The universe is not a state. — noAxioms

Well if the 'state of the universe' changes, then the universe changes. However, I think you made a good point here.

Anyway, relativity strongly suggests that 'change' is an illusion due to our limited perspective. However, as I noted in another discussion I had with you I am not sure if I am prepared to accept that. If our experience is illusory even on this seemingly basic fact, then perhaps this basic deception would undermine any empirical investigation.

Then mathematics would not be fundamental, but would supervene on some entity thinking the mathematical thoughts. — noAxioms

'Idealism' is a broad category. On some interpretations, Plato held the Idea of the Good as the fundamental entity but it wasn't seen as a 'Mind'. Others would argue that the 'Good' was indeed a Mind.
Yet, Plato, under both interpretations is often regarded as an 'idealist'.

If we restrict the term 'Idealism' to describe the views of those who posit a Mind or a plurality of Minds as fundamental, then yes your view isn't idealistic. However, if you think that mathematical truths are fundamental you are quite close to that, in the sense that you would posit concepts ('intelligible forms') as fundamental realities.

Right. Math doesn't supervene on material or energy, and 'physical' has implications of material. Physicalism (but not materialism) still works in such a case, since it only suggests that nothing additional is needed. — noAxioms

Again, this is only valid if you think that 'mathematical truths' are physical. I guess that we have freedom to call views with the names we want to call them, provided that we do this in a consistent way.
To me mathematical truths are not 'physical' because, as I wrote earlier, I believe that they are not localized into space and time and are not identical to space-time.

MUH seems to have some big problems that need solving. Maybe they have been solved and I didn't read up on it. In particular, why does our particular mathematical structure appear so interesting? Most mathematical structures are not, and if they all exist equally, they you're probably part of one of the uninteresting ones, not the tiny fraction that is interesting. That's a tough problem, and one that Carroll has attempted to point out. — noAxioms

I'm not sure how this is a problem for MUH. I mean, if all mathematical structures exist, then both interesting and non-interesting one do.

I mean, where does the cherryness emerge if none of the particles are cherry? — noAxioms

I can envision that all properties of 'cherryness' can be explained via the (known) properties of the constituents of cherries. I'm not sure that there is a 'discrete jump' in complexity between particles/fields and cherry.
However, in the case of a human being, I'm not so sure that there isn't a 'discrete jump'. It doesn't seem possible for consciousness to emerge as 'cherryness' does. So, if there is indeed emergence, it is of a different kind of emergence than in the case of cherryness.

Put more simply, it isn't hard to predict that the sun will rise tomorrow morning, but science goes further and blames it on Earth spinning and not the sun moving around. — noAxioms

Yes, but a skeptic would concede to you that your model 'works better' than the ancient's. However, the skeptic would then point out that this doesn't necessarily mean that you have more knowledge of 'how things really are'.

The skeptic would use the example of the 'progress' from Newtonian mechanics (NM) and, say, Special Relativity (SR). Taken as two descriptions of physical reality, NM and SR are incompatible. We know that NM has been falsified. However, they are both valid in many contexts and NM can be impressively precise in its prediction. So, even if NM is an incorrect description of physical reality is good at making predictions. So, perhaps, the skeptic would argue, the same goes for all physical theories. Predictive power, alone, doesn't guarantee that a theory gives a good description of physical reality. You need something else than empirical confirmation. Given that science begins and ends in empirical observations, this means that, in order to justify that we do know more of 'physical reality as it is' you need extra-scientific reasons.
From a 'purely scientific' viewpoint, scientific theories are predictive models. Nothing more or less. And if we wanted to base our knowledge only on science we should 'suspend judgment' on everything that is different from predictions, measurements and so on. Scientific progress would only give us better predictions, applications etc, i.e. it would have only a pragmatic value rather than a noetic one.

I agree with that to a point. However, I do believe that, say, we can discuss about the intelligibility of nature and find out a reasonable position about it, i.e. 'metaphysics' has a place. If it didn't, then knowledge of 'physical reality' would be impossible.

P.S. I believe I'll be unable to respond further until at least next weekend.

Personally I don't see a need for a fire. That's realism's problem, and yes, MWI is a realist interpretation. — noAxioms

I believe that the 'fire' is an image of change. If the universe was merely a mathematical structure - as Tegmark's MUH (mathematical universe hypothesis) says - it would seem that the universe would be changeless. So either change is a 'persistent illusion' (as Einstein wrote about 'time' in a letter to the family of his deceased friend Michele Besso) or change is real. If change is real, something more than 'just math' is needed.

Ironically, if MUH was right, it is difficult for me to consider its ontology as 'physicalist'. After all, mathematical structures seem very remote to something I would call 'physical' (in a former post you disagreed...).
If, instead, there is something more than 'just math' we might ask ourselves what is it. Again, we agreed that common form of 'materialism' seem inadequate. So, again, if change is real, what is it?

Depends on your definition of exists, but saying otherwise is essentially idealism. And most definitions of existence are pretty dang idealist. I really tried to hammer that home in some of my recent topics. — noAxioms

Agreed something like MUH is essentially a sort of 'idealism', however more a variety in which concepts are what is fundamental. To me this kind of 'idealism' is defective because it can't, in my opinion, adequately explain change, consciousness and so on.
But I respect Tegmark for his clarity and honestly I think your position is similar. In his system there is no 'prime matter' that is left unexplained and 'somehow' follows mathematical laws. Simply reality is mathematical structures all the way down.

I may not be an idealist, but I've come to terms with 'existence' being an ideal, which is awfully dang close to being an idealist I guess. Personal identity is certainly an ideal, with no physical correspondence. It's a very useful ideal, but that's a relation, not any kind of objective thing. — noAxioms

I think you're pretty close to what I am saying. You can't 'pin down' the identity of a person but denying the reality of a person is also wrong. Of course, if one starts from the assumption that anything that is 'real' can be 'pinned down' personal identity becomes an useful fiction.
Nevertheless, I also believe that the 'person' of a human being is not independent from the 'physical'. Perhaps the closest we can say is that the 'person' is a mode of existence, which, I believe, is curiously similar to how the 'Aristotelian' metaphysical tradition understood the 'soul' to be (note that for them the 'soul' wasn't a 'substance' opposed to matter).

There are those that deny that pies are physical because they cannot describe them in terms of field equations. I consider that fallacious reasoning. Maybe the pies are not just particles, but any claim to that effect needs more justification that just personal incredulity. — noAxioms

I can grant that 'pies' are indeed useful fiction we impose on experience to make sense of it. Valid fictions that help us to 'navigate' in our experience that remain valid until one 'looks deeper'. This doesn't mean that 'everything is an illusion' but I'm open to the idea that the way we 'carve' the world into separate objects is, in fact, is more rooted in utility rather than 'truthfulness'. However, pies and human beings are vastly different kinds of 'entities'. I can accept the idea that pies might be one day completely described in terms of fundamental particles/fields but I'm not sure the same is true for human beings.

Really? It does describe, but it describes what we know more than attempt to describe what is. In that sense, any such interpretation is far closer to the science of the situation than is a metaphysical interpretation. — noAxioms

QBism for instance is pretty clear that wavefunctions are more like representations of the degree of beliefs an 'agent' (and QBists differ on what an 'agent' is) has about a given phenomenon. There is no need for them that there is an isomorphic relation between the mathematical structure of the theory and some properties of nature. Simply, QM is seen as an useful tool for calculating, predicting and so on.
QBists are quite explicit of this and, however, I believe that the same goes for all other epistemic views (even if admittedly the latter aren't as clear).

Newton and Galileo certainly believed that we could 'disclose' something real about the 'nature of things'. A famous passage of Galileo:

“Philosophy is written in this grand book, the universe, which stands continually open to our gaze. But the book cannot be understood unless one first learns to comprehend the language and read the letters in which it is composed. It is written in the language of mathematics, and its characters are triangles, circles and others geometric figures without which it is humanly impossible to understand a single word of it; without these, one wanders about in a dark labyrinth.” — Galileo Galilei, Il Saggiatore (1623), in Opere, vol. VI, p. 232.

IIRC, even Fenyman (who AFAIK endorsed a form of the Copenaghen interpretation) in a lecture (there is an online video I believe somewhere) stated that physics is not only predictive. He made the example of the impressive ability of the Mayans to predict the motion of celestial objects. However, he was clear that science doesn't give us only predictions but it really helps to understand more of nature and we do understand more about celestial objects than the ancients.

Epistemic interpreters are often skeptics who also point out that what is common to all physical theories is their predictive powers. They would say that Newtonian mechanics remains valid for its predictive powers and not for being a 'faithful description' of the world.
I somewhat agree with them about this but, at the same time, I also believe that science is a gradual process of understanding better nature. Knoledge gradually becomes less and less 'confused' so to speak and 'physical reality' becomes less and less 'veiled'. I don't believe we will be ever be able to 'completely unveil' reality (so on this I agree with the skeptics) but at the same time I do believe that intelligibility of nature is real.

If DNA was your identity, then identical twins would be the same person. That doesn't work. Consider a bacterium. When it splits, which is the original? That's where our notion of pragmatic identity fails and one must us a different one. It gets closer to the notion of rational identity. — noAxioms

Sorry for the late reply. Indeed, my point was that a person seems more than anything that can be described.

But in a sense, everything is more than what can be described by concept, isn't it?
Stephen Hawking once asked What is it that breathes fire into the equations and makes a universe for them to describe?. Regardless the question about the supposed 'agent' that 'breathed fire' into the equations, clearly all that exists can't be 'reduced' to concepts. I believe that concepts can 'map' (or perhaps even are) the structure of what exists. However, in the case of personal identity there is even more than just 'existence' IMO.

Pragmatic identity is simply a convenient way to describe things, a coarse-grained description that has a pragmatic value. However, in the case of persons, I believe that a person is real in a fundamental sense. It can be 'dissolved into' a more detailed description or anything else.

Of course, this is all speculative but things like 'qualias', subjective experiences, the experience of being an agent ('free will') and so on do suggest so.

Physics itself seem to have no notion of identity and is of no use is resolving such quandaries. — noAxioms

I'd agree with that. You and I seem to disagree on how 'complete' the description that current physical theories is. It might well be the case that in the future our 'current picture' of reality will be regarded as how we now see classical physics.

That seems not to be how evolution work, hence my skepticism on the discreetness of it all. — noAxioms

And you should be skeptic! I know I am proposing something sketchy here. But I do believe that the 'hard problem' etc point to something like that.

Well, you mix 'are' and 'behave' there like they mean the same thing. They don't. The former is metaphysics. The latter is not. Science tends to presume some metaphysics for clarity, but in the end it can quite get along without any of it. — noAxioms

Yeah, I used the words in a somewhat flippant way. In any case, my point was that proponents of epistemic interpretations of QM think that QM doesn't give a description. To people like Newton, Galileo and so on that would be somewhat absurd (and even Galileo suggested that science can 'disclose' less about the 'nature of reality' than his contemporaries thought).

