So my point remains that there is nothing special about biology in this regard. The inter-theoretic reduction program is difficult and contentious at just about every level. — SophistiCat

I went through an Intertheoretic Reductionism phase, and it is tortuous stuff. I recently came upon Popper's writings. He maintains that this type of science, even though it cannot reach the answers it seeks, nevertheless is excellent for leading us down different paths, and opening doors to new areas of research (leading to new metaphysical research programmes) .

No doubt you've examined Chalmer's "Hard Problem." Would you share your thoughts about it? — Greylorn Ell

So I used to be much obsessed with the mind-body problem (Chalmer's hard problem). I favoured a kind of idealist-cartesian perspective as it suited my intuitions about the hegemony (free will) and autonomy of consciousness. When I immersed myself in systems philosophy last year, I became aware that the problematic nature of the mind-body phenomenon is a function of the reductionist approach. By taking the system as fundamental (in a paradigm-shifting sense) all events are comprehended in situ, specifically, insofar as they are elements (holons) within hierarchically nested systems. So the mind-body problem just isn't something that gives me pause anymore. There are psychological entia, intersubjective entia, empirical entia. They all participate in the operation (and self-reorganization) of the complex adaptive systems that constitute our reality. I'm finding Popper's scientific realism really works well with this perspective, especially his three worlds and critical objectivism. Habermas' theory of communicative action too, as it also carves experience up into subjective/social/objective realms which mutually interpenetrate.

The OP and subsequent comments seem to regard "mind" as an entity separate from the brain, repeating Descartes' mistake of conflating the concepts of soul and mind. — Greylorn Ell

The mind could be strongly emergent, in a systems theoretic sense, for example, without postulating a separate immaterial entity such as a soul.

chemistry is clearly reducible to physics — Pfhorrest

This is very much in contention and , given your usual thoroughness and scope I'm very surprised you would slip this in in such an offhanded yet apparently authoritative manner. Chemical properties are clearly not reducible to the mechanisms of physics. The entire science of Systems Theory (which offers a much better basis for a fundamental theory) is based on the emergence of new properties governing emergent realms, like chemistry, biology, psychology, etc.

e.g.

"After a long period of neglect, the philosophy of chemistry is slowly being recognized as a newly emerging branch of the philosophy of science. This paper endorses and defends this emergence given the difficulty of reducing all of the philosophical problems raised by chemistry to those already being considered within the philosophy of physics, and recognition that many of the phenomena in chemistry are “epistemologically emergent”."

https://link.springer.com/article/10.1023/A:1009932309197

Ironic that objectivity is one of those "foundational" concepts that essentially never emerge in ordinary practical contexts of discourse. It seems like it takes a critical-reflexion to become objective.

I think too that the external property (property?) of objectivity is probably related in a significant way to the subjective quality (ideal?) of objectivity, or "being objective."

Exactly so.

In general, the systemic approach treats "systems" as the fundamental units, so right there, subject and object always exist in a functional context. Which they kind of do anyway, being dyadic in nature, don't you think?

You’re not cognizing the rules of the language; you’re cognizing the content of language according to rules. This is why theories of knowledge are so complex, because even though all thought is considered to be according to rules, doesn’t mean each instance of it will obtain the same knowledge. It should, but that isn’t the same as it will. Ought is not the same as shall. All thought according to rules can do, is justify its ends, but it cannot attain to absolute truth for them.

The boundaries can be blurred, for sure, but context helps with clarity. They are both qualities, but sometimes what they are qualities of, gets blurry. Subjectivity is pretty cut-and-dried, I think, but objectivity isn’t just about objects. — Mww

If anyone is interested in Habermas' take on this, objectivation is the result of the interconnection of systemic and psychosocial mechanisms. In other words, the actual unification of the natural, normative/social, and subjective worlds. This is communicative action in operation. It involves the hermeneutic problem of excavating foundational presuppositions about reality.

