Why on earth was a complex human language invented in the first place? Well, given the evolution of life on earth we are equipped biologically to create it. Other species of animals may have more or less complex sounds that can be created to more or less impart information to each other. But nothing like ours. Still, what all such sounds have in common is the communicating of practical information about the world around us. Information allowing us to sustain our existence: acquiring food, water, shelter and protection. Sounds/words conveyed that facilitate reproducing the species.
The part about exchanging abstract philosophy came considerably later. And only for our own species. Philosophers talk about that which it is rational or logical to say. That which we either can or cannot know. But the bottom line [mine anyway] will always revolve around the extent to which we either can or cannot connect the dots between the words we use and the world we live in.
We can think and say and feel almost anything about “something” and “nothing”. About mind and matter. But what can we demonstrate to others is true or not true in regards to a particular context?
And, sure, if all one is interested in is exchanging “worlds of words” that conjure up some really fascianting possibilities [and discussions], fine. My “thing” here, however, is always in connecting those speculations to that which others have to say about the existential relationship between identity, value judgments and political power.
And, on this thread, probing the extent to which we can ascertain whether these exchanges are autonomous or not. Going back eventually to an understanding of Existence itself: Why something instead of nothing? Why this something and not another?
If exchanging conjectures embedded largely in intellectual contraptions is more someone else’s “thing”, there are always going to be plenty of folks around in places like this to go in that direction.
The point of separating out different meanings of “freedom” is to be able to talk about a kind of freedom that isn’t mutually exclusive with physical determinism (that’s why they call it compatibilism).
But if all we do talk about here is only that which we were ever able to talk about here, what kind of “freedom” is that?
We make choices based on the assumption that, unlike the choices that hedgehogs and rats and spiders make, ours are “thought out” and not just the biologically imperative. Most are convinced we have the capacity to choose something else entirely. But what if that is in turn just an illusion built into human psychology built into the laws of matter.
So, the two main questions would seem to be 1] is this true? and 2] if it is, how could matter become conscious/mindful of itself as matter in exchanges like this one?
How on earth do we come to grips with this in any other way than as we are always meant to? Or, sure, not meant to?
Even using the word “compatible” here would seem to be only as it ever could have been used in a wholly determined universe.
In other words, how is this part…
If you perform an fMRI scan on a person who is asked to perform some action out of free choice, you will find deterministic operations going on in his brain. What I’m calling “psychological freedom” is simply the psychological state of making a decision to do, say, or think something and finding that this decision is carried out just as intended. ← But no one said this requires rising above the laws of nature as they would play out in the brain. It’s just a type of brain state that leads to certain behaviors.
…not just inherently [necessarily] ensconced in the only reality there could ever have been?
If what any of us “say” about any of this is just “a type of brain state” and the brain itself is just more matter in sync with whatever brought matter into existence in the first place, well, what exactly does that mean in regard to the words we choose to sustain this exchange?
Again and again: I admit the problem here may well be my own incapacity to grasp your point in a world in which I do in fact have the autonomous capacity to grasp it if only I could.
On the other hand, how are “intellectual freedom”, “psychological freedom” and “metaphsical freedom” in the brain not analogous to a battery, an alternator and a starter in an automobile engine.
Yes, the brain is able to make the sort of choices that brings into existence the parts of an automobile engine. But just as the parts of an automobile engine interact only as they ever could, so do the parts of the human brain.
There’s a part here I can clearly recognize as different. But there is also a part that thinks, “it’s a distinction without a difference”. Why? Because whatever the parts of anything, they were never, ever going to not interact as nature intended.
Then, of course, this: Is there an aspect of nature that can in fact freely intend things? Which most call God.
Well, in a wholly determined universe, my certainty is only as it ever could have been.
So is your inconsistency.
Exactly!!!
And that was only 118 years ago. Do you really imagine that a 1,000 years from now physicists will be coming to the same conclusions about QM that are being made today?
And how is it you know what they will come up with 1,000 years from now?
I don’t know. But my point revolves more around the extent to which what we think we know now and what they’ll think they’ll know then is only ever what the minds of men and women were ever configured to know by the laws of matter.
But who doubts that a 1,000 years from now this knowledge will be considerably more sophisticated?
But I do not have a deterministic take on these relationships. I’m just not sure. Meaning I’m just not sure if I could ever have not been unsure.
But look what is at stake here.
For example, your take on mind over matter [encompassed in your book] is either the result of autonomous thinking, or thinking that was never able to be anything other than what it could only have been. You accomplished only what you never could have not accomplished.
Which is why I suspect that folks whose lives are in the toilet [for whatever reason] can take comfort in a determined universe, while those who go on to accomplish considerably more are going to be wary of it. Success that is thought to be earned or success that is seen to be just another bunch of dominoes toppling over onto to each other mechanically is hardly the same thing, right?
If I point to evidence that suggests our world may not be fully deterministic after all, you jump ahead 1,000 years when scientists will allegedly (re)discover a Newtonian clockwork universe. But if I agree with you that the world is fully deterministic, you don’t even bring up the fact that this view of nature was debunked that same 118 years ago (ironic that you brought up that quote).
Again, choose a context in which human interactions unfold. Note for us the evidence you subscribe to indicating that the choices being made are not determined. And the part about the irony you note is unclear. The quote notes the gap between what any particular generation thinks it knows about the laws of nature and what subsequent generations come to update considerably. I merely point out that this is likely to continue on into the future. But: is the past, the present and the future here anything other than what only ever could have been?
And that is what philosophers and scientists and theologians have been grappling with now for thousands of years: The part where matter becomes mind and the extent to which mind as matter is or is not in sync with immutable laws. Or in sync with one or another God.
The truth is, we don’t know if the world is fully deterministic or not. That you cling to such a view despite your alleged self-professed ignorance on the topic tells me you don’t know how to follow your own nihilistic perscription.
This is ridiculous from my point of view. My frame of mind here is entirely ambiguous and ambivalent. More to the point: how could it not be given that I [like you] are grappling with these things while profoundly, problematically embedded in the gap between what we think we know about these relationships and all that can be known about them?
And, in my opinion, you are starting to steer the exchange in the direction of making me the argument. I’m the problem here. You have patiently explained to me a more reasonable manner in which to think about these things but I won’t come on board.
And, sure, I’ll be the first to admit that the problem may well be my own inadequate intellectual capacity. Either inherently or not.
Of course determinism is still “decidedly problematic”. Just as is human autonomy and free will. And the last thing I am going to be here is an objectivist about it.
All I ask of folks here is that they bring their speculations about it out into the world of actual human interactions. And not merely exchange general descriptions embedded in worlds of words.
As for this part:
The assumption here seems to be that while this is a reasonable reaction of yours in regard to my point of view, the same can’t be said regarding my own reaction to yours.
Whereas I am the first to admit that no mere mortal on planet earth has actually succeeded in pinning the whole truth down here. Hell, the human mind may well not even be able to.
I can only assume here you are making an important point that I keep missing. But: was there ever any capacity on my part not to miss it? Am I actually “destined” to get it at some point in the future? Would anything at all here have ever been other than what it is if either of us had some measure of autonomy?
Don’t think too hard about this. It’s not that important a point. We just disagree on the compatibility of meaning with determinism. You say: no freedom, no meaning. I say: no freedom, yes meaning.
In a determined universe, we think [can think] only as hard as we were ever going to think. But, so much more importantly [to me], what we think and the meaning that we think that we impart to others is also only as it was ever going to be. Thus to make the distinction that you do is just another inherent manifestation of nature unfolding.
Meaning in which there was never any capacity on our part to mean something else?
How is this not just another intellectual contraption in which words define and defend each other by going around and around tautologically in presumptuous circles? The logic doesn’t seem to be connected to any empirical interactions such that experiments and predictions can be made. Such that others can replicate them pertaining to other physical interactions out in the world that we live in.
That’s not my concern.
Obviously. But: how obvious is it in turn that there was never really any possibility that it could have been of concern to you?
Philosophy is notorious for touching on topics that aren’t empirically verifiable. This is one of them.
Yes, but this one is a particulary Big Question. It revolves around the extent to which anything that we think, feel or do was ever within our capacity to not think, feel and do.
How do the points mainfest themselves in nature manifesting itself in turn through "natural laws”?
Plato’s cave analogy is very fitting here. You can think of matter as the shadows cast on Plato’s cave wall, and the objects that cast the shadows as the experiences had by the universe that matter represents (the representational relation is quite the same; matter represents the universe’s experiences like the shadows represent the objects in Plato’s cave) The light which makes the shadows possible would be analogous to meaning. .
Or you can think of matter as encompassing everything that Plato had ever done — this being the only manner that he could ever have done it. Inside the cave, outside the cave. Darkness, light. Shadows, the objects casting them. Ultimately, it’s all the same stuff interacting as it only ever could have.
But: If that’s not the case, to what extent can actual autonomous men and women learn lessons from Plato’s philosophy. For all practical purposes. Which parts are we able to freely concur with and which parts are we able to freely reject. And, most important of all to me, how are his ideas to be integrated into the lives that we live from day to day.
In particular, relating to my thing here: How ought one to live in a world of conflicting goods?
In regard to this part however…
All experiences are meaningful, and this gives rise to what I call “flow” or “entailment”—the metamorphosis of experience from one quality to another. This is nicely represented by the flow of energy in matter, and in the brain, the flow of signals from one neural centre to another. When Information impinges on the eye, signals are sent to the occipital lobe at the back of the brain. This is where vision occurs. Then signals are propagated to higher cortical regions so that we can recognize more complex and abstract features—such as shapes, 3D cues, movement, and identities. Signals will further propagate to other brain regions so that we can think and feel about the things we see (or sense in any other way). Physically, we see a flow of energy. Subjectively, we experience a change in experiences. This change is driven by meaning. The meaning is each experience “entails” the meaning in the next. Experience A means experience B. <— The logic of experience. This “entailing” of one experience by another is represented by physical laws—one physical event “causing” another.
When we observe a fire, we see the flickering of flames, hear the crackle, and feel the heat. All this is possible because of the flow of physical energy—light, sound waves, and the heating of the air around the fire. Even before this energy flow impinges on our senses, it represents the entailment of experience—this time had by the universe, not us. All physical events between the flickering of flame and the stimulation of our senses represent experiences of some foreign quality being had by the universe. The way these physical events change represents the way the experiences morph from one quality to another, driven by meaning and entailment, until they finally take the form of a visual, auditory, or tactile sensation. <— That experience is represented by the signals that enter our brains from the sense.
Natural law is like the observation of repeating patterns in the shadows. If the prisoners in Plato’s cave notice repeating patterns in the shadows, they might come up with a concept similar to natural laws. But obviously, these patterns are themselves representation–not of objects per se but repeating patterns in the activity of those objects, which someone free to roam about the cave might identify as the real natural laws. In the case of my theory of experience, this would be analogous to patterns of entailment between experiences–qaulities of experiences which consistently entail the same subsequent qualities (similar to a syllogism: the two premises “Socrates is a man,” and “All men are mortal,” consistently entail “Socrates is mortal”… and they do so because of what the premises mean).
…you’re right. This is not the answer I am looking for. Why? Because it is basically just another intellectual contraption to me. It’s not really about understanding actual human interactions unfolding in a particular context construed from conflicting points of view. In noting the material interactions in the brain [chemical, neurological] when we experience something, we are still at a loss in understanding whether this knowledge includes or precludes human autonomy.
We just don’t know.
After all, in a determined universe, what does it mean for all practical purposes for us to speculate about where the shadow end sand the light begins? It will happen only where it was ever always going to.
Once my own mind begins to acknowledge the possibility of that, however, then it seems reasonble to assume that all of my subsequent thoughts feelings and behaviors become merely the next dominoes in line. Just like yours.
Still, my own mind [here and now] is not able to sustain any degree of certainly at all about this.
You and I, Biggy, are like the prisoners in Plato’s cave. I’m trying to convey to you a theory about what creates the shadows. I have to bring in concepts like “objects” and “light”. You don’t understand so you ask: explain these “objects” and “light” in terms of the shadows. And I try to tell you that I did: the objects and light create the shadows, but beyond that, they don’t exist as shadows. If I could, I’d throw up my hands and say: what else can I tell you?
Okay, but if this exchange itself is “imprisoned” in the laws of matter unfolding only as the laws of matter necessitate, then the arguments themselves are only as they necessarily could have been.
If the manner in which I think and feel about my own subjective experiences is the only manner in which I was ever able to think and feel about them “here and now”, what exactly would be established in making yet another attempt?
Woaw, hold on there now. While I grant your helpless role in a deterministic universe, I do not grant that your responses to my questions are themselves natural laws–as though your first response will inevitably be your every response. People change their minds all the time. They give different responses on different occasions. If on one day, they feel like avoiding a question, they can turn around and decide to answer the question the next day. You’re not special, Biggy, you can change your mind too.
Around and around we go. If I change my mind only because my mind [as brain matter] was only ever going to change in sync with the laws of matter, what is that change but more of the same?
If you persistently refuse to answer my questions, that’s only stubbornness, not a law of nature. All you need is to want to answer my questions and you will.
At times, you strike me as someone who, in charging others with not answering your question, is more concerned instead with others giving you the right answers. Your answers. Also, the assumption seems to be that my wanting to is within my capacity. If I really wanted to, I would. Even though I am still not certain that my wanting to do anything is embedded in what is deemed by some to be my “freedom of choice”.
Let’s try this: Note what you construe to be the most important question here that I have not answered.
A tactic? As though pointing out that there is certainly a gap between what either one of us think we know about these relationships and all that there actually is to be known about them, isn’t just plain old common sense!
Are you actually suggesting that, in regard to what you speculate about here and in your book, this gap is not really relevant at all?
Not to you answering my questions. Whether a tactic you use to avoid a question is common sense or not is completely irrelevant. Most tactics depend on some truth or common sense in order to be used (otherwise, they’d be totally ineffectual). What makes it a tactic, as opposed to simply a statement that helps the discussion move forward, is that your motives in using it are other than to help the discussion move forward–you’re trying to avoid answering a question which you know would put your main points into doubt.
How does any of this make the gap between what you and I think we know about these relationships and all that can be known about them go away? Until that is grasped how on earth would anyone be able to determine if and when the discussion is moving forward.
Think, for example, of sending astronauts to the moon. A hundred years ago, what the human race knew about building a rocket and a capsule that could accomplished that, was not up to the task. But over the decades that gap was closing. Increasingly, we could determine if if the discussions moved forward because the science and the technology really did become demonstrably more sophisticated. And then we reached the moon. Mission accomplished.
But how much closer is the human species to bridging the gap between what we know here and now about human autonomy and all that there is to know in order to in fact demonstrate once and for all that we possess it.
And that’s before we get to the part that most interest me: the relationship between human autonomy and human morality.
And, come on, what could Nietzsche tell us definitively about that?
But my point here is that I have no capacity myself to “really believe” any of my own speculations. At best “here and now” they can seem reasonable to me. But “I” am no less the embodiment of the gap I point to.
Ah, then we suffer the same affliction. I too know what it’s like to not really believe my own speculations (which is why I have so much trouble answering your question about how I close the gap between what’s true in my head and what’s true out there). However, from what I gather, the difference between you and I is that you’re plagued by this while I’m at peace with it.
What are you suggesting here…that while acknowledging that, like me, you recognize the gap between what you think is true in your posts here, and all that can be known about existence itself may be significant, you’re “at peace” with that?
Okay, then good for you. Me, I can’t imagine a sense of equillibrium or equanimity here given that gap. I can only resign myself to the fact that soon enough I will tumble over into the abyss that is oblvion and be bothered by it no more.
I don’t myself imagine some God or some transcending “mind” up there/out there that “I” will somehow become a part of. It’s still just an essentially meaningless world on this side of the grave and the obliteration of “I” for all time to come on the other side.
Unless, of course, someone here can persuade me to think otherwise.
You tell me:
How is Ecmandu’s post not just a bunch of words that some might even construe to be gibberish?
Well, I can see what he’s saying. He’s raising Aristotle’s law of non-contradiction–a thing can’t be and not be at the same time. If you choose to eat cornflakes, you can’t, at the same time, chose to not eat cornflakes.
Okay, but to what extent was my choice to either eat or not to eat cornflakes [like my choice to either post or not to post these words here] within my capacity to not make?
For me compatibilism seems to revolve around the assumption that a choice has been made and a meaning has been concocted for that choice — but there was never any possibility of it ever being any other way.
Thus, from my frame of mind, Ecmandu can take comfort in the fact [if it is a fact] that there was never any possibility of him not posting what he does.