This is such an odd formulation.

Let us try the experiment. Let us collectively agree to aim for happiness. I think the first thing we need is a constitution that expresses our agreement and constitutes the formal foundation of the collective. Are we all happy to do that? All those in favour say "aye "and call yourselves "founding Fathers (and Mothers)".


It's a bit of a fairytale, but do notice that it is a Good Old American Fairytale, not Mr Nasty's Fairytale. — unenlightened

I think you got it figured out. My own concern is with pursuing a goal with a shoddy methodology or what can be called a 'socio-economic' system. My hope is that by realizing that the ends don't justify the means, or what have you, then we can come to agreement for a better system. What say you?

You seem to think that ‘collective happiness’ would be a supervenient happiness upon the society as a whole which overrides the happiness of the citizen itself (viz., the bee can be sacrificed for the hive). — Bob Ross

Yes, and that was how happiness was rendered only by the party for the party.

A slowly declining system where the socialist elements had to be removed one by one until we ended up in a corporative capitalist oligarchy called the Russian Republic? — Lionino

Sure, but, my point is that the Soviet Union wasn't only about the mistakes and atrocities conducted by Stalin. Just my two cents.

Seems like bashing on Stalin really dismantles whatever the Soviet Union was or became after him. Go figure.

It's interesting to analyze how Marx' epithet about "From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs," got totally redone in terms of collective happiness.

Anyone know why this happened?

I'm unsure the bolded can be supported in any fashion that isn't fantastical. Particularly as the underlined undermines it. They aren't the same thing.
Perhaps this was the problem. — AmadeusD

What I'm hinting at is the facet of Soviet communism seemingly adopting a totalitarian stance towards happiness. Does that make sense?

My thoughts are that this is the type of high-school philosophy that leads one to fall into a life of activism instead of growing up into a functional adult.

Those are, clearly, biases. But truly, I see nothing in this that needs any discussion. — AmadeusD

I doubt it. I think the gist here is associated with the simple fact that Soviet communists were really sincere about their intentions of improving the life of every individual, the collective, that is. Moreso, than any other political system communism was concerned with such an ethos.

I don't know why but this thread seems to be about why they were blind sighted by such an ambitious goal, and historically failed at it.

I think Stalin, for example, failed because he only pursued happiness. That and he killed 40 million people.

Did you have another communist in mind? — Hanover

Yes, the other communists I had in mind were the positivists or scientists who were told by political leaders, and the party, to create a better society through technology and science. Again, this isn't a small minority of Soviet communists, at the time. After Stalin, this seemed to be a common ideology pursued by the US and USSR in the space race and whatever they translated the fruits of such a race into real world utility.

It doesn't seem to be a question that can be answered. Personal identity is, as you say, formed through a period of time; but, has no discernable beginning or even some can say an end.

I would like to point out, that there are many discussions about socialization and individuation. Seemingly, when one goes to school, the hope is that the person grows accustomed to helping others out, as it seems an ethical standard for young people to believe in. Having said this, it seems that the abyss you speak about is relational. Having looked into it, one has to find meaning in what one sees in it or with dislike change one's self.

I thought about starting a thread about how fractured and weak the Republican party is but I'll ask it here.

What are your thoughts about the current state of the GOP? Is it in disarray or better than ever?

This shouldn't be on anyone's list of anything worth promoting. — AmadeusD

Yeah; but, why give the sound-byte? Concepts like these really ruin reputations if not elections...

Someone needs to tell Kamala not to promote equal outcomes with equal opportunity. Don't give the political right the slur word they love labeling on the left, being socialism or even communism.

I thought Albert Hoffman was mentioned. Interesting chap.

I see no difference between logical consistency and existence so I think that all logical possibilities exist in reality (modal realism). This leads to the many-worlds interpretation of quantum mechanics where all possible outcomes of a measurement are realized in different worlds that are apparently causally disconnected. — litewave

I'm having a hard time discerning the observer effect in QM with the MWI. Specifically, I can give an example. If one were to play the lottery in a world, then what determinant makes you the winner out of all the losses that are possible. One thing that one can deduce is consistent histories. But, even in simpler terms if all possible outcomes are realized, and the determinism of the MWI is applied, then where does this leave the uncertainty principle in any reference frame?

Thanks.