This avoids the whole subject-object problem (as systems theoretic approaches in general do).

I do know that this is the case, but are fields "processes"? — Echarmion

I would say that the manifestation of particles is a process for sure.

Right, but note that your description of the process is based on particles. So the particles ("things") seem to be required to have a notion of a process. — Echarmion

Yes, I used the term particles consistent with the accepted model of physics. It in no way constitutes or represents an atomistic ontology. Technically, particles are instantiations of underlying fields. I was expecting this response however.

But then how do we know there are processes behind the objects? — Echarmion

Everything from a purely physical standpoint is a process. Particles cling together for finite durations then proceed on their way, in the "direction" of whatever impelled them to begin with plus the sum of interactions. It is only because we have a psychological affinity for a specific spatio-temporal scale (the observable universe) that we preferentially identify things as "things". Change the spatio-temporal scale slightly and some things begin to look more like processes....

the present exists — Cidat

"There is thought now" is an updated version of Cogito Ergo Sum.

hence the origins and manifestations of thinking and of talking are necessarily completely distinct and separate, even if they are under some conditions related. — Mww

Someone better tell Jurgen Habermas this, because his theory of communicative action explicitly evaluates the emergence of rational thought in the context of the evolution of socialized communications.

My argument is that because life is consistent, it can be known, as oppose to a dream which is understood shortly after as unreal. — ztaziz

I thought the OP was speaking metaphorically, so not a literal exposition of the epistemological status of the dream-state was intended.

I like this notion. I would like to add to it the idea that there really is no such thing as "true understanding". As examples, Socrates', to know is that you know nothing. Or Richard Feynman, if you think you understand quantum mechanics, you don't really understand quantum mechanics.

I guess in this light, we are all waking up to the reality that we are only dreamers?

Finished Habermas' Theory of Communicative Action, Volume 1
so probably a good time to start
The Theory of Communicative Action
Lifeworld and Systems, a Critique of Functionalist Reason, Volume 2

I can understand him joining in and not knowing the context, but you've been a part of the discussion with me from the beginning. Jesus. — Coben

I was actually the second person to respond to the OP, ahead of yourself.

↪Pantagruel OK, what does that have to do with one of my positions? — Coben

I guess it contradicts it.

. I am just saying the torturer can force X. Can make x happen — Coben

I don't know what the context is of someone intending to submit to torture. — Coben

If someone intends to be made a martyr, for example.

this is a perfect example of poor torture — Coben

This is a perfect example of the fallacy of equivocation by persuasive definition. It's only 'real' torture if it conforms to my definition...for which there cannot be counterexamples.

If someone specifically intends to submit to the worst effects of the torture, then torture must be ineffective. Torture only succeeds where the human will fails.

Hello handalf.

I think that aspects of culture could be said to be limitations on freedom of thought. For example, being a member of an academic community may restrict the direction of one's research. But I think it is equally important to recognize that our minds and ideas are the products of culture. Arguably, one of the key features of mind is its reflexivity (self-knowledge). So the comprehension of history and culture becomes a way of the mind thematizing itself.

So what you describe as limitations could equally be conceived as directions.

Not sure that it implies that anything requires an explanation? Heavy metals are "rare" due to the way that they are formed (with respect to the rest of the cosmos) and likewise fulfill the rare functions that they fulfill because of their "ontological matrix". I think assuming teleology is unwarranted, but also perhaps unnecessary. A carbon atom is no more mysterious than a hydrogen atom, but opens up a whole universe of new possibilities.

Heavy metals are (relatively) "rare" and they are also "significant". Are they significant because rare? Certainly organic molecules could not form without carbon. Typically one reason things become viewed as "significant" is because they are unique or special in some way.

There are non-religious versions of the "rare earth hypothesis" based on the accumulation of unlikely events that had to conspire to result in the evolutionary apex we apparently enjoy. Life, especially highly-evolved conscious life, appears to be fantastically rare. I don't espouse the belief that we are somehow a unique and significant manifestation of the universe, but I don't discount the possibility either.

