My name keeps being brought up. — apokrisis

As the empirically obvious evidence shows, not by me.

You so far haven't made any mention of the charading, posturing, lying accusation I just made against you. Curious to witness it.

To be blunt, I see no sane reason to reply to you at this point.

But I am quite tiered of this interplay. Enjoy. — javra

So this is goodbye. :party: — apokrisis

Oh, yea. There was also this.

You waved goodbye. But I keep getting tagged. — apokrisis

So stamp your feet and splutter away. But I’ve lost interest. — apokrisis

And you keep on telling untruths. Why should I bother again?

:blush: Eh, we'll see how things go with the argument at hand.

Your arguments in no way address the stipulation that we do not empirically witness the mind's eye.

Besides, wasn't it a "goodbye" between us?

Unlike my seeing a moving hand when I look at it, I’m not seeing a mind’s eye in the brain images provided.

What I am seeing are individual slides empirically depicting a certain set of a brain's functions which are inferred to correlate with empirically evident self-reports concerning something that might or might not in fact be. For instance, were philosophical zombies to be real, one would expect exactly such empirically physical processes to occur in the philosophical zombie’s brain despite the philosophical zombie having no such thing as a minds eye. In short, I am not seeing the mind’s eye in the illustration.

A less complex way to address the same conclusion: to affirm that one is seeing the mind’s eye in these illustrations of a brain is in full parallel to affirming one sees in these illustrations what the mind’s eye is focusing on and thereby seeing. Both are brain functions; therefore, both ought to be seen in these illustrations. However, neither are empirically witnessed by us.

In other words, these illustrations of a brain’s functioning so far do not falsify the proposition which was provided. The proposition therefore so far remains substantiated.

The substantiated position is that consciousness is not empirically observable — javra

Substantiated how? — Isaac

Since I don’t want to start this debate from scratch, here’s a different, albeit terse, argument:

A proposition: No one can in any way see that aspect of themselves which visually perceives imagined phenomena via what is commonly termed “the mind’s eye”.

This proposition can be readily proven false by any empirical information to the contrary (which, as empirical information, can thereby be verified by anyone who so pleases).

Till the just given, falsifiable proposition is proven false, it remains substantiated.

:grin: I like that: converging with one's Jungian shadow in manners that benefits one's own intentions - preferably both short- and long-term.

I connect this with the ferryman in Hesse's Siddhartha and 'nothing human is alien to me.' — plaque flag

I find this is a good ideal to live by. But, of course, it's never perfectly actualized by any self. I've often enough thought that an important aspect of this otherwise quite elusive, maybe even mystical, term "wisdom" consists in being able to simultaneously entertain different perspective such that one's thoughts and actions satisfies all these otherwise disparate perspectives with the same breath, so to speak. But yea, a detective, for one example, likely wouldn't be worth squat without this ability or relating and understanding other - including that other with which one is in an antagonistic relation to.

Need to take off for now. But really good chatting with you!

If you like Jung already, you'll probably enjoy it. — plaque flag

Cool. As to my liking for Jung, yea, so so. Some of his concepts are interesting to me - and, maybe even pragmatic in certain contexts for some - but, notwithstanding, not analytical enough for my general tastes. Notions such as that of synchronicity and the universal unconscious come to mind. Well, this when considered from a panpsychistic perspective; or, at least, something close enough to it. As I said, interesting but in no way definitive.

You ever looked into Finnegans Wake ? — plaque flag

No, not yet at least. I tried Joyce's Ulysses but - just as with Virginia Woolf - though I recognize the genius in the work, it so far hasn't spoken to me. Maybe I'll check out Jung's analysis though, sounds quite worthwhile.

The person who doesn't believe in a world that encompasses us both and a language we can discuss it in is (if somehow sincere and actually thinkable) simply insane -- cannot even count as a philosopher. In short, the very concept of philosophy implies/assumes a encompassing-shard world-language, exceeding individual philosophers (else it's just mysticism or something.) — plaque flag

Fair enough! Still, there are some who do maintain that the philosopher, as an individual subject (subjected to the very same world of objects and logic to which everyone else is an equal subject of), is strictly illusion ... a view which, once analyzed, I so far find leaves the universality of this shared world in shambles. This though such philosophers wholeheartedly disagree. What can one say. One tries as a self-purported and always imperfect lover of wisdom to discern what is true from what isn't as best one can.

We'd probably agree that it feels bad to be cruel or petty. So the person aware of 'insane' freedom tends even to be nice. A sense of the infinite puts one in a good mood. I speculate that maybe even the Buddha saw such freedom but didn't bother talking much about 'the dark side of the force.' — plaque flag

Yeah, Nietzsche's golden passages are transcendent and joyous and sweetly wicked. — plaque flag

Couldn't help but given a joyful smile at this. Something about Nietzche's own aphorism of a beast of burden which, upon taking too large of load, transmutes into a predatory carnivore fighting off the monster or "thou shalt" and "thou shalt not" which, upon liberating itself of this monster, again transmutes into a babe newly birthed into the world ... one of his insights that has always stayed with me. As far as I know, it certainly fits the mythos of the Buddha underneath the tree in the wilderness. And it doesn't strike me as the only mythos to which it could apply.