Speaking of identity, it is kind of hard to follow Wafarer's identity given the somewhat regular change of avatar. @Banno (and 180) also does this with similar rate of regularity. You guys don't realize how much stances and personalities I associate with the avatar more than the name. It's like my wife coming home, same person I always knew, but after having swapped to a totally new unrecognizable body. My avatar has been unaltered since the PF days. — noAxioms

LOL, agreed.

I rather like this, from Mind and Cosmos
The intelligibility of the world is no accident. Mind, in this view, is doubly related to the natural order. Nature is such as to give rise to conscious beings with minds; and it is such as to be comprehensible to such beings. Ultimately, therefore, such beings should be comprehensible to themselves. And these are fundamental features of the universe, not byproducts of contingent developments whose true explanation is given in terms that do not make reference to mind.
— Thomas Nagel — Patterner

Excellent quote! Thanks!

I believed they're the two most important questions, but the answer to both turned out to be 'wrong question'. Both implied premises that upon analysis, didn't hold water. Hence the demise of my realism. — noAxioms

If they turned out to be 'wrong questions', then they aren't important. What is important is removing the illusion that they are. I disagree but I think I can understand why you think so.

Cool. Consciousness quanta. — noAxioms

Sort of. I see it more like that consciousness comes into discrete degrees and that there is some kind of potency of the higer degrees into the lower degrees. So, I'm a sort of emergentist myself I suppose but I would put 'emergence' as in 'actualizing a potential' (think of Aristotle). So, not in a way in which current 'physicalists' models frame it.

A river is a process, yes. If it was not, it wouldn't be a river. — noAxioms

But note that you're using the notion of 'pragmatic' versus 'rational' in a way that the above statement is, ultimately, false.

I can agree with the 'rational' model that the we aren't the same person as we were in the past to exclude a static model of the 'self'. Conceptual models are, of course, static and, being static, might not be able to fully capture a 'dynamic entity'. I can even agree with the Buddhist notion that the 'self' is ultimately illusory if it is interpreted as implying that we can't be identified by anything static.

As an example, consider a song. The song 'exists' when it is played. Its script isn't its 'identity' but, rather, what we might call its form, its template. However, we can't even say that the song is something entirely different from its script as the script is something essential to the song. In a similar way, something like my DNA is essential to me but, at the same time, it can't 'capture' my whole being.

No description, no matter how articulate can ever capture the being of a person.

The caluclator is (pragmatically) an individual — noAxioms

Yes, I agree with that. But I disagree that it has the sufficient degree of autonomy to make its pragmatic distinction from its environment as a real distinction. It is certainly useful to us to distinguish it from its environment and label it with a name and think it as an 'entity'. But is it really one?

and your assertion was that QM doesn't give a definition of it, which is false, regardless of how different interpretations might redefine the word. — noAxioms

Ok, fine. I concede that. But I believe that in 'interpretation-free QM' measurement is a fuzzy notion. Once you define it clearly, the definition gives an interpretation of QM.

Yes, exactly. Theories are about science. Metaphysics (QM interpretations in this case) are about what stuff ultimately is. — noAxioms

Well, up until the 20th century it was common to think that the purpose of science was at least to give a faithful description of 'how things are/behave'. I personally do not make a hard distinction between metaphysics and physics but I get what you mean here.

Wow, two in one go. Thank you all. It may not seem like it, but these discussions do influence my thinking/position and cause me to question thin reasoning. — noAxioms

:up: the same goes for me. These kinds of well made discussions, even if do not lead to a change of opinion, helps to clarify one's own.

That's something I look for in my thinking. X is important, so I will rationalize why X must be — noAxioms

Yes, I hear you. I don't think that is a 'dogmatic' approach if it is done with an open mind. Yes, some rationalizations can be a sign of dogmatism but if the inquiry is done in a good way it is actually a sign of the opposite, in my opinion.

So, even if on this subject we probably end the discussion with opposite ideas, this discussion perhaps helps both to consider aspect of our own position that we neglected and so on.
In my case, ironically, it helped me to understand how my own conception of 'consciousness' seems to exclude the possibility that conscious beings are algorithmic and this perhaps means that physical laws do make room for that. To me the biggest evidence (but not the only one) that our cognition isn't (totally) algorithmic is the 'degree of freedom' that it seems to be present when I make a choice. As I told in another discussion we had, this is, in my opinion, also strictly linked to ethics. That is we have a somewhat free power of deliberation that makes us eligible to be morally responsible (in a way that this concept doesn't become purely utilitarian and/or totally equivalent to being healthy/ill - although I do believe that there is a strong analogy between good/evil will and being helathy/ill, however both the analogy and the difference are crucial).

Reegarding the two other questions you wrote, they are also important for me. In my opinion, they are ultimately mysterious but, at the same time, I believe that they are worth asking and at the same time we can find some partial answer also to those.

I can grant that. Sentience is not an on/off thing, but a scale. It certainly hasn't reached a very high level yet, but it seems very much to have surpassed that of bacteria. — noAxioms

:up: Note that, however, I'm also a weirdo that thinks that the 'scale' is indeed like a scale with discrete steps. Nevertheless, I believe that the latency for the 'higher' level of sentience must be present in the lower. It seems to me that, to be honest, this inevitably leads to a less 'mechanicistic' view of the 'insentient'/'unliving' aspects of Nature.

Are you not the person you were 10 minutes ago? I have some pretty good arguments to say you're not, but not because of the mosquito bite. — noAxioms

Buddhists would tell you that saying that "you are the same person" (as you did change) and "you are a different person" (as the two states are closely connected) are both wrong. Generally, change is seen as evidence by most Buddhists that the 'self is an illusion (or 'illusion-like')'.
In my opinion, I would say that I am the same person. To this point, think about how the scholar D.W. Graham interpreters Heraclitus' fragment B12 "On those stepping into rivers staying the same other and other waters flow." (and Aristotle's view):

The statement is, on the surface, paradoxical, but there is no reason to take it as false or contradictory. It makes perfectly good sense: we call a body of water a river precisely because it consists of changing waters; if the waters should cease to flow it would not be a river, but a lake or a dry streambed.
...
If this interpretation is right, the message of the one river fragment, B12, is not that all things are changing so that we cannot encounter them twice, but something much more subtle and profound. It is that some things stay the same only by changing. One kind of long-lasting material reality exists by virtue of constant turnover in its constituent matter. Here constancy and change are not opposed but inextricably connected. A human body could be understood in precisely the same way, as living and continuing by virtue of constant metabolism–as Aristotle for instance later understood it. On this reading, Heraclitus believes in flux, but not as destructive of constancy; rather it is, paradoxically, a necessary condition of constancy, at least in some cases (and arguably in all). In general, at least in some exemplary cases, high-level structures supervene on low-level material flux. The Platonic reading still has advocates (e.g. Tarán 1999), but it is no longer the only reading of Heraclitus advocated by scholars. — DW Graham, SEP article on Heraclitus, section 3.1

Regardless the validity of Graham's interpretation of Heraclitus, I believe that it might be used to defend the idea that we can remain identical while changing. Life, after all, seems to be intrinsically characterized by some kind of 'movement'.

You seem to suggest that the identity somehow is a function of biological processes not being algorithmic. Not sure how that follows. — noAxioms

If all processes are algorithmic, I would believe that they can be seen as aspects of the entire evolution of the whole universe. Some kind of 'freedom' (or at least a potency for that) seems necessary for us to be considered as individual.

But I gave a definition that QM theory uses. Yes, it's pragmatic, which doesn't say what the measurement metaphysically IS. Perhaps that's what you're saying. No theory does that. It's not what theories are for. — noAxioms

To make some examples, in Rovelli's RQM all physical interactions are measurements. In most forms of MWI that I know, IIRC only the processes that lead to decoherence can be considered measurements. In epistemic interpratiotions measurements are updates of an agent's knowledge/beliefs (and of course, what this means depends on the interpreter's conception of what an 'agent' is). In de Broglie-Bohm measurements are particular kinds of interaction where the 'appearance of collapse' happens.
And so on. There are, in my opinion, an extremely large number of ideas of what a 'measurement' actually means in QM among the experts. So, it's not clear at all.

I think that adopting 'QM without interpretation' would force one to 'suspend judgment' on what a 'measurement' ultimately is.

Perhaps we are saying the same thing differently. I suspect we do.

I don't know. It seems to me life is processes, not properties. Our planet has various amounts of various elements, so that's what the laws of physics had to work with. But can't there be life on other planets that have different mixtures of different elements? I imagine there can be. I think different elements, different processes, different systems, can accomplish the work of life. — Patterner

I don't think that a 'process view' denies what I said. Note, however, that processes in order to be intelligible must have some properties, some structure. Otherwise knowledge is simply impossible.

In a 'process ontology', what I said perhaps would be modified as 'there is a potency for life-processes in non-living processes' or something like that.

Sure, the machine probably follows machine instructions (assuming physics isn't violated anywhere), which are arguably an algorithm, but then a human does likewise, (assuming physics isn't violated anywhere), which is also arguably an algorithm. — noAxioms

Physics is violated only if you assume it is algorithmic. I disagree with this assumption. I believe that our own existence is 'proof' that physical laws allow non-algorithmic processes (as to why I believe that our cognition isn't algorithmic I refer to some of my previous posts).

BTW, I want to thank you for the discussion. It helped to clarify a lot of my own position. I didn't think that my denial of our cognition as being totally algorithmic is so important for me. What you also say in respose to @javra about the 'hedonic aspect' of consciousness would perhaps make sense if you assume that everything about us is algorithmic.

As I stated above, I do not think that sentient AI is logically impossible (or, at least, I have not enough information to make such a statement). But IMO we have not yet reached that level.

That opens a whole can of worms about identity. The same arguments apply to humans. Typically, the pragmatic answer is 'yes'. Identity seems to be a pragmatic idea, with no metaphysical basis behind it. — noAxioms

Again, I have to disagree here. We seem to be sufficiently 'differentiated' to be distinct entities. Again, clearly, if all our actions and cognitions were algorithmic what you are saying here would make perfect sense. After all, if all processes are algorithmic it seems to me that the only entity that there is in the universe is the whole universe itself. All other 'subsystems' have at best a pragmatic identity. Ultimately, however, they are only useful fictions.

You need to expand on this. I don't know what you mean by it. — noAxioms

I meant that 'interpretation-free QM' doesn't give a precise definiton of what a measurement is. It is a purely pragmatic theory.

Ok :up:

Life on this planet has always been of a certain type. That makes sense, because the laws of physics woked with what was available. Certain arrangements of matter. — Patterner

While this can be viewed as a tautology (the laws of physics allow life because there is life...), I also think that this is a very interesting point. To me this suggests that we perhaps do not know enough of the 'inanimate' and this is the reason why the properties associated with life seem so different from the properties associated with 'what isn't life', i.e. life is, so to speak, latent in 'what isn't life'.

