I am moving Robert's post to this new blog############ Dino
I am only discussing solipsism - i am not convinced of it nor of anything for that matter - except perhaps absurdity.
both all things i sense and perceive around me and myself may only be in my mind or they both may be made up of something physical.
they are the same either way.
one is not one way and the other another way.
i do not stress the importance of myself more than anyone or anything other other than i am more aware of myself than anyone or anything other.
i am dependent on them for my own existence and survival.
i do not and perhaps cannot know for sure where or how far my being extends.
it may extend to the limit of the universe - i don't know, though that does seem improbable.
yes, objects need space to exist since they embody space - and time - by their existence.
no space and time - no objects.
so then, who am i and what am i holding in my hand smoking?
Moved Roberts comments to this new blog.
ReplyDeleteyes, objects need space to exist since they embody space - and time - by their existence.
ReplyDeleteno space and time - no objects.
Yes, I like that. It is best to think of matter as being space and time and
motion, too. Descartes refered to physical objects as extention, in the
sense of a thing extending out into space like our arm reaching out into
space, or extending into space, thus actually becoming space as it extends outward.
Nonexistence makes sense in the idea of the "parts and the whole".
Let us consider an old type TV set. When I remove a vacuum
tube from an old tv, the tv is not a tv anymore, because it is not whole thing
anymore, nor is the tube alone, a whole thing, it is rather a part, in fact they are now
both "parts" of a whole TV. And we know that the TV exists no more, or, at least, as a
whole TV. The tube depends on the set, and the set depends on the tube.
Neither are whole things, and, therefore are not things. Robert has a hard
time with this, as he will say, that the tube is a tube, with the name "tube" and the set is still a tv set
minus a tube, with that name, so they DO exist, and have these names, and that parts of things do exist, even if
neither is a whole thing. I argued back that if people tend to not recognize these parts of things
as objects, since they are not useful to people, people do not count them as
real. My example was the fact that a bunch, or, pile of leaves, is not counted as real,
although we can sense them. He said the bunch of leaves could exist as a work of art.
All this is true, and, by the way, good arguing, but, I still say, it is opinion that
sets realness to things along with perceptibility. And, the
opinion of most people that parts of things are not things in themselves, but,
only parts until they are a put together to be something like a whole working TV set.
Parts are dependent things, which depend on other parts to join with them to become something real.
It is in this sense, there is no reality or existence, in nature, at all. In
that, if all things are parts, there are no whole things that exist.
Or, to put it another way, all things depend of other things, and if something
depends, it is not whole or complete. It is only in our imaginations that we view
incomplete things as complete and whole. They are not.
This view of reality is helpful, because it answers stubborn questions about
space, motion and exitence. Assuming it is true that people are mere parts of the planet earth,
then we can say that there is no motion in their actions of their daily lives,
like going to the store and back home again. That their moving around, are mere
wrinkles or waves or twiches on the face of the earth, rather than human free and
independent movement, because there is no space, as their feet are always planted
firmly on the ground during their travels. They are "connected" to the earth. So, there
is no motion, just as Zeno says.
But what about space. Don't we see space existing
between one person and the next? Well, it would better say, that the so called
human bodies "in space" ought to be thought of more like goose-bumps on the
"skin" of the face of the planet earth.
Each person being connected to the next by the ground that lies between
him and the next fellow. And, so viewed in this way there is no space dividing
one person from the next, hense no actual space exists.
We know that to say "space exists" is an oxymoron, anyway, because if it existed,
it wouldn't be space. My above example attempts to answer this problem of space not existing.
es to sense perception.
ReplyDeletebut what we sense is what has dimension and duration otherwise we cannot sense it and we are only imagining it.
Robert #######################################
i thought you brought up god.
god doesn't ever have to be mentioned in any of this as far as i'm concerned.
it is meaningless.
but this is what i mean that the more we try to figure these things out the more absurd it becomes.
There is no question that we sense only those things
ReplyDeletethat have duration and dimension, but do they have it?
This definition requires an independent external existence something which things may or may not have, but in order to use your definiton, we have to presume that is the case, already, which begs the qustion.
Let me put this another way. When we say that
ReplyDeleteduration is necessary for a thing to exist, that is undoubtedly true. But how do we know that it is existing
over a duration of time? We know because we "see" it
existing for a long time, and, we can "feel" that it is there.
So, I am saying, that sensation comes before duration, sensing is more fundamental than these others.
Sure, whatever, exists must be durable over time, and,
must have three dimensions, but those properties are
understood only thru sensing them, first. Thus, sensation
"trumps" duration and dimension as a test for existence.
FROM paul: #######################################
ReplyDeleteHOW CAN YOU ACT SO SURE THAT THERE IS NO GOD? WHEN A LOT OF THE REST OF US ARE SURE THERE IS. YOU BOTH ARE NOT SURE OF A LOT OF STUFF: DURATION
AND DIMENSION DEFINE EXISTENCE? no, because feelings and ideas, concepts surely exist with no dimensions. We call it the physical world to differentiate it from our mental world. Yet our mental world is really all there is. Dean you say we create stuff prior to it coming into our experience like the bowling ball hitting our foot or the truck crashing into us. This is very close to the truth. Because of our concept of ourselves not having the ability, when we try to create it won't work.
Our creation however is the belief or in other words: a person limited in a body who can't create. That what we've been creating over and over.First we must change our thoughts in faith that we will then change our beliefs. The world is not there, it is just a reflexion of our thoughts and beliefs. So once again I say neither the world or bodies exist. I don't know why it seems so real, except that it is vital to the continued existence of our egos. We are part of something bigger and the whole idea of billions of people is merely a dream. We are more than bodies and we are one. (I know this seems incredibly strange to me too) Here's how to start on the path back to truth (since this perceived world represents untruth)
One person says there is a God. Another says there isn't. Meanwhile
neither has found the perfect life or endless happiness. Neither has found power or guidance.
But I have myself found these qualities in mysticism. When I am
practicing this work (it's not easy but work) I do find guidance,
energy, power and peace. Most of all I find JOY. I find the knowledge that He is indeed there.
When it is said of course there is no God, me thinks you protesteth too mucheth ha ha. Similar to a mental patient this keeps your mind closed. The theory says we are ALL insane. This is you agreeing with your ego a big mistake. The trick is to undo the ego because it's not needed. When we are truly free we will be like little children putting our hands in our Father's and not needing to know anything to have His love. And perfectly trusting Him for everything. The ego is always against REALITY or GOD because he is threatened and doesn't love you in fact hates you and under his leadership will keep you forever weak and unsuccessful. It is he that creates a never ending series of "problems" things for you to do or fix.
Keeping you busy, hectic, not able to think, in an endless dialogue with yourself, avoiding recognition of what you really need, or what mistakes have really taken place in life. Never side with the ego. He will not be satisfied till you are dead. (I know this sounds strange.) But that is the nature of the ego pure selfishness! We define the ego as that part of us that beleves in seperation. That we're alone and there is nothing more than our body that's all we are. But we can turn away from the ego and this perceived world.
Here is where we MUST turn. To doing the work. Let me ask a question
if there is no God, then how could there be mysticism?
-
HOW CAN YOU ACT SO SURE THAT THERE IS NO GOD? WHEN A LOT OF THE REST OF US ARE SURE THERE IS.
ReplyDeletePaul, A lot of people believe that Hitler was right, does that make him right? Paul, I know you know better, when u say this....
Feelings and Ideas and thoughts are real and so are electromagmetic fields, and magnatism, and Holloween, But, it is true, they are often said
to take up no space, and therefore do not exist.
Paul, that is what you are saying about feelings and ideas
that they do not exist. You may not realize you are claiming this, but it is true, believe it or not.
If things do not have dimension, how can they exist, you ask?
It is true, many say
that light does not exist, since it has no dimension, and
appears to occupy no space, but, if fact, Paul it does have dimension, and it can be measured, and, it is now
understood to actually BE matter, actual matter, only light exists in the form of energy. E equals MC square. Meaning that energy IS mass. So, feelings and ideas are really
matter in the form of energy.
To believe in a god is to have a closed mind, not the reverse. Yeah, we
atheists protestith too much, but we have to, cuz all
the limings are denying the truth, they, of the closed
minds, will use logic only so far, and then abandon it
for saliloque and trite sayings of Budda or Jesus or whoever.
How can people use common sense all day long, and
then go to church, and forget their natually given
brain to these fancy poetic phrases?
Paul, I think you want us to kiss god's ass, too much.
ReplyDeleteIn other words, most people cannot write about god
unless they do it in reverent tones. If they don't show
respect for god, no one will read what they say, as most
people (98%) are theists (beieve in god), and no publisher will touch you if you disrespect god in your writing.
But how are you to write objectively with constantly
having to watch every little word you write?
So, I think you sense impropriety in Robert's and my writing, and this you interpret as we being too sure of
ourselves. Robert admits he is a theist (believes in god)
but he still refers to god as "it" and views "him" as
impersonal or mechanical, like a force in nature of some
kind, not a caring being.
I see nothing of the kind.
Robert, I think I see your "patterns" in nature that you write about. But I still have
trouble with your insistence on that we experience the
world exactly how it is. Don't you think we have a lot of
input in our experiences?
PAUL ########################################
ReplyDeleteKiss God's ass?? Haha. You have writing ideas. A potential.
Right about getting published or rejected. Think God has an ass?
The need for reverance is questionable because we're are down here in the trenches sweating it out. IN the theory's view God does not see this world. He sees only what he created. Perfection. So I think in general
he doesn't take a look at this world at all(it might become real). He simply sees that part of his son is asleep and distracted by the things of this dream. We can call it a waking dream.
Also you say Robert calls God an it, not a caring being. Like I just said, god doesn't see anything but perfection. To have power this is how a creator has to be and must be loving(love casts out fear). Therefore if
something is wrong, we must be the ones to contact god and ask for help.
If we ask then we are starting a dialogue. If we want an answer we must listen in return. Listen. We don't have to try for brownie points in
speech in front of others or kiss ass. Just listen.
However we have created the problems ourselves as we're not aware of the tremendous power of thoughts, ideas, doubts, worry, fear. Fear creates the very thing we are afraid of. Change your thoughts and you
will change the world. Examine your thoughts all day long. There are quite a few. A huge problem is people pray OK and innocently fail to achieve because they unfortunately don't refrain from the old thoughts
and problems return so to speak. Whereas if with mind control those old ideas can be overcome. It's work. Or if such undesirable thoughts should return again quickly say no that idea or thought is nothing and utterly powerless (or Dear God please take that thought away forever.)
There is truth. Not just the truth someone wants. It doesn't matter what an individual thinks or wants or how angry he is with god. People have hated god's guts! (There's another one haha.) The truth is all that is true and all that will ever be true, the way the universe is set up. We can not wish for that to change to our liking. Come to learn about it and you'll see it always has been to our liking. he loves us he is with us
and he will help us when we ask and seek. Thus the conclusion that we need to be very disciplined, in the extreme! We will not achieve what the saints and masters who went on ahead of us have, by not doing the work.
I have not seen a lot of proof of this world being unreal but I have a couple times and I have been very critical of the course of miracles all the time say in last 4 or 5 years and man this stuff works!! Still I
don't need to convert anyone. This is not an organized religion but a
self-help book.
--
WOW! Homepage (http://www.wowway.com)
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PAUL ######################################
ReplyDeleteKiss God's ass?? Haha. You have writing ideas. A potential.
Right about getting published or rejected. Think God has an ass?
The need for reverance is questionable because we're are down here in the trenches sweating it out. IN the theory's view God does not see this world. He sees only what he created. Perfection. So I think in general
he doesn't take a look at this world at all(it might become real). He simply sees that part of his son is asleep and distracted by the things of this dream. We can call it a waking dream.
Also you say Robert calls God an it, not a caring being. Like I just said, god doesn't see anything but perfection. To have power this is how a creator has to be and must be loving(love casts out fear). Therefore if
something is wrong, we must be the ones to contact god and ask for help.
If we ask then we are starting a dialogue. If we want an answer we must listen in return. Listen. We don't have to try for brownie points in
speech in front of others or kiss ass. Just listen.
However we have created the problems ourselves as we're not aware of the tremendous power of thoughts, ideas, doubts, worry, fear. Fear creates the very thing we are afraid of. Change your thoughts and you
will change the world. Examine your thoughts all day long. There are quite a few. A huge problem is people pray OK and innocently fail to achieve because they unfortunately don't refrain from the old thoughts
and problems return so to speak. Whereas if with mind control those old ideas can be overcome. It's work. Or if such undesirable thoughts should return again quickly say no that idea or thought is nothing and utterly powerless (or Dear God please take that thought away forever.)
There is truth. Not just the truth someone wants. It doesn't matter what an individual thinks or wants or how angry he is with god. People have hated god's guts! (There's another one haha.) The truth is all that is true and all that will ever be true, the way the universe is set up. We can not wish for that to change to our liking. Come to learn about it and you'll see it always has been to our liking. he loves us he is with us
and he will help us when we ask and seek. Thus the conclusion that we need to be very disciplined, in the extreme! We will not achieve what the saints and masters who went on ahead of us have, by not doing the work.
I have not seen a lot of proof of this world being unreal but I have a couple times and I have been very critical of the course of miracles all the time say in last 4 or 5 years and man this stuff works!! Still I
don't need to convert anyone. This is not an organized religion but a
self-help book.
Yeah, I know it is a self-help book, not an organized religion.
ReplyDeleteIt seems like you think Robert and I are bitter at the world. I'm sure many people are bittter, and, that they
blame god for their bad luck. But, believe me Paul, that is
not what is happening here. We are not doing this blog
cuz we are disallusioned with life.
On the contrary, we have both repetedly proclamed our love of life.
But I have to say, I do suspect, not for sure, that Robert
has thought the same thing about me. That I was bitter
at my lot in life, and that I had "lost my way", as they say,
and that it generally seemed to me he was proclaiming the same thing about me that I think you are saying about he and I.
No, I say those nasty things about god cuz I don't believe he exists, not cuz I am a crazy, or unhappy man.
You say god is not into these petty little day to day trivia
of we mortals, that is what Einstein said, that god was
impersonal, and, that is what Robert says too, except R.
sees god as more of a machine than you do, a person with emotions. I think you see god as a caring person who is not interested in me calling him names, and such.
ok - i think this is working for me now.
ReplyDeletewe'll see...
first of all to dino -
i can see how sensation "trumps" dimension and duration.
how can we say anything exists unless we can sense it?
all i am saying is that when we sense something having the necessary properties of dimension and duration we say it exists.
yes, sensation comes first.
without mind to perceive it does anything exist?
this leads to what i gather you guys are saying about god.
god fails this test.
god cannot be touched tasted smelled seen or heard so how does it exist?
people will respond by saying god somehow transcends the physical universe and exists elsewhere.
i say this is nonsense.
the closest i can come to believing in anything close to being god is thinking that the universe itself is a living organism.
this would meet the qualities god is supposed to have to being something that is infinite.
but with that being said it is not something that can be prayed to or worshiped and will act in our personal lives.
ok - it worked this time but i don't know why...
ReplyDeleteto continue -
i would agree with dino in that for those of us who do not believe in god - except i believe in the flying spaghetti monster (lol) - we are not missing something because of that.
believing in god seems to be a common human delusion that does serve a purpose to give us some sense of social order but that's all it is.
god itself does not exist as i mentioned above.
paul -
ReplyDeleteyou say god is loving and good but what about all the evil that has been committed in its name throughout history.
how can you not take that into account?
believing in god in my view is a sign of something missing in someone - belief in themselves.
atheists do not have this problem.
they take responsibility for themselves not place it on some supernatural being they imagine existing and must be obeyed that they then force on others.
You mentioned properties to which we identify things
ReplyDeleteto be what they are. And, I do see that dimension and
duration do indeed follow from sensation, but over the
passage of time the properties of physical things change,
and I say that this means the things with their properties
become something else, than what they were, and so making the definition as that which lasts over time, a problem.
For example, we talked about the table receiving a scratch, to which I said that the table is no longer the
same table. You disagreed saying that it is the same
one but with a scratch.
But then how is it that "Table X is
the same as "Table X plus a scratch" not new, and having different properties, and this
table does have a different property, the scratch, now makes it a different
table than the original, where I say, the original is gone?
I screwed that up, but you get it.
Anyway, sure we must have the mind to perceive or then
nothing exists. But I still think that the objects of perception are not created out of thin air, as nothing is
created via the law of conservation. But, then we have to
try to figure how it is that we mean that reality is imaginary. I am sure it is, but, can't seem to work out
the details of it.
sure, things are fluid and constantly changing.
ReplyDeletea table doesn't need to have a scratch to not be the same table moment to moment.
nothing is fixed as they appear.
logically this is so.
logically it doesn't make sense to call anything a table scratched or not.
but some things hold to a more or less form to be called a name like table whether it is scratched or painted or missing a leg or whatever.
we do not use strict logic to determine this but our minds are more flexible than that to include even a stick drawing of a table to be called a table.
but we can also be discriminating as well.
we would not buy a new table in a store that has a scratch on it because it is not what we want it to be.
however we would buy the scratched table if we were offered a discount.
i'm not sure why this is so important to you or how it fits into anything else we are discussing.
i also don't see the problem of things being entirely in our minds although this is something that we cannot determine whether it is true or not.
we could possibly set up a virtual reality that would be indistinguishable from normal reality.
if we were in this virtual reality that is an exact duplicate how would we prove to ourselves it is not real?
Can't find any link to click on. I'm glad it seems we're all pretty happy
ReplyDeletemost of the time. This is good and gives us a greater potential for self control *& many other things as well! I know that you are very intelligent and good, and Robert as well. I need the address for the site
Paul, thanks for the kind words about me and Robert.
ReplyDeleteRobert: You said a table doesn't need to have a scratch to not be the same
one moment to moment. So, I guess this means that the simple passage
of time makes something different at every moment.
This I agree with, and, I agree that appearances cause the assumption of
the permanance of things.
Why do I care about this, you ask, and, how does it fit into our discussion?
I think we best get clear on presenting the philosophical problem, which
is a scientic one, also. I think we are trying, or I am, to understand how it
can be that what we experience as reality, is false. For instance, it must
be that, due to our busy imaginations that a table remains the same table
while we know that in each moment it becomes something other than
the same table.
Then knowing that to be true, we can begin to try
to develope an appreciation of the problem. And, as you know,
you dispute the fact that there is a problem at all, to which I sorta agree,
but that is no good, cuz we need to embrace the issue clearly before we
can begin to solve it.
By the way, I have the same sort of objection to
this as you are having...claiming there is no problem....like, hey dude, let's get past this, and get on with it.....stop making a mountain out of a mole hill....and on and on. So, I am trying to re-state the original problem of
philosophy in order for us all three, to clear it up, one way or another,
with all the objections to it, and, counter-objections and so forth.
Also, I do not accept this pop answer of today that there are some questions that are unanswerable...for me, that is a cop-out.
Then you say that you do not see the problem of things being totally
in our minds. Ok, let me refresh our memories on this. If all of reality is located entirely in our mings, then how is it that we cannot predict future moments like what we will encounter once we step into the next room, and, say, find grandma sitting there when we believed her to be outside working
in the garden, for instance. Or, how is that, if I am imagining everything,
and things do not have an equal external, independent existence apart
from out minds, that I dare not step out onto the freeway, lest a mac truck
will slam into me, if all mac trucks are mental manifestations only?
Then, u go on to say this is something we cannot determine, whether
reality is inteneral or external, that if we create an artificial reality exactly
like the one we experience, how could we know the difference. My answer
is that we cannot know the difference, but so what? We might as well
say this is a virtual world created by ET's from another planet. But that is
not the question, in this discussion. The question is that, regardless of
this world being artificial or not, does it reside solely in our heads?
the example i used of virtual reality was just an analogy.
ReplyDeletebut how would you propose to go about testing if what we perceive as being outside of us is actually out there or only in our minds?
i cannot think of any test we could conduct that would prove it one way or the other.
it all remains speculation.
a lot of people believe as you seem to state with your examples that if it is all in our minds then that should give us control over it that we obviously do not have - ie. the truck will smash our body if it hits us.
i do not think having control would necessarily be the case even in the sense of pure solipsism.
the fact is that we do not have control over it but that does not prove that it is really out there and not only in our minds nor the other way around either.
how or why it works that we do not have control i do not know other than that is the way it is for whatever (unknown and perhaps unknowable) reason.
i still feel that the more we venture into this the more absurd it becomes - something i've stated before that you have dismissed or not responded to.
trying to figure it out logically only seems to add to this absurdity as our discussion seems to demonstrate.
that is the conclusion the existentialists have come up with and they have developed a philosophy in the face of it all being absurd.
you say "the same table".
what same table?
there is no fixed table to be the same as or different from.
it is merely a configuration of ever-changing patterns that appear to us as a table over time.
exactly when do we point to it and say that is the table?
this appearance is what the mystics call maya.
it is not real.
i am sort of saying - come on, let's get on with it.
ReplyDeletewhat i mean is that i accept what you have said so far - at least to the point of giving it the benefit of the doubt for now - and want to hear what comes next in your argument of your theory.
but we keep returning to repeating these same points we have been for quite awhile now.
let's get past them.
i feel i have been prodding you to do this with my comments but for some reason you have taken them to be me arguing with you which i am not - i don't think.
i think we are on the same page but where does that take us next?
what can we conclude from this if anything?
Well, if there is no test imagninable to know whether reality is internal or
ReplyDeleteexternal, then we have a big problem, as you know. This automatically
implies we are talking nonsense. I imagine shutting off conscousness like
in death, wouldn't that remove reality? But, what if we could make the
entire world un-sense capable, while still allowing people to preceive, but
making there be nothing to perceive, seems like that would cause the
same outcome, and, then, what u suggest would be correct, due to the
"principle of indiscernables" of Leibniz, meaning that two things that are
exactly the alike in all ways, are the same thing, and, are, one thing.
So, that would mean that there is no question that we are discussing,
or that science is looking at, or, philosophy, and that the question of whether idealism or realism is ture, does not exist.
So, maybe that makes it all absurd, as u say, but I think we have to be more careful with the description of absurdity, than we think.
On the other hand, when you talk of the table persisting as the same table
over time, or enduring over time, it being the same, it seems easy to believe
that it is, in that way, that we mentally force the table to stay that same thing through a duration of moments.
In that sense, isn't that done through the power of the imagination? And probably no test for the truth of that applies, but, it does seem reasonable, to think that.
Yes, I'm not sure where to go from here. No, I am not aguing against you,
cuz, as you say, it is I, not you, who is making the claims. But you do
sometimes make claims, but they are usually the everyday beliefs of the
so called average man undertandings of reality, rather than what I'm doing.
And, I'd say, that when I do argue with you, I am really trying to put difficult
ideas into easily acceptable everyday language, instead of this
annoying math-based, or scientific and philosophic jargon we so
often hear, that renders understanding it, well neigh impossible. ha ha.
i'm not sure i follow what you are saying about making the world imperceptible or what it would mean if we did do that.
ReplyDeleteor about two things being the same thing.
i only have the average everyday understanding of things so that is all i can make claims about.
i know little about math or science or logic.
to me it's all just jargon that has little meaning to me.
i have no idea who leibniz is or many of the other philosophers you mention along the way.
it's greek to me - ha ha.
