I feel compelled to mention the name of John Vervaeke, author of a series of 51 recorded lectures called Awakening from the Meaning Crisis. Vervaeke is a Professor at University of Toronto the departments of psychology, cognitive science, and Buddhist psychology. Those lectures were given over the course of a year and cover a lot of material. More about Vervaeke here and transcriptions and other materials here.

The old Greek proverb: "count no man happy until he has died," is incoherent in the modern context. Happiness and the good life are disconnected from the original idea of "the Good Life." That is, the term "Good Life," as employed by Saint Augustine wasn't about "being happy and finding meaning," but rather about living the (morally) good life. Meaning and purpose are assumed in "the Good." I mean, it's even hard to make the distinction with our current lexicon. — Count Timothy von Icarus

My Indian Philosophy lecturer, Arvind Sharma, noted that when people die in the West, they say he's given up the ghost, while in India, they say he's given up the body.

Agree with your reading of McIntyre, although must confess After Virtue is on my 'must get around to finishing this' list. Interesting that he converted to Catholicism from having been a convinced Marxist. He believes A-T (Aristotelian Thomism) is the only coherent philosophical system in Western culture. I can see why he says that. The point about pre-modern philosophy and religion generally is that it is set against the background of belief in life eternal (or release from Saṃsāra), compared to which the joys and tribulations of worldly life are fleeting and transient. Naturalism is, of course, inimical to such concerns. According to it, we're simply another species (in fact for some on the extreme end of the green left, we ourselves are merely a pestilence.)

But you might agree that there are more and less meaningful ways to live. And that for many, the lack or loss of meaning is a genuine source of grief.

Greetings and thanks for the thoughtful post. Obviously it could be answered in any number of ways, but here I'll just respond with reference to what I consider unique about our historical situation.

I think these kinds of questions have really only been meaningful since maybe the mid-19th century. It would not have occured to anyone, or hardly anyone, that this was a question before that time. Subjects understood themselves in a social role, demarcated by their social class and their religion. Those background factors were assumed by everyone to be true - not only in the Christian West, but in other cultures also. The meaning of life was understood in those terms, and it was simply given, there was hardly the conceptual space to contemplate it. Of course, that may not be true of some exceptional individuals - Giordano Bruno comes to mind, but then his questioning of the accepted 'meta-narrative' so upset the establishment that he was burned at the stake. But to nearly anyone, if you were to ask them 'what is the meaning of life?', I think they would find it very hard to understand and respond, as their meaning was simply a given. They would not know what you were on about.

I think that with the dissolution of the geocentric cosmology and the advent of the scientific revolution there was a corresponding epochal shift in consciousness. The idea that human life might be the consequence of causes that could be understood through science was shockingly novel. As also was the discovery of the real vastness of the Universe and the age of the Earth. It thrust human culture into a completely different context - cf Pascal's 'the appalling vastness of space'. The idea that life could have arisen by chance alone, that there was no afterlife or any inherent reason for existence - these realisations were shattering. That is what gave rise to a great deal of art, literature and philosophy in the 20th Century - importantly, existentialism, from which the sense of 'existential crisis' arose.

I mention this to provide what I consider important historical context. Of course there is plenty more to say, but I'm sure there will be plenty of others to say it. :wink:

Very interesting and thank you for it. There has also been some comparative studies of the influence of Buddhism on Pyrrho of Elis and the subsequent formation of Pyrrhonian Scepticism. This also occurred through travels on the Silk Road and the Alexandrian Empire. There was a massive book published in 2008 or so, The Shape of Ancient Thought, Thomas McEvilly, an art historian, who goes into these purported influences in great detail (although when I did Buddhist Studies in 2011-12 there was no mention or awareness of this book by the academics.)

A question: whilst there are similarities, I think one cardinal difference is the absence in the Greek culture of an equivalent for the belief in saṃsāra and re-birth characteristic of Buddhist and Hindu cultures (although haven't looked at your article yet). I understand these themes were found in the Orphic religions which were the kind of generic Indo-European beliefs associated with very early Greek culture, but I don't know if that carries over to the Stoics.

Tip of the hat to @Gnomon for pointing out a book recently, Idealism: New Essays in Metaphysics which I have subsequently acquired. Chapter 5, Idealism Without God, seems relevant to the argument presented here. I googled the author, as you do, and found the website of Helen Yetter-Chappell (why does everyone look so young all of a sudden :yikes: ), which also contains a link to her (presumably yet to be published book) The View from Everywhere (readers will spot the allusion.)

reality is a vast unity of conscious experiences, that binds together experiences as of every object from every perspective: a “tapestry” woven out of experiential “threads”. — Helen Yetter-Chappell

Chapter 11 is on Buddhist Idealism, which I've not started yet, but which is another influence on this OP.

