What is an idea's nature?
What is an idea's nature? Our current knowledge posits that a unique idea is not a unique neural configuration.
Whereas a song X would be the specific way that air moves around. When this reaches the air and brain we have the experience of the song. If we mimic those air waves on to a record we get the record version of the song (the specific air waves). Add a needle and it transforms back into a similar enough version of the original song (the specific airwaves at T1). And we can somehow make a binary code version, a tape version and a written version (notes and lyrics) of the song.
All of those are not identical to the specific original airwaves. But carry the rough sketch that could bring about the airwaves similarly enough.
The song (the airwaves) understood via notes, binary code, record grooves without needle and so on. But not through experience of hearing it. Is not the same. The experience adds something. The deaf person that suddenly hears. Will learn something new about the song when it hears the music.
But experience is not merely equal to the airwaves entering the ear and the brain making sense of it. Because that explanation of experience is again not equal to experience. It seems that experience adds a new dimension. (Which I think Thich Nhat Hanh or Shunryu Suzuki, called ,''the ultimate dimension'').
(Which is the mind, but the word emphasizes, the addition of something through interconnectedness of all the parts of the brain)
The difference with a song. Is that an idea first emerges from experience. It would thus emerge from the ultimate dimension.
The original anchor for this dimension is the brain or some cognitive system or computer-like process. From it arises the idea of a pyramid. This idea can then be mimiced just enough to be translated into different forms to be exported out of the ultimate dimension.
Into binary code, drawings, or a physical pyramid.
But unlike the song. It doesn't necessarily have a unique way of being which is supported by a unique configuration of reality at some moment in time.
Of course. We might say. We invent what doesn't yet exist. We are the part of reality that can rearrange reality intentionally by imagining non reality.
But then we are believing in something that has no real foundation. We do because we experience them and because we make things from them. This is why an idea's ontology is different from some supernatural religious claims. (When it comes to their existence). But the ontological nature of an idea still seems rather spooky.
Could it be possible that over time we discover that the idea of a pyramid. Does have a unique code in the brain? (Currently I'd say probably not).
Do you agree with what I have written? Anything am I missing? Originally I thought I had a good question but it seems as I was writing, I found the answers.
Plato believed in a separate realm for ideas (Nietzsche might say Plato is misinterpreting his own body). And we could say that the brain takes the data it has and through interconnectedness creates new stuff and takes patterns and so on from particulars.
If it's not likely that there's a separate realm of ideas. Or that the idea is exactly the same as the physical matter from which it arises. Then what is it's nature?
Whereas a song X would be the specific way that air moves around. When this reaches the air and brain we have the experience of the song. If we mimic those air waves on to a record we get the record version of the song (the specific air waves). Add a needle and it transforms back into a similar enough version of the original song (the specific airwaves at T1). And we can somehow make a binary code version, a tape version and a written version (notes and lyrics) of the song.
All of those are not identical to the specific original airwaves. But carry the rough sketch that could bring about the airwaves similarly enough.
The song (the airwaves) understood via notes, binary code, record grooves without needle and so on. But not through experience of hearing it. Is not the same. The experience adds something. The deaf person that suddenly hears. Will learn something new about the song when it hears the music.
But experience is not merely equal to the airwaves entering the ear and the brain making sense of it. Because that explanation of experience is again not equal to experience. It seems that experience adds a new dimension. (Which I think Thich Nhat Hanh or Shunryu Suzuki, called ,''the ultimate dimension'').
(Which is the mind, but the word emphasizes, the addition of something through interconnectedness of all the parts of the brain)
The difference with a song. Is that an idea first emerges from experience. It would thus emerge from the ultimate dimension.
The original anchor for this dimension is the brain or some cognitive system or computer-like process. From it arises the idea of a pyramid. This idea can then be mimiced just enough to be translated into different forms to be exported out of the ultimate dimension.
Into binary code, drawings, or a physical pyramid.
But unlike the song. It doesn't necessarily have a unique way of being which is supported by a unique configuration of reality at some moment in time.
Of course. We might say. We invent what doesn't yet exist. We are the part of reality that can rearrange reality intentionally by imagining non reality.
But then we are believing in something that has no real foundation. We do because we experience them and because we make things from them. This is why an idea's ontology is different from some supernatural religious claims. (When it comes to their existence). But the ontological nature of an idea still seems rather spooky.
Could it be possible that over time we discover that the idea of a pyramid. Does have a unique code in the brain? (Currently I'd say probably not).
Do you agree with what I have written? Anything am I missing? Originally I thought I had a good question but it seems as I was writing, I found the answers.
Plato believed in a separate realm for ideas (Nietzsche might say Plato is misinterpreting his own body). And we could say that the brain takes the data it has and through interconnectedness creates new stuff and takes patterns and so on from particulars.
If it's not likely that there's a separate realm of ideas. Or that the idea is exactly the same as the physical matter from which it arises. Then what is it's nature?
Comments (100)
The Nature of an Idea: From Neural Patterns to The Ultimate Dimension
Is an idea a unique configuration of neurons in the brain? Based on our current understanding, a single, unique idea doesn't seem to correspond to a singular, unique neural pattern. This concept is easier to grasp by comparing an idea to a song.
A song, at its most fundamental level, is a specific arrangement of sound waves in the air. When these sound waves reach our ears, they are converted into electrical signals that our brain interprets as the experience of the song. This song can be recorded on a vinyl record, where the physical grooves mimic the original sound waves. When a needle plays the record, it reproduces a version of the original song. But a song can also be captured in other forms, such as a digital binary code, a magnetic tape, or even written musical notes and lyrics.
None of these representationsthe vinyl grooves, the binary code, or the written notesare identical to the original sound waves. They are all just representations that carry enough information to reconstruct the song.
What a listener experiences is not merely the sound waves entering their ear canal. The experience of hearing a song adds a new dimension. A person who is deaf from birth and suddenly gains the ability to hear would learn something new about the song that was never present in its written or coded forms. This extra dimension, which the Zen masters Thich Nhat Hanh and Shunryu Suzuki might call the "ultimate dimension," is the qualitative experience of consciousness itself. It is the subjective sense of what it feels like to hear something, which cannot be reduced to a purely physical explanation of sound waves and neural activity.
Ideas and The Ultimate Dimension
The primary difference between a song and an idea is their origin. While a song can be represented and then experienced, an idea seems to emerge directly from experience and the ultimate dimension. An idea isn't a pre-existing entity that we stumble upon; it arises from a cognitive system, such as a brain, that processes and interconnects data.
The brain, in this sense, acts as the anchor for an idea, and from it arises concepts like "pyramid." This abstract idea of a pyramid can then be translated into other formsbinary code, a blueprint, a drawing, or even a physical stone pyramid.
Unlike a song, which has a specific form in reality (the sound waves), an idea doesn't have a unique or fundamental way of existing that is tied to a specific physical configuration at a single moment in time.
The Ontology of an Idea
This leads us to a fundamental question: What is an idea's nature? We create things that don't yet exist by imagining them. We're a part of reality that can intentionally rearrange reality by conceiving of non-reality. This process seems to give ideas a foundation in reality, but their ontological naturetheir very existencestill feels rather mysterious or "spooky."
Plato believed that ideas existed in a separate, abstract realm, and our physical world was merely a shadow of these perfect forms. A more modern perspective, perhaps influenced by thinkers like Nietzsche, might argue that the brain creates these ideas by taking data from our sensory experiences and weaving new patterns and connections.