There is no crisis of contradicting paradigms. Reality runs its gamut from scales where the Cosmos is almost completely undetermined – as in the Big Bang – to scales where it is as thermally decohered and determinate for the difference not to matter a damn. In our everyday world with its everyday notions of causality. — apokrisis

There are other ways of looking at reality other than the classical Newtonian thermodynamic paradigm. I'm still surprised it has lasted for so long until the modern era. The only cherry on the cake, is what Newton might have alluded to in terms of entropy.

We are still occupied with the Newtonian view of reality -- not just physics, but the Newtonian causality. We might not be using the name 'Newtonian' because it is old-timey, but we are very much committed to causality, which is, in fact, Newtonian.

The probabilities and statistical likelihood -- our propensity to predict the trends and progressions of things -- has been made stronger because of our commitment to causality. They are actually connected, not at odds with each other. — L'éléphant

Yes, I believe Leibnitz was actually more in correspondence with how the world works according to possibilities and his monadology than Newton. Leibnitz all the way.

Very good question. Our perception shapes what we think of possibilities. It's been explored by metaphysicians that the quality of what we think of possibilities relies on the quality of our causal experience. Here we know that modalities are not in the world, but are actually the deliberative thought caused by our experience. There are futures to pursue based on what we know at the present. We perform the elimination process -- not everything is possible as we say. — L'éléphant

I think that through being within the very system that created us, that we can take a look at ourselves and the world to deduce how things fit together in the way the system works. That's why I don't believe that we are incapable to find out these relations between induction, deduction, abduction, and causality.

What do you thank that is the 'ground' of modal logic? — boundless

Modal logic is supposedly grounded by processism. I think that's the best answer I can give.

It seems to me that, according to you, we should infer logical principles by observing physical phenomena, which we assume that have regularities which can be 'translated faithfully' in a conceptual map.
Let's assume that it is indeed possible, in principle, to infer logical principles in this way.
But what does gaurantee us that, indeed, our inference is correct? On what grounds can we be sure that our inference is correct? — boundless

The concept is so vaguely understandable only based on the way we perceive change itself. I don't really have an answer as to these deep "why" questions about what makes change possible.

I disagree. By 'contingent' I mean something that might to cease to exist/be valid. If physical laws are something contingent and they at some point change, the criteria by which we consider an explanation 'coherent' change, if we take them as the foundation of logic. I don't think that is acceptable. — boundless

I'd like to address this again given that my previous response was just conjecture. What I want to point out is the ability for a system to change. This change is dictated by causality. To understand causality we have to regard nature as a unitary system evolving through time. So, with this said, what do you think "possibility" might mean?

By 'contingent' I mean something that might to cease to exist/be valid. If physical laws are something contingent and they at some point change, the criteria by which we consider an explanation 'coherent' change, if we take them as the foundation of logic. I don't think that is acceptable. — boundless

I'd like to point out that I view the very notion of having possibility within a system can only mean in terms of modal logic the necessity of determined states which are truth apt regarding causality.

You seem to assume that physical reality can be literally 'mapped' in a conceptual model, i.e. it has a structure that can be literally 'translated' in a conceptual framework. I guess that if we assume that this is true then maybe we might think that logic has a 'physical basis' (although then one might ask why this is so... but this is another story for another time). — boundless

I hope this thread can go in such a direction. It seems plausible that the logic of causality can only be defined materially and temporarily.

By the way, this thread is the longest thread with 742 pages. Keep in mind that I'm not talking about a phallus.

So much emotion.

Trump is someone I really admire. Only recently I began viewing him in the manner in which he doesn't bend over to the establishment or any secret societies and so on.

He might be a populist but he really is the man of the people. I doubt he crafted himself this way but his character and personality really resonate with voters.

I hope he wins the presidency.

By the way, this is coming from a Democrat.

Logic is mechanistic about relations, so I don't see the need to type-token issues. I also don't think logic has properties ascribed to these relations, again it's possible to do so as they do such things in computer games. Yet, to talk again in terms of complexity class I don't think we could do the things nature or any mechanistic conception of nature as science would we want or hope to do.

Again, I am not a simulation proponent but am only interested in logic being descriptive of physics.

