“Neural Correlates in Gratitude”? Really? When was the last time you consulted your neurons? For anything? — Mww

:lol:

Damn man, you're firing on all cylinders today. Reread Allais' interpretation of Kant - the best one there is currently. It's very interesting.

As for 'being', either we're employing a very general word with rather vague conceptions, or we use it in a technical sense meaning something particular. To say that everything has being is a bit like saying everything is. OK.

I now suspect an ontology only arises within the context of one's studies and can't be generalized to everything, without losing consistency in some other sub-system.

Anyway, interesting exchange with Joshs.

It's impossible to say. It's also astonishing how quickly we've learned so much, we've only had about, what, 300 to 400 years of science. Imagine if we had discovered it earlier, where would we be now?

What makes these people geniuses was that, despite rhetoric from certain public intellectuals, they saw and understood a lot given what they had.

I highly doubt that if you take even the most prestigious physicist today and sent him back in time, would be able to make such contributions as Aristotle or Descartes or Hume. She would only be able to develop on field of knowledge extensively, but this field does not cover most of what we're interested: psychology, sociology, ethics, epistemology, etc., etc.

Is the mind in what is understood, or in the way in which it understands? — Pantagruel

I'd say the latter. The mind (though we should speak of persons actually, not mind) is what the mind is capable of doing and understanding, what is understood happens to coincide with a mind like ours.

I'm not going to give you the "left wing" spiel you've probably heard thousands of times.

I'll only limit my comments to saying that the institutions themselves are not the problem, it's the way they're used. Free markets - if they exist - would be good for trade. It would not be a good idea for a society, to think of a society like a market.

Central planning - in so far as they can reflect the will of the majority - can be good for setting laws most people would agree to, such as having a police force of some kind, a universal justice system and so on. But it would also not be a good idea to foster the mentality of leaders in a society.

But these terms are so loaded, they impede communication just as frequently, if not more so, than they can get a message across.

It's not easy under any circumstance. I think minority rights could be respected in a more democratic society, but there's no guarantee.



If they don't depend on any resources from others, then they could do without certain aspects of central planning. Of course, this depends on if we are picturing an ideal-ish society or what can be done within our current system.

If we limit ourselves to the latter, we're going to have less choices to be creative about it.

The problem is not central planning per se, institutions are made by people, not laws of physics. The issue with how central planning has been carried out in many places, is that it becomes a place in which decisions are cemented to society by a class of people who think they should be the ones to run things.

This very much happens in market societies all the time, only that there's more smoke and mirrors involved. But it's the same concept of thinking that a few people know more than the rest of the population on what they should want or have.

I think there should be loose-ish centers in which people decide what rules they want in society. One would only need as much central planning as is necessary and not more. You can't avoid large institutions, but you can temper the power they have to reflect the will of the majority.

There are different notions of nothing too. One thing is to say there can't be "nothing" in the universe, there's always a quantum vacuum, which is something or sorts.

But we also have the nothing of ordinary life, as in, before I was born, I wasn't anything nor will I be anything after death. There isn't anything for me to grasp when I'm not here. That's a legitimate use of the word.

Now, how can the Permanent Existent be something definite, like continuous points with this as a continuous 3D wave field, given that it has no beginning and thus no direction or design to it? It's likely that there isn't anything simpler, given that it has to be partless to be fundamental. — PoeticUniverse

That's an attractive idea, of finding something which can't be simpler. That makes some sense. The thing is, we need evidence to postulate this as something that happened, instead of leaving it up as a possibility. This is fine too, but we should remember that we are speaking of something that may not exist.

Maybe there was always something. Our best science can only predict up close to the big bang. Then it breaks down.

But from the big bang to "before" if, that makes any sense, which is not clear, we have no clue. Perhaps, and contrary to all our intuitions, something can come out of nothing, given enough "time", which didn't exist prior to the big bang, supposedly. Or maybe it existed in a manner which is beyond us.

Or the multiverse could be a possibility.

The point being that we likely don't have intelligence enough to understand why there is something or why there should be a beginning or an infinity.

Some physicists now argue that something is more plausible than nothing. The laws of physics may well indicate this and it may be true. Doesn't take away from the fact that in conception, for us, it is extremely natural and much easier to understand "nothing existing" than something. No effort is required.

But we don't know. You could be right as well.

I am also above my abilities here, but that's never stopped a discussion, so, I'll ask:

Shouldn't the second law of thermodynamics be called a "habit" instead of a law? It seems to me to speak of a tendency to disorder, not an iron-clad rule.

We are here after all, so there are pockets or order within disorder, or something.