I pretty well know what you do, and do not, know. I mention Liebnez to
ReplyDeletereveal that the principle is a valid one, not to be taken lightly.
He said that if you take two things that are identical in everyway,
then you do not have two things, but only one. This is important all
through analysis, since so many mutltiple one thing into many obsure
words and meaning that have no business being all the things that
we usually imagine existing. We know that many make the error of
what is called the fallacy of false dicotomy, trying to imply there are
two concepts rather than one, like saying there is either external
reality or internal one. That you point out is one concept. Leibniz said
to imagine two equal universes located side by side to each other, and
that one of them is slightly off-center of the other, or, that one is
located 5 feet to the right of the other one. The two universe were identical to each other. This would mean that there are not two things
in this scenario, but only one thing.
Now that is what you did when you said that you cannot imagine a test
that could prove that the world being imagined cannot ever be shown.
I agreed, and tryed to construct an imaginary test to prove what you
said, and in doing so, I discovered that there is no discernable difference
between there being a ideal universe, and a real one. The principle of
identical indescernables. Does that explain it any better?
The test was to take the world away, but leave a person with his perception
and see what happens, this condition would be idealism - nothing existing.
Then, I said make the person blind, and have no senses, but leave the
world alone, I noticed that the two conditions would be the same black-
out for the person without sensation, as it would be had we removed
the world, and left him in it, with normal perceptions, hearing, sight, touch, it would seem the same thing to him - like nothing existed in both situations.
That fact, rendered the whole question of Idealism mute.
I don't know why u keep saying that you have no special training in
disciplines, what is your point? Do you want to say something, or is this
an apology of some sort?
I think you are very smart in all this, your training is not important to me.
You were saying we ought to move on, well, how about we discuss your
ReplyDeletereligion. I think we have before but all I remember is that you described your god as a force, or a dumb, or mechanical, cold force, with no feelings or, interest in human activity, so for that reason I'll call it "Force-it", and I
also thought that you were describing Force-it to be very much akin to
"The Force" they talked about in the movie 'Star Wars". And, I think that Force-it does not do anything, but be absurd, and pretty much meaningless.
How am I doing?
So, I would l like you to critic my foregoing analysis and add and subtract to it, as you wish. I think religion is appropriate to this blog, and we don't
seem to have gone into it much. Don't think that I am out to harm your
beliefs, I am just very interested, and, of course, I will try to hold you to
logic if I think there are inconsistencies. But I know that you and Paul are
pretty resilient to critizism, I'm glad to say.
i hate star wars.
ReplyDeletegeorge lucas destroyed science fiction forever.
the force is a farce.
i believe in many things.
it is just one of them.
there is the flying spaghetti monster.
there is the dada-ananda.
there is the tao.
there is the buddha.
there is the christ.
there is mohammed.
there are all the gods who have ever been named.
there are all the gods who remain unnamed.
there is no god.
etc.
so you are saying there is no difference between idealism and realism?
Same question, slightly altered. Why do you believe in all those gods, (and, in no god) instead of being an atheist?
ReplyDeleteI thought I was clear in explaining that there is no difference between Idealism and Realism. And, why is it you don't realize that this, as it is what YOU claimed, not me, and that I am just agreeing with you?
OK, it all started with you saying that you could not imagine such a test for
there being Idealism, that would prove it to be true. So, I wrote back,trying to create a mental experiement that would show it to be true or
false, which led me to the conclusion that there is no difference between
the two views of reality. Do you follow me up to this point?
Now, I continued by describing a situation in which 100% Idealism was involked.
Here is that situation......
Imagine that there is only one person on the face of the earth, and, that
this person had no sense perception, that he/she were blind, deaf, no sense
of touch, no nose (no ability to smell), and, could not utter a sound.
If this were ever the case, then for him, he/she would be living in a world of
his/her ideas (Idealism), with no physical reality to be experienced, eventhough total Realism exisited.
Now, let us construct the exact opposite, an entirely "unreal" world, with
no physical objects existing within it, yet the person had all their faculties
to perceive this world, he could see, feel objects, hear sounds, smell, and
taste, but, note these sense organs would be of no use to him/her cuz there
would be nothing in the world for him/her to perceive. This world would be
100% Idealism, but the experience for the individual would be exactly the
same. (for Realism, and, for Idealism). So, I concluded there is no difference either in idealism or realism, in that, shown in this test where one would ultimately experience exactly the same results whether he was living in an ideal world or a real world.
how can i be an atheist when i believe in so many impossible things at once for no other reason than to believe them?
ReplyDeleteatheism is way too restrictive.
i couldn't confine myself to just that.
why would i want to?
the possibilities otherwise are endless.
right - i guess there is no difference between idealism and realism.
so what does that mean?
From Paul ###########################################
ReplyDeleteDINO I don't know how I could make such a mistake to compliment you on your writer's ideas. I suppose I was trying to deal with you. But those remarks you made about God were the most asinine ugliest things you've ever said. Those words and the way you put them together not only shows
disrespect but a total lack of class on your part. It was insulting to me personally and "horrible" as my friend Dodd told me.
If you want to talk like that to people I can guarantee you no one will like you. No one. This is vital for you to know: Sorry to be the one to tell you this but you came across like a total ass with ridiculous arrogance, unjustified arrogance. You know I already have proved you
wrong. Of course God is real! The cleverness of the argument
sailed sraight over your head. Read it for a change. If there
were no God, mystics would not find anything. Yet they do. Great
people who have delved into the discipline, have indeed been inspired to write books to help others along the way such as Robert Merton,
Sister Theresa of Avila, the saints in general have found peace and power in their daily meditations, check out hinduism, buddhism, Einstein,
Max Plank. Who do you think you are?
It certainly is not obvious that there is no God. The fact that some
other scientists don't believe in God is of course not proof as you seem to think. Einstein is good enough for me. Besides I invoke the same rule as you said, "just because some say it's so doesn't mean it IS so."
When you said "a lot of people thought Hitler was right doesn't make him right" So I challenge you to find any evidence that suggests or might prove there is no God. Not just arrogance or disrespect, please! Give me a classy well written argument.
There was no sense in what you wrote because it's obvious that spirituality is extremely important to me in my life now. How could you say those idiotic things? In light of that? What gives? you are angry
that someone believes. I write such a beautiful page, uplifting and
intelligently arguing a proof or substantial evidence, hopeful
like a wonderful truth sermon and you reduce it all to the level of
HAha let's make fun of God! Well your humor got to me after a couple of days. That was bad because it caused bad feelings.
Sorry, too blunt.
ReplyDeleteRobert, what I mean is to ask you is how would the world be if there were
ReplyDeleteno Speghetti Monster in it? And, how is it different now, that there is a
Speghetti MOnster that exists?
I am asking you this to try to examine how your philosophy works.
ReplyDeleteChange is a property of things. Thus change by itself does not exist.
ReplyDeleteChange simply occurs in all material things. Change is always entropic,
but that has nothing to do with existing. I am trying to explain
how it is that Parmenedes claimed that nothing changes. That is because
change itself does not change, it is always the same, it is always change in
other things, not in itself.
But it isn't changing, cause if change changed, it would have to stop changing, that would be the only way change could change.
All things undergo the process of aging, which usually means disintegration.
or entropy. This is usually what change is, aging is falling apart. But
Parmenedes is saying that this ought to be viewed as a characteristic, or,
as they say, an attribute of all things. So, in the same way we know that
properties exist only abstractly, like the color red, or, smoothness, or
largeness, and, we know that these properties do not have independent
existence on their own, but are imagined by us as real, we still know they are not real things. In this way change being a physical property of all things is also imagined, as is motion in bodies, we seem to perceive.
But, Motion is no more than change, in fact, all change is motion. The aging of our bodies, is the motion of atoms changing in our bodies. Time is motion. So, time can be equated with change, and, therefore, with abstractness, too. Note that each person moving, is in his own time.
Now, we are reducing reality to only imagined things. But that still leaves
sense perception itself, which I have to say it cannot be imagined, we must be engaged in sense perception OF something, that is NOT imagined.
On the other hand, isn't our labelling of senses and our combining of them
purely sense correspondence? We exclude all things that do not correspond to mutlple sense perceptions. But even so, what are the things
that are corresponding? This might be circular...why should there already
be "things" that correspond, and if there are, what are they? Answer is, whatever are the things that correspond, they are the things that are counted.
And, counted, only if they correspond to two or more senses (usual sight
and touch).
So, it would be improper to ask what they are, if they are whatever we
say they are. It's like asking why are all the red shoes red. Because we
only choose the red ones.
Also, we do not create reality, but only pick it. We pick whatever provides us with sense perception, especially that which has depth, or dimension, to
the touch, and causes us to re-fucus our eyes from front to back which we
call depth perception, and what has visual stimulus (color). I don't mention auditory sensation, cause I prefer to be thinking of rocks, empty boxes, which are inanimate and therefore, silent.
So, we say only that which can be perceived is real, the rest is nothing or
empty space. That is what Parmenedes means by saying that science and such, is the way of opinion. Not that, it is our opinions that are creating things out of nothing, but, our opinions that are picking things to be real. We are choosing what is real.
dino -
ReplyDeletewhy focus on flying spaghetti monster?
i stated that i believe in ALL gods - even the monotheistic ones.
the fsm was invented by this guy in protest of people trying to get creationism taught in schools.
he made it into and official legal religion.
that's pretty much all the others have done as well - made themselves official legal religions.
sometimes the only religion.
i also stated that i believe in no god.
i would partly agree with paul - though i don't understand why he's so upset - mystics do have an experience that has been labeled and named "god" (or nirvana, etc.).
though i would not agreed that this is in any way proof of the existence of god.
it can very easily be explained as a psychological experience occurring entirely in the brain.
as i understand it what has been stated about it this experience is very pleasant - described as bliss.
however dino rejects this claim as unreal because he states that it cannot be verified.
i disagree with that.
i believe that if one follows a disciplined course then one will come up with the same results - bliss.
i do not understand why this is different from a scientist following a disciplined course to conduct an experiment.
i liked your description of change.
ReplyDeleteyes, change is always the same as it is always changing.
the rest of what you wrote was confusing to me.
are you saying that there is something real outside of us we are having sensations of?
if at times you cannot curse your own gods then what good are they?
ReplyDeleteWhy did I call yours the FSM, only? I was trying to show you that I appreciated your outlook on god, that you did not necessarily take god seriously.
ReplyDeleteI kinda thought that was a point you were trying to make with the
Flying Speghetti Monster, did not know it was a real religion, anyway, still
need an easy way to refer to your belief system, what word can I use to
not cause trouble?
Wait a minute, no, I acknowledged that you believed in no god, but back
aways you admitted to being a theist, or, that means one believes in a god,
no?
Yes, I see what you mean by nirvana being verified by others acheiving
the same bliss state. But, I think that scientic verification means something more stict like a lab where some of the people are observers and others are
the subjects. It is the testimony of the observers, not the subjects, that
is considered verification. In other words, the proof must come from the
guys in the white coats, so to speak, not the ones who have the experience.
Do you see how this is different than people just saying they have reached
bliss or nirvana?
Thanks for liking my description of change.
No I am not saying that there is something outside of us that we are sensing.
That is an important question.
We only know we are having sensations.
Sensations exist, not things. Why? how? Because, everything exists all
over the place, but we are ony counting the stuff we can sense. That is
OUR made up rule. And, as a flimsy made up rule, how do we have the
audacity to call only those things that we can see and feel, real?
What about the rest?
So, it comes down to, that the world is crowded, and stufted with matter,
yet, only the few things that cause us to perceive them, exist? Why? Who
says? Get what I mean? Why do we give this privaledged position to just
this kind of matter? There is much more dark matter in the universe than
the matter we experience. But that matter
we just blandly ignore, yet there is more of it, but we don't care about it,
why not?
If you accept what I say that the universe it packed full of matter, it would
not be meaningful to say that just certain kinds of matter existed, right?
And, how could it exist, if there is no empty space for it to exist in (too crowded)?
Don't you see, if there is matter in every inch of space, there is no place
for this special "sensed" matter to be. But, we just say it exists outside us,
as though there were room for it to be there.
You may ask, ...but what is it that we are sensing, if not something outside
of us? It IS there, but it has no space to exist in. So, it is not a thing or an
object, like we think of it. It has to be independent, alone, free, to
exist, it needs empty space all around it to be something real out there
existing. Sensed things do not have the space to exist within, nor does
anything else, therefore they do not exist.
test to see if this blog is full.
ReplyDeleteROBERT's POST
ReplyDeleteROBERT'S POST....it apparently did not print onto this blog...so I am
adding it myself. Dino.
you seem to want me to believe in one thing that you can identify and name.
why?
why just one thing?
that is where we went wrong with religion - monotheism.
we have come to believe that there is only one correct answer for everything.
even science thinks this way.
i do not.
i believe in the possibility of anything and everything.
if there is more than we might be sensing then there might very well be a god i would think.
what is preventing one from existing?
we have argued that there cannot be god otherwise we would sense it.
that was the proof of the pudding of existence.
now from what you have described leaves the door wide open for god to walk in.
to heck with the men in the lab coats.
who needs them to tell us what we are experiencing?
Yes, i have to agree that there are many answers and points of view for
ReplyDeleteall questions, but though not so with math and logic, that, in fact is one of
the hallmarks of both these. And, as we have discussed before,
what they both do to acheive the ability of permitting one answer, and only
one, for all questions, is, to reduce the question to all the small little implications, hidden within the question. Doing this it is possible or answer
yes or no, or, one or zero, or black and white, to any complex question, by
undoing it, so to speak, or unravelling it, laying it out, down to its many single claims, one at a time.
But, I understand the grey areas, and by allowing this, it puts the nut cases
and preachers under some kind of control, like Hiltler, who was an extreme idealist.
Sure, science thinks we will find the ONE and true answer to everything.
It was always of this way of thinking.
The men in the lab coats, could be anyone, as long as it wasn't the person
testifying that he is having some experience. In others words, there has to
be a third party deciding if something is true, not the one making the claim.
The controlled experiement of the unbiased observer.
You misunderstand what I'm saying that the unseen exists. Yes, only if
it is verified using instruments, like telescopes, to, shall we say, expand
our senses. We are not directly sensing the solar system existing, but
instruments that magnify our senses, do, and with our sense perception,
we can read the dials, and readings, telling us that something is there that
we do not sense dircectly.
So, where are the instuments telling us that there is a god?
PAUL#################################Interesting, I just can't buy it tho. Let's examine what you say here:
ReplyDeleteBut, I understand the grey areas, and by allowing this, it puts the nut cases
and preachers under some kind of control, like Hiltler, who was an extreme idealist.
I don't see how preachers need to be put under some kind of control. Do you really think they are all nut cases?
I don't see preachers per se as a danger in swaying the masses or anything like that. They did not have the power
but the white house did in 2003. Some bad preachers joined in. But it was the Bush-Cheney brainwashing on TV. They
wanted all of us to see Iraqis burning the American flag knowing the angry and grieving mood the country was in.
Then simply started an unnecessary war, and never stopped or pulled out. The worst government in the last two centuries I would say.
But what about good preachers? Offering people help working with families to heal their problems or advise them.
Norman Vincent Peale always helped people to realize change and that we are not limited in so many ways as most people always think
There are a lot of good people connected with all churches from what I've seen. I guarantee it. Just because someone believes there is no God, doesn't mean they are nut cases or like Hitler. Would you call Mother Theresa a nut case? I'm sure a lot of atheists would still
recognize good people everywhere.
I don't believe a lot of things about Catholicism but I can still learn a lot of good stuff watching the Catholic channel. Listen to Joel Olsteen sometime ....... my idea of a great preacher. He is so positive and is about love.
Someone said look at all the evil that has been done in the name of God. Do you really think it was God's idea? Let's face it it's man.
Man doesn't need God to do and be evil. He does it without asking God. Look at it like this :: Truman call s a bunch of scientists into the white house and says we want an atom bomb and we want it like yesterday....... That'll be all you have your orders! Move!
You think science is the Divine but a case could quite easily be made for saying that science is evil for supporting war. It's man.
Always looking for new ways to hurt other men. The gun was developed, then the rifle, tanks, machine guns and on and on to the....................................... atom bomb and missile technology.
A machine or instrument that could detect the soul or God? Your faith in science instruments to me seems child like, because there are so many things not understood such as disease, aging, corruption of men, diet, etc. you name it. How can we make a happy world?
We haven't found a way to stop children from starvation here or in foreign countries. We have speed radar but drivers now have radar detectors. Should we make one that like in Ghostbusters entraps the soul or ghost in a container?
Yet science has done good things as well as man.
PAUL#################################Interesting, I just can't buy it tho. Let's examine what you say here:
ReplyDeleteBut, I understand the grey areas, and by allowing this, it puts the nut cases
and preachers under some kind of control, like Hiltler, who was an extreme idealist.
I don't see how preachers need to be put under some kind of control. Do you really think they are all nut cases?
I don't see preachers per se as a danger in swaying the masses or anything like that. They did not have the power
but the white house did in 2003. Some bad preachers joined in. But it was the Bush-Cheney brainwashing on TV. They
wanted all of us to see Iraqis burning the American flag knowing the angry and grieving mood the country was in.
Then simply started an unnecessary war, and never stopped or pulled out. The worst government in the last two centuries I would say.
But what about good preachers? Offering people help working with families to heal their problems or advise them.
Norman Vincent Peale always helped people to realize change and that we are not limited in so many ways as most people always think
There are a lot of good people connected with all churches from what I've seen. I guarantee it. Just because someone believes there is no God, doesn't mean they are nut cases or like Hitler. Would you call Mother Theresa a nut case? I'm sure a lot of atheists would still
recognize good people everywhere.
I don't believe a lot of things about Catholicism but I can still learn a lot of good stuff watching the Catholic channel. Listen to Joel Olsteen sometime ....... my idea of a great preacher. He is so positive and is about love.
Someone said look at all the evil that has been done in the name of God. Do you really think it was God's idea? Let's face it it's man.
Man doesn't need God to do and be evil. He does it without asking God. Look at it like this :: Truman call s a bunch of scientists into the white house and says we want an atom bomb and we want it like yesterday....... That'll be all you have your orders! Move!
You think science is the Divine but a case could quite easily be made for saying that science is evil for supporting war. It's man.
Always looking for new ways to hurt other men. The gun was developed, then the rifle, tanks, machine guns and on and on to the....................................... atom bomb and missile technology.
A machine or instrument that could detect the soul or God? Your faith in science instruments to me seems child like, because there are so many things not understood such as disease, aging, corruption of men, diet, etc. you name it. How can we make a happy world?
We haven't found a way to stop children from starvation here or in foreign countries. We have speed radar but drivers now have radar detectors. Should we make one that like in Ghostbusters entraps the soul or ghost in a container?
Yet science has done good things as well as man.
Paul, ditto with what you say about Bush-Cheney.
ReplyDeleteIt's easy to see what fools they were, now, looking
back.
You know, I prefer to have religious people as friends,
yes, especially church-going. They are sweeter, speak
softer, and the men tend to be gentlemen, never the
macho fool.
Yes, I do watch the preachers and compare them, I
think I know the Joel guy. And, I do like the more
established kind about love, and like Jimmy Stewart
played in one movie. But it is the Evangilists that get
my goat, they are really full of hate. Hate for Jews,
for blacks, for Mexicans, you name it. They are usually
southerners with that GD twang I hate.
But, Paul, you forget that it was supposed to be god
who created everything, which includes evil. And, what
about Polio, those little children, who die slowly not being able to catch their breathe? Asthma is that way
too, it picks on kids.
No, a machine cannot detect god, or a soul, but I meant
that if god existed a machine could detect a god even
if we could not see a god. That is why I say
there is no god.
But Robert was trying to say that I was
leaving the door open for a god, by saying that the
universe is full of stuff we cannot see. The bible calls
this "the unseen".
So, I said back to him, that, in a way, machines see the
unseen for us, as they can "see" radiation and so forth.
So, I am saying that, although some things are invisable, they still exist, as long as they can be tested.
i write from my own perspective and my own experience only.
ReplyDeletethis is true with both religion and science.
i have read several accounts of mystics relating their experience and it seems plausible to me.
i believe that if i went through the process of meditation and such they went through i would have the same experience.
the same with reading what scientists relate of their experience.
i believe that if i went through the process of experimentation they went through i would have the same experience.
the two are the same to me.
as i am now i am no more capable of conducting an experiment than i am of meditation so in both cases i am left to take their word for it.
i see no reason to put the claims of science above the claims of mysticism.
both require a certain amount of faith on the part of the layperson like me.
unless we go through the rigorous training both require to conduct these things first hand for ourselves we cannot know for certain their claims are true or not.
in both cases they claim that these experiences are verifiable if one makes the effort to do this.
i've always been too damn lazy to follow through on either.
i would be very surprised if i did do so if i did not get the same results.
why would they lie to us about it?
but the possibility exists that they do.
i do not know for sure.
i should clarify about mysticism and their claims.
ReplyDeletei do not believe that their experience verifies that there is this thing called god.
it verifies that a psychological state of bliss can be attained through disciplined meditation.
i would agree with dino that the scientific method is required to verify whether there is a god or not.
if it cannot be sensed then it does not exist.
If I may be so bold as to summerize your argument this way.
ReplyDeleteYou say that you would believe what scientists say based on
their word, so why can't you do the same with mystics, and that
on the surface, we are being quite bias against the mystics, treating
them in an unequal way.
First of all, the situation is the reverse, we demand that scientist
conclusions be verified by 3rd parties, laymen (you and me), or by
other scientists (called peer review).
You say you are too damn lazy to go through the training to prove if science is true, or if mystisism is true. I don't even think this requires a
ReplyDeleteresponse, since I know that you know better. You and I don't distrust the
food and drug administration, but we go ahead and trust the meat we eat
wil not be poisened, but you say we should learn the trade of meat inspection, before we eat food? I know you do not believe this.
Why would the mystics lie to us? Why would Cristianity lie to us? But we
know they ARE lieing, or do you believe in Christianity?
No, so, as I say, I am suprised you argue this way. You ask why people lie, again, why do I have to explain this to you?
we as laypeople do not have the means or ability to verify scientific experiments.
ReplyDeletewe do not have access to the equipment needed and would have no idea how to run it if we did.
would you know how to perform an experiment on a particle accelerator or such?
it takes years of training to do this.
as such we are left trusting that what they tell us the results are is true.
so how is this different than what the mystics tell us?
it's quite simple because the only equipment they require is our bodies and the training and effort to conduct the experiment.
this is verified constantly by disciples following the instructions of masters who get the same results as it is with science.
anybody can lie to us.
i do not necessarily trust anyone - even the fda, as your example.
but we are often given no other choice.
we are in a society that relies on others to do things we are not able to do for ourselves.
often that trust is broken by all parties.
all i am saying is that both science and mysticism conduct experiments that can be verified by others who train to do so.
to me there is no difference between them besides a cultural bias.
and what's any of this have to do with christianity?
i don't get the connection you make.
Of course laypeople do not have the training or the equipment, so does this mean we should not eat food until we get the training?
ReplyDeleteOf course not, why?
We eat the food, but it has been verified by government authorities that the food and drug administration is on the up and up? Laypeople don't do
this, professionals do it. All I am asking is where are the professionals
who check out mysticism, or Christianity, or any religion or belief?