I think many philosophers have tried to establish a safe base of operations, a relatively certain center from which to speculate.

My suggested 'core' (which I think is what Karl-Otto Apel was getting at) is what you seemed to accept also.

"Communication that intends truth assumes (tacitly) a single world that encompasses all participants, and any relatively private subspaces (personal imaginations, maybe qualia) that might be allowed to them, as well as a set of shared semantic-logical norms." — plaque flag — plaque flag

Yes, there most certainly is agreement here. If I were to nitpick, I’ve at least so far found that addressing the totality you've just outlined leaves one with few options to then proceed in formulating conclusions from this - what we both find to be - sound premise. Such as in manners that could stand up to those who find doubt for the given affirmation, in part or in whole. That said, to each their own paths in enquiry just as in life.

In relation to this, although maybe coming out of left field: Though I don’t have tremendous respect for the person who said it, I can jive with the aphorism, “Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the law.” It’s just that, in the non-solipsistic world we in fact inhabit, I find this implicitly entails that there are consequences to everything we will – sooner or later, in one form or another. Hence, action and consequence; cause and effect. … But this isn’t pivotal to the topic at hand. Still, I do like the aphorism. In a way, it reminds me of the better aspects of Nietzsche.

In other words, I vote for open-mindedness within the limits of telling a coherent story and recognizing and avoiding pseudo-explanations. I think we agree on an awareness of ignorance --on keeping the darkness visible. — plaque flag

In agreement here as well. And very well said.

It occurs to me that any such sketch is aimed at describing the world. Your words are understood to be relevant to me. Communication that intends truth assumes (tacitly) a single world that encompasses all participants, and any relatively private subspaces (personal imaginations, maybe qualia) that might be allowed to them, as well as a set of shared semantic-logical norms. I see all this as a unified phenomenon. — plaque flag

Yes, precisely so.

More on this here:
https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/13308/our-minimal-epistemic-commitment-fixing-descartes-cogito/p1 — plaque flag

There’s a lot to the link you’ve shared. Descartes was a man in search of infallible knowledge. I’m one to believe such cannot be had. This ala Cicero et al. – the very folk Descartes wanted to disprove. My fallible reasoning for upholding fallibilism? Our lack of omniscience entails that no one can ever prove that, in the span of all remaining time, no one will ever find valid reason for why some proposition X which is currently held by us as true might, in fact, not be true – thereby mandating that proposition X can only technically remain liable to being wrong, this irrespective of what it might be: including “I am” and “1 + 1 = 2”. But this is not to deny that our fallible knowledge comes in a wide array of different strengths: that “1 + 1 = 2” is not on a par to “it will rain tomorrow” (both of which can well be knowledge claims).

At any rate, this epistemological issue of fallibilism vs. infallibilism aside, there remains this question:

If there are universals among, at the very least, all human beings – to include identical aspects of our cognition as a species, the occurrence of other humans, and the reality of an objective world commonly shared by all – how might these universal truths be discerned or discovered without any investigation into what is in fact actual relative to the individual subject? This such as that which Kant engaged in in his discovering of the categories.

And for this, the individual subject must first be evidenced to in fact be.

Get it straight if you want to claim to have a basic grasp on logic. I’m asking you to define what you might mean by circle. And yes, that is conventionally done in counterfactual fashion. So a circle is not a square for these particular reasons. Anyone with a compass and straightedge can demonstrate the Euclidean proof of the assertion. — apokrisis

You’ve addressed my analogy via a literalist interpretation of its parts. And deem this a rational argument against the analogy. Remarkable.

The substantiated position is that consciousness is not empirically observable and you insist that it be defined in an empirically measurable way to be taken into consideration in the first place - because circles can so be. From your previous comments, this via "counterfactual definitions" - whatever that might mean to you.

Aren’t you weary of your own failure yet? What keeps you going and going? — apokrisis

My failure? As in to convince you? You must take yourself to be the sole arbitrator of the situation. But I am quite tiered of this interplay. Enjoy.

I asked for your measurable definition - the one that would make sense to a scientist wanting to get on with their scientific inquiry. — apokrisis

Yes, apo. You're asking me to define circles so that they have four sides. My very point from the very beginning. Glad we've finally come to an agreement.

Let’s see. You’re laughing because you, in contrast, have certain knowledge of what consciousness is and isn’t in an empirically measurable way. This while at the same time holding that whether the proposition “I am conscious of this text” can hold a truth-value is unanswerable. :up:

As I previously expressed: Good luck with that!

An unorthodox hypothesis to address your concerns:

Suppose that two or more – hence, at least two – instantiations of individuated awareness co-occur. In other words, suppose solipsism to be false. (This shouldn't be that hard to hypothesize.)