And BTW, I also think that 'consciousness' is fundamental, albeit for different reasons and I have a different model of yours. For instance, as I said before, I believe that if mathematical truths are concepts (i.e. mental contents) and, as they seem, they are not contingent, independent of time, place and so on, that some kind of 'mind' is indeed fundamental. Physical objects, on the other hand, seem to be contingent.

That makes perfect sense if you have faith in the police, but otherwise, this excuse is much harder to support. — ProtagoranSocratist

Ok, yes, some police officers might break the very rules that enforce on others. Not sure about your point though. What are you getting at? How does that contradict what I was saying about it?

I think I can justify the possibility of complete selflessness. It seems at least conceivable that, given the degrees of selfishness we see in the real world, it is possible that some human beings can be totally selfless. This doesn't mean that such a possibility is actualized. — boundless

Wanted to add that even if 'perfect selflessness' were impossible for human beings - in the sense that humans by being humans can't be devoid of a minimum amount of selfishnesss - 'perfect seflessness' could still be a good regulative ideal. If being 'less selfish' is better (for oneself and for others) than being 'more selfish', 'perfect selflessness' could be a state that people can never approach but they can still approximate.

As boundless points to, its “behaviors” all stem from human created algorithms that logically reduce to an “if A then B” type of efficient causation—even if these algorithms are exceedingly complex, evolve over time, and aren’t fully understood by us humans—and this devoid of both a) any intent(s) innate to its being upon which all of its “behaviors” pivot (and intents, innate or otherwise, can only be teleological rather than efficiently causal, with algorithms strictly being the latter) and, likewise, b) the affective valence which these same innate intents bring about. Example: a stationary self-driving car will not react if you open up the hood so as to dismantle the engine (much less fend for itself), nor will it feel any dolor if you do. Therefore, the self-driving car cannot be conscious. — javra

:up: Yes, I agree. I believe that there is a tendency to read too much into the 'behavior' of machines. By analyzing my own phenomenological experience there are some features that do not seem explainable by referring to algorithms. And, as you say, 'consciousness' seems also to imply both teleological and affective states. I still do not find any evidence that machines have those.

Again, I also agree that this doesn't mean that it is impossible that one day a machine might become sentient.

What a rediculous statement, i have to stop here: how can one possibly commit "an unselfish act"? I think you attempt to answer this, but ill have to address that later. — ProtagoranSocratist

What do you mean by 'unselfish'? It seems perfectly conceivable to me. I can conceive a human being acting for the good of another without any kind of expectation of getting some benefit from that.

I think you are getting at something that typically bothers me about religions in general: if this is indeed a supposition for buddhists, then it is not an atheist religion as some claim, because the buddha must be a God if he is indeed selfless, as there is not a single selfless person on earth. — ProtagoranSocratist

Most Buddhist schools affirm a view that implies that the 'self' is 'illusory' in some ways, so it isn't surprising that they assume that a Buddha isn't in any way 'selfish': if their view is right, the very idea of 'getting a benefit for oneself' is, ultimately, illusory. Other religious traditions have different models of explaining how a person can be selfless.

Regardless of Buddhism, Christianity or any religion really, how do you know that "there is not a single selfless person on earth"? How can we be certain of the truth of this statement?

Certainly, there are degrees of 'selfishness/selflessness'.

How? This is questionable, because you're not elaborating. — ProtagoranSocratist

I'm not elaborating because it seems a tangential issue for me. My point was simply that punishments can be educative and aimed to the good of the individual who is punished and to the good of the community and that, in some cases, such punishments are perhaps the best course action for realizing such a good.

I really don't see why you are insisting so much on the 'selfishness' of those who administer the punishment. In your view, it seems, any act is in some way selfish. Even if this was true, it remains the case that if (some kinds of) punishments are the best course of actions for realizing the good of the individual and the community then the punishment should be done. After all, in your view, even the most 'selfless' acts of self-sacrifice have a 'component' of selfishness, so how the presence of 'selfishness' is a reason for devaluing punishments?

I think I can justify the possibility of complete selflessness. It seems at least conceivable that, given the degrees of selfishness we see in the real world, it is possible that some human beings can be totally selfless. This doesn't mean that such a possibility is actualized.

If you drive, then you'll see how unhelpful that is: the police regularly exceed the speed limit. — ProtagoranSocratist

So what? Police might have to exceed the speed limit in order to catch criminals. Or even if some officers transgress the speed limits, it is nevertheless true that in many circumstances doing so is dangerous.

It's not only about "enforcing good behavior", it's about collecting revenue and scaring people into safer driving habits. — ProtagoranSocratist

Yes, and scaring people into safer driving habits perhaps is a good thing both for themselves and the community in many cases. There are people who do not break the basic forms of morality only because the fear of punishments. Punishments and the fear of them have a place in educating people and building a virtuous character.

Of course, some people can be brought to virtuous behavior by dialogue or by example. But it seems evident to me that this isn't true for all. For some people it seems to me punishments and/or the fear of punishments (which might be of different kinds depending on the case) can be the only way in which they can 're-orient' their will to the good. And perhaps a subset of these people might even be corrected by any kinds of punishments, I don't know.

The police do more than enforce necessary rules, if you can't come to that conclusion, there's no sense in me trying to re-iterate my original extortion comment. — ProtagoranSocratist

Yes, but they also do that.

OK. I called it strong emergence since it isn't the property of the radio components alone. More is needed. Equivalently, substance dualism treats the brain as sort of a receiver tuned to amplify something not-brain. It's a harder sell with property dualism. — noAxioms

Ok. Note that epistemic 'strong emergence' seems to collapse in a sort of substance dualism where the 'mental substance' 'emerges' in an unexplainable way. So in a sense, that kind of strong emergence is IMO a hidden substance dualism.

That's what a radio is: a receiver. It probably has no understanding of sound or what it is doing. — noAxioms

Yes, the radio is a receiver. But the sound can't be called 'music' unless it can be understood as such. just like a chair can't be called a chair without human beings that conceive it as such.

I would suggest that we actually do know enough to explain any of that, but still not a full explanation, and the goalposts necessarily get moved. — noAxioms

I already stated why I disagree with this. I see why you say this but I disagree. The features of our experience can't be fully explained by what we know of the properties of our constituents.

Not true. There are plenty of machines whose functioning is not at all understood. That I think is the distinction between real AI and just complex code. Admittedly, a self driving car is probably mostly complex code with little AI to it. It's a good example of consciousness (unconscious things cannot drive safely), but it's a crappy example of intelligence or creativity. — noAxioms

Ok, but in the case of the machines we can reasonably expect that all their actions can be explained by algorithms. And I'm not sure that a self-driving car is conscious, in the sense there is 'something like being a self-driving machine'.

You can fix a broken machine. — noAxioms

When we fix a machine is the fixed machine the same entity as it was before, or not?

We get a new problem here. Can machines be regarded as having an 'identity' as we have?

Interestingly, a human maintains memory for about 3 minutes without energy input (refresh). A computer memory location lasts about 4 milliseconds and would be lost if not read and written back before then. Disk memory is far less volatile of course. — noAxioms

Interesting fact, yes. Thanks.

Quantum theory defines measurement as the application of a mathematical operator to a quantum state, yielding probabilistic outcomes governed by the Born rule. Best I could do. — noAxioms

Agreed I would add that It doesn't tell you in which cases the Born rule applies.

In this very weak sense, QM is an extremely practical set of rules that allows us to make extraordinary predictions. Everything more is interpretation-dependent.

And welcome back @Wayfarer

"education", to me at least, is besides the point, because education and learning are radically different things. Education can't really exist without some institution that requires it, whereas learning is a constant process we all face that never ends. — ProtagoranSocratist

I see your point but IMO humans are intrinsically social animals, so social behavior is an essential component of human life. And, hence 'education' is inevitable.

I was never intending to imply that punishment always does more harm than good, or cannot be justifiable, but that we cannot ignore the stance and selfish ends of the punisher. — ProtagoranSocratist

This is a questionable statement IMO. You seem to assume that it is simply impossible to punish without any selfish end. To make just one example of someone who would disagree, in a Buddhist discourse (AN 4.111) the Buddha, who is assumed to be totally selfless, is depicted as stating that sometimes harsh words are useful for some disciples and, in some cases, people can be even regarded "as [not] being worth speaking to or admonishing" (so, expelled from the order of monks... this is not explicitly stated in the discourse I quoted but you can find examples of transgressions that are regarded as worthy of expulsion). Criticism and expulsions are clearly punishments. So, your premise here is simply questionable.

Punishers are capable of making dubious claims about the actions of others and their intentions, and probably do so on a regular basis. Trying to exclude any punishment from ethical and moral standards makes absolutely no sense if you are indeed trying to make the best decisions for everyone involved. — ProtagoranSocratist

I agree with that. But I was making a point of principle. In practice, I agree with you that, unfortunately, bad motivations can 'mix' into the decision behind a given punishment. So, yes, punishments should be regulated. I sense that, ideally, punishment should aim for the good of both the transgressor and the community (so, punishments should also protect the victims, if there are any). So, at least a regulative principle, those who punish should seek the individual and communal good.

It's pretty typical for people to moralize about anything to do with children, which is a pretty huge motivator for me not to have children. — ProtagoranSocratist

Yes, unfortunately, and the idea of 'inherited guilt' that is present in certain forms of Christianity certainly had a bad influence. Note, however, that this idea is absent in many other forms of Christianity (the idea in these forms of Christianity is that we have a weakness that predisposes us to sin and not that we are 'born sinners' worthy of punishment). Again, this is an example on how we should be careful to generalize some criticism to the whole of 'Christianity' when, in fact, it is apt only to some forms.

The thought of me repeating the second moral lesson is even worse I.M.O., because then I'm stepping into the dicey territory of blaming someone else for a choice made by a police officer, which seems to be hypocritical. On top of that, traffic fines and punishments are a pretty clear example of extortion, no matter how much sense it makes on the surface... — ProtagoranSocratist

Not sure what your point is. In any case, I believe that fines are an example of a necessity. They aren't perfect because, after all, rich people aren't as affected by fines as poor people, but without traffic fines many people would neglect the rules.

I guess a more interesting moral question to me would be, when do you stand up for your kid when someone else punishes them? How far should I go in shaming them over inappropriate sexual expression and language? — ProtagoranSocratist

Ideally, a parent should accept the punishment, assuming the punishment itself is really 'for the good'.

In any case, the parent should evaluate carefully the situation and accept the punishment if it is indeed the 'better' option. This isn't clearly easy but parents shouldn't justify wrong behaviour of their children. Of course, if the punishment is totally unjust, disproportionate etc it is right to defend the child.

Thanks for the answer and clarification. Unfortunately, It'll take some days now for me to respond.

Sorry if I don't answer you in detail. But I believe it is better to begin from more general questions of principle.

