According to Lloyd Gerson in Platonism and Naturalism, universals are the only means of preserving realistic identity, because they provide the means that something can remain the same whilst also changing (same in essence, different in specifics.) This discovery was a consequence of the long dialectic arising from the teachings of Parmenides (nothing real changes) and Heraclitus (nothing real stays the same.)

As to whether identity can be reduced to genetics, I think not. People can overcome their genetic predispositions, although of course they can also enact them. But they are not wholly determined by them.

Why not? How can the existence of the universe from purely natural, non-God causes, be not a contradiction of the creation of the universe from God causes? — FreeEmotion

Because they're insufficiently defined. Our understanding of nature changes every day. Likewise what 'divine creation' means is far from obvious.

According to the big-bang model, the universe expanded rapidly from a highly compressed primordial state, which resulted in a significant decrease in density and temperature. Soon afterward, the dominance of matter over antimatter (as observed today) may have been established by processes that also predict proton decay. During this stage many types of elementary particles may have been present. After a few seconds, the universe cooled enough to allow the formation of certain nuclei. The theory predicts that definite amounts of hydrogen, helium, and lithium were produced.
— Britannica

Do you see the word "God" in any of the above description? — FreeEmotion

Here's an interesting story. The original form of the 'big-bang' model was published by a scientist who was also a Catholic priest, Georges LeMaitre, in the late 1920's. It was a paper called 'The Primordial Atom'.

At first it was hardly noticed as it was published in an obscure journal but it gradually gained attention during the 1930's. (It wasn't named 'big bang' until Fred Hoyle, another astronomer, called it that in a radio broadcast. He never accepted the idea and coined the name by way of deprecating it.)

Anyway, during the 1930's there was a lot of scientific resistance to the theory because it sounded too much like 'creation from nothing'. After all, it appears to say that the entire universe burst forth from an infintesmally small point in a minute fraction of a second. In fact it sounded so much like that, that by the 1950's, Pope Pious XII was saying that LeMaitre's theory supported the doctrine of creation ex nihilo. But LeMaitre resisted that idea, saying that science and religion should be kept separate in such matters. He even asked the Pope's science advisor to advise him not to keep promoting this idea (and that takes some chutzpah, considering he was a priest.)

So - I don't think the boundaries, or the conflicts, between scientific and religious are nearly so clear-cut as you believe.

You keep trying to push Indian religions because you personally subscribe to it/them, not because they are pertinent. — Lionino

I can see why you say that, but it's because they are a source of explanatory frameworks and metaphors which are largely absent in modern discouse.I mean, after all, the subject of the OP is 'reasons for believing in the permanence of the soul'. Who in secular culture even believes there is a soul? I know from long experience on this forum that the idea of the soul is not well-received here.

the west is catholic — Lionino

That's a bit of an over-generalisation, I feel. I do have some knowledge, very limited, of the philosophy of Aquinas, and there are Catholic philosophers I respect considerably, but I don't know if I accept their eschatology.

Not in the least, not the slightest. I feel my side-comments are derailing the thread.

To describe it in terms of "qualia" trivialises the issue. "Qualia" is jargon used in contemporary philosophy of mind to try and describe the irreducibly subjective, first-person nature of experience (or being) in third-person terminology.

Yes, but this is a rather rarefied point. — Leontiskos

I think it's a fundamental point, but one that has been lost sight of.

:up: The idea of self as a unified and unifying process rather than as an unchanging entity is realistic in my view. The process view goes back to Heraclitus and 'you can never step in the same river twice'. It also has resonances with Buddhist philosophy which views the individual as a 'mind-stream' (citta-santana) rather than as an unchanging unitary self (atman) and of course with Alfred North Whitehead and modern process philosophy (see this blog post).

