boagie has been banned for low quality and toxicity. — Jamal

Understandable and reasonable decision. There is no place for toxicity, derogatory languages or the swearing directed towards the individuals in Philosophy. We can disagree with, demand evidence and proofs, and reject the opinions, views and points of others.

But I understand that, still all of us are expected to have respect, the good spirits and basic manners towards the fellow members whoever they are at all times.

If I travel to 1776, then that was a time when Kant was alive. — Luke

Your premise "If I travel to 1776" is an impossibility from the reality of 2024, and therefore it is false. Your conclusion is true in that 1776 was the time Kant was alive.

Even if your conclusion was true, but because your conclusion was drawn from the false premise, your proposition is invalid.

In essence I’m saying that instinctive behaviour is very much thought, thinking. — Punshhh

Yes, I agree with all of your points.

How would these people who are explaining away thinking describe what a cat, or for that matter, a spider spinning a web is doing? — Punshhh

In the case of cats and dogs, and monkeys, they seem to show the intelligent activities in their daily lives.  They definitely have the clear evidence of possessing some level of intelligence, and their reasonings are mostly based on their sense perceptions and memories.  They also seem to understand human words when spoken to them although they cannot make linguistic expressions uttering words and sentences.

And even in the case of the spiders putting up their webs to trap their preys for their survival, it looks in most cases it has been done under the well thought out plans.  They tend to put up the webs in the good locations where it is dark, dingy and corner of the attics or ceilings where it is likely to attract their prey more than the implausible places such as in the middle of the roads, on the dining tables in the kitchens, or in front of the shower heads etc.  

But then we wonder, there are many more insects, mammals, fishes, planktons and even the plants and trees ... etc all seem to be selecting their habitable locations reasonably.  Trees tend to grow more in mass in the forests with the warmth of more sunlights and rainfalls combined with the rich soil bases.

The ants, bees and squids, octopuses, grasses, weeds, roses, they all seem to be selecting the places better for their survivals, and seem to be doing the right things looking for their food and making their shelters under the ground, soils and seabeds as necessary for their best survival chances.  Does that mean they must be all thinking and reasoning, abstracting and having ideas for their plans, and reflecting their pasts?  What do you think?

Kant is alive is in his time. I'd be going back to his time. — Luke

:chin: :roll: :yawn:

Time travel has nothing to do with waking the dead or rebuilding demolished castles. — Luke

Well, Kant has been dead for over 200 years. How else could you meet him, if you are going back to his time. Someone has to wake him up from the grave, and reinstate him as the professor of the university, and make the universe as it was in 1776. :nerd:

This is not what time travel is. A time traveller does not bring (objects and events from) other times into our present time. Rather, a time traveller leaves our present time to arrive at other times. — Luke

The whole point of time travel is about going to the place at the time of the past or future with the historical or futuristic people in real flesh in the reality at the time.

What would be a point time traveling to Königsberg of 1776, and on your arrival at the place, you see the modern military bases with the nuclear arms all over the place instead of Immanuel Kant taking his daily walks around the town centre?

What would be the point of traveling 2200 years back to the ancient Greece, if you met up with a bunch of Chinese tourists with mobile phones taking selfies in front of the relics, instead of seeing Plato and Socrates talking to his students in the Lycīum?

I could say that I am "here" at my current location (or "geographical place"), whereas earlier I was at a different location and later I might be at a location different to both of these. While I am at each location, I can sensibly say that I am "here" at each location. This is no different to being at the "present" at different times. I always find myself "here" no matter the place and at the "present" no matter the time. Although you can neither escape "here" nor "the present", this does not entail that you cannot depart from or arrive at different places or times. — Luke

When you say "I am here." in the each different locations, you are not saying anything about the physical geographical locations themselves, but you are stating that YOU are in a location.
Anyhow, it wouldn't be a concept such as happiness, hopes, past or future, you would be in physically.

And no matter how far back or forward, you imagine to have gone to, it would be always the present, because everything happens in present. You cannot escape from it.

Another problem with time travel would be, that EVEN IF you might have gone to the past or future, but the rest of the universe will still stay at the present. There is no point of you going back to 100 years back, if the rest of the universe stays at the present. It is just physical, metaphysical, logical and QM impossibility to wake up all the deads from the graves, and rebuild all the castles which had been demolished, and reinstate all the past monarchies and governments into the power .... etc.

The only way to plausibly think about time travel would be thinking the possibility of the existence of so many different possible worlds which are running at different times. And if you proved their existence, then you would have to find out how to get there from the actual world to one of the possible worlds of different times - say 100 years back or 2000 years back or 200 years forward. But are there such possible worlds in real existence? QMly oh yeah why not, Logically yes, Metaphysically maybe, Physically Nope.