Do you think, as possibly quite interesting ponderance, that if physics can be modeled in a direct correspondence between logic (a computer) and the world, then would that mean by entailment that certain features if not the entirety of the model proves (quite literally proof of simulation in logical space, that the system of logic utilized by the model itself) that it is actually a formally complete and consistent system contra Gödel?

Sure, take it from this point of view. How could truth be possible without a formally consistent and complete system to render it as such?

Furthermore, regarding my previous post, it seems possible that there could be some things one can have in causality (think synchronicity or Bell's inequality locality and non-locality) that can't simply be modeled.

Personally I look at most of what has been said in this thread in terms of computability. I'm not a simulation theorist and don't believe in it given complexity class issues arising once one would try and model in expspace and exptime.

By the way, I might add, I believe modal logic is capable of a ad hoc proof of the necessity of formally consistent and hypothetically complete formal systems in logic if physics describes logic. Even at a deeper level, truth itself, seemingly subsists on such an assumption.

And I believe that the criteria according to which an explanation is deemed 'coherent' cannot be based on something that is or might be contingent. — boundless

I don't think we can have the cake and eat it too here. The way things seem is that the very notion of possibility within a system of physical laws gives rise to a logic that is modal. Modality might be a better term than contingent...

IMO, the problem I see here is that when you try to describe the laws you might infer from your observations, you already use logic and mathematics (to make them coherent and give quantitative predictions). So, I guess I can say that in order to 'ground' logic in physics, you are already assuming that logic is fundamental.

What do you think about this last paragraph? Do you think I am wrong in detecting a circuarity here? If so, why? — boundless

It would be interesting to approach your question from the perspective of a counterfactual. What would a physics look like that could not be apprehended by any form of inferential or abductive reasoning? I don't think such questions are coherent, and there seems to be plenty of evidence attesting that everything in physics can be modeled. If it is indeed true that human logic can apprehend physics in a model or what have you (I think the right term, nowadays, is a "simulation"), then the circularity dissipates.

The only question that seemingly would remain as I see it, is whether logic is this medium by which physics and even mathematics subsists on...

Unless one shows that regularities in phenomena are not contingent physics cannot be foundational for logic and mathematics IMO. — boundless

Logic doesn't have that kind of dimensionality, but physics does. Are there any further conclusions based on this that can be said?

But I am not sure why you think that it would show that if that is the case then physics would have a precedence over logic. After all, computer operations too follow logical principles. — boundless

Sure, I would like to highlight your uncertainty as stemming from not knowing how logical space can exist. Is it true in how I'm framing the ambiguity?

Additionally, as @apokrisis main question, is there anything standing in the way of a direct relationship between logic and physics? I'm only saying this as it might seem interesting given logical positivists believed in a correspondence theory of language and truth through logic...

Yes, well may I ask whether there are things that cannot be modeled in a computer?

I'm also trying to understand your argument about logic being transcendental. Do you mean to say logic is foundational to every state of change within a system, as logic seems necessary to produce change or "cause and effect" between objects that may have a relation as defined by physical laws through logic or the transcendental logic you mention.

[...] logic is transcendental with respect to physics: it is a necessary precondition for physics. — boundless

What makes you believe that is true?

You can't have a physics that "describes" logic, because you can't have a physics unless you first have a logic in which to set it out. — Banno

Is this chicken or egg? Physics came first in a non-anthropological manner. QED?

Then what is a model to you? Wittgenstein called it a picture of reality, no?

If physics is to be descriptive of logic, then, a "cause" would be defined by how the system of laws governing physics works, and from there to deduce what logic would be required to explain those laws in terms of decidability in logical space.

Do you mean how does causality as imagined by physics relate to causality as imagined by logic? Do they share the same root or are they antithetic? — apokrisis

I am once again focusing on this as the thesis of this thread. If one were to know the antithetic nature of what apokrisis said then it might be deduced on such gestaltism to see the bounds and limits of physics and logical determinism.

I'd like to point out counterfactuals but don't have enough information to conjecture about it.

Thoughts?

People have used this sort of idea to create computational and communications based theories of causation, which are pretty neat. Past states of a system end up entailing future states (or a range of them). This seems right in line with the idea of cosmic Logos in some respects. It's also a version of causation that seems to deal with some of Hume's "challenges." — Count Timothy von Icarus

I think your right about this. You seem updated with the right semantic model in mind.