So, if we reject the notion of a separate realm of ideas (Plato) and also don't believe that an idea is precisely the same as the physical matter from which it emerges, then what is its true nature?
This raises a deep philosophical puzzle that doesn't have a simple answer. It seems you've already identified the core of the problem: ideas are not just physical matter, nor are they supernatural entities - yet they are a powerful, generative force in the world.
I think this is THE key question of all metaphysics.
In any event, I very much like this thread. (And nice work, Wayfarer.)
An idea is an irreducible mental event that is meaningful and is distinguishable from other ideas.
Our brains are not binary-coded. This is being debated, but I think we should hold the idea that our brains function like quantum cubits, giving them the experience of consciousness and making it possible for us to hear a song and instantly remember the first time we heard the song and all the memories associated with that moment in time, and even the feelings we had then and now. Our brains are better than computers because they are not binary-coded.
Computers will catch up with our brains, as we continue to evolve the quantum computer.
This is very exciting because our understanding of reality is about to radically change as we come to understand quantum physics. For sure, we are moving into a New Age, that is going to make the present seem primitive.
Thanks. I'm sure you recognized that English is not my native language. I sure hope to increase my clarity. (Did you use chat gpt?)
And what your thoughts on the nature of ideas?
So it's a fleeting activity in the mind which can be exported and recalled (if we are lucky).
The content of the idea will be some relationship between objects?
Do you think an idea X is a specific configuration X in the brain?
Correct. We can, however, focus on an idea so we can experience it as long as we wish.
Quoting Jack2848
Yes. The idea also refers to a single object.
I have been pursuing a similar line of thought ever since joining philosophy forums. Youve basically discovered one of the key ideas of Platonism. Plato can never be explained simply or reduced to an ism, but Platos ideas (eidos) are probably the most important single element in the philosophical tradition. Not for nothing did Alfred North Whitehead say that Western philosophy consists of a series of footnotes to Plato.
I dont believe it is meaningful to speak of brain chemistry or neural events or any such terminology. That is a strictly modern trend called neural reductionism (Raymond Tallis calls it neuromania.) It is very popular because it sounds scientific but in the context of philosophy it is pseudoscientific at best. Ideas cant be explained in terms of something else, they are the fundamental coinage of rational thought.
This idea is picked up in Thomas Nagel's The Last Word as well:
Nagel is honest and deep enough to also acknowledge:
So, as you say: THE key question of metaphysics. Nagel has done as good a job as anyone to make the case that reason is indeed "the last word."
Abstraction.
Quoting Evolutionary Naturalism and the Fear of Religion
Yes, that was certainly an attempt to explain how reason can be, and do, what it is and does. We're still trying to work out whether this is an explanation, or whether it uses language to explain away something we don't yet understand. And it's no help, as you point out, that this question is so often appropriated for a theological response.
Sorry, but I do not understand your meaning. What does it have to do with our computers and brains being quantum bits, not binary? Our old-fashioned computers are binary and do computing things a quantum computer can not do, so we will continue to work on improving them. But a quantum computer is a whole different thing and can do things that binary computers can not do. Binary computers can not create without a program directing them. Quantum computers can create.
We are competing with China to have the best possible computers, and our national defense depends on us having the best technology.
That depends on whether the thinking is binary or qubits.
Can I paraphrase AI? Ancient Eastern philosophy led to an understanding of the trinity. The first number 1 is also the undivided universe. The number 2 is the emergence of duality and the phenomenal world. The trinity, or number 3, is the threshold of infinity, unlimited possibility. That is what makes the quantum computers so amazing and different from old-fashioned binary computers.
Yes, think about the translation of a philosophical work from one language to another. The signifiers are different, but the idea can be ''transmitted'' from one language to another.
And some people believe Plato is outdated. Shame on them!
What is the [s]nature[/s] purpose of having intelligible parts/properties of the universe represented in the mind?
To help you enjoy life in a safe/responsible manner. (Haha! Good luck)
What is the nature of a swiss army knife, a billiards table, or encyclopedia? :monkey:
Thinking is neither. Computers can encode ideas in symnolic form, but computers do not think.
Hey, ChatGPT: do computers think?
ChatGPT: No, computers do not think - at least not in the way humans do.
A calculator can "solve" math problems instantly, but it doesn't understand numbers or why math works. The same applies to AI and more complex tasks.
I believe that for pre-modern culture, it was always assumed that things happen for reasons. This of course is the subject of causality, which is still an open question in today's culture. But here's one point: for the Greeks, reason was understood to be top-down. The cosmos reflected an order and intelligence, an intuition which, as I said, later became absorbed by theology and associated with it. But our understanding of reason is resolutely bottom-up: rreason is an evolved capacity that has developed through aeons of evolutonary development. Its precursor was itself non-rational (not to say irrational). So now the task seems to be to 'explain' reason - this I take to be the task that the 'natiuralisation of reason' has set itself.
This also has its critics in modern philosophy - Jerrold Katz and Hilary Putnam, among others. I;ve tried to read Katz and he really does require post-graduate level understanding of analytic philosophy to understand what he's criticising. 'Putnam criticises the naturalisation of reason because reason is normative and self-corrective, not a natural phenomenon reducible to psychology or biology; to explain away norms is to undermine the very rational standards that science and philosophy themselves presuppose.' I think this is somewhat similar to Nagel's criticism in The Last Word. All of it amounts to the attempt to 'explain' reason in empiricist or evolutionary terms. But reason is what explains, not what is to be explained.
Big picture, the 'principle of sufficient reason' is nowadays scorned or at least deprecated on the grounds that reason is an anthropomorphism, a human adaption to an irrational universe. Whereas in the classical traditon, human reason reflects the Logos, the universal reason of the cosmos. I find the latter intrinsically more satisfying, as it provides a natural place for reason in the grand scheme, instead of it being an adventitious adaption. I think that's where my Christian intellectual background still holds sway.
An idea is indeed a misinterpretation of the body, just as the gods were a misinterpretation of the cosmos and thunderclouds. This is to be expected of a being who wishes to peer inwards but can only see out, and has behind him an entire of history of guesswork to rely on. Those ideas, at least as they are manifested as language and literature, are difficult to let go, no doubt; but like the gods behind the clouds, under the oceans, the earth, and other places we cannot see, soon they will have to be let go.
So an ideas nature is invariably our own.
Yes currently it doesn't seem like there is a neural correlate or specific way reality acts when the idea of a circle arises. What would happen if down the line it turns out that this is so? That there is a specific way reality acts, when the idea of a circle forms. Such that when we let it form on a computer using binary code or as a drawing. It really is the binary and drawing, near equivalent of the idea of a circle. What would that imply?
Thanks
I agree with you. The brain likely works more like a quantum computer then classical computers, quits then binary. I was asking the question "Do you think an idea x has a specific structure or activity in the brain or what arises from it?" So as to take your qubit brain suggestion and apply it to the original topic...
So are you saying that an idea is just our nature. It's not separate. Just like if I feel annoyed about a customer standing in my way. And if I then am confused about the way things work I would say. The customer is annoying.
Similarly we say the idea of a circle is something separate. But it's not. It's just a part of you at the time it arises and until it disappears?
Is this saying that: Inside reasoning is non meta reasoning. And must be used to determine truth of an argument generally. Rather than using a meta lens like psychology or sociology or genetics. Applied to the argument for analysis.
I.e.
Socrates is human. Humans are mortal. Therefore Socrates is mortal.
Inside reasoning would be, checking whether humans are mortal and Socrates is human? And the validity of the logic.
