It depends what you mean by "external world". There is the external world that I perceive as Appearance, and there is the external world outside me that I cannot perceive that is causing these Appearances. — RussellA

You would agree that human visual perception is restricted to certain frequencies, and auditory perception restricted to certain wavelengths, would you not? Does this mean that frequencies and wavelengths that fall outside these limits are ‘mysterious’? Isn't it fairly simple that our perceptual abilities, and also our intellectual abilities, are limited in some ways, so that what the world is outside of those bounds can't be known by us? I can't quite see why this is such a difficult thing to come to terms with.

That contradicts the sources cited, so I will say for the final time, you are mistaken.
— Wayfarer

It is unfortunate because you don't understand the sources you yourself quote despite being explained, or care to read what comes after: — Lionino

But the SEP entry says unequivocally 'The philosophical term ‘substance’ corresponds to the Greek ousia, which means ‘being’, transmitted via the Latin substantia'. 'French' doesn't appear at all in the entry. And that Descartes published in Latin, using the term 'substantia'. Why are you being obstinate? Is it simply because you're loath to admit a mistake?

There's a black swan event brewing in China as we speak. — frank

Don't worry! They'll cook it and feed it to the masses.

I genuinely don't think that there is any possibility of explaining phenomenal consciousness through the lense of a biologist or anyone else. Because I don't think phenomenality can be explained by anyone, I have no motivation to look at things from any different perspective that were to be radically different from modern neuroscience, cognitive science, psychology. — Apustimelogist

I appreciate the answer and I like your forthrightness. But I don't think Chalmer's point in 'facing up to the problem of consciousness' really is a call for an explanation. It's not pointing out a flaw in the naturalist account, by saying the nature of consciousness is a problem for naturalism as currently understood. Or that scientific accounts of the mind leave something important out.

Philosophy itself is very much concerned with the meaning of being. It is not concerned with an explanation in the functional sense of explaining one thing in terms of another. From a scientific point of view, that sounds hopelessly vague and quixotic. It's not sharply defined and doesn't have crisp boundaries. But some of the most pressing questions in life are like that.

The dualistic [approaches] usually appear with two substances, a material one, which is attributed to the body, and an immaterial one, which is assigned to the mind. — Wolfgang

Agree - this is largely attributable to Cartesian dualism which posits a 'res cogitans', literally, 'thinking thing', an oxymoronic conception. However, there has been a revival of interest in hylomorphism, which is derived from Aristotle's matter-form dualism, which is a completely different animal, with current advocates including William Jaworksi and others.

Inevitably, one enters religious, esoteric or mystical ground, because an immaterial spirit lacks any real justification. A distinction must be made between those who speak of immaterial things in relation to thoughts, since they cannot be touched. The immaterial here is therefore not of a substantive nature, but of a linguistic nature. Body and mind sometimes work partly independently of each other, sometimes in parallel, sometimes the mind supervenes over the body, sometimes it influences it. None of these attempts, however, can solve the mind-body problem, and it remains an unsatisfactory dualism. And this contradicts the fact that every organism consists of nothing more than flesh and blood, thus of matter. — Wolfgang

I take issue with this claim. From Descartes' oxymoronic 'res cogitans' we inherit an unintelligible metaphor for the nature of mind. The principle problem is indeed perspectival, because the thinking being is never itself among the objects of perception. So it can't be grasped or comprehended objectively, which is why diehard materialists such as Dennett seek to eliminate it. The OP acknowledges this, but then just says 'so much the worse for philosophy'.

So I agree the unsatisfactoriness of dualism arises from trying to treat the mind as some object or thing. But as the OP also says, 'what is mind' is a badly-asked question - UNLESS it is asked as a kind of koan, a question that dissolves itself in the asking of it. By coming to realise that the mind is in some profound and real sense actually unknowable, that it, and therefore we ourselves, are a mystery at the heart of being. So that it is enter religious, esoteric or mystical grounds, an essential and primordial aspect of human being.

