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Gnomon

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did a good job of answering these materialistic challenges to the Hard Problem, with philosophical argumentation. But scientific evidence carries more...
December 31, 2023 at 18:12
Numbers, and other mental concepts, do indeed seem to be a product of brain activities. Yet the relevant question is not what are they made of, but "H...
December 30, 2023 at 17:42
As I said in a post above, it's your interpretation of my analogy that is "wrong". Believe it or not, I do know the difference between measurable Matt...
December 29, 2023 at 18:05
FWIW, the "shapeshifter" analogy was not intended to be a technical analysis of Einstein's equation, but merely borrowing his three elements to repres...
December 28, 2023 at 17:52
Does that explanation imply that the "Hard Problem" is scientifically inscrutable, because the scientific method studies physical sensations from envi...
December 28, 2023 at 01:11
Actually, I didn't comment on the visibility of Mass & C. But, for the record, all of the equation's elements are imaginary & invisible abstractions. ...
December 27, 2023 at 18:28
Yes, both are numbers quantifying qualities (properties). Properties (attributes) are rationally inferrable, but not sensibly visible. Why do you ask?...
December 23, 2023 at 18:24
With no background in academic philosophy, I have little depth in the Dualism debate, so I'm just reaching here, not "grasping". My self-acquired quan...
December 22, 2023 at 22:47
Immaterial (abstract) entities (essences), such as Consciousness, only "show-up" when a rational Mind infers*1 an invisible immaterial Function associ...
December 22, 2023 at 17:55
I apologize. I was merely looking for an alternative to "Pessimistic". And the colloquial usage of Cynical seemed to imply a generally gloomy outlook....
December 22, 2023 at 00:36
Yes, but it has nothing to do with New Age or Eastern religions. As a scientific concept, Holism is now called Systems Theory. Reductionism is appropr...
December 21, 2023 at 23:57
Sorry to hear that gloomy outlook. It seems to focus on the small percentage of bad stuff that the media calls "news" : "if it bleeds, it leads". I wo...
December 21, 2023 at 17:25
If the material universe popped into existence with a "bang", can we imagine that, like a planted seed, it came pre-set with un-realized Potentials th...
December 21, 2023 at 01:19
I suspect that --- for fear of straying into the seductive mindset of spooky Spirituality --- those who espouse the metaphysical doctrine of Materiali...
December 21, 2023 at 00:46
Historically, modern Science emerged from the traditions of ancient Philosophy. But in the interim, Religion claimed authority over both. When the Enl...
December 20, 2023 at 17:57
December 20, 2023 at 17:18
Coincidentally, I was just this morning skimming Terrence Deacon's book Incomplete Nature, which discusses the causal "Absences" (possibilities ; pote...
December 20, 2023 at 17:04
FWIW, I think of Mathematics, and "mathematical relations" as mental abstractions from observation of the arrangment and dynamics of the world. For me...
December 19, 2023 at 23:00
As an Architect, my occupation involves interpreting the client's ideas & dreams into a mathematical & graphic design language that can be erected int...
December 19, 2023 at 22:33
Yes. What you are labeling "reification", I would call an Abstract Noun. I assume that the referent of the term Consciousness is not an observable mat...
December 19, 2023 at 22:23
I do take exemption from the empirical requirements of scientific rigor, when I'm discussing a topic that has no objective empirical evidence. I would...
December 19, 2023 at 22:13
Yes. Apparently is reading Reification into what I call Ideality (the state or quality of being ideal). Ironically the "res" in res cogitans is usuall...
December 19, 2023 at 17:00
For the record, I'm not claiming that mental activity is a real thing (ontic), but an ideal concept (noumena). Brain processes are real & physical, bu...
December 19, 2023 at 16:47
Yes, both "Both" and "And" are conjunctions, so the redundancy is intentional for emphasis. But BothAnd joins the two into a single holistic concept, ...
December 18, 2023 at 23:07
I don't know where you got "reification", but I refer to the Mind as the Function of the Brain. Both are aspects of heterogeneous (diverse) Reality, b...
