Comments

  • Sleep Paralysis and Apparitional Experiences
    Forty years ago I decided to attempt Castaneda's Art of Dreaming. Amazingly, his instructions (Don Juan) worked the first time and I "awoke" in what seemed to be the normal world, but with colors, sounds, etc. accentuated. I would enter this state of mind usually during a hypnagogic interlude. No drugs were involved. Today, these are all pleasant memories.
  • What the study of Quantum Theory has taught me about Reality
    This qualifies as the quantified theory of love? — god must be atheist

    Ha :smile: Just curious if a physicist might jump in here. I don't think there are simple answers.

    But I wonder about string theory or similar conjectures, and whether they are considered metaphysical whatevers? If so, if one of these strange theories were verified by experimentation, would they become metaphysical actualities?
  • What the study of Quantum Theory has taught me about Reality
    The metaphysics in these topics is all over the place - and that's suitable for this forum. Is String Theory metaphysics? Or any other far-out "theory" which evades verification? Perhaps String Theory could be called metaphysical actuality?

    Personally, I would be relatively happy if someone describes the integrative measures that are employed in Feynman's path integral. I'm familiar with functional integrals, which involve measures on sigma algebras of "points" (functions) in a space, but the "DX" in the Feynman "sum over all paths" integral is still a kind of puzzle to me.

    :chin:
  • My own (personal) beef with the real numbers
    Was it Cantor who said the rational numbers are like the stars in the night sky and the irrationals are like the darkness in the background? Perhaps this has been posted before.
  • Epistemology versus computability
    Falsified theories are replaced by theories of greater explanatory power. — Banno

    The replacement of a theory due to counterexample (original theory wrong), vs the replacement of a theory due to the development of a better, more encompassing theory (original theory correct, but superseded). Business as usual in science.

    You make the distinction between theory and statement.
  • Mathematicist Genesis
    I'm a mathematician who studied a decent amount of logic — fdrake

    I'm one who hasn't. Complex analysis here. And you? :cool:
  • Everything In Time Has A Cause
    I am talking about 'Reason' - she is the person, the god, whose prescriptions our faculty of reason. . . — Bartricks

    OK. Now that I see the thread is theological I understand. Carry on! :cool:
  • Everything In Time Has A Cause
    Reason determines what's true — Bartricks

    At one time it was reasoned that a bolt of lightning was due to an action by Zeus. It might appear then that "reason" is not necessarily the test of truth. :gasp:
  • Everything In Time Has A Cause
    Then why did you mention Zen? If neither you nor I know anything about it, why mention it as if it had some importance? — Bartricks

    I never said I knew nothing about the practice. In fact, I do. I do not practice it now, however. As for importance, serious devotees reach a mental state in which empty awareness or no-thingness becomes "real" and may seem, to a non-devotee, to conflict with pure reason. Something arising from emptiness is not necessarily nonsensical.

    Is it possible there are aspects of reality that may be beyond what we consider reason?
  • Proof and explanation how something comes out of nothing!
    Or keep electron and positron at the same point in space and you will walk through them, would not be able to see them, detect or interact with them in any way. Effectively, practically, they will be nothing, — Zelebg

    Like Zelig? :smirk:
  • Epistemology versus computability
    We no longer follow visual procedures in mathematics. — alcontali

    Not true. For example, I just posted a research note in which I gave what is primarily a geometric (visual) argument that the iteration of a linear fractional transformation form converges to a limit for a portion of the complex plane.

    The second point is logical. That a proposition is falsifiable is not the same as it's being true; and hence, there will be verifiably falsifiable propositions that are false, yet unfalsified. — Banno

    You might want to elaborate with an example. In appearance, it looks like word salad. I would think that if a proposition is falsifiable it is not the same as it being false. In other words there is a procedure for determining falseness, but it hasn't been applied yet. I haven't been following the thread, however, and must be missing a technical definition. Confusing. :worry:
  • Everything In Time Has A Cause
    Doesn't your reason - your faculty of reason - tell you that nothing comes from nothing? — Bartricks

    Is reason axiomatic? How do you think it develops or arises in the human mind? Can it change as a culture changes?

    I don't practice Zen. Look it up on Wikipedia.
  • Why x=x ?
    :cool:
  • Everything In Time Has A Cause
    And again: can something come out of nothing? — Bartricks

    I would guess not, but I am not certain. Zen has quite a bit to say about no-thingness.
  • Everything In Time Has A Cause
    It's a self-evident truth of reason that every event has a cause — Bartricks

    Hence, a thought you hold true must always be reflected in nature. Metaphysical actuality.
  • If Climate Change Is A Lie, Is It Still Worth The Risk?
    But what about the billion or more people who live at, or slightly above sea level, will they come and join you, when you move uphill? — Punshhh

    I live at one mile elevation on the prairie. Lots of room up here. But the surfing sucks.
  • Everything In Time Has A Cause
    So, every event must have a cause. — Bartricks

    Why are you certain of this? Because that's the way the world works now?
  • My own (personal) beef with the real numbers
    This means that taking a square root is not a valid operation — Metaphysician Undercover

    Define "valid operation." You should have been around to make your current argument about 1700BC when the Sumerians were calculating the square root of two (and its reciprocal) on cuneiform tablets. They would have appreciated your perspective. :smirk:
  • What is the difference between actual infinity and potential infinity?
    I don't understand your definition re: metaphysics. What are things? We seem to be in a downward spiral here.

    On the other hand, for a little clarity:

    Des Bosses to Leibniz (1700s): "Monads are metaphysical actualities."