As to every organism comprising nothing but matter, this is outright materialism, and I reject it completely. But that doesn't mean endorsing any kind of thinking substance. The aspect of the human nearest the immaterial is the capacity to grasp meaning, is to see the real meaning of things. Of course that is preserved in science, but in a limited and specific way - an instrumental way, according to Adorno's analysis. We value science for its instrumental utility, not so much for its ability to grasp capital T truth. But that kind of insight into the big picture, the overall meaning of things, is precisely what is meant by sagacity (or sapience), and that is where something like 'the immaterial spirit' is revealed, albeit that nowadays sounds a rather gauche expression. (Who is that gauche amigo :chin: )

I paste this in from time to time, just to jog the collective memory.



How anyone thinks that the guy behind this outrage is a fit and proper person for the candidacy beggars belief.

I'm sure the opportunity will arise.

For a scientist's perspective, here's Sean Carrol — wonderer1

From a philosopher's perspective, I feel Sean Carroll, exemplary science communicator and all around gentleman that he might be, is a poor philosopher. Prone to just this kind of error:

You cannot objectify qualia, therefore you cannot examine them scientifically.
The phenomenologists can't do it either, they just don't know it yet. — Wolfgang

English substance comes from French and it matches usía in meaning likely because of the way the equivalent word in other languages has been used in European philosophy. — Lionino

That contradicts the sources cited, so I will say for the final time, you are mistaken.

anything to contribute about the actual question? The reification of Being? Or are you preoccupied with picking nits?

I'm trying to imagine what it will be like if Trump is a convicted felon and wins the election. What will that even be like? What if he has a prison sentence? Will that just be hand-waved away when he gets sworn in as POTUS again? — GRWelsh

I've been asking that question here too. Imagine the nominating convention in Milwaukee in July, if Trump has been convicted over the January 6th charges. Readers may recall there was a rebellion at the 2016 convention by the Stop Trump contingent. It failed at the time, but what will happen this time? What would it mean for one of the two major political parties in the US to support the nomination of someone convicted for attempting to prevent the transfer of power? How could that be anything other than a constitutional crisis?

Me, I don't think it will come to that. But it's not out of the question.

I stand by the sources I quoted. I am talking specifically of the philosophical use of 'substance'. Spinoza and Descartes initially published in Latin, and 'substantia', as the Encyclopedia Brittanica notes, was a neologism coined to translated 'ouisia'. The use of 'substance' to denote 'any kind of corporeal matter of stuff' is attested from 14th c (source) It too is originally derived from the Latin. Sure it might have also come in via French but as noted Latin was the lingua franca of philosophy up until and including Descartes. The historical roots of English have nothing to do it.

Your continued bluster misses the point of the egregious conflation between the philosophical and everyday use of the term. The passage I asked @Leontiskos to comment on was from a learned blog he linked to on Thomist philosophy.

a person is "an individual substance of a rational nature" according to Boethius' classical definition. And an individual substance is a hypostasis or supposit. This is precisely what suppositum or hypostasis signifies: an individual substance.

I've always felt that this use of 'substance' is the source of confusion in philosophy. If it is re-written like so:

a person is "an individual being of a rational nature" according to Boethius' classical definition. And an individual being is a hypostasis or supposit. This is precisely what suppositum or hypostasis signifies: an individual being.

Which is not right, either, but nevertheless conveys the original idea of 'ousia' better than 'substance'. After all, we have learned an astonishing number of things about material substance: the periodic table, the standard model of physics, the list is endless. What do we know of 'spiritual substance?' Why, it's a mere fiction, a hangover from medieval theology, the ghost in the machine. That's the substantive point. ;-)

If the hard problem cannot be resolved in science, it cannot be resolved in any area of human knowledge. — Apustimelogist

That is similar to the logical positivism of the mid 20th Century - 'whatever can be known, can be known by means of science'.