The Morning Star - Karl Ove Knausgaard

Re-reading:

Manifest Reality: Kant's Idealism and his Realism by Lucy Allais

It's a good question and again, I think that part of it has to do with what naïve realism imples for you. If it implies that stones and rivers would be as they are exactly as they appear, absent people, then I think naïve realism is problematic.

I wouldn't say a stone itself has colour absent or, or texture. For that to happen there needs to be a creature who appreciates or distinguished these things.

On the other hand, you make a good point. I think we switch from realism to something else once we enter physics, that is, we use mathematics to discover what physics is doing and mathematics seems to be of a different nature than perception.

But do we have good reasons to believe that the stuff mathematics is describing is accurate or true? I think that we do, given its results.

Yes, we need to observe the stone, otherwise we have no data to work with. When we investigate in close detail what this stone is made of, we discover it is made of colourless, odourless, insubstantial particles. So the stone is made of stuff that lacks the qualities we attribute to them in ordinary life.

So close investigation reveals the stone to be a projection, yet without this projection, we wouldn't be able to get to the stuff that makes up the stone.

Hence the paradox. As I understand it.

It depends on what naïve realism is taken to mean. The way discussed in the OP looks to me as a variety of realism. Naïve realism is the view is that that tree over there and that river exist exactly as I take them to be, even if all human beings are gone. But then we know objects themselves don't have colours nor sounds, etc.

In this latter sense, as Bertrand Russell said:

"The observer, when he seems to himself to be observing a stone, is really, if physics is to be believed, observing the effects of the stone upon himself... Naïve realism leads to physics, and physics, if true, shows that naïve realism is false. Therefore naïve realism, if true, is false; therefore it is false.”

So we have a tension here.

So I think it boils down to how naivety is taken to be.

But I don't see AOC kicking anyone, being disrespectful or otherwise "asking for it." She's been acting like a lady, and respectful, just speaking some truth: if that hurts some Republican or challenges his masculinity, tough. He's the pussy. Let Trump grab him. — James Riley

Agree, although Republicans distort even this as if she were speaking rudely.

Anyway, I know full well I sound like a sexist POS but that's the way I roll. I don't want to see her end up like Hillary or Nancy or Mitch McConnel. They got tough, which is not bad, but they also got conniving. Sad, really. — James Riley

I don't think it's sexist, it makes sense to me. I doubt she will turn into Nancy, though one never knows. Just look at the complete 180 Tulsi Gabbard did in like 3 or 4 months, that's kinda disgusting.

When I look back at what I just said, I realize how naïve and stupid I sound. It is, after all, politics. I guess that's why I stay out the kitchen: I can't handle the heat. :lol: Good luck to her (and Bernie). — James Riley

It's politics. We need all types of views. Nothing wrong with how you see things. I agree with it.

He is. I'm not a fan, but I have to give him credit he is quite capable.

If AOC were a man, she would not get nearly as much crap. I'm pretty confident about that.

But once the table manners return, it's time to settle down and act like adults. For Trump, being a jerk was not a tactic, but an actual personality/character trait. — James Riley

Of course, you can be honest (while still maintaining decency) outside of official office hours, but once inside, just behave as expected. Bernie is good with this, I like AOC here (though some people hate her to an extreme which is crazy to me).

They can call her a communist or socialist all they want, but she would literally belong to the right wing in most European countries such as Germany, France, Spain - they don't argue against universal healthcare or maternity leave. These days they may want to trim it down in these countries, but they would not dream of privatizing it, they would vanish in hours.

Yep. He does say what a lot of people think. And I won't lie to you and say I did not thoroughly enjoy Trump destroying the other Republican candidates back in 2016 in the primaries, I loved it.

But then he won. And that became a problem. Man, to think people would want boring politicians back sure is something!

Yes, China has said so, and given the history of China in the 20th century, I get that perspective and I have no reason to believe they are bluffing.

People in power do have to deal with nukes, but I highly doubt most sane citizens would want those used, I mean they're not supposed to be used at all, the point of having them is deterrence not attack.

All I'm saying that it's a dangerous game of chicken to be playing. It's bad enough that China and the US are doing military exercises in the South China sea, but if you get other countries copying the US in the same territory, that's considerably different. To be clear, I don't think most of the world cares about Taiwan to THAT degree (the exceptions being China and Taiwan, obviously) , it's more a manner of pride.

In any case, it's stupid.

I think we should relate to nature in a manner of mutual respect. Not adoration, despite our destruction of the environment, after all if most of us were dropped in the middle of the jungle we would almost surely die. Nor should we forget earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, hurricanes, tornadoes, landslides, etc.

