What is metaphysics? Yet again.
This is a spinoff from the “The difference between philosophy and science” thread which was a spinoff from the “You don't need to read philosophy to be a philosopher” thread. I checked - there have been 22 threads with “metaphysics” in the title in the past year, including Shawn’s “Metaphysics defined.” So, why a new one? Good question! Forget it. I quit….
But seriously. I want to do this, redo this, now because the question “What do you mean when you say ‘metaphysics’” has come up several times in the parent thread to this one. As I’ve said many times, failure to carefully define terms is the primary failing of many of the discussions on the forum. For me, no term in philosophy is harder to define and more important than “metaphysics.” Since it’s all been done before, I’ve pulled some text I think is interesting which may be helpful from various past posts to get us started. To start, here is my take, from the OP of “An attempt to clarify my thoughts about metaphysics” from the far distant past:
So, what is metaphysics. Here are some definitions from the web:
As noted, epistemology is not always included in metaphysics. To me it belongs, but maybe that’s because epistemology is what I am most interested in.
For a minute, let’s discuss what I want metaphysics to be, but which it probably isn’t. At least not entirely – I want it to be the set of rules, assumptions we agree on to allow discussion, reason, to proceed, e.g. there is a knowable external, objective reality; truth represents a correspondence between external reality and some representation of it; it’s turtles all the way down; the Tao that can be spoken is not the eternal Tao. Ha!
Now, let’s discuss what I don’t want metaphysics to be, but which it probably is. I discussed this briefly in a couple of other posts recently. I don’t think metaphysics should include a discussion of the existence of a particular God or the substance of particular religions. At least as it’s often considered, the existence of God is a matter of fact – he does or he does not. To me, matters of fact are not metaphysics. On the other hand, I think there is a discussion about god that is appropriately metaphysical.
So, anyway - Metaphysical questions cannot be addressed with yes or no answers. They’re not issues of right or wrong, what matters is usefulness.
During that thread, I was introduced to R.G. Collingwood’s “An Essay on Metaphysics.” I find his discussion of “absolute presuppositions” very helpful. It’s given me language to talk about things that had only been vague ideas to me before.
Now here are some other people’s ideas about metaphysics from past discussions. I’ve got them hidden so they won’t take up too much room. No need to read them if you’d rather just dive in with your own ideas.
[hide="Reveal"]Quoting Kenosha Kid
Quoting StreetlightX
Quoting Gnomon
Quoting tim wood
Quoting Pattern-chaser
Quoting Bill Hobba
I’ll leave it there. There's lot's more. In particular, I found @Pattern-chaser's "Metaphysics - what is it?" thread, which I didn't remember, really interesting.
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But seriously. I want to do this, redo this, now because the question “What do you mean when you say ‘metaphysics’” has come up several times in the parent thread to this one. As I’ve said many times, failure to carefully define terms is the primary failing of many of the discussions on the forum. For me, no term in philosophy is harder to define and more important than “metaphysics.” Since it’s all been done before, I’ve pulled some text I think is interesting which may be helpful from various past posts to get us started. To start, here is my take, from the OP of “An attempt to clarify my thoughts about metaphysics” from the far distant past:
So, what is metaphysics. Here are some definitions from the web:
- The branch of philosophy that deals with the first principles of things, including abstract concepts such as being, knowing, substance, cause, identity, time, and space.
- Metaphysics is a branch of philosophy exploring the fundamental questions, including the nature of concepts like being, existence, and reality.
- A division of philosophy that is concerned with the fundamental nature of reality and being and that includes ontology, cosmology, and often epistemology
- The philosophical study whose object is to determine the real nature of things—to determine the meaning, structure, and principles of whatever is insofar as it is.
As noted, epistemology is not always included in metaphysics. To me it belongs, but maybe that’s because epistemology is what I am most interested in.
For a minute, let’s discuss what I want metaphysics to be, but which it probably isn’t. At least not entirely – I want it to be the set of rules, assumptions we agree on to allow discussion, reason, to proceed, e.g. there is a knowable external, objective reality; truth represents a correspondence between external reality and some representation of it; it’s turtles all the way down; the Tao that can be spoken is not the eternal Tao. Ha!
Now, let’s discuss what I don’t want metaphysics to be, but which it probably is. I discussed this briefly in a couple of other posts recently. I don’t think metaphysics should include a discussion of the existence of a particular God or the substance of particular religions. At least as it’s often considered, the existence of God is a matter of fact – he does or he does not. To me, matters of fact are not metaphysics. On the other hand, I think there is a discussion about god that is appropriately metaphysical.
So, anyway - Metaphysical questions cannot be addressed with yes or no answers. They’re not issues of right or wrong, what matters is usefulness.
During that thread, I was introduced to R.G. Collingwood’s “An Essay on Metaphysics.” I find his discussion of “absolute presuppositions” very helpful. It’s given me language to talk about things that had only been vague ideas to me before.
Now here are some other people’s ideas about metaphysics from past discussions. I’ve got them hidden so they won’t take up too much room. No need to read them if you’d rather just dive in with your own ideas.
[hide="Reveal"]Quoting Kenosha Kid
I would define metaphysics as follows: anything left over that won't be explained by more rigorous fields. To the extent that it has value, the field of being and content has been removed from metaphysics by physics, phenomonology, etc. To the extent that it has value, the field of causation and origins has been stolen by science generally and cosmology and evolutionary biology in particular. To the extent that they have value, the constants of nature have been annexed by physics. If any idea in metaphysics is found to have any value, it ceases to be metaphysics and becomes something else. Metaphysics is then all of the ideas that will never be found to have any value. I'd put them in the following groups:
Metaphysics of the gaps: This Kantian metaphysics relies on things being unknown, such as having an incomplete picture of how mind arises from physical constituents and processes.
Metaphysics of the unfalsifiable: This relies on the outside chance that an unjustifiable idea might be true, such as the existence of God.
Metaphysics of ignorance: This relies on the metaphysician not knowing or pretending to not know how something is so they can continue on the basis that it is not, such as the evolution of species or the arrow of time (although some metaphysical questions regarding the arrow of time fall under MotG). The difference between this and MotG is that the latter claims justification via the gaps, whereas this tends to insist on purely metaphysical (i.e. not useful) approaches to well-understood problems.
Metaphysics of the impossible: This relies on considering only scenarios that are logically impossible or factually untrue, such as the "do otherwise" scenario of anti-determinist free will formulations.
You can do metaphysics then by picking one of the above, say: that the root cause of the creation of the universe is unknown. Despite the fact that everything we do know about the start of the universe comes from astronomy, cosmology, particle physics and the like, the next step is to disregard all of this and insist on a completely useless framework for understanding how it might occur. When asked to justify the framework, you can do so in any of the above four ways: claim that there is no hard evidence for an alternative solution; claim that your solution cannot be disproven; claim that any reference to non-metaphysical knowledge is out of scope, inferior, or invalid for epistemological reasons; and finally claim that anything that follows from your proposal that seems invalid doesn't matter because it's ab initio, therefore independent of how things are or can be in reality.
Quoting StreetlightX
via Jose Benardete, I think the most concise definition of metaphysics I know - at least in it's classical guise:
"Metaphysics in its classic sense has always been understood to be the rational investigation of the eternal order. Central to that investigation is the distinction between that which is eternal and that which is perishable, and though metaphysics addresses itself to both of those grades of being, its primary concern lies with the eternal, so that if there is nothing eternal, or if nothing eternal can be known, then metaphysics is an impossibility. The distinction between the eternal and the perishable may be said to be a cosmological one, in that the concept of time is cardinal to it.
That distinction may be translated into what might be styled ontological terms, as a distinction between the necessary and the contingent. What is eternal must also be necessary, and in this sense metaphysics is the science of being qua being, or of being as such, or of being insofar as it is necessary. If there is nothing which is necessary, or if nothing necessary can be known, then metaphysics is impossible." ("The Analytic A Posteriori and the Foundations of Metaphysics")
Quoting Gnomon
Meta-physics :
The branch of philosophy that examines the nature of reality, including the relationship between mind and matter, substance and attribute, fact and value.
1. Often dismissed by materialists as idle speculation on topics not amenable to empirical proof.
2. Aristotle divided his treatise on science into two parts. The world as-known-via-the-senses was labeled “physics” - what we call "Science" today. And the world as-known-by-the-mind, by reason, was labeled “metaphysics” - what we now call "Philosophy" .
3. Plato called the unseen world that hides behind the physical façade: “Ideal” as opposed to Real. For him, Ideal “forms” (concepts) were prior-to the Real “substance” (matter).
4. Physics refers to the things we perceive with the eye of the body. Meta-physics refers to the things we conceive with the eye of the mind. Meta-physics includes the properties, and qualities, and functions that make a thing what it is. Matter is just the clay from which a thing is made. Meta-physics is the design (form, purpose); physics is the product (shape, action). The act of creation brings an ideal design into actual existence. The design concept is the “formal” cause of the thing designed.
5. I use a hyphen in the spelling to indicate that I am not talking about Ghosts and Magic, but about Ontology (science of being).
Quoting tim wood
"Ontology" is a word often used here and elsewhere. What does it mean? This from online, "Branch of metaphysics concerned with identifying, in the most general terms, the kinds of things that actually exist." The more I think about this definition the less I understand it. And implied is that it is a species of, metaphysics. These are often referred to as sciences, but that doesn't seem right: what would they be sciences of?
Two words, then: metaphysics and ontology. Metaphysics, from online: "Branch of philosophy concerned with providing a comprehensive account of the most general features of reality as a whole; the study of being as such."
Ontology comes from the Greek ?? (on), being, and ????? (logos), knowledge.
It's well known that Metaphysics is also the name of an Aristotelian treatise, and almost as well known that the title, Metaphysics, says nothing about the contents of the treatise, not being Aristotle's title, it having been applied long afterwards and meaning "the books after the Physics."
And this thread is not about Aristotle's Metaphysics specifically. It is about what we understand now or can or should understand now about these words. If Aristotle speaks to that, then that's welcome. But in that case what he says is a matter of fact and the question goes to relevance. The distinction is that in one sense, while Metaphysics is the non-committal title of an ancient book, metaphysics is a modern name. Of what, exactly, I'm hoping I'll learn as this thread develops.
I'm hoping that certain difficulties with the two words will become apparent and that we can quickly dismantle problematic definitions. What, then, we end up with I'm curious to see.
Both seem concerned with "the most general terms" and "the most general features." Being and existence are the two most general terms, and I am not even sure what a "general" feature is. So we can say of something that exists, that it is. And no doubt much more, but everything else, it seems to me, devolves to non-general predicates. And of being itself, what predicates does that have?
Ontology seems self-limited, then, to the proposition that being is - and no more than that can be said. And metaphysics, pending a good definition for a "general" feature, seems about in the same circumstance. That is, that they're both empty - almost empty - concepts. At least as defined above. Is that the final word?
Quoting Pattern-chaser
In recent discussions, it has become clear to me that I have no clear idea of what metaphysics is. So I've come here, to ask the experts.... :wink: Seriously, can we have a stab here at defining and describing metaphysics? Does it have, as I suspect, many definitions that have evolved over years, and maybe within particular disciplines?
I think the everyday use of "metaphysical" is something like this:
Metaphysical
(popularly) abstract, abstruse, or unduly theoretical.
Incorporeal; supernatural.
— Collins English dictionary
But I think we need something better than "stuff that's a bit weird" for our use, don't we? :wink:
Accepting that "metaphysics" is used to describe quite a lot of philosophical thinking, the 'definition' that means most to me is one I thought I read in Pirsig's first novel. I've looked for it recently, and can't find it. Maybe I invented it? Anyway, I got the impression that if we start from all thought, ideas, and so forth, and we start to divide it, in order to reduce the pieces to bite-size. We might divide Everything into (say) Subject and Object. Then we would proceed to make further cuts. This process of deciding how to subdivide Everything is metaphysics.
But I'm sure you've got better ideas than this. What are they? What definition(s) of metaphysics do you find the most useful and meaningful?
Quoting Bill Hobba
I like the answer that says its just an attempt to clarify what is. 30 years of reading books on physics, especially QM, but GR etc as well, and philosophical writings on it by people like Wittgenstein (conventionalism), Poincare (conventionalism as well), Turing (applications were paramount. But had a magnificent debate with Wittgenstein about one of the most fundamental of things - math - https://www.britishwittgensteinsociety.org/wp-content/uploads/documents/lectures/Turing-and-Wittgenstein-on-Logic-and-Mathematics.pdf . Its ironic that before being a philosopher Wittgenstein used applied math all the time as an aeronautical researcher), Weinberg (realist - science is progressing towards something), Kuhn - well I am sure you get my drift - I still have no firm idea. I think its one of those things you need to read and form your own view - if you can - like I said I can't. I recently found a little known discussion between Dirac and Heisenberg that helped me quite a lot:
http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.485.9188&rep=rep1&type=pdf
I side with Dirac in that what is, is never really known, we just continually advance theories about it. Weinberg thinks we are advancing towards something, I think he is right, but bowed if I can justify it.
To me it's maddening we cant even pin it down well.
I’ll leave it there. There's lot's more. In particular, I found @Pattern-chaser's "Metaphysics - what is it?" thread, which I didn't remember, really interesting.
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Comments (417)
You can't do much with this though. I have noticed you like to make divisions. A break-up can be made into physical stuff and metaphysical stuff. But together they form a whole bigger than their parts.
You and I just had a similar discussion in another thread. As I noted, I've started this so the participants in that discussion can all work from the same meaning.
Great! I like all the views you presented! Must have been quite some work to collect them! I think examples can illuminate the distinction.
- Galen Strawson
"Metaphysics... business is to study the most general features of reality and real objects.... Here let us set down almost at random a small specimen of the questions of metaphysics which press, not for hasty answers, but for industrious and solid investigation:... Whether there is any distinction between, other than more or less. between fact and fancy? Or between the external and internal worlds?... What external reality do the qualities of sense represent in general?
- C.S. Peirce
"I take metaphysics to be about the world, not just about our concepts, conceptual schemes, or languages; and to depend on experience—not, however, on the kind of specialized, recherché experience on which the empirical sciences call, but on close attention to familiar, everyday experience."
- Susan Haack
"Metaphysical enquiry employs the same cognitive power as is employed in commonsense and scientific judgements about the world of experience: the very same principles of reasoning as are employed in empirical judgements about tables and atoms, are employed in a purified form, in metaphysical judgements about God and the soul.”
- Sebastian Gardner
I reject both of these, because I think the "subject/object" distinction, though very old, is not very useful. So I guess that rules me out of discussion.
The best remarks on the topic, in my view, are from Introduction to Metaphysics, by Heidegger. If you really want something to challenge you, that's worth looking at.
Those statements were presented as examples of metaphysical statements, not as metaphysical positions to be discussed. The point of this thread is to discuss the meaning of the word "metaphysics" not to discuss any particular metaphysical issue unless it is relevant to the meaning of the word.
Again, you make a distinction here, and rightly so, but you consider them separate without a connection. You posit the existence of an unknowable truth, be it physical or religious, or the gods of the Hopi. You say that we have a representation of world. The external world is objective. And it's knowable, be it God, physical reality, the gods of the Hopi, etc. Truth is the correspondence between reality and its representation.
But... You never seem to actually make contact with objective reality. It will always stay out of reach, turtles all the way down. This gives me a creepy feeling. Why not say each turtle is objective reality. That's what I meant (in the former very nice conversation we had in another thread) by saying that the combination of both divisions contains qualities not present in the both separate. Each metaphysics can influence the physics in the context of the whole. An observer and reality together give rise to a new reality and new observers, in mutual correspondence.
So reality is not observer independent. The reality perceived and thought is reality and not an approached representation of it. This being out of reach gives the feeling of endlessly trying in vain.
The Tao perceived is the Tao how it truly is. I don't claim that everything you think is true, not at all (might you think this).
I think the ultimate form of metaphysics is mathematics.
Then this metaphysics needs reconsideration. Why can't that be discussed?
I like all the quotes you provided. If you take them all, add all the ones I included in my post along with 1,000 more I could have provided if I wanted to take the time, you get an, at best, impressionistic picture of meaning that looks like one of those paintings done by elephants. Maybe that's the best we can do.
The problem is that I want to talk about a very specific sense of the word, the one I presented in the OP. I'd be happy to call it something else, but that would only make things worse.
So far as I can see, there's no technical notion of metaphysics. You're aware of its humble etymological beginnings in Aristotle. You ask any person and they can give you a slightly different answer. I tend to think of metaphysics as, at heart, the study of beings -- which several definitions you mentioned also include. Pretty general.
But meta ta physika is the meaning of the word: after the physics. The end. What's next?
Metaphysical Resarch Lab
Theory of Abstract Objects
Metaphysics of Science
From my perspective (as one of Leibniz's many, many professional descendants), I think of infinitesimals when thinking of Leibniz. He made many contributions to math, but an infinitesimal lies within the definition of metaphysics for me.
Sorry to interrupt a lively discussion.
My favorite philosophers derive mathematics
from quantification. Quantification in turn presupposes an enduringly self-identical object. Why? Because a calculation counts identical instances of a meaning whose sense is kept fixed during the counting . To count is to count continuously changing instances OF something that holds itself as self-identical through a duration or extension.
Husserl writes:
“ The consideration of the conditions in principle of the possibility of something identical that gives itself (harmoniously) in flowing and subjectively changing manners of appearance leads to the mathematization of the appearances as a necessity which is immanent in them.”
“A true object in the sense of logic is an object which is absolutely identical "with itself," that is, which is, absolutely identically, what it is; or, to express it in another way: an object is through its determinations, its quiddities [Weisheiten], its predicates, and it is identical if these quiddities are identical as belonging to it or when their belonging absolutely excludes their not belonging. Purely mathematical thinking is related to possible objects which are thought determinately through ideal-"exact" mathematical (limit-) concepts.”
Heidegger writes:
“Thus what can be shown to have the character of constantly remaining, as remanens capax mutationem, constitutes the true being of beings which can be experienced in the world. What enduringly remains truly is. This is the sort of thing that mathematics knows. What mathematics makes accessible in beings constitutes their being.”
So the question is , where do self-identical objects comefrom? If we believe the ultimate form of metaphysics is mathematics , we are likely to believe that self -identical presence is a fundamental grounding of the real. But my favorite philosophers argue that the objectively present object is a fabrication. It is a synthesis of constantly changing senses of experience . This means that mathematics , like objective presence, is a derived construction rather than a metaphysical grounding. What is metaphysically primordial is the process of subjective and intersubjective acts of sense making.
That's the problem. We have many definitions, sometimes incompatible with each other, so we have to choose one. Or leave the topic ambiguous.
I think that if we want to keep the spirit of Aristotle's "being qua being", metaphysics has to be reinterpreted epistemologically. Our physics would today, be Aristotle's metaphysics back then.
The goal of metaphysics was to explain the world. Now we know that we can say less about the world than was thought in antiquity. Aristotle wanted to (for example) show what a house was. Today we'd say that a house is mind-dependent not a aspect of the world.
If we want to talk about houses, or statues or clocks or people, we have to elucidate how these things appear to us, how do we think about them (is a cave a house?) and what can we say about the world for people (are colours a property of the world?, is our ordinary picture of the world misleading?, etc.).
That's what I concluded after looking at this for some time, but, like anything else in philosophy people are going to disagree.
The second point I think needs to be made is the centrality of the Greek verb 'to be'. I'm not a Greek scholar, but a paper that StreetlightX linked some time ago, "The Greek Verb 'To Be' and the Problem of Being", Charles Kahn, elucidates this at some length and is definitely worth the read.
I say this because Aristotle's consideration of the various meanings of 'to be' are central to his metaphysics, which is really about 'the meaning of being'. This is important with regards to the central term 'substance'.
The Greek term 'ouisia' was translated into the Latin 'substantia', which then became the English 'substance'. But there's a deep problem, in that the usual meaning of the term 'substance' is 'a material with uniform properties'. Whereas the Greek 'ousia' is much nearer in meaning to our term 'being' or 'subject' - a 'bearer of attributes'. And this introduces a diabolical confusion into many debates about metaphysics, all the more so because the confusion is not recognised as such. When pre-modern texts talk of 'substances' they don't mean any kind of 'stuff', but that which is independently existent i.e. not derivative. This persisted up until early modern philosophy:
The notion of there being greater and lesser degrees of reality is, I contend, something that has dropped out of modern philosophy.
When traditional philosophy speaks of 'substance' it is not speaking of any kind of thing. Whereas in our day it is natural to assume that the ultimate concern of metaphysics is what kind of things are fundamentally real. But I say that looses sight of a basic distinction between 'beings' and 'things' - a distinction which I think is barely recognised, due in part to the meaning of 'ousia' having been lost in the transition to modernity.
Quoting Manuel
It should be mentioned that when Galileo overthrew Aristotelian physics, the Aristotelian notion of 'causation' was rejected along with it - the idea of formal and final causes, or the reasons for a thing, in the sense of its telos.
Susan Haack picks up on that in her The World According to Innocent Realism. She discusses fiction and how it relates to the world and concludes that reality comes in degrees or parts. But you're right that it's not a subject much dealt with at the moment.
Quoting Wayfarer
Yes. So these things need a rearticulating of sorts.
You wrote it yourself:
"I think separating the study of the nature of things from the study of how we know the nature of things is wrong-headed. They are really the same thing."
About epistemology, the knowledge about knowledge. Knowledge about knowledge is best obtained by wallowing in it. Not by an abstract epistemology.
Quoting T Clark
It just seems to me that we could come up with all manner of rules and principles that are perhaps internally intelligible, but don't apply to the reality we actually deal with. Like solipsism. It makes a strange kind of sense, but it doesn't compute with the data available to us.
(P.s. thanks for the new thread! I'm afraid the little'uns get in the way of my spending too much time constructing lengthy posts, let alone OPs on here, so I appreciate your efforts.)
I don't think that's true, unless I misunderstand what you mean by "technical." Collingwood's definition fits the bill:
Metaphysics is the attempt to find out what absolute presuppositions have been made by this or that person or groups of persons, on this or that occasion or groups of occasions, in the course of this or that piece of thinking.
That's what I want to talk about when I talk about "metaphysics." Maybe I'll just change the word so it won't get so confusing. I'm going to start calling it "Collingwood's metaphysics," "C-metaphysics" for short.
Seriously. That's what I'm going to do from now on.
Quoting Manuel
As I noted in my previous post, I've solved the "metaphysics" problem once and for all, at least for myself. It's taken years, but I've finally figured out how to handle it. The only metaphysics I'm really interested in discussing is metaphysics as define by Collingwood:
Metaphysics is the attempt to find out what absolute presuppositions have been made by this or that person or groups of persons, on this or that occasion or groups of occasions, in the course of this or that piece of thinking.
From now on, I'm just going to use the term "C-metaphysics" to denote that usage. I'm serious. I mean it. You guys can all go fry ice. I don't care what you say....No.. No.. La, la, la, la, la, la, la...
I really am serious.
That's actually valid. Academics do it all the time.
Things remain the same. People will continue to speak about metaphysics and you'll be limited to speaking about "C-metaphysics".
It's good you found a solution.
It seems the problem with the term is here to stay.
My only problem with the term was that I couldn't get people to use it the way I want them to.
So, what you're saying is that I am a brilliant, towering genius. Thank you. Thank you very much.
Ask the person who you're debating with what they mean by metaphysics. Get them to define their particular terms. Phrases are digests of complex simple ideas. The act of doing philosophy should be to breaking down those phrases into complex simple terms with the person who you are discussing with. You're not debating the phrase, you're debating the underlying logical components. Those transcend any labels or ideologies.
I agree. The failure to do as you specify is the cause of many, most?, of the misunderstandings and disagreements here on the forum. Discussions often end up being derailed by what you call "debatingi the phrase."
Ideally, that would be nice.
Well, that's par for the course :wink:
But I do in fact think and agree that the conversations on the ENTIRE forum would go better if people clarified their terminology/baseline positions and worldviews before getting into the actual debates :chin:
That's the one you like the most, but doesn't make it a technical notion. I think you did misunderstand. I mean by "technical notion" those used in the sciences -- like "energy," "work," etc. These notions are given a meaning in the context of a theory. Metaphysics can be defined any way we want. There are some common themes running through the various ways it is described; it's a fairly amorphous term.
But what is the goal here? To arrive at a definitive meaning of "metaphysics"? How will we know when we arrive there? Seems to me on par with trying to find the world's longest sentence -- as soon as you get there, you can also add a word.
But C-metaphysics seems to be nothing more than discussing various assumptions people make or hold. That's certainly worthy of discussion, yes. That seems different than wanting to determine the meaning of metaphysics.
That will lead to some poor quality New Age stuff, but that's unavoidable.
But these posts will continue to arise. I suppose I kind of like them.
Metaphysics, in Collingwood's sense, is very important to me. It is central to my understanding of the nature of reality and our relationship to it. In order to talk about it effectively, I need a good word for the idea I'm trying to get across. I've spent years here on the forum trying to force the word "metaphysics" to fit that bill, but, as everyone acknowledges, it just means too many different things to too many different people. The epiphany I've just had is that I should just give up. Screw it. I'll make up a new word. Here's some ideas:
I think I'll use number 3.
Quoting StreetlightX
Whereas in a lot of modern thinking, the idea of there even being 'an eternal order' is passé. Positivism says straight out that metaphysics is empty words, and a lot of people agree. I think you feel the pull of something beyond - hence your attraction to the Tao Te Ching - but find it very frustrating and difficult to pin down or articulate what it is, as you say in your post.
Practically the only outpost of traditional metaphysics in today's world is with Catholic philosophers who follow Thomas Aquinas. The reason for that is that Aquinas himself was an exemplar of the 'perennial philosophy' in the Western tradition. But there is clearly a conflict between those 'traditionalist' types of philosophy, and modern philosophy generally, on a lot of grounds. Modern philosophy is overall anti-metaphysical, because metaphysics, rightly or wrongly, is identified with religion and it doesn't sit well with our secular age. (See Philosophy Lives, John Haldane.)
I think to study the subject takes a lot of reading and reflection but it is possible to attain an understanding of it. There are unprecedented opportunities for self-study on the internet nowadays. So - don't give up. And don't fold for 'craptastics'. There is something real and important to be understood in all of this.
This seems wrong to me. Metaphysics consists in various "absolute presuppositions (that) have been made". So, doing metaphysics is making such presuppositions. Studying metaphysics (meta-metaphysics?) then is the study of, or "attempt to find out what absolute presuppositions have been made".
Quoting Wayfarer
This is true, but the modern thinking that dismisses the idea of "an eternal order" is also a metaphysics. If you start from the twin assumptions that there is an eternal order and that human rationality alone is capable of discerning (and even understanding?) that order, then your efforts will be directed towards the goal of discerning and understanding that (purported) order.
On the other hand if you reject the idea of such an order, or reject the idea that such an order, even if it existed, could be purely discerned and understood by human rationality, then your metaphysics will consist in working out what seems to be the most plausible to think about the nature of the real in light of the whole movement of human thought and the sciences.
Most of it is rigorous daydreaming; a pseudo-scientific posturing about things that cannot be known, usually with a surreptitious (right-wing) political aim (i.e. propaganda).
To the flames! :fire: :fire: :fire:
Do you think Carnap would agree that his work falls under the heading of metaphysics? Or is a matter of irony if it does?
Damned! I listened to that one this afternoon! But in the Wall video where they sit together in the studio. "Mother do you think they drop the bomb?"
Quoting T Clark
The nature of reality? You mean Collingwood,'s view of it, and his relation to it.
After reading some of your comments here and elsewhere, I think Salmon's metaphysics about causal forks and statistical causation is perfectly fit for you. I had to read that brown book obligatory, but it's so far removed from actuality. Luckily, I only remember it's brown, soft shiny cover, and it resides as a mistakenly imposed memory in my brain. It's simply too much!
No no no. That won't do. Metaphysics is the stuff of the transcendent. Metaphysics is that which lies beyond the physics. Metaphysics is what Kant tried to ask how is it possible. Metaphysics is whatever Hegel said. And worldmaking, and interpreting physics, and seeing spirits and is gobbledygook and also profound.
It's pretty obvious.
There are few things in life that are exactly what we want them to be. So philosophers, unlike Scientists, tend to adapt the Self to the Situation (Ethics), instead of changing the world to better suit the human body (Physics).
It would be nice if we could all agree on a "set of rules" for discussing metaphysical questions. That would at least put philosophy on a stable foundation, like the "show-me" empiricism of Science. And Francis Bacon probably devised his Method of Inference with that in mind. But, to date, the best we've been able to do is to quantify the uncertainty of our educated guesses. Since practical physical science deals with real things, at least we can add to the statistical certainty of our inferences by repeating experiments, in order to weed-out exceptions to the general rule. But theoretical Metaphysical Science deals with Ideal concepts that merely represent crude approximations of reality (*1 icons).
Unfortunately, Post-Enlightenment Science staked a claim on all empirically verifiable questions (just the facts, no feelings *2), and left-over for Philosophy only the perennial probability questions that have more-or-less-likely answers. Science greedily hoarded all the objective facts under its purview, and let naive philosophers argue endlessly about subjective opinions. Hence, feckless philosophers can only hope to get Closer-To-Truth, by following Aristotle's logical rules for Induction.