This would be a consequence of the material world and neurology, in which the brain conditions the mental state to have this memory, because the brains corresponding to the previous mental state and the current mental state have spatio-temporal continuity. — Lionino

I don't accept that neurology or the natural sciences, generally, have an adequate grasp of the intricacies of inherited memory and the like. Consider that individuals are born with proclivities, talents, dispositions, and so on. You can account for a certain proportion of it in terms of cultural conditioning and social influence, but there seem traits which seem impossible to account for by those means (precocious talent, for instance.) Furthermore, much of what shapes and influences us is not directly available to conscious awareness or introspection. I'm sure I'd be right in saying that I sometimes do or say things for reasons (or due to impulses) the origin of which I myself am dimly aware of. Western culture has, of course, only naturalistic or materialist grounds on which to account for these factors, but I very much doubt their adequacy.

I think there's a deep underlying issue with the question of agency and moral responsibility. Of course if you accept the reality of karma then that provides the unifying principle that ties that together, but it's not widely popular in our culture.

This could be the central contradiction in your system. I think this commits you to the idea that there are objective truths which are not grounded in objective realities, which seems to be a contradiction. More concisely, "subjective truth" is chimerical (i.e. it is something which may seem attainable at first, but always fades into the horizon like a mirage). — Leontiskos

Here I would like to add a point about making distinction between 'subjectivity' and 'subjecthood'. It's an awkward distinction to make, but it attempts to distinguish between 'subjective' as in 'pertaining only to an individual' and 'subjective' as in 'pertaining to the state of being a subject', and to facts which can only be truly understood in the first person.

If a truth is not universally knowable, then it cannot be universally binding; and if the ground of a truth is accessible to only a single subject, then it is not universally knowable. — Leontiskos

This describes the subjective in the former sense. But what if those truths - like life-lessons or existential facts - that can only be understood 'in the first person'? Those that are not objective in the sense of corroborated by third-person measurement but real nonetheless?

If a truth is not universally knowable, then it cannot be universally binding; and if the ground of a truth is accessible to only a single subject, then it is not universally knowable. Offhand I can think of two kinds of subjective truths: truths known by a subject on the basis of private information; and truths made true by a subject's intentions. — Leontiskos

A valedictory for Joseph Pieper, the Thomist philosopher, said

Our minds do not—contrary to many views currently popular—create truth. Rather, they must be conformed to the truth of things given in creation. And such conformity is possible only as the moral virtues become deeply embedded in our character, a slow and halting process. We have “lost the awareness of the close bond that links the knowing of truth to the condition of purity.” That is, in order to know the truth we must become persons of a certain sort. The full transformation of character that we need will, in fact, finally require the virtues of faith, hope, and love. And this transformation will not necessarily—perhaps not often—be experienced by us as easy or painless. Hence the transformation of self that we must—by God’s grace—undergo “perhaps resembles passing through something akin to dying.”

'In order to know the truth we must become persons of a certain sort'.

If the concept of "apple" didn't exist, how could we be talking about the concept of "apple"?
If the word "apple" wasn't real, how could we be writing about the word "apple"? — RussellA

What I was referring to as oxymoron, or self-contradictory, was

"apples" and "electrons" are real in that they have an objective independent existence within language. — RussellA

'Objective and independent' stands in contradiction to 'within language'.

Consider the mind and a mind-independent world. — RussellA

We cannot consider a mind-independent world, because to consider anything is to make it the subject of thought. You refer to 'the mind dependent' and 'mind independent' as if these are two separate realities, but that is comparison that can't be made.

for the Empirical Realist, the apple that is perceived is a mere representation, not something that is mind-independent.

When you say the apple exists, but doesn't have inherent existence, what do you mean? — RussellA

That it does not exist independently of the mind.


@Mww - thanks for those excerpts and specific commentary. I'll bow out now unless I have something to add specific to the text.

I recently discovered that others can think in words. Some have even admitted to hearing an inner monologue, not so much as an audio hallucination, but as a fundamental component of their thinking. — NOS4A2

Do you mean there are people who don't?

Mind you, if you consider the net of the awards to Dominion Voting and this case alone, Trump's lies have cost various parties around a billion dollars. And counting!

My answer would be that yes, "apples" and "electrons" do exist, and they exist as concepts in the mind.

My answer would also be that "apples" and "electrons" are real in that they have an objective independent existence within language. — RussellA

But that is an oxymoron (although I am totally sympathetic to your struggles in these deep and difficult matters).