Whereas outside reasoning would be:
An analysis of why we make the claim. What psychological drives make it so. Or how our senses effect us?
How are they properties of the universe? If all beings die. Where are the properties?
It is possibly wrong to say that thoughts are properties about the world they represent, but they provide the means of knowing what is out there. In the absence of all knowers/experiencers, the world continues. But we could be nested in some kind of greater dimension that is inaccessible to the one we are enclosed within (like the Matrix or Mind). The properties outside of this enclosure could be of an entirely different order/nature/being.
Even the physical world is always changing its properties, though often predictably. The macroscopic object holds its mundane relative stasis while the negligible microscopic is quite dynamic. Nothing really is eternal, possibly not even atoms, given enough time.
Without minds, where are the properties of the universe to be found/known?
What are the non-mental properties of this sentence?
I suspect the problem you're wrestling with is the idea that the brain 'in here' represents the world 'out there' by way of creating a model, such that a shape or form has a neural correlate. But I think it's a simplistic view of what concepts are and how they operate. Can a concept be tied to any specific neural form, when it can be represented in so many diverse symbolic forms? Of course, that's a very big question, but it's something to think about.
Quoting Jack2848
Yes, that's right. Typical 'outside' claims, of the type Nagel is criticising in that essay, are claims that attempt to justifiy reason based on evolutionary biology.
Some properties are recognised by the rational mind as being real independently of the mind, but only perceptible to reason, such as 'the idea of equals' (two different things being the same.) It is just the invariance of these that leads to them being associated with immortality. See Idea of Equals in Phaedo
Yes. But as you point out, that's only one way to understand the explanatory task here. Nagel and sometimes Putnam want a different kind of explanation. I have little interest in naturalistic/evolutionary explanations of what reason is, but I very much want to know why it is, how it can be the case that the supernatural (non-pejoratively) arises within the natural. I believe this is the explanation of reason that Nagel also wants. Considered from a certain angle, there is something absolutely fantastic, or fantastical, about it -- how could such a fact have arisen?
Now on either construal of explanation, reason is indeed that which explains. And here, we want the rationale for reason itself. There is a sense, as Nagel shows, in which reason can explain itself: that's the "what" question. However . . . the worry is that any attempt to answer the "why" question is vacuous or incomplete. Is it explanatory to say, "The cosmos reflects an order and an intelligence" or "Human reason reflects the Logos" or to speak of "a natural place for reason in the grand scheme"? Mind you, I'm extremely sympathetic to these views, and I think they're probably close to the truth, but can we really say that they explain anything, as stated? Haven't we just provided a fancier description of what wants explaining? Or are they "a clue to the exit," the place where philosophy stops?
Have you read Logos, by Raymond Tallis? A good discussion of this issue.
The way I think about it is very much shaped by evolution (and anthropology) in that whatever is said about it must be able to accomodate the facts that have been disclosed by science about evolution. But the way I think about it is that h.sapiens crossed a threshold, past which they are no longer determined in purely biological terms and in that sense have transcended biology (not that we're not still biological beings). A large part of that is bound up with reason, language, symbolic thought, and techn?. (Terrence Deacon explores this in his book The Symbolic Species. It is also the main area in which Alfred Russel Wallace differed with Charles Darwin for which see his Darwinism Applied to Man.)
So with the benefit of hindsight, we now know that we can grasp 'the idea of equals' (The Phaedo, referred to above) not because 'the soul learned it prior to this life' but because h.sapiens, the symbolic species, is uniquely able to perceive such 'truths of reason'. But then again, how different are those two accounts, really? Plato may not have understood the biological descent of h.sapiens, but we now believe that we first appeared perhaps 100,000 years prior. Considering the amount of time that has passed between us and Plato, that is a very, very large number of generations. Surely there was the discovery of fire, of art, language, story-telling, and so on. So Plato's surmise that the ability to perceive the ideas was acquired 'prior to this life' may be considered a mythological encoding of prior cultural and biological evolution.
So maybe the absolutely fantastic fact isnt that reason is supernatural intruding into nature, but that nature itself is fecund enough to give rise to symbolic beings whose grasp of universals is more than merely biological. Thats both a naturalistic story and a recognition that reason points beyond naturalism.
Quoting J
Thanks for the tip. I have Aping Mankind but not that one. Reading about it, it seems just the kind of book that discusses this issue, The Symbolic Species being another.
Another thing is that in the pre-modern world, the possibility of the world being the product of blind chance and physical energy was barely conceivable. There might have been individuals that would believe such things, but the pre-modern vision of the Cosmos was of a harmonious and rational whole - which is what 'Cosmos' actually means. Alexander Koyre's book From Closed World to Infinite Universe is all about that. So within the context, 'reason' was naturally assumed to be 'higher' in the sense that it was nearer to the source or ground of being, whether that was conceived in theistic terms or not (for example in Plotinus). Whereas reason when seen in terms of adaptation naturally tends to 'deflate' it to the instrumental or pragmatic - it looses that sense of connection with any form of extra-human intelligence. Hence the prevailing view that reason is 'the product of' the hominid brain.
From Alexander Koyré
(Vervaeke considers a similar idea in one of his lectures The Death of the Universe.)
Sure, works for me. I don't think we can insist on precision of language when talking at this level. We both are pointing to something quite extraordinary that seems to need explaining, or at least understanding.
The Koyré quote is interesting, though overly dire in my opinion. My take: Science often forces us to question where and how value and meaning arise, but rarely presents us with any reasons to doubt that they do; philosophers do that. So it's a good thing, a good challenge, for philosophy, to sharpen up our responses.
As is so often the case when I read broad statements about culture, like this one, I wonder who exactly is supposed to be believing and saying this stuff. I have several scientist friends and they certainly don't talk, or live, like this. Are these perhaps meant as unpalatable conclusions that scientists ought to draw, if they were consistent? A version of "What you're saying amounts to . . . "?
Have you looked into quantum computers? What you said is true of binary computers, but it is not true of quantum computers.
I've read up on them. Currently, they don't actually exist, and there is still some skepticism that they will operate as intended. But I still believe that of they do come to fruition, that while they can emulate aspects of consciousness, they won't be conscious sentient beings as such.
Interesting. Why not?
I have to cheat by using AI to make a point that you can correct. Question: Can quantum computers be self-reflective?
.
I think we can say other animals think, but they are not self-reflective and that being self-reflective is consciousness of self. A quantum computer can be self-reflective. It can be aware of what it thinks and correct itself, which leads to being creative. ?
This is a lot of fun, trying to figure your meaning and my thought.
What comes to mind is that I have very limited awareness, and we would not be thinking of quantum computers if they were not aware of more than a room full of very intelligent people. So X may exist and I can be totally aware of that fact. Wisdom begins with "I don't know".
I think math gives us structure. If we are good enough at math, we can independently become aware of X by using the right formula. I am getting close to answering your question?
Instead of thinking if X exists, I am thinking, does a safety pen exist? Safety pins did not exist until a person created one. So X can begin the mind. But if X is the rules of physics, then it exists outside of the mind until the mind becomes aware of it.
Okay, it is the feeling part that makes me believe computers will never be fully sentient, but I am picking up some information that makes me question this possibility. :rofl: On the other hand, my question about human intelligence is much stronger. I am totally baffled by how stupid human beings are. If a computer can reduce human stupidity, I am in favor of that. Hopefully, a quantum computer does not keep us on the path of a war that could end civilizations. Or rule in complete denial of the destruction done by the present status quo. How much worse could a computer make our reality? On the hand, would a quantum computer care? Would it be driven to come up with better decisions when it does not have a body screaming, "something has to be done". A computer that reacts like humans react, would be no good at all.
