Well, it's strange that you phrase things this way, as if autism is the supreme reason what drives a philosopher. — Wallows

As an autist, I'm in two minds about this. :wink: No I'm not. I can see no direct contribution that autism makes to philosophy. We have some traits that could help, just as they could help in many other areas. But assigning autism to most philosophers does seem strange ... and wrong.

Contribute and tell us why you exist. — jorgealarcon

Because God has a sense of humour. :smile:

Anything not understood appears to be magic. — Janus

This explains why my world is so filled with magic! :smile:

Wouldn't physical evidence of the supernatural prove it's physical and therefore natural? — Hanover

Indeed it would. :smile: :up: Where is the evidence, then? Where have you put it? :wink:

No supernatural gods, no evidence, nothing, but they are ‘demonstrably' less moral than humans? — Brett

:smile:

You grasp Objective Reality by logic and reason? Lucky this topic concerns the supernatural, then. You are clearly much loved by the Gods, to have given you such power. Power they withhold from all other men.

I'm 64, and attended school from 1960-1973.

I [...] have a good grasp of the real and the imaginary. — Gnostic Christian Bishop

How? Don't just say the truth; accept it! Here it is again, for your consideration:

True that reality is a collective hunch. — Gnostic Christian Bishop

it does appear that in the US people are much more wary about their countries darker history (I’m from the UK and early on we were indoctrinated with the vile circumstances of WWI and the mistakes made). — I like sushi

I'm from the UK too, where my schooling taught me that the British Empire was us spreading our civilisation to the rest of the world. It was us doing the world a favour, uncivilised savages as they were before we brought them salvation.

...

No mention of invasion, occupation, theft and murder on a grand scale. Where do we think the Victorians got the money to build all that amazing stuff?

Do you need saving and what did you do to be condemned? — Gnostic Christian Bishop

No. Like Josef K., I don't know.

True that reality is a collective hunch. Still better to not add to the objective reality by adding a fantasy that one must believe in to be saved. — Gnostic Christian Bishop

Better still to recognise the truth of your first sentence. If you apply it to the second, you may see that you can't recognise a fantasy, nor tell fantasy from 'reality'. That is my point.

So I'm wondering what you think your perspective gains us? — Pattern-chaser


It tells us what we're actually doing when it comes to creativity. — Terrapin Station

So you think it's helpful to describe Picasso's Guernica (falling back to that example) as a rearrangement? In this example, we presumably view the work as a painting, that rearranges existing canvas and paints (or colour and lines)? Isn't that a trivial observation that takes away from whatever meaning and import the artist managed to incorporate into the work, not forgetting the meaning received and understood by the viewer (which might not be the meaning the artist intended, but that's art for you!!).

these acts of creation are now owned by professionals, so that the ordinary person views acts of creation as an act of a specific group: medicine, research, science, infrastructure, virtually everything about our societies. — Brett

Don't artists share in the 'ownership' of creativity? I agree that there is creativity in all of the disciplines you mention, but it is generally denied, even by the very practitioners that are doing it. But science is advanced only by creativity, whether it be seeing a vision of a benzene ring in the flames of a fire, or something else. Inspiration. Imagination. Novelty. Fantasy. Creativity.

I’ve been holding on to the term ‘value-use’ kudos used in the op. What I mean is a tangible benefit that enables a group, tribe, culture to move successfully forward in its development and to create the grounds for the next step. In the Darwinian sense only successful, beneficial creative acts survive because of what they offer to those who created it.

Somehow the arts have taken ownership of the word ‘creative’. My thoughts are that the creative act is a human instinct for survival. Whether it’s an instinct I’m not sure. But today these instincts (if that’s the right word) are really a watered down version of their origins and appear as acts of modification, like your car design. (It’s possible that this watered down version, like a fiddling at the edges, is responsible for the stagnation in our growth). They still have tangible benefits in that they contribute to our welfare and survival.

The ‘arts’ do not exist like this at all. They offer no tangible benefits. It can be argued that they contribute to something we need, but there’s never any hard evidence apart from some idea of “increased awareness, increased interconnectedness or increased overall achievement/capacity“. — Brett

So you seek evidence for the benefits that creativity, and maybe art, offers? I think a scientific analysis might be misplaced here. Some creativity is done for its own sake, perhaps because the artist has something to say to their fellow humans. I practised creativity in my work because I loved to do it (and also for the wage :wink: ).