    Now, that makes sense. :cool:
  • What is the difference between actual infinity and potential infinity?
    Speak to metaphysics, please. Define "actual" in that context. — jgill

    Metaphysics is a branch of philosophy, within which "actual" has a technical meaning that distinguishes it from "possible" and "necessary." — aletheist
  • What is the difference between actual infinity and potential infinity?
    If I say that I have an apple, what I usually mean is that I have an actual apple. If I posit a set of apples in the strictly mathematical sense, then I am talking about something that is logically possible, but not (necessarily) actual — aletheist

    "Metaphysics is a branch of philosophy, within which "actual" has a technical meaning that distinguishes it"

    Speak to metaphysics, please. Define "actual" in that context. :nerd:
  • Why x=x ?
    x=x

    Leibniz: "It is what it is."

    Clinton: "It depends on your definition of 'is'."

    :chin:
  • What is the difference between actual infinity and potential infinity?
    That is not what I mean by "metaphysical actuality." I just mean the modal property of being actual, rather than merely possible or strictly necessary — aletheist

    So, combining "metaphysical" with "actual" means someone is thinking a metaphysical thought? Or does the expression imply an interaction with physical reality? I am going on a classical definition of the expression. What do you really mean? Please clarify with examples.

    I am not a philosopher.

    Thanks. :chin:
  • What is the difference between actual infinity and potential infinity?
    It is not; as I said, mathematical existence--including the potential infinity of the natural numbers--is not metaphysical actuality, it is logical possibility — aletheist

    Metaphysical Actuality: The philosophical position that thought becomes actual by becoming concrete. Subjectivity, the "I" has constitutive validity, having sole omnipotence.

    This seems to me an extreme position. How then does it interact with historical actuality? :chin:
  • Modern Realism: Fieldism not Materialism
    ↪Gnomon
    Interesting links. Thanks.

    I've dabbled in mathematical vector fields for years, particularly time-dependent fields. If it were possible I would post some intriguing images, but there are problems doing so. We'll see. :nerd:
  • Everything In Time Has A Cause
    I do not understand you or why you are weeping with laughter — Bartricks

    I got carried away by your comment that physics doesn't investigate reality, which is the domain of philosophy. I cited the "x=x" thread because, to a novice philosopher, the law of identity (Leibniz's "It is what it is") seems beyond refutation and axiomatic. How can it contribute to a further understanding of reality?

    I don't agree with your comment. Physics most definitely investigates reality. The fact that scientists may avoid discussions of causality simply means that by doing so they can achieve a better understanding of physical reality.

    But I reacted excessively. Sorry.
  • Why x=x ?
    ↪Mac
    About the moon which is not there breaking into pieces which aren't there either? :nerd:
  • Circular Time Revisited
    An extreme version of reincarnation? Or is it?
  • Definition of entity
    And what of the word "being" ? Quite a bit of philosophy seems to revolve around that concept, and it has always been suspect for me. A Manhattan tower resting on questionable foundations IMO. :chin:
  • My own (personal) beef with the real numbers
    The square root of two just won a Golden Globe award!

    :gasp:
  • Everything In Time Has A Cause
    Philosophy - not physics - is the study of what's real. — Bartricks

    x=x thread? :lol:
  • What is the difference between actual infinity and potential infinity?
    I'm not entirely sure what your question was — fishfry

    "I submit that 5 is prime and the square root of 2 both exists and is rational. . . . But they are true."

    The square root of two is rational? Am I misreading your sentence? :worry:
  • If Climate Change Is A Lie, Is It Still Worth The Risk?
    I know it has no bearing on modern science, but sixty years ago, as a young USAF officer, I took a post-graduate curriculum in meteorology at the University of Chicago, and the "basket-weaving" course was climatology. At the opposite end of that spectrum were fluid dynamics (which I enjoyed) and atmospheric physics (which I didn't). My subsequent experience as a meteorologist has made me a little bit of a skeptic about all the hype these days.

    But if I owned beachfront properties I would be selling them.
  • Everything In Time Has A Cause
    It's been mentioned before, but many of those who toil in the depths of reality, the physicists, don't seem to worry about this issue. It seems to be mostly a philosophical concern. But, hey, look at what this forum is about! :smile:
  • Definition of entity
    A thing? I give up. What's the answer? :worry:
  • My own (personal) beef with the real numbers
    By "models' factorizations" I mean finding the right definitions that allow you to describe some complex (containing a lot of information) models in a simple way, or that allow you to prove something that was too complex to prove without these definitions. . . . . That's mainly what mathematicians are doing today — Mephist

    K-theory, Category theory, etc. might enforce this view. I remember years ago hearing a well-known algebraist joke that, "K-theorists will tell you, "All you have to do is believe me and I can prove it!'." However, moving up into more abstract or general levels with new definitions and relationships, while simplifying certain aspects of math below those levels, may or may not solve complicated problems at lower levels. For example, "Soft" analysis doesn't solve all the problems "Hard" analysis presents. I am well aware of this having done research in the latter. On the other hand, moving higher up, greater generality, in a subject can be wonderfully rewarding, and it certainly provides avenues of imaginative research for grad students. The lower level stuff has frequently been "mined out" and what remains can quite difficult.

    However, this is a side track, unimportant in this thread. :nerd:
  • What is the difference between actual infinity and potential infinity?
    I submit that 5 is prime and the square root of 2 both exists and is rational. . . . But they are true. — fishfry

    What am I missing here? :chin:
  • My own (personal) beef with the real numbers
    Mathematics (what is called mathematics today) is the research of "models' factorizations" that are able to compress the information content of other models (physical or purely logical ones). — Mephist

    I don't know what this means. Matrix factorization? That's all there is to mathematics research these days? Surely you jest. :cry:
  • My own (personal) beef with the real numbers
    :roll: Oh oh. It sure isn't. :cool:
  • My own (personal) beef with the real numbers
    What about inverses? It's not immediately obvious, but in fact if
    then .     — fishfry
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