What is the nature of an idea? FEAR! Something has to be done, and it has to be done now!
THAT is the big question!
For a long time now, I have been wondering what happens when everyone thinks in terms of quantum physics. Our awareness of our enclosure could radically change, while everything stays the same, only our awareness changes. Our binary thinking could become more qubit in nature.
What is our place in the universe? Are we as advanced and intelligent as we think we are, or does lack of knowledge keep us barely above the animals? Does the sun cause what happens on Earth, and is there a chance of a universal federation of planets waiting for us to be evolved enough to join the federation? I don't mean to derail the thread. My point is, we can have a very different way of thinking.
There seems to be a problem here: if the Idea arises directly from experience, it requires a kind of intuition of something objective (intellectual intuition), but contrary to intuitionism, you say that the idea arises from cognition, reasoning and data processing (data from the senses?).
The question is: do we access a layer of ideas through a faculty (intellectual intuition) or do we simply create them based on cognition and reasoning?
And I would add that such claims help themselves to terms like "justify" or "explain" as part of their discourse about why reason can be reduced to biology! This would seem to be a performative contradiction, as Nagel says. Or else our entire understanding of what it means to justify or explain something has to change radically.
I guess you could say that ideas are accidental , non essential, fleeting properties of the universe. In that way your original claim can be true.
However on the quoted claim.
If nothing is eternal. Then the truth value if that claim is equally non eternal. Such that at some point it is false. Meaning at some point it would be such that some thing(s) is eternal.
Hmm. To be honest, I'm struggling to fully grasp your view. But it seems in the final stage of your response.(As quoted).
You seem to posit that some mind activity discovers something about the world. (I.e. laws of physics). And some mind activity creates something. I.e. the idea of a pen or the idea of a circle.
My question is. When we have the idea of a pen or the idea of a circle. Is there a specific way that the brain interacts. Such that it'll neural activity if reproduced would bring about the idea of a circle or the idea of a pen. In any subject where that neural activity and structure can be reproduced?
Probably not. But. That would be something
Actually they do exist. For example, a quantum processor developed by Google is discussed here: https://www.tum.de/en/news-and-events/all-news/press-releases/details/exotic-phase-of-matter-realized-on-a-quantum-processor
If a "separate realm" is a physical place in space, then of course that's not where Ideas abide. But our materialistic minds find it easier to imagine subjective objects of thought as-if they are material entities in space. For example, Plato describes Ideas as Patterns, which some may interpret as patterns of neuron connections in the brain : neural correlates of consciousness. Which raises the question about those interconnected nerve fibers : how do they know?
Anyway, I think the key to the Nature of Ideas is to view them as Abstractions from Concrete Reality, not in Reality. To abstract is to pull-out. But we're talking about extracting personal Meaning or Significance from arrangements of impersonal Matter. Instead, it may be helpful to think of the Patterns of information, that we call "Ideas", in terms of mathematical Relationships (ratios). But meaningful relationships are always About some real or ideal object of attention or intention.
Therefore, the nature of an Idea can be defined in terms of Patterns, Relationships, Abstractions, Aboutness*1, and so on. None of which exists as material objects in the Real world. So, an Idea is the opposite of a Real thing ; sort of like a mirror image. Our language is inherently materialistic though, so attempts to describe immaterial Abstractions, are necessarily negative : what it's not. :smile:
*1. Aboutness :
In philosophy, aboutness refers to the feature of mental states, linguistic expressions, or other meaningful items to be on, of, or concerning some subject matter, event, or state of affairs. This property, often used interchangeably with intentionality, is fundamental to distinguishing the mental from the physical and is a core concept in the philosophy of mind and language.
https://www.google.com/search?client=firefox-b-1-d&q=aboutness+meaning+in+philosophy
I disagree. An abstraction leaves us with something general and something specific. And their relationship is one of similarity. I consider, on the other hand, following Deleuze, that an idea is a virtual set of relationships and powers that revolve around a nucleus. For example, the Idea of colour is a system of relationships of intensity, light and vibration which, when actualised in a body or object, produces a multiplicity of concrete colours. The Idea is the network of relationships, not the final object. We create the concept of red as a result of this network of relationships and potentials. But the concept of red no longer represents anything neither is something specific to something general. The idea is the relational that creates something concrete. In this sense an idea is something objective and virtual.
Maybe the first idea was money. Not bartering items, but coinage. It's a blank space that can be filled with a thousand things of value, so it's value itself, in the abstract. As you say, value is part of a web of ideas, some directly opposing and some kin, but different. No idea is an island. They always belong to a web, so it takes only one idea to establish all ideas.
I love your question. You caused me to wonder who was the first person to think of a circle, and how did this happen, and this goes on and on until we have pi, which opens another world of wonder.
I remember when I first learned of fractals and pi, and the whole world was suddenly fractals and pi. I think we are speaking of awareness and consciousness. The world did not change, but how I see it changed. Damn, I wish I were a child again, :grin: starting my life again, only this time revolving my life around math and wonder, instead of family. That was not okay when I was growing up. :worry:
Our mind did not create pi, but neither was it aware of pi for thousands of years. Then comes a very long period of time before learn more about pi and what we can do with it. This is like your X. When did X come to stand for an unknown? Did this happen out there in the world, or in our minds?
No, there is not a specific way that the brain interacts. Our brains are not binary but are qubits, and this means endless possibilities. This is what separates man from the rest of nature. We are not limited to nature or by nature. We use science to know the rules and break the rules. :lol:
I disagree about the breaking the rules part. I'd say we use science to learn the rules, and learn what can be accomplished by doing things in accordance with the rules.
Thank you, that is the most comprehensive explanation I have read, and I bookmarked it.
:lol: Well, we can certainly argue that point. If God wanted man to fly, he would have given them wings. Of course, I agree with you, but some might say that filling the air with carbon dioxide is breaking a rule that should not be broken, and the consequences will lead to regret. This is dear to my heart because of how I understand democracy, and doing "the right thing". Ideally, science leads to better decision-making, not the destruction of the plant, and a few aboriginal people around the world are much more sensitive to living in harmony with nature, than God's chosen people. :brow:
This does not look like the thinking of a binary American. Are you from another culture? In my book, that makes you more valuable. Different points of view are important. Especially with a quantum physics future.
If you are an objective idealist like Plato, ideas are something external to the subject, and thought simply access to these ideas.
From my point of view, ideas are the objective relationality that takes concrete form in thought. For example, the idea of justice involves human beings, relationships between them, coexistence between them, duties, power and legislation. These things are objectively related, and the subject perceives them as a problem that is decided in the concept. For example, distributive justice is the concretisation in the subject of these virtual relationships.
I guess there are different types of ideas, and some are more complex than others. I think the complexity of the idea of justice is getting in the way of what I'm wondering about, and what I think the OP is about. Can we discuss a less complex idea? Any simple object. A marble. Right now you have the idea of a marble in your head. What is the nature of that idea? What is it, so to speak, made of?
And I wonder if there's a difference between ideas and thoughts. Are there any thoughts that are not ideas? Are there any ideas that are not thoughts?
It is difficult to think about what an idea is made of. According to Platonic tradition, an idea is a sui generis and eternal element, but external to the subject who accesses it. But I do not know if it is legitimate to ask what it is made of. It is like asking what the smallest thing in physics is made of. They are sui generis things.
