intuitions about "selfhood" generally, bodily continuity, time, space and the possiblity of "multiples" given certain theories on might take up. It is certainly not as simple and restricted as you contend.

We may as well go with the "mojo" explanation for consciousness and declare no follow-up questions about mojo are permitted. — Mijin

That is, roughly, what a further fact account will do, unfortunately. But that is canyons from what I've said, and explained. You can reject it, but I have made the position consistent enough that it is logically discreet. Its brute, as noted.

It is both true that I am me. And that I am Mijin. — Mijin

So, hang on mate - you've accepted my premise wholesale. Yet you opened with:

What the hell? — Mijin

Please have a think before posting these comments. The inconsistency will turn me and others off pretty quick, if they are personal like this. Onward..

I am not interested in the trivial question of whether I am still me if I lose a pinkie. — Mijin

You asked me a question under which that is a direct, relevant and telling response. If you do not want to talk about Identity, the transporter and all its implications, you could have said that instead of stringing this exchange along to an end that tells me you are not open to discussions that challenge your presumptions. If my position is that the transporter problem tells us that consciousness is not hte most important aspect of discussions on identity, then that's what it is. You can't just say "nah, not that kind of reply". That is... ridiculous my dude.

in reference to the Kids in the Hall skit. — praxis

Answering the question was apparently a struggle. — praxis

Likely, because non-Woke don't suppose to tell what others should do most of the time. But yeah, it's better for their mental health if they ignore it. That isn't hard at all.

in reference to the Kids in the Hall skit. — praxis

I don't know where you are in the conversation but this isn't where i am. You explicitly stated "Andrew Doyle" in the comment I linked from. Earnest critique is not mockery still stands, and I'm not sure why you thought I was talking about the Skit as I linked from your comment about Doyle and mockery.

it needed to apologize and correct the record — Mijin

No, that is not what I said. The paper noted that the "uproar" was a myth. It was. Entirely. I was there. There was never any significant issue around Winterval, unless you were not paying much attention to anything else. It seems the Daily Mail got you with this, and now you're upset over something which didn't actually happen.

But oh it was just a momentary thing in 1998 — Mijin

This is not a good faith exchange, it seems. Moving goalposts wont work too well around here.

Deeply ironic that you can’t say “white supremacy“ anymore. — praxis

Who can't? It's all over the fucking place. What are you talking about?

Its essentially an urban myth that Winterval caused any uproar. What actually happened was, initially, nothing at all. In 1998 a Bishop made some stupid comments and less than 4000 people signed a Petition that went nowhere. I lived in Worcester at the time.

The hang-over is the resulting myth you've outlined above, which is not supported by the actual history of the matter. The Daily Mail itself outed it's behaviour as click-baiting in 2011, labeling the issue as a myth. It was never interesting, beyond the original comments by the Bishop. It has remained as some kind of distorted catch-all for PC gone mad, though.

ham-fisted attempts at diversity in some cases, but they are few and far between — Mijin

Is this to be troll-ish? There are plenty of ham-fisted attempts at diversity. One only need look at cinema for plenty. Those are trivial, to be sure, but illustrates that hte above is a bit naive.

I would suggest "beyond me", for you at this stage.

*facepalm*.

And the examples write themselves.

Thus to say that causality occurs between physical objects does not seem to prove that causality is physical, unless by "is physical" we only mean, "occurring between two physical objects." — Leontiskos

I think this is entirely wrong. We're looking at something observable, not abstract. We need to look at what actually happens in the world. Causation happens between physical objects, in a physical world with no evidence of any non-physical attribute involved. Philosophers don't seem to even think this is a coherent claim of a possible reality. I again want to bring in Jaegwon Kim and his pretty tireless arguments around trying to ascertain a non-physical mode of causation and landing on Supervenience of something undescribed as the only way out of hte physicalist corner. I tend to think no one has gotten further. I can't understand how you're getting yourself off hte ground, yet, though I find all of the discussions interesting. What we have to 'fall back on' as it were, is not something that points to causality being non-physical. And we don't seem to have much better than a fall-back. I do not know of any example of non-physical causation (mental causation is likely physical, reducible).

