Comments

  • If two different truths exist that call for opposite actions, can both still be true?
    WAI members compete with their domestic suppliers in downstream markets, and the Department of Commerce isn't concerned about the downstream impacts of AD/CVD. How does this situation allow WAI members to compete fairly in foreign and domestic markets?

    Also, to what extent do governments subsidise industry and/or require consumers to purchase domestic products?

    The International Wire Product Market appears to be a cooperative, asymmetric, zero-sum, sequential, discrete, many-player, Bayesian game where players/coalitions probably have:

    1) Incomplete information of game features (i.e., number and type of players/coalitions, their strategies and payoffs), and
    2) Imperfect information regarding game state/condition.

    The challenge is to allocate the payoff among players/coalitions in a fair manner.

    Players:
    1 & 2: Domestic and foreign wire rod producers.
    3 & 4: Domestic and foreign wire product manufacturers.
    5 & 6: Domestic and foreign wire product consumers.
    7 & 8: Domestic and foreign governments.
  • If two different truths exist that call for opposite actions, can both still be true?
    Can two sides with conflicting views of truth both be right? If so, does the concept of truth remain? — Mark Marsellli

    Truth is a proposition which accurately describes experience or reality (i.e., actuality).

    Because the same phenomenon may produce (a) different effect(s) upon different subjects, experience is subjective for individuals, or intersubjective for social groups; and in both cases, real (i.e., actual).

    So, different versions of truth may obtain with regard to the same phenomenon.

    Can one side’s truth can(sic) be considered a greater truth that subordinates a lesser truth? Or, is the essence of a truth that it is a truth, and as such cannot be made less of a truth by another truth? — Mark Marsellli

    By definition, degrees of truth do not obtain (i.e., a description is either accurate, or inaccurate), however; amounts of truth may obtain (i.e., a description may be either complete, or incomplete).
  • Is science equal to technology?
    Technology is (the) a physical manifestation of (the) science. — CosmicWanderer

    Yes, and as Harry Hindu pointed out: technology is a test of the truth value of that science per Negative Pragmatism, to wit:

    What "works" pragmatically might or might not be true, but what does not work must be false. — William Ernest Hocking
  • On the transition from non-life to life
    Information is information, not matter or energy. No materialism which does not admit this can survive at the present day. — Norbert Wiener

    It from bit. — John A. Wheeler

    In both cases, physics ends up endorsing an information-based description of nature. The universe is fundamentally composed of data, understood as dedomena, patterns or fields of differences, instead of matter or energy, with material objects as a complex secondary manifestation. — Luciano Floridi
  • Is science equal to technology?
    Wasting time arguing over semantics on an internet forum. — Marchesk

    You're kidding, right?
    The OP is concerned with the relationship between Science and Philosophy. We attach different meanings to the term "Science", so it's only logical that I try to ascertain what you mean by the term "Philosophy"
  • Is science equal to technology?
    What is your definition of modern "Philosophy"?
  • Is science equal to technology?
    So, Aristotle's zoological observations were philosophy, not science? — Galuchat
    No, they were not science. — Marchesk

    Then please define "Philosophy" in a way which includes activities such as Aristotle's zoological observations.
  • Is science equal to technology?
    I have modern science in mind which is a community built around the scientific method and naturalistic explanations based on the results of various experiments and research performed over time. — Marchesk

    So, Aristotle's zoological observations were philosophy, not science? And Zhang Heng (78-139), Zhang Zhongjing (150-219), Aryabhatta (476-550), al-Haytham (965-1040), al-Biruni (973-1048), and Avicenna (980-1037) were also not scientists (among others)?
  • Is science equal to technology?


    Does the origin of the scientific method go back "thousands of years" (Jeremiah), or "several centuries" (Marchesk)?
  • Is science equal to technology?
    No, unless you want to redefine the word "Science" to mean perception. — Marchesk

    I provided a definition for "Science" in my first post to this thread.
    Feel free to provide a different one for consideration.
  • Is science equal to technology?
    Science as a discipline is relatively recent. — Marchesk

    Empirical investigation may consist of simple observation (e.g., flint can be chiselled to provide a cutting edge), or more complex observation (e.g., the results of experiments which test the hypothesis: flint is a hard, sedimentary cryptocrystalline form of the mineral quartz).