It is not Trust as you contend, it is rigid verification by pros with their
careers on the line. Yet you say that we are left with trusting what anyone says is true.
Yes, disciples verify mysticism, but they already are believers, where are
the unbiased professionals?
These are DISCIPLES, which you harken to, which means followers,
who would be the worsed people in the world to verify their own belief system.
To verify, this must be done by disinterested parties, people who do not have
a steak in the outcome, in science these people are called peer reviewers.
Look at all your friends or people who are Christians, do you trust their
testimony? I don't think you do, but you do the Mystics.
What is the connection with what you are
saying and Christianty. Both C. and mysticism are religions, you believe
in your religion by faith, the same way Christians believe in their's, yet
you discount the testimony of Christians but accept that of the Mystics.
Been thinking about the idea of "trust".
ReplyDeleteI guess, yes, technically, bottom line, we must trust.
But, it seems to me, we trust a principle to determine what is true, not
to personal testimonies.
We trust the principle of verification, with our own senses. We don't
go out and verify the meat is not poisened, we assign another who
is an expert, who has degrees, who has a track record for objectiveness.
This expert tells us the food is OK, and he put a red stamp on the chunk
meat. We trust what he says because if he is wrong, he pays a big
price, it is that fact that we listen for, we ask the one who claims his
meat is good, why we should believe him. He says because the guy
who checks the meat has verified his claim, and he points to the
red stamp on the meat. We ask if the guy who verified is a relative,
of the meat man, and we ask what the tester/verifier has to loose by
lieing. The meat man says the tester could lose his job and the
tester's family could go hungry (need I go on?).
So, it "makes sense", what the meat man's claims are. "Making sense",
is our way of saying what is the truth, what exists must appeal to our senses, not, to "trust". "Trust" is "faith".
So, it as we having been saying all along the test of truth is thru sensation, what is real must be sensed.
PAUL ######################################
ReplyDeleteHi D! Comment: My take on this is of course quite different. Are you sure you want to say this? There is a poison gas
that absolutely can not be detected, yet will kill you. Sensing something is not a standard for anything; it's not that simple.
Physicist's aeither is not sensed. yet they say has to be threre enabling there to be a medium for us to see distant galaxies(light).
Paul, how can there be a poison gas that can't be detected if people are dieing? Don't we detect
ReplyDeletepeople dieing?
The theory of Aether has long ago been discredited,
Einstein has proven there is no aether. They've yet to find a medium thru which light travels.
You said, "Sensing something is not a standard for anything". Haven't you heard, "Seeing is believing"?
Don't we "trust" our senses continually as we drive
our cars, to avoid hitting other cars and, pedestrians?
PAUL ##########################
ReplyDeleteI think you'll enjoy this one.
We detect them dead yes, but that's too late. What I'm saying is they could not detect with their senses that the
invisable gas was there as it has no odor or visability. You're saying that's impossible? Aeither is still what physicists believe.
Can't we think of more things that can not be sensed W/physical senses? Yes how about ideas or thoughts? We read about something
but the idea is not a visable thing that we can measure or weigh. Like can't say that thought about Bob's future schooling is an electrical
impuse of neurons, because that 's not what it is. What it is is a plan to school Bob. A thing can not be two things according to your own writing.
It can only be one thing.
Even so it could not be the brain activity itself because lot's of thoughts go thru the brain and cause nuerons to move.
This is a constant brain function with thinking.
Don't tell me it's a drop of liquid in the brain, because with all the thinking we do our brains would have exploded by now or grown to the size of a huge water tower exploding.
Say you re walking down the street. Suddenly an idea pops into your head. Wow that's a good idea!
But it didn't come from any of the 5 senses. No just popped in. A valuable concept.
According to your stance, however, it doesn't exist..... not real.......................... How could that be possible?
So we have a whole class of things which are called abstract which we know of as real and never question but are not objects of mass and duration.
Sure we cannot detect the poison gas, by our sense of smell, natural gas has no
ReplyDeleteodor, and yet we can die from it. But, how can you say that the poisen gas cannot be detected, when people are surcoming to it?
Of course, We don't directly sense the presence of gas, but, we do finally sense that the gas was there, and that
it was poisonous, just as soon as we see (sense of vision) the deadly results from it.
So, I am saying that no matter how hard we try to find
something that exists that cannot be sensed, we will never discover such a thing. In fact, all things exist on account of our sensations. Yes, it is too late for the
poor souls that died from the invisable gas, but, it is only
thru our senses that we finally discover that the gas was
there, and was poison. All things exist on account of our sensing. If we don't sense anything, then nothing is there.
Paul, it is not true that Aether is believed in by physists.
Can you quote something on that?
Ideas and thoughts, can be detected by the electromagetic fields they create,
we can SEE the needle wiggle on the machine that is hooked to the brain by metal probes. The machine is
simply acting as an aid to our senses, as does the telescope and microscope. These devices act to Amplify
our senses. So that we can see more, see farther into
space, see the very small, hear the unheard, and so on.
Yes, I see what you are saying about thoughts being a
plan, a story, full of details that cannot be viewed by
anyone other than the thinker himelf.
Here's another tricky facit of existence, and that is, it
is, in fact, CONCEIBLE that such a machine that could do
that, would someday be invented. And, that means at least thought, and dream viewing COULD BE imagined to happen in the far off future. That is because thoughts are
physical things, they are physically constructed out of
chemicals and electricity which are real things.
Let's say when the chemical so and so is combined with
another chemical so and so, they together make the
mental vision of a tree, and, finally science comes to
recognize the correct chemical formula for this or that
mental image, combined with a particular electrical impulse.
Yes, a thought cannot be two things at once, both a picture and a chemical reaction. But, we speak of the
reaction in order to measure and to weight it.
No, I say the ideas that pop into our heads are real things
that exist. They exist electrochemically. They do have mass and duration as they can be measured and weighed.
Paul, your challenge of thoughts, mental images, emotions, as being things that exist but, not sensed,
ReplyDeleteis a fine one. Actually everyday language supports your
position on this, and you know what truck I put in the
importance of language to determine what is true.
We even distinquish mental illness as opposed to "physical illness",
which of course, suggests mental
disease is nonphysical along with all things of the mind.
So, I am arguing against this, I do say mental illness is
physical, as it can be perceived by the senses, so that
makes me have to argue a tough position.
Medicine tries to say desease of the mind is not real,
and we all say imagined things like in dreams, or, ideas have
no material existence. Well the "content" of the
dreams is not real, but the act of dreaming is real.
But what about a photo of a house? How is that not a real
house, but it is real in the form of energy, a movie can be
nonphysical because the people in the movie are not
real, but, the light and the shadow, are real exchanges
of energy. The "portrayal" is real, not the object being
portrayed. So, when we say, "that is not a real person, not a real car,
not a real tree", we do not mean that the
portrayal is not a real thing, but that the thing being
simulated on the screen, is not.
PAUL ###############################
ReplyDeleteYes I thought that you felt this way, I tried to undermine by saying your own idea that a thing can only be one thing not two.
So a thought is what it is saying and/or it's possible physical existence (inconceivable generally). Therefore two things. but I don't see
a physical counterpart existing. Rather that brain function is measuring the act of thinking in general, not piling up more and more
physical thoughts needing storage space.
Well, yes, you and I are trying to say that a thought is
ReplyDeleteindeed a physical thing, but, that is something quite
different than a creative idea, with all of its trappings of
originalilty, images, and maybe even inspiration.
So, I take it, that, anyway, you are accepting the physicality of a thought, but only in a blunt way, as a
simple manifestation of energy exchange. After all a
thought actually burns calories, not many, like 3 Kcals
per thought.
But, I am saying, no to that, I say that the energy that is
used has formed some special combination, never the
same way twice, that can cause another part of the
brain to "see" images, that I am calling "portrails" of
actually experienced things, like a drawn cartoon of
objects, or, visual replication of real objects, and, furthermore, it would be conceivably possible that someday, science could 'unlock' the chemical code
to reproduce those very images and feelings of thoughts,
say, on a TV screen.
Robert and I have had this discussion before you came
aboard, we finally were speaking of a human head sitting
in a vate of chemicals with tubes extending everywhere,
and, could this head actually think and do all that humans
do. I said yes, and I think he disagreed. ha ha.
What about original thought and creative thought?
I think we make too much of this kind of thinking.
We seem to want this thinking to set man apart from the
animals, and, to made man look like he was created special by an intelligent being.
I think this idea of creativity, is no more than very complex thinking that we can do where many ideas are
simply "rolled" together in our heads, to form one apparently "new" idea that is really made up of many
old ideas, but done so in a new and novel arrangement giving the impression of it having a transindental nature.
I think the day will come that computers will think up original ideas easily.
Energy fields, like electromagnetic fields, and the magnetic poles of the earth, have been questioned as to
their existence, as our everyday language does not count
energy as real, as something that takes up space, as R.
says, has dimentionality. But it was Einstein that showed
up energy was actually matter, in a different form.
Do you still hold to science suporting the Aether theory of fixed space?
I just took a walk, and re-thought what Paul was possibly
ReplyDeletesaying, which might be that a thought cannot be two things at once, in that, it cannot be both mechanical and spiritiual thing, it must be one or the other.
Of course, he did not say the word, "spiritual", but, I think
that is what he meant by it being two things. And then
in his next post he asks me to explain how a machine
can reproduce a spiritual occurance, which, of course,
it cannot, as such a thing is other-worldly, and by definition, cannot be so manipulated into ones and
zeros.
When I say spiritual I am equating that word with
metaphysical, supernatural, transindental, which ever
word he and others prefer.
So, what I need to do is to convince him that a thought
is not a metaphysical phenomenon. It seems to me to be
simply information that is coded in a way that we can
"see" in our mind's eye, and so a thought is the mechanical act of sight and sound in digital format, ones
and zeros. I think that computers are reproducing sight
and sound in the same way our minds do it.
Many people do believe that thinking is supernatural, the
same as I believe Paul does.
Thinking is like a tv program, where we "see" and "hear" only as a
ReplyDeleterepresentation of real sound and sight through electonic pulsations.
In the same way, our minds interpret electonic impulses into sight and
sound for us much like a tv show going on in our heads. All we have to do is someday find out how the mind does this, and replicate the same thing mechanically, and woe-la we have a machine externally verifying mental activity through sense perception.
If we ever acheive this, then we have proven that thinking can be sensed
by the two of our five senses, sight and hearing. So, we see, that thinking is capable of being sensed by an outside third party, and is something that exists.
Only those things that are metaphysical, or supernatural, cannot be sensed.
Well you already know how far out my beliefs are. There is something to be said for the idea of thinking being
ReplyDeletesomething like hearing or listening or seeing in the sense of visualization. But none of these actions are the thought
itself. Nor can I imagine that a thought could have some physical structure or appearance. These are real things
that exist but with no physical "outside the mind" existance. These type of abstract things are mental like a dream
is the best example I can come up with. If you dream of a mountain lion chasing you and the fear and he's on you his
breath and teeth bite into you, then you wake up and say, "Oh, man, I'm glad that was only a dream!" Yet it could be perfectly vivid
and very real and you couldn't tell it was a dream. What we are saying is our waking life is a dream and you wake up in the
morning to it: another dream which people call reality, but it seems so real that no one knows it's a dream.
But back to our topic. There is no physical substance to anything like the mountain lion's saliva left on your face or scratch marks.
You simply see that all that has dissappeared; it was merely a dream............ gone Thank heavens! And because of this I think people generalize that thought itself is the same......... no real substance there. It's weird to think of a thought having a
physical shape like a crawling bug. Then how could we remember it? the Lion? It crawls back? then when we forget the dream
where did the physical thing go? Is it hiding for a while? See it just can't be like that. We have an infinite number of thoughts
where could we possibly store them? Look at all the dreams we've had They disappear and then so do thoughts when were
done with them. This is quite fascinating. Dreams tho I wd say are a higher form of thought than our own daily mutterings.........
talking to ourselves. This activity tires us and does not bring original ideas . That 's my take ......... Let's see if we agree on and what.
Paul, this is a fine interesting post you submitted.
ReplyDeleteImagine an Island is discovered with people who no nothing
of modern technology. They see and hear themselves in a motion picture, and they think it is a mircle from god.
We try to show it is not, by showing them the cellulose film strip and the bumps that represent the sound on the film, but they protest saying that they do not see themselves or hear themselves, but, rather see a lot of meaningless film stuff, and
come to believe it is from god all the more.
This is how I think we look at the "pictures" and "sounds"
we imagine in our dreams and thoughts, but science says this
is no more the the work of brain synapses, chemical reactions, and electrical impulses. But, this is the only way
we can "see" our thoughts, and view them with our senses,
not 'seeing" the tigers attacking us, and us running away, but
only seeing their constituant parts, not the whole "movie" or
dream, as we experienced it. Someday, maybe science will
figure out how we can directly "see" the "show" with "tv's" that decodes mental activity. But until then, we can't see our
dreams except privately to ourselves.
But, although we cannot demonstrate thought itself, I see no reason to jump to believing that mental activity is supernatural, mystical, or some kind of a mystery.
Many religions believe the mind is supernatural, hence all
the so-called "mind religions" (Science of Mind, Scientology),
yet I believe some of these are quite inlightened, in spite of
that.
Sometimes, this is called 'the god of the gaps', putting in
god where we have gaps in our knowledge.
Well, you said a dream is an "outside type of thing" and is
an abstration. To me that is the popular idea of energy manifestations not being real, and occurences and events
are really energy happenings, and since we now know today
that energy, dreams, are real things, that E equals MC square
proves that energy IS matter in a different form (mass is energy),and that idea is undergoing change in society.
You said where does the dream go when we wake up. Well,
it still exists as a bundle of energy floating away into space,
forever. In fact, it has been said "I Love Lucy" of the 50's is
still out there somewhere, theoretically able to be tapped into
and watched now.
i'm not sure where to come into any of this.
ReplyDeletethere's certainly been a lot since i last wrote.
been busy with other things.
dino -
when i speak of mysticism i speak of a practiced art or techniques which if practiced correctly by anyone give a desired results - peace, bliss, la-dee-da, etc.
i am not speaking of religion or god.
interesting things you two write about.
i imagine that the two of you have been arguing this way for quite some time.
i cannot take either side - dino and science or paul and religion.
the two seem mutually exclusive.
you guys seem vehemently determined not to agree with one another.
i do not have that strong of faith in anything.
i only know what i have experienced or have learned about by some means.
i can only experience what i can sense.
i do not know or not what others experience - only if i can sense them.
i give many and their accounts the benefit of the doubt until it can be verified by me somehow.
but even then i do not forget how easily i can be fooled.
this includes science and religion - and the fda.
so far it seems that we have yet to all agree on anything being true or not true.
ReplyDeleteor have we?
paul insists on god and dino will have none of it among other things we argue about.
to me it doesn't much matter either way - the world and my experience of it is the same.
actually i was thinking more today and that there has been observations of things like meditation.
ReplyDeletethey have been observed lowering heart rate and breathing and i think brain wave activity as well.
sure, one can only self-report what one is experiencing but that goes for the scientist as well.
what does a scientist experience while conducting an experiment?
what does that really matter?
we all seek pleasure.
we each find it different ways in different places by different means.
i still believe that the mystics have found the most stripped down streamlined way to it.
perhaps not.
but what does it prove either way?
what are we trying to prove?
if we are either trying to prove god (paul) or disprove god (dino) i don't think there is an answer here for either.
the pleasure that the mystics experience could be proven to be entirely physiological and psychological.
where is god?
except to perhaps define god as being the ultimate that one might experience.
the mystics might have something there.
so might the scientists.
i'm sort of asking again about exactly what are we trying to accomplish here.
i'm not sure.
what do you guys think?
Robert said he does not have stong belief in anything. It sure
ReplyDeletedoes not seem that way to me. For one thing, he admits being
a theist (believes in god, or, a god), and, seems to defend
mysticism stongly.
Yes, Paul and I have been discussing this for a long time.
That is how he knew how I was going to respond. But, in
the same way, as it is between R. and I, we never seem to
have any acromony going on.
Robert often speaks of his personal experience as the way
to determine what is true, but I often wonder why he does
not trust, say, scientific results, and, good logical reasoning.
I do. I also like to study good philosophers and scientists,
and go by what they say. Neither Paul nor Robert seem to
be interested in that.
But, all disciplines can be scientifically investigated, science
is proud of the fact that it does not rely on personal testimony.
All the claims that any religion or belief (R.s mysticism) or practice can be tested under labatory conditions.
When they tested ESP at Duke University, the practitioners claimed they failed
(at choosing the correct playing card) because the very nature of ESP did not allow such testing....it sort of angered
the transindental "forces" so to speak, to be so insulted by cold hearted scintific tests, that ESP only worked as long as the tester also had faith in the art, and further that there could be no doubters present in the room where the testing was done.
No, R. is wrong when he says that science makes its judgements through self-reporting of one's personal experiences. There always must be the observation of some disinterested third party in science, this rule goes back a long
way.
R. like so many believers, often says that there are no answers to questions of "this" kind. This is the "pop" answer
to most philosophical questions, and that statement is always made by those who don't like the answers that science and logic are giving. It is more satisfying to though up their hands
and say, "who knows", that way they never lose.
Why are we discussing these questions? I know why I do.
I want to prove to these guys that they are wrong. That gives
me a lot of satisfation. And, I want to reveal to them that they
live day to day by logic, yet when they discuss these matters
that they through logic out the window, cuz, I know that they, nor most people don't realize that their logic is bad, they think
that they are being consistent.
Why do I care? Like R. often says this is fun. Anyway, it seems me that it ought to be possible to convince believers
that that they are believers hanging onto faith, if that is true,
I I think it is.
I have had many of these discussions and come away wondering why it was not possible to convince others of
their unreasoning stance on their points, so I am trying to do
that here, to find out how to fix it. Not to change their minds, but to prove to them their logic is bad.
Been thinking more on R's question what are we trying to
ReplyDeletefind on this blog. Looking at it again from another view, I
think that I, from the start, am trying to make Idealism more
palitable to me and everyone, thru discovering some simple
language to explain it and to try to resolve some of its
oddities. If we could do that here, seems like we could make
significant advance in science and philosophy.
First of all, yes, I do think Idealism must be absolutely true,
so with arguementation from Paul and Robert, we can
gradually resolve the troublesome questions lingering in
this philosophy.
Of course, this takes us on the road of theism vs. atheism cuz,
if Idealism is true and, anything other than this world being
a designed phenomena, requires the elimination of a god
or the "mysterious force" (of Robert's), as a creater of
universe the universe.
By the way, Robert doesn't seem to realize that his saying he
does not know anything, nor does anyone else, that he allows
in whatever god or deity one can imagine. This does great
damage to the cause of good, clear thinking.
So, I would like to convince the guys of this, and myself.
a lot of this is a problem of words, i think.
ReplyDeleteperhaps mysticism is too broad a term that allows many other things than what i am specifically talking about.
i was not talking about esp or anything else but the meditative techniques used by yogic masters (scientists) to achieve a desired state.
i do not know why dino changed this to talking about esp instead of answering the example i used which had positive results rather than negative except that it better supports his argument.
where's the logic in that?
these techniques are something like scientific experiments that anyone can train themselves like one has to do also with science to perform and get similar results.
i do not understand why dino is so determinedly resistant to this.
it proves nothing other than that as i have stated before.
he has said it requires belief to do this.
but science also requires belief that if one conducts experiments using the scientific method one will also get similar results of scientists (masters) who have performed it before.
in this way it could be said that one is a disciple of science.
again, it's only words.
i believe in both.
i believe that if i were to follow the disciplined methods of both yoga and science that i would arrive at similar results that have been reported by those who have done so before me.
but i have not.
i'm too damn lazy and have little to no ambition.
i am left only with trusting these reports as possibly being true - a point i tried to make in previous comments.
i cannot actually say either way unless i myself actually do perform them and either get similar results or not.
i might do so and find that they both are a crock of shit.
i see no reason to hold one above the other at this point until i have done so.
we do not live by logic alone.
we are much more imaginative than that as being humans.
this brings us to exciting new things but also gets us into serious trouble.
one needs to take a balanced approach to life.
i try to live this balanced life.
this is usually misunderstood by people who are in one camp or another who seem to feel that if i am not for them then i must be against them.
dino seems to feel i side with paul as paul seems to feel i side with dino.
i do both and neither.
i have never been a "good clear" thinker.
i never know what exactly i'm thinking moment by moment.
i do not understand how you guys can be so positive you are right about your beliefs.
i have never felt that way about anything.
it is a mistake to imagine that i feel as strongly as you seem to about what we are discussing being this way and not that way or vice versa.
i am open to it all because to me the whole thing is absurd (a point which has been ignored)and can be anything and/or nothing it might turn out to be.
the furthest i am willing to go into believing something is to give it the benefit of the doubt.
i often find myself between opposite positions as both and all seem plausible to me however much they might contradict one another as is the case here with dino's and paul's positions.
my main point in yoga and science is that they are both doing essentially the same thing.
ReplyDeleteboth perform actions and get results.
both report these actions and results to others.
both can be verified by others performing the same actions and getting similar results.
i fail to see the difference except we call one science and the other mysticism.
probably should appologize to Robert, cuz I think I went too far in overt
ReplyDeletecritizism of his beliefs, same with Paul.
All I can say is that science is not a "belief", or a "faith" system. In fact, it
claims it exists for exactly the opposite reason, to prove all its claims via
a stringent method called "the scientific method", which is a very strict procedure,
which I hope I don't have to present here, to defind it.
Maybe the problem is, Robert doesn't agree that beliefs can't be tested using the scientic method, but, roundly, no faith has volunteered to be scientifically tested. There is one exception though, and that is the folks who believe in ESP. That is why I mentioned that ESP and mysticism is "faith", yes it is a faith and belief like any religion or even, political point of view. People just seem to believe, or want to believe, in some things, no matter what.
I mentioned ESP cuz I sort of admire those believers, in that they had the
fortitude to subject their believes to scientific enquiry. Testers would show
a subject the back side of a playing card, and ask them to name the card, like,
the queen of diamonds....etc.. This completely disproved the existence
of ESP.
And, I have been warned to never discuss a person's belief or his politics,
by my mother. The reason I choose to discuss mysticism at all, was Robert was wishing
to change the direction of conversation. All I could think to do was to go
after his beliefs and Paul's, and give mine a rest.
For example, I would like to examine Robert's beliefs in going "the middle road" (very stong in Buddhism). And his, ideas on the 'absudity" of life. (to be continued on next post...too big)
R. says that I ignore his contention that life is absurd. I have always agreed
ReplyDeletewith this, over a long time, I'm suprised R. thinks this.
I think both Paul, and Robert, think that I am calling the people who
practice their beliefs, liers. Of course I am not, I am saying while I think
that they have got to a bliss state of mind, they forget that their son just
that day got straight A's on his report card, and his wife had dinner ready
when he got home. How do we know this is not what is causing the sense
of contentment? In lab science they carefully remove these variables. So, it is not
that I don't, or do believe what they say, or, if R. believes them.
The people who meditate of course, believe it is the meditation bringing them the
good feelings, they are not lying, as R. seems to think I am accusing them
of doing.