However, some Philosophers, Theologians, and a few Scientists don't even agree that there is a "knowable external reality" for our concepts to correspond to. In that case, there's no benefit to logical argument. So only power rules. And Ecclesiastical Courts of Inquisition take the place of experimentation for ruling out error. So the only humane alternative is to have Democratic Courts of Inquiry like The Philosophy Forum, limited only by Logic and respect for civilized discourse.
That said, we are still faced with agreeing on a definition of whatever it is we are disagreeing about. Which is even more difficult, if we can't even agree on what divisive topics fall under the umbrella of Metaphysics. Some dismiss the very idea of non-physics as non-sense, and refuse to even engage in dialog. And others dismiss physics as illusions of greedy minds. So, that's why I went back to Aristotle, to discover what topics he excluded from his book of Physics, and which he included in the second volume "After-Physics". The substance of volume II later became known to Medieval Christians as the "Meta-Physics", and to Enlightenment Scientists as "non-stuff" and "non-sense".
In Volume I, he defined what today we would call the Elements (Matter) and the Principles (Laws) of Physics, illustrated with specific instances. Then, in the Meta-Physics, he turned to the various ideas that humans have postulated, to explain the mysteries of the Real World. Those ideas are not themselves found in Reality, but in human imagination. Hence, we call them "Ideal". And even pragmatic Aristotle adopted Plato's notion of Ideal "Forms" (ideal patterns for real things) in his explanations. And that non-physical concept is also at the core of my own worldview, based on the Reality and Ideality of what we now call "In-form-ation". :nerd:
Meta-physics :
[i]The branch of philosophy that examines the nature of reality, including the relationship between mind and matter, substance and attribute, fact and value.
1. Often dismissed by materialists as idle speculation on topics not amenable to empirical proof.
2. Aristotle divided his treatise on science into two parts. The world as-known-via-the-senses was labeled “physics” - what we call "Science" today. And the world as-known-by-the-mind, by reason, was labeled “metaphysics” - what we now call "Philosophy" .
3. Plato called the unseen world that hides behind the physical façade: “Ideal” as opposed to Real. For him, Ideal “forms” (concepts) were prior-to the Real “substance” (matter).
4. Physics refers to the things we perceive with the eye of the body. Meta-physics refers to the things we conceive with the eye of the mind. Meta-physics includes the properties, and qualities, and functions that make a thing what it is. Matter is just the clay from which a thing is made. Meta-physics is the design (form, purpose); physics is the product (shape, action). The act of creation brings an ideal design into actual existence. The design concept is the “formal” cause of the thing designed.
5. I use a hyphen in the spelling to indicate that I am not talking about Ghosts and Magic, but about Ontology (science of being).[/i]
http://blog-glossary.enformationism.info/page14.html
PS___That definition of the disputatious term implies that Philosophers have no business arguing by the rules of Physics, instead of the applicable rules of Reason.
*1 Do We See Icons or Reality? :
https://social-epistemology.com/2019/12/05/do-we-see-icons-or-reality-a-review-of-donald-hoffmans-the-case-against-reality-brian-martin/
*2 Facts vs Opinions :
In the 1950's TV police drama, Dragnet, dour detective Joe Friday --- whenever a witness began to stray from observations to insert personal impressions --- would shush them with "just the facts ma'am".
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dragnet_(1951_TV_series)
It would depend on the nature of the dismissal of metaphysics. If the claim was that talk of an eternal order is incoherent or meaningless then it might be considered to be a semantic claim. On the view that metaphysics is impossible because it is incoherent, without meaning, to speak, or at least make claims about, things which cannot be empirically tested, then no claim could rightly be considered to be a metaphysical claim.
Heidegger, who rejects traditional metaphysics (as Kant did) in a different way, unless I am mistaken, sees metaphysics as a subset of phenomenology (and hermeneutics) and on that view metaphysical ideas would be different ways of disclosing our experience of the world, and not propositions to be considered true or false. This view could perhaps be interpreted as being close to Collingwood's
I don't think I am searching for "something beyond." I'm looking for the most mundane, scotch tape, macaroni and cheese thing there is. Metaphysics is not something beyond, it's mayonnaise, salt and pepper, those chicken cutlets on the counter in the kitchen. As you can see, I'm late for dinner. Metaphysics isn't beyond, it's before.
I've started two threads prior to this one about defining specific philosophic terms. Those were for "mysticism" and "consciousness." The conclusions I came to for those two terms is the same one I've come to for this one - I don't need to understand them better, I need to find a new word, because the old one doesn't work any more, generally because they're hung with so many different and discordant meanings and connotations that they obscure more than they enlighten.
Next time I am confused about a term, I'll know how to handle it. Don't try to understand it. Don't start a new discussion. Just come up with a different word. That, by the way, is why there are so much dumb-ass jargon in philosophy. Too many people like me wanting to wipe the slate clean.
There's already a term for meta-metaphysics. It's "metaphysics." As I noted in a recent post, it's metaphysics all the way down.
The question does arise as to why bother posting on a philosophy forum if you think it's a waste of time. I mean, I ask myself that also, but at least I have an interest in the subject.
Quoting Janus
Kant criticized traditional metaphysics, but he did not reject metaphysics wholesale, as positivism does.
"Right-wing political aim" seems like a stretch.
This from Kant stuck me as interesting:
Metaphysics has as the proper object of its inquiries three ideas only: God, freedom, and immortality.
Freedom?
I feel very at home with Collingwood.
Yes, and this is why I need a new word.
Sounds good.
I don't propose to change the world, just some words. And I don't need to change them for anyone other than myself.
Quoting Gnomon
For me, metaphysics is the set of rules.
Quoting Gnomon
I was never really interested in discussing "metaphysics" or metaphysics as such. I want to talk about, and use, Collingwood's metaphysical way of seeing things in my everyday and intellectual life. In order to do that, I've concluded that I need to call it something other than "metaphysics."
I don't think posting on the forum is a waste of time and I don't remember ever saying it was.
:clap:
My response was perfectly serious. I admit it was playful, metaphorical, but I don't see how it was disrespectful of your response.
Interesting. Do you have an example you like?
That's fine and understandable.
The only issue you may have is that when people ask do we have selves or is the world ideal and the like, you'll find yourself in a situation in which you'll say "that's not metaphysics, metaphysics deals with propositions." That's not what Schopenhauer or Peirce would say.
It's difficult.
And that's one of the reasons you have Sisyphus as your icon.
Hah! You're sharp.
Better to push a boulder up a mountain for eternity, than hitting your head on the wall repeatedly.
Cheers.
Is your claim that it is metaphysics all the way down itself a metaphysical or ontological, or a merely epistemological one? I'm not sure if you're being serious, but if so, my retort would be that there is no fact of the matter regarding what we should call the study of the history of metaphysics, which is what Collingwood refers to as just 'metaphysics'. There is, distinct from this historical study of metaphysics, the possibility of practicing metaphysical thinking which has no truck with any traditional metaphysics.
Will you give me some examples of those Metaphysical rules?
Quoting T Clark
I was not familiar with Collingwood, so I googled and scanned the Stanford biography. I didn't see anything specifically about a list of rules. And in general, his approach seemed to be more theoretical & academic abstractions than pragmatic & everyday applications. He seems to be mostly concerned with classifications & distinctions. One distinction mentioned in the article was between Realism and Idealism, and it said "Collingwood is often referred to as a British idealist". I didn't see anything that would distinguish his definition of "Metaphysics" from any other philosophical topic. Can you summarize his "metaphysical way of seeing things"? Is it a spiritual worldview? :smile:
Metaphysical.
Quoting Janus
Although I think it's funny, I am completely serious.
Quoting Janus
Generally I agree, although I don't understand the distinction you are making by calling it the history of metaphysics.
Quoting Janus
I'm not sure what you are suggesting. Please expand.
Here are some:
Here are some that I think may be metaphysical, but I'm not sure:
This is fun, although I'm not really satisfied that my examples capture the flavor I'm looking for.
Who goes by a rather precise (but perhaps restrictive) definition of metaphysics as the study of absolute presuppositions of knowledge.
This definition has a number of consequences, among which:
1. Metaphysical statements are not themselves provable. Instead, they make other statements meaningful and potentially provable. IOW they are the equivalent of axioms in mathematics. They found, frame and allow a certain form of discourse.
2. We all go with certain basic presuppositions, ergo we all sport some metaphysics or another, consciously or not, even those of us professing otherwise, whom Collingwood humorously calls the "anti-metaphysicians".
3. There is metaphysics at the heart (or rather seed) of physics and any other other science, since all sciences are built on certain absolute presuppositions.
4. The directions taken by our truth-seeking efforts (our observations of the world around us, in particular) are framed by and interpreted within our metaphysics. Therefore one rarely changes one's metaphysics, not based on empirical observation anyway.
5. People are 'ticklish' about their metaphysics. They can get angry if you challenge their absolute presuppositions (even so-called anti-metaphysicians). It is a natural reaction, as these absolute presuppositions underwrite their (our) whole world view. Hence perhaps the irksome tone of some metaphysical discussions.
6. Metaphysics as defined by Collingwood is a historical science in that absolute presuppositions are both a product and an engine of history: they are born at a certain time in a certain place, their popularity ebbs and flows, they are a bit like mental viruses. And since they can shape discourse, they can shape politics. Metaphysical ideas can have a political impact.
Objectivity is over-rated. What is seen as objective is highly dependent on many contingent factors, and whatever is ascertained to be real is obviously a matter of judgement, which is a rational process. Being able to criticize this attitude is where metaphysics begins. (This article keeps popping up in my news feed.)
Quoting T Clark
True. But different human thoughts can refer to different objective realities, a concept that's hard to grasp for western thought somehow.
Quoting T Clark
Obviously.
Quoting T Clark
Not true. General relativity didn't apply in Newton's time, and doesn't apply everywhere nowadays. Likewise for Newtonian mechanics. Statistical thermodynamics only applies in a specific range of experiments, same for the classical approach. Sometimes they overlap. Old-fashion hadron physics doesn't involve quarks. These were constructed within the quark model (you might say that they were always there, but that's in retrospect only). Etcetera.
Quoting T Clark
There is. Dependent on which theory one prefers.
Quoting T Clark
That's highly questionable and not really a metaphysical rule, except that it talks about stuff beyond the physical stuff. But there is no talk about that stuff. No metareligious chat. Metaphysics talks about physical stuff.
I'm not sure if you think this yourself, but you like the book it's written in. It looks as if you stated the stuff above yourself, but I'm aware you didn't.
I was using the statement as an example of a metaphysical statement, not necessarily one I endorse.
Quoting T Clark
Reality itself has a fundamentally subjective aspect, which is intrinsic, but is never knowable by objective means. It's not a 'that', so doesn't exist in an objective sense, but is real as the self. But as we tend to be exclusively oriented with respect to the objective domain, then this realisation must always elude us. This understanding is much more in keeping with non-dualist philosophies than with the theistic tradition, although I've learned that it's nearly always interpreted through the lens of theism, because that is the only way we've been taught to think about it.
Maybe by means of hidden variables gods can communicate, though I prefer to be left alone!
You mean stuff that resides inside matter? So that we indeed are what we eat?
Originally I responded to this:
Quoting T Clark
Attempting to find out "what absolute presuppositions have been made..." just is the study of the history of metaphysics. Making absolute presuppositions yourself is doing metaphysics (making metaphysical claims or adopting a metaphysical standpoint); so you have a distinction between studying the history of (other people doing) metaphysics and actually doing metaphysics..
Let's not forget that Collingwood was an historian.
So this, for example
Quoting Wayfarer
is not studying the history of metaphysics, but rather making a particular metaphysical claim, selected from among many other possible metaphysical views on account of personal preference.
NOT STUFF. Not an object, not a thing.
All right then: the non materialistic kind of stuff residing inside matter. Can't that be stuff? To be known only from the inside? And thus not knowable from the outside by examining just the matter aspect?
It would be an event of a process.
I might think about it as an object but don't feel it like an object. It's that what's inside the object, like a pain in my toe.
As I've noted several times in this thread, the problem with the word "metaphysics" is that it is not restrictive enough. It means different things to just about everyone to the point that it has become almost meaningless. As I've also noted, I don't really want to talk about metaphysics, I want to talk about metaphysics as envisioned by Collingwood. Using his understanding doesn't limit me, it gives me exactly the words I need to talk about my understanding of how human understanding of reality works.
Quoting Olivier5
Collingwood is explicit about this. Metaphysical statements have no truth value.
Quoting Olivier5
Yes. Keeping in mind that the difference between relative presuppositions and absolute presuppositions is central to Collingwood's way of seeing things. Anti-metaphysics is just another kind of metaphysics.
Quoting Olivier5
That's the reason we care about metaphysics at all.
Quoting Olivier5
I think people change their metaphysics all the time. You can be running two metaphysics programs at the same time if you're dealing with two situations simultaneously e.g. talking philosophy at the dinner table. I'm not sure Collingwood would agree with this.
Quoting Olivier5
That's true, but it's about psychology, not philosophy.
From my experience here on the forum, I think the irksome tone in metaphysics discussions comes from two places 1) The confusion and frustration related to different meanings attached to the ideas and 2) The fundamentally irksome natures of many of us here.
Quoting Olivier5
I agree with this.
As I told Wayfarer, I gave this as an example of a metaphysical statement, not necessarily as one I endorse.
Quoting Verdi
Again, this was an example I provided, not a position I necessarily support.
Quoting Verdi
Again, it's an example. I don't think you're paying attention. I was responding to a specific request to provide examples.
Quoting Verdi
An example.
Quoting Verdi
Again, it's intended as an example. I disagree that it isn't a metaphysical statement.
I think you know this is a position I am attracted to. It's something I use all the time. In this particular situation, I was using it as an example.
Ok, although I'm not sure the distinction is an important one. To be clear, those are Collingwood's words. I do agree with them.
Quoting Janus
Again, the distinction doesn't seem all that significant to me.
This has been a really interesting and helpful discussion for me. I've gotten what I need out of it and I'm happy to see it go wherever anyone wants to take it going forward. I appreciate your restraint, but I'm all set.
If so, I would ask you whether you cannot see that you could do one without the other, and that one necessarily involves some commitment to a view or views and the other doesn't, and that the difference between human activities which involve commitment to views and those which don't, is arguably of the greatest significance.
Not so simple. People can't really believe in, say, one unique god in the morning and believe in no god or many gods in the afternoon. Or rather, they can but they rarely admit to it and feel unsatisfied about it.
Quoting T Clark
Nope. The ticklishess Collingwood talks about comes from the fundamental nature of metaphysical statements. It's a healthy reaction to try and defend one's metaphysics, according to him.
First - I have trouble including existence of a personal God in metaphysics. The statement "God exists" is, assumedly, a true or false question. Metaphysical statements are not true or false. I wonder what Collingwood would say.
Second - I didn't say someone would reject a metaphysical position often. Different metaphysical systems are useful for different purposes. A Taoist scientist might experience the Tao during meditative practice, but then have no problem dealing with the world as an objective reality at work.
It's a classic metaphysical question, though. Collingwood goes as far as advising to use religious language to frame absolute presuppositions, as an indicator of whether we are truly at the right foundational level. E.g. "God is a mathematician" is his way of phrasing the absolute presupposition that quantitative differences are all there really is 'out there', i.e. that qualitative differences are not fundamental but rather the expression of mere quantitative differences. He sees this presupposition as being at the heart of the scientific revolution.
Quoting T Clark
Indeed, and a Christian or Jewish scientist may believe in miracles, yet have no problem excluding them as a possible explanation of her scientific experiences. But we are talking here of methodological choices, of people saying "for the sake of the argument, let us pretend that X is true even though I don't actually believe it true."
You say it's a fundamental metaphysical question, then go on to show how it's not. What you describe is the use of God as a metaphor for "he absolute presupposition that quantitative differences are all there really is 'out there', i.e. that qualitative differences are not fundamental but rather the expression of mere quantitative differences." Albert Einstein, an atheist, said that God does not play dice. Although I am not a theist, one of the texts that means the most to me this the American Declaration of Independence "All men are created equal and are endowed by their Creator...
Quoting Olivier5
The basic methodological choices are metaphysics.
Using different metaphysics for different applications is not "pretending for the sake of argument." It is making a choice, whether or not one is aware of it. Back to Collingwood's definition:
Metaphysics is the attempt to find out what absolute presuppositions have been made by this or that person or groups of persons, on this or that occasion or groups of occasions, in the course of this or that piece of thinking.
It says "on this or that occasion in the course of this or that piece of thinking." Metaphysics is time and use dependent. There's no reason someone can't use one metaphysical approach in the morning and another in the afternoon, depending on usefulness for a particular application. I have quite a few floating around in my mind right now. Now, I'm following (more or less) the rules of reason. Later I might want to follow the rules of intuition or poetry. One of the greatest strengths of human intelligence is the ability to hold two seemingly conflicting ideas in our minds at once and yet keep on thinking. Light is both a particle and a wave - far out man.
Good examples of a metaphorical use of the God concept. As an atheist myself, I agree that this is a possible and often effective use of the concept.
My only disagreement is with your characterisation of my position in your first sentence. I didn't use the term 'fundamental'; instead I said that God (or gods) is a classic question in metaphysics, i.e. a question which has been traditionally seen as an important issue for metaphysicians of old, the "classics".
Quoting T Clark
Well, I have to admit that both Collingwood and my own life experience vouch for this but I still feel unsatisfied with a lack of conceptual coherence between frameworks. For me there still is a need for a meta-framework binding different methodological frameworks together, if only to tell which framework(s) are best used when. Even if that need might never be totally satisfied, we (I for one) crave for coherence.
Hence for instance the search for a unified theory between Relativity and QM.
Yes, I pulled the old switcheroo. I started out with "classical" as you did. Then I switched it to "fundamental" because that supported my rhetorical position better. I'm a bad boy.
:grin: Let he who never sinned report you first.
I added a bit to my response BTW.
The willingness to accept the "lack of conceptual coherence between frameworks" is exactly "the ability to hold two seemingly conflicting ideas in our minds at once and yet keep on thinking" I was talking about. Rejecting the need for a "meta-framework" is intellectually liberating. I guess some would call it intellectually lazy, but it's not.
By definition, removing a constraint is liberating, but note that adding a constraint helps in focusing. The idea of Collingwood is that certain metaphysical constraints are fruitful, they bear interesting fruits in terms of knowledge by focussing our attention on certain types of explanations and excluding others.
For instance, a modern historian cannot decently believe or write that Zeus literally helped Heracles, or that Moses parted the Red Sea. Such mythological explanations or descriptions of events are ruled out by the naturalistic presupposition that gods do not intervene in history directly via miracles. Now, a mystical historian could say: "I find that believing in an interventionist God is sometimes liberating."
Would he be right?
If he means by that "The direct, literal intervention of Christ explains the victory of X over Y at battle Z better than any other explanation", or even if he means something like "The direct, literal intervention of Christ is as fair as any other explanation for the victory of X over Y at battle Z", I vouch he is wrong, at least in the context of modern historical research. For a sermon maybe ok...
If the mystical historian means something like: "Many people at the time and in the centuries that followed until now, especially many Christians, interpreted the victory of X over Y at battle Z as resulting from X's conversion to Christ, and we need to keep this framework of faith in mind when we read such and such historical sources", then he may be right.
Yes, but to me, the more interesting thing is that they are unavoidable and we need to try to be aware of what we are using and the influence it has on our thinking.
Quoting Olivier5
As I noted, for me, theistic religion's place in metaphysics is ambiguous. My solution? Don't worry about it.
Quoting Olivier5
I see it from the other side. To be constrained limits your ability to understand. That's why, in an ideal world, we would pick, take responsibility for, our own constraints. That's not how it usually works, even for such profoundly insightful intellects as you and me. Your historian is responsible for his own metaphysics. It is in our best interests to be aware of them when we are reading his works.
Is that not making the struggle to understand risk free?
The Collingwood method of not framing assumptions as true or false is helpful toward a taxonomic orientation of various concepts and points of view but it doesn't give itself problems it cannot solve.
Is that not an 'absolute' assumption of some kind? Is that saying all problems are only results of some set of ideas being adopted and are not verifiable beyond the expression of them?
Good question, although I think it comes from the wrong direction. The goal is not be be correct, it's to provide answers that will work in the real world. Collingwood's metaphysics makes us, or at least gives us the ability to be, responsible for our own assumptions. It's then our job to pick assumptions that make sense in the world in which we live.
Quoting Paine
First of all, it's not all assumptions, presuppositions, but only absolute presuppositions that Collingwood's view applies to. As I said, the goal is not to just solve problems, but to solve them in a way that works.
Quoting Paine
If you're asking whether Collingwood's understanding of metaphysics is a metaphysical position, the answer is "yes."
I propose the goal is to understand the world and ourselves in it. Being correct (or not) is an attribute of a proposition or a set of them. Understanding is finding out what is 'real' and wanting to understand more because of that experience. Being satisfied that a relativity separates absolute assumptions is a kind of cessation of desire. It is to say there is no ultimate coherence in this 'real' world and it is foolish to seek it out.
It is in that sense of the love in the word philosophy that I meant to have no problems. The eunuch does not sport pesky erections.
The world and ourselves in it are functions of the metaphysical system we choose. First pick the system, then you get to see the world.
Quoting Paine
Again, "real" is a function of the metaphysical system you choose.
Quoting Paine
No, it is to say that the ultimate coherence of the world is dependent on me and the choices I make and the values I hold.
So, you agree with Protagoras: 'Man is the measure of all things.'
That view captures a certain kind of immediacy in our experience but exemplifies the lack of desire I was referring to. According to Protagoras, any further efforts to understand beyond those parameters is make-work or wankery.
So, what is its central tenet?
In his own words:
Metaphysics is the attempt to find out what absolute presuppositions have been made by this or that person or groups of persons, on this or that occasion or groups of occasions, in the course of this or that piece of thinking.
Wherever our ideas and technology go, we ourselves live at human scale. All human value resides at human scale. For us, the world is inseparable from human value.
The only tools we have to conceptualize reality are human language and mathematics. Humans cannot understand or use anything that hasn't been translated into humanese.
Quoting Paine
Lack of desire for what?
Quoting Paine
I never said I agreed with Protagoras, you did.
The other point is that traditional metaphysics does not consist merely in "absolute presuppositions" whatever they might be, but in explicated systems. Sure you might say there are irreducible or groundless presuppositions or axioms that are the foundations of metaphysical systems, but that is also true of all empirical inquiries, ethics and aesthetics and even of the arts and crafts. I see those basic assumptions or axioms as being methodological, not metaphysical (excepting of course the grounding assumptions of metaphysics itself).
Seems metaphysical to Collingwood and me. No reason we have to agree.
Quoting Janus
As I said, it looks like "metaphysics" means something different to you than it does to me. That's no surprise. No one ever agrees as to what the word actually means. It comes down to this - Collingwood's understanding of metaphysics is what I'm interested in. It's an important part of my understanding of how the world works and how we understand it.
Again, no reason we have to agree.
To understand the universe as it is, both with us and without us.
Quoting T Clark
Yes, it is only my description.
1. The Word ‘Metaphysics’ and the Concept of Metaphysics
2. The Problems of Metaphysics: the “Old” Metaphysics
2.1 Being As Such, First Causes, Unchanging Things
2.2 Categories of Being and Universals
2.3 Substance
3. The Problems of Metaphysics: the “New” Metaphysics
3.1 Modality
3.2 Space and Time
3.3 Persistence and Constitution
3.4 Causation, Freedom and Determinism
3.5 The Mental and Physical
Above are headings in the SEP article on metaphysics.
It seems as if Collingwood is ignoring the world (the concern of metaphysics) and focusing instead on intended meaning.
Anyone can use the term "metaphysics" however they wish, but it is unusual.
The universe as is isn't anything. You have to have a point of view to see from, a center to stand on. That's metaphysics.
As I've said many times, "metaphysics" means different things to different people. You can say it means anything you want it to. So can I.
As far as I can tell, Collingwood's description of metaphysics is respected and still referenced 80 years later. Yet, you call it "unusual." Can you support your contention?
I don't think I get your point.
Collingwood is not generally considered to be a central figure in the historical evolution of metaphysical thought.
That doesn't tell me anything unless you point to what you are not getting.
And so...
My response was directed to what might be wanted beyond acceptance to any particular account of our limitations, however those things may be described. To notice that quality is not a claim upon what should be counted as possible or not. It is not leverage to object to your idea that the universe is a product of perception.
Nonetheless, I am pretty sure the universe is something with me and without me.
As I see it, it focuses on a rather narrow area of the world - important, no doubt - that of "absolute presuppositions".
Other traditions, say, pragmatism, process philosophy, analytic philosophy, phenomenology, continental philosophy, etc., continue to see metaphysics as dealing with the nature of the world.
There are exceptions such as the logical positivists or Heidegger's destruction of metaphysics and some of the language philosophy folks who either took metaphysics to be empty or in need of replacement.
So in this sense it's unusual, focusing on meanings (presuppositions). But it's not wrong or bad or anything like that.
Janus: Collingwood is not a metaphysician.
T Clark: Why not?
Janus: Because he's wrong.
T Clark: Why is he wrong?
Janus: Because he's not a metaphysician.
No, that's not what I;m saying at all. I'll correct it for you so you can better understand what I am saying.
Janus: Collingwood is not a metaphysician.
T Clark: Why not?
Janus: Because he's not doing anything that would conventionally be considered, according to either the ancient or modern conceptions, metaphysics.
In the Essay, Collingwood summarizes Aristotle's metaphysics and then derives his directly from it. I've read it several times and I don't understand it all, but I can see he didn't just wave his arms and say "abracadabra presto chango" and pull his metaphysics out of a hat. That's about as far as I can take it. I don't have what it takes to evaluate his results.
I don't think this answers the question anyway. I don't know enough to tell if he did a good job or not. It doesn't really matter, to me at least. As I've noted throughout this thread, I like the way Collingwood takes on the question of what underlies our understanding of reality, no matter what you call it. If it's not metaphysics, although I'm comfortable it is, it's still what I want to talk about.
So we can leave it there for now. You say you may reread him. I'm aiming to also. The kind of language he uses and claims Aristotle uses does not come naturally to me. We can talk about it in a future thread.
That may be because the other metaphysicians never actually understood what they were doing, while Collingwood did.
That's you, but it is a luxury that a historian like Collingwood could not afford. Faith exists as a historical force and needs to be reconned with. Besides, he was evidently a Christian himself and cared about it a great deal.
Quoting T Clark
He will simply not be able to publish in a scientific journal as his peers will 'cancel' him due to his heterodox metaphysics. So it's not just his problem. Other historians will make it their business.
Let me take another example: a Chinese physicist demonstrates that over there in China, E=MC3. Or a Zimbabwean mathematician proves that, over there in Zimbabwe, Pi equal 12.
Do you consider that as fine and liberating -- they are just using other frameworks and that's all? Or do you consider instead that the laws of physics and math ought to be universal, with no exception made for Zimbabweans and Chinese?
If my memory is correct, Collingwood does deal with God by using him as one of the absolute presuppositions for science. I'm not sure about that. I'm rereading it now and I'll check. My comment wasn't about Collingwood or any other metaphysician. I was speaking for myself. As I've noted previously, the existence of God is a matter of true or false. As such, it is not a metaphysical question. I don't know how Collingwood would respond if it were put to him in those terms.
Quoting Olivier5
The point I was making is that it is not my job to tell the historian what metaphysics he should use. If he chooses one that puts him outside what is considered the mainstream, he may have trouble being taken seriously.
As far as I can tell, my metaphysics is somewhat out of the ordinary. I don't think I've convinced anyone that I'm on the right track. I'm ok with that. When time comes when I have to fit into a conversation with people who don't share my particular views, I generally don't have any trouble. As I've noted and Collingwood wrote, a particular metaphysical approach is used to address specific questions at specific times in specific situations. One of the absolute minimum requirements for a metaphysical system is that it should allow people with similar interests to talk to each other. I can generally work with that.
Quoting Olivier5
That's not metaphysics - it's science and mathematics. They are positions with truth values. Metaphysics does not have truth value.
Do you mean they didn't understand the logic of the systems they created? Or they didn't understand that their systems were grounded on groundless axioms?
I'm not sure what you mean by saying that absolute propositions are not true or false. Can you give an example? It seems to me that the truth-aptness of the existence of God is equivocal. It would depend on what you mean by "exist". Empirical propositions on the other hand are unequivocal, except in extremis or radical skepticism.
My thoughts about metaphysics began to take shape in a thread I started about four years ago - "An attempt to clarify my thoughts about metaphysics." It grew out of the attraction I felt towards the Tao Te Ching. The metaphysics in that text is very different from one I had always been aware of as an engineer. That one was from science.
The difference between the two is the difference between the different grounds of being in each. The ground of being in the Tao Te Ching is the Tao, the undifferentiated unity which is the natural state of existence before humans get involved. For science, it is objective reality, which represents the multiplicity of concrete phenomena that would make up the universe even if there was no consciousness.
Although they seem contradictory, I didn't feel any conflict in using both ways of understanding. I could hold them both in my mind at the same time. That's when I started to think about the fact that they weren't true or false. Sometimes it made sense for me to think in one way and at other times the other. That's what made it clear that neither was true or false.
At about the same time, after I had started developing these ideas, someone recommended Collingwood's essay to me. I felt right at home.
But from the point of view of a kind of Kantianism--particularly Schopenhauer's--these two are consistent. At least, they're consistent if science's objective reality is not taken as the ground of being. My guess is that this is quite a common stance even among scientific people. It was something like Kant's view, and Kant himself was an astronomer and cosmologist who claimed never to be denying the reality of empirical reality (science's objective reality).