Do you think that 'punishments' (in a quite broad sense of the term) can never be means of education? Do you think that it is always possible to avoid 'punishments' and still educate efficiently?

'Punishment' here means either causing or allowing some kind of painful or unpleasant experience. I would actually answer yes to both, i.e. that 'punishments' can be means of education and that it isn't always possible to avoid 'punishments' to educate efficiently for the reason I tried to explain in my previous posts.

Wilhelm Reich might argue that people perform this particular punishment as part of their "character armor" instead of it being selfless education. In other words, it's not really about the kid deserving to be treated so harshly, but about the parent's fears about how the child will make them look in the future. — ProtagoranSocratist

Perhaps in some cases yes. In some cases no. Not sure why one would like to think that in the case I was thinking. Let's say that the stolen item was quite costly and if done by an adult the act could be considered a somewhat serious instance of theft.

I mean: I was thinking about the case of an adolescent that isn't easily convinced by a simple 'verbal reprimand'. Indeed, there was no physical harm done to the child in my example from the parent. The parent simply didn't allow the child to go to a place he/she did want to go (let's say having fun with friends) and, instead, brought him/her to the shop owner to apologize and give back the stolen item. It is actually an example of 'restorative justice' that perhaps also can benefit to the offended part here.

I am also not a parent but I do not see any kind of selfish behaviour in the parent. Certainly, 'doing nothing' would be worse. The misbehaving adolescent here might in that case continue in his/her destructive behaviour.

In any case, even a 'verbal reprimand' is actually a form of punishment even if it is less intense.

Even among adults, let's say that a grown man/woman one night drives recklessy and gets a fine for having exceeded a speed limit. Getting the fine might actually be the occasion of changing the way he/she drives. Maybe at first for fear of getting fined again and, later, because he/she comes to see that safe driving, while perhaps more boring, leads to more good than reckless driving.

Of course, punishments should not exceed some boundaries. Of course, at least when possible, dialogue or other 'measures' should be applied instead of punishments. But I think that punishments, when skillfully done, might lead to the good of those punished.

I have no idea what video apokrisis posted. I just did a search. This post is about the same stuff, but there's no link to a video. — Patterner

It was a video that was posted some years ago about a computer simulation of metabolic processes of a cell (I vaguely remember that ATP was also present, that's why I thought the video was the same). It was a very well-made video that gives the idea of how complex are those processes. I hope I find it again.

I'll watch the video as soon as I can. Unfortunately, in the next few days I'll be somewhat busy, so I'll need some time.

I don't mean this is how life emerged, as in abiogenesis. I mean life is various physical processes, such as metabolism, respiration, and reproduction, and we can understand these processes all the way down to things like electrons and redox reactions. There's nothing happening above that isn't explained below. There is no vital force/élan vital needed to explain anything. — Patterner

Ok, I see and I think I agree. But I also think that there is some rudimentary intentionality even in the simplest life forms (and perhaps even in viruses which are not considered living). So perhaps the issues of life and consciousness aren't separate.
I believe that perhaps the properties that characterize life are present in a latent form in what isn't life. Think about something like Aristotle's notion of potency and act.

As I said, consciousness is not physical processes like photons hitting retinas, rhodopsin changing shape, signal sent up the optic nerve to the lateral geniculate nucleus, signal processed, processed signal sent to the visual cortex, and a million other intervening steps. No amount of added detail would be a description of the experience of seeing red. — Patterner

Agreed. To which, I also add the capacity of reason that I alluded to my reference to mathematics.

I don't believe there's any such thing as 'strong emergence'. There's just emergence, which most think of as 'weak emergence'. And it is intelligible. — Patterner

Agreed. I believe that 'strong emergence' at least in the 'epistemic' sense can't be taken seriously. It basically is like saying: "under these conditions, somehow a property emerges...".

No, no subatomic particle, atom, or molecule has the property of liquidity.
... — Patterner

I agree with everything you say here about liquidity. However, life and, above all, mind are a different thing. They seem to present features that have no relation with the properties we know of the 'inanimate'.

I'm not going to do even as much as I just did for water, because this is already far too long. But watch this video about the electron transport chain. It explains how electrons being transported from one thing to the next in the mitochondria leads to a proton gradient, and how the pent-up proteins, when released, power the synthesis of ATP. ATP is the power source of nearly everything involved in those physical processes that are the defining characteristics of life. — Patterner

Unfortunately, the link redirects to this page. I believe, however it is the same video that apokrisis shared some time ago. Yes, that's impressive, isn't it? A purely reductionist explanation to all that doesn't seem credible. So, the 'emergence' that caused all of this is something like a 'non-reductionist emergence' or something like that. However, the details of how the emergence of life happened are unclear and details matter.

Again, I don't deny abiogenesis but I do believe that we have yet to understand all the properties of the 'inanimate'. Perhaps, the hard difference we see between 'life' and 'not-life' will be mitigated as we progress in science.

Mind/Consciousness is even a more complicated case IMO. One is the reason you say in your post, i.e. phenomenological experience seems difficult to be explained in emergentist terms. And as I said before in this thread, I even believe that our mind can understand concepts that can't be considered 'natural' or 'physical'. The clearest example to me are mathematical truths even if I admit that I can't seem to provide compelling arguments for this ontology of math (as for myself, I did weight the pros and cons about the 'existence and eternity' of math and to be honest the pros seem to me more convincing).



Edit: now the link worked. It isn't the video that I had in mind, so I'll watch it.

Observer is a classical thing, and QM is not about classical things, even if classical tools are useful in experimentation. Quantum theory gives no special role to conscious 'observation'. Every experiment can be (and typically is) run just as well with completely automated mechanical devices. — noAxioms

Standard interpretation-free QM is IMO simply silent about what a 'measurement' is. Anything more is interpretation-dependent.

I hope you see this is not an argument against what you said, but a different way of thinking. — Athena

Yes, I see. But I am suggesting that punishments and fear of punishments is a necessary (or perhaps inevitable) part of education. In my example of an adolescent that steals from a shop, the parent decision to lead the child to give back the item stolen and apologize to the shop owner is certainly a punishment even if educative. After experiencing it, the adolescent might gradually come to his or her senses and avoid to do that again, perhaps initially for fear of being punished again and later because he or she understands that the action is wrong.
So, I am not really disagreeing with the 'Eastern' notion of discipline and that a disciplined person in such sense is in a better state than a person who doesn't good only out of fear. But I would say that punishments (in a broad sense, including 'experiencing the natural results of one's actions' and 'educative punishments') and the fear of them are perhaps necessary part of our education.

Clearly, purely retributive punishments can't be read in such a way as their aims do not include education.

Regarding 'divine punishments' in Christianity I don't think that we can say that there is a single view. In fact, I believe that most Christians would say that in some cases the 'divine punishments' are educative. When they say they aren't, many Christians nowadays say that they are actually the consequence of the 'hardening' of the sinner's heart.
I don't, of course, deny that the picture of a vengeful God hasn't been common in Christianity and at times the most accepted one. But there is no single view about these among Christians.

You know what? So do I. I hunted around for that distinction and got several very different ideas about that. Some are more ontic like I'm suggesting and several others are more epistemic (intelligibility) such as you are suggesting. — noAxioms

Ok.

But a more knowledgeable explanation shows that it is getting the music from the air (something not-radio), not from itself. So the music playing is then a strong (not weak) emergent property of the radio. That's how I've been using the term.
Your explanation (as I hear it) sounds more like "I don't know how it works, so it must be strongly emergent (epistemic definition)". Correct conclusion, but very weak on the validity of the logic. — noAxioms

Ok but in the 'ontic' definition of strong emergence, when sufficient knowledge is aquired, it results in weak emergence. So the sound that is produced by the radio also necessitates the presence of the air. It is an emergent feature from the inner workings of the radio and the radio-air interaction.

(Regarding the music, I believe that to be understood ad 'music' you need also a receiver that is able to understand the sound as music)

Regarding your objection, yes I know and I have already said that I can't exclude with certainty an 'ontic' strong emergence. But it seems unlikely.

Are you saying that atoms have intentionality, or alternatively, that a human is more than just a collection of atoms? Because that's what emergence (either kind) means: A property of the whole that is not a property of any of the parts. It has nothing to do with where it came from.or how it got there. — noAxioms

Emergence means that those 'properties of the wholes that are not properties of the parts' however can be explained in virtue of the properties of the parts. So, yeah, I am suggesting that either a 'physicalist' account of human beings is not enough or that we do not know enough about the 'physical' to explain the emergence of intentionality, consciousness etc. A possible alternative perhaps is saying that intentionality is 'latent' in 'fundamental physical objects'. If this is true, however, this would imply that intentionality, consciousness are not an accidental feature - something that 'just happened' to come into being, an 'unnatural' super-addition of the inanimate. So, perhaps, the inanimate/animate distinction is less definite than what it seems.

Life arising from not-life seems like abiogenesis. Life being composed of non-living parts is emergence. So I don't particularly agree with using 'arise; like that. — noAxioms

Yes, I don't disagree with abiogenesis, of course. I just think that we do not have a complete understanding of 'not-life' and therefore the 'come into being' of the property 'life' seems difficult to explain in terms of what we know about 'not-life'. As I said before, this is perhaps because we do not have a complete understanding of what is 'not-life' - perhaps it is not so dissimilar to what is 'life'.

So does any machine. The parts that implement 'intent' have control over the parts that implement the background processes that implement that intent, sort of like our consciousness not having to deal with individual motor control to walk from here to there. I looking for a fundamental difference from the machine that isn't just 'life', which I admit is a big difference. You can turn a machine off and back on again. No can do with (most) life. — noAxioms

I believe that we are reaching a halting point in our discussion here. We know that all the operation of a (working) machine can be understood via the algorithms that have been programmed even when it 'controls' its processes. I just don't think there is sufficient evidence that this is the same for us.

Regarding when a machine 'dies'... well if you break it...

He IS an automated process. Same with parts of a person: What (small, understandable) part of you cannot be replaced by an automated substitute? — noAxioms

In that situation, I would say: his work is equivalent to an automated process in that situation. Regarding your question: I don't know. As I said before, it just seems that our experience of ourselves suggests that we are not mere automata.

I watched my brother's dog diagnose his appendicitis. Pretty impressive, especially given a lack of training in such areas. — noAxioms

Interesting and yes very impressive. Well also 'intuition' seems something that machines do not really have.

Thanks for your answer. I am sorry but I can now only reply on the part about punishments. I think that the matter is quite complex here. I do believe that 'fear of punishments' has a place in our own education. When we misbehave being punished - in some way - is perhaps the best thing that can happen to us. Of course, not all forms of punishments are good for us. Mere vengeance of course isn't good for those who suffer vengeance.