R. says his way is a "balanced" approached to life, because he sees both
my, and Paul's, point of view. But I think I have a balanced point of view
because I can see mysticism and Paul's book of miracles, and, I'm sure
Paul sees himself in the middle between Robert and me.Such claims gets us nowhere, does it?
Also it looks like R. is viewing Paul and I as extremists of some kind. Nut cases? ha ha
Robert asked me what is the point of this blog. I think now, it is
ReplyDeleteabout me trying to become a fulfledged atheist.
Robert has said that atheism is my "religion" as though I accept it without
scrutiny, by faith, like one does in religion, maybe he didn't quite say that,
but he did say, in a way, I was a fanatic and so was Paul, because we
were so sure of the truth of our positions, while he was not about his, and
he can see all religions having SOME truth.
Robert, I think, considers himself a reasonable person who is in the middle
between Paul and me and, the world, for that matter, and, who
is able to stand back watching everyone else with amusement, seeing through
their folly, and, considers others as trying to push their religion on him. No offense, please, Robert. Yet, that is, to me, the image of himself he is suggesting. I think that his view is kind of self-assured, though, and he
considers his position just as right as everyone else thinks that they are
right.
I do not have "faith" in atheism, well, I sort of do have, but only in the sense that I don't have all the answers yet, but I do not accept
this common sentiment that no one can ever know the answers to these
"big" questions.
I think Robert, in a subtle way, is suggesting that, also. I think the question ought to be re-phrased to.... "no one has the answers WE WANT TO HEAR to the big questions". Atheism is not wanted to be heard. So, we say that there are no anwers, basicly, to combate mostly atheism, and a few other viewpoints. And, besides, all the great thinkers were probably at heart, atheistss, because you really have to be, to be objective about this subject.
For this reason, I am trying to explicate reasonable answers to the "big" questions, even if no one likes the answers. And, I wonder if the great minds of the past have not already found these same atheistic answers,
but their writings have been censored along the way, forcing each atheist (me) to "re-invent the wheel", so to speak, if they want answers for themselfs, and, I for one, do.
It is without a doubt that if one has fixed beliefs he will never find the
answers to the "big questions", because the answers wil never agree
with his religion. I do think, by they way, Robert does harbor a faith,
although he sometimes to denies this. I think this faith is in many gods, in no gods, in Mysticism, and some others.
He seems quite sensitive to critisism about this, the same any true believer is, who believes in something they love.
i write an ongoing story that is based on me imagining myself on a beach of an island in the eye of a storm raging on an otherwise calm sea.
ReplyDeletethe sea is humanity.
i do sit back and watch and listen to others as dino suggests.
i do not know if what they all do or argue about is folly or not.
parts of it might be and parts of it not.
from my point of view it is absurd.
i have little or no vested interest in the outcome of it.
it could be this or that or the other thing.
there may be gods.
there might not.
it might all be nothing.
or not.
i do not know.
you believe that science and logic will lead us to the answers.
perhaps.
paul believes that religion and mysticism will lead us to them.
perhaps.
i have nothing that could prove either of you right or wrong.
i feel this way about what everybody argues about in the world.
there are so many possibilities.
how could i possibly have the time or the resources to verify them all?
i trust my feelings about one thing or another i may hear about.
i wrote a poem once about putting together a jigsaw puzzle.
that is how i go about it.
i find one piece that seems to go with another piece and so on like that.
it could all very well be proven wrong in the end.
should i care about that?
another thing is that i'm always changing my mind as more information is available to me.
my thoughts are fluid and always changing like each wave on the beach is different from the last.
then suddenly it's all gone...
I would tend to think whatever is absurd is folly, as well.
ReplyDeleteThere may be gods or not, he says? But it is only that he does not have the time or the resources to verify if there are gods.
But Robert is not consistent.
He Does not also say "there may be Santas, or not", only he doesn't have the time
or the resouses to be sure if there is a santa or not.
No, he doesn't believe is Santa because, taking a wild guess, as most children stop believing in Santa by age 5, but they never did costly research or take the hours and hours of
investigation to find out that there was no santa, why is it different with
gods? Why does he suddenly have to devote his life to research the question of gods existing, but, not santa existing?
Well, why doesn't he believe there could be a santa? After all, why doesn't he
do the same with the question of the gods?
He doesn't have the time to research, or the resources to
verify the existence of Santa, either, so why does he use a double standard when it comes to god? He should have to research with Santa as much as with God, doesn't he?
I ask him to merely use the same tools to decide no gods as he used to
decide no Santa, namely logic and reason. No, but now he says he cannot trust logic, anymore. Logic he thinks is no different than any religion,
It is a matter of faith in logic, and not logic itself. And, that is why he says it is really religion in disguise. Oh, I know that he did not come out and say it was religion, but he does clearly imply that, especially when he says there is little difference between Paul's position and mine. We are both fanatics caught up in our belief systems, evangilizing to the world to believe in our personal subjective beliefs. ha ha.
Then he says he trusts his feelings and not his reason, to believe things.
But that means he is
at his most bias position, in that, all he will believe only those
things that suit him best, and he will simply chuck his reasoning ability.
That is what The Catholic church did all thru the dark ages. They rejected
science if it did go their way. They chose to believe only what made them
feel good.
This is a post by Robert, that, I am sorry did not take hold on
ReplyDeletemy blog, so I am posting it here under my name
Post by ROBERT #########################################
Phat I am not consistent should have been quite obvious from the beginning.
i have taken the same steps about santa and gods.
i feel that more than likely that there probably are neither.
but i do not know for certain.
but i see no evidence that either exist more than in our collective imaginations.
but as such they do serve a common social function.
in that sense they do exist.
that is where i would place them as far as believing in them or not.
i mention gods and not santa because that's what you guys are talking about.
we could be talking about aliens or who shot jfk or whatever and i would do the same.
i'll talk about anything you might want to.
i feel that any of us believe what suits us best by whatever measure we might use to do so.
you use logic.
you believe that it will guide you to the answers you seek.
perhaps so.
if it does it will make you feel good.
i would not say that you or paul are fanatical as you would have me say.
but you do seem to have more invested in your positions than i do in mine - whatever it might happen to be at the moment.
you seem to want to know what i believe in.
i have tried to explain.
so far i have found nothing i can believe in 100%.
but i do find something of value to me in just about anything - some things more than others.
i can find enlightenment reading a comic book while many books others find sacred to me are largely meaningless.
i have stated several times that i have no position.
i think you have a hard time accepting this since there is nothing solid to argue against with your logic.
perhaps i do not belong on this blog.
i feel i may be more disruptive in what i have to say than adding anything to it.
but this is who i am and what i have to say.
i have never much been able to take much of this sort of stuff seriously - or much of anything else really either.
i do find it fascinating though.
it goes on forever without us ever able to reach an end to it i feel.
how more wonderful does it get?
and i have little to no idea what much of any of it really is.
you want it all to be nothing.
paul wants it all to be god.
i want it all to be whatever it is as it keeps happening however it does.
???
Robert, says he gives cridence to there being a Santa. I am sorry,
ReplyDeletebut that is hard to believe. And, he says he is not "certain'
there is no santa? Please, I delibertly chose santa never dreaming he
would contend that, but hoping, instead, he would see my point. But he
contends that he does consider the posibility that Santa exists. Is there
anyone not amazed by this?
No, Robert is not in the least disruptive of this blog, god bless him for his
honest comments. His comments are representitive of many people, I think.
I love reading his feelings regarding all of this, as it informs me of the
feelings of many of those I do not accord with, but, yet, highly respect.
Yes, let him know, how much I appreciate his true and honest feelings
on these matters.
I am even shocked at myself for never having espressed my deep regard of his
and Paul's fine remarks.
Robert is right in saying that I "want" it all to be nothing, as this point of view
simply, as they say, "rings a bell" with me. And, therefore I pursue it, beliving
given enough thought and debate, the truth of it will come out, and, all, not
just me, will see. That is really my hope. I really wish to tell the world the
"truth" of what Parmenides claimed, in words that make sense to all.
Robert has indeed stated many times, that he has no position, but, sorry, I don't
believe it. That is something, seems like we all believe about ourselves, that
we somehow have found the "middle road", and, do not hold any particular
philosophic position, but, no, seems like this is only a dream of us all.
The dream being that some how we ourselves, take no position.
But, i contend, that to simply live from day to day, is to take a position. And, anyway, I have detected
both Robert and I, and even in Paul, to have a clear concern in under-privelged people.
that I regard as commendable, so, no, Robert, you, like the rest of us, hold
clear and strong political and phiosophical positions.
i took your point about gods and santa - or aliens or unicorns or anything else of that doubtful nature - all needing to be put to the same test and criteria in determining if there are such things that exist.
ReplyDeletei followed by stating in what way i feel they all might exist - in our social/cultural collective imagination and mythology.
as such they perform a function.
though we question their existence we all know what we are talking about when we speak of them.
do i know that any of these things 100% do not actually exist?
no.
i highly doubt that they do however.
it's interesting that you use the term "rings a bell".
i know what you mean.
yet you have criticized me for using similar terms to describe my feelings about what i believe.
this seems to me to represent intuitive thought that has no real logical explanation.
yet even scientists are guided by it.
they have a "feeling" about what results they are looking for when conducting an experiment.
the experiment proves them right or wrong.
what i mean by having no position was i do not have any one set position i hold to as being true while other positions are false.
wishy washy is the term usually used to describe people like me.
never committing to any one thing but going any which way the tide might take them.
yup.
as such i take many positions - many of which contradict each other.
i can believe in no one thing 100%.
there is always a fly in the ointment with each of them.
i am not sure what it would take to convince me of being 100% committed to one thing being true.
i question whether there is one truth for any one thing to be.
you seem to feel that if it all logically lines up then it must be true.
perhaps so.
i do not know.
i do not deny logic.
it has its place in our overall thinking.
people were using logical reasoning long before it was outlined as a philosophy by the greeks and others.
how else does one figure out how to make a spear out of a stick and a rock except by trial and error and reason?
what i am saying is there are other modes to our thinking that are just as important to our overall individual and collective psychological well-being and view of the world that have nothing to do with logic.
as far as our discussion itself i thought we had established that everything essentially is nothing.
the problem we then ran into was how there is something here now which includes ourselves that we sense and perceive in our consciousness - whatever that might be.
the age old question of how does nothing become something that even science cannot adequately explain though there a many theories about how it might have happened.
this is a question the early creation myths tried to explain with gods and such.
i do not think we ever resolved this.
I do not think something comes from nothing, did I ever say I did?
ReplyDeleteNo, I am always saying the law of conservation proves nothing was
ever created, but then again, I believe science.
It must be true that there is at least thinking, but that is all, and it came about by chance, the rest of reality is a mental construction, even our bodies.
so everything is not nothing.
ReplyDeleteinfinite continuation without beginning or end.
or something like that.
i can see how that is a possibility.
so our consciousness exists by itself and all else is what it mentally constructs?
i can see that as a possibility too.
it is amazing what we can imagine.
Yes, it is amazing we can imagine.
ReplyDeleteI still think everything is nothing, but I can't seem to make it work.
I was trying to imagine my whole family walking into a restraurant and
trying to figure who was imagining the funiture in the forier, and who
of my group, decided how the tables and chairs were arranged. It
couldn't have been done by us all, like a group-think, and what does
the management have to say about all this? In other words idealism
requires tremendous explanation to make it work, and then I remember
Occam's Razor.
We can say "everything is nothing", or, "everything is everything", meaning
that reality is a "plenum" or, is a solid mass, which is the same as nothing.
I think I like the solid mass better, with that thought, I imagine that we
pick and choose out of the mass, what we want to be real. And what we
choose is anything that is there that provides us with sense impressions.
But, at this point, I seem to get no further in trying to explain reality.
i always liked our idea about the patterns in the random chaos.
ReplyDeletethe patterns form by chance and the ones that fit survive and evolve.
i always thought of these patterns as being both things and our consciousness of things with neither causing or being caused by the other since they are both sides of the same coin, as they say.
and it has no beginning nor an ending.
it all might very well be solid as you suggest.
i cannot think of why not.
we ourselves and everything else both receive and transmit sensory information.
all is in communication with itself.
the whole universe is generating and being generated by infinite waves of patterns.
or something like that...
thinking about two sides of the same coin made me think of the universe like being a coin flipped up in the air and spinning but it never falls to the ground.
ReplyDeletemaybe it's out in space.
so it is never decided "heads or tails" as to what it is but remains forever in virtual possibility.
this could be why when it is examined closely it disappears into infinity or the infinitesimal or both.
in previous posts on this blog and the ones before it we had pretty much dismantled the universe as being non-existing.
just a thought...
I had written privately to Paul that I am now reading that
ReplyDeletescience has recently pretty much dismissed the existence of time. They say that Einstein, as all of science, has only assumed it existed, but it does not assume this anymore, so there can be no time travel, at least into the past. There is no past or future, anymore, only the present, NOW, they say.
This is wonderful progress on the part of science, but they still have to
remove matter and space as real, also. I do not hold the hope this will happen soon, as this ought to put an end to physical science, I think, not
sure. Maybe they could still assume it, though I doubt it.
For a long time, I knew that matter did not exist because of the Greek and eastern philosophers, god bless them, who used reason and logic alone to arrive at no time and no space, and instead only one, single unmoving plenum.
While I know this to be true, I feel I am compeled to answer the sticky questions that come with this view. I think I have to give up on Idealism
as an explanation, though. I am trying to build a definition of reality as being nothing but "detached sense impressions". The "detached" business meaning that the sensations are of external impressions, not mental, and they are detached from the rest of external reality, too. They are sort of free-floating in space. But I can't say anymore that
reality is internal maya (illusion).
Yes, I agree about random chaos and accidental formation of
patterns that provide us an apparent meaningful world. But my
big point is that our sense experiences are a small part of the total
cosmological picture. And, for me, at least for now, this puts reality in its
place (of little importance).
If you ask me if my point is to downgrade reality, my answer is an unequivical, 'Yes', as this, I believe is the hold god has over us.
Namely, that he is trying to make us believe in him thru the power of
the argument by design. I believe that it is thru this argument that intelligent people believe in a god.
i'm not sure i follow the detached sensations thing.
ReplyDeletewhat is real if it is not sensed?
this leaves a very wide door open it seems to me.
one could say that anything exists that we do not sense which is what people say about god and other worlds and such.
i've often wondered what people seem to have against reality trying to prove it's not real and/or really something else.
to me it just is - whatever it is.
i have no real problems with it others seem to have.
when people say there is no time but the present moment now i ask how long does that present moment now last?
when is precisely now?
is it now?
or is it now?
or now?
i would say that it lasts for eternity with no beginning or ending.
i would agree that nothing can be experienced but the present moment as it continues going by always being now - now in the past and now in the future.
just like we cannot experience space unless we are present in it as being here.
i am here in portland in my house.
i do not and cannot experience someplace else unless i physically go there - then it is here to me.
there is only one thing and that is the here and now.
we can know nothing else though we might imagine it.
but here is infinite and now is eternal.
Robert asked when I say something exists unsensed, isn't this a slippery slop to god existing?
ReplyDeleteNo, this is about "matter" that is "not sensed" but still is made of matter, and it CAN be sensed using scientific devices....not so, god.
The name of this unsensed matter is "DARK MATTER" and "DARK ENERGY", both of which exist but cannot be seen (sensed)(that's why it's called "dark").
As advertised, it is dark MATTER not metaphysical stuff, so it has nothing to do with god and the spirtual world.
As dark matter, it can be detected only by scientific means, not with our eyes, IT'S DARK and reflects no light.
I always like to say, we can't "see" our solar system, but we know it exists, not with our eyes, but thru telescopes. Telescopes are like eyes, an aid to our senses, they are not our senses themselves. So are
we going to say the solar system doesn't exist, because we can't see it?
No, So there is no danger in that my suggesting something exists without us sensing it, cuz in effect, we ARE sensing it...but only thru mechanical means, it would be like us seeing by making our syes extra powerful ("telescope eyes").
On the other hand, we know that, no matter how stong a telescope is, that we still could never see god, as he is made of a different kind of substance that can't be seen, non-matter. Instead we must believe he exists, or, as they say, have faith that he exists.
So there is no slippery slop here, one we sense (indirectly), and the other one we believe in.
_________________________________
Now Robert says he doesn't like this talk of things being something else than what we see directly. He says,
"i've often wondered what people seem to have against reality trying to prove it's not real and/or really something else.
to me it just is - whatever it is.
i have no real problems with it others seem to have."
No, reality is not what"is". If he thinks that, he believes in god, and we know, Robert does.
So, what is reality? What it really is, is a plenum. What's a plenum? It is that dark matter I was taking about before. What Robert sees all around him is only 22% of
what "is". The rest, neither he nor I, experience. We know it is there because of how gravaty is working. And, as I said before, you don't have
to sense something to know it's there, but, wait, it still must be some-thing that is physical....so not god...it must at least have the ABILITY of being sensed...god doesn't....matter does.
So, anyway the plenmum fills in the rest of space with solid matter in every direction, every corner (as the universe expands it is adding more and more dark energy to itself).
Now here's the hard part. This is the part that messed me up for so long a time. I am sorry but I have to create an example again. Bear with me.
Imagine a painting, I am covering with ever more black spots. Now the spots get so close together that the whole surface of the canvass looks like one huge solid black spot....just blackness. That is how reality is. Solid matter everywhere.
Now, we ask, so what? Why does this mean nothing exists?
That is because, if everything exists everywhere, with no gaps between things, that is the same as saying, nothing exists. The canvass really has nothing on it if it is covered with solid blackness, right? How is solid blackness a picture of anything? This concept is ancient, and is
called "the plenum" in both east and west philosophy.
Robert says he believes"The Now" does not itself take up time, so he wonders how can Dino talk about "now". My answer is, sure now must be before and after something. The knife's edge of the present between past and future must at some time be......
ReplyDeleteI think scientists are aware of this difficulty, but, are
making out as though it is not a problem. They merely mean time doesn't
exist anymore only in the sense there is no real before and after, except in our minds and memories, and so have discontinued "measuring" it and using it as a veriable, and I
for one view this as good news. Now they should get down and
tackle space, too.
There is still another problem with the plenum. Why, one might
ReplyDeleteask, does it make any difference to the design theory if there
is a plenum or not?
Answer is, it reveals the lack of planning if reality is full,
because it is like having the measles, where the doctor is
amazed at one two red spots, when one wonders why pick those particular spots out, and make a fuss over them when the poor person is covered with red spots. So why have religions for a
few things in nature only because they can be seen against a
backdrop of billions of objects that can not?
What this realization does is to put reality into perspective.
So that it no longer appears to be a designed universe, in that,
all the objects we experience arn't much of the universe, in any
case. They are "detached" objects, also, which makes them seem
they were created just for us by intelligence, meaning they can
be moved around (detached) conveniently and seem to be made to just fit our hands. Ah, what design, we think.
Now Robert may think this is not why he and I tend to believe
in a god, but that is not true. The design theory is why all
people believe, if they do.
We have had a nice day, things have gone well. We wake up on
a new and bright sunny day, and, we just can't imagine this is
all an accident. At moments like these, the plenum helps us
to avoid brain washing.
i didn't know you were talking about dark matter as you didn't say that to begin with.
ReplyDeletehave they actually detected it or is only part of a theory to make it work?
if they have detected it then they have sensed it - though indirectly as you say.
they detect its effect on something we can sense.
same difference.
the universe could be 99.999...% dark matter for all it means anything to me.
i am only concerned with what i can sense no matter how small a % that might be of the whole.
we can speculate all day about what we may not be able to perceive.
if there is no past or future as you previously stated then how can now be between two things that do not exist?
i see now not as a infinitesimal point - that ultimately disappears into nothing - but as an infinite continuum - which again disappears into nothing.
either way it is all nothing.
but something that we sense exists in the midst of that infinite nothingness and we have yet to figure out how or why or what.
i seriously doubt we ever will.
your theory seems plausible enough as do many many others i have heard or read about.
paul -
ReplyDeletewhat you say about what you are doing sounds great if that is what one is into experiencing.
i've had enough of that and like the world as is.
this is my escape from the infinite spheres into the mundane world.
it is so delightful.
but dino will ask, what is the world "as is"?
i don't know.
i don't feel anyone else does either except for their own theory about it which some hold as truth.
i don't believe in truth.
why must one thing be truth?
why not all things?
this is how i regard all of what we are discussing.
what everyone thinks is possible.
it's funny paul saying, "i can't seem to get thru to them".
ReplyDeletei think each of us feels the same about the other two.
what does that mean?
is it to get through and convince the others of the truth?
is that the only option?
i take bits and pieces from what each of you say as they might seem useful to me and i can apply them to something i got from somewhere else.
i want no truth.
i want it always to be a mystery.
I guess I didn't say "dark matter" at the start, sorry, that is
ReplyDeletetruly important to what i am claiming, surely.
Yes it was discoved to exist due to the effect of gravity (on
the expansion of the universe).
Yes, you have it right. Scientists cannot detect the plenum
directly but can 'see" it thru the behavior of gravity.
In other words, the universe
is expanding expodentially (not right word), at an always accelorating speed, moment by moment, which could not
happen if what exists is only the material we see, there must be unseen matter out there and around us, and it must constitute all of 73% of reality or more. This proves or re-inforces, philosophy's argument of the existence of an unseen plenum.
Like I say, philosophy gets there first, and science plays catchup.
Robert still does not grasp my point of the plenum and its
significance, that I portend. He says what does that mean
to him if 99% of the world is undetected. Here's my answer.
Why does it matter to us if matter is everywhere? If ererything exists everywhere, and there are no gaps between
things, or no space, that is in effect saying, nothing exists.
It's like having the measles, and the doctor says, "wow look at
those two red spots", and the sick person says, "Yeah, doc,
but what about all the other spots, don't you see them?"
So that is like our universe, we see only a small part of it,
which seems so important (especially as it is detached from
the rest...it is about mobile objects, that we can carry around in our hands...these visable things are detached from the plenum, not connected, are valuable to us, thus appear to exist i.e., money.
But, that is not to see the world as it truely is, in perspective.
That is all I am saying, that nothing exists because everything
exists. Too much stuff exists to make what we think exists exist. We are incorrectly focusing on a few visable things,
calling that a designed world. There is no design in a
solid block of matter.
Why does this matter to Robert? Because he believes in a god
only because he imagines the world to be a beautiful designed
place. But there can be no design in a solid plenum.
PAUL #############################################
ReplyDeleteOKydok. do people still say that? OKydoc with a c. This computer of mine is weirder than
can be. The email went thru after all. It was just that the scroll bar grew too big and there
was no room to go up to where I started or down to where I ended it. I cd only be in the middle;
that's all I cd read. Glad I found this out, cus I thought it was lost, but it all came thru after all.
.Weird as Hell! That message keeps coming on at different times: "Safari requires your keychain password to log in"
Now I've learned to cancel twice and it goes away for a little while, what a laugh!
Yes I have all yr philosophy stuff stored away too, never deleted it.
NO OFFENSE BUT Sometimes you can make it sound like you knew it all the time, like everything that's in the world can be sensed. Then I say
about this gas that's poison can't be detected and you say "ARe you saying we can't sense that people have died?"