The awareness-resultant time and space (one could add causality to the list as well) that is requisite of these multiple instantiations could then either be a) strictly relative to the instantiation of awareness addressed or b) equally applicable to all instantiations of awareness that in any way interact.
That space, time, and causality which falls under (b) would not be partially applicable to any but, again, would be equally applicable to all concerned. It would hence be completely impartial – objective in at least this sense – such that its occurrence would be fully independent of any one instantiation of awareness.

The process by which this objective space, time, and causality manifest could not here be that of causality. I would instead need to be the outcome of material causes in Aristotelian terms. In this case, where the ultimate constituents are these very instantiations of awareness: in this hypothetical, the cosmos’s prime matter. Its not a relation in which that which determines occurs before that determined – as causality is – but instead is one in which the two necessarily occur simultaneously.

The greater the quantity of these individuated instantiations of awareness, the more stable would their commonly shared objective world of space, time, and causation be. For example, in presuming that only humans are awareness endowed, there currently co-occur over 7 billion instantiations of awareness on Earth. Assume all life is so endowed and … one gets the picture.

In such a universe, there would then be an objective world that is perfectly impartial to the whims of any one instantiation of awareness – that is in this sense perfectly independent of individual minds. Nevertheless, this very objective world could not however occur in the absence of Kantian categories.

That said, in such a world, that which is objective would then necessarily inform each individual instantiation of awareness – skipping over a minefield of details, such that in humans the objective human brain informs, and in turn gives form to, the instantiation of first-person awareness we term our conscious selves. No brain, no instantiation of awareness; yet awareness at large, when globally conceived, remains to keep such a universe going.

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This is only a very rough sketch of just one possible account regarding Kantian categories and the objective world. Other accounts might also be possible to envision such that they make sense of the two. All the same, though there obviously would be innumerable details to yet work out, I so far don’t see any self-contradiction in the hypothetical just provided.

I’ve provided it only to illustrate that ways of accounting for both an objective world and the Kantian categories are not impossible to devise.

You just switched from “conscious of x” to “first person awareness”. Are we talking about a thing or a process, counterfactually speaking here?

I was talking about a process. — apokrisis

And how is any awareness of which we can be in any way aware of not a process? Even none-empirical experiences such as those of our own happiness and sureness (as two examples) are process. Never mind our awareness of percepts and, hence, of empirical data.

Besides, as I’ve previously expressed, I make no inferential speculation as to awareness being an entity/substance, a process, both, or neither. Period. That unknown, or uncertainty, or vagueness as you term it, is part of my stance.

So what is first-person awareness? One should intimately know via one's own experiences.

And then when you make claims about consciousness of x - as something more than attention+reporting - is consciousness of the presence of a colour the same as consciousness of some bit of text? And is consciousness of a lump of rock the same as consciousness of a bit of text? — apokrisis

I've already addressed these questions here.

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Yes, you do need to back to the drawing board and do some work on your definitions so that there could be a less amateur discussion here. — apokrisis

From our exchanges it so far seems to me you want to win arguments by vanquishment – as though philosophy were a zero-sum game. It isn’t. You might want to ask more questions of those you disagree with, answer those questions you’ve been asked by them, and address the replies you've already been given.

This since we're so candidly exchanging advice on what the other should do.

Capable of being wrong rather than not even wrong. — apokrisis

How can something entirely nonsensical be wrong instead of not even wrong?

Still not even an attempt to define your use of consciousness here then? You had many chances now. That says you can’t do it. — apokrisis

Back to the drawing board: What’s wrong with “first-person awareness” as a definition for consciousness? Well, unless one finds the given definition to be entirely nonsensical.

Let me insult you again. You continue to weasel your way out of the requirement to provide a counterfactual definition to fit your counterfactual proposition. Technically, your position becomes not even wrong, simply vague. — apokrisis

He replieth!

Counterfactual conditionals (also subjunctive or X-marked) are conditional sentences which discuss what would have been true under different circumstances, e.g. "If Peter believed in ghosts, he would be afraid to be here." — https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Counterfactual_conditional

What on earth are you talking about??? Other than your ego's need to insult - which does hold semantic value - your expressions are entirely nonsensical.

That "I am conscious of this text" is not a counterfactual proposition, no more than is "the cat is on the mat".

Your turn.

You do a lot of weaselling to avoid supplying a definition to the term that I must give a yes or no answer on. — apokrisis

You belittling insults aside (yes, that apes win by posturing is a fact of nature), how on earth could I when you address the proposition of "I am conscious of this text" as neither having a truth-value nor being without one. Weaselling, huh. Nonsense pure and simple.