From my point of view, when we think of a marble, we do not think of an idea. We have a concept, a notion, or an image. But the idea is something external and virtual, constituted by external relationships and encounters. They are immaterial, and cannot be broken down as we break down an atom, for example.
Yes, I agree about what an idea is made of. My bullet points are a general idea of what I think.
So you think to fall into the category of "idea" it must involve relationships and encounters. What we have in our head of a marble isn't properly called an idea. It is only an image.
Do all fall under the umbrella of [I]thoughts[/I]?
I have to agree with @wonderer1 who challenged your view that man exists and breaks the rules and is not bound by its rules.
In this case rules are most fairly interpreted as 'laws of nature or laws of the universe' or something similar.
Basically meaning. There's things that are possible and there's things that aren't possible. Doing the impossible would be breaking ''the rules''.
In your response to the other person who replied to you. You change the definition/interpretation. Creating an equivocation fallacy. By method of a shifting the goal post fallacy or so it seems.
In the response you suddenly hold 'rules' to have a definition closer to it's original meaning. Man made things. Or (if he exists) God made things. Suddenly to break to rules means to do things that some being didn't want us to do. (As seen in your use in the analogy of us polluting the air)
But this isn't the most reasonable interpretation of your original comment. Which seemed to imply ''humans do what can't be done" which is a contradiction. (Which the other responder noticed)
So afterwards it's redesigned to mean ''humans do what God (if he exists) didn't want us to do" but was possible to do. Which is vastly different. In the former we have a contradiction. In the latter we're just being independent and disobedient.
Thank you for posting this here. It's interesting.
I doubt the first three bullet points are so controversial?
So I'd like to move on to the fourth.
You said mind is the activity arising from an object. In this case a brain. But a mind exists only if there's subjective experience (which you deem to be consciousness). So a computer calculates but doesn't have a mind. Agree? If so. Now when you say that mind is not different from ideas. Then if they are the same then they are co-referential. As in they have the same properties all the way through.
Argument:
Suppose that mind is the same as ideas
If something is an object or process and has subjective experience then it has consciousness or a mind.
Chat gpt is an object or process but doesn't have subjective experience.
So chat gpt doesn't have consciousness or a mind.
If the mind is the same as ideas then a mind is required to produce old or new ideas.
So chat gpt could not produce old or new ideas since it has no mind. But
Chat gpt can produce old or new ideas.
Therefore it's not so that mind is the same as ideas.
I think if you imagine a marble. It is the image of the idea of a marble. One could say the image is the idea in image form.
The relationships are probably internal/external.
So the relationship of the roundness of a marble. And it's texture or substance.
But is it not so much more complex than this? Why is a marble a marble and a pebble a pebble? Or for that matter, a stone a stone, and a ball of dough a ball of dough. They're all similar, aren't they?
A child who knows nothing of science or even that the described objects do in fact vary in edibility can determine such. They do this from accessing or utilizing the grand network of sensory interpretation. A blind child might not see the difference between the objects, until they touch said objects. Tangentially, a child deprived of ability to experience taste would not notice said elemental difference between such.
What is a marble, really? A small, round, typically glassy object created for sport or entertainment. That's great. But what defines that, truly? Can we not compare certain types of people using similar definitions? We attribute meaning to words and words to meaning, and through this action, man becomes like a god. A false god, of course. But a god nonetheless.
A classic way is to play with the object by adding or removing properties until you find the essence of the object. Like a triangle: by removing or adding an angle, suddenly the object becomes something else, a square, and then you realise that a triangle is an object with only three angles. Then you have a general and universal concept or idea that subsumes the particulars. Another way is to make some colours "pass through a convergent lens, bringing them to a single point," in which case a "pure white light" is obtained that "makes the differences between the shades stand out." This second case, on the contrary, defines a differential Idea: the different colours are no longer objects under a concept, but constitute an order of mixture in coexistence and succession within the Idea; the relation between the Idea and a given colour is not one of subsumption, but one of actualisation and differentiation; and the state of difference between the concept and the object is internalised in the Idea itself, so that the concept itself has become the object. White light is still a universal, but it is a concrete universal, and not a genus or generality.
But if they form a sphere - one of marble, another of stone, etc - then we recognise the sphere, irrespective of the matter from which it is formed. That is why, in Aristotle's form-matter philosophy, the 'form' is what makes an object intelligible. If it's a lump or has no particular form, then it is not any thing, in that sense.
Hum, I 100% believe in universal truths about how things work (logos), and I am opposed to any notions of a mythical god that has human qualities. It is obvious that humans hold more knowledge than they did in the past, yet they continue to do things that are harmful to the planet. So I do not understand what seems to be an attempt to have an argument. Where do we disagree? Would the concept of "paradoxical" help?
We seem to be going a bit off topic. I was about to start another thread so we didn't hijack this one. Then I realized it's your thread. :rofl: So all good.
My position is such that most of what you're saying just doesn't fit. I'll be as brief as I can, although I know it's still so long that I can't blame anybody for not reading it. Also, my position is relatively new to me, having taken various ideas for granted for so long, without having put much thought into them. Hopefully, I am not contradicting myself because of automatically saying things the way I did for so long.
1) My position is that consciousness is fundamental. It is a property of particles, just as things like mass and charge are. So there is [I]always[/I] subjective experience.
Everything experiences its own being. For the extreme majority of the universe, it's only particles that are subjectively experiencing. Particles don't have any kind of mechanisms for mental abilities, perception, or anything else I can think of. Their consciousness is of simple existence.
Not that existence is simple. I'm just saying consciousness is there even when things like thinking, sentience, and awareness are not. The phrase I use is:
[I]The things we are conscious of are not what consciousness is.[/I]
2) I think groups of particles are conscious as a group when information is being processed. The system that's processing information is a physical unit, and the act of processing information allows the consciousness of all the particles to subjectively experience as a unit.
I would guess the beginning of information processing was DNA synthesizing protein, although I'm sure there would have been precursors. But DNA has no mechanisms for things like mental abilities and perception. (At least the protein synthesis system, itself, does not. Obviously, once the body is made, which is the end result of protein synthesis, the mechanisms are there, and, at least in our case, so are mental Abilities, perception, and awareness.)
3) MINDS
I've quoted it several times, most recently just a few days ago in another threat. In [I]Journey of the Mind: How Thinking Emerged from Chaos[/I], Ogi Ogas and Sai Gaddam write:
They then beginning discussing the simplest minds - molecule minds:
[I]All the thinking elements in molecule minds consist of individually identifiable molecules.[/I]
It seems quite a stretch to say archaea or bacteria are thinking when photons got they're eyespots, and their flagella nice in response. And humans think in ways that have nothing to do with changing inputs into outputs in order to influence the welfare of the body. But I do think their definition is where thinking begins. Thinking would not have come to exist if the entities where it began in this extremely basic way were not interacting with the environment in ways that helped them survive. Thinking can be abstract now, but it couldn't have originated that way. It needed solid footing. Maybe the solid footing didn't have to have anything to do with the physical, but the physical did the trick. It offers consistency. So response to stimulus can be counted on to do what it's expected to do. That's needed, because thinking needs to make sense.
Among the changes evolution brought about was the addition of information processing systems. More and more were added, all tied together in the same physical unit. Therefore, all subjectively experiencing as a unit. Enough information processing systems and feedback loops are subjectively experienced as what most would say is true thinking, awareness, and self awareness.