//ps Meh. Read that Yetter-Chappell chapter, not *that* impressed by it. But it's good to know there are young up-and-coming academics defending idealism.//

The deeper point about this essay, is that it draws attention to the naturalistic notion of the purported mind-independent nature of objects. Where this arises, is in the fact of our existence as subjects in the domain of objects. Scientific method seeks to eliminate all trace of the personal, the idiosyncratic, and, in that sense, the subjective, so as to ascertain the quantifiable attributes of the objects of scientific analysis which will be the same for any observer. This is why physics and physicalism have been paradigmatic for the scientific outlook generally. Furthermore, it puts aside the existential question of existence in favour of instrumental utility, of mastering the forces that beset us. (Hence the emphasis on the quantitative rather than qualitative.)

But what this conceals or overlooks is that objectivity is a methodological axiom which is then taken for a metaphysical principle. That is the point at which it becomes metaphysical, as distinct from methodological, naturalism. Methodological naturalism can be, in fact should be, circumspect with regards to metaphysical questions, of which ‘the role of the mind in the construal of experience’ is an example par excellence. But due to the generally dismissive attitude of modern culture to such questions, they are subjected to the Procrustean bed of empirical judgement, even though they transcend the bounds of empirical experience. This is what the OP is drawing attention to.

In what sense would "the Earth is further from the sun than Venus" no longer be true when sentient life is gone? — hypericin

That is one example of an empirical fact. As I said in the OP I don't deny empirical facts. What I'm criticizing is the attempt to absolutize them as self-existent in the absence of any mind. The nature of the universe absent any mind....well, what can be said?

Kant, to whose philosophy I refer, was an empirical scientist as well as philosopher. His theory of nebular formation, modified by Laplace, is still considered scientifically respectable, even if superseded in many ways by subsequent discoveries.

In relation to empirical science, Kant believed that our scientific knowledge is valid within the realm of phenomena. He acknowledged the importance and validity of empirical science in understanding the natural world, as it deals with how things appear to us through our senses and rational faculties. His own work in the field of physical geography and the nebular hypothesis reflects this belief in the value of empirical investigation.

Kant’s philosophy essentially proposes a framework in which empirical science can coexist with transcendental idealism. Empirical science investigates and explains the world of phenomena, which is the world as structured by our sensory and cognitive faculties. On the other hand, transcendental idealism addresses the fundamental nature of these faculties themselves and the limits of what we can know, as well as the sense in which what we know is moulded or constructed by our knowing of it. ‘Things conform to thoughts, not thoughts to things’ as it is sometimes said.

Likewise it’s important to understand that what I propose in the OP is not in conflict with empirical science.

For my part, I don't see why the roundness of the bowling ball should not be included among the "primitive constituents of that object as described by science". — hypericin

The mathematical description of a sphere in three-dimensional space is given by:

x²+y²+z²=r ²

Here x, y and z are the coordinates of any point on the surface of the sphere, and r is the radius of the sphere. This equation ensures that every point on the surface of the sphere is exactly r units away from the origin.

What about that equation ‘looks spherical?’ Rhetorical question of course but makes the point that a sphere can be perfectly described by an equation as can all of the primitive elements described by mathematical sciences without ‘looking like’ anything. Its appearance as spherical is imputed by the observing mind - which is not to deny that it is spherical, but to recognise the constructive contribution of the observer.

Holding aside the fact that the motion manages to ramble on for 39 pages without offering any proof of a relationship between the two prosecutors, the motion’s legal theory is defective because at most the allegations amount to an HR personnel issue, not a prosecutorial misconduct—one much less a supposed federal crime.

Here’s why romance between prosecutors is irrelevant to a criminal prosecution.

First, contrary to the Trump lawyer’s argument, there is no “conflict of interest” presented by two prosecutors having a romantic relationship. That’s because they are on the same side of the case. If a prosecutor and a defense attorney were a romantic item, then the defendant might argue that their defense counsel was conflicted because the relationship might cause the defense attorney to fail to zealously represent the client by going easy on their friends-with-benefits opponent.

To get around this problem, defendant Roman argues that the conflict arises from the allegation that the special prosecutor—Nathan Wade—spends money on vacations with Willis, and that Willis therefore improperly “profits” from the prosecution. The problem with this argument is the fact that Willis is already paid to prosecute the case, so there is no “profit” in any prosecution for her.

Any theory that Wade spent money on Willis derived entirely from his salary as a special prosecutor would require proof that—but for his special prosecutor salary—Wade could not afford to spend any money on his supposed dates with Willis. That’s hardly a convincing proposition on its face, and one that would be particularly to prove at any evidentiary hearing.

But as The New York Times reported, one law and ethics professor—Clark D. Cunningham of Georgia State University—opined that Roman’s motion should have included “sworn affidavits by witnesses with personal knowledge or authenticated documents,” so the lack of any such proof makes it appear likely that any hearing would produce nada.