I’ll help you out. Do you mean something more than attending and reporting if I agree I am conscious of the text? If more, what exactly? — apokrisis

And here it is. In assuming that "I am conscious of this text" can be true (what a stupendous presumption on my part; for who knows if this proposition can in fact be true, after all. Right?):

The addressed "I" is not identical to the text it is being conscious of. The text is other to that whose occurrence is addressed by the term "I", which holds awareness of the text. Fast forward to what I've previous said in this thread, and that which is addressed by the term "I" holds conscious awareness of empirical givens without itself being an empirical given - either to its own conscious being or to any others. Of note, even though the addressed "I" can only occur in a duality to other which it observes and thereby constitutes a self, it is never identical to that which it observes. Again, it is thereby other in relation to all empirical data. An AI program attends and responds to information - as does an alarm clock - but is not endowed with a conscious being which we term "I" in propositions such as that provided.

Yours is a denial of those truths whose consequences are not useful to you - that of consciousness's occurrence very much included. I don't much admire your approach, for the same reason I don't admire the approach of Young Earth Creationist among others.

Try to insult me in a wiser way the next time around. That way, you end up having the last word.

Alright, my bad if I was a bit smug in my reply. But cool.

What is your theory of truth? — wonderer1

My own theory of truth in a nutshell: that which conforms to what is actual is true. Prior to you then testing out any and all possible ways this might not hold - but do if you so care - the question I asked apo was not based on "my theory of truth" but on his, regardless of what it might be.

I gave you the answer. Your question suffers from logical vagueness. Affirming yes or no would make no useful difference. — apokrisis

Honesty is important. For trust and the like. No, you only just gave me your answer right now. Its value here overlooked.

It remains up to you to define consciousness in terms that pragmatically means anything measurable if you are indeed talking about “the science” of it. Or even just it’s metaphysics. — apokrisis

To precisely demarcate what personal conscious is is not to define one's personal consciousness in ways that are measurable. Nor does metaphysics mandate that what is shall itself be measurable. I'll here point this truth at your own worldview, which infers the Apeiron to be a required aspect of what is real: The Apeiron by definition is immeasurable, and yet it is still what your metaphysics relies on at a basic level of explanation.

So I’ll let others explain their own views as best they can, — javra

You did a splendid job of misrepresenting what biosemiosis claims. :up: — apokrisis

Either the extrapolated worldview of the cosmos you endorse is not one of biosemiotics or I stand by what I previously said - so far finding nothing that contradicts my statements.

Besides, this is between you and @Gnomon.

Unless you want to bring me into it. But then, in this thread about the science of consciousness you’ve so far been unable to address the rather basic question of whether “I am conscious of this text” is a truth-baring proposition. Not much of anything to go on here. So I’m not inclined to participate.

you may be able to enlighten me about Biosemiotics (BS). Which has been proposed as an alternative to Panpsychism (PP) as a mechanism for the emergence of Mind from Matter. — Gnomon

I won’t be much help, and this because I so far find this very quoted affirmation to be nonsensical. Bio-semiotics is the semiotics of life – it addresses the meaning transference of lifeforms and all this entails. To apply biosemiotics to a former cosmos devoid of life from which life emerged will either necessitate a panpsychistic cosmos by default or, else, again, it will make no sense: the semiotics of life, i.e. biosemiotics, applied to processes of non-life in attempts to explain life’s emergence and all aspects of life, thereby explaining the semiotics of life. It’s circular reasoning consisting of a great sum of allegories and metaphors that utilize poorly defined words (if they are at all defined: e.g., life, meaning, etc.) that – after all the smoke and mirrors pass by – ultimately explains nothing: we start with biosemiotics to explain biosemiotics via a very fancy loop. Or, more simply, we use premise A to explain A. And then call it a done deal: everything explained, including the very issue of A which we were principally focusing on.

I have nothing against the study of biosemiotics. But using life to explain life from the vantage of a non-living (else, life-devoid) cosmos, again, to me so far does not make sense. Philosophically speaking. But that’s just fallible me.

So I’ll let others explain their own views as best they can, if they so wish.

I'll have to think about that more. It seems to me that the "end" does not exist until it is actualized. Thus, God's desire is posterior to the existence of the end. — Count Timothy von Icarus

The end never occurs, exists, as an actualized end until the moment its actualized, if this moment ever manifests, true. But the end one pursues will occur as that for the sake of which one does what one does; i.e., it will occur as a telos. As an actively held telos, it will then limit or bind what one generates to its own self - for all which one brings about will be so brought about for the purpose of transforming one's telos into an actualized endstate (at which juncture the telos vanishes). This, at the very least, is my take on the more basic premises of teleology.

For a common example, Alice intends to go to the store. Her having gone to the store doesn't yet exist - and might never exist if, for example, Alice becomes barred from so doing due to an unexpected friend's call that she deems to be more important to prioritize. Here, suppose nothing bars her from so going to the store. "Going to the store" is her intent, her telos - which will occur (non-physically) as that which guides all her ensuing activities aiming to fulfill this telos (i.e., to make it an actualized endstate). This very telos, then, in this sense alone, serves as a determinant of her actions. In the complete absence of all teloi - both conscious and unconscious - Alice's behaviors could then all be perfectly random.

