If you have no present, then nothing would be possible — Corvus

Why not say the same about the past? Something proper to the past is that it was once present. In that sense there is a need for the past in order to understand and explain the possibility of the present. That the present passes but does not disappear completely (becomes past) is necessary for the existence of the present as something caused.

And we would still ask, "What caused that to exist?" The answer is always the same in the end of the causal chain. — Philosophim

If it is a causal chain we cannot assume that it is one thing that existed alone and suddenly gave birth to a second thing. The causal relation as a relation requires at least two or more. Causality does not consist in creating things out of nothing (one thing creating a second thing out of nothing) but in creating things out of other various things (plural). That is why the idea of a first cause is so problematic.

Perhaps the problem is to understand causality in a linear and horizontal way and not in a vertical way in the order of coexistence.

An interesting point. But we can imagine a universe consisting of one simple thing. That would exist correct? — Philosophim

Yes, it can be said that it is possible that only one thing exists. But then we could no longer speak of causal relationships, don't you think?

About the scope of composition I have always wondered if when we reach the limit of composition we come to find something very different from composite things: A simple thing, without parts. I wonder likewise whether this simple thing is in a higher order of existence with respect to composite things.

But I immediately realize that the whole (or the relational property of the whole) has a retroactive effect on all parts, including the simple parts of a whole. The relational whole acts as the context of the simple thing making the simple thing something that is not known from itself but from its context, that is, from its relation to the other things.

Then it would not be a problem to reach the limit of the composition, we do not reach something divine or of a superior order of existence (the bricks of god). We arrive at one more part of the whole, since these last parts of the composition are only possible to know and understand them by putting them in relation to other things.

This said in causal terms seems to indicate that there are always at least two and never a first cause. First there is relation in terms of ratio essendi. The relational aspect of things seems to be primary and determinative of the identity of things themselves.

I used to interpret Kant's experience as "perception — Corvus

OK. But then you agree as would Kant that perception is given in the present. And we agree that you have to explain the prensent rationally in some way.

Let me ask you, do any of those worlds you invented have that function of explaining the present?

Already did it:

Don't you think that if we had this faculty it would not be necessary to make theories about reality? I mean, any theory would be true insofar as reality is given to us in its truth and we simply have to intuit it. — JuanZu

I want you to tell me the Absolute Truth about Reality Itself. — Arcane Sandwich

But what if I am wrong? I can at least give it a try.

Well, tell me if you want or don't want to have a debate with me.

You should if you want to have a debate with me according to your conditions.

OK. Could you help me to correct it and make it grammatical.

So it does not refute it. Right?

Then here's a counter-point to it. I declare that I am the creator of the Philosophy to be called "Argentine Realism — Arcane Sandwich

How that refutes what I just argued?

Don't you think that if we had this faculty it would not be necessary to make theories about reality? I mean, any theory would be true insofar as reality is given to us in its truth and we simply have to intuit it.

But what about the theory? Isn't it the theory which is true?

OK but what is truth?

I am not talking about perception, I am talking about experience. That is to say, when you and I experience something we do not see a perception without content and without conceptualization. Rather, the experience is already given with a conceptualization (a la Kant), but I wonder if this is given in the present, or rather it is the present itself or the present of the consciousness to the extent that the conceptualization is given simultaneously with the experience.

So you agree that there is a present of experience where conceptualization occurs simultaneously with perception?

Are you aware that the experience is given in the present?

In order for you to be able to experience different time dimension, first you need to start from present. You will need some special mental capability to be able to experience that suppose. It is not for the ordinary folks. But I was only giving you a hypothetical example scenario since you asked for it.
I would imagine extra multidimensional time experience would only be useful and possible for the only the few folks who are esoteric magicians or abstract artists. — Corvus

Let me get this straight: you're saying that people with special abilities can experience something like this?

If you read it again, it happens at present — Corvus

I think you are confused. You say that the events of these worlds happen in the present and then you say that they don't happen in the present.

I'm really not understanding you.

All of them must happen at present — Corvus

So we are still in the three dimensions of time. You haven't actually added any. You have added worlds but not dimensions of time, right?