It is a matter of contention whether the paradoxical attributes of the objects of quantum physics can be said to obtain to the objects of sensory perception. Werner Heisenberg, who aside from being one of the architects of quantum theory, also wrote on its philosophical implications, said that electrons 'do not exist in the same way that flowers or stones do' (in 'The Debate between Plato and Democritus').

Some physicists would prefer to come back to the idea of an objective real world whose smallest parts exist objectively in the same sense as stones or trees exist independently of whether we observe them. That, however, is impossible. —WERNER HEISENBERG — Kripal, Jeffrey J.. The Flip: Who You Really Are and Why It Matters (p. 89). Penguin Books Ltd. Kindle Edition.

Second, with respect to the reality of the proverbial apple, I too am an empirical realist - there really are apples - but I also recognise the sense in which they exist for a subject. Another kind of being might not see them at all, or might see them in a completely different way. It doesn't mean that they don't exist, but that they don't have inherent existence - they are absent what Buddhist philosophy describes as 'own-being'.

Oh well at least I'm not mining bitcoins. :yikes:

In an interview outside the courthouse on Monday night, Giuliani claimed that “everything I said about them” — Aaron Blake

It beggars belief that he will still maintain this obvious lie in the face of all that is happening. And thanks once again for the detailed breakdown, it does help to comprehend the massive amounts of money being awarded.

Although the magnitude of the award is plainly absurd. How is a man of Guiliani’s much-depleted means supposed to actually shell out such an amount? It might be intended to be symbolic but it’s also somewhat ridiculous. (Not saying he doesn’t deserve severe consequences for his perfidy.)

In Aristotelian philosophy, nous is the basic understanding or awareness that allows humans to think rationally. For Aristotle, this was distinct from the processing of sensory perception, including the use of imagination and memory, which other animals can do. For him then, discussion of nous is connected to discussion of how the human mind sets definitions in a consistent and communicable way, and whether people must be born with some innate potential to understand the same universal categories in the same logical ways.

Like Macbeth, Western man made an evil decision, which has become the efficient and final cause of other evil decisions. Have we forgotten our encounter with the witches on the heath? It occurred in the late fourteenth century, and what the witches said to the protagonist of this drama was that man could realize himself more fully if he would only abandon his belief in the existence of transcendentals. The powers of darkness were working subtly, as always, and they couched this proposition in the seemingly innocent form of an attack upon universals. The defeat of logical realism in the great medieval debate was the crucial event in the history of Western culture; from this flowed those acts which issue now in modern decadence. — Richard Weaver, Ideas have Consequences

I read recently (but can’t remember where) that prior to Descartes, ‘ideas’ were not understood as the prerogative of individuals, and that the meaning changed as a consequence of Descartes’ expression of ‘clear and distinct ideas’ as being foundational to reason.


Subsequently ‘idea’ has become such a polysemic term that it defies definition. I can have ideas of all kinds from the trivial to the profound, all conceived simply as an act of thought. The consequence of which is to reduce any sense of ‘idea’ to the psychological. So I think to get some clarity on the issue the OP is tackling I’ll refer to a passage by A-T philosopher Edward Feser, which refers to ‘concepts’ rather than ‘ideas’:

As Aristotelians and Thomists use the term, intellect is that faculty by which we grasp abstract concepts (like the concepts man and mortal), put them together into judgments (like the judgment that all men are mortal), and reason logically from one judgment to another (as when we reason from all men are mortal and Socrates is a man to the conclusion that Socrates is mortal). It is to be distinguished from imagination, the faculty by which we form mental images (such as a visual mental image of what your mother looks like, an auditory mental image of what your favorite song sounds like, a gustatory mental image of what pizza tastes like, and so forth); and from sensation, the faculty by which we perceive the goings on in the external material world and the internal world of the body (such as a visual experience of the computer in front of you, the auditory experience of the cars passing by on the street outside your window, the awareness you have of the position of your legs, etc.)

‘Concept’ in this passage is nearer to the sense of ‘idea’ that was called into question by nominalism in the first place, by way of the reaction against ‘scholastic realism’.