No I was talking about the gas itself. So you see it is useless to argue with a person who is unscrupulous in arguments
and the debate may never be over and do we really want that same old argument over and over. This is not in the NOW,but is from the PAST.
So far we have determined that everything can either be sensed or is a poisonous gas. But thanks to that gas we now have
a new category of stuff that is not sensed thru the 5 senses. However Einstein and many others proved that we can detect
only a very narrow spectrum of the radio frequency waves. There's like 80% more that we don't sense. Allso dogs can hear higher notes than we can. So there are things we don't or can't sense that still are known to actually exist.
I think Paul is saying, 'hey, if some things cannot be detected
ReplyDeletethru our 5 senses, and we know they still exist, why can't god
exist, although we cannot sense him?
That is close to what Robert thought that I was mistaken with, but he realizes that I am saying that we DO sense things even if we can't see them, through things like telescopes which reveal things with cannot DIRECTLY perceive withoout the aid of a telescope. But because we cannot directly perceive some stars unless we use a telescope, does not mean we don't sense them...
...we DO sense them INDIRECTLY.
That is not true of god, we neither sense him indirctly nor
directly.
PAUL ##############################################
ReplyDeleteTHEY EMPHASIZE THE CONFESSING AND THE PRIEST GIVES THEM 10 Hail Marys and 14 Our Fathers.
It must mean they are forgiven. So this becomes habit, second nature, and relieves them somewhat.
"We are all sinners! We are BORN into sin!! shouted from the rooftops"!! Good Lord we were guilty the day we were BORN.
"Don't question it ;it IS the gospel"!! " Silence YOU SINNER"!! THEY definitely don't want someone thinking about
it ,asking a simple question like ,"How can a cute little baby be guilty of anything, he don't even know how to poop yet?"
Divorced people are not allowed to take communion anymore and sometimes excommunicated.
This harsh strictness doesn't work so well on a generation who, enlightened perhaps by a higher educational standard
even be it only the TV and movies, and who have seen lies used constantly by commercials, politicians, wives, husbands, bosses,
fellow workers, to the point of: "IS there anyone anywhere I can trust?" "Do I dare go outside?" ............. ha ha..........
After the local evening news, who compete for the most sensational fearful stories to increase their rating, we lock our
doors very well at night.
Don't get me wrong I feel happiness just like Robert I am content with life most of the time. We want to be comfortable.
We make ourselves comfortable. But guilt is a problem. There are young people who cut themselves. There are suicides
more than we think. Guilt causes people to want to be punished; this is tragic. A great sense of Guilt is wrong,
simply because we are all innocent! BORN IN TO SIN????? You mean mom and dad wanted to have a little fun and came
together for a little while and I was born. There's obviously no sin there. Folks have a
hard enough time believing in themselves as it is without dealing with BORN INTO SIN.
Paul made some good points on Catholosism.
ReplyDeletewhen did i ever say there was design?
ReplyDeletethere might be.
there might not.
i see no evidence that clearly makes it either one way or the other.
i find this with most other questions as well.
there is no definitive answer to any of it.
i don't know what paul is going on about - guilt?
how did that come into this and what does it have to do with anything we are discussing?
whatever may or may not be perceived by us is irrelevant until and unless we perceive it.
then it enters what we call reality.
until then it is only something we imagine and speculate about and create theories describing it.
it's interesting and is how we come to discover new things.
but until it is sensed in some fashion it is not real.
all i said is that i am not concerned about that whatever % it might be - 73% or otherwise more or less.
why should i be concerned about it until someone discovers it and writes about it and i read about it - like dark matter?
until it becomes real because it now has been sensed.
of course there is always more than what we perceive and have the means to perceive it.
we are constantly expanding our knowledge and understanding of the universe.
what is new about this?
i'm not sure about sensing or not sensing god.
ReplyDeleteit depends on what we define god as being.
if one is looking up at the sky for an old man with in a robe and long gray beard then one is sadly mistaken and is a fool.
but if god is a state of mind then it can be sensed and is sensed by many.
when you use the word god i am not sure what it is you are using that word to mean.
I forgot to say that Robert is not aware that he is a designist, no one usually is. But, I know I am safe in saying
ReplyDeletethat about Robert since 99% of the believers are designists, and they do not usually know they are.
One finds out that they are thru argumentation. For instance,
Robert often says he is deeply happy with his life, and
cannot understand why others are not. He arrives at others
being dissatisfied due to them questioning the nature of
reality, to which he construes that those who question
reality must be unhappy with it.
He doesn't like being "outted" in the way that I out him as a
theist thru his support of "what is". This belief in his "is"
becomes a give away of belief in universal design in nature.
He calls it patterns, and he sees reality in smoking his
cigarette, and in typing his thoughts, and, just him having a deep respect of the reality he is experiencing. These
come though his written thoughts. And this also reveals him as a likable guy. He knows he sees purpose in his life, yet he
says it may be, or not. No, it is "not". He sees it as
purposful and meaningful and destined as do most. But he is
sophisicated and knows this appears simplistic to others and
so, does not easiy admit to it. That is also common to the
intelligent.
I love this guy, and Paul, too. I even love their naive beliefs. I hate me, the hard asshole who puts all the nice
things in life down. ha ha.
A sandcastle at the beach is a pretty thing, but not when
it is covered with sand in a day or two, is it still a
castle, once it is buried? The plenum covers all our beloved castles making them a non-things.
Robert really thinks this does not affect him? The fact that
there is no reality? No cigarettes, no ashtray, no home, it's
not there. That doesn't affect him? That is strange indeed.
There is nothing new in this, he says. Does he mean that we
have always known that it is all nothing? No, because we
didn't know about dark matter until recently. The philosophers
have been teaching us this, but we yawn, like Robert does,
and believe we heard it all before.
A thought is sensed, but not god. A thought of god, yes, but, we are not sensing a separate object called god, so how can Robert say that a state of mind makes god real? A thought is a real thing, but not what is thought about.
ReplyDeleteYes I knew Paul was talking about the gas itself, but I was saying again, we "sense" the presence of gas in his example by deduction, by the fact that there are dead bodies laying around. So, how is this unscupulous, I'd like to know? Like I'm doing some
sneaky trickery, and one cannot argue with one
like me. Again Paul is confused with indirect
and direct sensing of something. We do not sense the gas directly, but do, indirectly thru seeing dead people, and draw the conclusion that there must be gas present, eventhough we can't
smell it, or see it.
Now what about his comment on time? I have just read many posts back but could not find it. Paul said that I was not making sense, and did I know that.
Maybe it was about the knife's edge of the present moment, that it seems impossible to know what the present moment is, as it passes by immedialely and, in so doing, is already is in the past. All I can
say is, that the currect thinking is there exists only the present.
Here's the problem I am trying to overcome.
ReplyDeleteThe world "looks" designed. It even looks designed by an itellegent being. I think we all take that for granted.
However, we know it is not designed, but then we are instantly put into a position to explain why it appears designed.
It is not enough to say it is all chaos, or that matter
at base is infinite, since this still
doesn't explain the sensation of the "appearance" of order.
So we start by asking what is reality. I would say it
is the existence, or appearent existence, of separate
physical bodies in the universe. What are bodies?
They consist of the occupation of space, and just as
important, there must be empty space separating bodies.
So we start to examine what is the nature of empty
space. It proves to not exist. Wow, so now what do we
do?
Next, in come the philosophers telling us that there is
no problem here, because there are
no bodies that exist either, just like there is no
space, as you can't have one without the other!!!
HOw can that be since we can see these bodies?
We think we can see them, but what it is really, is that we think
we perceive space between the bodies, as there is no sensation happening there. So we draw the conclusion that things
exist, but there is stuff there in space, and, today, we even
know what that stuff is, it is "dark matter".
It can be "seen" indirectly through the behavior of
gravity at work on the universe. So, given this plenum
of a universe, then there are no physical bodies with no spaces dividing them.
Now we understand why the plenum is so important. For
me it is the great equalizer showing how the universe
exists as one single item. (Now here Robert will say,
'hey you just said there is no space nor anything, but
now you say there is an enclosed universe, surrounded by space).
He has tryed to catch me on this several times. My answer is, I hope, always the same.
And that is, that I don't know how
much of the cosmos is plenum and visual matter, it may
extend yeyond the universe to other ones, and continue
in those. But whatever way it is out there, at least we
now know how reality works here.
Now I expect Robert will say, that's fine and dandy, and interesting
but how does pertain to me? Read on to next post.
ha - it's nice that you have a neat little box to put me in.
ReplyDeletewhy do i bother responding when you know my thoughts better than i know them myself and can have this discussion all by yourself with people as you imagine them being?
a designist?
i said i have yet to see evidence of it being either way.
i have yet to be convinced by anything.
and how do i say others are unhappy because they question reality?
others are unhappy i suppose because their lives are misery and suffering for some reason or another.
i can understand that perfectly well why they would be so.
i would too except i have been fortunate enough that my life has been pretty much cake so far and continues to be so - knock on wood.
reality whatever it may or may not be continues within me and around me.
i have yet to see it obliterated by anything such as dark matter or anything else except whenever i might die.
then that'll be it.
i have little to no idea what it might be except as it appears and i interact with it on an everyday level which many people including you tell me is illusion of some sort.
that may very well be so.
so what?
what is the real difference between the two?
i did not mean there is nothing new except to mean that there is nothing new about everything being new.
that has always been the case of our history of discovery.
there is always something else over the horizon.
now the great discovery is dark matter that explains everything.
tomorrow it will be something else.
a state of mind is a state of mind and is experienced directly.
i am not talking about a thought of anything.
it's like knowing that you are happy or sad or angry or whatever.
you just know that you are.
though thoughts of things may cause us to have certain states of mind.
these affect each of us differently.
a song we might hear for example.
for some the thought of god causes them unending joy.
for others the thought of god causes them great despair.
for me the thought of god causes me to laugh because it is absurd.
and, no, a thought of god does not make it real.
i don't recall saying that either.
it's only that when others speak of the experience of god it seems to me they are talking about a state of mind not some object.
even the bible warns about this not to place anything before god.
god is not an object - if there is a god.
i doubt there is.
the "is" that you say i believe in - making me a theist and now a designist by your definition - is just whatever it is that we are and that connects us.
for now in this case it is our computers and the internet.
that this "is" might not actually exist is something i have questioned since being a child.
as i have said i see no evidence that answers that one way or the other.
until then i act as if.
and so do you and everyone else.
if we don't we die.
i have already told you that your theory seems plausible enough.
it could very well be how things are.
all i'm saying about it is that even if that is the case there is not nothing here that i experience as you say it should be.
i experience something as do you.
that something is what we call reality.
the idea of order is interesting.
ReplyDeleteyou have me believing in it.
once again you have mistaken what i have stated.
i do not agree with the idea that if there is one there cannot be the other.
both exist at once.
all opposite things exist at once.
if one looks at what appears as order one sees imperfection in it leading one to chaos.
so which is it really?
some say order.
some say chaos.
i say both.
it is all on a spectrum and continuum.
we seem to be somewhere in the middle where things do not appear definitely one thing or the other.
that is also how everything is both everything and nothing at once as you state - i think.
PAUL ###################################################
ReplyDeleteI laughed when Robert said, I think each one of us feels that way about the other two referring
to my remark about "I can't seem to get thru to them." Funny as that's exactly how it is!
I, sorry, used the word unscrupulous just picking an unusual word for fun of writing. The word itself hugely
exaggerates the situation and seemed kind of comical. I enjoyed catching up and was wondering what you all thought of
those two things: "Can't get thru" & ."scrupulous" I admit that was a bit unscrupulous of me , but it did get yr
attention and you commented on it.
The plenum I take it is matter that must be there but does not seem to be there. To fit into the idea of expansion of the
universe but why not just say the universe is not expanding after all; it's just that we are expanding or evolving in our
minds and growing into more advanced beings? Or if it's infinite how can it expand? Or is it that the stars seem to be
racing away from each other?
Dino was telling me about going to the Catholic Church.
Paul has a good post. The idea of the plenum is an
ReplyDeleteattempt to account for the appearent existence of reality. Why is there a reality, at all? This is the biggest problem for the atheist (me). So, that is why I'm talking about the plenum. It seems to answer the question, 'why is there
there is something, and not nothing?'.
The atheist's answer to it (my answer) would be to explain that there is not a 'something' but rather a plenum only,
which accounts for the "reality" we see around us.
Yes, the plenum is invisable due to the fact that it
does not relect light, so cannot be seen or felt, yet
it constitues over 80% of our world. We know it is
real because of the behavior of galazies (not individual stars, as Paul said). The galizies are flying away from
each other at ever greater speeds, even faster than
the speed of light in some cases. What tremendous force could be causing the acceleration? They call it
'dark matter' and 'dark energy'. There so much mass
in the dark matter that it's gravational pull is making
the universe grow at an accelorating speed day by day.
As the galazies spread out away from each other, this causes the universe to expand in size and, expand at
an always faster pace. But my point is that this
stuff exists eventhough we can't perceive with our senses. But, and here's the hard part, dark matter is
still matter, and so COULD be sensed via an instrument
in the future. It is See-ABLE eventhough not seen.
It is feel-ABLE eventhough we can't feel it. It is
all about the suffix, "ABLE", that makes the difference
between dark matter and the supernatural. The supernatural cannot EVER be seen, even if we invented
a machine that is able to theoretically see it. A ghost is not 'supposed' to be see-able, if you could
see one, it would not be a ghost. God is in this
category, also, along with sorsorers, unicorns, santa,
Greek Gods. Note, that a religious apologist, admits
that god cannot be proven, he'll say god is not that kind of thing, that you can measure, see, and touch.
But dark matter is that kind of thing that we could
see and touch, if we had the equipment.
What I detect in Robert is a stong sense of purpose to
ReplyDeleteexistence, all the while he declaring, the world may or may not have purpose.
If one sees purpose, and a point
to our existence, one sees design in it. I think he
knows he does regard the world this way. I admit I did make up the word, "designist", couldn't resist it, but
to box him in like that is to wake him up.
Robert wonders how it affects him that the world is an
illusion. I would answer it affects him as much as
him learning for the first time that the earth goes
around the sun, nothing in our lives change by knowing
that the earth moves. So, he says, so what? How will it change anything knowing this stuff?
Why is man curious? Who knows? It is just in our natures to want to know.
Yes, I do appreciate his understanding of the infinite
nature of material objects especially at their edges where one can never really say where a thing begins and
ends.
I think that in viewing the world as the plenum that
this comes to be a nice way to come to understand it
without so many of the difficulties that pure Idealism
seems to produce. It is just a lot easier to say that there is
too much existence than everything is nothing. So, I
would think Robert could appreciate the concept of the world
as a plenum, as I do.
No, I do not believe Robert has no beliefs, first of all, he believes in reality. Why? He would say experience. But, that is to say the same thing twice.
I hate to say it but the box he is in, is denial.
Now please I hope he doesn't get upset, this is true of everyone...Not me of course.
I don't know why he denied being a theist for so long.
We had a conversation about him not being sure on how
he stood, and, then finally he admitted on this blog
he was a theist. But it was hard going to "out" him
about this.
He is also a realist which is obvious about many things
he writes like...
"i have little to no idea what it (the it here implies reality exists, and he seems to have little doubt of that) might be except as it appears (again, "it appears", so it is there, he clearly is sure of this) and i interact with it (he thinks if he says he doesn't know what "it" might be he is
keeping an open mind about reality existing) on an everyday level which many people including you tell me is illusion of some sort.that may very well be so (not
in the way he is talking).
so what?
what is the real difference between the two?
He asks what is the difference between the two, reality and illusion, how does it affect us in everyday life, I
guess that is what he means. Does he want a practical application of it? This goes back to what I said
about Copernicus and the earth being the one that moves. And then he says who cares, there will always
be something or other over the horizon.
Robert writes he has no evidence of god one way or
the other, so therefore he belives in him??
Of course he would believe in him as he has no evidence one way or the other. So if he has no evidence one way
or the other, why does he believe? If his rule is that he must have evidence,
I want to know what evidence he has one way or the
other that Santa exists, or does he not believe
in him? He hasn't answered that yet.
I'll take a wild guess and say Robert does not believe
in Santa, so he must have evidence SAnta doesn't exist.
What is it, I'd like to know.
PAUL ##########################################
ReplyDeleteI wd say Robert is satisfied with life as he says. He likes cigarettes and coffee, writing and thinking, art,creativity, music.
There are lots of goods things in life for him now and he's happy. Robert understands most of your advanced concepts and enjoys the mysteries of existence and science. " Everything is nothing" has been like one of his main slogans.
Yet this is good because why should people be so serious about life and live in fear and worry? Robert might say,
"Let life unravel itself instead of me unraveling it." Laid back. He's on the fence between Idealism and realism; vacillates back and forth. But we all do.
He said there is no God, yet I also remember him saying he does believe in God and recommended prayer to a contact online. He's not strictly one who idealizes science anymore than other world interpretations. I would say that he is somewhat advanced in mysticism, would seem to be successful in life, and would say at the end, "Let's do it again!"
He cares about people and is a good person but he has some secrets. He wants to appear mysterious as well to attract. Of course who doesn't? But he is honest and straight foward.
Paul said some nice things about Robert. I
ReplyDeletesay here, here. I wish I would have said them first.
Paul said that Robert does not revere science
anymore that other world systems. This tells me
something about Paul's attitude, and maybe Robert's also, that they see science as a world
system or, i guess, a philosophy, no more than
a way of viewing the world. But I like the idea, but don't agree.
Yes, he is successful in life, for sure. "let
life unravel itself instead of me unraveling it". That is a great thought, snd, indeed true
observation of Robert.
Here's the problem I am trying to overcome. The world "looks" designed. It even looks designed by an itellegent being. I think we all take that for granted. However, we know it is not
ReplyDeletedesigned.
If we take that stance, we are necessarily put into a position to explain why it appears designed.
It is not enough to say it is all chaos, or that matter at base is infinite, since this still
doesn't explain sensation and the "appearance" of order.
So we start by asking what is reality. I would say it is the existence, or appearent existence, of separate physical bodies in the universe. What are bodies?
They consist of the occupation of space, so, just as important, there must be empty spaces separating bodies. So we need examine what is the nature of empty space. It proves to not exist. Wow, so now what do we do?
So, in come the philosophers telling us that there is no problem here, because no bodies exist either, just like there is no space, as you can't have one without the other!!!
HOw can that be that they don't exist, since we can see these bodies?
We only think we can see them, but what do we think we see? We see them and the empty space that exists between them. We falsely imagine there is no sensation happening in between. So we draw the intellectual conclusion that nothing IS there, and so, this is how we imagine things exist.
But truth is, there IS stuff there, between bodies, in space, and, today, we even know what that stuff is, it is "dark matter".
It can be known indirectly through the behavior of gravity at work on the universe. So, given this plenum of a universe, then there are no physical bodies with no spaces dividing them.
Now, we understand why the plenum is so important. For me it is a great equalizer showing how the universe exists as one great single item. (Now here Robert might say,'hey you just said there is no space nor anything, but,now you say there is an enclosed universe, surrounded by space). He is
right, and has tryed to catch me on this several times. My answer is, I hope, always the same.
And that is, that I don't know how much of the cosmos is plenum verses visual matter, it may
extend yeyond the universe to other ones, and continue in those. But whatever way it is out there, past this universe, at least we now know how reality works here. And, that is all we were trying to understand.
Now I expect Robert will say, thats fine and dandy, and interesting
but how does pertain to me? Read on to next post.
prayer?
ReplyDeletei know i never said anything about prayer.
what the heck is this god thing we are discussing?
i may believe in it or not depending upon what it is agreed upon being defined as being.
the world must look ordered because we have evolved to perceive order for some reason having to do with our survival and/or amusement.
for centuries we have felt that that was what the world was supposed to be - perfect order.
recent modern thinking has it that the real underlying basis of it all is chaos.
the eastern mystics would say it is both.
who is right and who is wrong?
whether everything is everything or if everything is nothing doesn't seem to matter much to me which it is.
it could be both.
i don't know.
TYPE or PASTE your text here... What is he referring to when he says,
ReplyDelete"I never said anything about prayer"? I never said anything about
prayer, either. So, I wonder what's up?
Next I asked, and, keep asking, why doesn't he subject his "it" god
to the same test as he does with Santa? Again, he makes no mention
of Santa. Ha ha.
Then he says, "I may believe in it (god) or not depending upon what it is agreed upon being defined". Does this mean he is a theist depending on his mood? Or, I think he may
mean that he does not believe in the concept of the old
man, white skinned, god with a long beard sitting on a
throne in the sky. So, I wonder what concept of a god or gods,
he does believe in. In other words, I wish he would
tell us what picture of god he does believe in, I mean I
would like a DESCRIPTION.
He says, that the world must look orderly due to evolution
for survival purposes. So, if there were no evolution, what
does he think the world REALLY looks like without it?
So, we see, that saying the world looks organized due to
evolution, simply begs the question. We still need a theory
to explain apparent design.
And, besides, it isn't the design part of reality that I am
trying to explain, it is the appearance of separation of
physical bodies in space, or, more simply, why are there
objects.
No, it doesn't matter much to Robert if there is a plenum,
he says (everything is everything, or, nothing, so what?), but then
again, he is back to his double standard.
The double standard being, if the nature of truth doesn't
matter to him, then why does Copernicus' discovery that the
earth moves around the sun, matter to him?
dino - "He said there is no God, yet I also remember him saying he does believe in God and recommended prayer to a contact online"
ReplyDeleteas i stated i have yet to see any evidence presented that everything is either everything or nothing - or both or neither.
until such time as there is it is mere speculation as to which it might be.
i meant that i could see it either way and that either way it might be proven to be is fine with me.
yes, i change all the time.
i've already discussed my thoughts about gods and santa and all that business.
i see no reason to repeat myself.
my being a theist is based on your definition of what a theist is - one who believes in existence.
i've already told you to google flying spaghetti monster if you want what my god looks like.
es, there is no evidence that reality is a plenum, but that
ReplyDeleteis not what philosophy does. Philosophy is pure thought,
about what makes sense, or, what has logical consistency.
It just seems to me that this idea has logical
consistency, that's all.
Yes, as I said in my private email to him, I apologize
for misunderstanding that he admits he
changes from theist to atheist, and back again all the
time. OK, that seems OK to me.
I can't help thinking making god a flying Spaghetti Monster
is just a joke, so that is why I don't look it up or take
it seriously.
i've already went so far as to state that your theory about everything seems entirely plausible to my untrained mind.
ReplyDeletebut so do many others that would contradict it.
why not a flying spaghetti monster joke or not?
all people have their own idea of what god might be - if there is one, which i highly doubt though i do not know for certain if or if not.
that's the wonderful thing about our imagination.
for people like paul god is very much real and can be experienced.
i wouldn't take that away from them.
i am so ignorant about most of everything so i feel i cannot claim anything as being true though i deeply doubt one thing is true while all other things are false as most people would have it.
if anything i am a multi-theist.
i see the universe as a whole spectrum from it being everything to it being nothing.
if one follows logic i'm sure one would arrive at the many of the same conclusions as dino.
if one follows mysticism one may arrive at the same conclusions as paul.
i have no idea which may or may not be true but would allow both of them being true.
the universe is a diamond with many different facets that appear to each of us individually.
why is that not possible?
i'd be interested to know what you think is a serious non-joke description of what god is if not something like the flying spaghetti monster.