As a more abstract example, many conceive of all life seeking optimal self-presertavion. Here tentatively granting this, optimal self-preservation will then be the at least unconscious telos of all life: one can never perfectly fulfill this telos while living. It does not exist as might some actual object exists; nor does it exist as a completely fulfilled endstate. It, here, nevertheless is deemed to be the intent (telos) that guides, motivates, teleologically determines all behaviors enacted by lifeforms. One that is not of lifeforms willful creation.

In these two examples, while we can select certain teloi to be thereafter guided by, we do not select - much less create - inherent teloi such as that of pursuing optimal self-preservation. And to select any one telos (e.g. intent) from two or more alternative possibilities, we in this very activity will need to be guided by teloi (else our behavior is random). Due to this - if I've explained things well enough - we ourselves cannot choose, much less create, all the teloi which determine our behaviors (both cognitive and physical).

Then, as an example applicable to the notion of an omnipotent deity: Does the omnipotent deity abide by that which is good or, else, is this deity the creator of the very ideal of the good? If the former, then the good here is a telos which guides, motivates, teleologically determines this omnipotent deity toward a potential endstate has not yet realized in full and which the deity did not create.

Hence, here, either the good as telos is an existentially fixed aspect of reality (which simply "just is") that either directly or indirectly governs the activities of everything, very much including those of this omnipotent deity - in which case this deity cannot be all powerful, for he is limited or bounded by the good which is not of his creation - or, else, this omnipotent deity is the very creator of the good.

Its the latter interpretation that I take logical issue with: to create entails intentional creation which, in turn, entails intents/teloi. One could for example ask: for the sake of what (i.e., with what telos) did this omnipotent deity create the good? If he deemed this creation good, then he didn't create the good. And one can argue this line of thought more abstractly: There is an infinite quantity of creations - always with some telos that determines the creations of this omnipotent deity (for otherwise the creations would be random) which this omnipotent deity neither created not chose but is instead guided by and, hence, limited and bound by.

OK, now that I've written this - tough I'll post it any way - I realize that it might be hard to understand or maybe poorly expressed. In which case, at this point, maybe it might be better to leave things where they're at? Inconclusive though things might be.

Not super relevant to the topic at hand, but I think it would be interesting to unpack why this strong tradition of seeing God involved in sustaining all things, filling all things, came to decline in favor of the "divine Watchmaker," or a God who mostly doesn't act in the world and only sometimes intervenes, and who always does so supernaturally. — Count Timothy von Icarus

FWIW, these are the views I so far hold: in the history of mankind, there has repeatedly emerged the notion of a certain uncreated given that "just is" on which everything we know of is dependent. For materialists, this given is matter. For those who are often labeled spiritual, this given has either been an individuated psyche with superlative abilities in all respects (i.e., a deity, replete with the deity's requisite abilities to perceive things and to hold agency as a psyche) or, historically preceding this concept, a certain something that by its very properties cannot be an individuated psyche. Both these notions can be addressed by the term "God". Plato's "The Good", which later morphed into the neoplatonic "The One", serves as one example of God as non-deity. So too does the Judaic notion of G-d which takes the form of the Ein Sof. So too the Eastern notion of the Brahman.

In Western culture, polytheism (including henotheism) converged with philosophical notions of the absolute (e.g., Neoplatonic notions of "The One") to create the notion of something that holds the properties of the philosophical notion of the absolute while at the same time being a singular deity of superlative powers - a singular absolute deity which can hear your thoughts/prayers and act as he (intentionally) wishes in turn.

There's quite a lot more, obviously, both in terms of this very issue and in terms of the wide array of spiritual and theistic belief structures that occurred in the history of the West. I'll here add that the non-deity understanding of God can at the very least be amiable to certain interpretations of pantheism and panentheism - and, therefore, to nature and naturalism (e.g., as aspects of the Stoic-like logos which this absolute in one way or another entails) - whereas the God-as-deity understanding requires that the deity stands in contrast to the nature which he creates and/or created. And, as per your example of the Gnostics, one can hold onto this uncreated, existential aboslute while also upholding the occurrence of deities (in this case, that of the Demurge as a prime example; also of Sophia as that deity which leads toward this very absolute that dwells beyond the Demurge and his creations).

I very much doubt we'll be able to arrive at any definitive conclusion on the matter, but this is a basic outline of my own best current appraisals.

I might come back to this latter on if beneficial. Let me know.

Your focus here is on God's desires (which are a part of God - this thought God is supposed to be divinely simple and thus partless) whereas mine was on God's teloi, or ends, that God seeks to actualize via his desires (which are other in respect to God). The latter, to my mind, necessarily entailing the reality of teleology. The end addressed is, again, apart from what God is. (Much like the universe is not, traditionally in the West, of itself an aspect of God but instead is God's creation.) In the latter case of teleological motives for creation - thereby of intent-ional creation - there will always then be an end which was not God's creation but which God seeks to actualize. With both the latter entailing lack of being "all-powerful".