But, nature does provide and nurture and inspire too. And while this is suffering, one must imagine instances of joy too: mass suicide is just not common after all.

So it's tricky. We need to respect nature, defends ourselves from it and not destroy it anymore.

Sure. It's just that some parents think kids should have guns is a sign of love.

I talk about nukes with some frequency, people say "oh that's so horrible nothings going to happen because of it" and it stays this way.

People disagree about objective facts now, so it's not possible to include "everybody" on a single political cause. Society can surely feel (and in some places is) quite isolated, but I suppose there's something anyone can do. Whether this something amounts to anything, who knows?

Everybody does. It's the profit makers that differ.

I don't think any rival state would dream of starting a war with the US.

A nuclear war could break out. Everybody loses.

I'm not really sure what you mean by this, but I think it is likely I agree with it. — dclements

It's a secret :rofl:

uncomfortable with our near neo-imperialism enough to sometime believe we are not so much always the good guys but someone that is barely tolerated considering the alternative. — dclements

If Europe had its own separate army from NATO, then things might be a little different. The US would still have BY far the biggest army in the world but, they'd have to deal with Europe somehow or consider them in some manner.

The only "threats" to the US vision is China, Russia and Iran, because they don't do what they're told. Granted China and Russia have nukes, so, it's a dangerous game to play.

The powers that be in China either can't or don't want to look impotent in standing up to the West and the US and her allies are not willing to look the other way for too long with China's posturing for trying to stand up to the US and become a super power on equal footing.

What is it that they say about when an unmovable object meets a irresistible force? IMHO, we are seeing a similar situation play out between the US an China lately. — dclements

China is surrounded by hostile power: Japan, Korea, Taiwan all have considerable US support.

I forgot who said it, but if you look at a map of China, the only way they can expand with least cost to them is precisely towards the South China Sea, but Taiwan is blocking them. And there's the whole re-unification issue, which is sensitive to China.

But I agree, it's too silly to be playing military exercise games. The stakes are too high.

That my fears are clearly not unfounded.

https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2021/11/10/china-holds-military-exercises-slams-us-legislators-taiwan-visit

https://www.scmp.com/news/china/military/article/3155908/china-will-keep-escalating-military-intimidation-taiwan-experts?module=inline&pgtype=article

https://www.reuters.com/world/asia-pacific/us-allies-would-take-action-if-taiwan-attacked-blinken-2021-11-10/

https://www.taipeitimes.com/News/front/archives/2021/11/15/2003767889

https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2021/11/15/us-china-taiwan-biden-xi-virutal-meeting

https://www.rfa.org/english/news/china/taiwan-submarines-11112021142036.html

https://www.news.com.au/technology/innovation/military/red-line-us-dangerous-ploy-against-china/news-story/55187d52501a68f1d283e5f24691fd8e

https://www.theaustralian.com.au/commentary/as-drums-of-war-beat-cool-heads-needed-in-uschina-conflict/news-story/eb942c9c9cb15858339f3deaac80bbe4

Yeah. Very much so. :roll:

And in a few years when they've come further into their own and the US is further into decline they can call the shots. We aren't there yet. — frank

Only economically, which is why there is (or was) all this brouhaha with tic-toc and Huawei, Silicon Valley doesn't want competition.

But militarily, it's not even a competition. The US wins by stupendous margins.

Why childish?

I don't think the US would like to have China occupy Guantanamo and have their navy patrolling the seas between Cuba and Florida.

I don't like the Chinese government much and I think Taiwan should have autonomy. But what I like or don't like is irrelevant to the situation.

The Taiwan issue is extremely delicate. I fear some mistake could trigger a nuclear war, which is not at all some crazy imagining of mine.

High and tight.

To be fair, we proceeded to have a discussion and I think we reached a kind of agreement. Which I'm forgetting now. :sweat:

so the question — for me — was whether those ideas are the same, or related to each other, or what. For instance, some location words like “here” are flexible in their boundaries, and can encompass as little as my knee to as much as the whole universe. — Srap Tasmaner

These words - concepts really - have some overlap related to location, trivially. We have similar, though probably not exact, intuitions as to when here becomes a there. I have a rubber ball in my hand, it is here now as I am about to throw it, when does it become something which is no longer here?

Is it at the moment in which I no longer feel it in my hand? Or does it have to be on the floor for me to consider it over there? We decide, ultimately.

But why is it so tempting, and can we approach the idea of location in such a way that we are not tempted to think of the universe as there, somewhere? It’s one of those perfect nine-year-old philosophy questions that we are too sophisticated to understand. — Srap Tasmaner

I can only say that although I am a part of the universe, I can't be identical with it. If you want to use the word "universe" to refer to the Earth, and "here" specifically, you are free to do so and not wrong at that.