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution—which first reported the story—quotes a professor emeritus ethics professor, Stephen Gillers, as saying if the allegations are true then “Willis was conflicted in the investigation and prosecution of the case” for lack of required “independent professional judgment.” But the professor goes on to clarify “that does not mean that her decisions were in fact improperly motivated,” but that the relationship could cause the public and state to lack confidence in her independent judgment.” Public confidence, however, is not a piece of evidence in criminal trials—because we don’t conduct prosecutions based on public opinion polling. — Shan Wu, The Daily Beast

Furthermore, even if the case were to be taken out of Willis' hands, it could be re-assigned to another Prosecutor, as there seems to be abundant evidence of criminal wrong-doing. Remember the famous 'I just need to find 11 thousand odd votes' in the defendant's own voice?

I have reviewed the comments I made on this thread six years ago, and I completely and unconditionally withdraw them. They were obnoxious and overly polemical. Later I will provide a revised response.

Are you conflating a frame of reference with a mental perspective? Nothing can be nearer or further, larger or smaller, independent of a frame of reference. But a frame of reference is not a mind, even though a mind can furnish one. — hypericin

Isn't positing 'a frame of reference' without their being a mind to conceive it, merely speculation?

It's difficult to convey Pinter's argument in a few sentences. But further on in the text, he notes:

We are misled by common sense to assume that we see in Gestalts because the world itself is constituted of whole objects. In actual fact, the manner in which physical objects are related to one another and come together rests on an entirely different principle, called the Addition of Simples, which is explained above. The reason events of the world appear holistic to animals is that animals perceive them in Gestalts. The atoms of a teacup do not collude together to form a teacup: The object is a teacup because it is constituted that way from a perspective outside of itself. In a similar way, a photograph consists of a large number of tiny dots of different colors, called pixels. The little dots do not conspire together to give rise to Grandma’s portrait. The portrait comes to exist in visual awareness when the whole of it is seen from an external perspective. The existence of an object as an individual whole is always something external to the object, not inherent in the object itself. — Mind and the Cosmic Order, Charles Pinter

In respect of the 'addition of simples'

Newton’s equations, which apply to pairs of bodies in space, determine the trajectories of planets around the sun. However, these trajectories are meaningful only to beings who see and conceive in Gestalts. The shape of an orbit, though it exists only in the eyes of a Gestalt observer, is a direct consequence of Newton’s laws, and no further principle is needed to account for it. Although the shapes of orbits are fully determined by the underlying physics (that is, by addition of simples), orbits exist only in the scheme of reality of Gestalt observers. The reality which a Gestalt observer perceives is quite different from that of the underlying physical world. In the Gestalt whole, the observer sees patterns—and these patterns do not exist in the ground reality because patterns emerge only in spread-out wholes and exist only in Gestalt perception.

I've had a few debates about this point with others here, and I agree it's a difficult point to convey. But what I think it means is that what we attribute to the world, as being the intrinsic property of objects, is actually an artefact of perception which is constructed from the (unconscious) tendency of the mind to construe objects as meaningful wholes. So what is thought to be 'inherent in the object' such as its perceived roundness, does not exist on the level of the primitive constituents of that object as described by science, but is imputed to it by the observer. And the reason that is difficult to see, is because we are accustomed to looking through that perspective, whereas here we're being asked to look at it. That's why I say at the outset of Mind Created World that the approach is mainly perspectival - that it requires a perspective shift (indeed, something very like a gestalt shift).

My essay ends with a quote (thanks to @Joshs for bringing it to attention):

Ultimately, what we call “reality” is so deeply suffused with mind- and language-dependent structures that it is altogether impossible to make a neat distinction between those parts of our beliefs that reflect the world “in itself” and those parts of our beliefs that simply express “our conceptual contribution.” The very idea that our cognition should be nothing but a re-presentation of something mind-independent consequently has to be abandoned — Husserl’s Legacy: Phenomenology, Metaphysics, and Transcendental Philosophy, Dan Zahavi

Trump hates America — GRWelsh

The only two world leaders that Trump routinely expresses admiration for a Kim Jong Un and Vladimir Putin, quite obviously because they exercise the kind of power that he lusts for.

So Trumps civil fraud trial concluded today. Assuming he’s on the hook for over $300 million— what happens then? He appeals…but he appeals in NY, right? It isn’t going to federal courts. — Mikie

Trump is beyond furious at this case. In Trump's thinking, he IS the law, and if he fudged his figures and lied about the values of his properties, they're not lies, but simply clever business practises. If, as expected, Justice Engeron essentially cancels the Trump's right to conduct business in New York, he's basically going to cancel the whole Trump organisation. Obviously Trump will appeal straight away, and I guess that the cancellations and fines will be suspended pending that appeal. But in business terms, this really is a knife to the throat of the Trump Organisation. As far as Trump is concerned, it's a political conspiracy contrived by a political DA and enacted by an irritating minor court functionary, with no basis in what he considers fact. Beyond furious.