However, punishments can also be educative. For instance, a parent that let his or her child to experience the 'bad natural consequences' of the child's behavior might do the right thing that allows the child to understand the problems of acting in a certain way. Also, I believe that is some cases 'extrinsic punishments' can be educative. Again, a parent that knows that, say, their child stole something from a shop might reprimind the child and decide that the child should go to the shop, give to the owner what has been stolen and apologize etc instead of letting the child do what they are currently desiring. This is clearly an extrinsic punishment in the sense that the child at the end does something that they would not like to do.

Of course, in both cases the point of punishment is educative. So punishments can actually help a person to become virtuous at least if they are skillfully applied.

Nevertheless, a rigid moralism where people are merely expected to follow rules and being punished in a purely retributive fashion if they misbehave risks to be perceived as purely cohercive by those who have to follow it.

So, at least ideally I believe that all punishments should have - among their goals - the education of who is punished. Clearly, it seems that such a goal can't be reached in some cases or can't be the main goal of the punishments but it seems to me that that these situations shouldn't be 'the norm'. Quite often, it seems to me, the problem is not the 'rules' in themselves but rather the approach to them. So 'fear of punishment' and even 'punishments' can actually be good motivators to learn virtue but at the same time can never tell the whole story. The 'moral code' we are expected to follow should be somewhat linked to what is good to us.

If one uses a definition of strong emergence meaning that the snowflake property cannot even in principle be explained by physical interactions alone, then something else (said magic) is required, and only then is it strongly emergent. — noAxioms

I honestly find the whole distinction between 'strong' and 'weak' emergence very unclear and tends to muddle the waters. When we say that the form of a snowflake emerges from the properties of the lower levels, we have in mind at least a possible explanation of the former in terms of the latter.
If 'strong emergence' means that such an explanations isn't possible then I do not think we can even speak of 'emergence'.

So, yeah, I believe that emergence must be intelligible.

Worse, I hold beliefs that I know are wrong. It's contradictory, I know, but it's also true. — noAxioms

I think I know what you mean and I agree.

Being an intentional entity by no means implies that the event was intended. — noAxioms

I get that but the baby is still conceived by humans. You already have a sperm cell and an egg cell that are produced by beings who at least have the capacity of intentionality.
An explanation of 'emergence' of what has intentionality from what doesn't have intentionality IMO requires that among the causes of the emergence there isn't an entity that has at least the potentiality to be intentional.

This clearly mirrors the question to explain how 'life' arises from 'non-life'.

But the (strong/weak) emergence we're talking about is a planet made of of atoms, none of which are planets. — noAxioms

They are nevertheless quite similar as concepts. We are trying to explain how a given arrangement of 'physical things' can explain the 'arising' of mind/consciousness/intentionality etc
In the case of a planet we can give an account of how a planet 'emerges' from its constituents. In the case of mind/consciousness/intentionality things are not so clear...

I suggest that they've simply not been explained yet to your satisfaction, but there's no reason that they cannot in principle ever be explained in such terms. — noAxioms

Perhaps. And perhaps, we do not understand the 'lifeless' as we think we do.

What do you mean by this? Of what are we aware that a machine cannot be? It's not like I'm aware of my data structures or aware of connections forming or fading away. I am simply presented with the results of such subconscious activity. — noAxioms

But we experience a degree of control on our subconscious activities. We do not experience ourselves as mere spectators of unconscious activities. We experience ourselves as active players.

The experiment was proposed well before LLMs, but it operates much like an LLM, with the CPU of the LLM (presuming there's only one) acting as the person. — noAxioms

It's not like any of my neurons understands what it's doing. Undertanding is an emergent property of the system operating, not a property of any of its parts. The guy in the Chinese room does not understand Chinese, nor does any of his lists — noAxioms

That's what I meant, however. The guy in the Chinese room could be replaced by an automatic process. However, if the guy knew Chinese and could understand the words he would do something that not even the LLMs could do.

And I'm not sure that this 'additional feature' can be explained by 'emergence'.

Same way you do: Practice. Look at millions of images with known positive/negative status. After doing that a while, it leans what to look for despite the lack of explanation of what exactly matters. — noAxioms

Unfortunately I have not studied in a satisfying manner how these machines work. But I would guess that their 'learning' is entirely algorithmic, most likely it is based on something like updating prior probabilities, i.e. the machine is presented by some data, it automatically compares predictions to outcomes and then 'adjusts' the priors for future tests.

I don't think we do this. Actually, I think that our subconscious activities work just like that (e.g. as, say, it is suggested by the Bayesian models of perception) but this is not how we experience our conscious activities.

It's difficult to make a machine analogy of what I am thinking about, in part because there are no machines to my knowledge that seem to operate the way we (consciously) do.

OK. Can you name a physical process that isn't? Not one that you don't know how works, but one that you do know, and it's not algorithmic. — noAxioms

Perhaps we will have to agree to disagree here. To me conscious actions of sentient beings have a non-algorithmic components. Yet, physical and chemical processes seem to be algorithmic in character. How the former are possible in a world that seem to be dominated by the latter, I don't know.

Whoo, whoo, you stirred too many thoughts. I can handle maybe 3 concepts at a time. Too many thoughts turn my head into mush, and my mind is like a kaleidoscope, changing shapes and colors, and I can not form a coherent thought from all this sensory overload. :worry: — Athena

Well, I was lucky enough to have enough time to write those long posts (and I also have a tendency to 'overelaborate'...). I'll have likely less time in the following days, so I'll reply less frequently .

Absolutely! — Athena

:up: Yet, sometimes it seems to me that many people do not seem interested to live a coherent life in beliefs and deeds, and/or do not seem to be able to appreciate the consequences of certain beliefs, and/or do not live up to their own standards...
Of course, I am included.

Doing philosophy however helps to do that or at least be aware of these kinds of disconnects.

For sure, it is incomplete. As social animals, our thinking must be inclusive. As supposedly intelligent animals, our thinking needs to consider future generations. — Athena

Agreed!

Yep, nations and cultures can need psychoanalysis just as much as individuals. The way nations play war games makes psychoanalysis very important. — Athena

Again, I agree with this. I believe that, in fact, societies and cultures can 'learn' in a way analogous to how individuals learn. One example is, for instance, how slavery became in time seen as the monstrousity which it is. Nowadays we think that a human being can be considered a property as an abomination but slavery was practised regularly. I believe that at least on this point it is safe to say that humanity (on average) has learned a bit better what is better for each and all individuals.

Something that you mentioned is the middle path, balance, and harmony. As you know, it isn't all about me or all about you, but it is about us. If I am knocking myself out to be the perfect daughter, wife, mother, woman, it doesn't matter. — Athena

Well, we can also say that both an 'unconcerned' and a 'perfectionistic' attitude can damage both oneself and others. If I don't care about the 'goodness' of my actions it is of course a problem. At the same time, however, if I care too much I will probably be unable to act in any way and we get entangled in despair. So, yeah, we need the proper balance. Easier to say than to to do.

In everything we do, who do we want to please and why? — Athena

In a way, both us and others. But, again, we should seek to 'please' in the right way. Assuming that the lecture aims to inform the audience of some theme, the goal is to inform the audience in the optimal way. So, one can't either cause boredom to the audience nor entertain them without any real information. The optimal way is to both inform and entertain. Again, more easily said than done. Realistically, this means that we need to put a limit on both the quantity of information we want to share and the 'entertainment/pleasure' we want to give to the audience.

Furthermore, in some context causing unpleasant feelings can be for the good of the other. While 'punishments' should be avoided as far as is possible, sometimes they are inevitable. Not punishing someone for their inappropriate behavior is hardly uneducative at least in some circumstances. Sometimes the right 'punishment' can be the proper way for a transgressor to come to their senses and change their ways (and if the intent is educative, perhaps it would be better to speak of 'corrections' rather than 'punishments').
Again, this equally applies to someone who behaves badly but also for an addict. If a parent knows that their teenage child assumed drugs, the parent might decide to ground the child and take the child to a doctor against their will. The child perhaps would perhaps find painful this kind of intervention but we can expect that, once the child has become wiser, he or she will be grateful to their parent.

How fast can we change our morals and keep up with a society that is on the move? But here is the question that really bothers me- was the force of social change really better for humanity? — Athena

Good questions. A famous aphorism of Kierkegaard says that life can be lived forwards but can be understood backwords. While I would disagree if this is taken to an extreme, this is largely correct. It is difficult to say if certain changes have been for the better. All we can do is form a well-reasoned opinion given evidence.

A rigid moralism has undoubtedly painful effects on people. Of course, I have said above that painful experiences can be for the better. But, at the same time there are cases where it is evident that a rigid moralism becomes self-referential and makes the 'code of law' something more important than the persons it is supposed to be useful to. If moralism becomes an obstacle to the process to realize the good for the individual and the community it should be put into question.
For instance, if a moral system is supposed to make people more loving but the practical effects are that people become more self-centred, suspicious and so one it is right IMO to question the moral system. But this should be done in a careful way and not in an unreflecting way.

You wrote in favor of this and that, both being part of the truth. I often find truth is both this and that. But right now, everything is moving too fast, and I am not sure we are on the right path. — Athena

Yes, I agree. And the problem with fast changes is that people have not time to think about them in a proper way.

I am not Christian and want to point out that Christianity is in the line of destroying the goddess and supporting the patriarchy, and I have strong feelings against all this. Many native American tribes were matriarchal, and I think that is better for mankind. — Athena

I am also not a Christian partly because I find it impossible to accept some social norms that are generally held by Christians to be 'non-negotiable'. I do believe that there are good arguments for theism and I am very sympathetic to some forms of Christianity but I can't right now join a religious tradition (Christian or otherwise). I know that, perhaps, it doesn't make sense to be a 'non-religious theist' but, to be honest, I can't help myself to be different.

Regarding gender inequality, I think it should be said that we tend to have an 'idealized' view of cultures we are not familiar with. I do not know about native American tribes so what I am saying doesn't apply to them, but over time I came to the conclusion that 'patriarchy' isn't really a problem of a specific religion or culture but simply was a common theme in Antiquity. Indian and Chinese religious traditions and societies haven't generally be 'more open' to gender equality than in the 'West'. Despite its reputation, for instance, you'll find more female writers among in the history of the Catholic Church - whose writings have been highly regarded for centuries - rather than, say, in Buddhist, Confucian, Hindu etc traditions (to my knowledge, I would be happy to be disproven here). I am not suggesting that Catholics are more 'inherently' open to gender equality than anyone else or anything like that but I just note how our assessment can neglect these things.

Furthermore, at least in recent times there are movements inside Christian traditions as well as for instance Buddhist traditions and undoubtedly other traditions that actively try to raise the awareness of the dangers of 'patriarchy', so I am a bit wary to make general assertion about what is the position of a given religion about this matter.

In general, I am persuaded that 'Christianity', 'Buddhism' etc are umbrella terms in which you find extremely huge variations in many aspects. So really if one tells me that he or she is a 'Christian', a 'Buddhist', a 'Muslim' and so on I have to say that I have little information about him or her.