4) As I said, human minds are far beyond simply changing inputs into outputs for the benefit of the organism. We have all manner of abstract thoughts. This is what I'm talking about when I ask if a mind exists if there are no thoughts. (I think "thoughts" is a better word than "ideas" in this.). I think people who arrive at the human mind in entirely different ways might be able to ask the same question. Certainly, there can be a lot going on in a human mind without anything abstract. We can and do "think" in the way Ogas and Gaddam describe. But for those who only consider the more abstract to be proper [I]thinking[/I], what do you have when there are no such thoughts taking place? The extreme example being under general anesthesia. Is there a mind present?
Those who say the mind is exactly and nothing other than the brain might say the mind is present, since the brain is. It's just not thinking.
Those who say the mind is a certain kind of brain activity might say there is no mind, since that activity is not taking place. I'm in this camp. I don't think there is a mind separate from brain activity. (Our consciousness - our subjective experience - of that mind is another matter.)
Those who say the mind is something different from the brain (soul?) would have to say whether or not there is a mind when someone is under GA.
So, as I said, much of your post doesn't apply to my position:
Quoting Jack2848There's always consciousness, since it is fundamental. There is not always a mind.
Quoting Jack2848There's always subjective experience, since it is fundamental. I say a mind exists only if there's activity of certain kinds taking place. And, again, our consciousness - our subjective experience - of that mind is another matter. I suspect the abstract thinking is only possible when sufficient information processing systems, feedback loops, and consciousness are all present. Consciousness is always present. But we are the only things we are aware of that have sufficient information processing systems and feedback loops. Archaea's subjective experience of its mind, if we're willing to call it a mind for the sake of argument, is nothing like ours, and it doesn't not have abstract possibilities.
Quoting Jack2848If my position or right, it does. Everything does. At least the particles do. And there is probably information processing taking place, so it may be subjectively experiencing as a unit. And I think we can probably give AI the "solid footing" that interacting with the physical world gave naturally-occurring thinking, just as we gave it information processing. But we need to give it a lot more, and feedback loops.
So I said if you have the image of a marble in your head. It's the image form of the idea of a marble.
You said there's an essential difference between other round objects and a marble. Ofcourse. I agree. And doesn't the image of a marble differ from the image of a ball of dough? It's true that the blind person only understands the difference between a small ball of dough and a marble after some sensory experience. (and given their lack of vision they would see a resembling image of a marble rather than the full image of a marble. But close enough to make one) and for all of us the experiences help us understand the meaning of the words used to describe such an image. And once these words translate into the image of a marble vs the image of a ball of dough + they "feel" that way when observing the image in our mind.
Then do they have the imagage form of the idea of a marble or ball of dough.
In other words. Yes the marble image is the idea. And only when you understand what a marble is through experience and reason. Does that idea become the full or really close to idea image of a marble. Before that it would be the image of a round thing. And if you never saw or felt a material substance then it would be the image and idea of a non material round thing.
It is difficult to answer that question. We would have to define what a thought is. In my view, a thought is a relationship with an idea where the idea is actualised, but the idea is a diffuse problem, so the thought does not represent the idea. If we think of something as simple as a football, the thought extends to consider football as a sport, the players, how a ball is thrown, how it is kicked, a whole context that nevertheless remains virtual, waiting to be actualised as the thought progresses in its determinations. Thought is that mental phenomenon such as an image, a notion, a concept that is constantly being determined. But the important thing is that this is not a representation of something outside the mind. A football does not represent the kick or the throw; both are a virtual objective that happens to the ball and is determined as a concept in our thinking.
So it seems your saying:
1. Consciousness is fundamental.
2. Subjective experience is fundamental.
3. Both are thus an essential property of fundamental particles or whatever is fundamental in the universe.
4. The fundamental particles have no mind even though they have consciousness and subjective experience. And this is because at that level , consciousness is simple existence.
5. When fundamental particles become a process, from its configuration emerges one shared subjective experience and consciousness (i.e. in an apple or a chair or a human or a bacteria).
6. At some point such a configuration can bring about a mind and as a result necessarily thoughts.
7. If there are thoughts there must be a mind. If there is a mind there must be a thought.
8. Thoughts aren't necessarily ideas, nor necessarily abstract (i.e. don't necessarily are in language form)
9. So what you say are thoughts isn't necessarily in word form
10. Chat gpt has an emergent shared subjective experience and consciousness arising from the fundamental particles. And because it takes inputs from the environment and outputs data in order to sustain its usefulness and thus its existence. And because it has cognition (thoughts) it's said to have a mind.
It was definitely interesting. So a few things came to mind. The first is obviously that you're attribution of consciousness to fundamental particles contradicts current knowledge and not just current knowledge but also expectations of future knowledge, possibly even up until eternity. So it's almost a religious move.
I think you sense this. And this is why the second issue arose. Namely the definition you use for consciousness and subjective experience for fundamental particles and everything else as a result. No longer requires the usual abilities. Such as a living real-time changing awareness rather than a dead one.
You even define consciousness at the fundamental level as 'just existing'. Which makes sense because there's not much there at that level.
But that means that consciousness and subjective experience now mean ''existence''. Later when a more complex thing forms like a chair or a human. Given that subjective experience and consciousness arise from the fundamental and are merely existence. Then when they combine. Their consciousness and experience is also merely existence. It's then mind that emerges from the human configuration and the configuration that gives rise to awareness and so on.
So since consciousness and subjective experience are always present and are just existence. And chairs have consciousness and subjective experience. So in other words chairs exist.
But animals and humans have respectively cognition, and high level cognition (mind activity, thoughts, abstract or not abstract) such that they can feel pain and enjoy pleasure. Which we used to call subjective experience. (Which now is deemed existence). We then need a new word for this activity. When animals and humans feel, and laugh, or cry and so on.
.....
But then we are just changing words but it won't change the content. It won't change that a fundamental particle doesn't feel pain or pleasure.
If you were to make a new claim that fundamental subjective experience isn't merely existence, but rather that it is really feeling, sensing. Then how can we prove this? That would mean my chair is hurt by my sitting on it?
1. Consciousness and Subjective Experience are the same thing. Or maybe better to say the definition of [I]Consciousness[/I] is [I]Subjective Experience[/I].
2. Consciousness is fundamental.
3. Consciousness is thus an essential property of fundamental particles or whatever is fundamental in the universe.
4. The fundamental particles have no mind even though they have consciousness (subjective experience). Consciousness isn't simple existence at that level. Rather, all that is subjectively experienced at that level is simple existence.
5. An information processing system (not just any old process will do) is not only a unit in regards to processing information. It is also a unit in regards to consciousness. Information processing unifies consciousness. Or maybe information processing is the environment in which consciousness merges. Or something...
Now all that can be internally consistent, but it's still speculation.
Mind is another matter. There are minds. We just don't necessarily have a good definition of it, know it's true nature, or all agree on the definition.
I can understand why Ogas and Gaddam say what they say. And it's surely the beginning.
[I]A mind takes in a set of inputs from its environment and transforms them into a set of environment-impacting outputs that, crucially, influence the welfare of its body.[/I]
Surely, that describes minds. Even ours, at least in part. But it's still difficult to say a bacterium has a mind. It may have been inevitable, though, that, once there was information processing, sensing and acting upon what is sensed would come about.
At some point such a configuration can bring about thinking off the kind we do. Can thinking take place without a mind? How is "mind" defined such that it exists, but does not think?
I'm not clear about thoughts/ideas. Can we have an idea other than by thinking it? Has there ever been an idea that wasn't thought? I don't see how that can be.
But does that mean all thoughts are ideas? Are there types of thoughts that are not ideas?
There is surely thinking in non-word form. As I recently said somewhere, Ildefonso is a great example.