It may be that questions like these blur the borders between questions we can ask and questions which we can't ask, because we lack the capacity to articulate and understand them.

No, no, a club. The International Brotherhood of Amateur Philosophers. That’s a thing that’s not me, but we can’t define my location relative to it. Or relative to 7. Or relative to ‘conformity’. Or relative to July 3rd, 1807. — Srap Tasmaner

Not to the number 7 or conformity, we agree.

Hmmm. How far off is the International Brotherhood of philosophers from you? 1000 miles to the east, 200 kilometers to the west? There is a relation here.

As to July 3rd, 1807, you didn't exist, I assume. But go back far enough in (space)time, and we would find that date. I am closer to Tuesday than I am to Wednesday and quite far away from July 3rd, 1807.

But not just as a body, but as my body, and only so long as I am a going concern. Once I’m dead, what you’ll call ‘his body’ doesn’t tell you where I am. — Srap Tasmaner

Correct. So experience is crucial here and we don't know if experience could exist absent a body, which is spatio-temporally located somewhere.

My location, then, is to be defined relative to a thing that is not me. — Srap Tasmaner

Yes, I think so.

But not just any thing. If I am a member of a club, my location cannot be defined relative to the club. Why not? — Srap Tasmaner

I assume you're using the club as a metaphor for the universe. I'd ask, how do I know I'm a member of the club? Am I the club itself? Well, no. If I was the club itself, I couldn't ask questions about it, because I would be the club, presumably lacking consciousness and contextual awareness.

For me to be a part of the club, I have to be quite isolated from it, enough to form some kind of cognition that allows me to contemplate these things.

Not where my body is, but where I am; I am not my body, but a person, a living, thinking organism. — Srap Tasmaner

I agree that you are not your body.

Tell me this though: If I am in my room, intensely daydreaming about a novel, where am I? I am not present to the situation of my body, as when someone says "he's not here at the moment" or "he's in Neptune", meaning he's not here with us at this moment, paying attention.

But if you insist that this makes no sense, because I am were my body is, not where my thoughts are at any given moment, then the body becomes an essential component of the identity of here-ness we are trying to understand.

So the natural thing is to start with a location that has an extra feature, as my location does, by being an instance of ‘here’. And that seems doubly right as an entry point because here is always where we are and the universe is always where we are. — Srap Tasmaner

Hmm. We have a location here on Earth, as I understand it, the Universe doesn't really have a location, you can't say it's to the right of nothing or behind something else. Unless there are other universes, welp, we don't know about that.

Similar to when we say, there's no up or down in space, this is what we can't help but bring to the world.

That’s not the way my here works, because I know what neither of those does, that I’m spatial and must have a location, and that location is always at least ‘here’, whatever it is in relation to other things. — Srap Tasmaner

It doesn't make sense to me to say that my jacket or phone knows its location. They just are.

So you're tying space to a location, here, namely where your body is. There is a sense my body is in my city, in my house, but I could be off in metaphysical space, thinking about "thing in themselves" or thinking about the novel I am currently reading. So where would I be, if I'm totally lost daydreaming?

at least by then we should have a little more to say about what that relation is and how it works. How much could we say about the relation we tried to start with? — Srap Tasmaner

Which is, the relation of my location... in the universe, on Earth? The relation is between me and something that is not me, in some very vague sense.

I'm not saying you don't have a legitimate puzzle here, these things happen. I'm not understanding the problem too well. That makes sense too, many of these puzzles are hard to even talk about. In my experience.

We don't know if such a thing is possible. There's no instances of consciousness absent body and dreams reflect stuff we got from the world, in terms of seeing other people and ordinary objects. We then do crazy stuff in dreams, but we cannot say that a person lacking actual experience could have such dreams.

We could be a brain in a vat, we cannot know. But we need senses to get data for our brains. The vat would stimulate the senses too, as senses all go back to some process in the brain. But if we lack all of them, we won't have a world at all. About the world, maybe, maybe not.

Our common sense intuitions do not reflect the nature of the world mind-independently. Then again, if no one is around to ask any questions and recognize things, what sense is there in talking about a world? It's tricky.

The second option, taking ourselves as independent and thinking of location relative to us, seems to have some promise. I was confused at first that you and Miller seemed almost immediately to start talking about solipsism, but it makes sense if that’s how you see starting from us.

I think I didn’t see solipsism here because I’m not allowing myself to assume that location is relational, or at least not relational in a way that I already understand. — Srap Tasmaner

Funny you mention that. I did not have solipsism in mind, but (paradoxically or non-sensically as this sounds) I think if we are to interpret the nature of a creature, you do treat that creature as if it were the only one in existence. That's why when they mapped out our DNA sequence, they only used the DNA of one person (I believe, please correct me if I'm wrong).