Iowa Caucuses will be the first indication, results should be clear mid next week.

Waveforms & wavefunctions are subjective metaphors, not objective things. — Gnomon

Seems to me that these concepts transcend the division between subject and object - which you actually posit here:

a quantum particle is both Real (physical) and Virtual (mental or mathematical) — Gnomon

That book looks absolutely splendid, by the way. I will search around for it. Noted this quotation from the Notre Dame review of same:

(Susan) Schneider argues that physicalism stands astride a contradiction. On the one hand, the physicalist maintains everything in reality is either a fundamental physical entity or depends upon a fundamental physical entity in its (supervenience) base. On the other hand, the physicalist is committed to the idea that, at least in part, what individuates physical entities are certain mathematical facts. But mathematical facts are best construed as facts about abstracta, and hence the physicalist cannot accommodate them in her ontology. Schneider calls this the "problem of the base".

Bullseye!

But just because we cannot truly think beyond perspective, isn't it injudicious to thereby conclude that reality itself is incoherent outside of perspective? — hypericin

What does 'coherent' mean?

Coherent

1. (of an argument, theory, or policy) logical and consistent - "they failed to develop a coherent economic strategy" Similar: logical, reasoned, reasonable, well reasoned, rational, sound, cogent, consistent, well organized, systematic, orderly, methodical, clear, lucid, articulate, relevant, intelligible, comprehensible, joined-up Opposite: incoherent, muddled,

2. forming a unified whole, "the arts could be systematized into one coherent body of knowledge"

Absent a perspective, how could there be coherence? As I said at the outset, we can imagine an empty cosmos, but that imaginative depiction still relies on an implicit perspective, or else there is nothing nearer or further, larger or smaller. The mind brings that order to any such depiction.

I also refer to a recent book I've mentioned a number of times, Mind and the Cosmic Order, Charles C. Pinter (Routledge Feb 2021). Pinter, a mathematician who had an interest in cognitive science, shows in great detail how it is the mind that operates in terms of gestalts (meaningful wholes) and brings the order we perceive to the universe:

Objects in the unobserved universe have no shape, color or individual appearance, because shape and appearance are created by minds. Nor do they have features, because features correspond to categories of animal sensation. This is the way the early universe was before the emergence of life—and the way the present universe is outside the view of any observer. — Introduction

@jgill

Texas Gov. Greg Abbott (R) said shooting people who cross the border is the only tool the state is not using to deter migrants because the Biden administration would sue the state for “murder.”

“We are using every tool that can be used from building a border wall, to building these border barriers, to passing this law that I signed that led to another lawsuit by the Biden administration where I signed a law making it illegal for somebody to enter Texas from another country,” Abbott said on “The Dana Loesch Show” last week.

“The only thing that we’re not doing is we’re not shooting people who come across the border, because of course the Biden administration would charge us with murder,” Abbott later added.

The implication being that, were there no law against it.... :yikes:

(source)

The best book I read on it was Manjit Kumar's 'Quantum: Einstein, Bohr, and the Great Debate About the Nature of Reality.' It provides a lot of detail on the original discoverers of quantum physics and especially on the Bohr-Einstein debates. Einstein was a diehard realist, he believed there is an objective reality and its the job of scientists to discern it. That was the reason he could never accept the probabalistic nature of quantum theory, God playing dice and spooky action at a distance. But as John Bell gloomily put it 'The discomfort that I feel is associated with the fact that the observed perfect quantum correlations seem to demand something like the "genetic" hypothesis. For me, it is so reasonable to assume that the photons in those experiments carry with them programs, which have been correlated in advance, telling them how to behave. This is so rational that I think that when Einstein saw that, and the others refused to see it, he was the rational man. The other people, although history has justified them, were burying their heads in the sand. I feel that Einstein's intellectual superiority over Bohr, in this instance, was enormous; a vast gulf between the man who saw clearly what was needed, and the obscurantist. So for me, it is a pity that Einstein's idea doesn't work. The reasonable thing just doesn't work.'

The moon is not in a specific state relative to anybody on Earth since it is over one second away and any measurement of it is quite old. That statement is wrong if one presumes counterfactuals. — noAxioms

I've never understood that expression about 'counter-factuals'. What does it mean, exactly?

Is it the current scientific consensus that inanimate matter evolves from to simple to complex in a similar pattern to organisms? — Vera Mont

I don't know if it's a consensus. That is the theory of a-biogenesis (literally 'life from non-living'.) It is of course one of the burning questions of the Creationism culture wars - ID people say that life must originate with divine intelligence, whereas scientific naturalism of course sees no such requirement.

