So “facts” are “states of affairs”, which “are the case”, which are “truthmakers”. What do these terms refer to, if not to things that are true?

According to Terrapin “fact” means the same thing as “is the case”, which means the same thing as “state of affairs”, which means “fact”. But he never actually said what these terms refer to outside themselves.

I would say that they refer to something that is true, and we ought to believe true things. What do you say they refer to?

1. I don't think the recursion problem is the fatal flaw you see it as. You see, I think you're thinking in these terms...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gZN2eoAPCwY

When really, this might be more enlightening:

https://www.slideshare.net/AsifAliRaza/recursion-37090597

The key point being, infinite recursion can be described, just so long as it has some kind of structure. — Theologian

But the Family Guy joke demonstrates the actual problem with the statement, “Everything I say is a lie.” You’ll have to explain the force of your point; I’m not getting why describing a grammatical structure called recursion addresses the problem with describing what is always first-person subjective as if it’s an object.

2. Regarding your most recent claim, that final cause is what allows things to have objective reality, I think you have two quite heavy burdens of proof to meet:

2.1 Given the general skepticism with which science regards final cause, I think the onus is on you to show that anything has final cause.

2.2 Even if you believe final causes exist, why is it that final causes give things objective existence? You have provided no argument to support this claim. — Theologian

2.1 needs its own thread. I’ll probably make one after we’re finished discussing this.

I think final causes give things objective existence because they mean a thing will behave a certain way (will be what it is) whether we perceive it as doing so or not. The bundle of matter that we call an acorn will become the bundle of matter that we call an oak tree regardless of our perception of it. On the other hand, the bundle of matter that we call a computer will never compute anything unless we perceive it as doing so (and so will not be a computer unless that is what we perceive). In and of themselves, its computations are just electrical signals bouncing around - those signals however exist objectively, because they behave a certain way regardless of our perception of them.

Are you saying that literally all descriptions are observer relative?

Do you think that there is an objective reality? Do you think it is describable? — Theologian

My thought here to appeal to final causes. An acorn is not observer relative because it has a final cause. It becomes (or can become) an oak tree regardless of our description of it, and we can describe what it actually is because of this.

A computer does not have a final cause of its own. It derives its final cause from whoever is perceiving it (observer relative), and so cannot be described as if a computer is what it actually is.

That sounds promising enough to me at the moment anyway.

How would you feel about the position that yes, it does mean that it is what you're describing it as; it just doesn't mean that it can't be other things as well? — Theologian

I think that illustrates that whatever it is you’re describing is observer-relative. A calculator to an adult is device for making mathematical computations; to a child it’ll more likely be a toy. I still say that in and of itself it’s neither.

This argument of your own seems to me to lead to the conclusion that no concept can ever describe the mind; or at least, cannot do so fully. You may wish to comment on that. I am currently re-considering my own views on the recursion problem. — Theologian

Yes, I did also think of that. That would seem to me to be right.

PS If I understand you correctly, it seems to me that your argument leads to the conclusion that mind can never fully describe mind because mind, perforce, is always one step beyond, continuing to describe the describer. Is this what you are saying? — Theologian

I had noticed this so no worries.

Yes, I guess I must be. It seems impossible to make an object out of something that is always first-person subjective.

I accept all your points except number 8. That something can be accurately described by information processing theory doesn’t change the fact that, in an of itself, it isn’t actually what you’re describing it as. Every concept you use is derived from the mind, so it remains that step beyond when you attempt to describe it in the same way. That very fact, it seems to me, makes the mind profoundly different to a computer.

The brain is the hardware and the mind is the software.

Think about how you learn. Learning is natural selecton shaping your understanding of the world and your place in it on much shorter time scales. When you learn something, what is the learning about, if not some information in, or about, the environment that you then use to produce better-informed decisions and actions that improve fitness? In learning something new, you change the way your mind interprets sensory data until that interpretation is no longer useful and you learn something else. — Harry Hindu

This doesn’t address the OP argument, which I think demonstrates that the mind cannot possibly be a computer, or part of one.

And I don’t think learning is analogous to natural selection. Natural selection works through random mutation and learning isn’t random, but rather intentional: “I am going to do this now for this reason.”

OK. Can you not first quote my equivocation back to me? You might be right, and I will admit to my mistake.

The relationship which obtains between brain and mind is one of correlation, not causation. However, you are free to cite credible scientific research to the contrary. — Galuchat

I haven’t said brain activity and what happens in our minds don’t correlate. I’m saying computations are done in the mind, by using what the brain does for us.