Number is an essential, material property. — ucarr

Numbers, like the bridge itself, are physically_materially real. — ucarr

If numbers are physically_materially real, then how long and heavy are they? What shape and colour are numbers?

What makes these assumptions wrong? What argument supports your assertion that times are not "geographical places you can arrive at or depart from"? — Luke

Can you travel into your happiness or hopes? There is no such a place as the past or future. There are geographical places such as the countries, cities and towns, not the past or future. You cannot escape the present. It is a universal law, which the whole universe and its contents must abide by.

Whatever time I am at is the present time for me. Therefore, if I were to build a time machine and use it to travel back 100 years, then it would be the present time for me when I depart today and still the present time for me when I arrive 100 years ago. — Luke

And you will be waking up from your dream or imagination. :D

Let's suppose I build a time machine and use it to travel to a time before my birth. What makes it impossible? I take it your view is based on the immutability of a single timeline, but that's never been proven and I can find no good reason why it must be assumed. — Luke

It seems the whole imagination has been based on the wrong assumption that the past and future are some sort of geographical destinations such as Tokyo, NY, Paris ... etc, which is not.

Another wrong assumption is that time is some type of physical distance laid out like a road or highway.

The reality is that time is an illusion, and there are only Durations (already proved and declared by Newton), and the past and future are concepts, not geographical places you can arrive at or depart from.

You cannot travel into a place where the destination doesn't exist. We are all nailed into the present until deaths under the universal law.

It has been imagined in numerous works of fiction, so it does not appear to be unimaginable. — Luke

The question of the OP is whether time travel is hypothetically possible. I don't see why not. — Luke

Sure one can imagine anything, but we are just letting them be aware that it is imaginable (at stretch), but impossible in reality from the logical and metaphysical point of view. :)

Impossibility of time travel seems to be one of the universally necessary truth. I am not sure if it would be even possible in a possible world. If one believed in the multiverse which runs on different times, would it be then imaginable in one them? But multiverse itself is a theoretical hypothetical idea, which is not proven to be existence yet.

I have reported this guy to moderation already. I would suggest that you do the same if you see fit. To me, he has nothing to contribute at all, just illiterate shit-flinging. — Lionino

Thank you Lionino. Yeah, a strange guy he was. There was no need for throwing childish tantrums in the public forum against what is supposed to be a witty banter. He wasn't a philosopher at all to allow himself opening his temper like that in public for absolutely nothing.

It didn't bother me at all. Truths sometimes faces mindless challenges :D We live and learn. Happy new year to you and yours my friend.

Passive-aggressive asshole that you are! — boagie

Well say whatever you want. They are just the reflection of yourself.

Yes, matter contains potential energy within it. But it is not energy yet, until some detonation, crash, combustion or shock, i.e. physical or chemical processes happened in it - as thrown to a wall, or dropped down to the ground from the top of the building etc. When it hits another hard object after the motion which carried the matter, then the energy generates.

FUCK YOU SHAKESPEAR! — boagie

khaaa ... hear the uncontrolled emotional explosion? :lol: Calm down.

Well concluded. Happy New year. :) — Pantagruel

Thank you sir. I wish you and yours a very Happy New Year too. :grin: :pray:
... although time is an illusion. :nerd:

Regarding getting stoned, one should not really have a passionate opinion on something one has never tried. — boagie

If you had some deductive reasoning skills, then you can know most things by the reasoning alone without having to try it for yourself. :)

You are not just contradicting me, SO RUDE --lol!! You are contradicting the science of physics. — boagie

I am sorry if you felt insulted by my rudeness. I apoligise in full. But also why not consider if you have been over sensitive as well? Feeling insulted too easily by unfounded causes can be the evidence of something irrational or psychological unbalance lurking underneath the unconsciousness, for example, from bad experience of childhood memories, or unfulfilled wishes of some sort?

Science of Physics? All science is just the objects for the Philosophical analysis and investigations. If their claims are not in the form of Logic, then toss them to the bin, or commit them into the flames, as Hume said. :)

I have just logged on again to this forum after 2 years, and I find many new posts. Proof positive that the world exists and it does not give a damn about me! :D — TheArchitectOfTheGods

Welcome back to TPF. :D I don't think we spoke before. Glad to catch you.

But the energy is just trapped in the matter, and can be released. All matter in the universe contains a lot of energy and is in the end equivalent to energy via E=mc2. I am surprised by the above statement, I thought this was at least since a hundred years a majority view that the universe consists only of Energy/Information and that all visible or invisible matter is just a manifestation of that energy. — TheArchitectOfTheGods

I think you have been hibernating too long from the real world :D
Energy is capacity for work. (The Encyclopaedia of Philosophy (MacMillan 1967) It is potentiality not actuality until you have applied into the physical objects, device or existence.