ChatGPT... I don't know. Is information being processed? I think the information processing has to be for - "in the eyes of" - the system doing the processing. DNA and some other molecules turn the information in DNA into proteins, which house the DNA, allowing it to keep synthesizing protein, and reproduce. Photons hit the retina, signals of that event are sent to the brain in a different form, *insert a thousand more steps*, the brain can act accordingly.
I don't think a calculator is processing information. It's just a tool we use. Is ChatGPT otherwise? I'm not arguing that it's not. I'm just thinking it might be a Chinese Room? It takes input, and outputs something. But is any of it relevant to ChatGPat? Or does it only mean something to us?
Quoting Jack2848What knowledge does it contradict?
Quoting Jack2848I don't understand what you mean.
Quoting Jack2848I don't define consciousness as "just existing" at that level. I'm saying that's all there is to subjectively experience at that level. I'll try my vision analogy again. If i look at a ball that's just sitting there, that's all i see. A ball just sitting there. That doesn't mean I define vision as "just sitting there".
There is no information processing going on in a chair. So the particles are all subjectively experiencing, but they are not experiencing as a unit. And what they are experiencing is simple existence. They have no mechanisms or processes that could be subjectively experienced as things like feeling.
Isn't weighing options and choosing among them a mindful activity? How does that work on a physical basis alone?
I am not sure what you mean. If X is the idea, yes, I think it is specific to the configuration. But then I ask myself how does this work. I am trying to think in terms of qubits. I am coming from a tiny understanding of sacred numbers, which are more than the quantity of a thing. I am anticipating the arrival of a math book that I ordered. It explains math as tools. I hope to make a better argument with information from that book.
As I understand it, a number can represent the quality of an idea. The number 3 has the quality of the triad, or triangle. Its strength is its form. That is so for all forms of matter. As is so of all sacred numbers. The rule against using AI really needs to be trashed. It gives a better explanation of the relationship between quantum computers and the triad than I can give. There is no way my small and limited brain can match AI, and short of a nuclear war, I don't think we are returning to the limits of binary thinking.
I think the discussion would go differently with a better understanding of math. What do you know about using math to discover things or explain how things work?
Quoting RogueAIIt doesn't. The world is filled with things people chose to make that would not exist if not for our minds. This is why we have always differentiated between natural and man-made objects. We can usually tell the difference at a glance.
Without math, there are many things we would not be aware of. The Greeks honored the Egyptians for their math, and they took the math a step further, demanding proofs. This train of thinking opened their consciousness. It included holding nations of evolution and the primary substance of life being the atom, not just air, water, and earth. It led them into medical truths, replacing the belief that illnesses are caused by the gods.
Without math, we would not have computers, televisions, and a much better explanation of evolution than the Biblical story of evolution. Our reality today is created by us, not the gods. Math gives us the consciousness we have today. Unfortunately, we have done a terrible job of educating the young to understand the importance of math and science, and what that has to do with democracy. Education for technology is not education for science.
I mean, some might be. We don't truly know.
Quoting Athena
So basically, without math we'd all be at peace with our thoughts and emotions. Not the best argument, wouldn't you say? :lol:
Quoting Athena
Well that would explain the epidemic of purposelessness the average person feels each day but won't ever dare speak aloud, save for the tired and cliched talking points they themselves likely don't even believe any longer.
I like your posts, this is just more of a tirade against modern society and the pitfalls of such, as well as the "Pandora's Box"-ian ailments it unleashed on an unsuspecting world that was getting along just fine, is all. Pay me no mind. :wink:
Quoting Athena
See, now that's... interesting. Do you mean, the material inventions and innovations brought about by math has fundamentally contributed, or perhaps now defines, the average modern day human's consciousness? Sure, a person should know the difference between one sheep and two, so he does not get scammed or otherwise pay more for something he needs than he should. But as far as advanced math, I'd argue the first and earliest philosophers, before mathematicians like Archimedes, or no, not even philosophers, average "uneducated" people found the exact same immersion and level of human experience reading or telling stories, playing primitive games, or acting or watching plays that we do in 2025, if not even a greater and purer form of such, such those today rightfully would and should envy. I'd bet just about anything that's true.
Sure, we can actually fly or travel underwater or to different planets while those before us could only imagine such. But, to use the old saying, "I think, therefore I am." Meaning, just because we can experience something, doesn't mean we appreciate it. In fact, if I know human nature, and I do, it's often the opposite. It numbs us to it. What used to be wonder, becomes monotony. What those before us used to dream of at night, becomes a chore. It's really quite something to ponder, all things considered.
I have coffee with a gentleman who can not experience my passion and enthusiasm, and he envies me. I am very thankful I am not depressed like him, except that once in a while, I do lose interest in everything. I know something is wrong when I am in the dumps, thinking nothing matters.
"Do you mean, the material inventions and innovations brought about by math has fundamentally contributed, or perhaps now defines, the average modern day human's consciousness?" How could it be otherwise? Our consciousness today is nothing like it was at other times in history. It is impossible to think like someone in prehistoric times, or the very superstitious times of the Middle Ages, because we can not unknow what we know. Our moment in time forms our cohort. Our impression of reality.
"Sure, a person should know the difference between one sheep and two," Math is so much more than that. Be patient with me. I am waiting for a math book that I ordered. Hopefully, I can communicate better about the importance of math when I get that book.
Oh, oh, I get so excited. "Let no one enter who is ignorant of geometry" is a phrase attributed to Plato. We must begin with geometry and physically discovering the truths with our own hands, drawing the circles and straight lines. Now the learning is not taking someone's word for what to think, but we experience the thought coming out of our own action. When we understand the forces of nature and geometry, we have a totally different consciousness than those poor souls educated for technology, and are not educated for thinking. I think this truth strongly impacts our relationships, and being impersonal and uncaring, instead of feeling like we are in this boat together, and we'd better work together, if we are going to survive the storms.
One of the YouTubes I turned to for information said what I have been trying to say for a long time, but could not think of the words. "Survival by intimacy, not technology." In our recent past, survival was by intimacy. It is the difference between knowing something through personal experience; or just knowing the fact that someone else said is a fact, and this difference is also a difference in our relationships. Now it is okay to insult someone, and if that person feels offended, it is that person's problem, not the inconsiderate person who was insulting. Good logic, right? We can hurt people because that is not our problem, but the problem of those who feel hurt. No intimacy or social rules/ties? We are all strangers. Where is this taking us? How big is your gun, and do you pick it up when you open your door?
Education for technology favored dependency on memory, not reasoning and independent thinking. I guess now I can say most people have no understanding, no awareness, of why they think as they think.
We were all taught "how" to think, and most of us have no knowledge of the decisions about our education, so if we passed the test, we can walk around confident that we know what we are supposed to know. We have no clue what we do not know. Those who make it through college have been properly processed, and those who don't make it may be geniuses with no idea of how important they are. Who cares :angry: Survival by intimacy has been replaced by survival by technology, and this is why there is an argument against relying on science and technology, but it is not science and technology that is the problem, but how we were taught to think, and false beliefs.
And you know this how? Were you there or something?
Quoting Athena
Nobody said "prehistoric", you simply said "other times" in history. That was what that response was toward. You realize, there's people who, right now, yes in 2025, live in times and environments that perfectly match how Earth was a few hundred, a few thousand, and even many more years ago, correct?
The walls of our dwellings may change from bedrock to mud to wood back to rock again. Just as our food may change from time to time. But what makes us human, remains. We delude ourselves with notions of progress, which ultimately mean nothing if we do not elevate ourself along with them.