We have a much wider milieu now in which our awareness/understanding of reality can unfold. Descartes was a genius of immense proportions, but he lived in a universe barely beginning to be comprehended in a Newtonian-mechanical sense. Up until 1920 the best minds in the world thought our own galaxy was the extent of the universe. Consciousness is unfolding at an unprecedented rated.

:ok:

Finally finished the Critique of Dialectical Reason; not an easy read.

Now for the really big project: Capital, Volume I. I have been keen to start this since seeing a thread on the forum suggesting a group reading of this work.

I think it is an a fortiori situation. If people cannot be bothered to challenge their own fundamental beliefs, why would they every think that that someone else might be persuadable?

And yet the "mechanistic nightmare" is part of the real dialectical process whereby serialized praxes condense to form the groups and institutions that in fact do direct future progress. Then the whole concept of progress can be interpreted in a schema of 'communicative action' oriented around the development of rationalization and concepts like reasonableness, and effective action (Habermas).

I think an equally interesting question is, can/do people change their own deeply rooted beliefs?

Just entering The Old Curiosity Shop now.

Dickens' Hard Times

It's a very cool "Longman Cultural Edition" I found on a recent trip. It has a huge section called "Context" covering the social, political and economic conditions in England at the time of writing.

For the organization of democracy, that is not what this thread is about — Athena

Exactly. I would act morally whether or not legislatively required to. I internalize normative authority, as I'm sure do many people. Traditionally, the internalization of moral authority is viewed as a normal part of socio-psychological development.

Belief is our way of giving meaning to life or any phenomena in it — Bilge

I like this characterization a lot. This sounds like a philosophy of "enaction," which I very much espouse.

I would love it if you responded to all my thoughts, not just the words you want to argue against — Athena

Here's the problem I have with your position in general - it is too ideo-centric. You don't seem to have a healthy sense of cultural/normative relativism. There is no limit to the possible number of ways to solve a problem and core institutions are precisely what need to be reformed from the bottom up. Democracy, socialism, these are just labels, not recipes. The solution required needs to unite many different domains, economic, social, spiritual, political. If the political dimension is going to be "democratic" then it will certainly have to be a different brand of democracy than I have seen in operation. I like the way many European democracies work, however, coalitions of parties. That seems to me a good model of co-operation.

What you are describing is the situation in which social-normative ideals shape democracy. What in fact has happened is that democracy has become assimilated to systemic structures (economics, politics) which in turn have replaced the governance and direction of our society by normative rules. This is what Habermas calls the "paradoxes of modernity". We created something to free us, and it ends up enslaving us through over-rationalization and the bureaucratization of institutions.

Democracy is about discovering truth and basing life decisions on truth — Athena

Your position smacks very much of the social problem that is criticized in the book I just started reading, Habermas' Theory of Communicative Action.

Basically a fallout of the Enlightenment, when people came to have an unreasonable belief in the inevitable superiority of the rationalist-reductive approach, inspired by Newton's accomplishments. Culminating in the dreary technical anomie of our modernist world.

"The progress of societal rationalization...turned out to be, according to Weber, the ascendency of purposive rationality....not a reign of freedom, but the dominion of impersonal economic forces and bureaucratically organized administrations"

So much for the ideal of democracy as an ideal of rational human excellence.

However, if practicality and not reason is the primary motivation for a belief, then such a belief cannot be justified as true. — StarsFromMemory

"Truth" is not necessarily applicable to all types of belief. Normative beliefs don't need to be true, they just need to be effective.

I wasn't advocating faith, per se. Merely pointing out that why someone believes something is not as important as what and how one believes (ie. enacts the belief).

There is an obvious gap between the spiritual and the material. Purely transcendental beliefs (if there are such) are basically meaningless. It is only when a transcendental belief is translated into the practical sphere that such beliefs gain meaning. And the usual way this is done is through normative prescriptions.