In its most general sense, a computer is an input-output processor.
Brains receive exogenous and/or endogenous neural signals from sense organs (input), perform sensory processing at relevant locations, and produce environmental or corporeal state perception (output). — Galuchat

I agree with this. Does it contradict what I said?

I should clarify that what I’m saying is computers do not compute. In and of themselves, they are just matter, bundled together and behaving a certain way. That they can be said to be computing anything is a concept derived from our minds; from our perception and designation of what it is they’re doing. Computers do not compute; rather we compute, often using computers as our tools to do so.

The Stanford page Harry Hindu linked to above contains this:

Our cognitive architecture is composed of computational devices, that are innate and are adaptations (cf. Samuels 1998; Samuels et al. 1999a; Samuels et al. 1999b; Samuels 2000)

That seems quite plain to me, although I admit I haven’t read all of that page.

Yeah I’ve noticed that; when applied to everything it leads to an “everything is one” conclusion. Although I’ve thought in passing that appealing to final causes gets you away from that conclusion, and computers only have their final causes through us.

No. — VagabondSpectre

OK.

Evolutionary psychology tends to treat minds and brains as black-boxes, where it seeks to explain the practical or evolutionary purpose of behaviors, not the internal mechanism that generates them. It's more behaviorism than it is neuroscience, and whether or not "the brain is a computer" is totally irrelevant to evolutionary psychology — VagabondSpectre

If you look at Harry Hindu’s post above you’ll see that the first tenet of evolutionary psychology according to “Influential evolutionary psychologists, Leda Cosmides and John Tooby” is:

The brain is a computer designed by natural selection to extract information from the environment.

So according to you their first tenet is irrelevant to their study.

Regarding cognitive psychology, brains do actually do calculations, but calling them "computers" is a misnomer. The fact is, we have biological neural networks in our brain that are capable of coming up with solutions to problems like "what's 10 + 10?". (and we also have biology-inspired artificial neural networks that are capable of doing the same thing). — VagabondSpectre

The brain doesn’t do calculations for the same reason computers don’t. It’s all electrical signals, and electrical signals are just that - electrical signals. It’s only in our minds that they mean anything.

You just seem to be intuitively rejecting the idea that the brain is a computer, and you offer objections like "computers cannot operate themselves".... — VagabondSpectre

I haven’t rejected that. I’ve explicitly said otherwise.

What if the mind is more complicated that "is a computer or is not a computer?" What if different parts of the brain do different kinds of things, such that one part of our brain can operate another part? (E.G: when our conscious minds want to access memories or perform a calculation, maybe it accesses other parts of the brain as if to exploit their computational ability). — VagabondSpectre

Eh? I don’t see how this addresses the OP.

I don’t actually want this kind of argument so I’d just like to draw a line under this now.

Is this related to Hindu thought? Body, life force, mind, intellect and consciousness being what we’re made of?

From that perspective it seems to me that it is still the case that the mind is not a computer. Rather it’s the screen that our image of the world is projected on, and then our intellect is what we use to interpret those images. I guess you could call the intellect a computer then, but only because it’s being deemed as one by itself. It isn’t a computer per se, because nothing can be if computers are observer-relative.

Basically, the OP argument I described works regardless, it seems to me.

Right. So when we experience our mind as an object, what do we experience it with?

Talking about the mind “rawly” seems to me to be the same thing as discussing its quiddity. What do you mean by “rawly”?

Ah, fair enough. I wonder then where that’s left evolutionary psychology.

I don’t think they are symbolic of one another. Computers don’t think about things, they aren’t aware of what they do, they aren’t aware of themselves.

I don’t know what you mean by “the whole vessel”.

I would say the brain is used by our minds to compute things. The brain isn’t doing any computing per se, just reacting to stimuli.

I guess its use can be summed up as computation, yeah. But that’s not to say that the mind itself is a computer. Computers do not actually compute - it’s we who do that, using computers as our tools.

Well, that's part of the problem there. If you want to understand what Evolutionary Psychology is, the best person to ask would be an Evolutionary Psychologist, not a Christian Philosopher. — Harry Hindu

I said the “first bit” was from him, the bit about the mind not being a computer. The second bit is a follow on by me.

Thanks for the bullet points, good clarification.

I notice the list only mentions the brain. I can see the merit of viewing the brain as a kind of computer, but I can’t see the merit of viewing the mind as part of that computer, for the reason I’ve described. That the brain responds to stimuli in “programmed” ways I don’t find contentious; but the idea that the actions we take are programmed into us by evolution I think is pseudoscientific.