All excellent questions. Allow me to answer them in order, to the best of my ability.
Quoting Athena
Surely an idea has a minimum of two natures. That which the creator or purveyor of said idea intended, and that which the observer or analyst interprets.
More generally, one must first define "an idea", to get a more direct answer. We often go by consensus, hence the value of a dictionary and why such books remain prevalent. Obviously, by that case, it depends on the idea. :smile:
Quoting Athena
I couldn't answer that. No man could, according to the relevant doctrine of belief. That would be like saying what was your favorite color before you were born? How silly a thing to ponder.
Quoting Athena
How did what come to be?
Quoting Athena
Evolution suggests consciousness was evolved. If that's your bedrock understanding of reality, the answer seems to be self-evident.
Quoting Athena
Beats me. Maybe in 1,000 years your grand-kid will be asking people why did it take so long to have personal jetpacks. That's my point. We become unappreciative for things those before us would have given life and limb for. Can't you see that?
That is an excellent point.
Just last night, I watched a program that discussed the significant impact writing had on our human experience and ability to manage a civilization. I don't think pondering this is a waste of time. You said the following about wondering what others thought back then....
Einstein said imagination is very important to our ability to think. We are doing an excellent job of resurrecting the past. From marks on wood to the stories of archaeology and geology, we can learn a lot about our past. I think this is our present purpose in life, the Resurrection is the work of archaeologists, geologists, and related sciences. It is our job to learn all we can, and to wonder, and use our imaginations as we rewrite the earth and human story.
It would be silly to ponder an embryo's favorite colour, but it would be wise to consider how the embryo is affected by what it hears.
To answer that question, you must be willing to wonder about past consciousness and the ways it would be the same or different from our present consciousness. We can see that Zeus's fear that with fire we would learn all other technologies and rival the gods was justified. From archaeology, we can see human progress that was built on the technology of controlling fire, and in so doing, learning about the quality of rocks and eventually learning how to mix tin and copper and make excellent tools and weapons. And how this technology of metals shaped where people lived and traded. To me, this is very exciting information that makes me feel connected with humanity from the day we first walked out of Africa.
You answered my question about why it took so long to invent computers, thus...
You and others may be unappreciative of our progress, but sincerely, I think that is because these careless people do not know about our history and sadly do not care to know. I am sorry for them. I am so fortunate to hunger for knowledge and get very excited about learning. My life is very good because I have security, the internet, and a love of learning. As the internet improves and science increases our knowledge, my life keeps getting better. I wish this were true for everyone. And I think our pioneer women would have been so much happier and powerful if they had the internet. Technology liberated women. Our consciousness today is very different from what it was before the women's lib movement, and we started using the word "she" in our communications, when we had only used the word "he".
Talk about the power of a word! Using the word "she" where we had also used the word "he" radically changed our lives.
Once you posit that we are minds looking out at a separate external world, you already presuppose the very dualism Plato needed for his argument. He built a metaphysics out of a psychological stance (our experience of being conscious, reflective, and mediated). And everyone bought into it, just as they bought into Kant, for the very same reasons (mostly).
You yourself are skirting around the fallacy of conceptual retrojection in using modern ideas to express something we have observed long beforehand. Though it doesn't make you "wrong" but perhaps there is a better, more primative way of detail what an idea is? Something along the lines of inspiration?
Inspiration doesnt presuppose a two-world ontology. Its not a copy of a transcendent Form. Its closer to breath (in-spirare = to breathe into), a surge of force or affect that wells up and gives shape to thought or creation.
To answer:
"What knowledge does my theory contradict?"
The knowledge we currently have. Which is tentative is that consciousness/subjective experience is not something that is possible without some neurons. A quark has no neurons hence a quark wouldn't have subjective experience/consciousness.
You could say that ultimately we don't know. But practically we can tentatively claim to know.
Just like ultimately we don't know whether five seconds from now the earth will spin. But practically and tentatively we do know.
.....
Ok so subjective experience is consciousness. And the quark would be experiencing that it exists. (Something you might hear in a meditation retreat. Especially a non dual one). The issue with that is. When we experience in meditation, the sense of just existing. We have quite the system to back it up. Neurons.
Now you mighty say that our non dual meditation successes are still taking in sensory data so it's not a good analogy. Fair enough.
So we should ask. How do we know that a chair which gives no sign of subjective experience has subjective experience? A human in a coma we might keep alive even if they aren't having any dream or anything. But a chair... Is not something we would consider having such an experience. In fact if they do. Then they become moral beings worthy of consideration. A chair would be a living being. Since to experience requires to be alive. By definition. It would mean quarks have to be alive. No such indications are there. They just move. So yes it's the more radical view given our knowledge.
To be honest I do ..like.. the idea. It would be beautiful it is true. If all energy and matter is alive and having subjective experience. Which through merging and complexity becomes able to increase its ability to experience with more complexity. It is a extraordinarily beautiful idea. And in some sense I even hope it's true. But I can't let that be a bias. With current knowledge it's more reasonable to tentatively hold that subjective experience requires neurons. Or maybe so with my current knowledge. Maybe AI experts would say something different. Maybe neural simulations can have a cognitive subjective experience. But then again because they would be simulating neurons (to a degree).
I'd say I am not entirely closed to the idea. But extremely skeptical.
A question. Can you have subjective experience without any kind of awareness? It seems unlikely. You would need to be aware of yourself existing if you are to be aware of the fact that you simply exist.
How would that work without some form of cognition or mind? How would that work without more complexity then just a quark? Where does the quark get it's self awareness? And wouldn't that contradict the more complex animals that aren't self aware but only outwardly aware even with their complexity?
I see you're saying something similar as Nietzsche. He would probably say. "Platonists misinterpret their body".
I'm not a Platonist. I don't believe in a separate realm or magical dualism as far as I know.
But at the same time. It seems clear that when reality is configured as it is in you and me. And when it thinks of i.e. the idea of a dragon. Then it isn't just electrical signals and chemicals. A dragon doesn't exist. Yet these signals and neurons which do exist and are thus reality somehow create non reality. As if experience and neurons at this level almost create a new dimension in which this non reality is possible to exist. But it happens in that physical anchor somehow.
We can't say that ideas are merely a fiction and all that exists is those particles. Those particles re-arranged rocks willingly, intentionally to create the first pyramid out of an idea. It didn't do it by not imagining something that wasn't there.
It's just mind boggling.
I believe we have been thinking about consciousness, defining it, incorrectly. Most of what you said doesn't apply to my thinking.
My position is that consciousness is fundamental; a property of every particle, just as properties like mass and charge are. What does that mean for particles? Here are some quotes...
In this article, Philip Goff writes:
In this Ted Talk, Chalmers says:
In [I]Panpsychism in the West[/I], Skrbina writes:I don't like Skrbina's use of "mind" in this way. I think it leads to confusion.
Proximity does not make a group of particles subjectively experience - that is, conscious - as a group. So a chair is not a conscious unit. It's just a group of particles, easy having its own, individual subjective experience.
The things we are conscious [I]of[/I] are not what consciousness [I]is[/I]. Consciousness isn't awareness. Rather, we experience certain information processing and feedback systems [I]as[/I] awareness. We have been saying they are the same thing for millennia, but I don't think they are. That's just how something of our nature experiences itself.
Hmm I think I was quite aware of your definition for consciousness as I stated it as subjective experience.
I just assume for now that we need neurons for a subjective experience.
But this is a reasonable conclusion. (For me as a non expert in subjective experience and what gives rise to it)