The solution is generally to define omnipotence more carefully, to reject the law of the excluded middle in some sense, maybe just for God, of to reject the God of classical theism as incoherent. I would go with the latter. — Count Timothy von Icarus

You've brought up good examples. Plenty more; such as Genesis 2 onward portraying God as an omnipotent being that had no control over what the serpent did.

But yes, I go with the latter as well.

Coincidentally, I just came across a YouTube video, by Sabine Hossenfelder, on the topic of "why the universe is not locally real". [...] To quote an old TV ad : "Is it real, or is it Memorex?" :smile: — Gnomon

Just saw the video. Very interesting. Still, first off, I’m no expert in the intricacies of modern physics and, secondly, all modern physics is chockfull of inference (the speaker’s reference to multiple worlds theory’s possible disagreements with some of the premises as one example). So, I’ll let others engage in the heavy-duty physics interpretations of these latest findings.

For what its worth, though, in terms of non-locality and all the other weird aspects of quantum physics:

We often assume that we conscious humans are the be-all and end-all of awareness – this as (mind-endowed) observers. Bring back the facts of biology into this equation and we multicellular organisms are constituted of individual living cells – from individual skin cells to individual neuron cells. Grant that each of these individual cells is endowed with its own primitive mind (as per, for example, the enactivist stance of Evan Thompson in his book "Mind in Life") – needless to add, cells to which the multicellular organisms in which they occur serves as their commonwealth upon which each such cell is dependent and whose preservation each such cell operates to maintain – and you obtain the following biocentric like perspective:

Each one of these primitive mind endowed (and, hence, awareness endowed) cells is constituted of organic molecules – some of which which have been empirically evidenced to exhibit at least some QM properties. *** The cell itself, however, does not exhibit QM properties. Skipping a good deal of rational inference, for each cell to properly function so as to live requires that each cell of itself settles all the QM weirdness (which, again, can apply to various organic molecules and, needless to add, their components) in a way that at the very least ends up resembling our locally real world.

We are constituted of these cells. Those that pertain to our CNS then constitute our own mind and give form to our own conscious awareness.

Going by the aforementioned, then, our own empirically known world will then necessarily be locally real.

I know, the just expressed is in certain respects speculative – or at least will appear so to those who might disagree with some of the premises expressed, such that an individual cell holds its own primitive mind, one that thereby also observes its environment (think, for a blatant example, of an ameba that recognizes and must readily distinguish predator from pray). All the same, this perspective so far works for me as a way of making sense of how QM applies to our empirically known reality.

At any rate, nice video / info!

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*** for example:

https://www.technologyreview.com/2019/11/09/238365/a-natural-biomolecule-has-been-measured-acting-in-a-quantum-wave-for-the-first-time/

https://phys.org/news/2020-07-diffract-molecules.html

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Edit: As a quick addendum to the proposed perspective: I take this to be readily evident but it might not be so to others: our immediate environment is always thoroughly infused with cellular life, be it diploid (e.g., eukaryotes such as ameba) of haploid (e.g. bacteria on solid surfaces and pollen in the air) – all of which would, in the previously given perspective, of itself settle quantum weirdness so as to successfully persist as an individual cell … one that interacts with its environment, including with other (locally real) cells. So, in this interpretation, we always dwell in a non-QM empirical world - this if one’s own body’s makeup were to not be enough (though I currently think it is). Our empirical awareness of QM's validity only comes into play when we focus - not on life, but - life's (as well as non-life's) material components.

[...] Together those processes make up the mind. Is it real? Yes. Is it physical - good question. What kind of a thing is it? I'm not sure, but I do believe it is a manifestation of physical, biological, neurological processes. — T Clark

Shoot. Going by that definition, I could qualify as a materialist myself. :wink: No bones to pick. Cool definition. :up:

Was in a rush with my last post. But regarding God’s intentionality, here’s a maybe better expressed argument:

Either a) God intentionally generated an initial given (e.g., the occurrence of light as per Genesis 1) or b) God has been intentionally generating givens for eternity such that there never was any initial given that God intentionally generated.

If (a), the generation of this initial given (call it X) was then necessarily to some extent limited or bounded (hence, determined) by an end – for the sake of which it was generated – which, as end aspired toward, could not have been generated by God prior to God’s very first, intentional generation (i.e., his generation of X). Here, then, God was himself to some degree limited or bounded (determined) by his actively held intent (telos or goal or aim), an intent held by him which he did not create and which he did not instantaneously realize. Therefore, God was not - and thereby is not - omnipotent.

If (b), then the conclusion of (a) also applies – for, here, there never could have been an initial, intentionally created end (for the sake of which future creations would be enacted). To intentionally create such an end (call it Z), an end for the sake of which this created end Z is brought about is required. One could here draw this out ad infinitum and, always, there will be one end for the sake of which a creation is made which was not itself God’s creation yet was requisite for God’s intentionally creating anything. Hence, God is not omnipotent.