You know the story: we perceive and model the world in the way we do owing to the way that we must do according to our perceptual and conceptual faculties. We never get beyond that to see the world in itself, the ground of being. What we have then, and what we study scientifically, is empirical reality, i.e., real and objective but bound reciprocally with human beings. (Whether this is coherent or not is another story).
It was Schopenhauer who took it a step further and asserted positively that the thing in itself, that which is beyond human perception and concepts, is an undifferentiated unity. He might have been encouraged in this by his reading of Eastern philosophy.
Quoting T Clark
So it seems to me that it doesn't necessarily follow from one's ability to hold both positions at the same time that they are neither true nor false. They might be doing different things, and are true in their own ways, meaning at their own levels of description or within their own scope. In a similar way, you can think of a painting as a certain configuration of pigments, and you can describe it that way in great detail, but you can also think of it as a moving portrait or beautiful scene or whatever. Different levels or modes of description, both having true or false statements. (I suspect you're an emotivist who doesn't believe artistic judgments have truth value, but I don't think that's relevant here; maybe I should have thought of a better example).
Yes, they may not have understood as clearly as Collingwood did that they were dealing with axioms for human knowledge.
So you do have some metaphysics then. It's not a salad bar.
Cliophobia even more so.
[quote=Thus Spoke 180 Proof]We have metaphysics in order not to despair of the real.[/quote]
If it were a salad bar, it would still be metaphysics. We all get metaphysics whether we like it or not.
As I've noted, this is what I've come to think is true.
Hey, you're just supposed to tell me when I'm a jerk and tell us about Russia. You're not supposed to give me substantive responses to my posts... Actually, this is a really good response. Makes me think.
Quoting jamalrob
Hm... I am aware that many western philosophers have a concept similar to the Tao. Kant's "thing in itself." I've heard that Schopenhauer does too. I've been rereading Collingwood's metaphysics essay. In his discussion of Aristotle's metaphysics, he describes the concept of "pure being," which has a lot in common. One of my favorite refrains - There is only one world. Add to that we are all human. Of course there will be parallels between philosophical systems.
Quoting jamalrob
I don't think this is true. I think scientifically oriented people do see objective reality as the ground of being, to the extent they've ever thought what "ground of being" means or if it exists. You certainly see that here on the forum a lot.
Quoting jamalrob
You say "...we perceive and model the world in the way we do owing to the way that we must do according to our perceptual and conceptual faculties." I think that's similar to what I mean when I say that there is only one world and we are all human. If you're saying that all philosophical systems have to be consistent with each other, I'll probably agree with you. In a sense, you're restating my premise. If they're all the same, we get to pick what's best for us. Yes, I know that's not what you're saying. At least it's not what you think you're saying.
How is empirical reality different from objective reality? Actually, I can see how they're different, but I don't think many, most, materialist (physicalist, realist) minded people do.
Quoting jamalrob
As I noted, it is my understanding that this idea is not uncommon among philosophers. I was reading about noumena once and it struck me how similar they are to the Tao, so I checked on the web. I found a paper that compared the two concepts. It wasn't a very good paper, but the idea is out there.
Quoting jamalrob
Hm... (again) People have been arguing materialism vs. idealism for thousands of years. If one is right and one is wrong, tell me which is which. If which one is true is an open question, tell me how that question get's resolved. I just read somewhere recently that mathematicians tend to be idealists while scientists tend to be physicalists. Whether or not that's true, it's at least plausible. And that doesn't even address all the other isms out there.
Quoting jamalrob
I'm not certain that's different from what I'm saying. As Collingwood wrote:
Metaphysics is the attempt to find out what absolute presuppositions have been made by this or that person or groups of persons, on this or that occasion or groups of occasions, in the course of this or that piece of thinking.
Is that different from your comment?
Good comments. Made me work a bit. This was fun.
Right. Similarly, even professing the absence of necessity for a meta-framework is a type of meta-framework, like the empty set is a set.
Those are examples of ideas & opinions, which are by definition : Meta-Physical. But are they "rules" or "laws" governing subjective reality? That's what I thought you meant. :smile:
Did you think I ever professed "the absence of necessity for a meta-framework?" I never did.
Some thoughts:
Ideas and opinions are not "by definition" metaphysical.
In the OP I described my view of metaphysics as the "...set of rules, assumptions we agree on to allow discussion, reason, to proceed..."
I also like Collingwood's definition:
Metaphysics is the attempt to find out what absolute presuppositions have been made by this or that person or groups of persons, on this or that occasion or groups of occasions, in the course of this or that piece of thinking.
:love:
I have read Collingwood's book and I still don't really understand what it could mean to say that metaphysical propositions or axioms are not true or false, unless you were to follow the positivist line in saying they are "not even wrong". But I don't think that's what Collingwood means. If you think you can explain it, then by all means have a go.
Of course, ideas & opinions have a physical substrate, but the neurons themselves are meaningless. So, my comment was directed at the subjective meaning, not the objective container. If ideas were physical, mind-reading might be as simple as an MRI readout, or drinking a brain cocktail. Therefore, by my definition (see below), Ideas are literally non-physical. Brain is an information processor, but Mind is the meaningful output. :nerd:
PS__I just read an article about Arc proteins in the human brain, which are descendants of ancient viruses, and are essential for retention of long-term memories, even though the physical proteins are destroyed after a short "life-cycle". Somehow the memories are passed along to the next generation of Arc protein. Just as viruses are not alive, technically, these lumps of protoplasm are not ideas or memories --- but merely temporary containers for bits of information.
https://getpocket.com/explore/item/all-your-memories-are-stored-by-one-weird-ancient-molecule?utm_source=pocket-newtab
Substrate : an underlying substance or layer. That which supports something.
Meta-physics :
[i]The branch of philosophy that examines the nature of reality, including the relationship between mind and matter, substance and attribute, fact and value.
1. Often dismissed by materialists as idle speculation on topics not amenable to empirical proof.
2. Aristotle divided his treatise on science into two parts. The world as-known-via-the-senses was labeled “physics” - what we call "Science" today. And the world as-known-by-the-mind, by reason, was labeled “metaphysics” - what we now call "Philosophy" .
3. Plato called the unseen world that hides behind the physical façade: “Ideal” as opposed to Real. For him, Ideal “forms” (concepts) were prior-to the Real “substance” (matter).
4. Physics refers to the things we perceive with the eye of the body. Meta-physics refers to the things we conceive with the eye of the mind. Meta-physics includes the properties, and qualities, and functions that make a thing what it is. Matter is just the clay from which a thing is made. Meta-physics is the design (form, purpose); physics is the product (shape, action). The act of creation brings an ideal design into actual existence. The design concept is the “formal” cause of the thing designed.
5. I use a hyphen in the spelling to indicate that I am not talking about Ghosts and Magic, but about Ontology (science of being).[/i]
http://blog-glossary.enformationism.info/page14.html
IS THIS WHAT A MEMORY LOOKS LIKE ?
https://virtuul.com/news/how-viruses-may-have-shaped-the-human-brain/
I understand that if Newton supposed some events to be caused and some not, and if Kant supposed that all events must be caused, and if modern physics supposes that no venets are caused, then the truth of those suppositions will not be questioned. But that is not the same as to claim that they are neither true nor false.
Quoting tim wood
That is obviously what you believe has happened to you, but beyond that it just sounds like more "dogmatic nonsense".
Yes, I also am talking about meaning, not the physiology of nervous system.
I don't believe your understanding that all mental phenomena are considered metaphysical is consistent with any generally accepted definition of the word. I don't see any way to reconcile my understanding of the word and yours. I guess we'll have to leave it at that.
I don't think 'true' is the right word; useful or valid would be better.
Quoting tim wood
I am not convinced that you or Collingwood do "know them for what they are". You certainly haven't demonstrated that you do.
I'd like to try to run through a thought experiment. I'm not trying to set you up for anything. I'm not even going to try to convince you of anything. I just want to see if I can get to the heart of our disagreement.
How would you characterize your philosophical understanding of the nature of reality? Realism, materialism, idealism, physicalism? Is objective reality all there is? Is reality just information? Is it just an illusion that only exists in our minds? For me it's easy - I'm a pragmatist, which means you can't tie me down to anything. When I was young, though, I was a strong materialist. Wore the label proudly. It seemed self-evident to me that the world is just the physical stuff that we interact with.
Now - is there a philosophical understanding that you reject strongly? For me it was always idealism. The idea that basis of reality existed on some sort of higher plane not accessible to us seemed deluded.
I guess by your way of seeing things, your chosen philosophical viewpoint is true and the one you reject is false. Is there any objective or even convincing way for us to resolve the issue and prove that one is correct? Obviously, from where I stand there isn't.
I don't really see that running through this will resolve the disagreement we have, but I thought it might be interesting.
This is the way I would say it too - Not true or false, useful or not useful.
Quoting T Clark
I don't have a settled ontological view. If you ask me whether the universe existed prior to human beings I would say yes. Does it follow that the universe is mind-independent? It would seem so, but it depends on what you mean by "exist". That we cannot definitively answer such questions I would agree, but that there is no truth of the matter I don't have a settled opinion about.
Quoting T Clark
I'm not even sure we are disagreeing. Remember that I said I don't know what Collingwood means by saying that absolute presuppositions are not capable of being true or false. If all he means is that their truth cannot be questioned from within the systems that they are foundational then I would agree. Do you think he wants to claim more than that?
Anyway it has been interesting and somewhat (which is probably the best we can hope for) clarifying; so thanks.
I agree. That's why I went back (meta-), beyond medieval theologians, to see what Aristotle was talking about in his second volume. The first volume, Physics, was about physical things (Quanta ; Science), but the second volume, "Metaphysics", was about non-physical concepts (Qualia ; Philosophy), such as abstractions, wisdom, ideas, meanings, attitudes, relationships, primary causes, etc . . .
Yes, I know Aristotle didn't use that term, but when spelled with a hyphen, "Meta-Physics" denotes the practical distinction between material Science and mental Philosophy : that which is beyond the scope of physical examination, but is amenable to rational scrutiny. So, that's how I derived a unique non-dictionary definition of "Meta-Physics" for my Enformationism thesis :cool:
What is metaphysics according to Aristotle? "
Summary Metaphysics. What is known to us as metaphysics is what Aristotle called "first philosophy." Metaphysics involves a study of the universal principles of being, the abstract qualities of existence itself.
https://www.sparknotes.com/biography/aristotle/section7/
Quoting Janus
So I guess here's the real difference in our views - As I see it, if we cannot definitively demonstrate the truth of a proposition, even in principle, then it has no truth value.
Quoting Janus
Good question. I think he means that but also more than that. I'll have to think about it some more.
Quoting Janus
It has been more than somewhat clarifying for me.
I think you and I have taken this as far as we can for now.
I don't hold the opposite view to that; I think that whether or not something whose truth value is undecidable nonetheless may be true or false, is itself undecidable. Purely logically speaking it would seem it would, but logic is not always enough to be convincing.
Anyway, it's been a good conversation and when I said it has been only somewhat clarifying, that does not reflect on the conversation in particular, but reflects the fact that for me everything is only somewhat clear.
My, aren't you clever. Nicely put.
I think I may want to start a new thread just for this statement.
It reminds me of a line that always stuck with me from the Two Ronnies, where one of the Ronnies says to the other: " I couldn't possibly fail to disagree with you less".
I am left with the strange feeling that I should apologize. :chin:
Theory of Abstract Objects
Edit: OK, it looks like there is an explanation of sorts in the article. If you don't feel it's worth the effort I might agree.
I'm sorry that you are frustrated by the lack of progress on this perennial philosophical stalemate. But, this topic is labeled "what is metaphysics. yet again". So, I think it's essential that we at least agree on a clear distinction between "Physics" and "Metaphysics". Otherwise, we'll never find any common ground for a rational discussion. And "physical" versus "mental" seems to be the closest to a black & white dichotomy. Of course, in philosophy, the setup is seldom that simple. But, if we can begin there, perhaps we can chip away at any other obstacles to mutual understanding.
I just read an article in Philosophy Now magazine, reviewing a book about four "linguistic" philosophers, including Wittgenstein and Heidegger. The reviewer said that they had one thing in common : "the belief that mistaken assumptions about language are the wellsprings of error in philosophy". And I think most dictionary definitions of the term "Metaphysics" mainly reflect medieval Christian theologian usage of that word --- not Aristotle's original intention for his "first philosophy". That's why I contend that most dictionaries simply repeat those "mistaken assumptions" derived from blending Greek philosophy with Christian theology.
The article goes on to quote Heidegger : "we cannot he argues, reduce philosophy's biggest question, 'Why is there something rather than nothing?" to any system of knowledge, because it is a question that informs every such question". Note the word "informs". Does it refer to a physical phase change. or to a non-physical transfer of Meaning rather than Matter? That is the distinction underlying my personal definition of "Meta-Physics". Although I like the hyphenated term, for it's symmetrical metaphorical implications, I also sometimes substitute "Non-Physics" in order to avoid the theological baggage of "metaphysics". Do you accept that there are non-physical aspects of the world? If not, this thread will be at an impasse.
I harp on the not-physical implications of "Meta-Physics" in order to distinguish a Philosophical concept from a Scientific topic. Empirical Scientists don't usually concern themselves with abstract concepts, such as Being and Ontology. But posters on this forum often try to place "metaphysics" under the umbrella of physical science, in order to avoid its spiritual implications. Which is why I point-out the second dictionary definition : "abstract theory with no basis in reality." ___Oxford. Can we simply agree that "abstractions" are not Real, but Ideal --- existing only in abstract Minds instead of concrete Brains? :cool:
Abstract and concrete :
In metaphysics, the distinction between abstract and concrete refers to a divide between two types of entities. Many philosophers hold that this difference has fundamental metaphysical significance.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abstract_and_concrete
I'm not frustrated, I just think your understanding and use of the word "metaphysics" is too different from mine for us to have a fruitful discussion now. As I've said previously, I came to metaphysics with a specific interest in the difference between the idea of objective reality, which I understand as the basis of western science, and the Tao, as described in the Tao Te Ching. Looking at that and similar issues convinced me that the difference between metaphysical positions is not a matter of truth or falsehood, but rather of usefulness in a particular situation. When I came across Collingwood's work, I found it very helpful in finding the right words to describe those differences in a way that I find satisfying.
I guess I don't see any good way to resolve the differences between your way of seeing things and mine.
A cause? Everything that happens, as we understand it, has a multitude of causes or conditions, doesn't it?
No it doesn't mean "outside physics".
That would be the term "???????????" or supernatural (beyond nature).
The term Metaphysics from the Greek "????"(?fter) and "??????" (physika) was first coined by Andronicus of Rhodes who was organizing and publishing Aristotle's work.(~100 years after the death of Aristotle).
He stumbled upon Aristotle's thoughts on the implications his work "Physika" had in his philosophy, so he literally labeled that work "Meta/After (Aristotle's) Physika".
Now the term Physika(??????) back then was synonymous to "????????"/science since the study of Nature(????) was literally the first discipline. When more disciplines were created Physika/physics took its place as one of them.
So in plain words "Metaphysics" just means: The philosophical work we do AFTER we have finished doing our scientific investigations. Its labels our philosophical efforts to understand what those new scientific data mean for our understanding and what are the implications on our current epistemology and the world.
This is why Aristotle included Physika(Science) as the second most important step in any philosophical inquiry. He knew that our philosophy should include our epistemology and our science in order for any of our hypotheses to be meaningful or reasonable.
Any hypotheses of science is nothing more than Metaphysics. Only after we verify or falsify them, they either become Theories(part of our Epistemology) or they are dismissed.
Yes. But such misunderstandings are the fodder for Philosophy. Only in Politics would it lead to retreat or attack.
That's why I suggested that we switch to some alternative words, such as "non-physical". Does a distinction between Physical and Non-physical compute in your Reality? Or do you lump Qualities and Properties together under the heading of Physical? Are such notions Natural or Supernatural (or Artificial) ; are they Real or Ideal, or what? What synonyms of Metaphysical would you prefer? :smile:
PS___See the post by Nickolasgaspar above
This is an interpretation of the meaning of "metaphysics" I've never heard before. Based on the limited amount I have read, I don't find it very convincing.
Quoting Nickolasgaspar
Even for a word such as "metaphysics," where there is such confusion and disagreement about it's meaning, this seems clearly wrong to me. Your argument sounds a lot like the one @Gnomon was making previously in this thread.
Quoting Gnomon
Quoting Gnomon
Quoting Gnomon
I disagreed with him also.
Yes, I just responded to it. I included some links to your posts. As I told him, 1) I think there are similarities between your positions and 2) I disagree with both of you.
Quoting Gnomon
I don't think there is any way to find agreement between our two positions. I'm certain you won't convince me of your position and I strongly doubt I will convince you of mine. It just doesn't seem likely to be a very fruitful discussion.
On this forum, I've been struggling to separate "Metaphysics" from its "Supernatural" heritage in Western Religion. That's why I have suggested going back beyond (meta-) Christian Theology to see what non-religious Aristotle was actually talking about. As you noted, it certainly wasn't about anything supernatural or spooky, but about making a philosophical distinction between Qualia & Quanta, between Potential & Actual, and betwixt Cause & Effect. Unfortunately, to this day we still portray Mind metaphorically as a Brain, which leads some to think that only Matter matters for thinking.
His metaphysical category could be interpreted as "more comprehensive" or even "transcendent", in the sense that he thought of Philosophy as going "beyond" the Space-Time & Thermodynamic boundary of Physics into the realm of Mind & Ideas, that are only limited by Logical laws. Thus, adding Philosophical science to Physical science. Aristotle even tried to fit Plato's ideal Forms into physical Shapes, by insisting that Forms do not exist independently of Things.
And that is equivalent to the notion -- common among Information scientists -- that what we now call "Information", is physical, in the sense of embodied ideas. But, in my holistic view, Information is both Physical (effect) and Meta-Physical (cause). That's a delicate distinction, but it could clear-up millennia of misunderstanding in Philosophy and Science. :nerd:
Meta- :
Original Greek meaning — Meta (from the Greek ????, meta, meaning "after" or "beyond") is a prefix meaning "more comprehensive" or "transcending."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meta
Potential :
Aristotle describes potentiality and actuality, or potency and action, as one of several distinctions between things that exist or do not exist. In a sense, a thing that exists potentially does not exist, but the potential does exist. .
Note -- even physical science finds the meta-physical notion of not-yet-real Potential to be useful in the Real world. For example, the Voltage of a battery is nothing-but Static Potential, until it is actualized into Active Amperage. We can't see or touch meta-physical Potential with our senses, but we can imagine it with our minds.
MIND and/or MATTER?
EITHER / OR divisive (reductive)
BOTH - AND comprehensive (holistic)
So, there's no such thing as Meta-Physical? Hence no need for philosophical terms like Qualia and Quanta? If so, why do we keep trying to split Nature into two different philosophical categories? Are philosophers just frustrated scientists, trying to make their wordy theories seem applicable to the real world? Why then is Dualism so attractive to most non-philosophers? :cool:
PS__my worldview is ultimately Monistic, not Dualistic. If we could agree on that Unity, all disagreements would disappear.
PPS__ I apologize for not just going away quietly, but I think this topic is essential. Plus, I really get into this unreal stuff. :joke:
I've laid out my whole metaphysics schtick over the previous six pages, not counting all the other places in the forum I've discussed it. I have no desire to go back over the whole thing again. Your understanding and mine are just too different to reconcile. I agree that it's essential, but I've thought about this a lot and I'm comfortable where I stand.
-"This is an interpretation of the meaning of "metaphysics" I've never heard before. Based on the limited amount I have read, I don't find it very convincing.''
-Well this is the official meaning of the word in Philosophy. The philosophy that projects beyond our current epistemology.
There is good metaphysics, where one reflects on the new findings of science and tries to puzzles together our previous epistemology and the new implications and there is bad metaphysics where one starts from unfounded assumptions/ existential claims (theism, idealism) and ends up with more unfounded assertions.
-"Even for a word such as "metaphysics," where there is such confusion and disagreement about it's meaning, this seems clearly wrong to me. Your argument sounds a lot like the one @Gnomon was making previously in this thread."
-Its not an argument. I describe facts. I came in Greece in an early age. Here they have an obsession with the legacy of their classical Philosophers so from early age we start learning the basics.
I understand that people and time tend to distort words and common usages but that usage is the original, official and only useful, since for almost any other usage we already have words for them.
There is a great talk by Richard Carrier on why philosophy isn't stupid and why most scientists think it is. In order to build his case he provides definitions on many basic terms. There you will find a clear definition of this word.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YLvWz9GQ3PQ
I agree and disagree in many points.
-"On this forum, I've been struggling to separate "Metaphysics" from its "Supernatural" heritage in Western Religion. That's why I have suggested going back beyond (meta-) Christian Theology to see what non-religious Aristotle was actually talking about."
-Correct The first word refers to claims that are beyond our current knowledge and the second refers to claims that are Above nature.
-"As you noted, it certainly wasn't about anything supernatural or spooky, but about making a philosophical distinction between Qualia & Quanta, between Potential & Actual, and betwixt Cause & Effect."
_Well metaphysics is ANY claim that makes hypotheses beyond our current knowledge.It isn't limited to any specific philosophical distinction. Those are conversations based on metaphysical hypotheses on the differences in the ontology of those phenomena.
-the big bang cosmology before its verification was metaphysics.
-Germ theory was metaphysics and it was assumed a supernatural one (Agents in addition to nature)
-Continental drift theory was metaphysics until we measured the shifting of tectonic plates.
etc.
-"Unfortunately, to this day we still portray Mind metaphorically as a Brain, which leads some to think that only Matter matters for thinking."
-Well that is not metaphysics for Neuroscience. The Mind is what the brain produces. Its like. Material structures and their function are Necessary and Sufficient explanations for the emergence of mental properties and states. The total sum of all those mental properties are labeled "Mind".
Metaphysics (working hypotheses) are the frameworks that are tested in order to find how symbolic thinking, or specific consicous states or pattern recognition abilities emerge.
"His metaphysical category could be interpreted as "more comprehensive" or even "transcendent", in the sense that he thought of Philosophy as going "beyond" the Space-Time & Thermodynamic boundary of Physics into the realm of Mind & Ideas, that are only limited by Logical laws. Thus, adding Philosophical science to Physical science. Aristotle even tried to fit Plato's ideal Forms into physical Shapes, by insisting that Forms do not exist independently of Things."
-Today we identify such "transcendent" type of metaphysics as pseudo philosophy when our new data do not offer evidence for such hypotheses. We have a decent amount of epistemology and a constantly verified Scientific Paradigm to evaluate claims that are in conflict with what we currently know and can verify. Any claim that is
And that is equivalent to the notion -- common among Information scientists -- that what we now call "Information", is physical, in the sense of embodied ideas. But, in my holistic view, Information is both Physical (effect) and Meta-Physical (cause). That's a delicate distinction, but it could clear-up millennia of misunderstanding in Philosophy and Science.
PHilosophical science already exists in Science. Science began its life as Methodological Naturalism. In its core it is just Philosophy on Naturalisitc principles with an empirical set of methodologies.
The problem of Philosophy starts every single time one decides to either ignore our current epistemology, go against it or use Non naturalistic principles.
Then we are dealing with Pseudo philosophy
Meta- :
Original Greek meaning — Meta (from the Greek ????, meta, meaning "after" or "beyond") is a prefix meaning "more comprehensive" or "transcending."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meta
-Well "beyond" in Greek is '???? ???". "Beyond" is implied. i.e. After two exits you turn left....so your destination is beyond those two exits.
The main confusion is with the word Physics.It refers to our work in science (Physika is the actual word) Aristotle did his "physika" (studied the world) and after he reflected on the new findings. The philosophical endeavor that tries to understand and glue new data, old epistemology or philosophy with new philosophical frameworks through reasoning is labeled Metaphysics.
Potential :
"Aristotle describes potentiality and actuality, or potency and action, as one of several distinctions between things that exist or do not exist. In a sense, a thing that exists potentially does not exist, but the potential does exist."
-I don't find such ideas useful because we humans have shown that we are really bad in our ontology.
Great examples are Alchemists wasting resources for ages to chemically produce valuable metals, Chemists delaying the evolution of atomic physics by insisting in the existence of Phlogiston, People conned or dying while believing in Miasma and Panacea....and Biology refusing to tackle for ages emergent phenomena like Life or Mind.
Note -- even physical science finds the meta-physical notion of not-yet-real Potential to be useful in the Real world. For example, the Voltage of a battery is nothing-but Static Potential, until it is actualized into Active Amperage. We can't see or touch meta-physical Potential with our senses, but we can imagine it with our minds.
-It isn't a metaphysical notion from the moment it is observed and can be quantified in everyday phenomena. Stored energy is the potential to produce work...so its nothing metaphysical about it. i.e. As a cyclist I understand the potential energy I gather when climbing a hill.
Again Physics (physika) in Metaphysics has nothing to do with Physical properties(spatial). It refers to our epistemology gathered and refined by science.
Quoting Nickolasgaspar
I must say, I have never come across this usage. Perhaps it is specific to Greece? (But don't tell me that Greeks own "metaphysics.")
It's funny though that the examples of usage that you give here exactly fit a word that we already have - a word that you use yourself: hypothesis.
Its specific to Philosophy and Science. Using Hypotheses is how we do Metaphysics. We hypothesize.
The term Physics in the word refers to Physika (Metaphysika). Physika referred to the knowledge about Nature (Science).
It is even defined in Aritstotle's philosophical method.
6 steps.
1. EPistemology
2. Science (Physika)
3. Metaphysika
4. Aesthetics
5. Ethics
6.Politics.
(feedback loo).
I understand that most philosophers just can't resist changing the meaning of the word since they allow themselves to introduce all kind of pseudo philosophy in Philosophy....by saying "its metaphysics"lol.
The term Physics in the word refers to Physika (Metaphysika). Physika referred to the knowledge about Nature (Science).
It is even defined in Aritstotle's philosophical method.
6 steps.
1. EPistemology
2. Science (Physika)
3. Metaphysika
4. Aesthetics
5. Ethics
6.Politics.
(feedback loo).
I understand that most philosophers just can't resist changing the meaning of the word since they allow themselves to introduce all kind of pseudo philosophy in Philosophy....by saying "its metaphysics".
No its basic knowledge on how specific terms are used in Philosophy.
I have posted Carrier's talk on Philosophy and why it is useful contrary to many scientist's opinions.(previous page). He provides the same explanation and definitions. Check it , its helpful.
I am puzzled that most people in here ignore basic definitions of philosophy or what qualifies as philosophy.
-"OK, I gather this has nothing to do with peculiarly Greek usage"
-How was your gathering performed? Did you research specific sources? Is it because your philosophy is excluded based on that definition?
Philosophy
1. Epistemology
2. Logic
3. Ethics
4. Metaphysics
[quote=Wikipedia]Topics of metaphysical investigation include existence, objects and their properties, space and time, cause and effect, and possibility.[/quote]
Metaphysics
1. Existence
2. Objects & their properties
3. Space & Time
4. Cause & Effect
5. Possibility
Metaphysics can be taken as an exploration of reality (existence, objects & properties, space & time, cause & effect) with accent on possibilities - observe reality as it presents itself to us and then try and posit as many possible ways (theories/hypotheses) such a reality could be what it is. Metaphysics is, in short, two very basic questions:
1. What is reality?
2. Why is reality the way it is?
-"Metaphysics is considered one of the four main branches of philosophy, along with epistemology, logic, and ethics. — Wikipedia"
- Correct, it deals with what lies beyond our current knowledge
-"Metaphysics can be taken as an exploration of reality (existence, objects & properties, space & time, cause & effect) with accent on possibilities - observe reality as it presents itself to us and then try and posit as many possible ways (theories/hypotheses) such a reality could be what it is.
-Any philosophical attempt to investigate aspects of reality is labeled metaphysics
Metaphysics is, in short, two very basic questions:"
-'1. What is reality?
2. Why is reality the way it is? "
- reality is a very "big thing".....
I believe that the meaning of "metaphysics" you describe does not represent how that word is normally used in philosophy at the current time. That's what this thread is about.
That is the definition of Metaphysics in Philosophy. The distorted versions used by many philosophers are nothing more than an attempt to expand the "philosophical realm" so that their worldviews can be included.
The problem with this "expansion" is that it pollutes our philosophy and introduce meaningless material in the academia.
Metaphysics are nothing more than theoretical frameworks that go beyond our current knowledge and attempt to expand our understanding.
All theoretical frameworks that speculate on what lies beyond our knowledge are metaphysics but not all of them are philosophical.
Those in conflict or ignoring our current epistemology and those who introduce arbitrary auxiliary assumptions are pseudo philosophy.
That's a practical way to think of Meta-Physics : as conjectures beyond current knowledge. And those projections from past evidence into unknown territory is how we discover new information. But to project into unknowable realms is risky. Whatever we find may or may not be true, and we'll never know. Yet, some are willing to take that chance, and even to accept attractive-but-ify ideas on faith.
Quoting Nickolasgaspar
Yes. Whenever an empirical scientist proposes a hypothesis, he's doing Meta-physics. And that's the domain of Philosophy. However, it's necessary to push the bounds of knowledge, in order to make progress. But then, it's the job of Science to confirm those reasonable probability estimates.