For the 5th (fifth) time, English 'substance' comes from French 'substance'. You are not Greek or Latin, you will never be, that is not your history, you are French, monsieur. — Lionino

And for the fifth time, you'd be wrong.

The philosophical term ‘substance’ corresponds to the Greek ousia, which means ‘being’, transmitted via the Latin substantia, which means ‘something that stands under or grounds things' — SEP- Substance

To hupokeimenon has an approximate Latin equivalent in substantia, “that which stands under.” Owing both to the close association of (prōtē) ousia and to hupokeimenon in Aristotle’s philosophy and to the absence of a suitable Latin equivalent of ousia (the closest analogue, essentia, a made-up Latin word formed in imitation of ousia, was used for another purpose), substantia became the customary Latin translation of the count noun (prōtē) ousia. — Encyc. Brittanica

Spinoza's Ethics, Latin edition, used the term 'substantia' in exactly this way. Descartes' texts were also originally published in Latin, prior to the French editions, and throughout them Descartes' use of the Latin term 'substantia' directly influenced the way his ideas were later translated and interpreted in other languages, including English. This term plays a critical role in understanding Descartes' philosophy, especially concerning his discussions on the nature of reality, existence, and the dualism of mind and body.

Which is where this whole discussion started in the first place, so with respect to your assertion that the philosophical term 'substance' originates with the French language and not the Latin, you are mistaken.

Hey Leontiskos, I perused the Thomist blog you linked to. I have a specific question on something I read there:

a person is "an individual substance of a rational nature" according to Boethius' classical definition. And an individual substance is a hypostasis or supposit. This is precisely what suppositum or hypostasis signifies: an individual substance.

I think the term 'individual substance' is rather odd, don't you? Shouldn't it be an individual being or an individual subject? This use of 'substance' is one of my gripes about philosophical terminology - I've often pointed out that it originates with the Latin translation of Aristotle's 'ouisia' as 'substantia', thence the English 'substance'. But 'substance' in ordinary usage means something utterly different to the philosophical 'substance'.

I'm sure those learned in Aquinas and philosophical terminology understand this distinction but it seems to me to result in a very unfortunate equivocation between the philosophical and ordinary meaning of the term, such that the meaning of the quoted passage really sounds decidedly odd.

Any thoughts on that?

Isn't that another way of asking 'is there a reason for existence?'
— Wayfarer

No, its really just asking the question, "Should there be existence?" — Philosophim

They mean the same. 'Should there be?' is just another way of asking 'is there a reason for?'

Here we are, trying to re-invent philosophy on the basis of hair-splitting distinctions.

What we know about the world and have observed tells us that they are intimately related to a deep, deep extent. Its pretty much certain at this point that our abilities to do anything mental - to see, think, behave, whatever - are a direct consequence of brain function. — Apustimelogist

And I think the motivation for that is to try bring the issue into the ambit of science, neuroscience in particular, as if this makes it tractable to scientific method. It is exactly one of the targets of the hard problem.

In theory, any kind of abstraction could be performed by some kind of neural network. — Apustimelogist

We can imbue machines with that ability, because we already possess it. If we can discern it in brain functions to some extent it's because we know what it is, and so, what we're looking for. And we know what it is, because it is internal to thought. If it were not already so, we would not be able to discern it in anything. We can't see it from the outside, though, because in order to see it, we must already possess it. Instead we project it onto the physical domain, although it is not innately present in it.

The brain is basically a neural network that can make inferences about sensory data, predict what goes next, generate behavior under a model of what should come next embodied in its physiology/anatomy. … Abstractions are just a product of what these neural networks are capable of doing. — Apustimelogist

But we know that because of the ability to make inferences, to infer causality, to say that this phenomena must mean that [x]. And that, I say, is epistemologically prior to whatever we deem to be physical, as the definition of physical relies on just those rational abilities - abilities which are quite separate from sensory perception. I see the claim that abstractions are ‘a product of’ physical causation as incoherent, as the notion of causation itself is an abstraction, relying on the ability to abstract and generalise. That’s the point of Maritain’s argument:

For Empiricism there is no essential difference between the intellect and the senses. The fact which obliges a correct theory of knowledge to recognize this essential difference is simply disregarded. What fact? The fact that the human intellect grasps, first in a most indeterminate manner, then more and more distinctly, certain sets of intelligible features -- that is, natures, say, the human nature -- which exist in the real as identical with individuals, with Peter or John for instance, but which are universal in the mind and presented to it as universal objects, positively one (within the mind) and common to an infinity of singular things (in reality).