ReplyDeletethis is one of the advantages of a polytheistic culture that we have lost to our centuries old belief in monotheism.
it even affects how we think of science as having one true answer.
i do not believe in that.
but it seems to me that this is what both you and paul are after - the one true answer.
you just each approach it from different angles and through different disciplines endlessly trying to convince others that they are wrong if they think differently.
Thank god, I do not have to describe god as Robert and deists have to do. Trying to do that, makes him and me foolish. I guessed that he would avoid answering that, in the same way he does not answer my Santa question. Cus, he cannot. He says Paul and I are "after" him, that we claim the one "true answer". I would never lump him and Paul
ReplyDeletetogether, as I know this is cheap way out of difficulties,
but he does, to make him seem victimized.
He is not being victimized, we are not evangelists, preaching doctrines, trying to convert him and others. Please, come now. Yet, he says these same things over and
over.
Then again he says science is a 'Belief", yet he has learned many times what the scientific method is, that is not a"belief", as he wishes, but he will not comment on that, either.
to say one does not believe in something one needs to define what it is one does not believe in otherwise one's statement of non-belief is meaningless.
ReplyDeletei'm getting really tired of the spin you keep putting on what i say changing it into saying and reveling something else that is in your mind not mine.
i kinda wish you would quote me directly instead of doing this.
the reason i repeat myself is because you either avoid what i say or completely misinterpret it so i have to explain it again... and then again... and then again...
ReplyDeleteWell, he didn't think I misrepresented him when I said that I commented about his flip-flopping with religion. I wish he would use the quote of what I said that seems to always
ReplyDeletemisrepresent him, so he wouldn't have to get "tired".
He often says he is not being understood and that I should copy and paste his remark...but what good would that do? I would still interpret what he is saying the same way.
"to say one does not believe in something one needs to define what it is one does not believe in otherwise one's statement of non-belief is meaningless"....did not understand this, can he edify, thanks?
He says he is a "multi-theist" (polytheist?), I wonder if that includes the Christian god?
perhaps i should have said misrepresent what i say rather than misinterpret.
ReplyDeleteyes, your interpretations will always be the same.
but please make it clear what i am saying when you respond.
quotes would help.
all i am continuing to ask is when you say you don't believe in god what do you mean by god?
god has so many meanings.
christian god?
why not?
Yes, I will enter his exact words, from now on, so
ReplyDeletewe all know what I am referring to, even if Get it wrong.
The problem with the Christian god is that one can't
have other gods before him, meaning if one allows in
other gods, one cannot be a Christian, that's why I
asked Robert that. I am responding to him saying,
"christian god, why not?", and that is my answer to
why not, and in fact, almost all the other gods do not
allow polytheism, or multitheism, they mostly say
the right god is their god and that the other gods are
not real.
In other words, he can't be a christian one day and a
Hindu the next. Maybe so.
He's asking me what kind of a god is it that I don't
believe in? Any kind.
This whole thing about all ideas are OK, is just that, we don't live our
lives that way. We prefer this over that, and make choices all the
time. Why is philosophy different? I have always thought that the
people who say that they believe in all things are just trying to keep
the peace. It's a good deed, but does not answer the question.
PAUL##################################################
ReplyDeleteI wish everyone well. I agree with a lot of points either of you bring up,
and I appreciate being included as one of three. It's a simple matter to describe God with his shockingly blue green eyes,
golden yellow hair, extremely muscular physic and shiny pure black skin! ha ha just kidding. An actual physical
description of Him I'm afraid would be quite beyond human ability. I also believe that describing the entire universe
as infinite or finite to be beyond human ability or real understandability. But these mysteries are quite enticing
they draw us to them. There's a certain feeling about infinity (no limit). So I go with this. Besides I can't see how
the universe which is supposed to be everything could be one enclosed thing. Immediately we wonder what's outside of it then?
contradicting our original definition.
I believe that the great religious leaders known about thru history, as well as the saints have found there way into REALITY
which is within us not outside of us also known as the kingdom of God. These disciplined folks ( the disciples, saints, etc. )
are continuing to help mankind in a place where they can do more good and exert more power. Yet they are just like us
exactly altho more advanced along the path of spirituality & mind control. Like there is a hierarchy above and below them.
Many great things have happened because of this. For instance the idea that all men are created equal.
This is one of those great spiritual, righteous discoveries from a few centuries ago. Included in my definition of spirituality
are the wonderful moral lessons that man is heir to, and teachings that have been repeated over and over thru out
history. Yoga and it works, certain martial arts like Jui Jitsu, Hinduism, the writings of recognized saints.
All these things attract me like a magnet. one writer( Robert Merton I believe) said if one has trouble dealing with people
one needs to be alone with God and this will help him learn to deal with people. He can come back.
This is what religion should be about and is for me. The greatest teachers in the world, the greatest helpers, greatest geniuses
where did they all go?
I think Paul is alluding to the scientific
ReplyDeleteunderstanding of the universe. Yes,. they say that is all there is, but they don't know that. They must say that because of the laws of logic demands that they take that tact. They have
to say it is enclosed but at the same time say
that there is nothing outside the universe.
But, I think logic tells us there is an outside
to it, containing even other universe (the multi-verse). And logic is always right even
more so than science.
never said i was a christian or anything else.
ReplyDeletei doubt any of the religions would have me.
and only fools follow rules.
i only mean that i feel that there is the possibility that this god - or any other - exists.
and i have yet to see any evidence that proves that it might not though i strongly doubt that it does.
to answer an earlier point, if one talks to or reads almost any anthropologist they will tell you that western science is indeed a belief system.
it is one that believes that there is truth and that if one follows a certain disciplined methodical path (logic and science) one will arrive at it.
so far i see no evidence that is necessarily true.
i have no problem imagining something as the universe being infinite and having no "outside".
ReplyDeletewhat exists outside spacetime?
i do not think logic will ever tell us.
infinity lies beyond its ability to measure.
to measure is to ration or divide - the root of rationality.
infinity is indivisible or irrational.
one measures it and is never done because it goes on forever.
what is the difficulty in imagining that?
logic will only accept reality falling under certain criteria.
it must be able to be repeated and tested and verified.
all it knows is that x-amount of reality that follows these conditions.
what about all of reality that does not?
it only happens once or a few times or happens sporadically.
it happens here and not there.
it happens for one but not all.
these are dismissed by logic and science as noise that must be removed from any experiment.
logic and science are limited by this.
the inner experience is the most mysterious of all to it.
this can only be known by the individual not measuring devices.
it is also dismissed.
Robert is quite right, science is truly a belief system
ReplyDeletewhen one comes down to it. It does not consider itself a
system of belief, we usually refer to religions this way.
It not only endorses the existence of truth, but it assumes
the existence of nature without proof, also. In other
words, science subscribes to the philosophy of Realism by
faith alone.
Robert also has a good take on infinity, I think. Yes, infinity cannot be measured and thus cannot be imagined.
And, we recall in philosophy 101, if you can't imagine
something, it does not exist. Now how can that be, that
infinity cannot exist? We do indeed, as Robert says, feel we can understand this idea, but how, if
we can't wrap our minds around it? We must somehow contain
a thing to picture it. One cannot contain infinity.
I have an idea of how we maybe do it. I think we
imagine a process, like us traveling out into infinite
space and never coming to rest, so that infinity never is
a single contain concept, but, rather, always in motion,
always going onward and out, forever, when we "look at"
infinity we see something in motion and undergoing constant
change.
Robert is saying this same thing by saying "one measures it and is never done", well said.
Logic does require reality holding to certain standards,
things must be seen, held, verified, and tested to be real.
The problem is that all things, spiritual, or not, claim to conform to those very standards, like Mysticism and bliss, claim this, claim to conform to logic and reason, but, they do not.
i like infinity as a process.
ReplyDeletebut infinity exists everywhere not just out in deepest space.
it exists infinitesimally within each thing.
in our normal unaided view of the world something like a rock seems solid and unchanging but we now know that it is a swirling conglomeration of increasingly smaller particles.
everything is ultimately infinite.
everything is also ultimately one thing - plenum?
where exactly are the boundaries between what we perceive as separate things?
i think this was intuitively grasped by the mystics for they speak often in these terms about the world and universe.
the only trouble i have is that they add gods into it.
bah humbug.
i only accept gods as metaphors to speak of things we have no other way of describing.
i do not believe there is an actual god or gods.
that is the one good thing about science is that it has done away with them by finding more better ways of describing the world.
for whatever reason we have evolved to perceive a world that appears solid and is populated with things that are separate from each other and we are separate from each other.
this is false (maya) but nonetheless it is how we perceive it and also need to perceive it in order to survive.
i don't know why this is this way but only that it is.
how else could it be to exist and also for us to exist within it?
you say "things must be seen, held, verified, and tested to be real".
this is all we know of the world we call real and our real selves in it.
we perceive ourselves as bodies in physical space.
that is the first thing a baby discovers after it is born.
your criticism of gods and religion is valid.
but gods and religion are just a bunch of made up stories to keep the masses under control and organized.
this is not what i mean by mysticism.
the true mystics are the ones who have experimented with themselves and observed and noted the results.
their goal is to quiet the body and mind so that one may observe the world more closely and clearly.
this makes sense to me though i have not practiced it myself.
it also makes sense to me that it would bring one tranquility and peace - boring!
i have always followed the haphazard approach just going along and putting together my own ideas out of my ordinary untrained and undisciplined life.
i am basically lazy and always look for the easy way with as little work as i can get away with.
both the mystical path and the path of logic are too much work.
but i like hearing from and reading people who have disciplined themselves to follow them and have many ideas i never would have thought of that could very well be true or not.
i myself do not know either way.
to me the world is full of people each with their own ideas about what is and is not reality.
many combine themselves together into collective belief systems like religion or science or what have you.
we seem to do this by nature as a social species to organize and get things done.
i have always been distrustful of such groups and try to stay away from them as much as possible.
but the problem with that is that i am not prepared to live out alone in the wilderness so i must compromise somewhat in order to survive because these groups provide what i need to survive - food clothing shelter, etc.
but i got off on a sidetrack.
what about the nature of reality?
will we ever know?
i'm not sure.
logic does seem to make sense but something makes me feel there is something missing in it and i'm not exactly sure what.
but much of mysticism seems to me to be wild flights of fantasy and imagination sometimes too.
but i feel somehow the "answer" is a combination of the two and more so than that.
that is also part of what i have followed for myself.
i may be sadly and foolishly mistaken to have done so.
i doubt everything and i believe everything.
i cannot tell the difference much of the time.
Ooh, good, infinity is everywhere, as Robery says, not justin the depth of space. And, yes, as he says, no boundries. By the way, I am getting to regard distance and
ReplyDeletesize as the same thing. I think sometimes that we can just
as correctly say a small thing is far away.
I think Robert misunderstands logic, to some extent. Logic is not that popular view of discipline and practice the way
that comtemplation is, that the mystics do. It is not
math and equations or word syllogisms. The wonderful thing
about logic is that is the most everyday activity built into every human being instinctively....no work...no
discipline. Logic is what we do every moment of our lives.
It arises naturally out of our instinctive belief in the
existence of physical objects, space, time, which are
instrinsically attached to our concept of reality.
We all have it, free of charge. No effort is needed.
I think the "answers" can be found within logic. The problem is that we love to use logic in daily life but
abandon it as soon as we want to explain our world.
I can't help to believe this is because the
answers that logic provides must not be to our liking.
Robert says he doubts everything, but then I have to ask,
why is it he uses logic every moment of his life?
Doubting itself is a logical process. Reasoning is rationing, or cutting away all the garage and getting down
to the nitty gritty.
i suppose the way you seem to mean it logic is used everyday by all though i doubt it is the entirety of our thinking - or feeling, which is just as important to us.
ReplyDeletebut what i meant was the formal logic used by philosophers and scientists to reason out things which you often use as examples of what you are trying to say.
that is a trained discipline.
i also feel that we must sometimes abandon logic to get at things we cannot otherwise understand.
we use imaginative intuitive thinking.
i feel that too much either way is not the way to anything but both are needed.
it seems to me that logic leads one to believe that one can find truth - a universal truth.
i have stated before that i do not believe in truth.
there are many truths.
there is truth for each of us as we experience our individual lives.
i think this is what we are the most afraid of - there being no truth.
what are we to do then?
we feel that we are lost.
we need truth to unify ourselves.
we need to all be believing the same thing if we are to function socially in any sort of organized meaningful way.
that is all it is and in that sense truth can be and has been most anything.
sure, small objects such as particles can be seen as being "far away".
they are just a distant from us as galaxies in some sense.
we seem to be floating on a boat in the middle of a sea of infinity.
how we got in the boat or where the boat came from are a mystery to us.
our own identity seems to be a mystery to us.
it seems quite natural that we use our imaginations to try to explain what we observe in the world around us.
now we have particle accelerators and telescopes and such to aid our perception into what things actually are but to the ancient people who had no such instruments it is no wonder that they came up with the ideas that they did.
the problem is now that people won't let go of these old stories.
now it is all theories about this and that and the other thing.
as i said above, that seems to scare the hell out of many people.
This post is not in response to the last one of Robert's, but it
ReplyDeleteis another response to the one before his last one, I'll comment
on it after this one, thanks.
Now Robert is saying he is a doubter, while his mind is open to all new ideas
He won't subscribe
to any particular point of view, as eventually they are all proven absurd.
Before, it seemed I could quote Robert to prove him out to
hold a philosophy, sort of, but not any more. It may be only my imagination, but it seems like he is being very careful in his wording, and with what he says, so one cannot quote him, or pin him down to show him having a point of view. But, then, in a way, I do, recall some of the things he said before he got so cautious.
And what would that be?
Things like how much he was happy with his life and with reality, and, that how much he wonders why it is that others are so dissatisfied with their world, and, not satisfied with
the way "it is" (note, "the way it is", not that this is
exactly what Robert said, but it is close, and I don't think I am too far off).
But in any case, he saying in effect, "the way things are", reveals a point of
view on how reality is to him.
Off hand, I would say that he, like the rest of us, believes
in the philosophy of realism, just like science does, and
like most people, which is that things exist, and, he LIKES
it that way. The giveaway is that he says, or used to say,
he likes the way things are, as they are, and, doesn't need for things
to be different. Different? Different than how? So that
means he knows how things really are, and that my friend, shows
a philosophy of life shinning through.
But now it is hard for me to quote him because he is on his
guard, after what was said. And what was that?
Basically, it was that I am arrogant in thinking that I know him better than he knows himself.
You know what? That is true of most, that many come to know
someone better than he knows himself, except for me, of course. ha ha. lol.
Now, I dare say, Robert will be asking me why I do not scroll back to find his exact words. But, I hate doing that. I never find what I'm looking for, and, besides, we
are talking about millions of words. Just too huge a project. And, when one does that, copy and paste quotes, it is always so boring to read for some reason. At least for me it is.
I have read that most philosophers do not adhere to the
ReplyDeleteidea of intuition, and, some have analyzed intuition to be
an order of rational thinking via a process that we are not consciously aware of (subconscious reasoning), I buy into
that because the idea of intuition is supposed to be one
of the "higher" things, beyond understanding, in other words, supernatural. By the way, that is always the case
of things that "cannot be explained", all such things are
logical contradictions, and so not exist.
Robert said that the other kind of thinking are our feelings. Feelings are not logical, of course, but logic
does not excude feelings. Feelings do not say anything,
or make claims, nor involve thinking. So, I do think that
logic is the entirety of our thinking.
Now Robert says we are on a sea of mystery, and, he asks
from where our boat come...oh oh, sounds like god.
I have always had a hard time with the idea of many truths,
and, with the statement that all truths are correct.
He says he doubts everything and believes everything.
This is to say, what is true for me, is true, and what is
true for you is also true. But to say, "...is true",
seems to mean ONE truth. It is an absolute truth but
only for one person.
Of course, it is impossible to have an absolute truth to
apply to only one person, because, "absolute" means
universal, or, the same for all.
i am happy with my life.
ReplyDeletei guess that is a philosophy of sorts.
i suppose i do have a belief in realism.
i believe if i step in front of a truck it will run me over.
i believe that food and air sustains me and i will die if it is too hot or cold.
etc.
am i wrong?
i would be surprised if these things were not true for you as well.
this is what i assume is reality to all or most people.
i do enjoy it so far.
it has done me no harm - yet.
the question is, what is this reality?
that is what we are discussing and others have discussed and argued before us and i have yet to come across any one particular set of ideas that explains it all.
of course people will claim this is designed to be this way that we are here and everything is just how it needs to be in order for us to survive.
i think evolution answers that - but perhaps not.
there is no need for gods.
it is the totality of ideas together that i find to be absurd as they all contradict each other and some contradict themselves.
there seems to be no consensus we all can agree on about it though some have tried to force others to believe as they do.
i have said that i myself take bits and pieces of these ideas to make up my own.
my own "philosophy" doesn't make much sense to anyone and often doesn't make sense to me.
there is so much about this world i do not know about - especially other people.
yes, stating that there is no truth is a contradiction because that is stating a "truth".
i see no way around that.
it is a semantic paradox of language.
my statements about things being different than they are is meaning that i see no need for there to be other worlds that are "higher" or more "real" than this one.
why should there be?
but then i do not know for a fact that there are not as many people claim there are.
you have written about me saying "what is" before.
what is is me sitting here before a computer typing out this comment.
i assume you are someone like myself on the other end doing the same.
i could be wrong however.
this is the "boat" i wrote about.
i have no idea how i got here or where here is exactly or what it is.
i really have no idea of who i really am other than a name i have been given by my parents at birth and this body i have been born into.
if you have answers to that you should write a book and go on tv.
i stated that people BELIEVE they have found absolute universal truth not that there are actually any.
a big difference.
my "truth" is that i am an ignorant fool who doesn't know what he is talking about most of the time and it is easy to pin me down to stating contradictions.
oh well.
why do things need to make sense logical or otherwise?
It is a mistaken idea to say one would be killed by
ReplyDeleterunning out onto the freeway is the same as saying that
freeways exist. It must be possible for them to exist without a mind thinking thinking of them. In the same way
that a mind cannot exist without it having something to
think about. Thus we see that both objects depend on each
other to exist. Existence is about something that does
not depend on something else to exist, and there is nothing
like that. The confusion arises in us believing that to exist means "being there".
Yes, I agree that evolution explains away god. But, I am
talking about a different kind of design. I mean the kind
that accounts for there being present separate physical bodies. This problem is embodied in the comment made so
often by theists, "why is there something, and not nothing?".
Robert confirms what he has often said that he "knows" he
is sitting by his computer, but he doesn't say how he knows
that.
I am well aware that he is saying that things are as they
are, and that there is no need for them to be different, is
to merely appeal Occum's razor in arguing the nature
of reality, but, I am simply using that statement to expose
his otherwise "buried" assumption of his particular point of
view of reality which I do not think he is aware of. I am
not contesting his idea, nor even referring to it. ha ha.
He does it again unbeknowst to himself as in this.....
"my statements about things being different than they ARE is meaning that i see no need for there to be other worlds that are "higher" or more "real" than this one.
why should there be?
but then i do not know for a fact that there are not as many people claim there are."
Notice he says, "My statement in things being different than
they ARE..."
So, Then they "are"? How are they? Isn't that clearly a hidden
revealation of his knowing what things "are", and how things exist?
No, he is not a fool, and, yes, he is very logical and he
loves logic or he wouldn't be on this blog. To write is to
be logical. Yet, I think he seems to think that art and
beauty are at war with logic, and so does Paul, seems like.
PAUL ###########################################
ReplyDeleteRather than logic I would trust reason. True reason can lead you to the truth. There has to be absolute truth.
Regardless of whoever's thinking. However one can not hope to find truth when already predjudiced against one of the
alternative possibilities. An open mind is needed. Not one carrying ideas from the past nor an emotional stake in the
outcome of an argument. All this must be left at the doorstep. Otherwise the person will support only what
he already believes in. So it is useless. Living in the past instead of the NOW!
I don't see how scientists who are atheistic would have any more credibility than others who do believe or those who are nuetral.
Those nuetral would be more likely to search and encounter the truth. Robert may agree with this.
Can't say why philosophers would have any more credibility than any one else in the intelligencia.
An editor of a newspaper, a doctor of psychology, a priest are all very experienced people.
Hypnosis has been used to discover many supernatural and surprising things: Certainly there's the supernatural.
One can not ignore a large percentage of life's experience, simply because one doesn't want to look.
If you've believed something for years and every day you pretty much say this to yourself............... no wonder
you still believe it today! But to prove it to someone is a different story.
Paul says that atheistic scientists should not be believed anymore than anyone else. But I would remind him that there are many theistic scientists, Einstein was theistic.
ReplyDeleteI do not agree that there is anything supernatural that exists.
Paul said that there has to be absolute truth, but does he
ReplyDeleterealize that for that to be, that something material would
have to be absolute, i.e., god? And, if he believes god to
be material, he is re-defining god?
dino -
ReplyDeletei think i can say that i am having an experience of something while at the same time not quite knowing what exactly it is.
as i said, i assume you and others are having the same experience.
perhaps not.
we as babies are born into a world wild with sensations that we then sort through and try to comprehend as we grow and have more experience of it.
we also rely on others to tell us or show us what it is as well.
does anyone really know what it is?
i would say not.
i do not understand your argument about this point.
why must me experiencing something mean i know what it is?
all i know is the experience and how it appears to me to behave that would seem to be consistent - though not always.
if existence doesn't mean "being there" then what does it mean?
paul -
why MUST there be absolute truth?
i can understand how appealing it is to us to BELIEVE such a thing as it gives us comfort in an otherwise seemingly meaningless world of diversity and even chaos but i feel it is only a fiction we have created in our minds to provide us with that comfort in a scary world.
absurdity and confusion and nonsense rule the day.
and why shouldn't it?
i see no reason or any real benefit to it being otherwise.
Yes, to Robert, of course, we are having experiences, but
ReplyDeletewhose to say that is reality? To say sense perception is
what reality is, is to make a value judgement, or,opinion.
If that is his opinion, than well and good, but he and
others need to admit that. He keeps saying we don't know
what it is...but isn't it sense perception? I would like to
know what part of the words, "sense perception", he does not
understand.
One more word to Paul, about the absolute. To believe that,
he must believe something exists that lasts forever. What
could that be? We know that all things get old and finally
disintegrate, every piece of wood does, even gold does.
It is a law of science, "Entropy", or the 2nd Law of
thermodynamics. Even the universe, and all the stars are
dieing out, and cooling, and dieing a cold death. But
yet Paul says there is some universal truth, that never
changes and is always true and there is a being that exists
this way never moving or changing. This is contridictory to
all of nature.
on one hand - usually in your argument about there not being god - you state that everything must be verified with sense perception in order to exist.
ReplyDeletebut here in this last comment you imply that sense perception isn't real.
you can't have it both ways.
which is it?
"reality" is a word in our language that is commonly understood to mean that which we perceive with our senses.
if there is some other reality than that we cannot possibly know about it other than perceiving it with our senses - otherwise why can't there be god?
i took it as a given that it was understood that everything i write is basically my opinion of things.
this is true with anyone - yourself included.