For example, we could add super or subconscious and imaginative time time — Corvus

OK. But do any of those times have a direct relation to the present that you and I live in? I mean, of the explanatory kind and with truths that actually can be discovered?

would think that you can add as many dimensions you would like, — Corvus

Can you give me an example of another dimension of time other than the past or the future?

Past existed in the past, but it doesn't exist now. Does it? Saying past exists sounds language with no tense knowledge. We are not denying past didn't exist. It existed. Where did it exist? In the past, and in memories. But does it exist now and reality? — Corvus

Have you considered that it is simply another dimension? A dimension where there is no present. And that is precisely why we cannot perceive it. Since consciousness only lives in the present. But we cannot say that it has no content, nor that it has no truths.

Historians going crazy with this discussion.

I think of time as a building that goes upwards. We have the current floor and the floors below that are the past. You need a virtual and indeterminate raw material (future) to keep building floors.

The past exists as the dimension of sedimentation where the added floors solidify in an unmodifiable way.

I didn’t say anything about ‘collapse’ by which I presume you’re referring to so-called ‘wave function collapse’. — Wayfarer

You did. But indirectly.

https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/comment/968214

https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/comment/968235

This blurring between the objective and the subjective is a confusion of concepts that is solved by removing the unjustified intrusive belief of the role of the scientist in quantum physics experiments.

Why? What dictates that necessity?
3h — Wayfarer

Because otherwise we would have no possible explanation of how the watch functions.

I think the consciousness does act causally, with the measured physical system, necessarily so. This is done through the measuring tool. The tool is created with intent. As you see, others like to argue that the tool measures without any interaction with the conscious mind. But as you argue, that is not actually a measurement at all. So we need to accept that "the measurement" includes the intent put into the tool, as well as the observations of the tool. — Metaphysician Undercover

This sounds to me like, literally, the ghost in the machine.

What I want you to understand is why the measuring device is necessary. The collapse of function in fact is explained not because a person thinks or is aware of the experiment. In this sense the human or scientist is neutralized. There is no experiment that is correctly explained by something like "collapse by interpretation". In such an experiment the measuring apparatus and the environment are involved. And both are efficient causes of the collapse, the passage from coherence to quantum decoherence. Just think about the necessity of the means to perform the measurement: why are they necessary? They are necessary to interact with this quantum phenomenon. And, at this point it is obvious, they are necessary to measure, that is to say, they perform the measurement. The scientist is the person who interprets that measurement, but he is not the efficient cause of the wave function collapse.

I don’t agree. The clock is the instrument by which we measure, but the act of measurement is carried out by the measurer. As that passage I quoted says, ‘ A physical clock measures a succession of moments, but only experiencing duration allows us to recognise these seemingly separate moments as a succession’ - which is what measurement entails. — Wayfarer

The thing is that to measure we need interaction. The observer is subsumed in this interaction in such a way as to make that interaction physical. So the observer is our measuring machines, like a clock, which makes the coherent state of an isolated system disappear. That interaction does not exist between our consciousness and the system. I am not saying that the clock measures the time of consciousness, what I am saying is that the clock is the interaction that the mechanism reflects as a function of a minimal movement. So measures a part of the movement of the world (and remember that there is no time without movement) But there must be an ontological continuity between the clock and those movements. This continuity does not exist between the consciousness and the measured object (here the isolated system in coherence). To affirm the contrary is to affirm magic or some kind of mentalism. How does the consciousness interact with the isolated system if it cannot even see it? It has a representation of it but does not interact, it needs the machine. Did you get it?

The thing is that for quantum mechanics to measure is not to be conscious but to interact with an isolated system in quantum coherence. It does not matter if we experience a time different from the quantifiable one, it matters however the mechanism that acts in our quantum clock. The clock measures time as its mechanism interacts with an exact minimal motion. We would not measure time because that accuracy is not given by our experience but by the clock mechanism. Hence it is the clock that measure.

The thing is that I already have my metaphysician's hat on and I have never taken it off. And I maintain a position that is in accordance with the metaphysical commitment of the scientist.