Thanks to the association of particular images and recollections, a dog reacts in a similar manner to the similar particular impressions his eyes or his nose receive from this thing we call a piece of sugar or this thing we call an intruder; he does not know what is sugar or what is intruder. He plays, he lives in his affective and motor functions, or rather he is put into motion by the similarities which exist between things of the same kind; he does not see the similarity, the common features as such. What is lacking is the flash of intelligibility; he has no ear for the intelligible meaning. He has not the idea or the concept of the thing he knows, that is, from which he receives sensory impressions; his knowledge remains immersed in the subjectivity of his own feelings -- only in man, with the universal idea, does knowledge achieve objectivity. And his field of knowledge is strictly limited: only the universal idea sets free -- in man -- the potential infinity of knowledge.

Such are the basic facts which Empiricism ignores, and in the disregard of which it undertakes to philosophize.

Seems to me basically everything we experience is modeled off activity at our sensory boundaries. Things like math are just an abstraction of that information from our sensory boundaries — Apustimelogist

You may or may not be interested, but here is an essay by a Aristotelian Thomist on why human intellectual capacity is different in kind to sense-perception. The section immediately after III is relevant to your claim. (Probably not the ideal thread to discuss it, but it is connected to your remark.)

Sure. Trump spent huge amounts of time in his last months in office assembling success stories, so-called, but his legislative record was extremely thin, and many of the things he blustered about, like overturning the Affordable Care Act, never happened. He also undermined much important environmental legislation because of his belief that climate change is a hoax.

But I'll leave it there, as you yourself said the other day:

I think Trump is an incompetent child, ill-fitted to working the desk at a Hotel let alone owning one. So the idea that he was President hits me as a joke. I can't grasp it fully. — AmadeusD

And in this, consists a claim that is entirely incomprehensible to anyone who disagrees. — AmadeusD

It's not incomprehensible, if you take the time to analyse the figures. There has been measurable progress on environmental legislation, economic growth, jobs growth, controlling inflation, and many other metrics, beyond the froth that pops up in newsfeeds. It is objectively true that the one major piece of legistlation passed in the Trump presidency was for tax cuts that benefitted the wealthy and massively increased government indebtedness.

But it's objectively untrue. You know the MAGA have been trying to pin crimes on him - just one! - for the last three years, they have found absolutely nothing. He's been a dedicated public servant all his career. You need to be more discriminating, there is not a moral equivalence at work, it is not 'both sides are to blame'.

I know, I know. But I like to think that Biden is unpopular in a different way.

Does this rely on that Platonic conception of the 'real' though? If so, I can see why Schop is considered wrong there, given that particular version of things doesn't really work for anything beyond Platonic discussion specifically (i.e Platonic forms tend to only be used as an exemplar or metaphor, rather than an example of anything actually being discussed - in my experience./reading). — AmadeusD

Understanding 'the ideas' is a very subtle and difficult thing. Not that I'm by any means an expert but I think I have an intuitive grasp. My heuristic is that 'the ideas' and the 'noumena' do not exist in the way that tables, chairs and apples exist. They are real on an altogether different level - which is the meaning of transcendent (again, a term which was adapted and somewhat modified by Kant).