Quoting Nickolasgaspar
Mind is indeed the function of Brain. But what is the Ontological status of Mind? Empirical neuroscience has no answer for the "Hard Problem" of Consciousness : Brains are subject to physical laws, but what are the limits of Minds? It seems that, in imagination, anything goes. In dreams, I can fly. But how can matter imagine anything?
Quoting Nickolasgaspar
All Meta-Physics is "transcendent" in the sense of going-beyond known physics. If our hypotheses don't explore unknown territory, they are merely mundane applied knowledge. As long as our conjectures extend an unbroken logical chain, we can look for the evidence later.
Quoting Nickolasgaspar
Yes, but the Enlightenment Renaissance of Greek philosophy, left Metaphysics behind because of its association with Scholastic Theology. But today, the era of Information and Quantum and Big Bang Theories have undermined the outdated Materialistic Atomic theory, and Self-existent World assumptions. The result is that the cutting edge of science is mostly groping around in the meta-physical territory of mathematical fields and multi-dimensional strings of ????
Quoting Nickolasgaspar
Yes. That's the difference between empirical Science (physics) and theoretical Science (philosophy). 20th century Empirical scientists were often disdainful of feckless philosophy, because instead of physical evidence it relies on metaphysical reasoning. Yet in the 21st century, physical evidence in the quantum and cosmic realms is harder to come by.
Quoting Nickolasgaspar
The distinction between Potential & Actual has become essential to science again. For example, 20th century Quantum "particles" and now labeled "wave functions" and "virtual particles". A virtual particle is not Actual, but merely Potential until some perturbation causes the metaphorical collapse of the wave function.
Quoting Nickolasgaspar
In my vocabulary, Voltage (Potential) is Meta-physical because it is not Actual or measurable. Voltage is merely a promise of Amperage. :smile:
What is reality to you?
Why didn't Aristotle, the father of metaphysics, not make a Kantian-like distinction between noumena and phenomena?After all it seems to be baked into metaphysics. Someone as brainy as Aristotle should've hit upon the idea and found it useful. It wasn't as if he had to work too hard for it - Plato, his teacher, had already dropped a big hint with his allegory of the cave.
-"That's a practical way to think of Meta-Physics : as conjectures beyond current knowledge. And those projections from past evidence into unknown territory is how we discover new information.''
-We are in total agreement.
-"But to project into unknowable realms is risky. Whatever we find may or may not be true, and we'll never know. Yet, some are willing to take that chance, and even to accept attractive-but-ify ideas on faith."
-Correct.
-"Yes. Whenever an empirical scientist proposes a hypothesis, he's doing Meta-physics. And that's the domain of Philosophy. However, it's necessary to push the bounds of knowledge, in order to make progress. But then, it's the job of Science to confirm those reasonable probability estimates."
- Correct. I will add that Science also works with theoretical models. Its not just a set of empirical methodologies. Theoretical Models with specific characteristics fall withing the philosophical work of science(Natural Philosophy).
-"Mind is indeed the function of Brain. But what is the Ontological status of Mind?
-The ontology of the mind is an property that emerges through the anatomy of the brain structure and its function . Similar ontology is shared by all biological properties i.e. digestion, mitosis, photosynthesis,homeostasis etc.
-" Empirical neuroscience has no answer for the "Hard Problem" of Consciousness :""
-Of course! because Science in general doesn't deal with "Why" teleological questions when we try to explain physical phenomena. The Hard Problem of Consciousness(Chalmers) is littered with "why "questions, I quote his 3 main qs:
Why are physical processes ever accompanied by experience?
Why does a given physical process generate the specific experience it does?
why an experience of red rather than green, for example?
The answer for all those 3 questions can be....."Because. "
Its not a problem that can be objectively answered since anyone can give his subjective opinion on why this phenomenon manifests in reality the way it does. The real question is How the brain achieves the production of mind and what are the causal mechanisms and synergies of the system.
-" Brains are subject to physical laws, but what are the limits of Minds? It seems that, in imagination, anything goes. In dreams, I can fly."
-Yes we can imagine anything. Those imaginative thoughts are the product of previous facts about reality being put together in a different way while ignoring empirical limitations and logic.
That is nothing special in my opinion. Our brain allows those mental models to arise, but those brains need to be exposed to stimuli from early age. Without empirical input a mind is unable to be shaped and produce anything.
-" But how can matter imagine anything?""
-What do you mean? Matter is the building block of the "machine". Its like saying, how matter can combust, or digest,or metabolize, or illuminate etc. Its the function and structure of the system made from matter that can produce those properties, as long as it is fueled with energy(and isn't "dying").
Give the brain time and stimuli and it has the raw material to work with, to cut and paste and rearrange everything that is stored chemically. This is what imagination is.
-"All Meta-Physics is "transcendent" in the sense of going-beyond known physics. If our hypotheses don't explore unknown territory, they are merely mundane applied knowledge. As long as our conjectures extend an unbroken logical chain, we can look for the evidence later."
-Sure, I was referring to transcendent metaphysics, where the claims ignore and are in direct conflict with established epistemology. Here is where the logical chain snaps.
-"Yes, but the Enlightenment Renaissance of Greek philosophy, left Metaphysics behind because of its association with Scholastic Theology."
-I don't know what it means for Metaphysics to be left behind. Metaphysics depends on the volume of your epistemology. When the circle of your epistemology grows the perimeter of your metaphysics grows even more. After a second thought, you can argue that theology does impose useless claims as knowledge, rendering any metaphysical attempt to be useless.
-"But today, the era of Information and Quantum and Big Bang Theories have undermined the outdated Materialistic Atomic theory, and Self-existent World assumptions."
-Materialistic??? Since when Descriptive Formulations of Science (based on Methodological Naturalism) has become "materialistic"? I Didn't get that memo! Descriptive means that those models describe what we observe. Those observations are verified in our applications and predictions. So what the pseudo philosophical worldview of materialism has to do with real Scientific Descriptions?
-"The result is that the cutting edge of science is mostly groping around in the meta-physical territory of mathematical fields and multi-dimensional strings of ????"
-Our metaphysics do not advance because Physics has FINALLY hit the point known as Observation Objectivity Collapse, something that many sciences have been dealing with for many decades (Social Sciences). Our observations are either affected by our methods or measurements or there is an absence of observations for miscelenious reasons or we don't have the technology for specific experiments.(i.e. high energy demand).
Just because we are unable to advance our epistemology, that doesn't mean that we are going to demonize our current frameworks by calling them "materialistic", lower our standards of evaluation and allow non naturalistic principles to pollute our metaphysical hypotheses.This is where we disagree and Methodological Naturalism is on my side on this.
-"Yes. That's the difference between empirical Science (physics) and theoretical Science (philosophy). 20th century Empirical scientists were often disdainful of feckless philosophy, because instead of physical evidence it relies on metaphysical reasoning."
-I must not get your point because I find it weird. First of all there is a single type of science with its theoretical models being evaluated by its empirical methodologies. Any framework that manages to be verified empirically becomes an official theory(tentatively).
Scientists (without any distinction) are still disdainful of feckless philosophy for the same reasons.
-" Yet in the 21st century, physical evidence in the quantum and cosmic realms is harder to come by.""
-So what do you suggest?
-"The distinction between Potential & Actual has become essential to science again. For example, 20th century Quantum "particles" and now labeled "wave functions" and "virtual particles". A virtual particle is not Actual, but merely Potential until some perturbation causes the metaphorical collapse of the wave function."
-Won't disagree with the Potential & Actual distinction, but I am not sure we are reading the same QM. Wave functions describe statistically specific characteristic of particles. We didn't change the label we use.We still use the same name to refer to the energetic glitch in question.
We can not pinpoint the position of a particle so we use statistical probabilities (like we do in many scientific disciplines) . These probabilities can be expressed ?n a Graphical wave function. When we crash a bozon and a fermion(hardly an observation lol) we can measure the characteristics of their "debris" and get accurate numbers fon which point of the Wave function is correct and discarding the rest of it.
I am not sure about your point in this distinction you are making. Can you elaborate?
-"In my vocabulary, Voltage (Potential) is Meta-physical because it is not Actual or measurable. Voltage is merely a promise of Amperage."
-Voltage is the electric potential difference between two points...that difference is quantifiable and we can quantify the potential. I am sure my multimeter has a position on the knob that allows me to measure that difference. We are dealing with a Process that we can quantify, what is metaphysical about it?
Again I don't get your argument.....that which is not quantifiable for you is "metaphysical". And how do you use the word potential?
What is reality to you?
Reality is an abstract concept that includes everything we can objectively verify interacting with our existence and its qualities.
-"Why didn't Aristotle, the father of metaphysics, not make a Kantian-like distinction between noumena and phenomena?After all it seems to be baked into metaphysics. Someone as brainy as Aristotle should've hit upon the idea and found it useful.''
-Well Aristotle's philosophy sucked. He is know for his systematization of Philosophy and Logic than his actual philosophical performance. After all his metaphysics were extension on his work "Physika".
It wasn't as if he had to work too hard for it - Plato, his teacher, had already dropped a big hint with his allegory of the cave.
-I guess he was more interested in listing all our logical fallacies, organizing logic and systematizing philosophy.
The distinction between reality and appearance is writ large through the whole Platonic corpus. The sensory domain is phenomena, the realm of forms is the noumenal. (You know 'noumenal' is derived from 'nous', right?) That lay down the basis which Kant developed. Kant adopted the Aristotelian categories practically wholesale. He rejected the received wisdom about the Forms, but I think in a way those concepts are still present in his later work. Philosophy develops and changes over time: Kant was a modern, he understood the actual physical nature of the Universe, at least to some extent - you know his nebular theory is still part of current science. Whereas in the ancient world the mythical/symbolic and the empirical were intertwined such that 'the heavens' were understood to be literally the domain of the Gods. 'The past is another country, the do things differently there'.
Perhaps it has something to do with the division Descartes made between the I and the world it perceives. The singularity presumed is not concordant with Aristotle seeing humans as inhabiting a place between gods and animals.
And yet they do.
I guess your point is truth is not the only game in town.
So, the natural question is, what else, if not truth, matters?
Banno mentioned aesthetics.
@Wayfarer
Was Buddha's reply to "does the Buddha exist after death?" a hint that truth is not the priority?
1. A statement/proposition is a sentence that's either true or false.
2. Not all sentences have to be true or false.
3. Metaphysical claims are neither true nor false.
Ergo,
4. Metaphysical claims are sentences but not propositions/statements.
Examples of sentences that are not propositions
5. Go home! [command]
6. What time is it? [question]
7. You should stop smoking. [recommendation]
What gives?
@Banno's position
8. Metaphysical claims are true but unjustifiable [Gödel: true but unprovable]
There's something Gödelian going on :point: decidability (OP title Decidability and Truth), Banno's statement (8 above)
@Wayfarer Gödel was a Platonist. Metaphysics & Platonism - what's the connection?
The difficulty lies in the way existence/real has been defined - in physical terms (detectable with our senses/instruments + causally potent in the physical realm) - but given skeptical arguments (Descartes's deus deceptor, the brain in a vat, etc.) there's no solid reason to say the physical is real and anything else, including but not limited to the abstract, is not.
Thanatos (death) and Algos (pain) have a part to play in all this.
Does this [If we experience pain and death then it's real] make sense?
I ask because these (pain & death) are the purported distinguishing features of the real when contrasted with the unreal (e.g. dreams).
Somehow, I feel this is bad logic.
Have a read of the cultural impact of empiricism.
I think truth is over-rated, but I can talk truth when it's called for. It can be a useful concept. Hey, wait... I think that's metaphysics.
In this particular discussion, I'm trying to use "truth" as it is normally used in philosophical discourse.
Merriam Webster says a proposition is "A statement to be proved, explained, or discussed."
MW says a statement is "Something that you say or write in a formal or official way : something that is stated."
The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy says, "Propositions, we shall say, are the sharable objects of the attitudes and the primary bearers of truth and falsity."
So, whether or not a proposition has to be true or false is an ambiguous question. Still, it's clear from the context that, for the purposes of this discussion, propositions do not have to be true or false. You're the one playing with language here.
I distinguish between physical properties (measurable) and ontological essence (rational). Integrated Information Theory is an attempt to measure mental qualities in terms of Phi. But Phi only measures the degree of integration of a system (an analogue of wholeness), but not Mind or Consciousness directly. And, just as a physical circuit is necessary to convert Voltage into Amperage, information feedback loops are essential to Minds. Some IIT advocates have proposed a Consciousness Meter, but implementing that idea is beyond current capabilities. It's not as easy to measure a subjective quality, as an objective property.
Digestion is comparable to Thinking only in the sense that both refer to holistic system functions instead of particular physical parts. However, Digestion produces measurable physical effects, while Thinking produces invisible images in the Cartesian Theater we call a Mind. Like all metaphors, the CT is not real, but ideal ; not physical, but meta-physical. If mental images & thoughts were physical, we wouldn't need metaphors to communicate them.
Quoting Nickolasgaspar
Yes. Mapping physical causal paths, may give you a picture of How, but not the Why of the final output. The complexity & chaos (randomness) of brain systems tend to blur the map near the fringes "where be dragons". Ideas in a Mind are teleological in the sense that they point toward something that is not an actual thing, not present, not yet real. Terrence Deacon calls that meta-physical function “aboutness”.
Quoting Nickolasgaspar
That is indeed the model that most Consciousness researches are working with. But "empirical limitations" and logical loops tend to frustrate their attempts to force Minds to fit the model. Somehow, Mind is able to by-pass physical limitations (e.g. Lucid Dreaming), but not Logic in the universal sense. Contrary to the old wive's tale, if my flying dream-self crashes, I won't wake up dead. (I've tried it) You might say that Mind-Logic “transcends” Physical-Logic. Which also touches on the question of subjective FreeWill versus objective Determinism.
Quoting Nickolasgaspar
True. But irrelevant to the philosophical problem of Meta-Physics. And I have answered that question in my personal worldview of Enformationism. The “problem” derives from an outdated Dualistic concept of Matter & Mind. But the emerging concept of Information is Monistic, in that the single power-to-enform comes in two forms : Physical (Matter) and Meta-Physical (Mind). I won't go into how I arrived at that conclusion in this post, but it's laid-out in my website. Information is a shape-shifter, which can transform from Energy into Matter into Mind. That may sound like non-sense in a Physicalist belief system, but not from a Fundamental-Information perspective. This recent book presents a physicist's “Information Theoretic Ontology” :
Information-Consciousness-Reality :
http://bothandblog7.enformationism.info/page18.html
Enformationism website : http://enformationism.info/enformationism.info/
Quoting Nickolasgaspar
It's easy to say that Imagination is just the output of a mechanical process. But not so easy to prove it. No machine we have constructed, including super-computers, has imagined anything like E=MC^2. Even their poetry is derivative and imitative. That's because a Whole is defined as more-than the sum of its parts. So the question remains, what is that "more than", the quality of wholeness, integrity, identity, unity? It's the difference between Data and Meaning.
So, Imagination is more-than just chemicals or neurons. Instead, it's the function of a whole System. Function is teleological and purposeful. It has the quality of Aboutness.
Function : 1. an activity or purpose natural to or intended for a person or thing.
Quoting Nickolasgaspar
Yes. But even sober scientists can't resist speculating beyond established knowledge. As in Multiverse theories, the best they can do is to extend established knowledge into the future, beyond the scope of empirical confirmation. And it's well established that projecting the current state into the future soon "snaps" the logical chain by turning it into randomized mush.
Quoting Nickolasgaspar
Rejection of Theology is why Post-Enlightenment Era scientists abandoned all attempts to gain useful knowledge via meta-physical means. But, 21st century science has become more & more meta-physical as the old models of reality crumble under the gravity of Quantum weirdness, and the BB beginning of reality put a space-time limit on Nature. Even our units of Quanta are now more mathematical than physical : Fields instead of Atoms ; Virtual instead of Real particles.
Quoting Nickolasgaspar
Since the fundamental bits of Matter (atoms) were ground into the mathematical mush of Wave Functions. The original basis of Atomism was philosophical instead of empirical. And the foundations of modern physics are beginning to sound more philosophical than empirical. Scientists still use concrete metaphors to illustrate quantum abstractions. And their assumptions about Nature remain under the influence of common-sense Materialism.
“Eliminative materialists go further than Descartes on this point, since they challenge the existence of various mental states that Descartes took for granted.”
Quoting Nickolasgaspar
Would you prefer to call our modern epistemology “Physicalism” or “Naturalism”? Materialism is not demonic, it's just outdated in an era of Relativity and Quantum Theory (which only appears quantized after continuous Waves “decompose” into Particles). Nature has become less mechanical & methodical and more spontaneous & statistical in this post-classical era. The post-enlightenment Mechanical “framework” is gradually giving way to a more Organic model. So, I don't “demonize” the older frameworks. Instead, I just categorize some of them as “misplaced Materialism”, which is similar to “misplaced Concreteness” (reification of abstractions).
Quoting Nickolasgaspar
My point about a distinction between Empirical Science and Theoretical Science is that the cutting edge of science today (e.g. String Theory) is completely theoretical (mathematical), and not subject to being “verified empirically”. Hence, it is indistinguishable from feckless philosophy.
Quoting Nickolasgaspar
I suggest that we update our mental models of Nature and Reality to include their Non-Physical aspects. And post-Shannon Information Theory is one way to do that.
Quoting Nickolasgaspar
The old Atomic & Materialistic models left no place for sub-atomic (quarks) and statistical aspects of Reality. Until recently, empirical Science dealt only with here & now Actuality. But, now they are forced to use statistical methods to model Reality. Potential, like Probability & Possibility, refers to that which is not here & now. Instead of empirical observations, they must use gambling odds. The once-firm foundations of Reality were imagined as Absolute & Actual, but now they are viewed as Relative & Potential. Fortunately, post-Shannon Information Theory can deal with both sides of the Natural coin.
Quoting Nickolasgaspar
Yes. Qualia are not quantifiable. And Statistical is only Potentially Real. So, I use “potential” according to Aristotle's usage : “a thing that exists potentially does not exist, but the potential [statistical probability] does exist.” [my bracket] So, Potential existence is equivalent to Plato's Ideal Forms. The “properties” of real things (e.g. red of an apple) exist only in the minds of observers. And I call that Mind-stuff “meta-physical” instead of “physical”. :nerd:
PS__Obviously, I have a philosophical axe-to-grind. But, since it's based on a new paradigm and somewhat counter-intuitive (like Quantum Theory and Block Time) it can't be summarized in one post.
[i]What is Information? :
The Power to Enform[/i]
http://bothandblog6.enformationism.info/page16.html
PPS__ I have enjoyed the mental exercise (despite the meta-physical sweat) of responding to your stimulating questions. :smile:
Quoting T Clark
You need to go over what you said above carefully, specifically the parts underlined. There's a difference between the two statements:
1. A metaphysical claim is useful and is neither true nor false.
2. A metaphysical claim is useful and it doesn't matter whether it's true or false.
You also need to,
3. Consider how truth and utility are related in terms of necessary and sufficient conditions.
4. Look into how truth and assumption of truth impact your argument.
You're not out of the woods yet, T Clark!
I think I've gone through this enough for now.
Fine.
I told you yesterday that this is not true, but I was wrong, at least according to Collingwood. Yes - a proposition has to be true or false. An absolute supposition has no truth value.
Quoting T Clark
Please don't give up on your Grail Quest for a definitive definition of the "M" word. For some on this forum it's a four-letter word, rhyming with "cr*p". But for me, Metaphysics is the essence of Philosophy. So, if we are going to dialog effectively on this forum, we need to get the General Principles nailed down before we get bogged-down in Specific Details. Yet, many physicists and philosophers reject such idealized notions as being-qua-being and essence to be un-real & super-natural, hence subversive of the Realistic & Materialistic dogma of post-Enlightenment Science. So, if 21st century Philosophy has any purpose at all, it should fall under the categorical heading of "Before Physics", or "more General & Universal than mere physical phenomena". Admittedly, Philosophy shares some of those supra-mundane interests with traditional & mystical Religions, but it also shares the goal of understanding the mundane real world with Physics. "Can't we all just get along?". ___Rodney King :cry:
FWIW, I have added a new post to my BothAnd Blog, as an attempt to explain, in more detail than possible in a forum post, my personal meaning of "Meta-Physics", as it applies to my personal philosophical and scientific worldview. :smile:
Meta-Physics : The Purview of Philosophy
http://bothandblog7.enformationism.info/page22.html
PS__ the popup at the bottom of the second page is addressed to the Transcendent implications of the first principles of philosophy.
My (admittedly sophomoric) understanding of that is that it really begins with Parmenides, then proceeds through the dialogues of Plato (including the dialogue of that name), which then culminates in Aristotle. And the substance of all of those dialogues concerns the nature of the forms or Ideas. Aristotle criticizes his master, Plato's, conception of the Forms but nonetheless still maintains the idea in his hylomorphic (form-matter) dualism. Unless we understand at least the outline of what the forms are, then I don't think we will have any grasp of metaphysics in the specific sense the word is used in European discourse.
I notice that the OP in this thread introduces R G Collingwood, who was at least a scholar of metaphysics, insofar as he was not part of the general movement against metaphysics which characterised many others of his day (including his successor in that chair, I think.)
In the same vein, I wonder if philosophy has a higher proportion of contributors who were borderline or full-blown psychos.
How about: because Aristotle's Metaphysics is as sane, sober, dry, and methodical piece of philosophical reasoning as exists anywhere in the corpus. What you're describing seems much more characteristic of Nietszche than anything in Aristotle.
I dunno. Aristotle's love of art is, for me, the smoking gun in re the possibility that he was himself a mad artist. Plato had warned us against the artistic types and ironically, it was his beloved pupil, Aristotle, who was the first to philosophize on the "merits" of art. Et tu Brute!
To do so we must find an inescapable, or deniable only on pain of self-contradiction, position from which to proceed; if so, then I propose the Principle of Non-Contradiction (PNC) with which to begin and regulate (my own) speculative droppings ...
:yawn:
Quoting 180 Proof
Quoting 180 Proof
Quoting 180 Proof
Are there legitimate Metaphysical Questions?
Quoting 180 Proof
"Certum est, quia impossibile" ~Tertullian
Quoting 180 Proof
Quoting 180 Proof
Quoting 180 Proof
Quoting 180 Proof
What's your ontology?
Metaphysics - what is it?
Quoting 180 Proof
Complete vs incomplete reality
Quoting 180 Proof
:scream:
postscript:
Quoting 180 Proof
compostscript:
@Wayfarer
Quoting 180 Proof
Metaphysics as Utilitarian
I suppose I see your point.
Metaphysics is about first principles which, from a scientific standpoint, are theoretical frameworks or theories in short.
Your approach is, in philosophy of science, decidedly antirealist in that scientific theories (metaphysical first principles) aren't about truth, to the contrary they're about how useful they are in making sense of, comprehending, reality as it presents itself to us. That is to say we have some first principles (metaphysics) that explains everything there is to explain much like a ToE is meant to. The value of a good ToE (metaphysics) is in the scope and accuracy of its explanatory power (utility) and not in its truth. More than one set of first principles may fit reality.
That's how I understand it.
I'm not sure you and I are using "theory" the same way. I don't see a scientific theory, e.g. general relativity, as a metaphysical entity. Theories have truth value. For me, the scientific method is a metaphysical entity. Perhaps that includes the methods by which theories are developed and verified. I'll have to think about that.
How do we know YOU are not suffering from some psycho malady? I don't care. On this text-based forum, I'm interested in the reasonableness of your expressed ideas, not your mental health. Besides, an ad hominem attack on an ancient philosopher, who remains a major influence on Western thought after thousands of years, is (or should be) beneath you. :cool:
PS__Did you choose "Mad Fool" as your screen name, based on personal experience? I have dialoged with several forum posters who have admitted their drug-dampered insanity. :smile:
:ok:
Quoting Gnomon
Asoka (King, Mauryan Empire): I'm going to abdicate my throne, give away all my wealth, shave my head, wear a simple robe, and beg for alms.
Asoka's wife: You must be mad!
Asoka: No, I'm buddhist.
I'm not smart enough to know anything with such absolute certainty. That's why I look to geniuses like Aristotle to categorize General Principles that stand the test of time. And PNC was at the top of his list. :joke:
Quoting TheMadFool
While more than one map depicts the territory, fact-free, or merely conceptual / imaginary maps, such as "metaphysics" do not. The map of "Middle-Earth", for instance, is useless for navigating around North America (or any other actual continent) because it does not correspond to any actual truth-makers (i.e. empirical facts). Likewise, as distinct from physics, "metaphysics" has no "explanatory power" – is not theoretical (re: "ToE" :roll:) as pointed out – and, at best, provides only categorical or methological criteria for critically interpreting, even creating, theoretical (formal or physical) models.
Yep, metaphysics - goes beyond the empirical/verifiable/falsifiable, the domain of science. A map's accuracy vis-à-vis the territory is assessable (science) and metaphysics includes, inter alia, the analysis of such maps. Metaphysics then is the study of the models we create of reality, it doesn't seek empirical verification for it makes no empirical claims.
I started posting on this forum to discuss the big issues of Metaphysics, not the mundane details of Physics. But, in all too many threads, a stalled discussion turns to challenges of "what can you prove?", instead of "what is reasonable?" Metaphysics, in my opinion, is supposed to be focused on ideas that literally transcend the scope of empirical scientific methods, such as "what caused the Big Bang?" There is no way for us to know for sure about the time before Time, or a place outside of Space. As philosophers, all we can do is to make educated guesses, and then test them against the critical faculties of other educated guessers. The result will not be absolute Truth, but it may get us closer to truth.
Those educated guesses are what we call "Hypotheses", and when some guesses survive the scrutiny of peers, or lead to some replicable evidence, we may even call them "Theories". But even the best of our Theories, such as Thermodynamics and Evolution, are based on incomplete evidence. Hence, they are subject to falsification or revision in the future*1. Consequently, understanding the difference between Theory and Practice is essential to my understanding of Meta-Physics. A theory may-or-may-not have truth value, but only when it is put into practice will we know which. For example, Darwin's Theory of the Origin of Species has been tested and proven accurate regarding adaptation to a changing environment. But after two centuries, evidence for divergent speciation has been iffy. *2 Likewise, Quantum Theory violates many of our reasonable intuitions, yet some of the mathematical models can be proven in practice.*3 So, we are sometimes forced to accept facts that defy common sense. And we have to adapt our incomplete theories over time.*4
My point is that a Theory is a "metaphysical entity" --- a meme in a mind, not a thing in the real world. A bird is a physical thing, but a species of birds is a mental category. General concepts and Universal Properties are Meta-Physical, according to the same categorical distinction between a Mental Meme and a Physical Gene. A theory is a model or map, not the physical thing or terrain. That's why I think it's important to differentiate between meta-physical theories and physical testing, between metaphysical "methods" (Philosophy) and physical methods (Science). Unscientific conjectures, such as Multiverses & Many Worlds, cannot be verified empirically, because they go beyond the physical limits of the Real World, into the Ideal Realm of Meta-Physics. *5
To many posters on this forum though, the distinction between Physics and Metaphysics is like the post-enlightenment political division between rational methodical Science and irrational mythical Religion. But that's not what I mean when I use the hyphenated term "Meta-Physics". By that I simply refer to the same difference that Descartes formalized between a physical Brain and a metaphysical Mind. A material Brain can be studied empirically, while the immaterial Mind can only be studied metaphorically. That's why the Behaviorism trend in Psychology was so brief. They soon realized that documenting physical actions was not the same as verifying mental intentions. Their hypothetical inferences often depended on the personal subjective biases of the observer. So, their "verifications" consisted mainly of confirming bias. That's why both Scientific and Philosophical models are subject to Peer Review. Only by comparing the "theories" of several observers can the errors be canceled out.
In my theory of Philosophy, Meta-Physics is about models and theories that are not currently verifiable. They can only be determined to be reasonable or not, based on Logic and incomplete evidence. And that requires Wisdom. Yet, we can't even define that term objectively, even though we may know it subjectively when we see it*6. So, let's not play the "show me the evidence" card, when the game is non-linear and open-ended. :nerd:
*1 Superseded theories in science :
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Superseded_theories_in_science
.
*2 Adaptation vs Speciation :
A new bird species that is only slightly different from others of the Finch family. So, it's more like evidence of adaptation, than of something entirely novel.
https://www.sciencealert.com/darwin-s-finches-evolve-into-new-species-in-real-time-two-generations-galapagos
*3 "The verbal interpretation, on the other hand, i.e. the metaphysics of quantum physics, is on far less solid ground. In fact, in more than forty years physicists have not been able to provide a clear metaphysical model. "
___Erwin Schrodinger
*4 “It is impossible that there should be demonstration of absolutely everything; [for then] there would be an infinite regress, so that there would still be no demonstration.”
? Aristotle, Metaphysics
*5 "Nature is under no obligation to conform to our mathematical ideas—even the most brilliant ones"
___Avi Loeb, Astronomer
*6 "The phrase "I know it when I see it" is a colloquial expression by which a speaker attempts to categorize an observable fact or event, although the category is subjective or lacks clearly defined parameters".
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I_know_it_when_I_see_it
“The devotee of myth is in a way a philosopher, for myth is made up of things that cause wonder."
? Aristotle , Metaphysics
"He, however, who begins with Metaphysics, will not only become confused in matters of religion, but will fall into complete infidelity."
___ Maimonides
Schopenhauer's will a sound idea. Also Cudworth and Kant's "things in themselves", which are quite legitimate problems, which are very hard to clear up.