So until the resource of energy is somehow detonated (like in the example of E=MC square), it is just a potential resource of power, action, explosion, heat .... etc etc. You cannot possibly call a litre of gasoline as energy, until you filled it into the car and drove away. The force which caused the movement of the car by the engine is energy, not the oil, vibration, wave ... whatever.

All I have done is been accommodating to your perspective and all you have done is quibble. — Pantagruel

And another thing my friend. To a quibbler, everything looks like quibbles. To a philosopher, what matters most is truth. Good day :)

Philosophy itself is a detailed subject which adopts the conceptual and logical clarifications for its methodology. If and when one uses wrong or unclear concepts, and starts making shady claims, then the whole picture might get severe distortions miles away from the truth or what it is ensuing the naive people jumping and diving into the pointless discussions, hence we must all guard against the possibilities. You can witness yourself the similar situation from the other topic on Physicalism.

The whole problem with the OP seemed to have stemmed from the fact that the concept of idea is broad and abstract, and we are here trying to clarify.

And yet I explicitly offered that comment quite early that it was not "purely passive." — Pantagruel

That is a pure nonsense. I never said perception is purely passive. It just proves that perception can be passive at times. :)

Just goes to show you how perceptions can get pre-filtered.... :) — Pantagruel

Another wrong use of the word here - filtered can only be used for the physical entities such as a liquid, gas, light, or sound ...etc. It is not for abstract nouns such as perceptions. :D

If I learn to anticipate that there will be cheek and ear pulling I can modify my activity patterns to avoid those circumstances. — Pantagruel

We were talking about the case where you have not been able to avoid getting pinched or pulled out the ears :D

Being poisoned is much more painful and deadly a perception than being pinched. But some animals develop an immunity to the poison of their chosen prey. — Pantagruel

This must be some unique and rare case in the Evolution. Can't see happening in human life. Evolutionary theory has little ground for their claims anyway.

Our existence as a receptive organism is predicated on our capacities as an active organism. — Pantagruel

There are passive features too.

Right. And I said I just wanted to emphasize that perception is not purely passive. Upon which it seems we can agree. — Pantagruel

It sounded like you were saying that perception is purely active. It rang a bell, it can't be true.

You've never been stoned, have you? — boagie

I heard some folks saying that they get stoned for listening to the music in order to hear more details in the music, and some saying that they get stoned for having sex in order to increase the sensuality etc, but it just sounded like fooling their senses, which will result in self harming themselves.

My point has been that apparent reality is biologically dependent. Why on earth if all is energy, frequencies, and vibrations, and we have the examples of there not being any color or sound in the real world, do we assume that objects are any different than sound or color? It is all energy, what makes objects manifest? — boagie

OK, you have a point in saying that our senses are the only gate for perceiving the world, which is also for the ground for the sceptics assertions for their sceptic claims on the existence of the world.

But I don't quite see your point on saying that it is all energy. There are more than energy in the world. Don't you see the sky, the stars, clouds, sun, the mountains, hills, rivers, sea, the roads, buildings, houses, cars and the people? They are not all energy. They are the physical objects in the world, with which you interact in your daily life.

Energy is only energy when the resource has been directed, converted or read, in order to actually being used with the device to exert, process, activate motions, heat or sounds.

The entity such as waves and vibrations are not energy on its natural form before the modifications and processed for the emanations of the power, force, heat or sound. It entails the claim that "everything is energy." is invalid.

Just how far we are willing to go to maintain our presuppositions about reality is illustrated by cognitive biases. The most well-known of these - confirmation bias - is exemplary. But there are loads of others that accomplish basically the same thing - prejudice enforcement. — Pantagruel

But think again. You keep insisting perception is active activity meaning that you can control perceiving the world and objects with your own will or desire.

If I pinched your cheek or pulled out your ear hard, then could you control the pain, into not feeling it at all or to some other feeling than the pain? What active part of perception of feeling the pain do you see in that case?

Excellent advice. The point was however, that to alter one's reality one need only alter one's biology, different biologizes different realities. — boagie

Everyone knows that human perception is bound by the biological sense organs. There is nothing new or interesting in that point.

But if you induce some kind of drug or medication based changes in your mind, then you will have uncontrollable and unexpected hallucinations, rather than an accurate perceptual understanding of the world.

It would be like keep shouting "The world is dark." with a dark sunglasses on. What's the point in that? Take off your sunglasses and see the world again with your bare eyes.