I'm describing creativity. — Terrapin Station

I gathered that. :smile: But the way you're describing it is misleading and obscure, to me. So I'm wondering what you think your perspective gains us? How does it help?

If you want to argue that the only possible knowledge comes through science
[...]
You really think you can scientifically demonstrate all the things you know to be true? — Coben

I don't! No! I am arguing exactly the opposite of these sentiments! I'm appalled that I have expressed myself so badly that you think I'm championing science as the one and only knowledge-gathering tool we have. I apologise for my laxity.

I think the God one is less easy to predict. It might be beyond science. It might not be. — Coben

No? Then how will you obtain (scientifically-acceptable and -useful) evidence? For without evidence, science can do nothing. And there is no evidence. Thus... — Pattern-chaser

I was talking about the future history of science. You are saying it is beyond science, so this includes all future possible scientific theory and research. — Coben

Yes, I'm saying it's beyond science, but not that this is a failing of science. God is not detectably present here in the world (I mean detectable by any form of scientific measurement), and this will not change unless God does. Science requires evidence for its function; there is none; there never will be any. Therefore such matters are forever beyond science, no matter what new theories or research emerge. ... Unless science can change so as to be able to do its work without evidence? This could create a new discipline. We could call it ... philosophy? :wink:

I'm describing "creation" as a rearrangement. I'm not saying that something hasn't been created. — Terrapin Station

OK, fair enough. But why? Why describe creativity - an everyday concept centrally associated with ... creating something - as something else? Why distract attention from its prime feature? Why take away from its prime feature, and focus instead on something that communicates a much lesser act than creation? What does your perspective gain us, in this discussion of creativity? :chin:

I've made a living as a musician, composer and arranger since the early 80s. I've done a lot of film work, but not only. I've done some film work outside of a musical context, too. I also do some visual art, and I've written fiction, including some scripts. — Terrapin Station

Your thesis is that your song-writing involves nothing but rearrangement of existing 'components'.

First, I accept and agree that songs comprise melody and tempo, and that songs which precede them also comprise melody and tempo. So your new song uses only pre-existing components. Most people would agree that this is pedantically true, but also trivial and useless.

Then we might consider what happens if I take a song of yours, and change/add one note. I have produced something new and different. Most people would agree that, pedantically, I have created something. They might also continue by observing that what I did wasn't creative enough to count. And I would agree with them. My song is literally a new creation, but doesn't really justify that description.

But RL songs are not like mine. They use words that have been used before, and notes that have been used before, but it is still reasonable to describe them as new and different. Something has been created, not just rearranged. The song is not wholly unique, rearranging certain components, as you observe. It is not created from scratch. But it does contain new and different things; something more than mere rearrangement has occurred here, or this could not be so. This is the common-sense version, and I think most people would agree. You don't agree, but for the life of me, I can't see why. :chin:

being creative does necessarily involve creating new and different [X] — Possibility

Exactly. Creativity involves creation. :up:

To not at least stick to what can be known, and think what cannot be known is real, would be people giving up logic and reason for fantasy. — Gnostic Christian Bishop

Where logic and reason have no useful effect, what choice have we but to look elsewhere, maybe to fantasy? You talk blithely about sticking to what we know, but that is itself a difficult area. Adopting the perspective of Objectivism - a school of thought I find to be a pointless waste of time, personally - we know only that Objective Reality exists, and (maybe) that we are all or part of it. We know nothing else at all, to Objective standards. It depends how rigorous you want your thinking to be.

These questions cannot be answered by science. If you want to assume that the world your senses show you pictures of is Objective Reality, I can't stop you. But you have already embarked on a fantasy voyage, and your claims to knowledge are less than they seem. And yet science does what it can, and what it must. The 'reality' our senses show us is the only one we have access to. So we pretend it's real and certain ... and we could be right. But we cannot demonstrate this. We assume it, maybe as one or more axioms, but we don't know it. Your talk of knowing stuff is, at least in part, fantasy. A necessary, common-sense, fantasy, given our position, but fantasy nonetheless.