That's a good summary. If you don't mind, I may add it to my blog post on Meta-Physics. :smile:
Post done :
http://bothandblog7.enformationism.info/page22.html
In other words, the Absurd (re: Zapffe, Camus, Rosset).
"Metaphysics isn't theoretical." ~180 Proof
Quoting TheMadFool
:up:
Quoting 180 Proof
Not necessarily. When practiced by scientists and philosophers, Metaphysics is merely the extension of Reason into un-mapped territory, beyond current understanding, or beyond the scope of empirical evidence : e.g. essences. :nerd:
Absurd : wildly unreasonable, illogical, or inappropriate.
Metaphysics and logic are both concerned with all being (common material object), but under different aspects (proper formal object). The object of metaphysics is real being considered formally in its real quiddity, invested with real attributes. ... Logic is the science of the science of the real.
https://maritain.nd.edu/jmc/etext/logic-06.htm
Quiddity : the inherent nature or essence of someone or something.
This 'Platonist conception of metaphysics' proposes nothing but idle speculation aka "pure reason" (i.e. pseudo-science, woo-of-the-gaps). Caveat: Whereof one cannot speak, thereof one must be silent, no? :zip:
The Absurd, which I've alluded to above, is not synonymous with merely being "absurd", sir.
That may be true. But I am discussing the meaning of "metaphysics" from the perspective of my personal worldview, not that of Aristotle. I refer to the Greek Philosopher simply because he literally wrote the book on this topic. My interpretation includes scientific and philosophical knowledge that Ari did not have access to. "Representations of Reality" falls under the heading of Generic Information Theory, as defined in the Enformationism Thesis. :smile:
What is Information? :
Information is Generic in the sense of generating all forms from a formless pool of possibility : e.g. the Platonic Forms.
Reality is not what you see :
In other words, what we think we see, is not absolute reality but our own ideas about reality. Donald Hoffman calls those mental models “Icons”, serving as symbols that merely represent the unseen information processes within the computer system.
Since you seem to know or care nothing of "pure reason", you should take your own advice. :joke:
PS__Pure Reason is Philosophy. Practical Reason is Science. Since this is a philosophical forum, it is not limited to Practical Pragmatic reasoning. That's why we do a lot of "speaking" about a variety of non-woo "whereofs". :cool:
Critique of Pure Reason :
Kant explains that by a "critique of pure reason" he means a critique "of the faculty of reason in general, in respect of all knowledge after which it may strive independently of all experience" and that he aims to reach a decision about "the possibility or impossibility of metaphysics."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Critique_of_Pure_Reason
In a certain sense, yes.
Quoting Gnomon
That's part of it, until it becomes part of empirical investigation, then it's stops being called metaphysics.
Exactly. But some un-named posters on The Philosophy Forum try to limit our discussions to "empirical investigation", which is Physics, not Metaphysics. They don't like to go beyond the edge of the conventional "Map of Reality" into the uncharted territory . :brow:
PS__Pure Reason is Philosophy. Practical Reason is Science. Since this is a philosophical forum, it is not limited to Practical Pragmatic reasoning. That's why we do a lot of "speaking" about a variety if "whereofs". :cool:
Read Kant, Peirce-Dewey, Popper, Zapffe-Camus, et al ...
I've nothing to say about the content of any woo-of-the-gaps (i.e. 'making up shit without grounds to do so' instead of simply saying we just don't know yet) except to point out that it cannot explain anything and only begs questions (i.e. attempts to account for an unknown with an inexplicable). :roll:
That's OK with me. So why are you "saying" whereof you know nothing? Why are you posting on a Philosophy Forum instead of a Science Forum? Do you feel a "calling" to cleanse errant philosophers from the error of the Metaphysical way, or the Way of the Buddha, or the Way of the TAO? You must find it frustrating that the freshly-washed pig returns to wallow in the mud. :joke:
Quoting Gnomon
Quoting Gnomon
Quoting Gnomon
Quoting Gnomon
Your use of the word "metaphysics" is not consistent with how I use the word or how anyone else I've heard of uses the word. Adding a hyphen doesn't change things. Of course, you can define it any way you like. At least you try to be clear about what that definition is.
Your idea of "meta-physics" may have value in philosophical discussions, but it isn't "metaphysics" as we normally use the word. We've been through all this before. I don't think we'll get anywhere going through it again.
The metaphysics of dialectical materialism contains the tension between how it is and how it should be, considering the distribution of material property, a tension which inevitably leads to revolution.
The metaphysics of the mind is a physics guiding thoughts, ideas, emotions, etc. Dawkins' selfish memes and memes are a metaphysics of the biology and the mind, insofar it tries to explain behavior in the biological sphere and the human mind. All organisms are creation of selfish genes whose only selfish will it is to stay alive and he projects the same idea to memes, which created the mind to realize their selfish desire to stay alive. One can create a similar idea for altruistic genes and memes though.
The metaphysics of music seeks a theory to explain music and its behavior. Like economics for money. The metaphysics of humor seeks an explaining theory of jokes and funny situations. There is even metaphysics in physics itself. Physics tries to explain physical situations but. It is non-meta in the sense that the stuff to be explain is physical and a similar kind of explanation can be extended to a different subject matter.
One can even talk about the metaphysics of dragons, angels, or God (he can be considered omnipotent, omnipresent, and omnisapient, or just a modest guy with the power of creation and no further intentions to interfere with his creation). I suspect that even the metaphysics of philosophy can be considered.
Yes yes, the Nature of nature (Spinoza).
What are you talking about? I'm not proposing or discussing 'scientific theories'; interpretations, however, are the philosopher's business as well as calling out pseudo-science and sophistry and philosophical anachronisms like (your) Platonist / essentialist 'metaphysics'. I don't advocate positivism and I actively oppose idealism / antirealism as vacuous (i.e. groundless). Physics, however, is not proffered by me as the alternative to metaphysics; negative metaphysics, as I propose with good reasons , surpasses (anachronistic – Platonic-Aristotlean) 'positive metaphysics'.
Simply put, I'm a naturalist for whom nature is self-explanatory (i.e. immanent — though in no way 'self-evident') without recourse to accounts of non/super-natural (i.e. transcendent/al) entities, forces, etc. There is some overlap between metaphysics and "Meta-Physics" (as you call it) but just as there is between chemistry & alchemy or astronomy & astrology or mathematics & numerology. Nonetheless, I ask you too, Gnomon: why do you post on a Philosophy (i.e. contra sophistry, pseudo-science, woo-of-the-gaps) website instead of a site dedicated to New Age (esoteric) "theories"? :eyes: :sparkle:
[quote=Max Horkheimer, The Eclipse of Reason]The idea inherent in all idealistic metaphysics–that the world is in some sense a product of the mind–is thus turned into its opposite: the mind is a product of the world, of the processes of nature. Hence, according to popular Darwinism, nature does not need philosophy to speak for her: nature, a powerful and venerable deity, is ruler rather than ruled. Darwinism ultimately comes to the aid of rebellious nature in undermining any doctrine, theological or philosophical, that regards nature itself as expressing a truth that reason must try to recognize. The equating of reason with nature, by which reason is debased and raw nature exalted, is a typical fallacy of the era of rationalization. Instrumentalized subjective reason either eulogizes nature as pure vitality or disparages it as brute force, instead of treating it as a text to be interpreted by philosophy that, if rightly read, will unfold a tale of infinite suffering. Without committing the fallacy of equating nature and reason, mankind must try to reconcile the two.
In traditional theology and metaphysics, the natural was largely conceived as the evil, and the spiritual or supernatural as the good. In popular Darwinism, the good is the well-adapted, and the value of that to which the organism adapts itself is unquestioned or is measured only in terms of further adaptation. However, being well adapted to one’s surroundings is tantamount to being capable of coping successfully with them, of mastering the forces that beset one. Thus the theoretical denial of the spirit’s antagonism to nature–even as implied in the doctrine of interrelation between the various forms of organic life, including man–frequently amounts in practice to subscribing to the principle of man’s continuous and thoroughgoing domination of nature. Regarding reason as a natural organ does not divest it of the trend to domination or invest it with greater potentialities for reconciliation. On the contrary, the abdication of the spirit in popular Darwinism entails the rejection of any elements of the mind that transcend the function of adaptation and consequently are not instruments of self-preservation. Reason disavows its own primacy and professes to be a mere servant of natural selection. On the surface, this new empirical reason seems more humble toward nature than the reason of the metaphysical tradition. Actually, however, it is arrogant, practical mind riding roughshod over the ‘useless spiritual,’ and dismissing any view of nature in which the latter is taken to be more than a stimulus to human activity. The effects of this view are not confined to modern philosophy.[/quote]
Ahem, Brian Cox is not "scientific culture". Paul Davies, for instance, wouldn't attribute "creator" to nature. Pro tip: All swans ain't white, sir. :eyes:
Wtf? :roll: Life increases disorder (re: erosion (e.g. compare extant meteor-impacts features on the surfaces Earth to Luna), mass extinctions that produce hydrocarbons, greenhouse effects, anthropogenic climate change, etc). Also, entropy is the tendency of disorder not to decrease especially in thermodynamically closed systems. For example, you're not getting any younger (or smarter), Wayf. :mask:
But then, he won a Templeton prize. See for instance this OP which triggered a backlash from the secular intelligentsia.
The problem is that logic alone cannot determine plausibility only validity, and what you would count as constituting evidence, in anything beyond simple empirical observations, is controversial and depends on your presuppositions.
[quote=Paul Davies]Over the years I have often asked my physicist colleagues why the laws of physics are what they are. The answers vary from “that’s not a scientific question” to “nobody knows.” The favorite reply is, “There is no reason they are what they are — they just are.” The idea that the laws exist reasonlessly is deeply anti-rational. After all, the very essence of a scientific explanation of some phenomenon is that the world is ordered logically and that there are reasons things are as they are. If one traces these reasons all the way down to the bedrock of reality — the laws of physics — only to find that reason then deserts us, it makes a mockery of science.....
Clearly, then, both religion and science are founded on faith — namely, on belief in the existence of something outside the universe, like an unexplained God or an unexplained set of physical laws, maybe even a huge ensemble of unseen universes, too. For that reason, both monotheistic religion and orthodox science fail to provide a complete account of physical existence.[/quote]
He concludes:
Which is what motivates this statement:
Quoting 180 Proof
But he goes on
I'm reminded of Wittgenstein's aphorism that 'the whole modern conception of nature is founded on the illusion that so-called laws of nature are the explanations of natural order'.
I don't agree with Davies that the explanation of 'why scientific laws' are a matter for science. Science has discovered that f=ma and e=mc[sup]2[/sup], but how can it deduce why these are the case? How could you create 'a testable theory' short of discovering some other universe where these values are different?
So - what is Davies getting at in this OP? Does he really believe that science will 'one day' understand why the laws of science are they way they are by discovering even deeper laws that explain them? Or is it a polemical argument that indirectly shows how science itself was originally derived from the belief in God's laws?
The second is a strange statement,considering that science is not a matter of faith at all, but of provisional hypotheses. The idea behind science is to find things wrong with your theories so that knowledge can grow, which is the opposite of religious faith which tries to find confirmation.
It's worth reading the OP. Paul Davies got a lot of pushback for that piece. His argument is that until now, scientists simply assume scientific laws, without exploring why they are the way they are. That's why he is saying science 'rests on faith' - faith in scientific laws. I think that's a hangover from science's Christian origins. (See Nancy Cartwright No God, No Laws.)
I take it as axiomatic that the predominant belief in secular culture is that 'life arose by chance'. Once you dispense with the idea of divine creation or emanation or a divine origin of some kind, what is the alternative? It can only be physical or chemical necessity, a kind of chain reaction that starts and then simply grows according to natural laws. That's what Daniel Dennett spells out in Darwin's Dangerous Idea, and Jacques Monod in Chance and Necessity, but there are many other examples. But more than that, it's a tacit consensus about how the Universe must be, according to scientific materialism.
I'm more inclined to a kind of 'orthogenetic' philosophy. This is that the Universe gives rise to sentient life-forms as a way of discovering horizons of being that could not be realised any other way. You find ideas like that in Tielhard du Chardin, Henri Bergson, and others. It's neither creationist on the one side, nor materialist on the other.
I think scientific laws are formulated to describe observed invariant phenomena. So, for example, minimally,the law of gravity is just the observed invariability of unsupported objects falling until they are supported.
Explanations as to what the "mechanism" of gravity "is" are another matter; the invariant behavior of objects, at least as so far observed, is not an assumption. If matter and energy always behaves the same way, and must do so, because that is simply the nature of things, then laws are just the way we say that is the case; no need for any God.
Buddhism posits invariable laws in the form of karma, codependent origination and rebirth, for example, without positing a God who intends these things to be so.
Quoting Wayfarer
I don't think that is the predominant view, or at least it is not "axiomatic" in my view. Given the nature of the basic chemical elements and the inevitable diversity of conditions that can come about in an immense universe, the arising of life seems inevitable. That said, if all you mean by "chance" is that the advent of life was not planned or "programmed" by anything "outside" the natural order, then I would agree with what you say. There just doesn't seem to be any strong evidence for design, so no reason to believe in it, beyond human wishes (in some humans) that it might be so.
Quoting Wayfarer
This seems like an anthropomorphization of the universe, as though it had some intention or wish, or at minimum, an internal striving, to bring life into being..It seems most plausible to me to think that this kind of thinking is a case of us projecting our own natures out into the universe.
On the other hand such ideas can be richly creative and imaginative, so they are not without poetic value. They can even inspire scientists to look down avenues that they otherwise wouldn't and discover unexpected things.
No argument there. But what do you make of that statement 'the whole modern conception of nature is founded on the illusion that so-called laws of nature are the explanations of natural order'? Why does Wittgenstein think this is an 'illusion'?
Quoting Janus
That's how it must seem to us in this day and age but do please notice the implicit division between 'our own natures' and 'the Universe', as if these are separable. But really they're not, as nature is not something we're outside of, or apart from. The idea of being a subject in a world of objects is just that - an idea. An idea which then becomes a condition.
That is just another way of saying 'by chance'. The million-monkeys idea - give a million monkeys typewriters and enough time and they'll produce a manuscript. When in fact what you will get is an enormous pile of broken typewriters covered in shit.
Perhaps Wittgenstein thinks it is an illusion because the laws of nature are not explanations but descriptions of natural order. I mean even if you take Einstein's explanation for gravity; that it is due to the warping of spacetime by mass, that just pushes the need for explanation back one step; we can now ask what causes mass to warp spacetime. Whatever we come up with as an explanation becomes then another phenomenon that we can seek to explain.
Quoting Wayfarer
I don't know, I think it is more the fact that we observe a (staggering) diversity of phenomena, including ourselves. On one perspective our natures may be understood to follow the same micro-physical laws as everything else, but on another we behave very differently than other kinds of phenomena. We don't need to think we are separate from nature to acknowledge that there is a diversity of observable phenomena, that show apparent invariances on many different levels and to different kinds of observation.
My point exactly.
//ps// check out this blog post. Don't know anything about this guy, but his blog is pretty interesting.
But we know circumstances in which such universal "laws", break down, in black holes or near the singularity. We might discover more exceptions when the James Webb telescope goes to space (hopefully) in a few months and takes extremely high resolution images.
I personally don't see the problem in substituting "God" for "nature". That's what makes sense now, I reckon a good deal of the traditional figures in philosophy (perhaps not all) would've agreed, given how things have changed.
I think this is a good idea. If I remember rightly from long ago reading Peirce spoke this way. Hume point out there is no deductively valid reasoning to support our belief that the so-called laws of nature will continue to hold sway. On the other hand there is an enormously complex and coherent scientific picture, and no well-documented exceptions have been observed.
Quoting Manuel
I could be wrong but I thought black holes were theoretical entities which were posited on account of our understanding of the laws of nature. I believe I've read that they have subsequently been observed, but I'm not sure. (I could search that but I can't be bothered).
I like Spinoza's deus sive natura ("God or nature'). For us nature is God indeed (but I don't agree with the pantheistic reading of Spinoza's idea) I agree that the great philosophers would likely have very different views if they were alive today..
I don't think what science tells us about the world should be blithely ignored or that we should believe in certain metaphysical notions just because they might "feel right" (which could just amount to serving our wishes regarding how we might like things to be).
I never found the "million monkeys' idea compelling. In any case if life is inevitable then it is not by chance. That doesn't have to mean it was planned or "striven for' somehow. On the macro scale the universe appears to be deterministic, which would mean that, on that scale nothing is by chance, even if on the micro-physical level processes are uncaused and utterly random, macro processes could still be statistically determined.
Not sure if I am on board with your apparently low opinion of monkeys. :wink:
Yes, Peirce and Hume are correct. For all we know, tomorrow gravity could work differently, unlikely to happen, but not impossible. If we take multiverse ideas seriously, then different "laws" might reign. There is no great word for this, "law" sounds too sacred, "habits" sounds to anthropomorphic, but better overall.
Quoting Janus
Yeah, they exist. They even were able to picture one (due to the light if a nearby star): https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-019-01155-0
Quoting Janus
This sounds correct to me. I don't see any good reason to be suspect of nature. Everything is a natural thing, I see no scienticism here, nor denying all those very profound experiences most of us have, which we cannot explain.
I think that, despite our best efforts to the contrary, we end up adopting a metaphysics we like. Maybe we are uncomfortable with the idea, but then one accepts is it as a very good direction to go in.
All that's to say, nature is mind-boggling. That's a good thing, to me.
Amen! How boring would it be if it wasn't?
I think we generally do adopt metaphysics we feel good about. That said, I think we should adopt metaphysics we find most plausible, being as honest with ourselves as we can and having done our best to put what we might wish for aside.
Of course what we find most plausible will inevitably be influenced by our cultural conditioning; we have to live with who we are since living in denial of it would certainly seem to be a bad move. That said, I am not claiming we must be enslaved by our cultural conditioning; I think we can change by working through our conditioning, but not by denying it or pretending it's not there in us. It's a balancing act to be sure.
Quoting Janus
I'm with @Janus. There's another way of looking at things. Much simpler and less fraught with misunderstandings than what you are talking about. As I, and many others, see it, science does not explain anything. It is just and only a description of how things have been observed or predicted to behave. In that way of seeing things, there are no whys. Asking for why is a contamination of science by human notions of purpose and meaning.
Quoting Wayfarer
If by "secular culture" you mean science, you're wrong. Scientists who study the origins of life see a middle way. Life is originated, not by random behavior of physical substances and not by divine intervention, but by a natural tendency toward self-organization. Rather than try to explain how that might have happened, which I am not qualified to do, I would point you toward "Life's Ratchet, How Molecular Machines Extract Order from Chaos" by Peter M Hoffmann. As the book describes, physical and chemical reactions may have a direction that makes life much more likely than if reactions happened purely by chance.
It has been calculated that a million monkeys typing would take more than the life of the universe to type one of Shakespeare's plays.
Quoting T Clark I agree. And any explanation only brings forth more that needs explaining (which I see as a good thing).
By which scientists, for example? Ever run across https://www.thethirdwayofevolution.com/ ?
Quoting Janus
Determined by what? Or rather, what is it that determines?
I gave an example in my post - Hoffmann. His proposed mechanisms seem really plausible to me, which is beside the point. Fact is that reputable scientists are currently studying mechanisms other than wild random action and intelligent guidance.
Quoting Wayfarer
I took a quick look. It seems to be about evolution, which is a completely different subject than the origin of life.
Yes, a fine balancing act indeed. The problem is finding arguments against what I believe, say, a Cudworthian innate-ism - I won't go into the details here , that deserves a thread- but I genuinely (I think) try to look for arguments against it, there are some but I'm not confident they touch the main issue.
The other metaphysical idea, does have more holes in it (things in themselves), those arguments are better, but not definitive in a way that I could abandon them.
That's my version. Others adhere to say, modern materialism, or panpsychism surely go through a similar process, as you do too, I'd wager.
It's a bit like adopting a stance in modern physics actually, you go through an intense phase of thinking about the problem, then you have an idea which you think is best: "many worlds", "Copenhagen", etc. It should be hard to change your mind, given the time invested.
I think that's very likely true, but then it still begs the question as to how this can be the case, because all of the inherent characteristics of physical and chemical laws are ultimately dependent on a very small number of universal parameters without which the universe we see and complex matter would never have appeared in the first place (subject of Lloyd Rees book 'Just 6 Numbers'.)
I don't see that as a surprise. You and I agree quite often on the forum.
Quoting Wayfarer
I don't know what Peter Hoffman would say about the manifesto. Probably wouldn't like it. Even I think it overstates the case. I don't think materialism is false (It's metaphysics so...yadda, yadda, yadda. Never mind). I think it is not always the best way of seeing things.
To late. I looked at it. I'm melting, melting.....
:lol: :monkey:
1. Ontology
2. Identity & Change
3. Causality
4. Space & Time
5. Necessity & Possibility
It appears that metaphysics is the study of broad conceptual frameworks with which we make sense of our world.
I guess we could call metaphysics pre-science, not proto-science. Meta-science.
I would say conditions determine what happens, how things change.
You made the same comment with the same list back around page 5 or 6 of this thread.
:lol: Sorry for cluttering your thread. I have a very poor memory, consider me as Dory from Finding Nemo.
Should I delete my post?
But then, where do conditions come from? Remember, metaphysics is 'first science', so you can't start with any assumed conditions. This discussion started around 'what accounts for scientific laws'. Of course science assumes that the universe is lawful or that there are predictable regularities. But I'm saying that science can't say why there are. The question as to why the universe is lawful is a metaphysical question, even if the measurement of, and predictions based on, those regularities is not. That's why I think Wittgenstein said that believing that scientific laws are the explanations of natural phenomena is illusory.
Wittgenstein did not, as far as I am aware advocate asking questions about why the laws of nature, or better conditions, are as they are. As I already said, any explanation you give will then require a further explanation as to why it is as it is; if you were able to go down that rabbit hole there would be no end to it.
Well put, beautifully phrased. Spot on!
A blend of the principle of sufficient reason & Agrippa's trilemma and we get an infinite regress of explanations. No terminus I'm afraid. Metaphysics was doomed from the start.
That was just me being cranky. Sorry.
Don't sweat it.
Although there is "some overlap" between my worldview and New Age spirituality, I don't consider myself a New Ager. For me "Spirituality" is an outdated model of reality. But I don't cast aspersions on those who are motivated more by feelings than facts. They are free to interpret the world as they see fit. I don't practice any form of Western Esotericism, or Religion of any kind, for that matter. Yet, I do find some wisdom in both Eastern and Western Philosophy, that has stood the test of time, despite being sublimated under the communal rituals & mystical practices of popular religion, that appeal to the emotions instead of the intellect. I don't feel the need for such diversions & consolations from the raw reality of a world that seems indifferent to human needs & feelings. So, I don't burn incense at shrines, or recite mantras, or pray to any "higher beings". Consequently, the consilience between my worldview, and the traditional religions of the world, is in the ancient wisdom of rational thinkers (Philosophers), who tried to make sense of the world without the artificial sensory enhancements of modern science.
Unlike the ancient sages though, I do have access to the latest developments in science, and strive to reconcile my personal paradigm with current models of Physics, etc. And that's where a prominent role for Information comes in. I once read an article by a practicing physicist, who commented on the so-called "particles" of Quantum Physics with : "it's nothing but Information". So, I began to investigate the implications of that assertion, by asking "what then is Information?". From that study I learned that Atomism and Materialism are just as outmoded as Spiritualism. Pursuit of the holy grail of a fundamental Atom, has revealed that Physical Reality actually consists of various sensible forms of invisible immaterial Information (the power to create material things). You may think of that active force as Energy (E=MC^2), but I call it EnFormAction, because it is much more than just "the capacity for doing work". So my website and blog expand upon that basic capability-for-causing-machines-to-work, in order to show that EnFormAction is the Cause of all Change in the world, both Physical and Mental.
What I'm saying here is that you are mis-interpreting my rational Information-based philosophy in terms of something that you obviously despise : irrational Religion. Instead, it is the cutting-edge of Information-centric Science. Yet, like all novel paradigms of Reality, it will take time for this new worldview to percolate down through human society, until it seems just as natural as Spirituality to the ancients, and Materialism to moderns. Materialism began to die on the vine, in the early 20th century, at the advent of Quantum Theory and Information Theory. Yet, those powerful new ideas were at first resisted, even by such wise philosophers as Einstein. So, the time has come for a new paradigm that combines the best of Spiritualism & Materialism with a Quantum Foundation & Information Power. :nerd:
The German physicist Max Planck said that science advances one funeral at a time. Or more precisely: “A new scientific truth does not triumph by convincing its opponents and making them see the light, but rather because its opponents eventually die, and a new generation grows up that is familiar with it.”
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-10-10/science-advances-one-funeral-at-a-time-the-latest-nobel-proves-it
Consilience : agreement between the approaches to a topic of different academic subjects, especially science and the humanities.
Information :
* [i]Claude Shannon quantified Information not as useful ideas, but as a mathematical ratio between meaningful order (1) and meaningless disorder (0); between knowledge (1) and ignorance (0). So, that meaningful mind-stuff exists in the limbo-land of statistics, producing effects on reality while having no sensory physical properties. We know it exists ideally, only by detecting its effects in the real world.
* For humans, Information has the semantic quality of aboutness , that we interpret as meaning. In computer science though, Information is treated as meaningless, which makes its mathematical value more certain. It becomes meaningful only when a sentient Self interprets it as such.
* When spelled with an “I”, Information is a noun, referring to data & things. When spelled with an “E”, Enformation is a verb, referring to energy and processes.[/i]
http://blog-glossary.enformationism.info/page11.html
I think you're mistaken and have bought into the pop-science hype ofter promulgated by philosophically illiterate / negligent scientists and academic idealists and other latterday woo-woo sophists. My two bytes on 'speculative atomism consilient with QFT' .
Insofar as "information" has causal efficacy, it is physical (i.e. not "immaterial" or merely abstract/formal). See David Deutsch (re: Constructor Theory).
"Doing work" and "change ... both physical and mental" is, in my mind, a distinction without a difference. I could be wrong though – tell me succinctly, Gnomon, how "work" differs significantly from "change". :chin:
Btw, from reading many of your posts (but not your blog), I've had the impression of your "EnFormAction" as a quixotic hybrid of David Bohm's holomovenent and G. t'Hooft's & L. Susskind's holographic principle; perhaps, though, you're saying something else ...
Photons are a good source of information in our macro world; light peels information off of an object for us to receive.
Of course, the elementary particles are called matter but they are not fundamental; Einstein suggested rather that all is field, and in QFT we take this elementary matter as being spread out quantum lumps in a fluctuating quantum vacuum field. Their information is such as the wave frequency telling of their energy, the wave length providing for volume and extension into dimension, the positive and negative amplitudes providing for matter and antimatter and its charge polarity.
That there are are just a few handfuls of particles tells us that there are only those number of ways to make them, especially the more stable particles that are just a few. The information that makes the physical particles would be just as physical since the physical particles are directly the quanta of the fields, not something new and different in substance. The information for making a particle is described by the math that matches quantum field waverings as sums of harmonic oscillators, for this is how the quantum fields operate.
We can still out of awe portray nature in a kind of mystical fashion, too. Here are two of my videos that do that, just for the fun of romanticism to show that way:
Since it obviously can't be done, that makes metaphysics, conceived that traditional way, pointless, No doubt that is why Gautama refused to answer metaphysical questions, because when people become hooked on looking for such impossible final explanations they become lost.
:100:
Quoting Janus
As I pointed out at the beginning of this thread, and every thread on the subject of metaphysics, the word itself was coined in relation to Aristotle's Metaphysics. And Aristotelian Metaphysics is a legitimate topic with an established provenance and coherent meaning. The tradition in which it is best preserved are those associated with Thomas Aquinas, but it is also preserved in other philosophers to a greater or lesser extent. So, no, I don't agree that it is pointless or meaningless, it is mainly dismissed on the basis of incomprehension. Almost nothing in this thread has actually been about metaphysics at all. I'm not saying that on the basis that I'm an expert on the subject, even particularly adept at it, but I am endeavouring to educate myself in it.
I believe that something that is conspicuously absent in modern philosophy generally is the whole concept of necessary being, also known as the unconditioned, unmade, uncreated and so on. This is something generally identified with religious philosophy and so rejected on those grounds, but it leaves a void, the 'god-shaped hole' in the Western psyche, which unconsciously continues to exert influence.
If all you want to say is that the "terminus of explanation" is Quoting Wayfarer then this doesn't amount to saying anything much.
Quoting Wayfarer
It may have possible poetic value, but what explanatory value could it have, since it posits something about which nothing can be said, other than what it isn't?
You always think that when others disagree with your assessment, that it is because they don't understand it. This is a huge blind spot in my opinion; others are not as stupid as you would like to imagine.
The value it gives, is to tell us that to proceed in the direction of pure chance is to go in the wrong direction.
Quoting Janus
To go down the road of "there is an explanation", even if that explanation may require a further explanation, and a further one after that, is a much more reasonable route than "there is no explanation".
There is a big difference between saying "if you go that way you'll never get to the end of the road", and saying "that is the wrong way to go". The way of "it is chance, it is unintelligible and will never be understood", is clearly the wrong way to go. But if someone says "your understanding will never be complete", this should not deter anyone.
As I already said the idea of "pure chance" is incoherent. If there is an explanation of the origin of life it will be in lawlike terms. To say something arose by "pure chance" is no more an explanation than to say it arose on account of "necessary being, also known as the unconditioned, unmade, uncreated and so on".