We have been thru this issue several times. The issue is
ReplyDeletesense perception. When he says, "my last comment.." does he
mean my last post? I don't think I said sense perception
is not real, as Robert says I did. But, it is true I have
said that a long time ago, in my posts. I mean by that, that sense perception sometimes needs an aid to work, like
a telescope, other times it requires only math equations,
like the discovery of dark matter must exist in order to complete an equation. In the latter case we use our eyes (sense) to "see" that that the equation balances. I don't know if this means sensation.
So, yes, for anything to exist, sense perception is required. But, Robert is saying, unbeknownst to him, that
only things that we can DIRECTLY perceive exist, I think.
He has a point, and a good one, and that is, for Plenism to
be true, does it require the usual dose of sense perception? If it does, than, seems to me, I am trying to have it both ways, as he says. I do indeed believe the plenum is
"visable" through math equations, and I do, more or less,
rest my case on that fact. But, I do also think, that this
kind of belief, finally comes from logic and math, as opposed to experience (experiment)(science).
I believe that visable proof will come in the distant future of plenism similar to the bending of starlight, that verified Einstein, who originally
aquired his therom from "thought experiements", deduction,
reasoning, mathmatics, not experimentation.
I think I tried to say in my last post, also, that it is not
so much that Robert, and all Realists, are believing only
their senses, but in the existence of space as well, and that is the logical conflict Realism plays in that being
their concept of reality. You see, Robert, does believe that space exists. And that is where logic and
math come into this. We cant "see" space, but realist say
that they can. If so, please describe it to me, one can't.
PAUL ###############################################
ReplyDeleteYes you mean space is not something sensed, but the absence of something sensed. But we don't sense it at all.
And we don't sense it as a plenum either; but this from equations and thinking that light needs a medium to travel through
and so forth. Llight rays bend.
All this however is for A Course in Miracles (ACIM) looking at hallucinations that seem to be real. Many
,many illusions all stemming from the idea that we are bodies and that's all we are. There is no world.
So we are all insane, and asleep. We wanted this world as a place where God could not come because we wanted
autonomy. This world was designed by the sonship to escape from God and to make it look like there is
no God. As clearly a place where death, unfairness, warring, and attack seem to be part of the whole package.
Many people can not get along with their own family members and this is not unusual.
It's not that there's a better place it's that we don't see what's really there, what's really here.
What;s really within. When you all were saying everything is nothing that's exactly right
and that attracted me to your dialogue. Amazingly I saw glimmers of just what I had learned in the class
and on my own. It was being said in the lessons : There is no body and there is no world. "Everything is nothing."
But we could not seem to hold to this in belief. We vacillate back and forth in our day to day as whatever seems practical.
Since I am insane I can say these things to myself but can't seem to get it right. With time doing the work and exercises
I am supposed to progress in learning to allign with God power and power comes back to me. However the entire
.ego-based thought system must be replaced with love and happiness, forgiveness-based thought system. Forgiveness =
happiness. Furthermore when I think I am thinking actually my mind is blank. When I am listening then I may hear my real thoughts.
It's all joining with a much deeper part of myself which brings new original ideas, joy and energy for anything.
dino -
ReplyDeletei was going by your comment - "To say sense perception is
what reality is, is to make a value judgement, or,opinion."
i would ask how else do we determine what reality is than what we perceive with our senses (aided or unaided)?
paul -
it seems to me that you are falling back on the old idea that this world is wrong somehow and/or we are not perceiving it correctly - being "insane".
i cannot buy into this idea.
i do not understand why it would be so.
it seems like god's bad idea of a joke.
this idea that we do not perceive the world correctly is an idea that the two of you seem to share though you come at it from different perspectives.
i have never understood this.
dino -
ReplyDeletepure space cannot be perceived nor does it exist.
space is the objects involved that define it.
Quoting me and Robert.......
ReplyDelete" "To say sense perception is
what reality is, is to make a value judgement, or, opinion."
i would ask how else do we determine what reality is than what we perceive with our senses (aided or unaided)?" "
Robert voices an insightful question. He always seems to have probing, and, to the point questions, by the way.
Well, how else do we determine what is real than by the use of our senses? Reason, logic, thought.
Not always just sensual experience. Also, I would add, that those two are the ONLY ways we can determine the nature of reality. But
it is logic or reason, that wins out.
Moreover, it was the great Parmenides who said that truth can be known ONLY, note ONLY, via logic, and never by
experience (sensation). So, that leaves only one way to aquire
the truth of existence.....thought, and logic.
What I was saying in the first instance was that to say we
decide that either way (thought or sensing) is the right way, is to do so
by an opinion, or personal preference. We so often, regard what we see as the truth, that we come to regard sight as the proof
that seeing, itself, is the way to truth.
But that is an opinion, without evidence. Seeing, itself, cannot be evidence of itself. That is obviously circular reasoning.
--------------------------
Why does Robert keep saying this sort of statement?
""this idea that we do not perceive the world correctly is an idea that the two of you seem to share though you come at it from different perspectives. i have never understood this.""
Once and for all, I wish to state that I do not say that humans
view the world any different than the visual part of it suggests (I mean our senses), and yet, it is different, because there is MORE
of it, physically, than we can sense. When I say it is different than what our senses tell us, I mean, that there are
other things that exist outside of our senses (not spiritual or supernatural), just needing aid.
Sometimes Robert has said that I am speaking of god, I am not,
I am speaking of MATTER, physcial MATTER that is invisible, or,
does not reflect light). But, sure, the part of the world that we DO see is the way we see it, why not?
On Robert's part two, he says.....
ReplyDelete""pure space cannot be perceived nor does it exist.
space is the objects involved that define it"".
To me the above says that he doesn't believe in space, but,
then, that would contradict that he say the world is as it appeares to him.
This is so, because he says, on the one hand, that things
exist as he perceives them, which is that things are
separated by space, but, yet, space does not exist.
i would disagree with you and parmenides in that i feel sense perception comes first before logic and reason.
ReplyDeletethis tells us something is there.
it only after we have experience of something (that we have immediately upon our birth) that we then think about what it might be.
but you said logic was essential for determining the nature of reality and that i would agree with.
but that is saying something different than what i meant.
logical and reasonable deductions can be made by what we observe from our experience but we need to first have the experience before we can do this.
i had thought afterward that my statement about other worlds wasn't entirely correct.
there is part of the world that we have yet to discover as you say.
and in this sense we are even now falsely perceiving the world without all the information we need to make an accurate judgement about it.
but i think paul means something different.
he seems to say there is some sort of supernatural spiritual world we do not perceive.
this i cannot go along with.
unless he means that we can change our internal perception of the world by changing our state of mind.
anyone who has ever done drugs could agree to this.
objects are not something in space but are space themselves.
He is saying experience comes before logic. The baby does
ReplyDeletenot think, it only sees immediately from birth.
The infant must conclude that seeing
equals realness, which is indeed a hugh intectual jump. But
my guess is that the "jump" is instinctive, allowing the
non-thinking baby to form a few simple conceptions, like, "mother","food","look out that can kill me".
Why would nature have us make that mental"jump"?
Because, as with most things, this intellectual "knowing" contrubutes to much to suvival, as surviving is at the heart of of evolution, and would do well to pin such an opinion within us from the start. That the infant thinking to get out of the way of that animal, dog, which, being real, helps it to know there are dogs, even before it can think.
So, we see that belief in Realism, is an inborn, instinctive
philosophy of life, all humans are born with for survival.
But, why can't we question it? Robert would not let us do that. Because,
as with the infant, thinking proves thinking (pure circularity).
But, he and most others are not aware of this above conflict within the philosophy of realism.
Robert goes on to say, objects are not "within" space, but,
are space, itself.
Yes, objects are not "within" space, but, are actual actual space. But, then in the same way, if objects are
what space is, then objects would have to be touching
each other to not allow empty space to filter in between their bodies.
Why? Cuz the bodies would have to be blocking the
possibility of non-bodies being there.
But, we tend to ignore this illogical distinction, and move along, sayinb, 'well, yes, there must be space between
bodies for them to be bodies, but, let us igore this little
problem for the time being, so we can get on with the practical, experimental, valuable proofs, and forget that space both can and cannot exist at the same time. Anyway,
let's leave that to the philosophers.
Also, lets say to ourselves, 'I recognize that empty space must
exist along with objects, or, there can be no objects.
But there must be this empty space between bodies to allow
them to exist, in order to be separate physical things, that exist apart from each other, we must give them absolute exist, independent of our minds and, therefore must never die away, but exist etnally. (Another conflict of Realism).
This strangness is the outcome one encounters analyzing
the everyday belief in the existence of physical bodies. The "strangness" being that for them to be, they must depend, in part, on the
presence of the observer's eyes. Or, to put it another
way, that it is our ideas that contribute to the reality
of this world, being real.
Note, I said "contribute" to reality, not wholly create reality, as is commonly thought by the critics of Idealism.
This is so because there are objects external to us which
produce the sensations of sight, sound, touch, and the rest,
that do exist independent of the mind. Idealism comes
into the creation process though us imagining that it is only what we perceive, aided and unaided, that exists.
All the while, leaving the greater part of mass unaccounted.
as far as i can tell we essentially agreed on this yet you continue to argue as if we hadn't.
ReplyDeletei said we have experience of things first and then think about what they are.
as with your example with the dog we don't know it might harm us until we experience it doing so then we think to avoid it.
i'm not following your argument about this.
then you say "But, why can't we question it? Robert would not let us do that"
a quote here would help as i do not know what it is you have me saying we cannot question.
i don't understand.
i certainly did not say anything about not questioning anything.
i also don't get what you mean by "empty space"
please explain.
there is and can be no empty space.
Robert said.....
ReplyDelete""as with your example with the dog we don't know it might harm us until we experience it doing so then we think to avoid it. i'm not following your argument about this"".
No, I thought I said that the fear of the dog came prior to
infant being bitten by the dog, as that was instinctive in the infant, not needing to be "learned"("experienced") by the baby. And even if one makes an scary face close to a baby's face it will cry without being harmed, meaning the baby did not have to "learn" or have the "experience" of being harmed, to be afraid of scary faces to react to them. So that ideas DO come before experience, but only, these ideas are not reasoned out by the baby but come to it freely by way of instinct.
Maybe it is a good thing he did not get what I was saying
regarding empty space, for the following reason....
""objects are not something in space but are space themselves"" This Robert has said, but this is Plenumism
straight out, and, besides, this is saying what we perceive
is not the same as things are, which he has venimitly denied, saying it is Paul and I who say reality is not perceive correctly. Yet, I have to admit, I had never noticed that he must have accepted Plenumism somewhere along the line, because it is not the first time he has denied space.
In denying space, this way, he is saying objects are space itself, being tantamount to saying all things stand shoulder to shoulder in the universe, allowing for no space to
exist. That suggests a "full" reality without gaps of space, which is the world as a plenum, and, which is nothing less than perceiving the world differently than it is normally perceived.
And, if he wants to, he will accept the plenum as the explanation of Idealism, settling all those challenges posed
by the realists.
Robert says.....
ReplyDelete""logical and reasonable deductions can be made by what we observe from our experience but we need to first have the experience before we can do this.""
Einstein had no experience of light being bent by gravity prior to him proving it does do this.
Paul #########################################
ReplyDeleteI don't get Robert's idea about "Why another world ? This world is good enough for me?" Didn't i just make a list
of the problems of this world? DEATH, etc. And then yes I'm happy I don't mean I'm personally unhappy. NO
It's more like I am escaping from the problems with my philosophy of staying in communication.
Maybe it's because he's younger and hasn't had to face a lot of tough problems. We could have a much better world!
However he is a real gentleman as are you, dino.
dino -
ReplyDeletewhat you are talking about is instinct not reason and logic.
but even with instinct we need to be stimulated by our environment first before we instinctively react - someone making a face at us as with your example.
you are putting the cart before the horse.
i did not say we could not reason out speculations about what things could be as with your example with einstein and others who discovered things unknown to us prior.
some of these prove right and some prove to be wrong.
but this too comes after the fact of us having experience that we make these deductions from.
they are also verified by our experience as well.
until then they are only someone's theory about things.
and i agreed awhile back that your idea of plenum seems plausible to me.
yes, space is continuous.
paul -
what's wrong with death?
it is an integral and necessary part of the whole process as are all the other what we consider "evils" of this world.
it is only because none of us personally want to die that we abhor it.
when i think of how people would want the world to be in supposed perfection i can only think of one thing - BORING!!!
one thing this world has going for it is that it is not that.
i would have it no other way.
i am continually amused and delighted by it - even when it frightens me sometimes.
Yes, I know I am talking about instinct, but, I am trying to
ReplyDeletesay that instinct is not experience. A baby knows to suckle
without any instruction (experience).... pure instinct. It did not have to have an "expirience" (instruction) first before it knew how
to suck its mother's breast. It seemed to me that Robert was saying in an earlier post how a baby first learns by
experience, trying to prove expirience comes before logic by an example of an infant baby. I am just trying to show him is not due to experience but due to instinct. I think he is confusing instinct with experience.
I quote Robert....
""this (experience) tells us something is there.
it only after we have experience of something (that we have immediately upon our birth) that we then think about what it might be.""
Here I thought Robert was trying to show that babies need to
first have experience of some kind, and then, make logical
deductions from that experience that something exists, like
pain, or whatever. I have been trying to show that babies
do not think, but react to instinct alone.
With Einstein, I wanted to show that Einstein did not have to conduct any experiment or to have
any experience, say of mass equaling energy to determine that as a truth, the A-bomb on Japan was the "experience" that later proved his therom. So, here is another example
of discovery without experience coming first.
But of course, there are many examples of experience coming
first and then the deductions following. What Parmenides
said was that it is only through logic that leads one to ultimate truth.
""i agreed awhile back that your idea of plenum seems plausible to me.
yes, space is continuous."" I quote Robert.
If he says space is continuous and filled with matter, or,
"objects" as he says, why is the plenum only plausible to
him, when in fact, he is declaring it to be the case, in so
many words?
Is trying to avoid saying plenum is true, because he knows he has previously said what we directly perceive as reality is the way it is?
But now he would have to say, while we do not perceive any plenum, it is true?
i fail to see what instinct has to do with logic and reason.
ReplyDeletewe have instincts about a lot of things we do that we do not have to learn.
we seem to have an instinct to think.
so, what's the point you're trying to make?
i am not saying experience replaces logic and reason but merely that it precedes it.
certainly logic and reason can take us beyond what our experience might be as do many other things we do also.
did you miss the part where i stated that i did not say that speculations such as einstein's could not be made from our experience that go beyond our experience?
this is what he did.
he drew upon his experience and the experience of others before him in math and science and made certain far-reaching conclusions about it which then later were proven to be true by the verifiable experience of others.
i do not understand how this became a sticking point in this discussion.
you seem to be trying very hard to prove me wrong about something and i'm not quite sure what it is.
i pretty much regard almost everything as being plausible not just your plenum.
that's as far as i'm willing to go with anything anybody tells me.
everything i know about the world is from what i experience and from what i speculate about what i am experiencing or have heard in some way from others ideas about it as well.
all of which is my experience.
i am trying to state this all as simply as i can manage.
Robert asks what is the point I am trying to make by
ReplyDeletebringing up the question of instinct. I was trying to point
out that what appears to be conscious thought on the part of
babies, is not, but, is rather instinctive responses.
He had earlier said that at the time of our birth we are learning first and then we act on what we learn, to prove his point that experience is more fundamental, more primary, than logic is.
He alluded to the shock of child birth being the first
experience we have in the world. I suppose his point
was to suggest that my belief in logic taking us to ultimate
truth is not a good one, that I should persue experience, too.
Robert asks me if I understood about his point of Einstein
having an "experience" of solving a math problem to arrive
at truth, and, that doing his calculations is really an experience, the same as if Einstein were in a laboratory conducting an experiment. Maybe this is not the point that
Robert is making but I think it is. Here is the quote I am
going by......
""he drew upon his experience and the experience of others before him in math and science and made certain far-reaching conclusions about it which then later were proven to be true by the verifiable experience of others"".
Note the word, "experience" above in the phrase, "he drew
upon his experience and others...". Meaning I think, that
Eistein was a scientist doing experiments, not doing math.
But no, this is not concidered by anyone to be anything like
an experience of Einstein's, he called them "thought experiments", that is true, but he did not mean he was making an actual experiement....he was just coining a term in a cleaver new way.
His key meaning is in the word, "Thought", not the word, "experiment", what he accomplished was thru the work of thinking, not science, he was using math or logic or reason, whatever we want to call it, not experimentation. And my
point is/was logic is better than science.
I disagree that the plausability of the plenum is as far as
as Robert wishes to go with my theory, because, again I bring up the fact that he stated that no space exists. That means he accepts plenumism. That is that. I doesn't matter if he doesn't think he believes in it, or isn't aware he does, or imagines he believes in it equally to others opinions and theories. What he is
saying here on this blog is inconsistent with that idea, that he gives equal plausibility to all ideas, a balanced,
a fair treatment approach.
Here again, I am telling Robert what he believes over and
above what he states he believes, which made him upset before, I hope not this time.
I am trying very hard to prove him wrong about something or
other, he does not know what. All he knows is what he experiences, not what he thinks of what he experiences. It is all experience, you see.
I am trying to prove you wrong in that knowledge is mostly
experience. I am trying to prove you wrong that you give
equal credibility to the plenum, as with any other philosophy. Period.
Let me comment on Robert's saying, "What's wrong with death?" Yes this sounds like you are satisfied
ReplyDeletewith the world you seem to perceive. So death we can deal with in order to continue the process?
What process? Chaos & evolution or a spiritual learning? Then would you prefer to keep death?
If you had the choice? Honestly?
The above is from PAUL...Sorry. Dino
ReplyDeleteI think it probably isn't all that important about
ReplyDeleteinstinct vs. learning, at least to this discussion. I think Robert may have had a reason
for why he mentioned it in the first place. So
maybe he can tell us what is the point of the
fact that in life experience comes before logic?
That we draw deductions from experience, and so
forth.
dino -
ReplyDeletei think you are over-analyzing what i am saying and drawing conclusions about it i do not mean.
but perhaps i am not explaining it right.
i will try again.
with the example of einstein - his ideas did not just pop into his head from nowhere in some sort of tabula rasa mind state.
he first had to learn math (his experience).
he then had to read up on the current thinking in this area (his experience).
from that he conducted his thought experiments and came up with his theories.
do you understand now?
this is all that i am saying.
one has to have some sort of experience before one can make deductions about it whatever they might be.
it is true that logic and reason supersede experience but experience comes first.
you state that i believe in plenum because i said space is continuous.
but both are things that seem plausible to me.
i do not know for certain that either are true or that they are the same thing though i suspect that they are.
but maybe not.
paul -
i do not know what you mean by "Chaos & evolution or a spiritual learning?"
please explain.
about what i mean by process is the whole ongoing thing of it - life and death, darkness and light, good and evil, etc.
the process of the tao, i suppose.
each and every thing is integral and necessary whether it is to our liking or not and cannot be removed or replaced.
if you are asking do i personally want to die and the answer is not really.
but that is what is and i accept it for whatever it might turn out to be or not.
in some ways i'm looking forward to finding out what no one living knows but everyone wonders about - but not in any great hurry.
also - i think you both have me mistaken for someone who knows what he's talking about...
ReplyDeleteMath is not experience, it is using numbers instead of
ReplyDeletereal objects to test ideas. But I see how Robert is dealing
with the idea of learning something. That the act of reading from a receipe book on how to make a omlette is the
same as the experience of actually making it.
To go to school and learn math
is indeed an experience, but it is not the experience one
has actually had the experience one learns in a book. The school learning is to
avoid having an experiences which would be time consuming in
trial and error.
IT is often said we
don't have to go thru what our parents went thru because
we can "learn" from their mistakes, or, when we say
we do not have invent the wheel all over again. We can, and
do, "learn" and build on past experience without having to go thru the painful experiences that our father's did.
So, Robert is confusing learned knowlege with learning by experience.
I do not have to step in front of a car to know it could kill me, no I can "learn" not to my mother telling me - so I do not have to have the actual experience and
maybe die.
Einstein had no experiences of relativity, he
did it all thru his mind. When he learned math, that was
not experiencing the theory of Relativity, that was
experiencing "learning" math.
So, Robert can see that math and logic are opposites to
experience. We go to school so we don't have to have experiences.
Did he say that the plenum and continuous space are the
same things? Well yes, you could look at it that way. The plenum is not discreet, it is continuous through
out as he says. It has no description as it has no differences within itself. There is equal amount of mass
in all directions in the space of the plenum.
I would think Robert calling space continuous, that he is
indirectly saying it is non-existent. Maybe he can say it
exists to him, or it does not, and the same with time.
But he did say, that physical objects and space are the
same, I even quoted him back are few posts. Why didn't
object, or comment on my quoting him saying matter and
space are equal? Doesn't he see that this impies that
space does not exist?
Does Robert believe there is time? I'd like to know.
In other words is time absolute for him.
Is some particular time the real
time thru which we set our clocks?
The same question about space. Is he willing to listen to someone who says there
is some spot in space that doesn't move, that is absolute?
And can this someone tells us where this spot is located?
Does he really think there is absolute time and space?
He says his his mind is open to all theories. So, hopefully he will tell us. He says he is "uncertain" if there is, or
isn't real space, or real time. Does he really imagine there exists some "real" time in the universe that never
changes? If so, what is it? No, his mind isn't this open, or, maybe it is.
all i pretty much have to say at this point is - arrgh!
ReplyDeleteyou state "When he learned math, that was
not experiencing the theory of Relativity, that was
experiencing "learning" math."
stop right there.
that is what i'm talking about.
i don't know what you're going on about other than that.
the act of learning and doing math is experience.
what comes out of that in terms of ideas is something else entirely.
i never said the two were the same.
"real" time that never changes?
how can it still be time?
the same with space that doesn't move since the two are connected as spacetime which exists by being dynamic.
would it still be space?
i don't get what those questions have to do with anything though besides being the same as asking how many angels can dance on the head of a pin or what happens when an irresistible force meets an unmovable object.
this is the absurd nonsense philosophy can turn into as i have been saying.
I am trying to figure out why Robert believes in space, that
ReplyDeleteit exists, and the same with time. Those two things are so
obviously non-existent, and yet the Realists think they are
real. All I am asking the realists, is what is the real
space you so hardily believe in? What is it made of? How
is it any different than matter? Why do you go around using
two different words, Matter and space, for the same thing?
Then Robert says he never said space neither does or doesn't exist, he only says it is "continuous". What the heck does
that mean? Seems like it means it is infinite,,,i.e., it
continues on forever. But, then he'll say he never said that. Which is true, he didn't, but then what did he say?
He says he is open to all points of view. So, end of
discussion? This attitude of his, I cannot understand.
If he is serious, does he allow the posibility that the
earth is flat? He must, that is indeed a point of view. And
besides reasonableness doesn't count
with him, the only thing that matters is to accept all
points of view, and to take the best of each point
of view as his own. And I dare not ask him which points
are the "best". He will merely fly back saying none of
them are any good, they are all absurd. End of discussion,
again. If I challenge him on any point, he waits for a few
postings to go by, and then denys ever saying it. Cant win for losing.