But there's another point, which is that the theory of evolution doesn't account for how life originated. Given there are species, it explores how they evolve but it doesn't really provide an account of how it started. There's a often-quoted letter by Charles Darwin musing about the origin of life in a 'warm little pond' but it was not a serious effort at theorising. I think some of the current favourites are undersea vents, where complex chemicals are subjected to a big range of conditions, although I'm hazy on the detail.

Philosophically, I'm of the view that organisms are categorically different to inorganic matter in a variety of ways - they seek homeostasis, heal from injury, grow, replicate, and (naturally) evolve into new species. I'm not a fan of the attitude that as everything is created from the table of elements, that there is no essential difference between, say, rocks and microbes. I think there is.

Where does evolution begin? — Vera Mont

When I work that out, I’ll be sure to invite you to my Nobel Ceremony. Although I’ve always been rather drawn to the charmingly-named panspermia, the theory that organic compounds are dispersed throughout interstellar space and combine in various forms wherever the conditions are suitable.

The sources I consulted put sentience before consciousness, but it’s contested. Sapience is supposed to represent wisdom - the Latin ‘sapientia’ is distinguished from ‘scientia’.

Consciousness only entails awareness.
Sentience requires feelings about that awareness. — AmadeusD

I had rather thought it was the opposite. Crabs and lobsters are sentient beings, but would we call them 'consciously aware'?

No solid lines in between; just continuity. — Vera Mont

I think the leap from inorganic matter to organisms is just that - a leap. Says Ernst Mayr, one of the heavyweight biologists of the 20th Century, says 'The discovery of the genetic code was a breakthrough of the first order. It showed why organisms are fundamentally different from any kind of nonliving material. There is nothing in the inanimate world that has a genetic program which stores information with a history of three thousand million years!’

I'm not sure I agree. But want to extend the discussion to you. If you think living things are "conscious" or aware or have a "me" from which they reference the world, does this apply to all living things? Or where is the cutoff point? And why? — Benj96

I think a better word that 'conscious' might be 'sentient'. Sentience refers to the capacity to perceive and experience sensations or feelings, such as pain, pleasure, emotions, and basic awareness of one's surroundings. Sentience does not necessarily imply a high level of cognitive or self-awareness. It can exist in organisms that react to stimuli and have some form of subjective experience but do not possess complex thought processes or self-awareness.

Consciousness is a more complex and multifaceted concept. It includes self-awareness, the ability to think, reason, reflect, and have a sense of identity and an ongoing stream of thoughts and experiences.
Consciousness involves a higher level of cognitive functioning and is often associated with the ability to introspect, make decisions, and have a deep awareness of one's own mental state and the external world.

I'm inclined to say that all sentient beings have a primitive sense of self in that they have to distinguish themselves from their environment, seek sustenance, avoid danger, and so on. Plainly many simple creatures lack conscious awareness in the sense that humans and higher animals have it (dogs, whales, birds, elephants, etc) so are not self-conscious in the same sense. (Arthur Schopenhauer published a book on the idea that simple creatures are like somnambulists, sleep-walkers, who execute sophisticated behaviours, like a spider building a web, with no awareness of what they're doing.)

In any case, I recognise an ontological distinction between sentient beings, plant life, and rational sentient beings such as humans, which I think is often called into question.

The demonizing of Republicans/Conservatives as ethical monsters in the last 20 years has much, much more to answer for imo. — AmadeusD

But the Republican Party has a lot to answer for, doesn't it? After the January 6th atrocity, if the Senate had confirmed the impeachment, Trump's political meddling would be over. As it is, they've re-habilitated him and are continuing to push 'the big lie'. Even the current Speaker, when asked just the other day whether Biden's election was legitimate, would not give an unequivocal answer. They're pursuing a completely groundless impeachment motion against Biden on Trump's bidding, and Trump is once again dominating the Party. And they have allowed that to happen.

Hyperbolic. Note I said 'in spirit' - the demonising of a section of the populaton, 'Liberals' and 'the Deep State' along with bomb threats. It is fascistic, even if not on the same scale as Nazism.

Wouldn't January 6th have worked if there was? — Moliere

Who says it didn't? 139 current members of Congress voted not to certify the election result. They're still there doing Trump's bidding. The Jan 6th coup attempt is not finished.

Two excerpts from yesterday's Washington Post:

Donald Trump on Tuesday threatened unrest if the criminal charges against him cause him to lose the 2024 election.

Speaking to reporters after an appeals court hearing in which Trump’s lawyers said he should be immune from prosecution for trying to overturn the 2020 election, Trump claimed without evidence that he was being prosecuted because of polls showing him leading President Biden. He warned that if the charges succeed in damaging his candidacy, the result would be “bedlam.”