Quoting Metaphysician Undercover
Sure, that's the way of science, not metaphysics (as traditionally understood) though.
I don't know if this obscurity is due to the topic itself, which could be the case, or if simply we are just confusing ourselves.
I can certainly see the appeal of using "physics" as ones metaphysics, and then forget about all the other issues that will arise. Or, as is said, "shut up and calculate."
You reckon? :yikes:
Since explanations concerning the cause of material being have always been incomplete, what is wrong with pursuing an explanation which would likely require a further explanation? I don't see the merit in your rejection of such a "rabbit hole".
If we want to say something about how life arose, then we would need to investigate what were the physical conditions and then theorize from there as to what imaginable physical processes could have caused the changes in the chemical compounds such as to produce life.
As far as I know we already have some explanatory hypotheses, but as yet have been unable to create life in the laboratory. Maybe we won't ever be able to come up with a definitive explanation and will be left with various possibilities, but any explanation, whether definitive or not, will be in terms of physical processes, because anything else cannot constitute a testable explanation.
If the explanation you are considering is a physical one then there is nothing wrong with it, Even if we can create life in the lab, showing that some physical explanation works, that still won't answer the question as to why physical substances are such as to allow the advent of life. That kind of question is not answerable in any verifiable or falsifiable manner in principle..
I'm not against imaginative speculation in the metaphysical way; all I'm saying that such speculation cannot be shown to be anything more than an exercise of the creative imagination. I follow Popper in thinking that such metaphysical speculations can (and arguably have) lead to exploring avenues which lead to actual physical discoveries, which may never have happened otherwise.
What kind of bias is that? If we are seeking the cause of physical existence, obviously the answer cannot be something physical.
Quoting Janus
I don't see how you would justify this claim.
Yes.
Then again, we don't know much about creativity at all and we can say it's as real as anything else. I mean, we all have it to an extent and it leads to discoveries on some occasions.
I suppose the surprising thing is that we even manage to have theories that "connect" us to the world at all. There's no reason to suspect any advantage in terms of survival based on science creation.
We have not (all of us, or most of us) agreed as to what metaphysics even is.
The topic of this "philosophical discussion" is "what IS metaphysics", not "what is the correct or conventional definition of an obsolete Aristotelian concept". We agreed earlier that your definition and mine are different. And that's OK. I'm not arguing over conventional usage of the term, but attempting to show that there is a different interpretation of Aristotle's usage, with a practical application to 21st century Reality.
If I insisted that mine is the correct definition, that would be the One Word One Meaning Fallacy. Instead, I am trying to show you a different-way-to-think-about-the-philosophical-concept of Metaphysics. If you have a problem with the neo-Greek word itself, ask yourself if there is something Non-Physical about our mutual Reality. If so, that's what I'm talking about. :smile:
Non-Physical : 2. not tangible or concrete ; 3. immaterial ; incorporeal.
Examples : digital money (cryptocurrency ; bitcoin) ; abstractions ; culture ;
How can something non-physical exist? :
The mind can conceive of objects that clearly have no physical counterpart. Such objects include concepts such as numbers, mathematical sets and functions, and philosophical relations and properties. If such objects are indeed entities, they are entities that exist only mind itself, not within space and time.
Metaphysical Causation : Ideas are abstractions and have no material form. But they can be Causal, as in the Aryan Myth that motivated millions of people to join in a world war, and a holocaust, with devastating physical effects. The ideas and Ideals of Jesus, an insignificant Jewish preacher, motivated millions of minds to convert the pagan Roman Empire into the Christian Church. Some insist that anything Real must interact with the physical world in some way. But they tend to ignore the mediation of minds in real-world Causation.
That may be true; but then in light of my last reply to MU, why couldn't we say that anything that is testable is a physical, not a metaphysical, hypothesis? On the other hand don't we know what traditional or classical metaphysics is, because it is canonized in texts which are recognized as being concerned with metaphysical questions?
So, as to the idea that metaphysical ideas are untestable ideas this not to say that every untestable idea would be a metaphysical idea, but if an idea is an aesthetical, anthropological, economical, psychological or ethical one, then wouldn't that be kind of obvious? This is not to say that all hypotheses in the other disciplines I mentioned would be untestable in principle like metaphysical speculations are; I think some ideas in those other areas of inquiry are testable in principle, but very difficult or even impossible to definitively test in practice.
It may seem that an idea is definitely non-physical and yet causal (this is Descartes' problem). As Spinoza, solving this problem, would have it, I think that physical and non-physical (mental) are not two substances, but two kinds of perspective or ways of thinking about (some) things. So we can look at ideas as being non-physical (mental, semantic and so on) or physical (neural). Insofar as ideas are physical (neural) then they can of course be causative.
Absent evidence, we resort to reasons. Someone can give you a reason for thinking that idealism is better than panpsychism, you weigh those reasons based on your experience and proceed to adopt either view, or you can reject them both.
The issue I see with your use of "physical" here, is that it stands in for publicly observable phenomena, that is a thing many people can point to and see.
That leaves out an awful lot. But, this specific issue aside, you can say that metaphysical ideas are not subject to testing, only reasons.
So, it is more a matter of being true to your intellect, and trying to avoid being swayed by wishful thinking (which would be a form of intellectual dishonesty for us educated moderns). This allows that those who have been inculcated with more traditional beliefs can be true to their intellects without demanding empirical evidence for their beliefs..
Well, in a sense. I mean, everybody has a metaphysics, scientists included. They just don't have a particularly good metaphysics.
So take a scientists who believes in only what the evidence shows. The world is made of quantum fields. That's what the evidence says exists at bottom. It's a fluctuating space that vibrates. It's a physical thing that we'll never see, can only get at thorough (physical) mathematical equations and offers no hints that a rock, much less an organism would ever arise.
That is a metaphysical view. That's a strange belief to anybody, even if it has evidence.
You can define words any way you want. You can define a dog turd a large breed of poultry, but please don't invite me to Thanksgiving dinner at your house.
you do know why Karl Popper introduced the criterion of testability? And that he himself was not a materialist?
Quoting Gnomon
Agree, but this doesn't account for the uncanny effectiveness of mathematics in the natural sciences. Saying that something exists 'in the mind' subjectivises it - but mathematical truths are true for all minds, not for a particular mind. So their reality transcends the subjective domain.
Non-physical explanations are tested logically. That's what logic gives us, non-physical explanations. Are you familiar with mathematics for example? Some people however, still do not trust logic, they have no faith in the non-physical, and so they must fall back onto the comfort and illusory security provided by their senses.
Quoting Janus
The problem with this statement is that you define "definitive evidence" as physical evidence. If you would allow that logic provides evidence which is just as "definitive", or even more so, than your senses, you would allow for "non-physical evidence".
You are mistaken, my friend. As I noted in my previous post, I don't do woo. So your prejudice against Metaphysics causes you to mis-interpret the meaning of my words. But that's OK. We'd have no use for philosophy if people didn't disagree on the applicable meaning of words in different contexts. But our good intentions keep us dialoging toward a meeting of minds. :cool:
Quoting 180 Proof
From reply to above :
Metaphysical Causation : Ideas are abstractions and have no material form. But they can be Causal, as in the Aryan Myth that motivated millions of people to join in a world war, and a holocaust, with devastating physical effects. The ideas and Ideals of Jesus, an insignificant Jewish preacher, motivated millions of minds to convert the pagan Roman Empire into the Christian Church. Some insist that anything Real must interact with the physical world in some way. But they tend to ignore the mediation of minds in real-world Causation.
Quoting 180 Proof
Physical change is called "Work". Mental change is called "Information". In the human brain, Mental Work burns a lot of energy, even though the Brain does not change its physical form. The mental "difference" is in the abstract meaning of the Information. But hey, It's all the same to me : EnFormAction is transformation, which is Change, whether mental or physical. :smile:
The novel concept of Enformation is also a synthesis of both Energy and Information. So I invented a new portmanteu word to more precisely encapsulate that two-in-one meaning : “EnFormAction”. In this case though, the neologism contains three parts : “En” for Energy, “Form” for Shape or Structure or Design, and “Action” for Change or Causation. But Energy & Causation are basically the same thing.
http://bothandblog2.enformationism.info/page29.html
Quoting 180 Proof
In my world, there are physical differences (ratios ; numerical values) and there are mental distinctions (meanings ; reasons). But your worldview doesn't seem to have a place for a Meta-physical Mind. So, you look for physical analogues to such "nonsense" (woo) notions as : Betrayal, Charity, Courage, Cowardice, Cruelty, Forgiveness, Truth, Love, Anger, Fear, Grief, Happiness, Jealously, Sympathy, Insanity, Knowledge, Wisdom, Right/Wrong, Duty, Fame, Justice, Liberty, Friendship, Greed, Innocence, Rules, Social Norm, and Religion. If they are not physical, they don't exist, hence have no importance to a "Physicalist Mind" (an oxymoron) :joke:
In philosophy, physicalism is the metaphysical thesis that "everything is physical"
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Physicalism
Information :
Knowledge and the ability to know. It’s also what you know. But technically, it's the ratio of order to disorder, of positive to negative, of knowledge to ignorance. It's measured in degrees of uncertainty. Those ratios are also called "differences". So Gregory Bateson defined Information as "the difference that makes a difference". The latter distinction refers to "value" or "meaning". Babbage called his prototype computer a "difference engine". Difference is the cause or agent of Change. In Physics it’s called "Thermo-dynamics" or "Energy". In Sociology it’s called "Conflict".
http://bothandblog6.enformationism.info/page16.html
The BothAnd principle is a corollary of the Enformationism thesis. It views the world as a process motivated and guided by antagonistic-yet-complementary powers. For example, Energy is the motive force for all physical actions, but it is offset & moderated by the, less well known, antithetical force of Enformy in the great dialectical process of evolution. The overall effect of energy in the universe is destructive, as encapsulated in the concept of Entropy. Yet, by balancing destructive Entropy with constructive Enformy, evolution has proven to be a creative process. However, since the existence of Enformy has not yet been accepted by mainstream science --- except in the crude concept of “negentropy” --- any worldview based on such a flimsy foundation is likely to be dismissed by either/or empiricists as a bunch of Woo. Yet, all scientific & philosophical speculation inevitably begins with a leap of imagination. And this hybrid world-view is one such leap into the unknown.
Yes, I've read a fair bit of Popper's work many years ago. He introduced the criterion of falsifiability, as a corrective to the Logical Positivists idea of verifiability. He clearly identified metaphysical ideas, in distinction from scientific ideas, as being untestable. He rejected Kant's noumena. It's true he wasn't a strict materialsit, as he posited "three worlds" if I remember right. Since my memory of this is a bit vague I just searched that and found this on Wikipedia. Note that Popper thinks world 2 and 3 are emergent, not primordial; they are exclusively human phenomena for Popper.
I'm trying to trace the origin of metaphysics back to Parmenides, as he is traditionally believed to be the originator of that stream of thought. I've been reading up on it, but it's a very taxing subject, because he's very hard to understand, and because there's been literally millenia of commentary about it, so the whole field is littered with enormously elaborated arguments about the exact meaning of some phrase or word. But I think the general gist is that as he was an axial age philosopher, his outlook and mentality is closer to that of Vedanta and Buddhism than to anything in modern philosophy. I've found a couple of interesting papers on that idea (plus McEvilly's book The Shape of Ancient Thought.)
Yes, but physical Photons are not the Information (meaning ; difference) itself. They are, like the 1s & 0s of computers, merely empty carriers of cargo (meaning). So, the physical Effects of photons are due to the non-physical contents, not the container. As a metaphor, imagine that an empty brass shell becomes a bomb when it is filled with potential energy. Besides, a Potential photon is barely physical, and it only becomes Actual when it slows down to "macro" speeds at which its potential condenses into Matter. So, the "source of Information" (meaning) is always a differentiating Mind of some kind. :cool:
Photons have no charge, no resting mass, and travel at the speed of light.
That's about as close to nothing as you can imagine. But modern physicists have become grudgingly resigned to treating nothingness as-if it is a physical (material) object. Photons, Fields, & Quarks would have been dismissed by Aristotle as Platonic Ideals. :nerd:
[quote=Werner Heisenberg, The Debate between Plato and Democritus] The mathematically formulated laws of quantum theory show clearly that our ordinary intuitive concepts cannot be unambiguously applied to the smallest particles. All the words or concepts we use to describe ordinary physical objects, such as position, velocity, color, size, and so on, become indefinite and problematic if we try to use then of elementary particles. ... it is important to realize that, while the behavior of the smallest particles cannot be unambiguously described in ordinary language, the language of mathematics is still adequate for a clear-cut account of what is going on.
During the coming years [i.e. after the 1950's], the high-energy accelerators will bring to light many further interesting details about the behavior of elementary particles. But I am inclined to think that the answer just considered to the old philosophical problems will turn out to be final. If this is so, does this answer confirm the views of Democritus or Plato?
I think that on this point modern physics has definitely decided for Plato. For the smallest units of matter are, in fact, not physical objects in the ordinary sense of the word; they are forms, structures or—in Plato's sense—Ideas, which can be unambiguously spoken of only in the language of mathematics.[/quote]
Plato gets the last laugh.
Yes. Popper made the same kind of distinction that I am making to distinguish Meta-Physics (world 2 &3) from Physics (world 1). Even though they like to quote Popper's Falsifiability rule for unconscious physical World 1, they deny the "emergent human phenomena" of conscious minds, that mysteriously evolved from insentient matter by a hypothetical phase change that left a record in fossils in the form of a gap (insert unknown cause here). :smile:
World 1 : the realm of states and processes as typically studied by the natural sciences.
World 2 : the realm of mental states and processes.
World 3 : the realm of the 'products of thought' when considered as objects in their own right.
Now, you're just getting nasty. So, I'll back-off the stinky word "Metaphysics", and present my aromatic turkey dinner in the form of Karl Popper's notion of non-falsifiable Worlds 2 &3 as noted in the reply to Janus below. Now, would you accept my invitation? :smile:
Physics --
World 1 : the realm of states and processes as typically studied by the natural sciences.
non-physical Meta-Physics --
[i]World 2 : the realm of mental states and processes.
World 3 : the realm of the 'products of thought' when considered as objects in their own right.[/i]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Popper%27s_three_worlds
Note -- as typically studied by the philosophical sciences
Karl Popper is generally regarded as one of the greatest philosophers of science of the twentieth century.
https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/popper/
PS___I don't know about you, but I'm learning a lot about this topic. But it's all in the form of Ideas and Information, not Physics.
It is thought that two photons colliding can produce an electron and a positron, if this is what you mean by them slowing down, and this is under study. Photons don't decay on their own, which is why they will be left at the end of the universe. Also, "barely physical" is still physical.
I see that you have Mind's information operating a photon.
I agree. I am not a Cartesian Dualist. but an Information Monist. :smile:
Information already has this monist/dualist BothAnd property, which could explain how metaphysical minds emerge from the functioning of material brains. It might also suggest how a physical universe could emerge from a mathematical Singularity consisting of nothing but the information for constructing a universe from scratch : a program for creation.
http://bothandblog.enformationism.info/page14.html
Like Spinoza's Pantheistic "God", Information appears to be the single substance of the whole World.
http://bothandblog2.enformationism.info/page29.html
Both/And Principle :
My coinage for the holistic principle of Complementarity, as illustrated in the Yin/Yang symbol. Opposing or contrasting concepts are always part of a greater whole. Conflicts between parts can be reconciled or harmonized by putting them into the context of a whole system.
Indeed, they are all close to nothing, as expected, being so minuscule, but 'close' is not nothing and so there is no "nothingness" to treat…
It is imagined that two photons colliding is like a standing wave in a continuous Field of mathematical "substance". No one has ever observed such a collision of massless particles, they only see it's effects on massive matter as tracks in a fog chamber. Anyway, it's that hypothetical "standing wave" that I refer to as stable Matter. But, as I imagine it, the wavey Field of Energy (the power to Enform) exists only in the Mind of the Enformer (the Operator), who is able to transform nothing (or near nothing) into something. :smile:
PS__A massless Photon at rest (energy & momentum but no mass) qualifies as Meta-Physical in my usage of the term -- Potential but not Actual. No mass, no matter. It's a metaphor for a particle.
The Enformer :
AKA, the Creator. The presumed eternal source of all information, as encoded in the Big Bang Sing-ularity. That ability to convert conceptual Forms into actual Things, to transform infinite possibilities into finite actualities, and to create space & time, matter & energy from essentially no-thing is called the power of EnFormAction. Due to our ignorance of anything beyond space-time though, the postulated enforming agent remains undefined. I simply label it ambiguously as "G*D".
http://blog-glossary.enformationism.info/page8.html
Close only counts in horseshoes and hand-grenades. A Quark is invisible and un-measurable, so in scientific terms it's only a theory (information) in a mind. Since it only exists as three-in-one, it's only as real as the Holy Trinity. :joke:
Quarks are probably not made of anything more fundamental. The idea that everything has to be made of something else is not true. Light is not made of anything else, neither is gravity.
https://physics.stackexchange.com/questions/16048/what-are-quarks-made-of
Note -- all those "nothings" are "made" of Information (the power to enform, to create forms).i.e, Intentional Energy. Is that such a crazy notion?
Yet quarks are supposed to be the constituent parts of massive objects. Where does all that mass actually come from?
I think that the Higgs mechanism only accounts for a very small percentage of mass that is known to us.
[quote=Wikipedia]It is worth noting that the Higgs field does not "create" mass out of nothing (which would violate the law of conservation of energy), nor is the Higgs field responsible for the mass of all particles. For example, approximately 99% of the mass of baryons (composite particles such as the proton and neutron), is due instead to quantum chromodynamic binding energy, which is the sum of the kinetic energies of quarks and the energies of the massless gluons mediating the strong interaction inside the baryons.[28] In Higgs-based theories, the property of "mass" is a manifestation of potential energy transferred to fundamental particles when they interact ("couple") with the Higgs field, which had contained that mass in the form of energy.[29][/quote]
In my previous post I did not claim you did. I said it seems you've been taken-in by pop-science hype about "materialism".
What "prejudice"? I've proposed an alternative method of metaphysical speculation to the mainstream (i.e. Platonic) method you've undertaken. I've not "mis-interpreted" you but have taken your self-described "idealism / essentialism" at face value as pseudo-science masquerading as philosophy ("Meta-physics"). Criticism, Gnomon, is not "prejudice against". I'm always open to being persuaded otherwise. I'm familiar enough with digital physics, information theory, Bohmian QM, black hole entropy, etc, however, to recognize pseudo-scientific misappropriations of those theoretical constructs and interpretations when I encounter them (e.g. "Enformationism", etc)
Then it would be physical, not "metaphysical". :roll:
Explain why a physical brain physically "burns a lot of" physical "energy" (i.e. calories) if, as you suggest, "Information" is not "Work". Oh, btw, the human brain functions by constantly changing its neuronal configurations (re: neuroplasticity) that encode *wait for it, wait for it* new information (i.e. updating current information —> memories, expectations, predictions, feelings, learning-conditioning, etc).
Strawman. I've only obliquely made empirical (and more directly analytical) objections to your 'idealist / essentialist claims' – you're peddling sophistical pseudo-science, Gnomon! – not "metaphysical" (e.g. physicalist or positivist) counter-claims. Btw, anti-idealism isn't necessarily physicalism (e.g. Kant wasn't a physicalist), so even your strawman consists of a strawman. :sweat:
Pedantic to the last ... :mask:
Quoting Gnomon
Acosmist.
Logic, though, doesn't tell us anything about an inference other than whether it is consistent with its premises (validity); it cannot tell us whether the premises are true.
The only way to test the truth of any premise is by empirical evidence.
Most of the mass=energy of a proton is from the gluons.
…added up to a heck of a lot of crap!
Premises need not be descriptions of physical things, whose truth and falsity is judged according to empirical evidence. We can make premises which are descriptions of how logic works, and also premises concerning moral issues. The judgement of truth or falsity of these premises is not based in empirical evidence, so it isn't really correct to say that the truth of a premise can only be tested by empirical evidence. That itself would be a premise which cannot be tested, so the truth or falsity of it could not be judged. Whether empirical evidence, or knowledge about the immaterial, provides a more sound judgement is another question. Plato was insistent on the latter.
Science is based on a method of testing the truth or falsity of immaterial principles (hypotheses) through reference to empirical evidence. What science does not provide for us is any real principles for testing the validity of empirical evidence. Sure there are guidelines as to what constitutes an "observation\", and principles as to how experiments ought to proceed in a way to produce objective observations, but these are all based in "ought", so they can only be supported by strong metaphysics. Weak metaphysics produces inconsistency between one field of science and another, as to what constitutes a valid observation.
Quoting PoeticUniverse
Yes, gluons have no mass in themselves, but they are responsible for, as carriers of, the strong force. The strong force, which binds quarks into massive objects, is mathematically equivalent to mass. So if quarks are separated there is a freeing of energy which exists in the hadron (massive object) as gluons.
The problem is that the strong interaction force is not well understood. It is "observed" to be unrestricted by distance, and because of this, quarks cannot actually be separated in experimental practise. No matter how far apart they are supposedly separated, the strong force still acts to hold them together, and no real separation can be observed.
[quote=Wikipedia]The strong force acts between quarks. Unlike all other forces (electromagnetic, weak, and gravitational), the strong force does not diminish in strength with increasing distance between pairs of quarks. After a limiting distance (about the size of a hadron) has been reached, it remains at a strength of about 10,000 newtons [N], no matter how much farther the distance between the quarks.[7] As the separation between the quarks grows, the energy added to the pair creates new pairs of matching quarks between the original two; hence it is impossible to isolate quarks. The explanation is that the amount of work done against a force of 10,000 newtons is enough to create particle–antiparticle pairs within a very short distance of that interaction. The very energy added to the system required to pull two quarks apart would create a pair of new quarks that will pair up with the original ones. In QCD, this phenomenon is called color confinement; as a result only hadrons, not individual free quarks, can be observed. The failure of all experiments that have searched for free quarks is considered to be evidence of this phenomenon.[/quote]
I must have missed your explication of that method. Can you summarize it for me? In what sense is it beyond physical"? Do you have a name for it?
My "metaphysical speculation" necessarily goes beyond Physics, because The Scientific Method doesn't address "ultimate questions". Moreover, my alternative Philosophical method is a combination of both Platonic Idealism and Aristotelian Realism. For example, Ari applied Plato's notion of Ideal FORM to real things. " Aristotle famously contends that every physical object is a compound of matter and form". And that is exactly what I'm doing with an "alternative" definition of "InFORMation". Whatever he meant by "form", it's clear that it's different from "matter". “by form I mean the essence of each thing and the primary substance” In my usage, Information is the "essence" of material things. And by that I'm referring to the immaterial mathematical Structure, that our minds interpret as Geometry & Topology (i.e. Shape or Form). That Essence is Ideal in the sense that it exists as an Idea in a Mind, which makes it as real as anything else in our mental & mathematical models of reality. :smile:
Metaphysical speculation is, simply put, the pondering of ultimate questions about the universe. https://miuc.org/the-value-of-metaphysics-and-of-metaphysical-conversation/
Quoting 180 Proof
That may be true of Shannon's definition of "information", as an empty carrier of meaning. But in my usage, and that of credentialed physicists, such as physicist Paul Davies, Information is both Causal and Meaningful. He edited a book by a dozen scientists & philosophers entitled "From Matter to Life: Information and Causality". So, if he is correct that Information has Causal powers, then that causal process is what we call "Work". :wink:
Quoting 180 Proof
In the process of Enformation (change of form) the brain burns energy to Change (en-form) the state of neurons. Note -- I resurrected an "obsolete" form of the verb "to inform" in order to emphasize the en-ergy aspect of the process. To En-Form is to cause a change of Form. Which is what Energy does. However, in my thesis, Energy is not "physical", but "meta-physical" ; not in a spiritual sense, but because it is knowable only by mental inference from its effects on matter, so we can't detect energy directly. We infer, or imagine, the invisible Cause from observation of physical changes in matter. :chin:
Energy is the relationship between information regimes
https://physics.stackexchange.com/questions/22084/how-is-information-related-to-energy-in-physics
Almost all the forms of energy are invisible
https://www.quora.com/Why-are-most-forms-of-energy-invisible-to-the-naked-eyes-while-we-can-see-heat-as-fire-for-example-What-make-some-forms-seen-and-other-not
Quoting 180 Proof
Hmmm, interesting! I suppose you mean that Anti-idealism is Realism. But I could call it "Naive Realism". And my alternative would be "Information Realism". :cool:
Naive Realism :
In social psychology, naïve realism is the human tendency to believe that we see the world around us objectively, and that people who disagree with us must be uninformed, irrational, or biased.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Na%C3%AFve_realism_(psychology)
Information Realism :
This abstract notion, called information realism is philosophical in character, but it has been associated with physics from its very inception.
https://blogs.scientificamerican.com/observations/physics-is-pointing-inexorably-to-mind/
PS__I'm enjoying your challenges to my thesis. It helps me to weed-out errors in reasoning, and to find different ways to describe counterintuitive and non-mainstream concepts. :joke:
Which includes those imaginary Quarks and Gluons, and all invisible Forces for that matter. But hey, icky & gummy crap can be used to stick & glue things together. :joke:
"Gluon :a subatomic particle of a class that is thought to bind quarks together."
"We now postulate that the particles carrying this force, called gluons,"
My Space Vacation:
Only premises that are descriptions of physical things or the behavior of observable things can be tested, though. Descriptions of how logic works are observations of how we think and are tested for veracity against observations of how we think. Moral premises are judged against standards of compassion, social harmony and against how we feel about things. All of this requires observation. The premise that the truth of premises can be tested only by observation is itself based on observation of how we test premises. It is supported by the fact that we cannot come up with any other way to test premises.
I think the examples you give: psychoanalysis and communism are tested by observing their results. Such testing is empirical but it cannot be as definitive as testing in physics or chemistry. Testing of theories in geology and biology are somewhere in between; not as definitively testable as physical and chemical theories, but more definitively testable than psychoanalytic theories or the predictions of communism.
I wouldn't say that untestable ideas are invalid. Logical validity is to do with form, not content, so even nonsense syllogisms can be valid. In any case, considerations of validity aside, untestable ideas may be highly creative, and poetic and inspiring, so they are not necessarily without value.
although I will add that I can see merit in this formulation:
Quoting Gnomon
I posted a snippet upthread which might be worth including again as it makes a similar point:
Quoting Janus
But Popper's point was that all kinds of results could be accomodated by both theories, which is why he used them as examples of the kinds of theories that purport to be scientific or empirical, but actually are not, because they can't be falsified by observation.
I was thinking along the lines that psychoanalysis is believed to help people work through their mental problems. So you could do case studies to see if that is the case. I believe such studies have been carried out on the various psychotherapies, and I recall reading that CBT has generally appeared to be the most effective kind of therapy.
To test whether communism would work to make for more harmonious communities and general improvement of happiness you would first need to establish a community that works according to communistic principles freely chosen by the people, not imposed by force.
As I said before, I think there is a continuum of definiteness of testability across the various domains of inquiry. Take the idea of enlightenment as knowing-the-ultimate-truth; that cannot be tested at all; how could you ever know by observation whether someone knows the ultimate truth (whatever that might even be thought to mean). But enlightenment as non-attachment and non-reactivity can be tested by observing the purportedly enlightened one's behavior.
There is a "demarcation problem" that philosophers of science are still grappling with. The boundary between science and pseudoscience or non-science cannot definitively be established, so I think it is best thought of as a continuum. Any speculation which in principle cannot be even with minimal definiteness tested by observation would count as non-science. Where something would seem to be able to be tested, for example astrology, but the testing cannot coherently, consistently, plausibly and unequivocally link the predicted results with the purported causes would count as pseudoscience.
Yes, but Popper's point was that no matter what came up, you could accomodate it or explain it, so Freudian psychoanalysis wasn't a predictive theory at all. (He compared it to the theory of relativity, which was confirmed in part by Eddington's observations of solar parallax.)
Anyway I wasn't wanting to divert the thread into a discussion of psychoanalysis or marxism, but only to make the point about why Popper invoked the criterion of falsifiability in the first place. You brought up 'how could non-physicalist ideas even be tested' or something along those lines, so I was trying to show that the criterion of falsifiability in Popper's sense is not relevant to philosophical rationalism. The fact that metaphysical ideas are not testable does nothing to negate them, as ideas on that level can only be judged according to their philosophical merits.
Quoting Janus
It can't be tested in the third person.
Quoting Janus
As if the scientific criteria are the only criteria by which anything can be judged to be real. Which is as I've often said, pretty well an exact definition of positivism:
Science is a way to organize experience in a repeatable manner, such that we have some confidence in the mind-independence of some phenomena. Of course, this independence cannot fully be actualized, but postulated.
One problem with relying too much on science as a worldview is that it must overlook personal (private) experience. I suspect this is part of the reason why psychology as a science, has not made as much progress as other fields, the phenomena get too complex eventually.
I don't know if it's even possible to negate a metaphysical perspective.
But it is a predictive theory, The theory is that is you remember and confront past emotional traumas that have been repressed because they were too difficult to cope with, then you will overcome the psychological blocks and complexes that those repressions are sustaining. As I said it is not definitely testable, but there is no other way to decide if that theory is on the mark or not. It cannot be decided by thinking about it.
No theory, not even relativity (which along with quantum theory is one of the most predictively successful theories ever) can be known to be true, in any case. All we can know is whether it works in the sense that what is predicted is observed.