Lastly, were God able to fulfill all ends that God aims to fulfilling – as would be required of omnipotence – then God would at such juncture no longer be intentionally (i.e., teleologically) creating anything whatsoever. For all God’s intents would have here become fully actualized as God intended. Therefore, the omnipotence of a psyche logically mandates that the psyche does not intentionally generate anything - for there here is nothing that this omnipotent psyche has not been yet able to actualize.

Due to the aforementioned, no individuated psyche (no individuated anything, actually) that is teleologically driven - of which intentionality is a form - can possibly be omnipotent.

Hence, an omnipotent creator deity is logically impossible. Same is valid for the impossibility of an omnipotent designer, programmer, etc.

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Hopefully that makes better sense. Would welcome to hear any flaws in this reasoning.

I really don't see how that follows. — Count Timothy von Icarus

That's fare. It was tersely given argument.

If the universe develops teleologically why does that entail that God is guided by the same goals? I don't even see how this necessarily applies to God's immanent activities and properties. — Count Timothy von Icarus

"It doesn't" to both questions.

It only requires that God has goals in what God does. If God does not have any goals, then irrationality or, at best, arational reasoning (if that can even make sense). If God does have goals, then these ends with God pursues cannot rationally all be God's creation. This is because the very act of creating (and of designing, programming, willfully generating, etc.) is intentional. Hence, it is driven by at least one end which is a priori to the act of creation for the sake of which the creation is enacted.

This is likely still too terse. Followed through, though, it at least currently seems to me that no god can be omnipotent (if at all occurrent) - for any god will abide by at least one telos/end that this god did not create. An end which the god seeks to actualize, but has not yet had the ability to.

B. Seems to imply that having goals necessarily implies a lack of agency. — Count Timothy von Icarus

I find quite the contrary to be the case: Agency cannot occur in the absence of teloi, i.e. of ends for the sake of which agency is enacted. This is what makes our free will intentional (here, for those of us who at least entertain the possibility of free will). We as agents are neither "fully determined" nor "perfectly undetermined by anything" in what we do. And each choice we make will be intentional (an unintended choice is nonsensical). This then, to me at least, entails that our freely willed choices are always partly determined by the ends we actively hold for the sake of which we so generate a made choice. While at the same time not being fully, or absolutely, determined as per traditional interpretations of causal determinism.

Surely one isn't free if one's behavior is arbitrary. — Count Timothy von Icarus

Hence free will needing to be intent-driven or intent-semi-determined - and, thereby, intentional.

The ability to rationally develop one's own goals and the ability to have second and nth order goals about one's own desires are both generally taken as prerequisites for freedom. — Count Timothy von Icarus

I grant this. And it, to my mind, can get complex. But then in so developing one's goals via one's free will, one's free will, to be intentional, will need to be telos-driven (i.e., semi-determined by teloi which are a priori to this developing of end to follow in the future). In sort: otherwise one's develping of goals would be unintentional and, hence, arbitrary.

How does this not rule out all free will? — Count Timothy von Icarus

No. It is, I find, a requisite for free will's occurrence. This with free will loosely defined at the metaphysical freedom to choose otherwise in the same situation - something which causal determinism disallows. (But then, neither does this in and of itself validate the reality of our being endowed with free will.)

Depends on how you look at it. :joke: — Gnomon

That's as good an answer as I'll probably get in regard to my question. :grin: Thanks for it.

Empirical science ignored the mental aspects of reality for centuries, because it was associated with Souls, Spirits, and Ghosts. — Gnomon

I myself think of this as "Empirical science ignored the mental aspects of reality for centuries, because it was associated with Psyche (as in "psychology" - the study of psyche)". But yea, your assessment seems to be about right.

The Great Programmer designed the universe to ... ? — unenlightened

Even in denying the validity of the argument I've presented against exactly such a "The Great Programmer", you do realize this question can only be answered via a teleological reason, don't you? In other words, by providing an end for the sake of which the means (in this case, the universe) was set in motion.

However, it is hardly clear that this problem implies the "God of classical theism," a God that only seems to exist in philosophy journals anyhow, — Count Timothy von Icarus

Haven't read the entire OP yet, but as to this, the reality of teleology directly contradicts the occurrence of the "God of classical theism".

This omnipotent God (psyche) either a) unintentionally creates everything or b) intentionally creates everything.

If (a), reasoning (emotive as well as cognitive) goes down the drain, and anything might be - which at the very least rules out the existential requirement for such a God.

If (b) then God Himself is teleologically driven, and hence determined, by His intentions - all intentions being teleological, i.e. intent/goal/end driven. Therefore, God here can rationally only remain subject to teloi (goals) which God does not (intentionally) create but, instead, intends to fulfill (irrespective of what they might be). Hence, here, God cannot be the omnipotent "creator of everything" - for he cannot, when rationally addressed, create (intentionally) his own intents by which he's driven when so creating.