We are in need of our monkey trainers. — Fooloso4

I'm often painfully aware of that need.

He gets this from Aristotle. — Fooloso4

Right - and this is the sense in which Aquinas is a representative of the philosophia perennis. Don't let the fact that it is interpreted differently in different cultures obscure the reality that these are differing interpretations of something fundamental to the human condition, and something which I think has largely dropped from philosophical discourse since Descartes.

A Priori does not mean universally true for all people at all times. — RussellA

I don't think your depiction of a priori as subjective is correct. A priori facts don't need to be validated against experience, they are known to be so by dint of logic alone.

If A priori is just innate to you, and all different from person to person, then what is the point of A priori? — Corvus

:up:

I cannot prove that electrons exist, yet I believe they exist. I justify my belief from the numerous scientific articles that I have read that say that electrons do exist. — RussellA

The problem with that view is that the manner in which electrons can be said to exist is not at all straightforward. As is well-known, electrons and other sub-atomic particles are said to manifest as waves in some contexts and as particles in others, depending on the nature of the experiment (although this is not the thread for that, there's some discussion of it in this thread.)

We have to get our head around the role of the mind-brain in constructing/creating what we perceive as reality. Kant and Schopenhauer both understood that, but it's rather a difficult thing to grasp. It requires something like a gestalt shift in perspective, more than just discursive reasoning.

Schopenhauer, who builds his own metaphysics from Kant's, is also a great read. — Bob Ross

Indeed. Of all the great philosophers, he is the most clearly-spoken and incisive.

Doesn't a deep examination into relationships involve an examiner and what is examined? Doesn't that examination require mind? — Fooloso4

You will encounter an expression in various schools of philosophical spirituality, 'the union of knower and known'. It is interpreted very differently in different cultures - for example the Zen doctrine of no-mind, mushin, elaborated in D T Suzuki's books (although rather difficult to compress into a forum post.)

In scholastic philosophy, the union of knower and known is seen as the process of assimilation which is foundational for the Thomist view of truth, where knowledge is seen as the conformity between the intellect (the knower) and the reality (the known).

But the key point is the falling away of the sense of separateness or otherness which characterises the egological attitude.

What Pirsig was onto was what is now called skillful coping — Joshs

:100: You'll like this, if you haven't seen it already.

Of course some will see no conflict between evolution and divine creation, but some will do. What is so difficult for me to accept is the pure logical contradiction between the act of divine creation and and all natural creation. Beliefs aside, the practice of reason absolutely demands that such a contradiction be recognized, what you want to do with that later is another matter. — FreeEmotion

Excellent question, but I don't think there has to be a 'pure logical contradiction' between creation natural and divine. I think it's pretty unsure what divine creation really means. It's a question of interpretation. All spiritual faiths have inner and outer meanings - you might ask why they must be expressed in symbols and parables, but the reason is, they convey truths that are very difficult to grasp, using imagery and allegories from everyday life. Misunderstanding those symbolic truths has been criticized even within the Christian faith from very early days. I've often re-quoted the following passage, although I'll acknowledge that I haven't read the book it came from:

Usually, even a non-Christian knows something about the earth, the heavens, and the other elements of the world, about the motion and orbit of the stars and even their size and relative positions, about the predictable eclipses of the sun and moon, the cycles of the years and the seasons, about the kinds of animals, shrubs, stones, and so forth, and this knowledge he holds to as being certain from reason and experience.

Now, it is a disgraceful and dangerous thing for an infidel to hear a Christian, presumably giving the meaning of Holy Scripture, talking nonsense on these topics; and we should take all means to prevent such an embarrassing situation, in which people show up vast ignorance in a Christian and laugh it to scorn. The shame is not so much that an ignorant individual is derided, but that people outside the household of faith think our sacred writers held such opinions, and, to the great loss of those for whose salvation we toil, the writers of our Scripture are criticized and rejected as unlearned men. If they find a Christian mistaken in a field which they themselves know well and hear him maintaining his foolish opinions about our books, how are they going to believe those books in matters concerning the resurrection of the dead, the hope of eternal life, and the kingdom of heaven, when they think their pages are full of falsehoods on facts which they themselves have learnt from experience and the light of reason?