Quoting Wayfarer
If even scientific theories cannot be known to be true, how much less can metaphysical speculations be known to be true? There is no agreement among philosophers, much less than there is among scientists, so how could a metaphysical idea be judged according to its "philosophical merits"? Who decides what constitutes philosophical merit, and by what criteria?
Quoting Wayfarer
It can't be tested at all. If you believed you knew an ultimate truth how could you know it is true, and how could you know it is ultimate?
Quoting Wayfarer
Where have I said anything about anything being real? We are discussing truth and its relation to testability.
But quantum theory and particle physics is consistent with chemical theory, and chemical theory is consistent with geology, cosmology and biology. I see them as just being different domains or levels of description and explanation.
I agree, and the further problem is that people do things for reasons, which is a whole different ball game than what is involved in studying events, processes and the behavior of things in terms of causes.
Yes, you can find consistency and some scientists like to be able to think in terms of reduction. The thing is, almost all physicists would agree that, based on physics alone, you would never be able to predict a biological phenomena emerging, much less a complex mammal.
And we may call physics "physical", but I like to point out that these things are discovered through equations and then verified by observational evidence. The issue is that I cannot think of something less "physical" than mathematics. So we have an ideal theory formation (equations we come up with) combined with physical observation. Looks like messy metaphysics to me.
It's strange. I often feel I understand a human being better when I'm told why they did something, say, I discover John was mad or Jane was excited, because John was fired and Jane got promoted.
But this "understanding" is way different than understanding a scientific theory.
Did you meet Elon Musk out there?
I was pleasantly surprised to see how much enthusiasm there is on the forum for this contentious topic. Especially after it petered-out at least twice before. The expressed opinions seem strongly divided between Science & Pseudoscience, or between Physics & Metaphysics, with some fer it, and some agin it, and only a few on the fence.
However, the intention of my thesis was to bring Metaphysics back into the fold of Science, if not exactly Physics. But centuries after the "Enlightenment", the gap is still wide, among those who care enough to even argue about Ideal concepts that have no immediate effect in the physical world. Metaphysics won't make your cell phone work, or put food on your table. But deep thinkers seem to think it's important to think about such non-things. To some, it's a vermin to be eradicated with rat poison, while to others it's the creamy icing on the worldview cake. :smile:
I have referred to both of those ideas in my thesis. For example, I describe what Plato called Ideal FORM, in terms of Generic Information. That label is intended to include metaphysical Memes as well as physical Genes, as carriers of Information. In my thesis, both fall under the heading of EnFormAction.
Whereas Aristotle may have imagined "entelechia" in terms of an animating World Soul, I prefer to describe that teleological force in Nature as positive "Enformy", to replace the made-up label in Physics : "Negentropy". Although it sounds dismissive, just giving it a name is an indirect admission of a mysterious positive force, driving Evolution toward some unknown future state. And despite attempts to denigrate Metaphysics as "supernatural", Entropy is as natural as Energy. It just happens to be defined in terms of Information Theory, instead of Thermodynamic Theory. :smile:
Information is Generic in the sense of generating all forms from a formless pool of possibility : the Platonic Forms.
http://bothandblog2.enformationism.info/page29.html
An entelechy is an internal force or principle that drives a being toward its destiny.
https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/entelechy
Enformy :
In the Enformationism theory, Enformy is a hypothetical, holistic, metaphysical, natural trend or force, that counteracts Entropy & Randomness to produce complexity & progress.
http://blog-glossary.enformationism.info/page8.html
Because of the "Hard Problem" of Consciousness, Physics has no good explanation for the existence of Memes in the world. It's a "cultural analog" to Genes, but the evolutionary leap from molecules lto Genes, and from Genes to Memes are not explained by the analogy. So, it remains an "explanatory gap" to be filled by some Potential. But, was that pre-real potency physical (particular) or meta-physical (general)? The latter is a "Meme of the Gaps" solution to a philosophical mystery. It assumes that concepts are not made of Atoms or Bosons.
Just as genetic information is encapsulated in a protein form, a meme requires a physical medium (e.g. neuron) -- but the meaningful content of the capsule is not physical. it's relational, like Mathematics. So, what is Math made of, if not Information (the power to enform)? That's a rhetorical question, I already know the usual "it's all physical" answer, as a term of Faith in Science. :cool:
I don't associated the idea of the 'world soul' with Aristotle in particular, but definitely with the idea of 'animating principle'.
[quote=Brittanica]entelechy, (from Greek entelecheia), in philosophy, that which realizes or makes actual what is otherwise merely potential. The concept is intimately connected with Aristotle’s distinction between matter and form, or the potential and the actual. He analyzed each thing into the stuff or elements of which it is composed and the form which makes it what it is (see hylomorphism). The mere stuff or matter is not yet the real thing; it needs a certain form or essence or function to complete it. Matter and form, however, are never separated; they can only be distinguished. Thus, in the case of a living organism, for example, the sheer matter of the organism (viewed only as a synthesis of inorganic substances) can be distinguished from a certain form or function or inner activity, without which it would not be a living organism at all; and this “soul” or “vital function” is what Aristotle in his De anima (On the Soul ) called the entelechy (or first entelechy) of the living organism.[/quote]
I suppose this would nowadays be dismissed as vitalism, but it makes intuitive sense to me. The problem is that this so-called vital function doesn't exist on the level of molecular transactions, so it can't be measured objectively, so to all intents it is dismissed as a figment.
Big questions, but this is what philosophy is for. As I might have mentioned I've been reading a blog I've discovered by a Dutch author - don't know if he's an academic but seems to have read everything - take a look at Leibniz's Question, the Crisis of Physicalism, and the Return of Absolute Idealism. It describes pretty well the point I'm up to. I've also been studying Bernardo Kastrup's 'analytical idealism' which is in accord with a lot of what is written there. There's definitely a sea change happening in philosophy and science - 'the old is dying, the new is struggling to be born'.
Sorry, Aristotle gave a definition of "soul", so perhaps I mis-spoke. Anyway, his notion of Entelechy sounds like another word for the motivating animating vital force of the world. Some Physicalists and Realists on this forum don't mind reifying metaphors into material forms. :smile:
Reify : make (something abstract) more concrete or real.
The Platonic doctrine of the world soul was rejected by aristotle.
https://www.encyclopedia.com/religion/encyclopedias-almanacs-transcripts-and-maps/world-soul-anima-mundi
Entelechy :
[i]the realization of potential.
the supposed vital principle that guides the development and functioning of an organism or other system or organization.[/i]
Note -- apparently I expanded that narrow notion to include the Cosmic Organism. Doesn't that make sense? I suppose he "rejected" Plato's ideal soul, because he was trying to be a Realist, instead of an Idealist. But, I don't see anything necessarily Ideal about the concept of directional momentum in the expansion of a Singularity into a Cosmos. Of course if you try to explain how that teleology came to be programmed into a speck of Potential, that might get Meta-Physical, in the sense of probing beyond the physical boundary of our world. But physicists do that with Inflation and Multiverse theories. So, why not philosophers? :wink:
Information - Consciousness - Reality :
He then offers two ways of understanding this dynamic world : in Aristotelian terms as “the entelechy of existence”, and the metaphor of “the rhizome of reality”. Later, he mentions a more technological way to think of reality, as a mathematical structure forming “the software that connects us, that enables all distributed systems, including life itself”. However, he seems to think of this evolving complexifying mechanism as more like a living cosmic organism.
http://bothandblog7.enformationism.info/page18.html
There's a tendency of thought called 'orthogenesis' - 'Orthogenesis, also known as orthogenetic evolution, progressive evolution, evolutionary progress, or progressionism, is the biological hypothesis that organisms have an innate tendency to evolve in a definite direction towards some goal (teleology) due to some internal mechanism or "driving force". According to the theory, the largest-scale trends in evolution have an absolute goal such as increasing biological complexity. Prominent historical figures who have championed some form of evolutionary progress include Jean-Baptiste Lamarck, Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, and Henri Bergson.' https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orthogenesis
I think that in mainstream science the idea is deprecated, although the entry is worth looking at as there still seems to be some controversy about it. It's similar to the term 'teleology' which due to its association with Aristotle is strictly verboten in scientific reasoning, but then the term 'teleonomy' had to be coined to capture the fact that organisms are inherently purposeful. (Replaces 'purposiveness' with 'apparent purposiveness' - typical materialist double-speak.)
Take a gander at https://www.thenewatlantis.com/authors/stephen-talbott. Interesting essays on philosophy of biology.
Your idea of "meta-physics" may have value in philosophical discussions, but it isn't "metaphysics" as we normally use the word. We've been through all this before. I don't think we'll get anywhere going through it again". — T Clark
Since, in my wordy posts, I haven't been able to convince that there is another way to define "Metaphysics", here's a less verbose version : :chin:
Physics is about analyzing a system into pieces and parts (practice).
Meta-physics is about generalizing pieces & parts into systems (theory).
I guess you didn't read this post
Quoting 180 Proof
or the embedded link (rabbit hole to Oz!) therein.
[s]Impossibilism (will do, I guess) – membership-rules of the Null Set as a speculative criterion for understanding[/s] (instead of a 'categorical construct' e.g. essences, universals, transcendent entities, etc).
edit:
Immanentism – negative ontology as a speculative criterion for the understanding which enables-constrains praxes, or agency. :smirk:
My only complaint has been your confusing misuse of the word "metaphysics." As for your ideas themselves, I don't have strong feelings either way.
Quarks have mass. I do remember reading that the mass of the quarks making up larger subatomic particles; i.e. protons, neutrons, and mesons; add up to less than the mass of the particle itself.
I will explain quarks and bosom energy tomorrow, along with the some old sexist problems caused by the quark names.
In my responses I have noted that, although he uses "metaphysics" in a way I don't think is appropriate, he is careful to define what he means by the words he uses. I appreciate that.
That's not true, logic is tested by consistency. That 4+5 equals 9 is tested by 9-5=4, etc..
Quoting Janus
Obviously you don't actually know how premises are tested, so your premise is false. It's like you saw 20 black squirrels, and no other squirrels, so you claim as a true premise, "all squirrels are black".
You have actually given a very good example of how "observation" itself is very deceptive as the basis for validating premises. Without very good (immaterial) rules as to how one might derive a valid premise from observations, observations very often mislead us.
Quoting Janus
Your missing the point. No amount of observations of compassion, social harmony, and such things, will justify the claim that we ought to support such things. Moral premises concern what ought, and ought not, be done. That people act in a specific way, and they say "this is good", does not justify the claim that what they say is good, is what ought to be done.
Quoting Janus
What happened to "premises can be tested only by observation"? The example of "quarks" described earlier, is clear evidence that the Standard Model is not supported by observation. So now you make appeals to consistency? That a quantity of energy moves from one place to another, in the form of a wave, and also in the form of a particle, is an example of inconsistency. So quantum theory is supported neither by observation nor consistency. It is supported only by its capacity to predict.
Quoting Wayfarer
The point (derived from Plato) which Aristotle demonstrates very well, is why the soul is necessarily prior to the material living body. Any living body is organized. Such a body is necessarily organized from the very first moment of its existence. Organization requires a cause. Therefore the thing which causes the living body to be organized (the soul) is necessarily prior to the body.
Then, in his metaphysics, Aristotle carries this principle further, to all physical existence in general. Since the very essence of physical existence, is to be in some way organized, then all physical existence must be organized from the very first moment of its existence. And since organization requires a cause, that cause must be prior to physical existence.
The modern trend in metaphysics is to posit some initial condition of absolute disorganization, from which organization emerged. This idea is what is demonstrated by Aristotle's cosmological argument to incoherent and unintelligible. But it has reemerged in modern metaphysics as a result of physicalist bias impairing the cognitive capacity of human beings.
Quoting T Clark
I agree that quarks have some mass, but it's relatively small. The majority of the mass in a proton or neutron is accounted for by the energy of the gluons which are supposed to hold the quarks together. The problem is that individual, separated quarks, cannot actually be observed.
I understand the concern. I think it's not just that they cannot be observed, it is my understanding that they can not exist independently. From the point of view of @Gnomon's point, I'm not sure that it matters.
:ok:
The point is mainly directed at Janus, and anyone else, who argues that the theories employed in modern science have been "tested", or proven by observation. What constitutes 'proof by observation' seems to have lost all credibility in modern science.
Take the famous Michelson-Morley type experiments for example. What these experiments prove is that certain postulated relations between mass and the proposed ether of light transmission, are incorrect. What is commonly cited as "proven" by these experiments, is that there is no ether. You ought to be able to see that logically, the inability to properly represent the existence of something in hypotheses, is not proof that the thing is not real. In this case, what is demonstrated is that "ether" has not been adequately described (defined).
This is the big problem with the metaphysics of 'observation is the foundation of knowledge'. It doesn't account for the fact that in knowledge observation, as proof, is posterior to hypothesis. Therefore the usefulness of observation as a means of proving hypotheses, is limited by the formulation of the hypothesis.
To really understand the nature of knowledge therefore, we need to grasp the method by which hypotheses are produced. Focusing on observation as the source of knowledge, is to account for the a posteriori while remaining ignorant of the a priori. And to deny the reality of the a priori simply demonstrates this ignorance.
I still don't grok your alternative method of "negative metaphysics", nor the assertion of "Impossiblism" or "immanentism". So, I'll reply by comparing my worldview to the -isms below. I don't expect it will change your mind or attitude, but it may help you to see where I'm coming from, instead of the -isms you try to pin on me. Although this clash of -isms does sometimes sound like a doctrinal religious dispute, that is not my intention. :smile:
Holism and FreeWill, versus Reductionism and Fatalism
When you accused me of being a woo-mongering New Age nut-case*1, I began to realize that a significant difference in our worldviews might be characterized as Reductionism vs Holism. You may not be aware that the man who wrote the book on the modern concept of Holism was in no sense a New Ager. Instead, he was a South African general, statesman, naturalist, and philosopher. His 1926 book, Holism and Evolution, was a treatise on the philosophy of Western Science, which he saw had veered so far toward a reductive perspective that it couldn't see the forest for the trees. My worldview is not New Ageism*2, but it is a form of scientific Holism or Systems Theory. :nerd:
Holism and Evolution :
The holistic approach to life has had such a far-reaching impact in the world that most people assume it grew out of some Far Eastern practice.
___review of book by Jan Smuts
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00VISSWR6/ref=dp-kindle-redirect?_encoding=UTF8&btkr=1
Another divergence in our philosophy is between Determinism, narrowly defined, and FreeWill, as the ability to choose based on rational evidence rather than on fatalistic necessity. But Determinism is a belief and a premise, not an objective fact. And Determinists typically assume a linear chain of physical causes only. Yet they ignore the influence of feedback loops in the human mind, which become the non-physical causes we call "beliefs". The behavior of lower animals might be caused by external influences only. But the human mind is able to interrupt the flow of physical causation with feedback loops that insert new links in the chain (creative ideas). When those new links are perceived as different from our beliefs and preconceptions, the mind begins to look for a way to get back on course. Which is what we call "Reasoning". :cool:
Feedback Loops :
The human brain is a negative feedback loop system. This means that whenever there is a difference between what a person experiences in reality that is different from the ideal set point established by this person’s brain, an urge to behave to correct the situation is created by the brain.
https://www.funderstanding.com/brain/brain-biology-a-negative-feedback-loop-system/
Every Effect has a Cause, but not all causes come from the environment. When faced with an incongruency, humans are able to "leap" to a conclusion that seems reasonable, in light of our prior beliefs of what ought to be true. So, what seems reasonable is not just pure Logic, but also depends on (determined by) any prejudices, premises, and presumptions in our belief system. And those beliefs are not in any sense physical objects. Instead, they are meta-physical causes of our mental behavior. You might say that beliefs are indirect causes of behavior, because they result from feedback loops in the chain of incoming information. Those information loops add to the complexity of a simple linear cause & effect system. But out of the apparent chaos comes the novel (butterfly) effect that we call "Free Will".
Philosophers don't usually do physical work with their hands, but with their minds. They do non-physical (meta-physical) work with their cognitive faculties. But Reductive thinkers assume that Mind = Brain, because they focus on the parts (neurons) instead of the whole system. Mind is not a mass of concrete neurons, it is instead the abstract Function of the whole body as a complex system. Like a computer, the Brain seldom makes logical errors, but the Mind often gets side-tracked into irrational beliefs. Unfortunately, some of those non-physical concepts (e.g. Qualia) may be what you think of as Essentialism. But, actually it is merely Synthetic thinking as contrasted with Analytic thinking. And the synthesis is Mental instead of Physical, so it is knowable only by exchanging Ideas or Memes. The exchange is via a physical Medium, but the media is not the Message.
Holistic (synthetic) thinking is a common characteristic of New Age philosophies. But in practice, they also include particular inherited beliefs, such as those in Eastern religions. Such woo-ish notions as Wandering Souls, and Weaponized Chi*3, are not inherent to Holism. But Reductionists tend to lump them together with the Holistic worldview. So, for clarity, I will sometimes refer to my personal paradigm of Science as "Systems Theory", in hopes of losing the mystical baggage. :pray: :halo:
Systems theory is an interdisciplinary study of systems as they relate to one another within a larger, more complex system. The key concept of systems theory, regardless of which discipline it's being applied to, is that the whole is greater than the sum of its parts.
https://www.onlinemswprograms.com/social-work/theories/systems-theory-social-work/
Holism as an idea or philosophical concept is diametrically opposed to atomism. Where the atomist believes that any whole can be broken down or analyzed into its separate parts and the relationships between them, the holist maintains that the whole is primary and often greater than the sum of its parts.
http://abyss.uoregon.edu/~js/glossary/holism.html
Note -- you might say that Holism multiplies the parts
PS__Science is expected to be Analytical, but Philosophy is supposed to be Synthetical.
*1 I was not offended, because I have come to expect expectoration during a philosophical exchange of spittle.
*2 Not that there is anything wrong with New Ageism as a personal worldview. Only as a coercive religion would it impose woo on you.
*3 The notion of "throwing Chi" like a flame thrower is not characteristic of Eastern Religions, but of SuperHero movies.
Ludwig van Bertalanffy : GENERAL SYSTEMS THEORY
Quoting Metaphysician Undercover
[quote=Quanta Magazine, A Fight for the Soul of Science; https://www.quantamagazine.org/physicists-and-philosophers-debate-the-boundaries-of-science-20151216/]The crisis, as Ellis and Silk tell it, is the wildly speculative nature of modern physics theories, which they say reflects a dangerous departure from the scientific method. Many of today’s theorists — chief among them the proponents of string theory and the multiverse hypothesis — appear convinced of their ideas on the grounds that they are beautiful or logically compelling, despite the impossibility of testing them. Ellis and Silk accused these theorists of “moving the goalposts” of science and blurring the line between physics and pseudoscience. “The imprimatur of science should be awarded only to a theory that is testable,” Ellis and Silk wrote, thereby disqualifying most of the leading theories of the past 40 years. “Only then can we defend science from attack
As Wayfarer noted, I explicitly differentiate between the common definitions, and my peculiar information-based usage of that traditional philosophical term. Philosophers often coin new words for novel or technical concepts. If you don't accept my proffered concept, that's on you. But, If I am not making my meaning clear, I guess the fault is on me, for trying to add some novelty to the worn-out phrases of philosophy. :joke:
As the links in my previous posts show I've addressed (my conception of) negative metaphysics – proposes eliminating necessarily unreal Xs as an alternative in contrast to positing categorical (e.g. Platonic) constructs of necessarily real "essences", "universals", etc – in our exchanges quite a few times over the last couple of years. But that's okay; I've only made brief (socratic) sketches and not laid out a proper treatise as you've done, Gnomon, especially via your blog. Anyway, you're familiar with negative theology, aren't you? Well, my negative ontology (aka "immanentism") is more or less the same but applied to reality (in general) rather than just to g/G (in particular).
I wasn't making an appeal to consistency, although obviously consistency is important to any rational thought; I was merely pointing out that the various domains of inquiry in modern science form a consistent whole.
That doesn't mean that theories in the various domains are not tested by observation. How else do you think they could be tested? The theory that mountain formation and continental drift are caused by tectonic plate movement cannot be tested by simply examining whether it is logically valid.
The various domains of science actually do not form a consistent whole. There is significant inconsistency between principles employed from one field to the next, and the same words are not always defined consistently from one to another. There isn't even consistency as to which fields qualify as "science" and which do not. For insistence, google the phrase "is mathematics a science", and you'll see evidence of disagreement.
Quoting Janus
I think theories in the domain of "science" are tested by observation. But that doesn't mean observation is the only way to test premises. In mathematics for example, axioms are tested by consistency. That's why we generally do not class mathematics as a science.
However, many people seem content to blur the boundaries of "science". This is probably because science has a very good reputation. So if you can pass something off as "science" which really isn't science, and you don't get exposed, it will make you look like you know more than you really do
I say, think of metaphysics as an "Other" that confronts the inquirer with as much vigor as anything else. It is the ideatum that exceeds the idea; the desideratum that exceeds the desire. Metaphysics has a long history, so I say put this down altogether, and put down the epistemology texts as well. All one can reasonably say about the world must be grounded in the bare encounter, and not in the long discursive arguments, and the insight one seeks in metaphysics is not augmentative, but pure. It begins, I claim, with the reduction from knowledge claims that clutter and dialectically collide, to the clarity of the structure of the encounter itself.
The beginning of "good" metaphysics (as opposed to bad metaphysics, as when we talk about God's omniscience and the like) lies in the simplicity of the pure encounter, the "presence" of the world as presence. Alas, this seems to be something very difficult to do, that is, to understand with this kind of clarity, for when one tries to adjust the perceptual Archimedean point, if you will, mundane analyses assert themselves by default. This is what stands in the way of really addressing metaphysics.
In my response to the post from Wayfarer you reference, I acknowledged that you were good about stating what you meant by "meta-physics." I had also acknowledged it in a previous response. I think it was a response to one of your posts. I always make a big deal about defining your terms and I appreciate that you did so.
Quoting Gnomon
That's true. Sometime you and I can have a discussion about why I think that is an unnecessary and disruptive practice.
Quoting Gnomon
I don't reject your concept. I object to your use of "metaphysical" or "meta-physical" to name it. If I might paraphrase a wonderful statement from @Cartuna from a different discussion:
It's my duty, as a [s]scientist[/s] philosopher, being loyal to the imperative of [s]the Sciences[/s] Philosophy, to correct you. Others may take your [s]false image of reality[/s] misuse of language for granted...The Truth must be told...
Other people have expressed many different opinions about metaphysics throughout this fairly long thread. For me, your statement expresses a metaphysical position and, therefore, is neither true nor false. I can see that it might be a valuable way to see things. I sometimes call myself a pragmatist. Your understanding seems like a pragmatic way to approach the subject.
I don't see pragmatism entering into it. Dewey and co. would have nothing to do with this. Rorty included. No, this is an honest observation. Observe the simplest thing and proceed with philosophical inquiry. Eventually you will, as Putnam put it, end up where the words simply run out. You have to see that when you affirm anything at all, you do this through language, and if you are in Wittgenstein's court, you toss your hands up and say, oh well! failing to see the that in the simple encounter, as the words run out before your very eyes, you are literally witnessing the threshold of metaphysics. Ask yourself, where does eternity end and finitude begin? Do you think eternity is a fiction? Of course not; it is there, in the structure of the world, but most are so busy trying to bring all things to toe the line of familiar meaning making to bear on this that they never see the that the deficit is existential, not abstract. It is in the language itself. Language is the pragmatic imposition on the world. See the pragmatist theory of knowledge: to know is to have a problem solved as to what to DO with a thing. Heidegger is close by here. The trick, I am saying, lies with understanding that such a threshold is existential, IN the fabric of things. To see this one has to reduce all things to their presence.
But here, there is an earnestness in the revelation of the world: IN the perceptual event, there are actual features that are no fabricated, which demonstrate that metaphysics inherent the presence of affairs of the world themselves.
I got the implicit dismissive message of "negative metaphysics" : apparently it's intended to ban Metaphysics (i.e. anything non-physical) from philosophical discussion. But I still don't get a positive understanding of why you would want a gag order on Philosophy (see PS below). Since modern Science took over the role of Naturalism after the Enlightenment era, all that Philosophy has left to study is the non-physical aspects of the natural world. Namely Concepts (ideas. minds, consciousness), Essences (form, mathematical structure) and Universals (qualia), which are all "unreal Xs" in your outdated definition of Metaphysics, but are important topics in my 21st century definition of Meta-Physics. That's the study of preter-natural features of Reality, in the sense that Mind is the "more-than" of Holism. It is something in-addition-to Brain matter. So the Brain is Natural, but Mind is preter-natural (i.e Cultural).
Of course, some disingenuously try to place Mind under the heading of Physics, because it is a Function of a brain, knowable only by another Mind. That's why you can't place Consciousness or Reasoning under a microscope or create it in a Cyclotron. That's not the kind of thing that Physicists, Biologists, or Chemists study. So why would you want to negate the only remaining subject matter of philosophical investigation? (see PS below) Meta-Physics is inherently subjective, hence it is literally "un-real" in any objective sense. Aristotle tried to avoid the Ideal implications of his own metaphysics. But ironically later philosophers realized that he was in denial, because his de-idealized notion of "Form" is itself only an abstract idea about reality, not a real thing itself. Moreover, all Functions (e.g. Mind) are knowable only by rational Minds, not physical senses. (See The Trouble With Psychology below).
My Enformationism worldview is indeed Idealistic (unreal) in the sense of asserting the value of Ideas in a world of human Culture. But it is also Realistic in the sense that it does not deny the value of Material objects to denizens of Nature. Take away non-physical ideas, and Culture vanishes from the world. And along with Culture, Science itself would disappear from the world. And Technology would revert to apes pounding nuts with rocks. :nerd:
PS__ I can guess the answer to my own question above : you want to ban Metaphysics, because of its association with Religion and Mysticism. Me too! That's why I want to bring it back under the broad umbrella of Classical Philosophical Science by labeling it "Meta-Physics". Although the topic is inherently Subjective, I try to keep it grounded in Objective science as far as possible.
In metaphysics, a universal is what particular things have in common, namely characteristics or qualities.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Universal_(metaphysics)
Qualia are the subjective or qualitative properties of experiences. ... Qualia have traditionally been thought to be intrinsic qualities of experience that are directly available to introspection. However, some philosophers offer theories of qualia that deny one or both of those features.
https://iep.utm.edu/qualia/
Idealism in sense (1) has been called “metaphysical” or “ontological idealism”, while idealism in sense (2) has been called “formal” or “epistemological idealism”. The modern paradigm of idealism in sense (1) might be considered to be George Berkeley’s “immaterialism”, according to which all that exists are ideas and the minds, less than divine or divine, that have them.
https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/idealism/
The journal embraces a broad and dynamic definition of the preternatural, since the ... strongly encourages submissions covering cultural traditions worldwide.
https://www.psupress.org/Journals/jnls_Preternature.html
The trouble with Psychology :
With respect to science, human psychology faces an immense obstacle posed by its focus on the mind. Human psychology is defined as "the study of the mind, occurring partly via the study of behavior", but the mind is not a physical organ, it's an abstract concept, and measurements of the mind's state are indirect and subjective (by way of a subject's verbal reports, for example). This makes psychology, as defined, a branch of metaphysics, not physics.
https://arachnoid.com/trouble_with_psychology/index.html
GAG on Philosophy
There's a very sensitive sub-topic around this point - the boundary between metaphysics, philosophy and religion are somewhat hazy and it's easy to find yourself crossing it whenever this subject is discussed.
My approach is somewhat religious, but not the way my grandad (for instance) would have understood. As I frequently mention, my interest in philosophy arose from what I understood 'enlightenment' to be, subject of discussion in another thread. That pathway lead through psychedelic experiences (way back) to what I understood to be the only legitimate way to re-capture those higher states I thought I'd seen without such artificial enhancements - namely, Eastern philosophy. In any case, that's a preamble to something I discovered in that endeavour, namely that the practice of Buddhist meditation has an inescapable religious dimension to it, albeit very differently conceived to that of theistic religions (on the surface, at least). Meanwhile I also worked to map 'the idea of enlightenment' across different spiritual traditions or 'domains of discourse', which is the subject of Comparative Religion. During all of this, some of the latent religious ideas in my cultural background became activated by some of this reading and the associated realisations. But I'm trying not to get drawn into 'religious belief' as is usually understood, although again it's often a fine line. (I'm reminded of a comment attributed to Noam Chomsky, 'I'll tell you if I'm an atheist if you can tell me what it is I'm supposed not to believe in'.)
IN ANY CASE, what I'm wanting to say here is that there is a strong implicit prohobition against certain kinds of ideas associated with religion, which is well articulated by Thomas Nagel:
[quote=Thomas Nagel, Evolutionary Naturalism and the Fear of Religion; "https://drive.google.com/file/d/1z_IqIxLEwAaRi2ztoP3PIF_6lCSfqm-X/view?usp=sharing"]In speaking of the fear of religion, I don't mean to refer to the entirely reasonable hostility toward certain established religions and religious institutions, in virtue of their objectionable moral doctrines, social policies, and political influence. Nor am I referring to the association of many religious beliefs with superstition and the acceptance of evident empirical falsehoods. I am talking about something much deeper--namely, the fear of religion itself. I speak from experience, being strongly subject to this fear myself. I want atheism to be true and am made uneasy by the fact that some of the most intelligent and well-informed people I know are religious believers. It isn't just that I don't believe in God and, naturally, hope that I'm right in my belief. It's that I hope there is no God! I don't want there to be a God; I don't want the universe to be like that.
