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@deepthot,

Quote:

The number system is just linguistic

Hey, sorry, but can't let this one go by. The point about mathematics is that, among other things, it is extraordinarily powerful in predicting as yet unobserved things about reality.

Numbers don't just exist in the human mind, or in human language. They are 'real' in that they are not the property of this or that mind; they are the same for all who see them. A mind may be more or less adequate at understanding mathematical concepts (and mine is definitely not very adequate in maths.) But they signify real properties of reality in a sense that language does not. One may think of a thousand different signs or symbols for the number 7, yet what it signifies will always be the same.

And yet, numbers are also purely intellectual, in the sense that without an intelligence capable of counting and understanding numbers, they can't be said to exist at all. They obviously don't 'exist' in the same way that material objects do. Yet they determine, and predict, many of the main characteristics of existing things.

From an article called The Unreasonable Effectiveness of Mathematics in the Natural Sciences: "it is not at all natural that "laws of nature" exist, much less that man is able to discover them".

I think this actually supports, or is related to, the first post in this thread.

---------- Post added at 09:15 PM ---------- Previous post was at 09:04 PM ----------

I think where this is heading for me is that the idea that we are intelligent subjects percieving an objective reality is a construct. The intelligence is neither objective nor subjective.

@jeeprs,

Zetetic11235;70559 wrote:

As far as numbers go, I would say that the aspect of countability is built into the logical form of an object. The number system is just linguistic, more for communication purposes, but the property of countability is intrinsic in every object that we can count. Because the logical form of the action that is counting exists, and we have a situation that permits its application, the logical form of counting can be superimposed on the presence of objects that can be counted and from this we derive the 'practical idea' of counting. Or the idea of counting as we generally use it.

Just my take:).

jeeprs;70572 wrote:

Numbers don't just exist in the human mind, or in human language. They are 'real' in that they are not the property of this or that mind; they are the same for all who see them.

Try reading my post more carefully, you clearly did not catch what I was trying to say.

@deepthot,

I did read it again, but I think 'the aspect of countability' is tautological. Why is something countable? Because we can count it. Why can we count it? Because it is countable.

This says nothing about the predictive ability of mathematics or why mathematics can be used to ascertain the nature of the universe a split second after the big bang (or the many other uncanny things we can find out with math).

I don't claim to have an answer but I do at least think I have a question.

@jeeprs,

jeeprs;70743 wrote:

I did read it again, but I think 'the aspect of countability' is tautological. Why is something countable? Because we can count it. Why can we count it? Because it is countable.

This says nothing about the predictive ability of mathematics or why mathematics can be used to ascertain the nature of the universe a split second after the big bang (or the many other uncanny things we can find out with math).

I don't claim to have an answer but I do at least think I have a question.

Why is something visible? Because you can see it, Why can you see it, because it is visible. Do you find this a satisfactory explanation of why something is visible, or why you can see it? I am sure that scientists concerned with vision would not.

@jeeprs,

jeeprs;70743 wrote:

I did read it again, but I think 'the aspect of countability' is tautological. Why is something countable? Because we can count it. Why can we count it? Because it is countable.

This says nothing about the predictive ability of mathematics or why mathematics can be used to ascertain the nature of the universe a split second after the big bang (or the many other uncanny things we can find out with math).

I don't claim to have an answer but I do at least think I have a question.

Well, that wasn't the point I was addressing, since you made more that one point in your last post.

From the way you talk about it, it seems like you don't have a strong background in mathematics or physics. We don't find out how physical laws work with math, we observe data, recognize a pattern, an apply an appropriate mathematical structure or formula. What came first, the study of electromagnetism or Maxwell's equations? In this case the tools used to come up with an accurate language to describe the action of electric and magnetic fields and their interactions were developed through observation and recognition of an underlying pattern that reveals itself inductively. Look at how calculus came to be developed!

Even in the case where most of the formulae have already been developed, the process is still fundamentally the same. Einstein noticed certain phyiscal patterns and drew connections between them, and(for the most part) simply applied appropriate preexisting equations.

Calculus is the mathematical languge of rates of change and motion(the rate of change of position). When we apply a mathematical formula to a pattern of action that we observe, we are simply describing the action in more exact and standard terms. The predictive aspect of physical 'laws' is that they continue to hold unvaried(unless you want to get into some of the claims made by John Wheeler) so that we can just infer them on the basis of observational induction.

We don't know why induction works, we don't know why phsical laws don't change(or if they don't, again, if you put any stock in what John Wheeler said on this subject). The point is that the predictive ability of mathematics does not exist, it is just a linguistic and organizational framework that is used for 1) unifying and strengthening/expanding mathematical ideas by drawing relations between them and 2) Providing a standard language of action/description for physical patterns or objects.