Before the advent of modernity, this seemed to have been understood, because of the 'scala naturae', the Great Chain of Being, which stretched from matter (at bottom) to the Divine Intellect (at top) with humans being in a kind of intermediate level. So due to Reason, which was the spark of the divine intellect in humans (that which enables them to see what truly is), the Philosopher could 'ascend' to the 'realm of forms' (this was a kind of intellectual conversion or transformation). Of course, nobody believes this any more, it fell out of favour many centuries ago. I've found a few sources that articulate it, notably the SEP entry on early medieval scholastic John Scotus Eriugena - ' a particular level (of being) may be affirmed to be real by those on a lower or on the same level, but the one above it is thought not to be real in the same way. If humans are thought to exist in a certain way, then angels do not exist in that way.' But due to the 'flattening' of ontology in the transition to modernity, and the belief that only the physical is real, this is, of course, completely unintelligible to most.

Anyway this is all a major digression, for which I apologise, but it's a part of my personal philosophical quest.

How long do they think that's gonna hold? When will that house of cards fall down? — Christoffer

As I said a couple of pages back, there are two extremely serious felony trials looming, the Jan 6th and the Classified Documents trials. If the first of these does result in a guilty verdict, how is it possible that at the Nominating Convention in Milwaukee in July, the Republican Party selects a candidate who has been criminally convicted of trying to interfere with the last election? How is it even conceivable?

By the way, I don't accept that Biden is feeble or senile or incapable. I do accept that he projects very poorly on the podium but considering the stuff he's having to deal with, and magnitude of the problems he and the world are dealing with, any number of which could literally be world-ending, I think he's doing a quite exceptional job.

Not everything fits into one or the other category. Cognition, metacognition, meaning, truth, social institutions, and other things quite simply are neither one nor the other. — creativesoul

Right! Agree with that also. They transcend the subject-object distinction.

It seems really, really clear that most thinkers consider the thing-in-itself noumenal. Can you help me understand how this is the case, with Noumena/on being different from the thing-in-itself? It is just Kant being annoying and confusing"? — AmadeusD

There's a helpful Wikipedia entry on Noumenon (Philosophy). It discusses whether and in what sense the noumenal is synonymous with ding-an-sich (general view is that it's not synonmous, but that Kant was rather inconsistent with his usage).

But an important point concerns the etymology of the term, which I copy here:

The Greek word νοούμενoν, nooúmenon (plural νοούμενα, nooúmena) is the neuter middle-passive present participle of νοεῖν, noeîn, 'to think, to mean', which in turn originates from the word νοῦς, noûs, an Attic contracted form of νόος, nóos, 'perception, understanding, mind'. A rough equivalent in English would be "that which is thought", or "the object of an act of thought".

However, I think the 'rough equivalent' overlooks the subtlety of the fact that the term is derived from 'nous'. Nous is one of those seminal philosophical terms, associated with Aristotle but found throughout Greek philosophy, which is nowadays often translated as 'intellect' but means something much more like 'that which discerns what truly is'. Recall that in Platonic epistemology, only intelligible objects - the forms or Ideas - were actually real, and that empirical objects were a shadow or instantiation of the Forms of things.

In some form or another, this was preserved all the way up until Scholastic philosophy as matter-form dualism (hylomorphism). So in that context, 'the object of nous' was explicitly not a sensible object, but the Idea, Form, or Principle of an object (that which makes the particular what it is).

Now Kant changed the meaning of the term somewhat. Notice the remark taken from Schopenhauer in that article:

The difference between abstract and intuitive cognition, which Kant entirely overlooks, was the very one that ancient philosophers indicated as φαινόμενα [phainomena] and νοούμενα [nooumena]; the opposition and incommensurability between these terms proved very productive in the philosophemes of the Eleatics, in Plato's doctrine of Ideas, in the dialectic of the Megarics, and later in the scholastics, in the conflict between nominalism and realism. This latter conflict was the late development of a seed already present in the opposed tendencies of Plato and Aristotle. But Kant, who completely and irresponsibly neglected the issue for which the terms φαινομένα and νοούμενα were already in use, then took possession of the terms as if they were stray and ownerless, and used them as designations of things in themselves and their appearances.

(This has been discussed before here, and others have opined that Schopenhauer was wrong in his assessment, but I can certainly see the sense in it.)

I didn't mean this entry to be so long, but what it gets at is that 'the noumenal' actually has quite a pedigree, prior to Kant, but that Kant appropriated the term, as Schopenhauer says, for his own purposes. But in the earlier philosophies, what was 'an object of thought' was not some unknown thing, but an Idea or Form which could only be grasped intellectually (or 'noetically') but which didn't exist on the plane of sensible (or sense-able) objects.

Consider all this a footnote.

Unfortunately, even if Trump loses, America politics are going to remain incredibly broken. — Count Timothy von Icarus

I don't want to believe that. I mean, it is easy to believe, but at the same time, this forthcoming election may well be a circuit-breaker. I'm convinced that Trump will loose, even if he is the nominee, which I think is highly dubious. The 'Red Wave' never materialised at the half-terms. The Republicans now have a majority of only three after Santos' expulsion, it's conceivable that the Democrats might win the House, Senate and White House. And the House Republicans are basically split between moderates and the MAGA fringe, who are detested by a lot of people on both sides.

Despair and cynicism are part of the MAGA narrative - 'everything is broken, only we can fix it'. If I wanted to go and do the research on Biden's legislative and economic wins, I'm sure I could find it, although I don't want to spend the time. And yes, they're doing a very poor job of communicating those wins, but then Trump continues to suck all the oxygen from the room.

Agree the Ukrainian stalemate is disgraceful, and I'm sure there are Republicans who agree with that, but they're over a barrel held by halfwits like Marjorie Taylor Greene and Jim Jordan. The rot really set in with Gingrich and the Tea Party fundamentalists, and they are carrying it forward. But I refuse to give up hope.

Basically if "Existence should not be" is true, all other moral questions are moot. — Philosophim

Isn't that another way of asking 'is there a reason for existence?' And that, if there is a reason for existence, then there is what you're calling an 'objective morality' because existence is grounded in a reason, or is justified. Whereas if there is no reason for existence, then nihilism (nothing matters, nothing is real) flows from that. Have I paraphrased your intent?

And every time you say such things, a fence-sitter is closer to slipping off into Trump camp. — baker

More fool them.

So which one of you should one side with? — baker

I'll pick the side that is *not* cheering on a mendacious narcissist wannabe dictator.

I am relatively new to the philosophy forum. I was asked to indicate who I was responding to and I thought I did that. I commented immediately after Ciceronianus so I thought that would show on the thread. — George Fisher

Hi George, that was me who gave that advice and as it happens also produced the How To article that I linked to. Was that not clear? Couldn’t you find it? (Here it is again, just in case.) In the context in which I posted that, there had been a fairly large number of contributors and a lively debate, and it was difficult to see who the ‘you’ was that you were referring to. No big deal, just helps to keep things in order.

(Oh, and there’s some more Help articles in the Help section which you can find at the very bottom of the left-hand menu bar. And in case I didn’t say before, welcome to The Philosophy Forum.)

Existence is the smallest bit of identifiable material possible.

In our case, its quarks. But maybe in the future it will be something smaller. So the examples here are 'atomic' comparisons, but are simply an abstract for, 'the smallest existence' — Philosophim

Good ol' atomism, eh? The problem is, quarks, whatever they are, are not ‘identifiable material’ or ‘particles’ as such. From an article on the nature of particles:

A particle is...a collapsed wave function. But what in the world does that mean? Why does observation cause a distended mathematical function to collapse and a concrete particle to appear? And what decides the measurement’s outcome? Nearly a century later, physicists have no idea.

Werner Heisenberg elaborates:

During the nineteenth century, the development of chemistry and the theory of heat conformed very closely to the ideas first put forward by Leucippus and Democritus (i.e. atomists). ...The concept of the atom had proved exceptionally fruitful in the explanation of chemical bonding and the physical behavior of gases. It was soon apparent, however, that the particles called atoms by the chemist were composed of still smaller units. But these smaller units, the electrons, followed by the atomic nuclei and finally the elementary particles, protons and neutrons, also still seemed to be atoms from the standpoint of the materialist philosophy. The fact that, at least indirectly, one can actually see a single elementary particle—in a cloud chamber, say, or a bubble chamber—supports the view that the smallest units of matter are real physical objects, existing in the same sense that stones or flowers do.

But the inherent difficulties of the materialist theory of the atom, which had become apparent even in the ancient discussions about smallest particles, have also appeared very clearly in the development of physics during the present century.

This difficulty relates to the question whether the smallest units are ordinary physical objects, whether they exist in the same way as do stones or flowers. Here, the development of quantum theory some forty years ago has created a complete change in the situation. The mathematically-formulated laws of quantum theory show clearly that our ordinary intuitive concepts (such as ‘particle’ ~ wf) cannot be unambiguously applied to the smallest particles. All the words or concepts we use to describe ordinary physical objects, such as 'position', 'velocity', 'color', 'size', and so on, become indefinite and problematic if we try to use then of elementary particles. I cannot enter here into the details of this problem, which has been discussed so frequently in recent years. But it is important to realize that, while the behavior of the smallest particles cannot be unambiguously described in ordinary language, the language of mathematics is still adequate for a clear-cut account of what is going on (i.e. by predicting observations ~ wf).

During the coming years (spoken in 1949), the high-energy accelerators will bring to light many further interesting details about the behavior of elementary particles. But I am inclined to think that the answer just considered to the old philosophical problems will turn out to be final. If this is so, does this answer confirm the views of Democritus or Plato?

I think that on this point modern physics has definitely decided for Plato. For the smallest units of matter are not, in fact, physical objects in the ordinary sense of the word; they are forms, structures or— in Plato's sense—Ideas, which can be unambiguously spoken of only in the language of mathematics. — The Debate between Plato and Democritus

(Democritus represents materiaiism, Plato represents idealism.)

Turns out that 'the indivisible atom' is not quite so fundamental after all.

GPT reminds me of a sociopath; superficially charming, but you can sometimes sense the glib emptiness and fakery. — Tom Storm

A snippet from a recent exchange:

Wayfarer: The point about mathematical objects for mathematical realist, is that while they’re independent of any particular mind, they can only be apprehended by a mind.


ChatGPT Your clarification highlights a key point in the philosophy of mathematical realism: while mathematical entities are independent of any particular mind, they require a mind for apprehension and understanding. This perspective maintains that mathematical objects and truths exist independently of human thought, but human cognition is necessary to access, interpret, and understand these truths.

This stance is interesting because it navigates between two extremes. On one hand, it avoids the notion that mathematics is purely subjective or a construct of the human mind, which would imply that mathematical truths could vary or cease to exist without human thinkers. On the other hand, it acknowledges that our engagement with mathematics is a cognitive process, rooted in human thought and understanding.

This viewpoint resonates with certain interpretations of Platonism in mathematics, where mathematical entities are seen as abstract objects residing in a realm that we access intellectually. The human mind, in this view, acts as a bridge between the abstract, independent world of mathematical truths and our subjective experience and understanding of these truths.

I thought that a pretty cool response, but then, it was also telling me what I wanted to hear (although, how did it know that :chin: )

Our Western notions about religion are largely tailored after Christianity, so when we look at other religions, we automatically see them through our Christianity-shaped lens. Yet this isn't necessarily how things work in other religions. — baker

:100:

What Trump said in his speech to Iowa before the vote:

We’ve got a crooked country,” run by “stupid people,” “corrupt,” “incompetent,” “the worst.”
Trump, in the gospel according to Trump, was the victim of “hoaxes,” “witch hunts,” “lies,” “fake indictments,” “fake trials,” judges who “are animals,” a “rigged election,” “rigged indictments,” and a “rigged Department of Justice where we have radical left, bad people, lunatics.”
The nation’s capital, Washington, D.C., “is a rat-infested, graffiti-infested shithole,” he said, with swastikas all over the national monuments.

His opponents, the prophet Trump continued, are “Marxists,” “communists,” “fascists,” “liars, cheaters, thugs, perverts, frauds, crooks, freaks, creeps,” “warmongers” and “globalists.”
Immigrants are like a “vicious snake,” whose “bite is poisonous,” he told them, and there is an “invasion” at the border by “terrorists,” “jailbirds” and “drug lords.”
“Our country is dying,” he informed them. And, by the way, “You’re very close to World War III.”

The people loved it. They swallowed every word, and they voted for him.

I can’t quite understand why this is. but I don’t find it entertaining. Depressing, would be one word, and scary, another.

I have used ChatGPT daily since it came out in Nov 2022. I'm also using Bing Co-pilot for work-related stuff in my role as a technical writer. I've become very comfortable with ChatGPT, and often ask questions about issues raised on this forum (see this recent exchange). Of course it's true that it's sometimes mistaken and what it spits out needs to be validated against other sources, but overall the variety and tone of the output is quite amazing.

As for the impact on the jobs market, I can guess there will be employment categories that are going to be impacted. Apparently it's very handy with coding (I don't write code, so can't tell). I think many writing roles could be impacted, it turns out blog posts and short articles very easily. Personally I'm at the end of my career so I can't see it replacing me - I mean, it can't do what I'm required to do every day - but it's getting more capable all the time.

Love Penrose. Watched that interview yesterday. He's a hero of mine. Mind you, I bought his book Emperor's New Mind, and whilst I completely agreed with the jacket blurb, I can't understand his mathematically-based arguments, and a lot of what he says is over my head.

You may be right, I will admit I was commenting on one aspect of it. But I won't press the point. I was probably reacting to the explicit materialism of this statement:

And this contradicts the fact that every organism consists of nothing more than flesh and blood, thus of matter. — Wolfgang

Both neuroscience and artificial intelligence research are working on models and applications to compensate for damage to the organism on the one hand and to autonomize process sequences on the other. Both proceed inductively, collecting empirical data and evaluating them statistically. And both are hardly dependent on the insights of the philosophy of mind — Wolfgang

Speaking of AI research, I posed this quote to ChatGPT4, who agreed that philosophy of mind is not that relevant to neuroscience. But, it said, in respect of AI research:

AI research does have relevance to the philosophy of mind, particularly when it comes to questions about consciousness, self-awareness, and ethical considerations related to AI. While many AI researchers primarily focus on practical applications and improving AI system performance, there is a growing subfield of AI ethics and AI philosophy. These researchers do engage with philosophical questions, such as the nature of consciousness in AI, the ethical implications of AI decision-making, and AI's potential impact on society and human values.

So, while the claim is accurate in stating that neuroscience is not heavily dependent on the philosophy of mind, it is more nuanced in the case of AI research. Some aspects of AI research are influenced by philosophical considerations, especially in the realm of ethics and consciousness. Chatbots like myself, which are part of AI research, may draw upon philosophical insights when discussing topics related to ethics, consciousness, and human values. However, the core functionality of chatbots like me is primarily based on language models and machine learning techniques, which are more grounded in empirical data and statistical methods. — ChatGPT

I have put many philosophical questions to ChatGPT since it came out, and have been overall impressed with the responses (not least the personable tone, and the way it conveys genuine interest (e.g. 'that is an intriguing insight', 'that is a very nuanced analysis', and so on.)

if he goes too far — Christoffer

Everything he's done since coming down the escalator is a step too far. A thousand times already, it's been 'that's it, now he's done it, there's no coming back from this.' And yet, here we are.

It's only that the comment I responded to seemed quite indifferent to the possibility of Trump winning or even that - 'if and when' - it's probable. Don't you think that he's a real threat to society? Not trying to pick a fight, I'm just trying to understand people's attitudes.