So I can say: yes, science as an object of study and as a fact refutes something about empiricism. We are being aware (which differs from perceive) of some things that we do not perceive. And we can study, analyze, investigaste them through technology.

somehow — tim wood

For me there is no somehow except in a very rudimentary stage of science. You perceive something, then you study or analyze it, but you use means to analyze and discover (today more than ever) things that you had not and will not be able to perceive. Even the result of analysis and investigation can totally change what we first thought we perceived.

We don't actually measure the time from the clock, the clock does the work automatically, we read that measurement.

Are you aware of any form of consciousness that is not the attribute of an observer? — Wayfarer

Yes, because observer is not consciousness. it is called a measurement, carried out by a machine or the environment. That is why the cat is not live a dead at the same time. Consciousness belongs to humans not observers.

Science is a method for studying phenomena. If you do not agree, we need to stop here and work this out.

Phenomena are what actually happens, relative to what might otherwise happen. And in a lot of modern science, the phenomena that are studied are on the gauges of machines and the readouts of printers. And that's it, period. Now, an analysis of phenomena can lead to theories, and the theories can be tested, and so on. But in many cases the "thing" studied is never directly observed, never itself a phenomenon. — tim wood

If phenomenon means to be-perceived then no. Science according to the example I have given consists in the study of perceivable or Non-perceivable reality. And I think you agree.

Empiricism concerns phenomena. Our OP seems to think that is a matter of the perceivable v. the unperceivable. But I shall leave to you a question he so far has ducked: can there be a science of anything that is not perceived, that is not in some way or other a phenomenon observed? — tim wood

I believe that in this topic the central criticism has been made of empiricism a la Berkeley, which is empiricism taken to its last true consequences (the criticism of primary qualities). In that sense the critique is absolutely right

It's already been demonstrated in this very thread, that there is a scientific argument for the indispensability of the observer in cosmological physics. — Wayfarer

Just a reminder: the observer is not consciousness.

Time is known to be eternal and non stoppable. It keeps flowing even all your watches and clocks stopped. Even when someone died, time keeps flowing. Maybe not for the dead. If there were no life on earth, would time still keep flowing? — Corvus

You refer me to the battle realism VS idealism. For me there is always a delay of everything existing that prevents its presence from being absolutely or absolutely identical to itself, but it is still constitutive. This delay is given by the relational being of things. And this is impossible to be given without time and space. This is applicable to consciousness which in turn is referred to an outside that constitutes it. Therefore time and space are conditions of consciousness. Therefore, time is something real and existent.

No problem. I'm glad to agree with you.

The machine makes the particles travel at near-light speed until they collide. How can that not be interacting? There is also the recording, that's true. In any case you get information and this like all sign systems is in place of something, something that is not perceived: the collision and the particles.It doesn't matter if a person has to read the information (even a picture with information) . The point is that when he reads it he is not perceiving what the information refers to.

I would not say that. For example, when two particles collide, what we see is information in a computer. The one that perceives is the machine, but that is not perceiving, it is interacting. Information here is a key element, getting information is not perceiving in my opinion, there is a whole chain of deferral that makes and generates information, or signification. This means that significance or information transcends perception. Thus we must say that we know the world not only as we perceive it, but as we obtain significance or information from it.

Feel free to disagree, dear reader. — Arcane Sandwich

I guess I can't disagree. I would say that much of science, especially physics, is composed of objects and relationships that are not directly perceived. We need in most cases technological devices to be able to perceive their reality. And not only that, but much of the theoretical work specializes in theorizing according to the available technology. Today knowledge is completely subsumed in different types of mediations.

Hegel would say that we live the development of knowledge through the work of negativity.

Heidegger's critique of calculating reason.

We are in the age of the calculating technique in which nature is manipulated or at least has the power to do so. Man's eagerness to dominate in order to control and predict.

The calculating reason turns everything into an "available resource" losing the opening to the mystery of being according to Heidegger.

Heidegger a conservationist?

Heidegger was talking about a passive attitude towards the sending of being. Let us say that this is doing justice to nature.


I do not agree. A pure and passive experience of being is being under the view of immediacy. But how could there be justice without law? One cannot stay passive, one must make laws that protect nature, and why not, even more science so that violence does not repeat itself.