December 18, 2023 at 21:12
My thesis of EnFormAction does exist "within the material world", because the observer lives in the world of tangible material objects and invisible p...
December 18, 2023 at 17:47
I don't know if a complete survey of such political attitudes has been done. But I recently saw a video of a Trump supporter, who said something like ...
December 17, 2023 at 22:37
In my thesis, there is indeed a close relationship between Energy and Consciousness. Both are emergent forms of a cosmic predecessor that I call EnFor...
December 17, 2023 at 22:24
The only non-physical entities I'm aware of are Mental Phenomena (e.g. ideas), which I place into the philosophical category of Meta-physical. My use ...
December 17, 2023 at 18:17
Are you expecting a Scientific, or Philosophical, explanation on this forum? In addition to "spooky action at a distance", Quantum Physics raised unse...
December 16, 2023 at 23:08
Mind/body questions are at the root of the Enformationism thesis. If you accept quantum physicist J. A. Wheeler's "It from Bit" conjecture, then Menta...
December 16, 2023 at 18:27
Generalizations are abstractions from immediate reality (opinions ; beliefs), and shouldn't be "pushed" into the realm of "accurate" empirical Facts. ...
December 16, 2023 at 17:28
Meaning of Life The "Meaning of Life” in general is a perennial quest for Philosophers and Theologians. Scientists though have no need for universal m...
December 15, 2023 at 22:58
I just received my copy of Bernardo (BK) Kastrup's 2020 book, Science Ideated. He doesn't discuss the "Hard Problem" directly, but the subject matter ...
December 15, 2023 at 17:49
I think you are picking up on the perplexing problem, with online philosophical dialogs, of using common conventional language, which is inherently ma...
December 14, 2023 at 17:11
Yes. I used the term metaphorically to indicate what Plato called Logos. I'm not referring to the Bible-god. It's an abstract concept, that we rationa...
December 13, 2023 at 18:02
I mean, from the perspective of the sensing organism : interior = self ; exterior = other or environment. :smile: The evolution of conscious thinking ...
December 13, 2023 at 17:04
Fundamentally. plant "senses" work the same way as human senses : electrical & chemical data are routed to & from the exterior and interior. Each "mes...
December 12, 2023 at 17:59
I have a blog post that presents a sort of Mind/Matter evolution "flow chart" in the form of an emergent phase ladder*1. But it was not specifically b...
December 12, 2023 at 17:45
The Great Man Theory assumes that world-changing leaders are born, not socialized. In fact, most of them --- Alexander the Great, Napoleon, (Trump???)...
December 11, 2023 at 23:04
Maybe ChatGPT could serve as a moderator on this forum. :joke:
December 11, 2023 at 22:41
Although Elon Musk was a founder of the Open AI organization tasked with creating ChatGPT, he seems to be almost paranoid about computers colonizing t...
December 11, 2023 at 22:36
The Venus Fly Trap is a brainless living organism, so it seems to "sense" the intrusive fly via a mechanism similar in principle to a Mouse Trap. I'm ...
December 11, 2023 at 22:17
Yes. Since the universe itself is still evolving, it and everything-in-it is an open-ended continuum. So, I doubt that Consciousness has reached its f...
December 11, 2023 at 18:11
Yes. I am a retired Architect. So I am familiar with imagining things that are not yet real. I use geometry to translate my idea of the future thing i...
December 11, 2023 at 17:57
Of course. This is basically an opinion-sharing forum. But it's different from a gossip forum like Twitter (X) in that opinionated people are expected...
December 11, 2023 at 17:38
Sorry to butt-in here. But, the term "proto-consciousness" caught my eye. I assume you are defending Panpsychism from a Materialistic challenge. And I...
December 11, 2023 at 17:19
Shortly after our dialog in this thread, on the distinction between "Perception" & "Conception", I came across the Quora article linked below*1. The a...
December 10, 2023 at 22:06
I'm glad that my posts challenge you to consider ideas that may not have occurred to you independently. That's the basic purpose of this forum. :smile...
December 10, 2023 at 17:40
Have you noticed that my posts usually have two or more parts? The first part is my abbreviated "personal view", and the second part is other people's...
December 10, 2023 at 17:21