So to reformulate your question, you might ask, 'Why is the universe so regular that we can look at a finite number of physical events and develop a fairly accurate prediction?'

@deepthot,

Quote:

Why is something visible? Because you can see it, Why can you see it, because it is visible. Do you find this a satisfactory explanation of why something is visible, or why you can see it? I am sure that scientists concerned with vision would not.

Well, not an explanation, but a simple statement. But visibility is quite different to numerical relationship, isn't it? Something is visible because it reflects or emits light.

Why is something 'countable', and is 'countability' an attribute in the same way that 'visibility' is?

---------- Post added at 02:32 PM ---------- Previous post was at 02:26 PM ----------

Quote:

From the way you talk about it, it seems like you don't have a strong background in mathematics or physics.

Yes, thankyou, perfectly true, and as I already said, my grasp of maths is rudimentary. I am an Arts graduate.

Quote:

So to reformulate your question, you might ask, 'Why is the universe so regular that we can look at a finite number of physical events and develop a fairly accurate prediction?'

Yes that is fair enough, in a general sense. I still think it remains a question in philosophy of science, despite all of what we know.

Furthermore, I don't think this is a scientific question. That is one of the things that is interesting about it. Science relies on the fact that axioms can be discovered, and that the universe is lawful, however, this regularity is as it were senior to scientific thought as it precedes it. So I am thinking about what the fact of mathematical regularity tells us about the nature of existence. I still suspect the answer is much nearer to platonism than most people want to admit.

@deepthot,

Update - have discovered a very interesting text on the issue of the existence of numbers, called (not coincidentally) The Reality of Numbers, by John Bigelow. Unfortunately it is $149.00 on Amazon however quite a lot of it is in Google Books.

And it does identify numbers with a species of Platonic 'abstract universals' although apparently with a physical basis.

@kennethamy,

kennethamy;70266 wrote:

I think you must mean that sometimes we have different views about what is happening. Not that we have our own reality literally. Reality is what actually exists, and what actually is happening. But sometimes we make mistakes about what exists and actually is happening. But that is because what we think exists and is happening is not true.

In the original post in this thread I argued that reality more-than-exists. That is why we have different words for it: one phrase (describing, say, a song composed by M. Jackson) says "it exists", and the other declares "it's real !"

"Real" in this case is akin to "Super !", "Rad", "Intensely cool", "Baad", "Ultra-incredible !!", "Absolutely unbelievable", Etc..

Yes, our different views on what is happening is what I meant by "we project our own reality." I did not rule out that these 'realities' could intersect. Yet you must admit that what is real for Sarah Palin is distinct from what is real for George Mitchell (or for me.) I am not a Fundamentalist. She is. I am not a dxixtxz ......
Yes, I have my faults, but I don't think like most beauty contestants.
:bigsmile:
[I will drop my analysis of the concepts "existence" and "reality" in an instant if a better explanation comes along. At least that's what I believe right now.]

If I'm deluding myself then I'm projecting a reality which is different than thine -- because thee never deludes theyself. ---------- :whistling:

@deepthot,

deepthot;66493 wrote:

I disagree that "an idea exists." Why do I say that?

An idea only consists as a construction, a stipulation, of a mind. It is a mental construct.

And where is the computer that you are seeing? Where is the keyboard that you are looking at? All the evidence is that it, too, is a construct in mind. Before your nose is absolute darkness! Where is the light? Where the colors?Absolute silence! Where is the computer noise that you hear, the TV?
All in mind.
You are creating an arbitrary distinction between the evidence of mind and the fantasy/belief of an 'objective out there'.

Everything that is perceived, exists, whether 'thoughts', 'dreams' or a 'hamburger', all are perceived, all exist, in context!
Not anything exists that is not contextual!
You can certainly disagree (regarding where to draw the line in your particular distinctin), and many do, but the complete 'set' is that everything exists. Any 'distinction' at all is a 'subset' and unnecessary according to Occam's razor in that the 'subset distinctions' add complexity to the model with no gain.

@deepthot,

deepthot;74991 wrote:

In the original post in this thread I argued that reality more-than-exists. That is why we have different words for it: one phrase (describing, say, a song composed by M. Jackson) says "it exists", and the other declares "it's real !"

"Real" in this case is akin to "Super !", "Rad", "Intensely cool", "Baad", "Ultra-incredible !!", "Absolutely unbelievable", Etc..