It’s a study that combines evolutionary biology and cognitive psychology. Cognitive psychology takes a computational view of the mind. If the mind is demonstrably not a computer, then any narratives based cognitive psychology’s view of the mind will be neither based on empirical observation nor anything demonstrated by reason; they will simply be intriguing stories. That’s how it seems to me anyway.

Right. Well then my thinking is that if the mind is demonstrably not a computer - and if evolutionary psychology takes a computational approach when creating its narratives for how the mind has evolved - then narratives are all its findings can ever be.

Settle down. I’ve told you three times now that I’ve had enough.

I skimmed it and it seems to me you’ve not properly considered what I’ve been saying again, or you’re just failing to understand. Others can judge, so let’s call it a day.

I said “Last thing” and you write a bloody essay at me.

All I’ll say is the statement, “it is true that true things are not things we ought to believe, and so we’re not obliged to believe that either”, seems obviously absurd to me, especially considering that the statement itself is supposed to be a statement of truth, which we’re not obliged to believe (so why even say it?)

Maybe that absurdity really is the fact of the matter (that we’re not obliged to believe), but I wonder if that is sincerely believed by anyone.

Aye, a little too much maybe.

Last thing: If you say that someone can know the truth yet still do wrong, then I’d say they’re justifying that wrong to themselves with something they believe is true, but is actually a lie.

So all together we ought to believe the truth (facts), since it’s by the truth that we do right. Take that as my final statement because I really do want to close this now.

I recognise that in reality you would have the Nazis believe the lie in that situation. But in principle, if everyone understood the truth, then no wrong would occur.

The Nazis are at your doorstep. They ask...

Are there any Jews in your attic? There are. — creativesoul

And here’s what I wanted to say: It’s not telling the Nazis the truth there that leads to wrong, it’s the implicit lie that they should arrest the Jews. It could be that those particular Nazis oppose their regime, and would actually help the Jews once they knew they were there, because they recognise it’s true that they should do so. It’s always the truth that leads to good.

Though I would actually be interested in an example of a lie that leads to good.

This ignores important parts of my last two responses to you. You can try again if you want, may not respond though.

Alright, it’s been three days now so that’s me done.

If there is some third option that demonstrates that accepting facts is an objective value you have not presented it, even if you have unflaggingly repeated it. Neither logic nor practical consequences are objective values. — Fooloso4

I’m tired and about to quit, so I’ll just refer you to the thread again. I’ve defended the argument as much as I’d like to now.

“Oy vey” all you want mate. Unclear whether you actually get the point or not. Seems a good one to me though.

Fascinating.

Nope, try again:

Actually the word “fact” doesn’t even mean anything here. It means “state of affairs”, which means “is the case”, which means “fact”. The word just refers to itself. — AJJ

If facts are true statements, then whether or not we ought believe them has nothing to do with 'objective values'. We can know what sorts of things can be true and what makes them so. We can know how irrevocably important it is to form, have, and/or hold true belief. We can know that and also know that there is no such thing as 'objective value' aside from being an imaginary construct. It points to nothing but linguistic conception. — creativesoul

Urgh. I don’t care about anyone’s personal credo.

Come on now, when you or Clark say:

If there are no objective values then there are no facts (
— AJJ

that makes facts contingent upon belief. You may want to revise his/your claim but either make it clear that you are revising it, or stick with what was said and defend it. You already backed away from defending it on page one: — Fooloso4

No it bloody doesn’t mate. It means, as you keeping forcing me to say, that they ought to be believed. That does not mean that they’re contingent on belief. It means we ought to believe them. They still exist if we don’t, but we ought to believe them. We don’t have to believe them to make them exist, they exist anyway, and we ought to believe them.

I have no idea why you guys spout this nonsense about me not defending the argument. Look back over the thread, please. Be fair.

Facts don’t depend on whether or not we believe them
— AJJ

And so, if facts do not depend on whether or not we believe them then how can it be that if there are no objective values then there are no facts? — Fooloso4

See above.

Whether or not there are objective values is what's in contention. That is what's at issue. You're assuming what's at issue in the argument you're offering. I've merely done the same. — creativesoul

What’s more accurately been in contention is whether we ought to believe facts. The OP argument assumes it, I’ve been single-handedly defending that that is indeed the case, starting in fact from the OP.

All statements are existentially dependent upon a subject. Some statements are true. All truth value is existentially dependent upon a subject. There is no objective truth value. — creativesoul

You’ll have to more clearly explain what “All truth value is existentially dependent upon a subject” means.