To him experience is all that matters, his personal experience, not science, not thinkers, but what he reads
and what he likes. If that is illogical, so be it.
i feel that most of the problem you seem to be having with me is with who you imagine me being and what you imagine me saying.
ReplyDeleteyou now imagine me as representing the realist position.
i do not know if i am a realist or not.
i know little to nothing about realism but i believe that they would say that everything that appears to us as being real is actually something out there that is real.
there are problems with this as you point out.
i do not know how the realists would answer the questions you have posed.
what i mean by space (actually spacetime) being continuous is that it is like a continuous dynamic "fabric" with all interconnected with everything else.
as to whether this fabric is infinite or not i really don't know.
maybe it is and maybe it's not.
yes, i do believe that everything is at least plausible.
however i judge things as to how probable they might be being true or not based on my experience.
there is actually a flat earth society that argues that the earth is a flat round disk.
i'm uncertain whether this is meant as a joke or satire or if they are serious.
i have been to their site but there is very little stating how they have arrived at this conclusion.
for myself i believe that the earth is a particlewave.
the earth as we perceive it being the particle and its course around the sun and the galaxy and universe the wave.
i think i thought of this myself but maybe somebody else has too.
i don't know.
my experience is all that i feel i can know for certain.
yet my experience is made up in large part by what i learn about things i have no experience of.
there are any number of ideas out there with numerous people promoting each one.
as i mentioned above i weigh these ideas in what their probability of being true or not.
i do not have the time or the means to verify each one.
i rely a large part on those who claim to have done so.
some like the laws of nature seem highly probable enough i can judge to be true though i would imagine that there are people who would argue against them.
there are some ideas i just have feelings about one way or the other mostly based on what little i actually know about them.
ultimately i could be entirely wrong about everything i believe about the world and everything in it.
yet so could everyone else.
What I have been hoping for is for Robert or someone to
ReplyDeletequestion me about the "plenum", or, should I say, challenge
me. I have always thought Robert would be the one to do this, as I have never experienced anyone so willing to
examine a theory.
It seems lately he has not wanted to do this. Rather he
says that all ideas have merit, and in some ways are
all true, and are, also, all false. He considers the plausibility of them all, certainly a commendable attitude.
This seems to mean he does not wish to discuss ideas anymore, but rather, merely view them all as plausible, and if
he would ever think about some particular point, that would be taking sides, because it entails criticism of ideas.
Robert has objected to me calling him a Realist. I do so
because he so often says that he doesn't know what reality is but then goes on to say he does know that he knows he is typing on his computer, and having a cigarette, and so forth, and he says he believes that even I am having similar experiences.
I take this to mean he believes in realism, that the act
of experience itself, stands as evidence of reality, or that seeing things proves the existence of things, or, simply, existence proves existence.
Normally it is true that sense perception proves existence.
But sense perception cannot prove itself. This is stock
Realist argumentation. That is why I feel confident in identifying him as a Realist.
As I so often try to say, Robert isn't coming out and saying
he is, but, seems like that is present is his writing.
well, you've made yourself a little more clear this time.
ReplyDeletea challenge to plenum?
by this i believe you mean that the universe is solid mass or matter?
i believe that this is possible that it is so.
it would fit into my idea of the fabric of continuous spacetime.
i can't think of any reason why it would not be so.
if you say i am a realist i would go with that since you seem to know more about realism than i do.
i'm ok with that.
if you are having a difference experience than one similar to mine - being a physical person sitting before a computer posting comments on this blog - i would like to know what it is.
i however make no claims about what this appearance of reality is whether it is something that actually exists outside ourselves (realism) or if it is in our minds (idealism).
i do not know what sort of experiment one might conduct to prove it being one way or the other.
Why would he think that I think, that I am having some kind
ReplyDeleteof different experience than he is having sitting at his computer. I don't think that - never did - but what difference would that mean if I did?
I going to end this post with that, because it is so important for me to get an answer to that particular question.
I continue on my next post.
you stated "he does know that he knows he is typing on his computer, and having a cigarette, and so forth, and he says he believes that even I am having similar experiences."
ReplyDeleteyes, i do say that.
i took the last part to mean that you have a different experience.
i guess i was wrong.
Is he saying that if we, Robert and I, are having the same
ReplyDeleteexperience, sitting at our computers, how this helps Realism, or, that it hurts Realism, or, that it helps Idealism, or hurts it?
I just want to know why he so often points out that he and I
are having the same experience, and, to tell me why that
matters to our discussions.
It's not that I have different kind of experiences, it is just that, as I keep saying,
ReplyDeleteI don't believe "having experiences" is proof for
having them, I thought maybe you did, don't you?
then what else would you call it?
ReplyDeletethe proof is in the pudding.
Anyway, I'll take that as an "yes". Yes, that he
ReplyDeletebelieves that experience proves there is experience. Normally that would be good evidence
FOR ANYTHING ELSE. Having an experience of, say,
a lamp sitting there, is good evidence for it being there. But, experience cannot be evidence for itself, anymore than the lamp can be evidence
of itself, the lamp need outside experience of
something else than the lamp's experience of being itself. I know lamps can't think, but, go
along with me here. I don't have the time to
dream up a better example.
In the same way, experience cannot be evidence for itself, either.
But in any case, this does make Robert a Realist.
How? If he believes in experience, then he
believes things exist outside his mind, because
of the part of the word, "ex" in "experience",
that means "outside", or the existence of a world
external to us, and separate from us.
That is Realism, when he says the 'proof is in the pudding', the proof is the act of having an
experience, to Robert.
"What else would you call it?" He must mean that
the word "experience" is called experience because it is experience. We cannot have outside
proof that experience exists, because it means
outside, how can we get outside of outside in
order to prove it exists?
I know this is not easy stuff, but I hope this
may help show this philosophical problem.
well then, what constitutes proof?
ReplyDeleteand proof of what?
i don't see how having experience of whatever necessarily means it lies outside of oneself other than it may appear so.
one can have the same appearing experience within one's own mind.
as i mentioned before i don't know of any experiment that could be conducted that could prove it one way or the other.
to me experience means having sensations.
what causes these sensations or where they might originate i have no idea except only that i am having them.
you will argue against there being things like gods because they cannot be sensed as proof they exist.
now here you deny sense and experience.
what we experience is what is commonly referred to as reality.
i don't understand the difficulty you are having with this.
Robert says again....
ReplyDelete"you will argue against there being things like gods because they cannot be sensed as proof they exist.
now here you deny sense and experience".
You can't have a sense experience of an experience !!
He says...
ReplyDelete"to me experience means having sensations.
what causes these sensations or where they might originate i have no idea except only that i am having them."
He is "having them"...how does he know? By what logic or
experiment does he determine this? Like he says
there is no experience to prove this one way or the other,
yet he knows he is "having them".
huh?
ReplyDeletethe sense experience is the experience.
i know i am having them the same way you do which you already admitted that you are unless you are now saying something different.
this is becoming absurd.
i said there is no EXPERIMENT to prove this one way or the other and i meant to determine between realism and idealism.
i feel that our discussion of late adequately proves how philosophy can logically argue itself into tail swallowing circles that go nowhere to proving anything but its own absurdity.
ReplyDeletePAUL ##############################
ReplyDeleteOH YES. Sorry supposed to answer question about well here..............
1) would be a meaningless accident(life)
2) would be a platform or schoolroom for
spiritual development.
in the remark about "What's wrong with death?" I commented or am saying now that this seems awfully strong.
How strong a person must be not to be disturbed at all by death of those around him?
In your more recent conversation you are both experiencing the same thing sitting at a computer and so on.
to me this is common with people because astoundingly we are all one. There are too many coincidences like this!
I am "feeling" the same as he is feeling when "having experiences" but I do not know they prove anything, he seems
ReplyDeleteto let that be evidence for the existence of the world -
which is not evidence.
Yes, of course, he means there is no EXPERIMENT OR EXPERIENCE (same thing) that can prove an external or an
internal world (realism vs. Idealism). Isn't that is what I said?
Absurd, yes, too bad. I don't think I am causing this.
Does he mean that this blog study is absurd? Or, does he mean that life is absurd?
ReplyDeleteDoesn't he see that our discussion of realism and idealism,
is nothing more than the question of there being an external
world, or not?
I think he means to say that experience is evidence, because
it is SELF-EVIDENT that the world exists. Like the bible
says just look around you, there is this world, isn't that
evidence of existence?
He must be saying that existence is proof of itself, it does
not need to be proven. But, as soon as I think he is saying
that, he will say that there is no way, no experiment that
can be imagined that can tell us which way it is. So now I
think he doubts his experience of an external world. So, it's seems like it is back and forth with him.
Does he, or does he not, believe in an external world?
And, can he please stick with one notion, whatever it is,
so that we can finally discuss this issue, and it not be
an exercise in absurdity?
i thought i was being clear.
ReplyDeletewhat i experience is a world that APPEARS to be external.
whether it actually is or not i do not know nor do i believe does anybody else.
i also can think of no experiment that could be conducted that would determine if it is or isn't.
if you can think of one, please explain.
in what i stated above about the experiment would i think go along with you stating that experience cannot prove itself.
ReplyDeletethis is why one could not be conducted to prove realism or idealism to be correct.
OK, then I take it that you don't know that you are sitting in front of your computer?
ReplyDeletein the sense that it could be illusion i suppose that's right.
ReplyDeletebut then i am experiencing the illusion of me sitting here.
i am experiencing the illusion that if i do not breathe or eat or if i stick a metal fork in a electric outlet i will die.
that's all i can reasonably go on.
all else is speculation that any sf reader is well acquainted with.
i never said i knew for certain what any of it is only that it is something.
what it is is something we are still as a species discovering.
Looks like he is already back to being a realist, that
ReplyDeletedidn't last long.
He "knows" that if he sticks a metal fork in the outlet he will die.
He "knows" outlets are real, because one could die, and that is not "speculation", that is fact. That is real experience, and whatever we experience is true, especially if it can hurt us, kill us, or cause pain, those things prove their own existence.
On the other hand, if one is really sitting in front of a computer that possibly could be in doubt.
But his point is that it will no longer be about sitting in front
of computers, but it is going to be electrial outlets, from
now on. OK, I Got it.
at this point i feel you are only arguing against anything i might happen to say just for the sake of arguing.
ReplyDeletei do not see it going anywhere.
you propose nothing but negation.
"back to being a realist"?
when did i say i was or wasn't?
for some reason it seems to be important to you if i'm a realist or not.
i've already said if you want to think of me as a realist then that's fine by me.
you are the expert on realism not me.
i couldn't care less.
i have mentioned before awhile ago that pain is a measure of reality - what we commonly refer to as reality.
except you of course.
i suppose none of this applies to you as you seem to be pretending it doesn't.
go ahead, stick a fork in an outlet - i'll watch.
or perhaps you would prefer to walk on water instead.
whatever.
this is one of the reasons i haven't followed philosophy because it ultimately turns into this absurdity of arguing points about nothing.
i know these things because of gazorbnik.
i haven't mentioned this before because gazorbnik is beyond anyone else's comprehension but mine and cannot be explained.
end of argument.
sitting before the computer and sticking a fork in an outlet are both part of the same idea.
ReplyDeletei sit before the computer because it doesn't cause me pain.
i avoid sticking a fork in an outlet because it would cause me pain or even death.
i know these from my experience and learning from my experience - and because of gazorbnik.
that you do not seem to be able to understand this is not my problem.
"back to being a realist"?
ReplyDeletewhen did i say i was or wasn't?""
This is when he said he was, when he said he KNEW he was sitting at his computer....
That says he is a Realist.
Yet this latest quote says he is NOT a realist but rather a sceptic,like me.
"what i experience is a world that APPEARS to be external.
whether it actually is or not i do not know nor do i believe does anybody else.
i also can think of no experiment that could be conducted that would determine if it is or isn't.
if you can think of one, please explain.
No experiment could determine one way or another, that means the one who wrote that, Robert, does not know if he is a realist or an Idealist, and that would mean he isn't a
realist, isn't that true? Before he was saying the he
KNOWS that he is sitting at his computer (realist), and
that makes him a realist, then he said he does not KNOW,
In his last post he just said he does not know how it really is,
nor does anyone else, then why did he over and over say he
KNEW his was sitting at his computer? Now, with all that
going back and forth, he still won't admit he was wrong about the computer business, but prefers to say I am being
argumentive.
What he is saying now, that he's not, he switches it again, by saying
stuff about electrical outlets being real because one could
die from them.
This back and forth is exhausting me. He owes an this blog explanation.
if trying to figure out whether i am a realist or not is exhausting you perhaps you should give it a rest.
ReplyDeletei stated that i couldn't care less.
what part of that did you not understand?
ttest
ReplyDeleteROBERT ####################
ReplyDeleteI am posting this for Robert, for some reason it
did not post normally....
if trying to figure out whether i am a realist or not is exhausting you perhaps you should give it a rest.
i stated that i couldn't care less.
what part of that did you not understand?
Yes, maybe we should rest and let tempers quell.
ReplyDeleteI think we discover a lot of good stuff doing this, no matter what.
i have no temper about this.
ReplyDeletethat you can't manage to fit me into a box is entirely your problem not mine.
that it seems to upset you is regretful but what am i supposed to do about it?
what is reality?
ReplyDeletewe use the word reality to describe the common experience we are having we perceive through our senses.
when we say reality this is what we are referring to and mean.
that is all we have to go on.
logic and reason and intuition, etc. come into it when we try to figure out exactly what this experience is or not.
there are any number of theories about what it might be from the mystical to the scientific.
i see these theories as each being relatively plausible but i also have my doubts about each one as well.
as far as i am aware of none of them can be proven to be true or not to everyone's satisfaction and agreement.
i certainly am not convinced.
the main argument here seems to be between realism and idealism.
these too i can see as each being plausible explanations as well as having doubts about them.
it also might be true that neither are the answer but something else.
or both of them might be true.
you seem to want me to be on one side or the other but i am not.
you don't seem to be able to understand why i can make statements that support either one over the other.
but i have yet to be convinced by anything one way or the other.
you have criticized me for being inconsistent but that's just the way i am and how it is.
i am just as mystified by your confusion over this.
Sorry about the other.
ReplyDeleteAnyway, No, I do not think he should be on
one side or the other, but, that he should be on MY side. ha ha. My side is is the one in-between the two points of view, or, rather, the sceptical side, which is all I am, and wish Robert and paul to be.
But, I do feel that if he would consider the middle position, he would agree with it. If fact, I not only think
Robert and Paul, should have this position, but so should
everybody, the whole world, because that is how it really is...we just don't know (sceptisism), or ever will.
As R. says, we do not know the answer, and, cannot know, and
probably never will know it, so everybody ought to be sceptical. Yes, all we ever seem to have is our sensory
experience "to go by", but, we should never go by it, cuz that tells us nothing, and is loaded with strange contridictions, as does the other way, also.
My purpose is, and I hope, going to be, to try to make
the Idealist way make sense by us discussing it, and hopefully thereby to create a logical scenario that works.
Note, not to prove it.
I do "want" the Idealist way to be correct, because I think
with all its troubles, it is less a problem than realism is.
the way you state it here i suppose i am somewhat of a skeptic more so than not.
ReplyDeletei try not to fall into believing anything too seriously as being the truth.
i wonder if there is a truth for anything to be.
yes, to us needing to be careful of even what our senses tell us.
i feel that it does all occur in the mind (idealism) whether there is actually anything "out there" or not (realism).
how do we know anything is outside of being in our minds no matter how obvious it may appear that there is?
this is what i mean by there being no experiment i can think of that would definitely prove that there is anything external to us or not.
the world appears to us as being external extending to infinity as far as we know.
it behaves in certain consistent ways that would allow us to believe this.
but as you state, this actually proves nothing other than this is the experience we are having.
is it how the mystics would have it that we are all sharing a common dream (maya)?
it could be.
i tend to believe that it is something like that but what i'm not exactly sure.
but the mystics also state that there is some sort of other reality that we are unaware of unless we practice techniques to be able to perceive it.
this seems to be paul's position.
i am wary of this.
why would there be another reality?
why would we be unaware of it?
that logically doesn't make much sense.
but we have been wrong about what we thought about the world before - that it is flat and that the sun orbits the earth instead of the other way around, etc.
as time goes on who knows what other discoveries we might make that would prove our present view of the world to be in error?
the problem lies in that normally we count on our senses to verify whether something is real or not - the scientific method.
this is how we can say that things like gods and such are not real but are only something we imagine being real but do not stand up to scrutiny.
but what test do we make to question whether or not our senses themselves can be trusted?
i can't think of any.
in some of the examples i made i was just pointing out that whether the world is real or not we need to act and behave as if it is or risk injury or death.
but again that does not prove it one way or the other.
you pointed out to paul once that we can know about an undetectable lethal gas by the fact that there were people dying.
this is similar to how i conclude that sticking a fork in an outlet could possibly kill me.
i have had experience with electricity and knowledge of other people dying by electrocution.
but also as you stated i formed this idea by logically thinking about my experience and concluding that this is the case.
i do not need to stick a fork in an outlet to have the experience to prove it.
this is what i felt that we agree more than we disagree.
our words got in the way.
language is a virus from outer space - william burroughs.
He says he wonders if there is any truth about reality. I think there is, and even think it most probably is Idealism.
ReplyDeleteExperience does make us think there is an external world out
there, and, that it behaves in just about the way we think
it does, that, there is motion, time, space, energy,
physical bodies, size, and shape.
One of the problems with realism is what I just wrote.
Look at all those things that we have to accept to let realism be true - motion - time - space - size - shape. They have to exist also
or there cannot be realism. Occum's Law forbids this much clutter.
I liked what R. said about how our senses were wrong in
deciding that the sun moved around the earth. So, can't
we be wrong in this?
Take 'size' for
example, does that exist? What would be small to us, no matter what size
we were, would still be small even if we were the size of ants.
This because they say size does not change even if the size
of the observer (us) changes.
For realists, the laws of
physics never change, no matter in what universe.
For them, what is big is always big. Size is absolute
in physics, it remains the same in all places and in
all times and for all observers (ants), and in all universes.
They say the laws of physics never change. And the same with shape, the shape of a car is the same as seen thru the eyes
of an ant, or an elephant, even though we can guess that
the ant can't even contain the the entire view of a
car at one time, but only portions of it at a time. No matter, say the
realists, even to the ant it still has the shape of a car just the same as we see it. You see, science says size is
absolute and so is shape, and time, and space, they have
nothing to do with the observations of the scientist, or the observer. Now, Idealism says the observer matters,
doesn't that sound like quantum mechanics? I think idealism
is right.
I am guessing that reality is not created strictly by us, but have been thinking that the outside and us (inside) together share in
the creation of reality. Both are dependent on the other.
What we do in creating reality, is to cut away all matter
except those things that produce sense perception in us.
What the objects do, is to give off whatever it is to cause sense perception in animals.
That would explain why all measurements are slightly different relative to who is making (observing) them.
i have often thought about idealism ever since i was young before i knew there was such a thing.
ReplyDeletei always felt that the world wasn't really there but in my mind.
used to frustrate the hell outta me that nothing would obey my will to my liking - ha.
do you think it is possible through some type of discipline that one may be able to reach a state of mind where one could manipulate reality?
some of the mystics claim this is possible.
i think paul also believes in this.
you state "I am guessing that reality is not created strictly by us, but have been thinking that the outside and us (inside) together share in
the creation of reality. Both are dependent on the other."
do you mean by this that there is actually something out there stimulating us that we interpret into what we perceive?
you had mentioned before about how you were thinking that everything is actually a mix of realism and idealism.
that seems like it could be true.
what is this something?
is it the plenum that gets filtered by our minds into a world that we can exist in?
or am i on the wrong track?
Yes, I think we were, at one time, speaking of both Realism
ReplyDeleteand Idealism both being involved in reality. And, yes, I am
saying that I now think there has to be something or other
that is external that is stimulating our senses, and again,
yes, we probably do mold these stimuli into perceptions that
mean so much to us. But, at the same time it is ourselves
who are cutting away 99% of reality, so that we
select only certain things to be aware of. That selection is
not a conscious choice, but rather caused by how we evolved.
We are "choosing" only those things that can produce sensations in us.
And, that brings me to his other question, can we ever
manipulate our reality into making it work for our benefit?
Unfortuately, I see no way how, what I am proposing, allows for that to happen. It would be nice, I could change on this, though.
Part of the reason I do not believe in that, is that, it seems like
something as useful and wonderful as that, would have been
done by now. But, as I said before, I do not think, at least so far, that something like mental control of our
invirnment, is suggested in my ideas. Damn it. And, yes,
in my opinion, that is what Paul is suggesting.
No, you are on the right track with us "filtering out" most
of physical reality, so, that we can exist in it.
Good thinking, Robert.
so, the question arises, what is this "something" that is out there?
ReplyDeletedoes it exist as chaotic virtual stuff until we perceive it?
i always liked the idea of random chance patterns that are both what we perceive and ourselves perceiving it.
all that exists is in some kind of communication (transmission of information) with every other part.
this is how it becomes existing and real.
it exists by evolving into "agreement" of what is and is not otherwise it cannot function.
if we could change it it would all ultimately return to chaos.
being fixed and unchangeable is how it is and remains real.
and how do we know about anything existing beyond our sensory experience of it?
it seems that this can only be speculation on our part at this time.
but this is a good idea, i think.
but where does it take us?
What it is that is out there is nothing. That is because it
ReplyDeletehas no definition, no separate existence, as it is only a
part of everything else that is around us. We, and all things, are in a plenum, with no space available to exist in.
Robert asks, "....and how do we know about anything existing beyond our sensory experience of it?"
We know the plenum is there due to its gravatational effect.
But, not just that, logic demands it.
if we can detect it by its gravitational effect then it is detectable to our senses.
ReplyDeletehow is there no space available to exist in?
itself is space (spacetime).
how does logic demand it?
Robert, I quote him.
ReplyDelete"if we can detect it by its gravitational effect then it is detectable to our senses"
Yes, it is detectable to our AIDED, I emphasize, "AIDED", senses.
AIDED through arithmetic deduction (calculation)(equation).
In other words, science knows the plenum is there. Is that what Robert wants to know, or is stating?
Or we could say it this way, if our senses were better, or
improved, somehow, than we could "see", or sense, the plenum...unlike the supernatural.
"How is there no space to exist in?"
Space is full of stuff.
For something to exist, is must have "room" to exist in. In other words, reality is not differentiated, on its
own, without our help sensing it. If things are not
differentiated from one another, they all blend in together,
and cannot be considered separate beings. If there are no
separate existing things, there are no things.
Here is another way to view this. Imagine I paint a single blue spot on a blank canvass. We can say that the spot exists, can't we? But, then if I cover the whole canvass
with blue paint, so that the spot can no longer be set apart
from its invirnment, is the spot still there? No.
That is how reality is, it is a plenum, full of matter, so
that we cannot individualize any one thing, and, call it
real and existing.
Finally Robert asks, "How does logic demand it (a plenum)?"
Because without a plenum, we have to admit the absolute
existence of time, of space, of motion, of being itself.
Those ideas are crazy, to admit them is to allow in a fake
dream world. Occum's razor likes the simple plenum much
better.
I persally love the plenum, cause I hate the arrogance and
stupid self-assurance we all have of this so called "reality".