Reckless and incompetent expounders of Holy Scripture bring untold trouble and sorrow on their wiser brethren when they are caught in one of their mischievous false opinions and are taken to task by those who are not bound by the authority of our sacred books. For then, to defend their utterly foolish and obviously untrue statements, they will try to call upon Holy Scripture for proof and even recite from memory many passages which they think support their position, although they understand neither what they say nor the things about which they make assertion. — St Augustine, (quoting 1 Tim 1:7, from The Literal Meaning of Genesis).

Another early Church father, Origen, was likewise scornful of those who didn't understand the symbolic meaning of scripture and who projected literal meaning on allegorical texts.

Have a read of Aquinas vs. Intelligent Design.

Can the question of what value is be addressed without regard to what it is that people value? Whatever answer we might give to the question "what is value?" wouldn't it be rejected if it is something that no one values? Is there a tipping point? Would it be an adequate answer if one person values it or only a few people? Does it matter who it is that values it? — Fooloso4

That reminds me of a long-ago book, Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance. In it, Pirsig argues that Western metaphysics too often focuses on the duality of mind and matter, with an emphasis on the rationality and objectivity. Pirsig proposes a different approach. He suggests that the this metaphysical framework has limitations when it comes to understanding the value or quality of things.

Pirsig argues that there is an inherent quality or value in everything, and this quality is not merely a subjective human judgment but something real. He believes that this quality can be discovered and understood through a process of "Quality" inquiry, which involves a deep examination of and insight into the relationships between things and the recognition of patterns and value inherent in those relationships.

Pirsig's metaphysics of quality was exemplified in his exploration of motorcycle maintenance and the idea that the quality of one's actions and the care put into them can be a source of meaning and fulfillment whilst also having practical consequences (namely, a beautifully maintained motorcycle!) He suggests that this metaphysical perspective can be applied to many aspects of life, including art, science, and the pursuit of personal excellence.

The connection with Zen is not made that explicit in the book, but Soto Zen , one of the two major Zen Buddhist sects, also places a strong emphasis on the integration of aesthetic qualities into everyday life. This practice is often referred to as "everyday Zen" or "Zen in daily life," and it involves applying mindfulness and a deep sense of presence to ordinary activities, such as cooking, calligraphy, gardening, and various forms of traditional arts.

In Soto Zen, the idea is that there is no clear separation between the sacred and the mundane. Instead, the practice of mindfulness and being fully present in each moment can elevate even the most routine tasks to a level of artistry and spiritual significance. Again in this respect Soto sidesteps or short-circuits the customary divisions between mind and matter, fact and value, that seem to bedevil the complicated Western psyche.

Thanks for that thorough report, it is comforting to know that there are substantive issues.

I feel that the burden of explanation being placed on me here is unreasonable. — FrancisRay

I don't think it's the burden of proof, as much as the request to explain what you mean. And this if from someone who has a very similar philosophical orientation. You tend towards sweeping statements 'As Kant notes' you say, omitting the fact that what Kant said about that precise issue constitutes some of the most difficult passages in the history of Western philosophy. 'Oh yes, everyone here will obviously know what I mean'. Afraid not.

Objective, measurable, repeatable. Keywords of scientific method.

well if he wins at least I’ll be able to tell my grandkids that I saw democracy die. If I’m allowed.

‘Hunter Biden is the son that Donald Trump never had’ ~ Jimmy Kimmel (commenting on the content of Hunter Biden's indictment documents.)

I mentioned a few days ago scepticism regarding the NY fraud case against Trump org. Here's a strongly worded CNN OP on that. Again makes the point that the supposed victims of Trump Org's fraud didn't complain and made a profit from the transactions. It also seems to me that the judge is motivated by personal animus against greedy business practices. Pains me to say it, but best not to take shots at a bull elephant without having the right kind of gun.

Disgraceful, vindictive gutter politics from the do-nothing MAGA Congress in passing the motion for a meritless impeachment today. American politics at its lamentable worst.