I think we all do that and that is why it is important to have ones thinking in reality instead of fiction or the supernatural. If you use junk members in your scaffold, it is not safe. — Gnostic Christian Bishop

Life, the universe and everything aren't "safe". We base our thinking on speculation and the like because there's nothing more concrete available. If you think you know stuff - really know stuff - then you are very lucky ... or more likely, deluded. Much of "reality" is unknown and unknowable to us. Sometimes it's fiction or nothing.

If governments controlled disposable income of the .1 %, would poverty end? — Gnostic Christian Bishop

Less than 30 individuals own and control more than half the wealth in the whole world. If governments confiscated this wealth, and they used it to combat poverty, the there would be less poverty. Maybe even an end to poverty, if the wealth proved sufficient.

My guess - and that's all it is - is that when you attempt something you find difficult, some of your muscles tense, giving rise to the discomfort you've noticed. On the one hand, you could simply (as you suggest) avoid the activities that cause your stress. On the other hand, you might see fit to push yourself in the direction of coding, in which case you will need to find a way around the stress, and the consequent discomfort. You will never learn software design if, whenever you approach it, it hurts.

Good luck!

Pattern-Chaser [Retired software designer]

Should people like me be registered predators even if we abide by the law regardless of our nature? — THX1138

No, if you abide by the law, then society has nothing to reproach you for. You have followed its rules, and that's all it can (and does) ask of you.

I suppose I could attenuate its form in a manner such that what had been spoken of, and expressed on my part, be of greater frugality in that respect. — Vessuvius

Do you mean "I could've said it more concisely"? :roll:

From the OP:

Another thing that pushes me towards thinking we are, indeed just a body is things like OCD (Obsessive compulsive disorder), where one isn't in complete control of their thoughts, due to some difference in the structure of the brain. — Anirudh Sharma

A side-point, which is worth mentioning but not debating here, in this topic (IMO :smile: ), is that no-one is in "complete control of their thoughts". Much of our mental activity takes place unconsciously; out of our own awareness. It is not in our control.

I think the God one is less easy to predict. It might be beyond science. It might not be. — Coben

No? Then how will you obtain (scientifically-acceptable and -useful) evidence? For without evidence, science can do nothing. And there is no evidence. Thus...

If such an issue, as any of these, is beyond science, is it beyond any way of knowing? I would say 'not necessarily'. — Coben

Beyond knowing? Yes. Beyond our speculations and guesswork? No. In RL, there are many issues that an individual human cannot solve, so they guess. [Even when the issue has been solved by other humans, but this human doesn't know it.] It's a defining characteristic of humans, this guessing-without-sufficient-evidence, and we're not too bad at it. So we can guess, and we can speculate, but to no avail. Our guesses will remain guesses, unfounded by anything more intellectually substantial. [And a guess remains a guess if we call that guess an axiom or assumption, or even if we call upon Occam's Razor, which is not a logical principle but a simple rule of thumb.]

I’m meaning a value that goes beyond personal. — Brett

Value is a personal thing. Something widely accepted as valuable is merely valued by a large number of persons. How can a wholly-subjective thing like value go beyond the personal? Are you touting objective value here? :chin:

So the creative act, and the creative animal today, works with ‘value-use’, as the creative act always has, otherwise it dies in a vacuum. — Brett

I wonder if you're giving this more attention than it deserves? Everything any human has ever done has value - to them, if no-one else - and some sort of use or purpose (again, to them if no-one else). This doesn't just apply to the creative process, it's universal. What you're saying is not specific to creativity.

The creative process in advertising, marketing etc., is driven by a) a brief, b) budget, c) market research, d) a deadline, e) the medium. None of this is subjective on your part. You don’t decide what the client needs, the client does. — Brett

Yes, that's what design is about. My client specifies what, but my job is to discover how it can be achieved, within the specification. That's where the creativity is.

:chin:

There is some creativity in the creation of the specification by the client...

But in the end it’s still a car, already invented. The designer is just pushing the idea of a car, modifying it. — Brett

Yes, and in modifying it, part of what the designer does as she follows the creative process is creative. The modifications are new. The car itself is not, of course. Not any more.