Yes, our different views on what is happening is what I meant by "we project our own reality." I did not rule out that these 'realities' could intersect. Yet you must admit that what is real for Sarah Palin is distinct from what is real for George Mitchell (or for me.) I am not a Fundamentalist. She is. I am not a dxixtxz ......
Yes, I have my faults, but I don't think like most beauty contestants.
:bigsmile:
[I will drop my analysis of the concepts "existence" and "reality" in an instant if a better explanation comes along. At least that's what I believe right now.]

If I'm deluding myself then I'm projecting a reality which is different than thine -- because thee never deludes theyself. ---------- :whistling:

I would not disagree that there are times when people have conflicting beliefs about what is real. For instance, I as a novice about jewlery may believe that ring has a real diamond in it. But a professional jeweler will know at a glance that the stone is a zircon, and not a real diamond at all.

@kennethamy,

kennethamy;75063 wrote:

I would not disagree that there are times when people have conflicting beliefs about what is real. ....

You say you would not disagree..... That's good.

Actually, it is rather nice that we finally do agree on something, Ken.
:bigsmile: :bigsmile: :bigsmile:

---------- Post added 07-06-2009 at 03:25 AM ----------

nameless;75008 wrote:

And where is the computer that you are seeing? ...

Everything that is perceived, exists, whether 'thoughts', 'dreams' .

I don't recall stating that I see any computer?? I am looking at a monitor, if that's what you mean. I am perceiving it with my sight organs.

In my way of understanding, perception is what we do through the senses.

Conception is only Systemic. Perception is Extrinsic. Experience is Intrinsic.

This is how I value these affects of an individual. They are on a spectrum, from least value to most value. Yes, we need them all - but there is nothing so vital as Experience: which processes and integrates our conceptions and our perceptions.

Malcolm Gladwell, in his latest book - a best-seller - writes at length, and rather profoundly, about the value of experience. You may want to look it over.

@deepthot,

deepthot;75256 wrote:

I am looking at a monitor.... I am perceiving it with my sight organs.

No, you are perceiving it with your mind. Just like you perceive your sight organs.

Quote:

Conception is only Systemic. Perception is Extrinsic. Experience is Intrinsic.

What we perceive is our experience.
I see all this 'intrinsic' and 'extrinsic' stuff as a false and unsupportable distinction.
'Perceiver' and 'perceived' are one and the same. All 'distinction' is in the eye of the beholder. Occam's razor condemns such 'distinction' as a model of additional complexity with no gain. (But thats just from Occam's Perspective... From youPerspective it is, of course, perfectly real and valid. Existence is contextual.)

Quote:

...but there is nothing so vital as Experience

I agree! With no perception/experience, there is no Universe!
Perception is experience is perception...
We experience our lunch, our thoughts our dreams our senses our keyboard our feelings...
We perceive that which we experience, we experience that which we perceive.

@nameless,

nameless;75599 wrote:

No, you are perceiving it with your mind. Just like you perceive your sight organs.

What we perceive is our experience.
I see all this 'intrinsic' and 'extrinsic' stuff as a false and unsupportable distinction.
'Perceiver' and 'perceived' are one and the same. All 'distinction' is in the eye of the beholder. Occam's razor condemns such 'distinction' as a model of additional complexity with no gain. (But thats just from Occam's Perspective... From youPerspective it is, of course, perfectly real and valid. Existence is contextual.)

I agree! With no perception/experience, there is no Universe!
Perception is experience is perception...
We experience our lunch, our thoughts our dreams our senses our keyboard our feelings...
We perceive that which we experience, we experience that which we perceive.

I have never perceived anything with my mind, except, maybe I have "seen" the point of a joke. And I have certainly never perceived my eyes, except by the reflection of them in the mirror, or in a photograph. You cannot really think that when I perceive a chair, that I am one and the same with the chair. (Why do people who philosophize say such peculiar things?) You think that with no perception, there is no universe? That means that before there were creatures who could perceive, there was no Sun, Moon, or Earth. But science tells us that those bodies existed from many years before there were perceiving creatures. So, I think I'll trust science on this, rather than you. I am sure you'll understand. Nothing personal.

@nameless,

nameless;75599 wrote:

No, you are perceiving it with your mind. Just like you perceive your sight organs.
What we perceive is our experience. .......'Perceiver' and 'perceived' are one and the same. All 'distinction' is in the eye of the beholder. Occam's razor condemns such 'distinction' as a model of additional complexity with no gain. (But thats just from Occam's Perspective... From youPerspective it is, of course, perfectly real and valid. Existence is contextual.)
I agree! With no perception/experience, there is no Universe!
Perception is experience is perception...
We experience our lunch, our thoughts our dreams our senses our keyboard our feelings...
We perceive that which we experience, we experience that which we perceive.