My guess is that this cosmic authority problem is not a rare condition and that it is responsible for much of the scientism and reductionism of our time. One of the tendencies it supports is the ludicrous overuse of evolutionary biology to explain everything about life, including everything about the human mind. Darwin enabled modern secular culture to heave a great collective sigh of relief, by apparently providing a way to eliminate purpose, meaning, and design as fundamental features of the world. Instead they become epiphenomena, generated incidentally by a process that can be entirely explained by the operation of the non-teleological laws of physics on the material of which we and our environments are all composed.[/quote]
That's where I think a lot of the gag originates. The British, American and German idealists, whose ideas were effectively closed down by Russell and Moore at the beginning of the 20th Century, had a similarly kind of 'swinging-door' relationship with religion, as philosophical idealism nearly always does. So the reaction against all of that culminated in the typical kind of 20th century physicalistic naturalism which is the defacto standard.
On which topic:
Quoting Gnomon
I disagree with this because of Berkeley's nominalism. If think idealism has to recognise the reality of universals in the form of 'universal ideas' - ideas which are the same for all who think, but are nevertheless ideas rather than material objects. That is much nearer the traditional formulation (which is preserved in C.S. Pierce, a quote from whom, incidentally, is the starting-point for Nagel's essay above).
Surprise! I have already written an essay on that very topic. I get blow-back from lazy posters who don't care enough about philosophy to learn new ideas. They seem to want their philosophy expressed at an eighth-grade level. IMHO Philosophy is supposed to be disruptive. And my thesis in particular is intended to shake-up old hand-me-down notions and definitions of cutting-edge topics. :smile:
Why Coin Tech Terms? :
The practice of using words that can't be found in a dictionary makes reading more of a challenge, and may seem pretentious. But, such coining is common for scientific and philosophical writings that explore uncharted territory off the current maps. One reason for using novel words is to avoid old biases. Well-known words usually have collected a lot of baggage over the years. And some-times, the meaning of common words has evolved into a sense far from the original context & connotation. But the primary reason for using a special label for a technical definition is so the writer can control its meaning precisely.
Quoting T Clark
I have offered several alternative definitions. Can't you find one that doesn't offend your sensibilities. What motivated you to start this thread? Did you hope for a nice simple list of precisely-defined dos & don'ts. That's not philosophy, but propaganda or dogma. Philosophy, and especially subjective Metaphysics, is always open to interpretation. So, what's your interpretation of "my concept" (Enformationism), if it's not "Meta-Physics", as I defined it in the thesis : non-physical ; immaterial)?
Regarding Cartuna's post, scientists don't do "Metaphysics" by any name. But for idea-dissecting philosophers, that's all they do. Although some like to think they are practicing hard Science, when they argue endlessly over the meaning of words. Science is necessarily Reductive & Analytical & Precise. But Philosophy is necessarily Holistic & Synthetic & Vague (General, Universal, Moot). :cool:
Note -- Aristotle's "Categories" in The Metaphysics volume, are inherently general and non-specific.
Feynman on Philosophy :
A person talks in such generalities that everyone can understand him and it's considered to be some deep philosophy. However, I would like to be very rather more special and I would like to be understood in an honest way, rather than in a vague way. ___Richard P. Feynman
Was Richard Feynman a philosopher?
Ben Trubody finds that philosophy-phobic physicist Feynman is an unacknowledged philosopher of science.
https://philosophynow.org/issues/114/Richard_Feynmans_Philosophy_of_Science
Yeah, don't you just hate people like that.
Quoting Gnomon
Sometimes in science you just can't get by without coming up with new words. I'm not sure if that's ever really necessary in philosophy, in which people are still talking mainly about the same phenomena that have been discussed for a thousand or more years. In philosophy it is not unusual to read through something someone has written and realize it is very similar to what someone else has written, but that it's hard to tell because each uses idiosyncratic language.
Quoting Gnomon
I have no problem with your ideas, but they're not metaphysics as anyone else has used that word. Putting in a hyphen doesn't get you off the hook. Nuff said.
Oh yes! My head is "bloody but unbowed", as a result of encounters with anti-religionistas. But my thesis necessarily crosses the line, because traditional religions in most cultures were based on the philosophical & scientific memes of their time. I have no problem with the philosophical basis of Hinduism, it was insightful for its era. But I see no philosophical reason to bathe in the polluted Ganges, It's just an ancient cultural practice that some feel compelled by religious loyalties to continue. Likewise, I appreciate the philosophical foundation of Buddhism, but I don't follow any of its tradition religious rituals. For example, I studied Meditation long ago, but it was a secular form. :smile:
Quoting Wayfarer
Some would consider my behavior to be somewhat religious, but with my Fundamentalist family and relatives I tread lightly. I do have a concept that I call "G*D" in the thesis, but it's not a lordly tyrant in the sky. Instead, it's more like Spinoza's Nature sive Natura, or Plato's Logos, or Lao Tzu's TAO. I used to attend meeting of a local Deist group, but they split between the religious and secular factions. :nerd:
Quoting Wayfarer
I agree with Nagel's hope that their is no "God" (in the Biblical sense). But, have never been able to find a reasonable alternative to a First Cause, that is necessarily preter-natural, in the sense of existing prior to the beginning of our natural world. But it's not "super-natural" in the sense of Greek super-hero gods, or a heavenly humanoid. If believing in a First Cause or Necessary Being makes me religious, I'm guilty. But I have no motivation to impose any doctrine on anyone. My posts on this forum are for self-development, not for evangelism. :cool:
Yes. But my thesis is based on 21st century science, with strange concepts that didn't exist eons ago. Which necessitates the use of novel tech terms, even though it falls into the 2 & 1/2 millennia old category of Metaphysics, (according to my reading of Aristotle). Ironically, Shannon's "Information Theory" deliberately gave a new meaning to an old word. So, when I refer to the original conventional meaning (e.g. meaning in a mind, not digits in a computer) I have to contrast it with the entrenched technological notion. So, for convenience, I have added a growing number of pertinent definitions to the thesis glossary over the years. For example, "meta-physics", if taken literally, should be self-explanatory, And here's one I didn't coin, that I may add eventually just to deny that my thesis implies : Acosmism. (That arcane term was used by 180proof). :smile:
PS__a good example of novel philosophical coinages is A.N. Whitehead's Process and Reality. which is on the same basic topic as my thesis. I had a lot of difficulty reading it, because it didn't have a glossary of neologisms, So, I feel your pain. But I persevered. :joke:
If you want to start a new thread about the use of new words, I am likely to participate, although I will be out of town with no computer for three days.
That's an uncharitable reading to say the least. I've proposed an alternative / complementary way of 'doing metaphysics' not unlike negative (apophatic) theology is an alternative / complementary to positive (cataphatic) theology. How you get "implicit dismissive message" "to ban" from that seems more disingenuous than not, Gnomon: you just don't want to examine (or explore) anything but anachronistic "hand me down notions" like e.g. Platonic "essences", etc. :yawn:
You don't, Gnomon, because I don't propose anything remotely like that (see reply above).
Wrong. Also, "Religion and Mysticism" refute themselves and globally are uncorroborated by – inconsistent in manifold ways with – both human facticity and the natural world. They are not targets of my speculative concerns.
Quoting Gnomon
Your "thesis" doesn't hold up under either philosophical or scientific scrutiny, sir. And when you're presented with my "disruptive" alternative, you're so busy proselytizing that you uncharitably read my proposal (re: negative ontology ) and fail to even question its premises in the context of (western) ontology.
Which, in the context of western metaphysics, they occlude as much as, or more than, they clarify. One ought to use ordinary terms to say out-of-the-ordinary things and not the other way around. And by "ordinary terms" I mean words and concepts used as classical and modern philosophers have used them. Unwarranted "alternative definitions" such as yours, Gnomon, are indistinguishable from misdefined jabberwocky. Illuminate the unfamiliar with the familiar (logic) rather than obscure the familiar with the unfamiliar (magic). :eyes:
The fact of the matter is we understand stuff in terms of simpler stuff and metaphysics deals with the simplest - it's, for that reason, incomprehensible.
I'm not likely to start a thread on such a broad topic, and one that is outside my limited range of expertise. But I'm happy to discuss specific examples of Neologisms and technical jargon. For instance, my usage of the baggage-laden word "metaphysics", with a revived ancient meaning, is essential to understanding the neologism of "Enformationism". Most discussions on internet forums merely recycle old ideas expressed in conventional terms. But, if you have a novel idea, especially a whole new worldview, it would be self-defeating to use words carrying obsolete meanings. :smile:
A neologism is a relatively recent or isolated term, word, or phrase that may be in the process of entering common use, but that has not yet been fully accepted into mainstream language. Neologisms are often driven by changes in culture and technology.
___Wiki
Philosophy is Meta-Physics :
"As for a super-natural realm, however, can we ever hope to know about a realm not open to the inquiries of science? If it is beyond our physics, then it's metaphysics --- philosophy again."
___Peter Carter, MD
The Single Simple Question that Challenges All Convictions
Note -- The author seems to advocate Secular Humanism, as opposed to conventional religions. His challenging question is "does every event have a cause?" If so, then a trickle of Free Will is lost in the flood of Causation. However, he inadvertently raises the same "get out of jail free" exception that I use to justify my own notion of "FreeWill within Determinism". :joke:
I apologize, if I misinterpreted your intention. I didn't intend to the un-charitable, but I was shooting in the dark, so I might have missed what I was aiming at. Obviously, you are referring to a philosophical or theological approach that I am not familiar with. Perhaps, because I have no background or formal training in such esoteric topics. However, I looked-up "apophatic" and now I almost see what you meant by "negative metaphysics". It's trying to describe an ineffable being or concept by listing examples of what it is not. I was vaguely aware that medieval mystics used such reverse poetry to describe the deity they experienced subjectively --- in objective terms that always miss the target, but draw a circle around that empty place. :smile:
Apophatic :
The apophatic tradition is often, though not always, allied with the approach of mysticism, which aims at the vision of God, the perception of the divine reality beyond the realm of ordinary perception
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apophatic_theology
Quoting 180 Proof
OK, you have denoted that which is not of concern to your philosophy. But I'm still not sure what is in the Black Box, whose contents you are describing without opening. If it ain't "Religion and Mysticism" what is it? Is there a common name for it, other than arcane terms like "Apophatic". I understand Terrence Deacon's notion of the "Power of Absence", but in the absence of some positive information, I'm at a loss to imagine that which is not there. I fail to see what "human facticity" has to do with Metaphysics, except in the sense that it is the common human perspective on that which is not Physics. I need you point in the direction that I should look, in order to see what you are seeing. :cool:
Note -- FWIW, I call my Black Box neither Religion nor Mysticism, but merely "philosophy".
Quoting 180 Proof
OK. So you're not seeing what I'm seeing. That's no reason to give-up. That's philosophy, I'm willing to keep shooting in the dark until I finally hit some target, even if I don't know what I'm aiming at. But, what you call "proselytizing" is what I call "explaining what I'm talking about". Maybe you need to do more proselytizing, If you want to bring me into the fold. :halo:
Quoting 180 Proof
Apparently, we are both occlusive in our 'splaining. I don't know what you are talking about, and you don't know what I'm talking about. But, maybe, if we keep "throwing mud" on the wall, some of it will eventually stick. Teach me. :joke:
PS___I have learned the hard way to not assume that posters will click on my links. That's why I usually try to summarize, in their words or my own words, what the link means.
The G*D Mind who programmed the universe is still a 'God', even if not infinitely smart. How is it there as the Eternal Basis of All, it thus necessarily having no input? What memory does it have to work with? What relations of concepts would it have to use in order to sort out thoughts? How could it make plans? What source would it use for making a universe out of? What purpose would it have?
I've only proposed apophasis in a dozen of so posted replies to you (with links for further context and wiki-simple descriptions of relevant concepts), so, yeah, "obviously" you've not familiarized yourself with what I've spoon-fed to you.
Try a new trick, Gnomon: read my posts for comprehension (and the links via my handle). If you at least pay attention, you'll find I've answered these questions a while back without having to be asked. I read your (everyone's) posts enough at least to identify their premises or assumptions which I either take issue with (as in your case) or read on further until I find grounds for doubt or disbelief. So far, in your case, the courtesy has not been reciprocated. :brow:
I'm trying to engage you in a dialectic not an exchange, or clash, of preachy dogmas. Philosophy, man, not religious sophistry.
Pro-tip: as much as and whenever possible, for clarity's sake, avoid sumarizing in your "own words". A thesaurus and philosophical dictionary don't bite.
Good questions! I don't pretend to know the answer to those un-verifiable metaphysical conundra. All I know is that an Aristotelian First Cause is logically necessary to explain the existence of our contingent cause & effect world. So, I adopt the Aquinian Necessary Being as the axiom of my Information-based worldview. Whatever that non-contingent Entity might be, it serves as the "Eternal Basis of All". Or as Tillch so eloquently phrased it : the Ground of Being --- the eternal foundation of the space-time structure we call Home.
Unfortunately, anything prior to the initial Act of Creation (Big Bang : Birth Pang) is not subject to empirical verification. However, using normal philosophical methods of inference, I can establish a few logically necessary qualities of the Programmer of those initial conditions, and the evolutionary development of emergent features. For example, a primary characteristic of the presumptive FC is the creative power (Potential) to enform a new physical world from nothing but Cosmic Power, Which in my information-centered thesis I call EnFormAction (Meta-Physical Energy ; power to give form to the formless). If that notion sounds far-fetched, it is supported by logical argument and scientific evidence in the Enformationism thesis.
Most cosmologists agree that, for anything to exist in Space-Time, something must be Infinite & Eternal. But they typically think of that "something" as Natural Laws & Energy, which are not things but concepts. Yet, as a philosopher, not bound by the rules of space-time, I can conjecture into the un-bounded void beyond the Big Bang beginning. And I have various names for the eternal nothing that gave birth to something : i.e. everything in our world. And one name for that non-physical non-thing is Enformer : the creative power to convert Potential into Actual.
Most alternatives to a god-like Cause assume (without evidence) that Natural Laws and Constructive Energy have always existed (eternal Potential). And I agree, except that I call the mathematical "laws" of Nature : LOGOS. And the ability to "do work" (cause change) is what I call EnFormAction (the power to cause changes in Form). Moreover, I define "Form", not as a physical shape, but as the mathematical structure of each real thing. That's my interpretation of Plato's posited Source of all real things. If the logic of math & reason has always existed, rather than evolved, you could infer that it must be "infinitely smart", in the sense of encompassing all Possibilities.
By definition, any First Cause must have causal "input" in order to encode the criteria for a new world, in the form of initial conditions (constants, definitions) and rules for interaction (natural laws). That's why I use the metaphor of a Programmer to describe the FC. Our world was "born" with all the genetic information (constants & laws) necessary to compute a universe from a sub-atomic-scale dot of data. So, the data input was the program we call "Nature", which is currently running (evolving) on the self-creating self-organizing "machine" we call our World.
The "memory" (temporary repository or register) for all that calculating (energy exchanges) is Matter, which takes on physical forms as defined by the program criteria. Another theory of cosmic memory is the imprint of physical changes and energy exchanges on the gravitational field (see link below). I don't know much about such things. But, it's usually assumed by scientists and philosophers, that every change in the world leaves a trace (encoded information) behind. Long ago, I read an excellent sci-fi novel that was based on that notion. And that was long before the LIGO observatory detected gravitational waves from distant galaxies.
The "relations of concepts" you question, would be what we call the Logic of Nature, which we know primarily in terms of abstract Mathematics. But we also imagine natural relations in terms of Space & Time, which are metaphysical concepts, not physical things. We perceive such abstractions in terms of metaphors, that only exist as mental images. That's why we can only communicate our ideas about such non-entities in the form of Meta-Physical Metaphors.
How could the presumed Creative Cause "make plans"? Presumably, in the same way human minds create imaginary scenarios, and then plot a course to make it real. The best laid plans of gods and men, oft go awry. Unless, the planner is an omnipotent programmer, with the power to control how the universe gets from Now to Tomorrow, from Input to Output. By inputting criteria into initial conditions and laws, that guide the world to compute an answer to the Programmer's question. I don't know what that question was, but it is the reason we are here in space-time. And the answer to that reason is the "Purpose" of this experiment in evolutionary programming. All I know is that it seems to involve increasing complexity & organization of matter & energy & mind.
In the Real world, each physical effect must be preceded by a physical cause. Except, when the cause is an idea in a mind. That's often called "the power of ideas", or "agency", or "creativity". So, the notion of a mental (meta-physical) Cause is not so far-fetched. Yes, I'm aware of the notion that even creative ideas can be traced back to a chain of physical causes, but what if the First Cause was the metaphorical pool-shooter, standing outside the pool table (physical universe)? That aiming Agency is the "Source" of all information in the world, which is also the source of all forms in the world. Ironically, in the Enformationism thesis, the Cause is also the Effect, in the sense that the Enformer is both transcendent & immanent. It consists of Potential Information (power to enform), which is a shape-shifting force similar to Energy, which is the "source" of Mass and Matter.
The bottom line of all this speculation is that, like the immaterial human mind, the Meta-Physical Mind of the Programmer exists in the form of Creative Power (EnFormAction) : which is both the Enformer and the Enformed, both the Creator and the Creature. A philosophical label for such a Power Input, which is also the Output, is PanEnDeism. Look it up. :smile:
EnFormAction :
Ententional Causation. A proposed metaphysical law of the universe that causes random interactions between forces and particles to produce novel & stable arrangements of matter & energy. It’s the creative force (aka : Divine Will) of the axiomatic eternal deity that, for unknown reasons, programmed a Singularity to suddenly burst into our reality from an infinite source of possibility. AKA : The creative power of Evolution; the power to enform; Logos; Change.
http://blog-glossary.enformationism.info/page8.html
LOGOS : abstract mathematical rules of relationships, that we call Logic or Reason. What we call "Mathematics" is simply Symbolic Logic as we imagine it metaphorically. Those rules determine how real things fit together into a holistic Structure.
Causality is an abstraction that indicates how the world progresses. So basic a concept that it is more apt as an explanation of other concepts of progression than as something to be explained by others more basic. The concept is like those of agency and efficacy. For this reason, a leap of intuition may be needed to grasp it
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Causality
How the Universe Remembers Information :
Nonetheless, physicists are on the hunt for evidence of an observable “memory effect” left behind by gravity that could soon be picked up in a lab.
https://nautil.us/issue/69/patterns/how-the-universe-remembers-information
How is time an abstract concept? :
Time is a abstraction, a filing system used to arrange events and memories into a logical system of cause and effect. Per relativity, space and time are not discrete entities, but a single construct called spacetime.
https://www.britannica.com/science/space-time
Obviously your are not swallowing what I poke at you, and vice-versa. So, what might cause two intelligent people to have a "failure to communicate"? That is the ultimate question for Philosophy. But the most common cause is a clash of worldviews or attitudes, in which words have different meanings, and motives are contradictory. I think our worldviews are not so different, but both of ours seem to be custom-made, so we're comparing apples and oranges. :joke:
I get the feeling that you are talking down to me, but not dumbing-it-down enough. I'm not a Pro, merely an amateur cogitator. I have no formal training in Philosophy, and most of my reading has been in hard Science, not fashionable ideologies. So, when I refer to a technical philosophical issue, I have to paraphrase it in my own words, in order to understand it. Teach me as-if I'm a six year old. :cool:
"If you can't explain it to a six year old, you don't understand it yourself.”
? Albert Einstein
Don't take it personally.
I'm not smart enough to dumb down my 'philosophical via negativa' any further especially for someone who won't bother to read it.
[quote=The Sign of the Four, chap. 6]How often have I said to you that when you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth?[/quote]
Last attempt (paraphrasing Arthur Conan Doyle):
[b]'If we eliminate (negate) the ways the actual world necessarily could not have been or cannot be described, then what remains is every way the actual world – phase space – possibly could have been or can be described.'
(NB: The natural & historical sciences, not philosophy (i.e. metaphysics), however, provide complementary, possible ways of describing the actual world.)[/b]
So what's the point? To (A) propose an 'absolute' (or first principle) which is self-contradictory, or irrational, to deny and (B) which also functions as
Quoting 180 Proof
that – by eliminating background 'beliefs-in-impossibilities' (re: ways the actual world necessarily could not have been ...) which amount to expectations inevitably, repeatedly, frustrated by 'the actual world' – optimizes agency / reduces misery. :point:
Pardon me, but your version of the 'via negativa' is completely different from that term as traditionally understood. It is associated in Western philosophy with Meister Eckhart, (Pseudo) Dionysius, Plotinus, and John Scottus Eriugena. The apophatic or negative way assumes God's transcendence and unknowability in such a way that nothing meaningful can be spoken about the divine essence as it is beyond the vicissitudes of becoming, birth and death (in other words, beyond existence). This 'way' is often expressed in terms of darkness, unknowing, self-emptying (kenosis) but also the pleroma (divine fullness), a 'no-thing' which is at the same time the source of everything.
Eliminating the impossible does not give us the truth. Such a method always leaves us with possibility because the logic operates within that category. And truth is what actually is. So we still have a categorical separation between what we get from eliminating impossibility (i.e., possibility), and truth (what actually is).
And, the proposition that all reality consists of mere possibility, without anything actual, is inconsistent with sense observation. In other words, to class the actual as impossible because it is other than possible is contrary to empirical evidence (it is a sophistic trick). So we are still left with a gap between what the logical process of eliminating impossibility gives us (possibility), and what sensation gives us (actuality). This gap needs to be closed if are to claim a proper understanding of reality. To deny the gap, by claiming that the actual is impossible because it is something other than possible, is a sophistic move of ignorance.
That's hard to avoid. The entire post is a ragged mess, best to abandon.
My problem with Sherlock's eliminative method is that, to be as certain as he seemed to be, you must begin negating from a position of Omniscience. Otherwise, you could omit something important from your list of necessities. Remember, the Butterfly Effect is predicated on a few seemingly minor differences in initial conditions. Sherlock's "deductions" from first principles were actually inductions from limited evidence and unprovable assumptions.
For example, presumably an omniscient Creator or Programmer of the actual world, would consider all possible forms, and then actualize only the "best of all possible worlds", as Leibniz claimed. In that case, what we know as Reality is already the result of a cosmic sifting process, but still full of conditional possibilites. That's why statisticians, whose job is to eliminate uncertainty as much as possible, begin by plotting a few known points, and then interpolate a Normal curve, from which they make their best guess predictions. Yet, those carefully aimed forecasts rapidly succumb to randomness over time & space.
Thus, for those of us who are not omniscient, we are faced with the mind-boggling mega-zillions of Possibilities that remain in a world of zillions of Potential combinations of physical & metaphysical interactions. For me, that would be a daunting task. I have no way of knowing all the "ways the actual world could not have been". So, I have to begin my investigation into Reality from a position of limited personal knowledge (plot points). And most of that "knowledge" is general & vague, instead of specific & precise. Consequently, my Normal Curve -- plotted from a few points of positive evidence -- has many degrees of possibility (phase space) in which to go wrong.
Therefore, unlike Sherlock, my attempts to see beyond the Big Bang, would not present a high degree of confidence. So, all I can say is that it works for me right here and right now. But I could be wrong. Absolutely wrong. Which is why I have to qualify my deductions (or inductions) as merely reasonable guesses. And your guess could be as good as mine, as long as the reasoning is not mis-aimed by false premises : initial assumptions. That's why philosophers are not prophets. They can only compare a variety of personal guesses to see what they have in common. On this forum, our range of worldviews is wide, but we are forced to view them in the light of skepticism & critical thinking from different perspectives. That said, I can see some overlap in our personal paradigms, but the non-intersecting parts are still a bit fuzzy. :cool:
that your appropriation of that terminology is meaningless a lot of the time.
:lol:
You've contradicted yourself; you've said something purportedly meaningful about "it"; that it is divine, is an essence, and is "beyond existence".
Ah, the laughs, they never end...
Don’t know how I’ll ever get over it. Although on the plus side I’ve discovered an interesting book from the linked wiki article on apophatic theology. (Although these specialized texts are always so expensive.)
Strother Martin. A character actor. This was his most well-known role.
Now that I'm not typing on an iPhone in a coffee shop....there is of course an inherent paradox in saying anything whatever about what is designated as 'beyond words', but various philosophical schools have found ways to accomodate that.
In any case, the passage I had quoted, which you attributed to me, was a paraphrase of the wiki entry on Aphopatic theology which actually was linked by 180 Proof in one of his comments. The quote verbatim is:
That was attributed to a scholar, Dierdre Carrabine, on a site called Centre for Sacred Sciences. I looked her books up, one of them is the one I mentioned.
//ps// reading the interview, is was based on her PhD thesis.//
//pps//and there are many passages in it about 'saying the un-sayable'. It is where Christian mysticism is most like Zen.//
You ought not say things like that 180. It just demonstrates that you are convinced by ad hominem. And that's known as a fallacy. Relying on ad hominem to make judgements of metaphysics is just not good. Why do you base your metaphysical judgements in fallacious logic?
I would say instead "Love is god", "Beauty is god", "Goodness is god", because these are things we know and, at our best, make to be our gods and practice.
Likewise "Immanence is god", "Transcendence is god", "The knowable is god" and "The unknowable is god", because these are things we think and imagine and at our best, make to be our gods and practice.
Hey! I didn't mean to offend you with my non-comprehension of your "via negativa" speculations. That approach is just as valid as my "via positiva" for conjectures beyond the scope of empirical science. It just doesn't fit my personal amateur methodology. I'm sure that lots of philosophers, including the Buddha, respond to ineffable topics with negations and koans. Even in my thesis, I admit that negations can carry Information. For example, "Zero" and "Infinity" are words & symbols that stand-in for that which is unknowable, yet meaningful. Apparently, you don't grok my Enformationism worldview either. And that's OK. I'm aware that it's an abstract & holistic concept that's hard to wrap your mind around. Merry Holidays to you! :cool:
Nassim Nicholas Taleb defines Via Negativa as, “The principle that we know what is wrong with more clarity than what is right, and that knowledge grows by subtraction.
https://coffeeandjunk.com/via-negativa/
Meta means after, metaphysics is what comes after physics (in Aristotle's corpus).
However, the subject matter of metaphysics is first principles of, inter alia, physics & all of philosophy which, logically, should come before physics.
I second your motion.
A metaphysical question like what is time? becomes easier to answer. Time is, in the most basic sense one of many things we use to organize our lives and also to comprehend reality.
-"Please don't give up on your Grail Quest for a definitive definition of the "M" word. "
-The definition of the word is already available to us. (Andronicuso of Rhodes made it clear to us)
Its any philosophical endeavor attempting to go beyond our current knowledge. Any conclusion that falls outside our Epistemology is understood as Metaphysical...that's all.
i.e.Evolution used to be a metaphysical claim until objective evidence rendered it in to Science
The big bang theory -//-
etc
Metaphysics is how we form hypotheses and science is how we verify or falsify them, its how we expand our Epistemology. Its how we form our Questions and guide our investigations.
So I will agree with you Metaphysics is the Third (in order) Most valuable step in the Philosophical Method. Without it we wouldn't have any progress in our philosophical/scientific inquiry
-"Yet, many physicists and philosophers reject such idealized notions as being-qua-being and essence to be un-real & super-natural, hence subversive of the Realistic & Materialistic dogma of post-Enlightenment Science. "
-Now you confuse Metaphysics with Supernatural. Supernatural Metaphysics is NOT philosophy. This is not because physicists and Natural philosophers reject those notions, but because you have ZERO epistemology to philosophize about such concepts. This is more of theology or Hollywood scripting than Philosophy.
Metaphysics IS an important step of Philosophy but MORE important are the steps of 1. Epistemology and 2. Physika (Modern Science). If you don't have any epistemic input to your Metaphysics then you have nothing to philosophize about...plus your metaphysics will always remain in the metaphysical realm since it will never inform the rest of the steps of the philosophical method(Aesthetics, ethics, politics), thus they can never become "wisdom", which is the ultimate goal of all Philosophical inquiries.!
-"FWIW, I have added a new post to my BothAnd Blog, as an attempt to explain, in more detail than possible in a forum post, my personal meaning of "Meta-Physics", as it applies to my personal philosophical and scientific worldview."
-Words have common usages. The best usage SHOULD have practical value, meaning that it should avoid ambiguities and it should be able to address a need to describe facts of life.
Metaphysics is any philosophical statement that can't be evaluated by our current understanding (knowledge) of the world. There are metaphysics that their conclusions expand on our current knowledge(Real Philosophy) and there are metaphysics that presume unfalsifiable dimensions(Supernatural) and they circularly conclude to them (Bad Philosophy).
One is guilty of the second type of philosophy when he accuses Philosophers/Physicists for rejecting their unfalsifiable supernatural principles.
-"Meta means after, metaphysics is what comes after physics (in Aristotle's corpus).
However, the subject matter of metaphysics is first principles of, inter alia, physics & all of philosophy which, logically, should come before physics. "
-Well this is not what metaphysics means. Metaphysics (???? ?? ??????) , in short, means "After you are done with your Science", meaning that any philosophical hypothesis that we form on the implications of what we currently know (science/??????) inevitably falls beyond our current knowledge about our World.
So Metaphysics, according to its etymology and by definition is the philosophical step that follows Epistemology and Physika (Science).