If there is no reason to claim that causality is physical, and there is no reason to consider a non-physical basis for energy transfer, then why not simply abstain from affirming either of those things? — Leontiskos

I disagree with the former, so maybe we are on different pages here. I've not affirmed either, though. There is reason for the first claim, and no reason for the second, both of which support the first. That's as far as I'll go.

Note though that if you think energy transfer is the transfer of physical matter, then it seems that you do think energy is a physical object, even though you said, "Energy is not a physical object, and no one claims it is." This is a large part of the difficulty. — Leontiskos

Its not difficult. I had assumed this would be intuitive.
"energy" is a description of effects gained by the interactions of bits of matter. That "energy" is not an object, or a "thing" at all. But it obtains in the transfer described (i mean, it could be that "charge" is what transfers as, in that way, if its not the particles themselves, we may have more to discuss and might be hte page you're on).

The concept of "capacity to do work" (energy) is not physical matter, and yet you think the transfer of energy is the transfer of physical matter. — Leontiskos

The above should sort this out. The capacity to do work is exactly represented by hte physical attributes of the matter in question.

It is a Cambridge property. — Leontiskos

Very hard disagree, which should but paid to that part of the discussion. Something's position in space and time are properties of it. An apple has to be an apple at a certain time, in a certain place. It cannot simply be 'an apple'. That doesn't exist, anywhere. If you take away the spatio-temporal description of a physical object, you lose the ability to claim it as extant (on our current knowledge). This doesn't seem at all unusual or controversial to me.

Does the physicist see the "spacetime fabric" as physical? In what sense is it said to be physical? We can surely stretch the word "physical" far beyond what we ever generally mean by it, but I am not much interested in that approach. — Leontiskos

This is interesting. I think, yes, they do. I think intuitively, most would. I cannot understand the underlying strata of the universe not being physical. We are in a physical universe. If you're going to posit otherwise, You need to explain how to get from that, to this physical universe. No one can do that. So it doesn't make any sense to me to go down that route (at this time) despite it being interesting, to some degree or another. We don't live in a non-physical universe. Its actually hard to even point to a non-physical thing in it (Though, i understand a few good candidates about). I guess, on similar thinking to some of your replies, I'm not prepared to look at some physical force like gravity and entertain that it isn't physical, yet. We have zero avenue to explain try to explain that. The other option is weird and difficult, but i prefer that currently.

I still don't see that (4) follows. There is no sufficient reason to believe that the (causal) interaction is itself physical. — Leontiskos

There is no reason to think it isn't is my position(and good reason to think it is). It obtains within a physical system, between two physical objects in a physical event with no indication anything else is involved. When you adjust any physical parameter, the result differs.
At the very least, this should be accepted as the best explanation we have. Speculation abound, for sure. But there's nothing here that makes me think its even reasonable to start looking for an non-physical answer (except perhaps impatience, which isn't the worst reason, tbf).

This form of reasoning does not seem to be valid. — Leontiskos

Because it isn't. I didn't mention material. I mentioned mode. Theres a gulf between the two "reasonings" you've put up, which are non invalid, but essentially tautological (or self-evident in some other way). The reasoning I gave speaks about mode not content. If the lines in the previous paragraph I've written above about why we have no reason to think about non-physical causation occurring go through, then the content is irrelevant. Any event which can described on that term would adhere to that reasoning. I would want to say calling something "human" is hugely different to calling something "physical". Largely, because in your examples, everything reduces to the physical explanations underlying those words.

Causation is not ... physical — Leontiskos

But that begs the question. I can't quite wrangle something helpful out of this explicative section..

If we just assume that everything is physical, including causality, then we lead ourselves into absurdities. In this case it is the absurdity which makes interactions the same kind of thing as that which interacts. — Leontiskos

Evidenced by this (out of order, sorry) making no sense to me. We don't "assume". We investigate and find nothing but physical interaction surrounding all change we see in the physical world. We are given no material on which we can explore a non-physical basis (descriptively) of causation. We may not have good answers, but we certainly don't have any reason to move off the line currently. Again, it's interesting to entertain and may well at some stage become something we can adequately explore, but we have nothing on which we can do so currently but speculation.

but it is still improper to say that the collision is itself phenolic resin. — Leontiskos

I am unsure it is. But its not saying the same thing as calling hte collision physical. They are asking different things. The collision between two balls of phenolic resin is clearly phenolic resin (they are just in contact with each other - changing nothing about the material we're wanting to name). The mode is different, as I see it and requires a different answer.