If you wish to experience a different world, simply alter your biological nature, perhaps with drugs and/or meditation. In the absence of a conscious subject, nothing can be known, nothing is experienced, and the apparent world is biological reaction dependent. — boagie

I would advise you to stay away from any drugs or medication induced experiments with your minds. You will end up being dependent on them, and eventually you will be damaging your biological and mental health.

We are the efficient causes of many organic functions over which we do not exercise voluntary control. However they are still in essence controlled by us, since that control is a key feature of organic incarnation (evolution). — Pantagruel

I was not denying that perception is active, and it is an activity.   I was suggesting that it is active, but also passive at times, and sometimes it can be both active and passive.  

Anyhow, I was looking into my English dictionaries(Collins English Dictionary, Merriam Webster Dictionary) last night, and in there, experience is defined as skills or knowledge acquired via direct participation or observation.  It seems to emphasise the skill factor.
Therefore I am wondering if experience has much to do with the epistemological element in its concept.

Really I just wanted to emphasize that perception is not "purely" passive. There is always an active element; which is embedded in the mechanics of the perceptual (cogitive) mechanism itself. Even our most passive perceptions are pre-structured in some sense, in order to facilitate the information-processing tasks that our brains have to accomplish. — Pantagruel

Well if you allow the images you see in your dreams as type of perception (which we must, I would imagine), then you would find yourself deep in the well of contradiction. Can you actively control what you see in your dreams during your sleep?

But even if you are not dreaming, there must be things that you see, which you didn't expect or want see, when you are living in the real world, as a real person.

Or maybe we lose grounds for other minds existing entirely? — Count Timothy von Icarus

If Physicalism is all about saying "Everything is physical", then it is just a non-sense. If they say
that some objects in the world are physical, then maybe it could be acceptable.

I think the only problem is if there is implicit assumption that perception is passive. Perception is an activity. — Pantagruel

Really? Isn't perception passive or active, or both in some cases? You wake up in the morning, open your eyes, and you see all the things around you whether you wanted or not. Isn't that
a passive perception?

And if you were watching a live concert, and seeing and listening to the band's performance on the stage, and suddenly and unexpectedly you get to see the lighting simulation of rainbow in the back stage in the middle of the performance. Isn't that a perception both active and passive?

Presumably, experience designates in the broadest possible sense that "contact with reality" which is universally...experienced. — Pantagruel

Could we agree experience as same meaning as "perception", which supervened into knowledge or skills?

I reviewed my posts, and, in fact, I only mentioned it one time prior to your initial question. So the conceptual burden on the term (concept) of experience didn't come from me, it came from you. For example. — Pantagruel

"a lot" can also mean significantly and notably, rather than "many". I presumed you must have a good definition of experience, when you were using the word in your sentence.

The place is the world, a world devoid of objects in the absence of a conscious subject. This is why I say, there is no such thing as something being objective, think of apparent reality as a biological projection, a biological readout. — boagie

Is the world devoid of objects in the absence of a conscious subject, a part of the actual world? How could a conscious subject access or understand the world, if the conscious subject is absent from the world?

The concept of experience and idea can be broad, because almost every philosophers in history had their own views on them. Hence it would be a good idea trying to narrow down the definition of the concepts before delving deeper.

What exactly is your take on experience? — Pantagruel

You have been using the word experience in your posts a lot, so I thought you would provide the definition, which I could investigate on.

I still don't see your definition for experience. Are you claiming that experience and idea are the same concept?

the ancient Greek philosopher Thales, that everything is water, — SEP

Thales saying, that "everything is water" is wrong. He didn't say that. What he said was, that the origin of the world is water. To say everything is water doesn't make sense, and misinterpreting Thales.

Physicalism is the thesis that everything is physical, or as contemporary philosophers sometimes put it, that everything supervenes on, or is necessitated by, the physical. — SEP

The word "Physicalism" itself is a concept, which is not physical, but an idea. Therefore saying "everything is physical" is a self-contradiction. If everything was physical, then the proposition itself must be physical. No proposition is physical. It follows the claim is a non-sense.

Apparent reality exists only for biological life and its consciousness, remember, ultimate reality is a place of no things. — boagie

What is "a place"? Is it some location on the earth such as town, city or a well-known location, or a house, building, temple or even church?

What do you mean by "no things"? What are they in actuality?

Depending on the arguments, yes it could establish some conclusions on the topic, I would imagine.

I never said anything troubled me. I was just asking about your definition of the concept of experience you were using.

Are you confident that arguments can establish whether or not gods exist? — Tom Storm

They are totally separate matter. My confidence in anything doesn't have any relevance in the arguments.

I don't think God exists. — Walter

I am agnostic, but interested in reading about either positive or negative arguments for the proof of existence.