There's always blind faith ... but when it comes to reasoning, the reality of teleology is logically incompatible with an omnipotent God that creates everything.

This goes out to those who are not irreducibly fixated on the unquestionable reality of their own particular worldview, whatever it might be (if any).

"Apparently, monistic Materialism solves the origin problem by denying that it is a problem : consciousness is not real, but ideal : a figment of imagination, so it literally does not matter. Dualism just accepts that we tend to think of Mind & Matter as two completely different things, and never the twain shall meet : hyle + morph = real matter + ideal form. Monistic Panpsychism assumes that Matter is an illusion generated by the inherent mental processes of nature (a priori Cosmic Consciousness), hence matter does not matter." — Gnomon

While I wouldn't say that physicality doesn't matter, I'm in general agreement with the given description of panpsychism. Nevertheless:

So conceived it seems to me that a world of so called “monistic panpsychism” would yet necessarily consist of an ontological duality: namely, between 1) awareness (with any kind of ur-awareness which might apply to non-life included) and 2) everything that is not awareness (which, as such, thereby informs, and thereby gives form to, awareness). Here, then, all aspects of mind and body that awareness can be in any way aware of would ultimately consist of the same basic stuff - with mind and matter being only a property dualism of this substance (rather than being two ontological substances). And, in conformity with the boldfaced and underlined parts of the quote, this underlying stuff/substance which is “everything that is not awareness” would itself ultimately be the product of awareness when globally addressed - this then likely in a multiplicity of different ontological manners.

Then: Properly speaking, would you interpret panpsychism thus understood to be an ontological monism or an ontological, non-Cartesian dualism?

Hence, is consciousness actual rather than illusory, fictional, etc.? — javra

This is monism. This is reductionism. So how I think of things – how Peirce thought of things, how systems science thinks of things – just doesn't share your ontological commitments. You are trying to jam square pegs into round holes. — apokrisis

My lack of effort, you say. Alright then. Baby steps.

Here's a proposition: "I am conscious of this text." In your worldview, does this proposition have a truth-value?

Yes. But what are the ontic commitments of this term "real" that you employ. Or what has become now the term "ontic" that I guess is supposed to mean "really real" or "fundamentally real" or "monistically real". — apokrisis

None of that, or at least not necessarily "fundamentally real". The ontic is that which ontology is the study of. That which is actual rather than illusory, fictional, etc. Hence, is consciousness actual rather than illusory, fictional, etc.? It need not be fundamental for me to make my argument that it cannot be empirically studied by the sciences. But if you deem it illusory, fictional, etc. then that's a disagreement on what is actual and what is not in this world.

I've told you I am a holist and not a reductionist and therefore don't buy the causal cop-out that is supervenience.

So your line of argument goes wrong from there. I am not a reductionist. And you don't seem to have a clue about what else that leaves. — apokrisis

Could you calm down a bit? First off, you could interpret "to supervene" as "to be dependent on something else for truth, existence, or instantiation (definition pulled from Wiktionary)", which is what I intended. Let me know of a more appropriate term to express this and I'll use it: If A's occurrence holds X, Y, and Z as its constituents, then A is dependent on X, Y, and Z in such manner as that just quoted. And obviously this does not negate holistic top-down processes from operating on X, Y, and Z.

Secondly, of main interest was the one question I previously asked, together with what is meant by you to be "an idea".

But I'll cut the crap. If you have no intent to discuss the issue, then so be it.

Really what? Really an idea? Really material? Really semiotic – as in the modelling that connects the two? — apokrisis

I didn't ask "really". I asked "real". As in something that ontically occurs. Not as an idea, but as that which apprehends the idea of consciousness when so thought of.

"Really material" would be contingent on what you here mean by matter; I'll tentatively interpret you meaning that matter is the constitutional makeup of any given (what Aristotle intended by "matter") - and that consciousness thereby supervenes on its own constituents. If this is an accurate interpretation of what you here mean by "material reality", I then easily accept this to be true.

But then its being semiotically real as a "modeling that connects the idea to its constituents" can so far to me only be a misguided inference. And this precisely because I so far cannot make either rational or experiential sense of awareness of itself being an idea - I so far cannot understand how it can be an idea that thereby (due to its semiotics) then holds awareness of other ideas. This would result in turtles all the way down, for all ideas have their constituents - e.g., lesser ideas or connotations, all of which further supervene on the operational parts of a CNS - here apparently entailing that the idea of, say, evolution is in fact itself endowed with first-person awareness.

So I'll again ask a question in the name of optimally impartial philosophical enquiry:

Do you find that consciousness can only be "a) an idea and b) its constituents which are c) connected semiotically by modeling"?

Your previous reply - and I thank you for it - indicates yes. So, if your answer is "yes", then please express what "an idea" signifies in this context - such that consciousness becomes distinctly different from the idea of evolution which consciousness can be aware of (in that while the first is aware the second is not).