I re-read William James from time to time. He was from a different epoch in history, very much idealist in today's terms, before Western philosophy turned its back on idealism. His Varieties of Religious Experience is still a standard text in comparative religion. Anyway I thought his 'radical empiricism' worth mentioning in light of the discussion about empiricism and non-dualism.

I can't see any reason to think the answer is not undecidable. — Janus

Too many double negatives in that to make sense of. But according to this blog post by Sean Carroll the question is undecideable.

quantum mechanics has been around since the 1920’s at least, in a fairly settled form. John von Neumann laid out the mathematical structure in 1932. Subsequently, quantum mechanics has become the most important and best-tested part of modern physics. Without it, nothing makes sense. Every student who gets a degree in physics is supposed to learn QM above all else. There are a variety of experimental probes, all of which confirm the theory to spectacular precision.

And yet — we don’t understand it. — Sean Carroll

Makes me wonder if it is a form of sorcery :yikes:

As for what is or isn't mind-independent, much of the argument over interpretation revolves around just that point.

Remember the basic idea behind the concepts of materiality and physicality is that they denote that which exists in and of itself independently of human perception and understanding — Janus

Capable of existing independently was the original meaning of ‘substantia’ in the philosophical sense. And that was never understood as 'physical' until Descartes' 'res extensia'.

It has a lot to say — Pantagruel

...at least as far as objects are concerned.....

The thought crossed my mind that mention might be made of William James 'radical empiricism', so I asked my friendly AI assistant to provide a summary:

William James introduced the concept of "radical empiricism" to challenge traditional empiricism and provide a more inclusive framework for understanding human experience. Radical empiricism can be summarized as follows:

Experience as the fundamental reality: James argued that our understanding of reality should begin with individual human experience. He believed that traditional empiricism, which focused on sensory data as the sole basis of knowledge, was too restrictive. Instead, he advocated for a broader view that considers all aspects of human experience, including thoughts, emotions, and even mystical or transcendent experiences.

Pluralistic perspective: Radical empiricism acknowledges that there are multiple dimensions to experience, and it rejects the idea that reality can be reduced to a single, objective viewpoint. James emphasized the importance of considering diverse perspectives and taking into account the richness and complexity of human consciousness.

Rejecting the "block universe": James also critiqued the idea of a fixed, predetermined universe, arguing that experience is continually evolving and that the past, present, and future are interconnected. He rejected the notion of a rigid "block universe" in favor of a more dynamic and open-ended view of reality.

In essence, radical empiricism encourages us to explore and understand the full range of human experience and to recognize that reality is not limited to what can be empirically observed through the senses. It emphasizes the importance of individual and subjective perspectives in our quest to comprehend the world.

A much broader view of empiricism that would potentially be quite open to non-dualism.

there may be phenomena associated with life-processes whose feedback is long term and complex (read, "karma"), which, as real as they are, may not be measurable in any trivial sense. We need to always bear in mind that science functions explicitly by reductive abstraction. — Pantagruel

Totally agree. My remarks about the ineffectiveness of empiricism with respect to grasping the profound philosophical truths of Advaita were not meant as a criticism of Advaita, but to illustrate the implications and limitations of empiricism in such matters.

We seem to be demonstrating that judging the extent to which the advaita doctrine is empirically testable is not a straightforward problem. — FrancisRay

:100:

I'll give you an example of what I mean. Say that someone says that they have life-altering insights through meditation or spiritual philosophy. How could that be demonstrated to a disinterested third party? There are large-scale studies of the effects of meditation practice carried out by Universities and the like. That is an arduous process involving surveys, questionnaires, and the gathering of data about large numbers of subjects. That is 'empirical data'. What this or that person says about their state of awareness or changed state of being which they attribute to meditation or nondualism is not empirically verifiable. I'm not saying, on that account, that it's not true or doesn't represent a profound insight. But it's not empirically measurable.

t is an empirical fact that philosophers cannot decide metaphysical questions due the the logical absurdity of all their positive answers. — FrancisRay

That itself is not an empirical statement. Not that I want to pick nits with an otherwise kindred spirit. :chin:

I would strongly disagree that the advaita teachings do not teach factual information, however, and wonder what you mean by this comment. After all, it teaches that reality is not-two, and what more important fact could there be? — FrancisRay

Not factual in the sense of being about objective things or states-of-affairs. I don't mean it in the sense of not being true - far from it! - but not being about empirical facts. As Edward Conze says, 'the wise men of old have found a wisdom which is true, although it has no empirical basis in observations which can be made by everyone and everybody." Why? because it depends on insight.