In my humble opinion, I just think that neither 'patriarchy' nor 'matriarchy' perhaps are the best options. Indeed, it seems to me that biological sex shouldn't be thought as a reliable indicator of the place in society that an individual 'should have'. I wouldn't say that biological sexes do not matter at all, but they certainly seem to matter less than our ancestors seemed to believe so firmly.

There are so many things to think about, and I wish we began with scientific thinking, not Christianity a personal God, and individuality, that can be divisive and exclusive and include harmful rationalizations. Destroying the planet for temporary benefits is not good thinking. It is not moral thinking. — Athena

I agree. After all, irrespective of one's own religious beliefs I think that we can establish if certain things are good for us both individually and collectively. As you say ruining the very environment in which we live is certainly not a good thing to do. It is also frustrating how difficult is to get a substantial change here.

You've been leveraging the word now for many posts. Maybe you should have put out your definition of that if it means something other than 'able to be understood', as opposed to say 'able to be partially understood'. — noAxioms

Let's take the weaker definition. Honestly, I don't think that anything changes in what I said.

So I must deny that physicalism has any requirement of intelligibility, unless you have a really weird definition of it. — noAxioms

Partial intelligibility is still intelligibility. For instance, the reason why I don't believe that the Earth is only 100 years old is because a different age of the Earth better supports all evidence we have. This doesn't necessarily mean that absolutely everything about the Earth is intelligible but if I had not some faith in the ability of reason to understand what is the most likely explanation of the evidence I have I could not even undertake a scientific investigation.

So, yeah I would say that intelligibility is certainly required to do science. And I doubt that there are physicalists that would seriously entertain the idea that science give us no real understading about physical reality.

One person's reasonable doubt is another's certainty. — noAxioms

Of course people can be certain without a sufficient basis for being certain. A serious philosophical investigation should, however, give a higher awareness about the quality of the basis for one's beliefs.

I hold beliefs that I admit are not 'proven beyond reasonable doubts'. There is nothing particularly wrong about having those beliefs if one is also sincere about the status of their foundation.

There are more extreme examples of this, like the civil war case of a woman getting pregnant without ever first meeting the father, with a bullet carrying the sperm rather than any kind of intent being involved. — noAxioms

Good point. But in the case you mention one can object the baby is still conceived by humans who are intentional beings.

An even more interesting point IMO would be abiogenesis. It is now accepted that life - and hence intentionality - 'came into being' from a lifeless state. So this would certainly suggest that intentionality can 'emerge from' something non-intentional.
However, from what we currently know about the properties of what is 'lifeless', intentionality and other features do not seem to be explainable in terms of those properties. So what? Perhaps what we currently know about the 'lifeless' is incomplete.

A similar argument seeks to prove that life cannot result from non-living natural (non-teleological) processes. — noAxioms

Yes, I know. However, unless a convincing objection can be made to the argument, the argument is still defensible.

We change our coding, which is essentially adding/strengthening connections. A machine is more likely to just build some kind of data set that can be referenced to do its tasks better than without it. We do that as well. — noAxioms

Note that we can also do that with awareness.

As a curiosity, what do you think about the Chinese room argument? I still haven't find convincing evidence that machines can do something that can't be explained in terms like that, i.e. that machines seem to have understanding of what they are doing without really understand it.

They have machines that detect melanoma in skin images. There's no algorithm to do that. Learning is the only way, and the machines do it better than any doctor. Earlier, it was kind of a joke that machines couldn't tell cats from dogs. That's because they attempted the task with algorithms. Once the machine was able to just learn the difference the way humans do, the problem went away, and you don't hear much about it anymore. — noAxioms

Interesting. But how they 'learn'? Is that process of learning describable by algorithms? Are they programmed to learn the way they do?

Technically, anything a physical device can do can be simulated in software, which means a fairly trivial (not AI at all) algorithm can implement you. This is assuming a monistic view of course. If there's outside interference, then the simulation would fail. — noAxioms

This IMO assumes more than just 'physicalism'. You also assume that all natural process are algorithmic.

Doing science is how something less unintelligible becomes more intelligible. — noAxioms

Ok.

There are other examples of that, such as the robot with the repeated escape attempts, despite not being programmed to escape. — noAxioms

I'll try to find some of these things. Interesting.

Partially intelligible, which is far from 'intelligible', a word that on its own implies nothing remaining that isn't understood. — noAxioms

Well, it depends on what we mean by 'intelligible'. A thing might be called 'intelligible' because it is fully understood or because it can be, in principle, understood completely*. That's why I tend to use the expressions 'partially intelligible' and 'intelligible' in a somewhat liberal manner.

*This 'in principle' does not refer only to human minds. If there were minds that have higher abilities than our own it may be possible that they understand something that we do not and cannot. This doesn't mean that those things are 'unintelligible'.

Not sure where you think my confidence level is. I'm confident that monism hasn't been falsified. That's about as far as I go. BiV hasn't been falsified either, and it remains an important consideration, but positing that you're a BiV is fruitless. — noAxioms

I believe that you believe that some alternatives are more reasonable than the others but you don't think that there is enough evidence to say that one particular theory is 'the right one beyond reasonable doubt'.

I'm saying that alternatives to such physical emergence has not been falsified, so yes, I suppose those alternative views constitute 'possible ways in which they exist without emergence from the physical'. — noAxioms

Ok, thanks.

No, since I am composed of parts, none of which have the intentionality of my employer. So it's still emergent, even if the intentions are not my own. — noAxioms

My point wasn't that the programmer's intentionality is part of the machine but, rather, it is a necessary condition for the machine to come into being. If the machine had intentionality, such an intentionality also depends on the intentionality of its builder, so we can't still say that the machine's intentionality emerged from purely 'inanimate' causes.

Not a very strong argument but it is still an interesting point IMO (not that here I am conceding that we can build machines which have intentionality).

Don't agree. The thing in the video learns. An engine does too these days, something that particularly pisses me off since I regularly have to prove to my engine that I'm human, and I tend to fail that test for months at a time. The calculator? No, that has no learning capability. — noAxioms

Mmm. I still don't get why. It seems to me that there is only a different of complexity. 'Learning' IMO would imply that the machine can change the algorithms according to which it operates (note that here I am not using the term 'learning' as to refer to the mere adding of information but, rather, something like learning an ability...).

Dabbling in solipsism now? You can't see the perception or understanding of others, so you can only infer when others are doing the same thing. — noAxioms

Yes, I agree. But I am not sure that this inference is enough for certainty, except of the form of certainty 'for all practical purposes'.

More importantly, what assumptions are you making that preclude anything operating algorithmicly from having this understanding? How do you justify those assumptions? They seem incredibly biased to me. — noAxioms

They are inferences that I can make based on my own experience. I might be wrong, of course, but it doesn't seem to me that I can explain all features of my mental activities in purely algorithmic terms (e.g. how I make some choices). I might concede, however, that I am not absolutely sure that there isn't an unknown alogorithmic explanation of all the operations that my mind can do.
To change my view I need more convincing arguments that my - or any human being's - mind isn't algorithmic.

So the reason why I said that discussing about 'what is good' is the starting point is that it is the foundation upon which ethics is oriented. — boundless

Forgot to mention that 'what is good' for a person seems to be related to the 'what is a person' and this would in turn imply that ontology and ethics are related. Ethical values can't be an 'arbitrary code' that has no bearing to the ontology of human beings in order to be meaningful.

I did not think you personally started with Christian notions, but I think it is so much a part of our Western culture that it would be unavoidable. — Athena

Ok.

What are possible obscurations to rational thinking? — Athena

A lot of things. I made the example of addiction before. An addict clearly acts against one's own good. And this is because they prefer the good feelings experienced by indulging into the addiction over the long term benefit of stopping it.
Another possible example might be excessive 'self-importance', e.g. someone who tries to force their will on others which likely result in isolation, excessive suspiciousness and fear.

I don't like labels, and I am realizing that is hindering my ability to understand what you are saying. I mean, I know virtually nothing about libertarians. On the other hand, I feel strongly about the importance of learning virtues, but now I am thinking that learning virtues may be culture-bound and that this may be inadequate. Such as, I recently learned, some cannibals feel strongly about the rightness of eating their loved ones when they die. Culturally, eating people is forbidden, but to the cannibals who eat their loved ones, to not eat them is terrible. I think culture puts some limits on what we can think about. — Athena

By 'libertarianism' I mean the position that equates 'freedom' with the mere 'ability to choose between different alternative'. In my view, this understanding is incomplete.

Choices are made with an end in view. If we aren't constrained to act otherwise, if we are presented with different options, we choose the 'best' alternative, i.e. what we think is good for us (even when we experience a 'cost' for such a choice - e.g. in an 'altruistic' choice - we regard it is better to act in a certain way despite the 'cost'). However, we can be wrong in our thinking about what is good and this leads us to choose what isn't good for ourselves.

Regarding the differences between cultures I do think that the best explanation is actually that societies can be wrong in their practices, just like individuals can. I do recognize the possibility that I am 'constrained' in my judgments by my own cultural and social prejudices but I also believe that an excessively 'relativistic' approach leads to absurdity. To make a different example, slavery has been seen as 'something natural' for a very long time. I believe that nowadays we are simply more aware of the evil that slavery is and those societies that considered slavery as 'normal' were simply deluded.

Also such a relativism would also make questionable the dialogue between cultures. If we are so constrained by our cultural and social prejudices, how could possibly have benefit by having a dialogue with someone from a different socio-cultural context?
As always, perhaps, the truth is in the middle.

I have listened to a long explanation of meditation and Buddhism, which makes me think that enlightenment is a totally different frame of mind from our everyday thinking. I don't think I am ready to be free of being a part of our common lives with all our social concerns. — Athena

Neither do I. In any case, I was just using Buddhism as an example where virtue ethics seems to be central. IIRC, some scholars disagree with this interpretation of Buddhist ethics because in Buddhism there is the central tenet of 'anatman', not self, which is generally interpreted as meaning that the 'self is illusory'. At the same time, however, for an 'unenlightened' disciple the 'virtue ethics model' seems to best represent the way in which Buddhism ethics 'works'.

Incidentally, this idea that "we should cultivate virtue because it is good for us" was actually common in Antiquity. It is certainly found also in Greek and many Christian thinkers. However, in the latter case, there are undoubtedly also streams of thoughts that seem to reduce ethics to 'following rules of an extrinsically imposed system' (especially from the Late Middle Ages, if I am not mistaken). But you also find many thinkers that agreed that virtue is it's own good, that we should cultivate virtue because it is beneficial to ourselves and so on.

Well, what would be good for me is an end to pain and more energy, so I could do more volunteering and have greater life satisfaction. This is so far from what I think you are talking about, but, back to us being animals, our health and the amount of energy we have. plays into our decisions. It is hard to be the person I want to be when dealing with pain and having very little energy. Like many people my age, I am learning to keep my mouth shut and let the young find their own way. The way to relate to others is to be encouraging but not interfering. Wow, that is hard for me to do! — Athena

Ok, I see and I appreciate that :up: Note, however, how the conception of 'what the good for us is' influences the 'ideal' of life we have and how the former depends also on the 'worldview' one has.