    If Science is empirical investigation, and the psychological process of observation is its method, then when in human history have human beings been without Science? Never.

    Someone asks me, "Is there a house across the road?" (problem definition).
    I look out the window (observation), and see a house across the road (fact established).
    I answer, "yes" (condition explained).
    That's Science.
  • Is science equal to technology?
    It seems a kind of "explaining away". — Pacem
    Correct.
  • Is science equal to technology?
    How should we reestablish of relations between science and technology to make wider room for philosophy? — Pacem

    If it were required, by conceptual analysis, to wit:

    1) Science: empirical investigation which provides a reliable explanation.
    2) Technology: applied science production.
    3) Philosophy: logical investigation which provides a coherent concept and/or model.
  • Unequal Distribution of Contingent Suffering
    Contingent suffering is the suffering that is contingent on situational context. — schopenhauer1

    The situational context (a redundant phrase) shared by all human beings, the human condition (i.e., existence as a human being), produces its own forms of suffering by means of the choices we make every day.

    These are choices which satisfy one's:
    1) Corporeal needs and desires (being mindful of mortality),
    2) Social needs and desires (being mindful of a transcendent public good), or
    3) Ethical needs and desires (being mindful of moral obligations imposed by conscience).

    Reaction: choosing to satisfy fundamental human needs in all three categories (i.e., corporeal, social, and ethical) results in the least amount of contingent suffering produced by the human condition.
  • Forget about proving God, Is it man-made?
    So if we could backward construct the object into a blueprint and verbal model, we might have an insight into the creator of it? — MikeL

    I would prefer to use the word "origin" rather than "creator", because creations can be natural or artificial (to create is simply to produce something new). Spiders create webs, painters create art.

    Analysis may, or may not, determine the producer (i.e., cause) of an object. So, I don't see how the natural/man-made distinction provides any insights with regard to God.
  • Forget about proving God, Is it man-made?
    A composite concept, situation or system? Still not sure what you mean. — MikeL

    A domain ontology is a verbal model.
    And a new building is a verbal model before it becomes blueprints, then bricks and mortar.
  • Forget about proving God, Is it man-made?
    Hey, Galuchat, what do you mean by human verbal modelling? — MikeL

    Human beings are unique among all other organisms in nature in that they have the faculty of language. This faculty permits verbal conceptualisation (e.g., definitions like the one provided for nature, above) and verbal modelling (i.e., constructing a set of related verbal concepts, such as: natural, artificial, produce, manufacture, create, etc. arranged to represent a composite concept, situation, or system).
  • Forget about proving God, Is it man-made?
    Is there some way we can prove that something is man made? Some method? — MikeL

    Great question.
    Does it help to define nature as: the universe not produced by human verbal modelling (recognising that humans, being part of nature, produce both natural and artificial things)? Artifice being human design.
  • On the transition from non-life to life
    Thanks very much for a summary I have saved to disk.
  • How to define consciousness and how not to define consciousness

    I'm sympathetic to T Clark's comments.
    The OP concerns a topic I'm familiar with, but I also have plenty on my reading plate. Instead of making others take the time to digest the Velmans papers, it might encourage them to make that effort if you could address the contents from your own perspective (i.e., indicate what you agree/disagree with, provide some questions and/or propositions to jumpstart discussion). Otherwise, for all I know, I could just be doing your homework for you.
  • On the transition from non-life to life
    At this point we are faced with apokrisis' conclusion that semiotic principles are responsible for bringing into being substantial existence. Therefore we are forced to assume something outside of substantial existence, which reads the signs in the first place, causing the coming into being of substantial existence. Whatever it is which reads the signs in the first place, it cannot have substantial existence. — Metaphysician Undercover

    "It" either reads the signs, or creates them (thinking of the creative power of Hoffman's conscious agents); a conscious agent, or agents, which transcend(s) substantial existence. From a psychological standpoint, that makes sense because that's what human beings do: create things (albeit, in a temporal manner).
  • On the transition from non-life to life
    Semiosis is sign processing (a psychological process of cogitation exercised by psychophysical organisms, or conscious agents).

    Signs (i.e., representations) have meaning, hence; semiosis is the processing of semantic (i.e., attributive*) information; not mathematical, physical, or biological (i.e., predicative*) information.

    "Information" and "semiosis" have become equivocal terms, and are used by apokrisis in a manner which attempts to validate a physicalist worldview (which I alluded to here).

    Whereas, ascribing semiotic attributes to anything other than a psychophysical organism is a category error.

    *Floridi, L. (2010). Information: A Very Short Introduction. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
  • On the transition from non-life to life
    In case you hadn't noticed, my physicalism is semiotic. So as science, or indeed metaphysics, it starts from psychology and sociology. — apokrisis

    Similar to the entropy equivocation (thermodynamic-information) devised by von Neumann and Shannon:
    You should call it entropy for two reasons: first, the function is already in use in thermodynamics under the same name; second, and more importantly, most people don't know what entropy really is, and if you use the word "entropy" in an argument, you will win every time. — John von Neumann

    Just substitute "semiosis" for "entropy" and "everything" for "thermodynamics" in von Neumann's quote, and hey presto, voila: pansemiosis. It's magic, or better yet: HUGE !
  • On the transition from non-life to life
    The reason matter~symbol works, and mind~body doesn't, is that we have fundamental physical theories...This is huge. As big as DNA. Science has come through for us once again. — apokrisis

    The only thing huge here is your ego. All hail, Science. Are you mad?

    You believe in physicalism because it complements other aspects of your worldview, and yet refuse to acknowledge the legitimacy of other beliefs and worldviews. So, why should anyone think that your beliefs and worldview are legitimate? Because they conform to the current majority opinion of the natural science community (i.e., an argumentum ad populum)?

    In case you hadn't noticed, or more likely refuse to acknowledge as an inconvenient fact, Psychology and Sociology are sciences which investigate phenomena that are not physical.

    Cue: retaliatory scorn, ridicule, condescension, browbeating, bullying, obfuscation, evasion, and other responses which typically accompany a lack of coherency (in spite of copious amounts of irrelevant data, scientific terminology, meaningless metaphor, and biased interpretation).
  • Political Philosophy... Political?
    What standards (other than morality) are available as a basis for political evaluations? — Galuchat
    That is the very problem here. — TimeLine

    I agree. Hopefully, after reading Streetlight's recommendations, you will be able to answer my question.
  • Political Philosophy... Political?
    there seems to be a lot of normative political theory of 'ought to be' rather than any concern for 'what is' or at least no division from ethics as part of our political evaluations. — TimeLine

    What standards (other than morality) are available as a basis for political evaluations?
  • Emotional reaction is all that matters - who's idea was this?
    I find it hard to adequately explain what I mean (see "not a philosopher"), but the idea was predominantly grounded in a sort of fluidity in positives and negatives. Bad and good things that happen in life are not inherently one or the other, the after-effect and responses one has is what attributes the label, thereby allowing the individual to somewhat distort the event without necessarily influencing it. — Mattioso

    It reminds me of the operation of empathy, which informs the ethical interpretation of social situations.
  • A Sketch of the Present
    This is why I'm so keen to focus on institutions and policy; in a word - look at where the money is going. — StreetlightX

    The money is going to buy things (as always).
    First, to buy things that control people. So, forget about trying to pin blame on politicians, social institutions, public policy, etc. They have been bought. Your narrative is naïve in most respects.
  • A Sketch of the Present
    Part of what's at stake in my post is the attempt to move away from 'psycologizing' explanations: things like saying 'ah, if only people would change their attitudes, think differently, engage with the world in a more productive way', etc. To pin the blame on these sorts of things - 'skepticism', 'cynicism', etc mistakes a symptom for a cause. — StreetlightX