Also, not at all clear by what is meant by 'metaphysically neutral'. Perhaps you might unpack that a little.

The question of what the nondual doctrine explains is easy to answer — FrancisRay

I'm very much influenced by my encounter with Advaita and (also Buddhist) non-dualism, although that mostly amounts to reading about it, with some regular meditation over periods of years. But I don't think it is an easy thing to explain.

Recently I've discovered an excellent Advaita teacher, Swami Sarvapriyananda, of the Vedanta Society of New York, who has many online videos and discussions with other philosophers (some can be found here. I particularly liked his conversation with idealist philosopher Bernardo Kastrup.) He is articulate, educated, and philosophically literate. Indeed the Vedanta Society of New York was originally founded by Swami Vivekandanda in the late 1800's and has had a profound influence in America and beyond.

Nevertheless I don't believe that the teachings of Advaita are easy to convey, as they demand a deep kind of perspective shift or insight. They are not trying convey factual information, but a fact about existence, which is said to be obscured by avidya, ignorance. And 'piercing the veil of ignorance' is the fundamental teaching of Advaita. It's simple in the sense of not being complicated, but it's not necessarily easy to grasp. The well-known Advaita guru, Sri Ramana Maharishi, made it perfectly clear that there was only one requirement for true 'God realisation', which was complete abandonment of the ego.

:up:

From an instrumentalist perspective, scientific theories are conditional propositions that do not say how things are in themselves, but rather predict or describe the empirical consequences of performing a particular action or observation in a particular context. So according to this perspective, possibilities are what is directly expressed by scientific theories, but not what is represented or referred to by such theories. — sime

Not a perspective of philosophical interest, I'm afraid. I'm genuinely interested in the philosophical implications. As I said already, what is ostensibly represented or referred to by fundamental physics is, or at least was, considered to be the ostensible building blocks of material reality. Of course as far as studying physics and putting the results to work is concerned, none of that is particularly important. But I think it's important.

There must be a good reason why there is no consensus among those who might actually know what they are talking about when it comes to the question about ontological status of the collapse of the wave function. — Janus

That's right! As it stands, it is still an open question, something many here seem not to notice. The three main popular books I have read on it the last 5 years or so are: Manjit Kumar, Quantum: Einstein, Bohr, and the Great Debate about the Nature of Reality(best of them in my view); David Lindley, Uncertainty: Einstein, Heisenberg and Bohr and the Struggle for the Soul of Science; and Adam Becker, What is Real? The Unfinished Quest for the Meaning of Quantum Physics. Notice all of them are about the 'debate over the nature of reality' and 'struggles for the soul of science'. It suggests that there's something important and real at stake.

Einstein represents the realist view - that what is real must be real independently of any act of measurement on our part. But it seems from those readings that in this philosophical respect, Einstein was mistaken (which probably has no bearing on his scientific discoveries).

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. — John Stewart Bell (1928-1990), author of 'Bell's Theorem' (or 'Bell's Inequality'), quoted in Quantum Profiles, by Jeremy Bernstein 1991, p. 84

We don't know whether there are "material ultimates" or not. — Janus

If a material ultimate can be conceived of in the classical sense of an atom, an indivisible point-particle, I think it's pretty definitively disproved. It is now said that sub-atomic particles are 'excitations in fields' - but what 'fields' are is an open question, as is whether there may be fields other than electromagnetic (which you would never detect with electromagnetic instruments, for example morphic fields.)

I read one of Paul Davies' books years back, around 1990, called: The Matter Myth, about just this this topic.

I do notice that you’re working through all these ideas here. Which is just what this forum is for. :ok: