Is this your own rendition of repartee?
It is precisely what might be the case here that philosophers and scientists and theologians have been grappling with since matter first evolved into minds like theirs. Or since mind first evolved into matter, as you seem to suggest.
Huh? Over and again I make note of how, if we go far enough out on the metaphysical limb, there are all manner of “explanations” that might encompass this exchange: sim worlds, the demons, senility, dreams, solipsism…
Ok, it’s just… you seem to really, really, really like to emphasize the laws of matter making us think, say, and do stuff.
Actually, what I like to emphsize most of all is the gap between what any particular one of us might claim to know about the relationship between the laws of matter and the things we think, feel, say and do, and all that actually can be known about the existence of existence itself.
Haven’t those aliens got anything better to do?
Suppose they don’t. Respond to the point I made.
See, this is the problem, Biggy. No one knows what kind of response you want. I said I’m not troubled by it (I forget what “it” is at this point, but that doesn’t matter). You asked: what if autonomous aliens pointed out that I could never have not been troubled by it? And you want me to respond to that. Well, ok. I respond that nothing would change. I would still not be bothered by it. The only light this would shed would be that I couldn’t help but to not be troubled by it. Still… I would not be troubled by it.
You seem to expect that the idea of not having a choice in the matter would somehow change things. Like now I am troubled by it.
The only kind of response I expect is one that either nudges my own thinking in the direction of that response or it doesn’t. The alien is pointing out that you had no capacity to not not be bothered by it. But that changes nothing, true.
The difference however [from my frame of mind] is the hypothetical assumption that the aliens can choose autonomously to be or not be bothered by something. Thus if you were somehow able to leave the planet earth and be in a part of the universe where the human will is not just on automatic pilot, you would grasp the disctinction more clearly.
It’s like the folks in Flatland. They are compelled to view the world through two dimensions. But there actually does exist a three dimensional world. And for all we know [re string theory] there are many more dimensions besides.
If nothing changes other than in the manner in which it must change in a wholly determined universe what does our choosing to change something mean? Our minds are matter able to broach it. Mind-boggling matter in other words. Unless there is in fact a component of mind able to choose autonomously.
…you seem to have concocted an explanation that, what, starts with mind?
Yes. If you want to rephrase your question in terms of brain matter evolving from mind, be my guess, but I’d think by now you know what to expect from me–one of those metaphysical limbs.
Matter into mind or mind into matter, what really changes? What you and I think about it either “metaphysically” or “psychologically”, is either within our capacity autonomously or it isn’t. But how “on earth” do we go about determining that given either assumption?
So, how does this general description analysis relate to the extent to which your own particular “I” is able to understand it such that it can be determined whether or not your “I” is freely choosing to type those words or, instead, was never able not to type them?
It says that my particular “I” cannot determine it either.
And that would seem to be where all of us are stuck. We can only determine it to the extent that the human mind is even capable of determining why there is something instead of nothing. And why this something and not another.
It’s just that we are among the few folks around the globe who give it a go. Most just leave all this stuff to God. We create these fascinating discussions, but some of us speculate on how futile it all might be. And that’s beofre the part about oblivion. Or the part about the is/ought world.
Okay, fair enough. But you seem rather certain that your answer is considerably closer to what the right answer might be [if there is a right answer] than mine.
First of all, I’m not sure what your answer is. Do you just mean the belief that mind evolved from matter?
Any answer that I might give may or may not be subsumed in a universe that allows for only one answer. And that answer may or may not be in sync with the answer. Though almost certainly not.
I just speculate that this is the case for all the rest of us too.
And “belief” is always my point. That gap between what we believe about the relationship between mind and matter and all that we cannot possibly know about it given all that can be known about it if the human mind is even sophisticated enough to know something like that.
Second, I wouldn’t put it in terms of “being closer to the truth”. Rather, I would say “making more sense”–and only in regards to specific philosophical puzzles. It’s a theory primarily designed to solve the mind/metter problem, and it has far reaching implications for the nature of existence–ironically, answering the question: why something rather than nothing.
And then I like to point out the gap between a “general description” such as this and attempts to bring words of this sort out into the world of actual human interactions.
All I claim is that with my theory, the questions of how consciousness comes out of brain matter, and what is existence and how did it come to be, don’t arise. That is, they are answered. But this is different from the claim that my theory is right, that the answers it provides are actually true, that they match the state of reality outside the cognitive picture of reality it paints. I cannot say how close or how far away the theory is to that, or whether the essential nature of reality is such that a cognitive model like my theory can be said to be “close” or “far” from matching it.
Okay, fair enough. I can’t possibly ask more of you than this. You are making an attempt to grapple with it. And, as a result of that, I might in time learn from it. Or not. I’m just hopelessly ambivalent [here and now] about whether the things that I choose, I choose autonomously such that I will have learned from it only because I freely chose the right things. The things that allowed me to learn from it.
And if it is not matter evolving into mind how does mind evolving into matter [if that’s what you believe] make it any easier to understand whether you either do or do not have the capacity to freely choose to do one thing rather than another.
My theory is not designed to answer the question of whether we are determined or free. It’s like asking: how does Einstein’s theory of relativity make it any easier to understand how life began on this planet?
Again, I can only respect that. It’s just that, in regard to that which most intrigues me philosophically – how ought one to live? – I have to grapple in turn with whether or not I was ever even really free to be intrigued by that.
Thus, from my frame of mind, matter from mind or mind from matter…what’s the difference re dasein, conflicting goods and political economy?
Though it would seem to be clearly the case that in regard things able to be demonstrated as either this or that, everyone’s “right” is not created equal.
When things are demonstrated one way or another, this changes a person’s “side”. If what relativism says is: X is true according to a person’s “side” (where “side” just means someone’s beliefs, point of view, picture of the world, etc.), and if demonstration has the power to change a person’s side, then X remains true according to that person’s previous side. It’s just that he doesn’t take that side anymore.
But in the either/or world [assuming there is one] there is a right side and a wrong side to choose. One’s answer is relative to that which can in fact be demonstrated to be the case for all rational human beings. With human minds, however, one can still be convinced that the wrong answer is the right answer “in his head”. And, most crucially, he behaves in accordance with what he thinks is true. And it is human behavior that precipitates actual consequences.
It’s just that given my own assumptions in the is/ought world there does not appear to be an essentially/necessarily right or wrong answer from which to choose.
After all, isn’t that really the only way in which to come to grips with, among other things, death and oblivion? If there is an answer and “I” am somehow intertwined in it, then why not for all of eternity?
If somehow “I” is at “one with the universe” and the universe is always around one way or another then so am “I”.
Something like that. I’ve always thought that a belief in an afterlife was a way of making us feel that reconciliation will come. It’s not just the comfort of knowing that we will never really die, but that everything will be made right somehow. All wrongs done to you, all the misfortunes and missed opportunities, all the unfairness, all the disappointments. A chance to finally get what you deserve (Heaven) or a chance to start over (reincarnation). It’s a way of coping with the unbearable prospect that life just isn’t fair… period.
But here [far and away] God is the belief of choice for sustaining comfort and consolation among the true believers. And it really isn’t necessary at all to even demonstrate His existence. That’s the whole point of having faith in Him. Either through one or another religious denomination, one or another Kierkegaardian leap or one or another rendition of Pascal’s wager.
Instant karma in the next world.
So, just out of curiosity, re your own beliefs regarding mind/matter, how do you imagine your own “I” fares once it shuffles off this mortal coil?
Here, I’m a lot more closely aligned with your views. I too believe the “I” fragments and disintegrates upon death, but unlike you, I don’t believe in an absolute oblivion. I believe experience continues but there will be no “I”. It parallels the body. The body, after death, decays and rots away. But it’s not as though the matter that makes up the body disappears into a black hole. The molecules, atoms, and elementary particles that make up the body continue to exist and get dispersed into nature–some being carried off by the wind, some being consumed by other organisms, some mixing in with other elements, etc. I believe that there will be a continuum joining our experiences while we’re alive with those of the universe after we die. Our minds will disintegrate into “pieces”, like the body into atoms, and transform into qualities that merge seamlessly with those of the universe, like the molecules of the body merging back into nature. There will be no more experience of “I am gib” or “I remember my childhood” or “I am a computer programmer” or “My favorite food is pizza”–all thoughts and experiences once connected to our individuality or personal identity will be gone–unimaginable experiences that only the universe can have will replace them.
Here of course all there is, is someone [anyone] asking you to demonstrate that what you believe is true is in fact true. And then to the extent that this might provide some measure of “comfort and consolation” – peacefullness – for some and not for others. But it’s still more than I am able to conjecture: “I” desintegrating back into star stuff. Not completely gone, but, come on, who is kidding whom.
If there is any comfort at all for me it resides precisely in that unimaginable gap between what “I” think I know here and now and all that must be known in order to know for sure.
There is only dying and finding out or dying not finding out.
Thus…
Is there any measure at all of comfort and consolation here for you? Because, given the way in which I think about all this, there is absolutely none for me.
At best I can only accept my own oblivion to the extent that my pain becomes so unbearable, I, like those folks in Aliens, will beg to die.
Biggy, have you ever considered that your pain might be due to something as simple a bad brain chemistry? Maybe you’re brain just isn’t producing enough dopamine.
Yeah, sure. Grappling with this necessarily takes us in many directions. On the other hand, the same could be said about our pleasure. About anything we think, feel or do. In a wholly determined unverse in which mind is brain is matter in sync with those alleged immutable “natural laws” nothing is not going to be subsumed in necessity.
I mean, we all fall into bad moods. We all get depressed. And we always attribute it to something–the first things our brains can reach for–some will blame their misery on politics, some on the state of war and poverty we see the majority of the world in, some on their family, how they were never loved, some on their job and how under-paid or under-appreciate they are. But then they have better days. They have a good night sleep and wake up in a better mood. Still, that doesn’t change anything. The world is still full of war and poverty, they still have the same job, their family hasn’t changed… but someone, now in a better mood, they shrug it off and say: life goes on, or: yeah, it’s all pretty bleak, but there’s hope that things will get better. You know how it is when you get drunk, right? All of a sudden, life is great and you love everyone around you. Did life really change in the course of a couple hours of drinking? Did everyone around you suddenly become that much more lovable? Or did your brain chemistry just change. You wonder why I could agree with everything you say yet not be troubled by it. Might it not be just differences in our brain chemistry? Maybe happiness has absolutely nothing to do with the state of the world, or whether we have the answers to the most profound metaphysical questions, but rather just what kinds of juices our brains our cooking.
Clearly that is one way to look at at. Just as there are clearly other conflicting narratives. But how does that fit into “I” interacting with “we” interacting with “them” interacting on this particular planet in this particular solar system in this particular galaxy in what may or may not be this particular universe going back to something instead of nothing going back to the reason it is one rather than another going back to or not going back to God.
But there it still is: the profoundly problematic mystery that is mind. The human mind especially.
But who really knows how many extraterrestrial minds might be out there who could take this exchange in directions that none of us have ever even imagined. Perhaps never could have imagined.