We then generalize from single organism to others, under the (rational) assumption that they are like the initial creature studied.

The last sentence in this quote, is unclear to me.

In essence I’ve been arguing that the title of the thread, “Where are we?”, is exactly the way into answering “Where is the universe?” by turning it into “Where is here?” first of all, and thinking about location (what is ‘here’?) this way first, but knowing that we’ll need to end up with a sense of location that also works for ‘there’ and ‘that stuff’ too. (Does it need to be the same sense? Unclear.) — Srap Tasmaner

I think so. But look at your own examples, you relate "Where is here" to thinking about location. But in order to make sense of here, you also have to account for "there" and that "stuff". I guess I'm not getting what's the puzzle you have with the relational aspect of this.

I mean, if you can, tell me something that isn't relational and then maybe we can proceed. I can't think of a single example. Or maybe you have some different concept of relation than what I'm using.

Quite a bit of good stuff to go into, I'll pick out the relevant stuff.

(1) Where is everything?
(1a*) Where is everywhere? — Srap Tasmaner

Some things can be put in the forms of questions: "why is there nothing?", "what isn't a thing"?, but these don't have answers. So we say something trivial like, (1) everywhere, (1a) all around us. That leaves us with blank stares. We have to produce a question that could be given some kind of answer.

The universe, too, is wherever it is, and since we’re in it, that’s where we are. Or, maybe better, the universe is wherever we are. — Srap Tasmaner

Both are fine.

‘being somewhere’ is only ‘being somewhere (relative to something else)’? That is not clear to me at all — Srap Tasmaner

Well, what then? I can say "I am here", that doesn't tell you much. It's true that relations themselves don't explain the question, but if we don't include them, then we can't speak of where we are in any sense I can think of.

I know that I must be somewhere because I am spatial, and insofar as I am at all, I am located. What is that sense of being located, that’s what I want to get it, and what I think “Where is the universe?” can force you to confront. I don’t think you get to say that I know I must be located only in the sense of being located relative to other things, because we cannot claim already to understand what it means for those things to be located somewhere. — Srap Tasmaner

That sense of being located is what you feel, when you ask yourself where you are. You specify what comes to mind as you think of this question. If you don't include a relational aspect, then I can't make any sense of how to even begin.

I don't think that covers everything at all. But I also don't know how to proceed. This seems to me intimately related to the issue of self-consciousness.

And obviously we can’t say where the universe is in relation to anything else, but we can still say that it’s right here, or that it’s ‘all around us’. — Srap Tasmaner

The concept "universe" is relative to me, the creature asking the question.

I may be part of the universe, but I can scrutinize it in a way that it seems unable to do, absent someone asking a question.

And maybe the conversational emphasis is the right one. What does it mean to be the sort of thing that has a physical location? That’s a defining characteristic of us, but what does it mean to have a location? Can my having a location only be described in terms of the location of other things or beings that have a location? That still doesn’t say what it is for anything — those things, me, us — to have a location. The simplest way to block even thinking you can answer my location question by talking about the location of other things, is to ask “Where is everything?”

And that’s a very good question. Not ‘where am I in relation to (something else)’, but what is ‘being somewhere’? — Srap Tasmaner

Raymond Tallis writes about this in some detail, I'm forgetting the book now, or books.

I don't think that's possible to answer without postulating a self-referential entity and this itself is highly puzzling. In some sense, I have to be different from myself in order to refer to me and my location. For if I am completely in myself, I don't see how I could recognize other things at all. I would just be a passive creature, taking in whatever sense data the world happens to throw at me.

It depends on the relation you want to clarify. If you ask such a general question like "where are we?", you have the choice of narrowing the topic down. So, in one instance, we are on a planet in the universe. Speaking more narrowly, we are in a galaxy in the universe, the Milky Way. To be more specific, we are in a solar system containing eight planets and we are the third planet close to the sun.

We don't have evidence to say that we are in a multiverse, that is only speculation based on a mathematical supposition, which may or may not be true. From here you could specify an arbitrary line on a map and call that "your country", furthermore you can state if you belong in a town or city, all the way down to your address. That's where you are in a sense.

We now enter tricky territory because you'll say "I am here" as opposed to over there. Where is here exactly? Do you want to give an exact longitude or latitude? Are you next to a chair or a table? Are you the same person all the time, otherwise looking for you will have a temporal characteristic. And so on. In absence of a relation to something else, you can't say to be anywhere.