“I think they feel this is the way they’re going to try and win, and that’s not the way it goes,” Trump said. “It’ll be bedlam in the country. It’s a very bad thing. It’s a very bad precedent. As we said, it’s the opening of a Pandora’s box.”

On the same day, the headline story was "Violent political threats surge as 2024 begins, haunting American democracy

On Wednesday, bomb threats forced evacuations, closures or stepped-up security measures at more than a dozen state capitols, in Connecticut, Georgia, Kentucky, Michigan, Minnesota, Mississippi, Montana, Wisconsin, Hawaii, Maine, Oklahoma, Illinois, Idaho, South Dakota, Alabama, Alaska, Maryland and Arizona.

...Steven Levitsky, a professor of government at Harvard University who studies democracies around the world, noted that while violent threats span the political spectrum, the “vast majority” come from activists and others on the far right. Crucially, those threats are often not discouraged by their representatives in government, he said. Rather, Trump and others have appeared at times to encourage and condone the behavior.

Not far from krystallnacht, at least in spirit, but with 'Liberals' and 'the Deep State' as targets.

The moon was measured. It's still there despite it not being measured at the moment (like it's possible to ever not measure the moon from anywhere as close as Earth). The proton is like that, but with not quite as many 9's to express the probability of it still 'existing'. — noAxioms

I often bring up the famous rhetorical question that Albert Einstein asked his friend on an afternoon walk (I think it was Abraham Pais): 'Does the moon continue to exist when we're not looking at it?'

I think the answer is obviously 'yes' but the question I would like to ask is, why did he feel compelled to ask it in the first place? Why did it bother him?

Note that if I say something different from the physics-forum guys, they trump me. There are some really solid experts over there, and I don't often respond to questions for fear of putting my foot in my mouth. — noAxioms

They give philosophical questions very short shrift. To all intents, they're banned. So these questions fall between the planks - Philosophy Forum says 'hey, this is a physics question, it's not a matter for philosophy', and on Physics Forum, philosophical questions are not encouraged. I should know - I brought up a question about Platonic realism in mathematics, and it was deleted, with a polite note from a mod saying that nobody there had the expertise to answer it.

The others might still say it 'exists', in the manner of say energy, charge, baryon & lepton number conservation. It can't just not-exist. It just lacks objective properties that put it in a specific state. — noAxioms

Where I think it's philosophically interesting is because it introduces just this question of degree or kinds of existence. You know - it kind of exists. Because in most other contexts, 'existence' is a univocal term - something either exists, or it doesn't.

A purely human perspective that should not really be a foundation for objective understanding. To understand the universe, we do not need an exceptional emotional experience of it and fundamentally we are already doing something like that through art. — Christoffer

Very many deep questions here. Again a large part of scientific method is in the reduction of observables to their measurable attributes, and the integration of the observable results into an over-arching hypothesis. My claim is that whilst this has been an incredibly effective method, there is something that it leaves out as a matter of definition. It provides what philosopher Thomas Nagel calls 'the view from nowhere', which attempts to understand the world independently of any personal or subjective perspectives and experiences, aspiring to a form of understanding that transcends any particular individual's perspective. It is scientifically effective, but philosophically barren, because in reality we are subjects of experience, we're not really standing outside or separate from our lives or existence as a whole. And that is very much the thrust of phenomenology and existentialism.

What happens if you go beyond that point, other than the slits melting or something? Got a citation? — noAxioms

Thanks for your response! As I mentioned before, I ran the idea past Physics Forum, where I was told that:

Q: So energy is a significant variable - if you vary the energy, you vary the resulting pattern - but rate is not. Would that be a valid conclusion, all else being equal?

A: Yes, but only up to the point where the rate is so high that the interaction between different electrons can no longer be neglected.

You can confidently say about some proton that it 'exists' mostly because outside of the sun, protons are pretty stable and don't just cease existing, so it exists but you don't know exactly where it will be next measured. — noAxioms

It's the nature of that existence which is the philosophical conundrum. It's not as if it's precise position and momentum is unknown, but that it's indeterminable. It will be found whenever it is observed, but the sense in which it exists when not being observed is what is at issue.

In short, when philosophy (and the humanities in general) is broken down to the advocacy of the position of meaning or power, a very interesting conversation can begin. — Dermot Griffin

You're being too nice. What you're actually referring to is close to what Adorno and Horkheimer describe in the dialectics of the Enlightenment: the subordination of Reason to mere utility. Finding things out, getting things done, having a better life. Philosophy proper has its sights set on a higher goal - which you of course know. But I get that you're making concessions for the sake of conversation, and your interests really lie elsewhere ;-)

For most of us, both ancient and modern, the art of living is not something that can be practiced cloistered and removed from the demands and necessities of life. — Fooloso4

But then, most of us are not renunciates, sages, separated from the masses. Most of us are 'the they', das man, the man in the street. That's why traditional philosophy is extremely non-PC.