I think its possible you are just flat-out wrong about what physicists would say about a collision. I also don't think that has much to do with our discussion. Whether a physicist says x y z doesn't quite change anything in the world. Unless you're a total Continental.

is a strange and ambiguous phrase. — Leontiskos

Not at all. You just picked up something wrong in it. It means to deducible entirely in physical terms, from physical activity, assessed in physical terms against other physical activity. If you want to say the deduction isn't physical (because mental) I put the conversation down, as that's a very different thing for another time imo. Fraught, and something I'm only really getting into currently (that is, why it seems mental causation is a misnomer.

How many of your atoms, and why does it matter? — Mijin

You really need to re-read this exchange. This is no longer a relevant question, and its one I've directly answered in two different ways. Please review.

just spitting your atoms across space and reassembling them — Mijin

I can't understand what you're trying to describe here. This doesn't seem to say anything that could result in the experiment we're talking about. Can you please be clearer?

i am just saying that bodily continuity (or identity...I didn't really follow the distinction) is not as straightforward
an answer as might first appear — Mijin

This makes the preceding far more perplexing then.

I think its entirely straightforward and have given you the reasons why. Its an air-tight reason. You can reject it though. It doesn't bare this sort of scrutiny because its a brute claim. Numeral identity is what is required for bodily continuity to be the source of "me" along all the constituents of "me" at any given time. This is not a logical claim, other than that "if true" its a logical dead-end for identity discussions. In any case I don't think this constitutes Identity so not sure where you're going..

Right now I am Mijin, and Mijin is me — Mijin

Hmm. Unfortunately, I think logically, No. This instantiates that you are two people. Unless you hold that are, in fact, two people (you seem to rejecting that) at all times, all the follow-ons from that position fail immediately. Mijin is all of the things you see as "yourself" at the same time as they are one-and-the-same thing. That is exactly why it's so hard to sort this stuff out. If we had two aspects to ourselves, it would be much easier to talk about because we could have criteria for each. But Identity is, by definition singular. (this is out of order, because the next reply is hte meatier)

It doesn't solve the problem, it avoids it. — Mijin

I cannot understand what you're talking about. The analogy is that it is not relevant how many ,or which atoms are involved. For two reasons. Both of which make this an utterly ridiculous question (to me... it may be entirely reasonable on your understanding of what i've said). These are:

1. It had nothing whatsoever to do with consciousness. You questioned me the position that to answer to bodily continuity claims which get murky, we can say 'You are not the exact atoms I am, therefore you are not me'. There isn't wiggle room. "the exact atoms". It is now incoherent to ask the questions you're asking; and
2. It is 100% true, without any possible discussion, that people lose limbs, multiple limbs etc... and remain exactly the person they were (i.e John Smith, of 134 Arden Street, Baltimore, Maryland (or whatever.. Just making clera I do mean that person before and after the loss of limb/s)).

Therefore I don't know what you're asking me to clarify. The answers are baked in to the position outlined. And again, to be clera (because this doens't seem to be landing) this is not my view of identity. I am answering the questions posed.

I've not insulted you once. I've laid out exactly how incoherent your utterings are. They are, patently, out of step with reality. Everyone can see this but you. It is not incumbent on me to assuage your unregulated system of reason into thinking it makes any sense.

You have continually side-stepped everything important to hold on to an obviously, demonstrably false belief in the face of overwhelming examples of both of those claims. This is no one's problem but yours. If your feathers are ruffled (they clearly are) its becuase your beliefs are absolute nonsense and you are perhaps realizing it. This is no one's issue but yours.

Could you perhaps refrain from not answering anything, and just throwing these sorts of things out? I'm trying to understand you, but you seem to want to do nothing at all but smear responses..

Absolute bullshit. Earnestly critiquing something is not mockery. If you feel its mockery., maybe just notice how earnest critique makes it look. Silly.