For someone who has a 'secularist' worldview, clearly, the 'good' arguably is 'flourishing' in this life. And it makes perfect sense in such a framework.

A traditional Buddhist would, however, point out that, if Buddhism is correct, we are bound in samsara and, ultimately, 'flourishing' doesn't resolve the deeper lever of suffering we are into. In other words, those effort would be amielorative but, ultimately, would be unsatisfactory. Practicising for the ending of the cycle of death and rebirth would be the 'highest good' for them. So, in this framework, a monk or a nun that tirelessly practise to achieve Nirvana with limited social contacts would be seen as wiser than an activist.

A Christian can similarly argue that social, environmentalism activism is good. But, again, the general worldview that a Christian has is different from that of a 'secularist' and this influences also the conception of what the 'good' is and certainly for a Christian activism alone can't be the 'highest way of life'.

I could go on with examples.

So the reason why I said that discussing about 'what is good' is the starting point is that it is the foundation upon which ethics is oriented. Also, I think that too often a 'religious life' is assumed to be a life where one imposes to oneself an extrinsic 'moral code' that one follows only due to fear. Incidentally, I also believe that extreme forms of relativism also have the same problem. If there isn't any 'objective' ground upon which we can base values, ethics etc, at the end of the day there is a risk that one system imposes itself. It is no wonder why IMO Nietzsche made so many references to conflict while also be a critic of 'morality' as a form of 'denial of life'.

I deny that requirement. It sort of sounds like an idealistic assertion, but I don't think idealism suggests emergent properties. — noAxioms

If physical processes weren't intelligible, how could we even do science, which seeks at least an intelligible description of processes that allow us to make predictions and so on?

I was on board until the bit about not being a time (presumably in our universe) when intentionality doesn't exist. It doesn't appear to exist at very early times, and it doesn't look like it will last. — noAxioms

I was saying that if there was a time when intentionality didn't exist, it must have come into being 'in some way' at a certain moment.

But it hasn't been fully explained. A sufficiently complete explanation might be found by humans eventually (probably not), but currently we lack that, and in the past, we lacked it a lot more. Hence science. — noAxioms

I sort of agree. And honestly, I believe that everything is ultimately not fully knowable as a 'complete understanding' of anything would require the complete understanding of the context in which something exists and so on. Everything is therefore mysterious and, at the same time, paradoxically intelligible.

Maybe we already have (the example from wonderer1 is good), but every time we do, the goalposts get moved, and a more human-specific explanation is demanded. That will never end since I don't think a human is capable of fully understanding how a human works any more than a bug knows how a bug works. — noAxioms

I don't know. Merely giving an output after computing the most likely alternative doesn't seem to me the same thing as intentionality. But, again, perhaps I am wrong about this. It just doesn't seem to be supported by our phenomenological experience.

Mathematics seems to come in layers, with higher layers dependent on more fundamental ones. Is there a fundamental layers? Perhaps law of form. I don't know. What would ground that? — noAxioms

Yes, I think I agree here. Even natural numbers seem to be 'based' on more fundamental concepts like identity, difference, unity, multiplicity etc. But nevertheless the truths about them seem to be non-contingent.

Good point — noAxioms

In my records, if you agree with that, you are not a 'physicalist'. Of course, I accept that you might disagree with me here.

Just so. So physical worlds would not depend on science being done on them. Most of them fall under that category. Why doesn't ours? That answer at least isn't too hard. — noAxioms

If we grant to science some ability to give us knowledge of physical reality, then we must assume that the physical world is intelligible. Clearly, the physical world doesn't depend on us doing scientific investigations on it but, nevertheless, the latter would seem to me ultimately fruitless if the former wasn't intelligible (except perhaps in a weird purely pragmatic point of view).

Agree again. It's why I don't come in here asserting that my position is the correct one. I just balk at anybody else doing that, about positions with which I disagree, but also about positions with which I agree. I have for instance debunked 'proofs' that presentism is false, despite the fact that I think it's false. — noAxioms

OK. I have a sort of similar approach about online discussions. Sometimes, however, I believe that it is simply impossible to not state one's own disagreement (or agreement) with a view in seemingly eccessively confident terms. Like sarcasm, sometimes the 'level of confidence' comes out badly in discussions and people seem more confident about a given thing than they actually are.

Furthermore, I also believe that a careful analysis of a position one has little sympathy for actually can be useful to understand better and reinforce the position one has. I get that sometimes it is not an easy task but the fruits of such a careful (and respectful) approach are very good.

Close enough. More of a not-unemergentist, distinct in that I assert that the physical is sufficient for emergence of these things, as opposed to asserting that emergence the physical is necessary fact, a far more closed-minded stance. — noAxioms

Not sure what you mean here. Are you saying that the physical is sufficient for emergence but there are possible ways in which intentionality, consciousness etc emerge without the physical?

This is irrelevant to emergence, which just says that intentionality is present, consisting of components, none of which carry intentionality.
OK, so you don't deny the emergence, but that it is intentionality at all since it is not its own, quite similar to how my intentions at work are that of my employer instead of my own intentions. — noAxioms

Good point. But note that if your intentions could be completely determined by your own employer, it would be questionable to call them 'your' intentions. Also, to emerge 'your' intentions would need the intentionality of your employer.

Anyway even if I granted that, somehow, the machines could have an autonomous intentionality, there remains the fact that if intentionality, in order to emerge, needs always some other intentionality, intentionality is fundamental.

So, yeah, I sort of agree that intentionality can come into being via emergence but it isn't clear how it could emerge from something that is completely devoid of it.

It recognizes 2 and 3. It does not recognize the characters. That would require a image-to-text translator (like the one in the video, learning or not). Yes, it adds. Yes, it has a mechanical output that displays results in human-readable form. That's my opinion of language being appropriately applied. It's mostly a language difference (to choose those words to describe what its doing or not) and not a functional difference. — noAxioms

Again, I see it more like a machine doing an operation rather than a machine 'recognizing' anything. An engine that burns gasoline to give energy to a car and allowing it to move doesn't 'recognize' anything, yet it operates. In the same way, I doubt that a machine can recognize numbers in an analogous way we do but I still do not find any evidence that they do something more than doing an operation as an engine does. This to me applies both to the mechanical calculator and the computer in the video.

An interesting question, however, arises. How can I be sure that humans (and, I believe, also animals at least) can 'recognize' numbers as I perceive myself doing? This is indeed a big question. Can we be certain that we - humans and (some?) animals do recognize numbers - while machines do not? I am afraid that such a certainty is beyond our reach.

Still, I think it is reasonable that machines do not have such a faculty because they operate algorithmically (and those algorithms can be VERY complex and designed to approximate our own abilities).

Cool. So similar to how humans do it. The post office has had image-to-text interpretation for years, but not sure how much those devices learn as opposed to just being programmed. Those devices need to parse cursive addresses, more complicated than digits. I have failed to parse some hand written numbers.
My penmanship sucks, but I'm very careful when hand-addressing envelopes. — noAxioms

Do we just do that, though? It seems from our own phenomenological experience that we can have some control and self-awareness on our own 'operations' that machines do not have.

That would be an interesting objective threshold of intelligence: any entity capable of [partially] comprehending itself. — noAxioms

I think I agree with that provided that one adds the word in the square brackets. The problem is: can we have an unmistaken criterion that allows us to objectively determine if a living being, machine or whatever has such an ability?

Would you like to pick up from here and say something? We might consider how different the discussion would go if we held a more scientific mindset, as opposed to assuming Christianity pretty much covers the subjects of morals and ethics, and proceeded with Protestant assumptions. — Athena

TBH, I never wanted to assume the truth of Christianity from the start in my posts, not sure why you think that. I was just arguing that, in my opinion, virtue ethics is a better view about ethics than other models. Virtue ethics is also generally coupled with the 'intellectualist' model of freedom, i.e. that a rational being is truly free when he or she is freed from all 'obscurations' that prevent him or her to recognize properly the good with the assumption that being 'rational' means to spontaneously desire what is recognized as good, in contrast to the 'libertarian' model which, instead, simply assert that freedom is the same as 'deliberative power' to choose among alternatives.

This model of ethics and freedom was certainly accepted among many Christians in history but I think you find it also asserted in completely different traditions like, say, Platonism, Neoplatonism, Aristotelism etc in the 'West' and also in Indian religions. For instance, in Buddhism Nirvana is said to be achieved when spiritual ignorance ('avidya') ceases precisely because the 'enlightened' isn't said to be deluded about what is truly the highest good for him/her.

I now believe, after having reflected upon these things, that these kinds of ideas about freedom and ethics - irrespective (of some form) of Christianity, Buddhism or even 'secularism' etc being right - make most sense and they are the only that allow us to avoid considering 'virtuous behaviour' as the result of merely following an external code which is unrelated to our own nature.

Having made this clarification, sure, I think that scientific studies about the behavior of animals actually give us more understanding about human ethics. I am a bit reticent, however, to use it as a starting point because as you note there are differences among animal species. Still, I believe that the best approach is to study directly what happens among humans. I believe we should make the same observations we can make about animals in the case of humans.

So, I believe that the starting point of this kind of inquiry would be: what is good for a given human being? Considering that humans seem to be 'social animals', i.e. that human beings can't really be in total isolation from other human beings, we might think that, perhaps, relationships with others are essential for the good of a human being. So, how should people relate to each other in a way that it is good for them?

Are cultural differences enough a barrier to prevent us to make some judgments about other cultures? For instance, it seems that it is better for children to be raised by parents who truly love them. This is something that certainly seem to be supported by research in psychology. If we encountered a society that doesn't consider important how parents treat their children, would the difference among our cultures prevent us to say that such a society is simply wrong about this? Are we so hopelessly constrained by our own cultural context that we aren't able to make any judgment about other cultures?

The Count was quick to point this out and I agree. — praxis

:up:

I think human reality is largely shaped by human needs or purposes—and human values. We don’t share the same values however, so if there are objective values, who is right and who is wrong? And what is the purpose of insisting that one set of values is Correct? It provides the means to harness collective power. — praxis

I believe that the best approach here is to carefully examine all proposed 'set of values' with a critical spirit in a similar way one does in science (although the approach can't be the same of course). I happen to believe that, as I said, in the beginning of this post, virtue ethics and the intellectualist model of freedom are right precisely because they make the most sense and not devalue ethics as the mere following of an extrinsic moral code that is estranous, as you put it, to our 'needs or purposes'.