    Human nature is not a variable, it's a constant. It is also not a cause or symptom of "these developments"; it is a necessary condition for them.
  • A Sketch of the Present
    If you study the sociology of the changes, they are most certainly not a 'function of human nature'. — StreetlightX

    What an absurd statement, given that social change is the statistical product of the behaviour of large numbers of individual human beings.
  • A Sketch of the Present
    Of importance here is that fact that these developments have been politically mandated, as it were. That is, this kind of precarcity, in distinction to, say, the precacity of the the peasant in the middle ages, isn't a function of 'the state of nature', so much as developments in the political sphere. — StreetlightX

    These developments are financially mandated and a function of human nature.
  • On the transition from non-life to life
    I have found no practical way to define life. — Pollywalls

    I provided the following general definition of life in the "What is Life?" thread (participants included Apokrisis, Javra, Metaphysician Undercover, and Wayfarer): The condition extending from cell division to death, characterised by the ability to metabolise nutrients.

    Perhaps this needs to be modified to include creative power?
  • On the transition from non-life to life
    ...a close comparison of pierce's semiotic pan-psychism to both standard materialism and Berkley's idealism. — sime

    Please provide a synopsis. If we're lucky, the thread may tolerate a close comparison. Otherwise, we are left with a dispute "over the best flavour of ice-cream."
  • On the transition from non-life to life
    Inanimate matter interacted through (currently) unknown processes to create a substance/organism we would classify as alive. — T Clark

    Without testable hypotheses, Science only contributes relevant established facts to the problem space.

    And I suspect that the only contribution Philosophy will make is to determine that the OP is incoherent. The two hypotheses I was able to extract from it seem to be self-contradictory, to wit:
    1) Life evolves from non-life.
    2) Inanimate matter creates conscious agency.
  • On the transition from non-life to life
    We're talking about physical, chemical, and biological processes and how they relate to each other. In what way is that not a scientific question? — T Clark

    Good point and question.

    Can the OP be reduced to an hypothesis, such as:
    1) Life evolves from non-life, or
    2) Inanimate matter creates conscious agency.

    Assuming the hypothesis makes sense by definition (which is doubtful in the case of the two examples provided above), can an experiment be designed to test the hypothesis?

    If not, the OP poses a conceptual, not empirical, question.
  • Being - Is it?

    Sorry, it's all clear as mud to me. But thanks for trying.
  • On the transition from non-life to life
    If there aren't any community-independent criteria to settle the matter one way or the other, then why should we think that there is a mind-independent fact of the matter — sime

    Thanks for the explanation. However, it sounds a bit reality-independent to me.
  • On the transition from non-life to life
    why should a third-party philosopher assume that there is a transcendental fact-of-the-matter that determines who is 'correct'? — sime

    I give up, why? Seriously, I don't understand the question.

    Without communication it is impossible to create an unbiased (human oriented) definition, though some claim to be able to communicate with other forms of life. — Rich

    I agree that defining consciousness on the basis of conscious animal behaviour introduces bias, because there are many other forms of life.

    Consciousness (or what I prefer Creative Mind) behavior is the movement (will) toward organization and evolution (learning). — Rich

    I'm not a biologist, so must defer to others to determine whether or not your proposed definition of consciousness (i.e., creative mind) and conscious behaviour (i.e., the movement/will toward organisation and evolution/learning) comprehend all forms of life.
  • Being - Is it?
    'Being and time' of course related everything to angst, to fear/anxiety, but one can take the Heideggerian model of Dasein thrown into a world of bewilderment and conjure different ideas of what being in the world involves. — mcdoodle

    Do you and/or Heidegger have a general definition of "(B/b)eing" that can be used as a starting point for conceptual development, and how does that relate to the historical "Categories of Being" proposed by Aristotle, Kant, Peirce, and others?