I’ve read up on Kant’s criticism of Berkeley, but I’m finding it hard to see how it connects to what I wrote in the post you responded to. I don’t deny that Kant believed there were objects outside us. Only that we don’t know what they really are.

Let’s not forget that only yesterday, in support of Trump’s claim for immunity, his own lawyer argued, in a Federal Court of Appeals, that Trump should literally be allowed to get away with murder - that if he ordered a Seal team to assasinate a rival, then he should be immune from prosecution, unless he were first impeached by both houses. Let that sink in. When Trump said he could shoot someone on Fifth Avenue and get away with it, it wasn’t empty rhetoric. He believes it. And a very large number of regular voters are apparently down with it.

The coup is ongoing. Don’t let anyone tell you otherwise. 139 current members of Congress voted not to certify the last election result.

But the wave form of the particle is not the probability wave of the particle is it? — jgill

But what is the probability wave, other than a distribution of probabilities? The answer to the question ‘where is the particle’ just IS the equation, right up until the time it is registered or measured. So the answer to the question ‘does the particle exist’ is not yes or no. The answer is given by the equation. So you can’t unequivocally say ‘it exists’ - you can only calculate the possibility that it might. (This torpedoes Democritus ‘atoms and the void’ by the way.)

So - does that mean ‘yes it is?’ - let’s ask @noAxioms.

Second point - this is one of the questions I asked on Physics Forum - it is well-known that if only one particle at a time is fired in the double-slit experiment, a wave interference pattern still occurs. But the intriguing thing is that even if you increase the rate, you still get the same pattern (up to a point). I posited that this indicated that time (rate being a function of time) was not a factor, meaning something like a ‘timeless wave’ - which was declared ‘gobbledygook’ by my interlocutor (ref).


So I don’t think of the wave function as a physical wave, but a pattern of degrees of likelihood. So the wave is in the fabric of reality itself, not the fabric of space-time.

But I know I’m on thin ice.

How much do you expect and or fear that a strong fascist moment could be organized within the next 5 years? — BC

Trump/MAGA is unashamedly fascist. He’s openly boasted that he thinks the constitution should be suspended, the public service purged, and his enemies subjected to prosecution. He has a strong movement if polling data is to be believed. Many are saying that he will win the election, and although I don’t believe that he will, the acceptance of his threats of fascism and the escalation of violent threats against the judiciary and other institutions is alarming in the extreme.

Is he saying the probability wave is the particle?

But perhaps I am misinterpreting it. — jgill

As you know, the 'wave-particle duality' is one of the fundamental oddities of quantum mechanics. Bohr said, as I understand it, that you can't see whether it 'really is' a wave or a particle - that whether it appears as wave or particle depends on the way you set up the experiment ('nature exposed to our method of questioning' was another pithy aphorism.)

But the reason I posted it, was in response to the claim that there's nothing mysterious about the whole wave-function collapse business, we just change the object because of interfering with it. That really overlooks the greatest philosophical conundrum of modern physics. Not claiming that I can adjuticate it or have the definitive interpretation, so much as pointing out that (1) nobody can and (2) there isn't one.

1. Thing-in-itself appears to us as an unknowable entity; — AmadeusD

The 'thing in itself' is not anything, by definition. In order for it to be Something, it would have to appear.

ding-an-sich serves as a placeholder in Kant, to remind us that knowledge is limited to what appears to us, and the judgement we make ot it. We can't know what it really is, as it is in itself. But that doesn't make the thing in itself an unknowable something. Seeing it like that misreads or misunderstands why the term was used in the first place.


1. The "thing in itself" is not anything, by definition: the "thing in itself" is not an object of human knowledge or experience. Kant posited that human cognition is limited to what appears to us through our sensory perception and understanding. The "thing in itself" exists beyond the realm of human knowledge and experience.

2. In order for it to be Something, it would have to appear: it must be capable of appearing or being apprehended in some way. Kant argued that our knowledge is rooted in sensory experience and conceptual understanding, so the "thing in itself" cannot be known because it does not appear in this manner.

3. Ding-an-sich serves as a placeholder: Kant used the term "Ding-an-sich" as a placeholder or conceptual tool to emphasize the limits of human knowledge. It reminds us that our knowledge is contingent upon what appears to us and the judgments we can make about those appearances.

4. The thing in itself is not an unknowable something: while the "thing in itself" is unknowable in the sense that we cannot directly access it through human cognition, it should not be regarded as an entirely mysterious or unknowable entity. This view aligns with Kant's intent in using the concept to highlight the boundaries of human knowledge rather than making it completely unknowable.

The problem that Capital R realists have, is that they can't abide the notion that there's something about the proverbial Apple or Chair (='any object') which we don't see or understand. So they feel this burning urge to 'peek behind the curtain' and see what 'it really is'. That innate realism is a kind of barrier to understanding transcendental idealism in my view. The thing they need to learn is a kind of circumspection - rather Socratic in orientation, really.

A lot of people try to wave away the perpexities sorrounding quantum physics. I'm not a physicist, but I've discussed it with physicists, including posting detailed questions on Physics Forum and reading a pretty extensive list of books. And I don't believe anyone who says there is 'no mystery' around it. But I'm not going further along that line, as it's a famous derailer. Suffice to say, I'm one of the many who claim that quantum physics has forever torpedoed any simple form of physicalism. What remains is a general commitment to scientific method as the royal road to truth, a.k.a. 'scientism'.

But the philosophical point about the inherent limitation of objectivity remains.
— Wayfarer

It remains mostly just as a remark of an obvious observation on human perception, but it fails to lock down limitations as actual limitations of knowledge. We cannot see all wavelengths of light, but we know about them, we can simulate them, we use them both in measurements and in technology. Understanding reality doesn't require limitless perception, nor is it needed. — Christoffer

I'm not talking about the limits of knowledge. There is no end of things to discover. I'm talking about the limitations of objectivity as a mode of knowing.

Carl Sagan? He emphasizes the idea that sometimes people construct their beliefs first and then selectively choose or interpret facts to support those beliefs. — Christoffer

I looked it up - facts as being like 'ships in bottles' was from a philosopher called Jimena Canales, mentioned here some time back, link here. The point is, facts are always embedded in a context - theoretical, historical, social, and so on. The point about classical physics was that its calculations and predictions were not dependent on context in the way that higher-level and less straightforward sciences are. They are universally applicable, within a range. Physicalism generally wishes to extrapolate that method to knowledge in general.

The "observer" in quantum physics has to do with any interaction affecting the system. When you measure something you need to interact with the system somehow and that affects the system to define its collapsing outcome. This has been wrongfully interpreted as part of human observation, leading to pseudo-science concepts like our mind influencing the systems. But the act of influence is whatever we put into the system in order to get some answers out. — Christoffer

Not according to Brian Greene:

The explanation of uncertainty as arising through the unavoidable disturbance caused by the measurement process has provided physicists with a useful intuitive guide… . However, it can also be misleading. It may give the impression that uncertainty arises only when we lumbering experimenters meddle with things. This is not true. Uncertainty is built into the wave structure of quantum mechanics and exists whether or not we carry out some clumsy measurement. As an example, take a look at a particularly simple probability wave for a particle, the analog of a gently rolling ocean wave, shown in Figure 4.6.

Since the peaks are all uniformly moving to the right, you might guess that this wave describes a particle moving with the velocity of the wave peaks; experiments confirm that supposition. But where is the particle? Since the wave is uniformly spread throughout space, there is no way for us to say that the electron is here or there. When measured, it literally could be found anywhere. So while we know precisely how fast the particle is moving, there is huge uncertainty about its position. And as you see, this conclusion does not depend on our disturbing the particle. We never touched it. Instead, it relies on a basic feature of waves: they can be spreak out. — Brian Greene, The Fabric of the Cosmos

It is a fact that when the measurement is taken (or a registration is made) then the previously 'spread-out' nature of the 'particle' suddenly assumes a definite position. That is the (in)famous wave-function collapse the nature of which is still a matter of contention. It was what lead Wheeler to say that 'no phenomenon is a phenomenon until it is a registered phenomenon'. This is the sense in which quantum physics definitely mitigates against physicalism, and why you are compelled to dispute it.

insubstantial pluralism. — JuanZu

That's new to me!

Fossils are a good example. Did they just happen to form, or are they present because they have a material past?

I believe many things about the past -- the before now -- which are about the physical world. So I figure that must be physical, even if not present. (That dodoes existed, for instance) — Moliere

The philosophy I'm interested in recognises the empirical reality of past events, the pre-history of life before man and so on. But the reality that is imputed to them, is still imputed by an observing mind - yours, mine and whomever else considers the matter. The question is, is temporarility itself truly independent of any observing mind? And if the answer is yes, according to what scale or perspective is it so? Time - the measurement of duration - seems to me to depend on scale or perspective, and that is what it provided by the observing mind. None of which is to deny the reality of the fossil record.

I stand corrected.... :yikes:

I guess the guy that told it to me wasn't a mathematician.

There's an old joke. A University Chancellor was going through budget requests with the board of directors.

'The physics department!' he says, throwing his hands up in the air. 'They always want such enormous amounts of money! Big pieces of equipment, special buildings, all kinds of stuff.

"Why can't they be more like the English Department? All they want is books, and stationary, and wastepaper bins.

"Or the math department. They don't even want the bins."