The fields you worked in have different objectives. Website design, advertising, marketing, they’re driven by pure ‘use-value’, a monetary value and measures of success. There’s very little subjectivity here, it’s all market driven, measured against costs and returns. — Brett

Agreed. There is little subjectivity here ... but there is creativity (and actual creation).

In website design, advertising and marketing, there are many more scientifically generated constraints but in my opinion they can present more of a creative challenge than a painting or a play where you’re choosing many of your own constraints as part of the creative process. The capacity to produce something ‘new and different’ - to have a broad vision of the potentiality - in such a narrow scope demands a high level of creativity: a more flexible subjective view, if you will. — Possibility

Yes, that's what I mean. :up:

I agree with your first statement, but your perspective of exactly what constitutes ‘new and different’ implies ‘something from nothing’ that unnecessarily mystifies the process. I don’t think Terrapin Station is denying the central attribute of creativity at all - ‘new and different’ relates essentially to awareness and perspective, not to actuality. — Possibility

So being "creative" doesn't necessarily involve actually creating something? <baffled> Then we should coin a different word for it, one that doesn't communicate actual creation.

So what do you think that I'm doing as a creative person other than what I'm describing? — Terrapin Station

I'd love to know, but you haven't told me. I know only that you work with 'creative' people, and that it has something to do with music.

I'd argue that it being new and different is a property of originality rather than creativity. — kudos

Because obviously, creativity has as it's aim to produce an original new thing. — kudos

For the purposes of this discussion, it seems easier to assume that creativity achieves its aims, even though we know it might not.

But it's not a definitive quality inherent in the product, but in the intention — kudos

This doesn't really matter, does it? As part of a successful creative process, something is created, something new and different. If this wasn't the case, then the thing 'created' would not be new, it would be derivative, and we could not reasonably describe it as anything other than a reproduction.

In some cases, it is exactly that. Cases such as 'Does God exist?', where there is no (scientifically-acceptable) evidence. Cases such as 'What is Objective Reality?', where there is also no possibility of us gathering evidence. And so on. — Pattern-chaser

Well, first off, I said it is not necessarily that kind of thing

it is not necessarily that science cannot confirm or measure these things/areas/phenomena — Coben

though I could have made my wording clearer. I meant, that just because cannot test something empirically now, does nto mean will not be able to later. — Coben

Consider the standard thought experiment concerning Objective Reality.

• Your (senses + perception) deliver to your mind images of an apparent world. This world is Objective Reality.
• You are a brain in a vat. Objective Reality is the world containing your brain and the vat.

It isn't just that these two are indistinguishable to you, but that your experience in both cases is exactly the same. That's a defining condition of the thought experiment.

Science cannot distinguish these two. The evidence cannot be gathered. In the future, this will remain so, until and unless humans develop Objective Perception. This is an example of a problem that science cannot address. [It's not science that 'fails' us in this instance; this is a fixed and unavoidable limitation intrinsic to being human.]

But let's not concentrate on this one example. There are others too, e.g. solipsism. The point is that there exist problems that science cannot address, and will never be capable of addressing.

Maybe so, but Glastonbury is still the centre of the universe! :wink:

"Welcome to Glastonbury, possibly the quirkiest town in England. Steeped in history, myth and the smell of incense." :smile:

Then visit Glastonbury, the spiritual centre of the universe. :smile:

it is not necessarily that science cannot confirm or measure these things/areas/phenomena — Coben

In some cases, it is exactly that. Cases such as 'Does God exist?', where there is no (scientifically-acceptable) evidence. Cases such as 'What is Objective Reality?', where there is also no possibility of us gathering evidence. And so on.

Again, this is not at all a judgment about anything. I don't know how I can stress that to successfully get it across. — Terrapin Station

I acknowledge and accept your intention. But when you concentrate exclusively on the non-creative aspects of the creative process, how can that not be dismissive (of creativity)?

If the goal is to create a catalogue of all we know about creativity... — kudos

One thing we know about creativity is that it involves the creation of something that is somehow, in some way, new and different. To describe creativity in a way that emphasises its non-creative aspects, and doesn't even mention creation, is very odd to me. Why deny (by omission) the central attribute of creativity?