So, I believe that the starting point is to assess and try to find out what what are these 'needs' and 'purposes' are. Clearly some of the 'needs' aren't culturally dependent. It seems that, for instance, all children need genuine love when they are raised. Are we going to argue that this depends on a given culture? Or, instead, we might consider that, say, after reading the brutal effects that being raised in a dysfunctional or even abusive context can have on a person, perhaps we are allowed to say "it is good for children, irrespective of their cultural context, to be raised in a loving environment" as something that might apply to cultural contexts different from our own.

Ok, I watched the video. Nice explanation of how machine learning works.

Still, I am hesitant to see it as an example of emergence of intentionality for two reasons. Take what I say below with a grain of salt, but here's my two cents.

First, these machines, like all others, are still programmed by human beings who decide how they should work. So, there is a risk to read back into the machine the intentionality of human beings who built them. To make a different example, if you consider a mechanical calculator it might seem it 'recognizes' the numbers '2', '3' and the operation of addition and then gives us the output '5' when we ask it to perform the calculation. The machine described in the video is far more complex but the basic idea seems the same.

Secondly, the output the machine gives are the results of statistical calculations. The machine is being given a set of examples of associations of hand-written numbers and the number these hand-written numbers should be. It then manages to perform better with other trials in order to minimize the error function. Ok, interesting, but I'm not sure that we can say that the machine has 'concepts' like what we have. When we read a hand-written number '3' it might be that we associate it to the 'concept of 3' by a Bayesian inference (i.e. the most likely answer to the question: "what is the most likely sign that the writer wrote here?"). But when we are aware of the concept of '3' we do not perceive a 'vector' of different probabilities about different concepts.

This is clearly a bad analogy. Scientific truths are a different category of knowledge than moral truths or values. — praxis

I find interesting that you only quoted this part of my post. You raised the objection that, if all human beings are wrong about 'what is good for them', then 'objectivity' about ethics is impossible. I merely made an example where there has been a context where most people have been wrong.

In any way, I don't believe that one can make such a 'hard distinction' between scientific truths and moral truths. We also learn, at least in part, good and bad behaviour with experience. A coward, for instance, often lives in a tormented state due to their fear. Instead, a generous person might find solace in the acts of helping others and live a more serene life than say someone greedy who lives in either a constant fear of losing one's possessions and/or in a state of disappointment for not having all the desired riches.
I already made the example of the addict. Clearly the addict acts under a self-deception (sometimes mingled with some awareness of behaving against one's own interest) about what is 'good' and might completely ruin his or her life.

These are clearly empirical observations one could make. They perhaps do not tell the whole story about what is 'virtue' and what is 'vice' but nevertheless they are important in a context of virtue ethics. I like virtue ethics because, as I said, seems to me the only ethical framework where ethical behavior never becomes an external imposition.

I still have not find a compelling objection of the apparent objective validity of, say, the statement "an addict, while indulging in the addiction, acts against one's own good".

:vomit: I am sorry, I am strongly opposed to using the God of Abraham religions to understand reality. It stood in the way of science and stopping, or at least slowing down, the destruction of our planet. It continues to stand in the way of science, and this has divided the US. I feel no mercy for those who bring this upon us. — Athena

It seems that you have an aversion against Christianity and apparently other Abrahamic religions. I just say that generalizations are never helpful and I think if you seek enough you'll find that there are very different ideas among Christians on a huge variety of topics.

But note that I wanted to make a general point about virtue ethics which was widely accepted, I believe by many Christians in history. But, in fact, not only Christians but you find the idea in many ancient cultures (e.g. Indian religions, Taoist texts like Daodejing and Zuanghzi and so on).

Clearly, virtue ethics assumes that there is a distinction between 'virtues' and 'vices' and the firsts are 'better' than the seconds for a given person.

The way many humans dealt with this moral conflict was to create a story where the hunted animal agreed to being killed and eaten in exchange for a benefit the humans would provide. However, the Christians have a different relationship with nature that is not so nice. — Athena

Well, I would not say that about all Christians... anyway, I believe that even the most radical vegan would recognize that, in order to live, we have to kill some animals (e.g. the insects that would destroy our crops).

Also, note that Christians actually recognize that this world is not (at least now) 'what is meant to be', so perhaps e.g. the inevitability of conflict with other species would be better understood in that light.
This is not to say that, of course, that many Christians didn't have a 'not so nice' relationship with nature.

In a more general viewpoint, it seems to me right to say that a human being should seek 'what is truly good' for herself or himself. At the same time, it is also obvious that, even within a 'secularist' viewpoint, that (most? all?) human beings often act against their own good, are confused about what is 'better' or 'worse' for them and so on. This is to say that 'virtue ethics' is IMO applicable even within a purely naturalistic view of human beings. In fact, it seems the only view to me that avoids a 'legalistic' reason to consider some intentions, behaviors etc 'right' and others 'wrong'.

We will absolutely misunderstand — even about ourselves — so how can there be objectivity? — praxis

I would say that, yes, it seems that it is inevitable for human beings to misunderstand and act against our own good.

Regardless, I do not see how even if all human beings misunderstood what is 'truly good' for them or even what is 'better for them' and what is 'worse for them', this would falsify the possibility, in principle, of making objective statements about 'what is truly good for human beings' and so on.

There was a time when most people believed that the Earth was the center of the universe and all celestial bodies revolved around the Earth. Yet we know that geocentrism is 'objectively false'. So, it would be not surprising that we might in a condition that we do not know what is truly good for us and nevertheless, in principle, we could know it.

And I do not see a contradiction between what I said above with the claim that philosophy might help us to improve our understanding of 'what is truly good for us' (in general or in a particular situation) etc.

thanks for the video. It seems interesting. I'll share my thoughts tomorrow about it.

No, I'm sure monkeys dislike being eaten.

Monkey consumption is still good or bad relative to the perspective—whether one is the eater or the eaten. — praxis

This doesn't imply that "for a monkey it is bad being eaten" is 'relative'. At best, it might show that the what is good for the tiger is bad for the monkey and this leads to conflict between the two animals.

That "the same event might be good for a being and bad for another" hardly implies that "there are no objective statements about what is good for a given being". Indeed, even this 'relativistic statement' ( i.e. "the same event might be good for a being and bad for another") seems to be a truth that is independent for any given perspective on the matter.

At the human level there are situations that seem ambiguous but some seem obvious. For instance, indulging in a drug addiction seems good to the addict because of the pleasant feelings the consumption of a given substance might give. But when compared to the painful consequences the addiction bring, it seems to me clear that the addict acts under a deception about 'what is truly goodfor him/her'. And this isn't true only 'for me' but also for the addict himself/herself.

In a 'virtue ethics' framework what is sought is what is truly good for a human being and the reasonable assumption that is made is that a human being might misunderstand 'what is truly good for him or her'.

I would not buy that suggestion. More probably the intentionality emerges from whatever process is used to implement it. I can think of countless emergent properties, not one of which suggest that the properties need to be fundamental. — noAxioms

Ok. But if there is an 'emergence', it must be an intelligible process. The problem for 'emergentism' is that there doesn't seem any convincing explanation of how intentionality, consciousness and so on 'emerge' from something that does not have those properties.

As I said before, that we have yet to find a credible explanation for such an emergence is an evidence against emergentism. Of course, such an absence of an explanation isn't a compelling evidence for the impossibility of an explanation.

Anyway, I also would point out that IMO most forms of physicalism have a difficulty in explaining that composite objects can be 'distinct entities'.

Thus illustrating my point about language. 'Intentional' is reserved for life forms, so if something not living does the exact same thing, a different word (never provided) must be used, or it must be living, thus proving that the inanimate thing cannot do the thing that it's doing (My example was 'accelerating downward' in my prior post). — noAxioms

Ok, thanks for the clarification. But note my point above.

boundless: Ok, but if intentionality is fundamental, then the arising of intentionality is unexplained. — noAxioms

I misphrased this. I meant: if intentionality is fundamental then there is no need for an explanation.

That would make time more fundamental, a contradiction. X just is, and everything else follows from whatever is fundamental. And no, I don't consider time to be fundamental. — noAxioms

Right, but there is also the possibility that ontological dependency doesn't involve a temporary relation. That is, you might say that intentionality isn't fundamental but it is dependent on something else that hasn't intentionality and yet there have not been a time where intentionality didn't exist (I do not see a contradiction in thinking that, at least).

As an illustration, consider the stability of a top floor in a building. It clearly depends on the firmness of the foundations of the builing and yet we don't that 'at a certain point' the upper floor 'came out' from the lower.

So, yeah, arising might be a wrong word. Let's go with 'dependence'.

Again, why? There's plenty that's currently unexplained. Stellar dynamics I think was my example. For a long time, people didn't know stars were even suns. Does that lack of even that explanation make stars (and hundreds of other things) fundamental? What's wrong with just not knowing everything yet? — noAxioms

I hope I have clarified my point above. But let's use this example. Stellar dynamics isn't fundamental because it can be explained in terms of more fundamental processes. Will we discover something similar for intentionality, consciousness and so on? Who knows. Maybe yes. But currently it seems to me that our 'physicalist' models can't do that. In virtue of what properties might intentionality, consciousness and so on 'emerge'?

That's what it means to be true even if the universe didn't exist. — noAxioms

Good, we agree on this. But if they are 'true' even if the universe or multiverse didn't exist, this means that they have a different ontological status. And, in fact, if the multiverse could not exist, this would mean that it is contingent. Mathematical truths, instead, we seem to agree are not contingent.
Given that they aren't contingent, they can't certainly depend on something that is contingent. So, they transcend the multiverse (they would be 'super-natural').

Maybe putting in intelligibility as a requirement for existence isn't such a great idea. Of course that depends on one's definition of 'to exist'. There are definitely some definitions where intelligibility would be needed. — noAxioms

If the physical world wasn't intelligible, then it seems to me that even doing science would be problematic. Indeed, scientific research seems to assume that the physical world is intelligible.

It might be problematic to assume that the physical world is fully intelligible for us, but intelligibility seems to be required for any type of investigation.

A made-up story. Not fiction (Sherlock Holmes say), just something that's wrong. Hard to give an example since one could always presume the posited thing is not wrong. — noAxioms

Ok. I would call these things simply 'wrong explanations' or 'inconsistent explanations' rather than 'super-natural', which seems to me to be better suited for speaking about something that transcends the 'natural' (if there is anything that does do that... IMO mathematical truths for instance do transcend the natural).

Again, why is the explanation necessary? What's wrong with just not knowing everything? Demonstrating the thing in question to be impossible is another story. That's a falsification, and that carries weight. So can you demonstrate than no inanimate thing can intend? Without 'proof by dictionary'? — noAxioms

TBH, I thing that right now the 'virdict' is still open. There is no evidence 'beyond reasonable doubt' to either position about consciousness that can satisfy almost everyone. We can discuss about what position seems 'more reasonable' but we do not have 'convincing evidences'.

That does not sound like any sort of summary of my view, which has no requirement of being alive in order to do something that a living thing might do, such as fall off a cliff. — noAxioms

OK, I stand corrected. Would you describe your position as 'emergentist' then?