I find it useful to make distinctions -- and so did Occam. He was a philosopher, and that's what they do.

Monists have to explaiin why we believe we see differences. When you say "experience is perception" I get the impression you are a monist.

In ordinary life we perceive through the senses - although we have more than five.

Yes, we do experience all those things you mention, but I can't fathom how we "perceive what we experience". I feel you have shaved off too much with that razor.

Ken is right in his response to you, nameless. I agree with all that he wrote in h;is most recent post.

@deepthot,

deepthot;75836 wrote:

Ken is right in his response to you, nameless. I agree with all that he wrote in h;is most recent post.

I wouldn't know what he/she writes as he/she has earned his/her place on my ignore list, for many reasons.
But it is certainly your prerogative to agree with whomever you like.

@kennethamy,

kennethamy;66771 wrote:

I wonder why you believe that your new stipulation of how we ought to use the term, "thought" has anything to do with what we ordinarily call, "thoughts", and why you use the same word for what you seem to be talking about. For what you are talking about certainly seems to have no connection with what is ordinarily meant by the term, "thought". It just seems to be arbitrary that you use the term, "thought" for both. And a little confusing too.

I am drawing a distinction very much like that between The Rationalists and The Empiricists.

The Rationalists - Spinoza, for example - believed that when they put together a coherent system it brought something into existence. In contrast, the Empiricists - say, Hume - didn't 'buy' that. They saw that ideas and thoughts alone do not impress upon existence until something is done with those ideas; it is the doing that makes the change in the world; it is the empirical process.

That sort of thing is what I was getting at in the distinction I drew between definitions (and a system based upon them) on the one hand; and on the other hand the material, empirical world which would have a richer description. This was a value analysis. Values are based upon meanings. I defined the three terms, "Essence", "Existence" and "Reality" and showed that ideas, technicalities, systems, ideologies, dogmas, etc. correlate more closely with essences than with things that exist. My aim was to bring some order and clarity into the field, the topic of discussion.

@nameless,

nameless;75599 wrote:

I agree! With no perception/experience, there is no Universe!
Perception is experience is perception...
We experience our lunch, our thoughts our dreams our senses our keyboard our feelings...
We perceive that which we experience, we experience that which we perceive.

Dear "nameless" from Mercury!
Greetings;

You may pardon but I'm a newcomer here with a "humorous" perspective.I see the "existence" as the maintainer of the existents,opposite to the French philosopher who believed that he thought therefore he was!:sarcastic:

If an "existential cause" offers the "effect's identity" as a whole,then the offered one will be the "effect's existence".The "Main Cause" is a "Shining One",you may consider the effects as the "Parades"!

Returning to the Shining One,every effect will kiss his/her/its own Archetype,not the "Hidden Unknowable Essence" of the Cause!You may consider yourself the "Main Cause",while I'm the "Main Cause" of the effects!!:eek:

Now let's be a little humorous,trying to de"Fine"(I mean de+fine)the existence:

Suppose there are just four ones shaping the cosmos:

There is(:exists) a tree in my office I'm sitting on!
There is (:exists) a baboon;I'm the baboon! Very Happy

There is (:exists) an honorable human being,you're the one!

Four ones:You,my office,a tree,and the white baboon(:I mean me!! Very Happy

)!

Well;the first parts of the sentences are "equal"(i.e.we all exist)!
The rest of the sentences should be "equal" too,though ...we differ!

Now;tell me please:
From where do our "differences" enter?!
Out of existence?
Is there anything out of the existence?!
...I mean without(with+out)the existence?!:shocked:

Thanks and regards/
Yours/"Blessed Lunatic Wiseman"

@deepthot,

Do you all agree with me that it is better to be real than merely to exist?

Do you also agree that to exist is better than merely to be an essence?

If you do, then I infer that you like my analysis.

...And I thank you for that.

Yours for staying in touch with reality,

deepthot

@deepthot,

deepthot;99551 wrote:

Do you all agree with me that it is better to be real than merely to exist?

Do you also agree that to exist is better than merely to be an essence?

If you do, then I infer that you like my analysis.

...And I thank you for that.

Yours for staying in touch with reality,

deepthot

I very well might if I knew what those meant.

@deepthot,

For those who are not sure of the meaning of my terms see the first post in this thread wherein these terms are defined. Also see the subsequent discussion for some of the larger implications of the value analysis offered in the o.p.

For a fuller understanding of the meaning of Systemic, Extrinsic, and Intrinsic, see Chapter 3 of the booklet, a link to which is offered below.

The terms I defined - such as "essence" and "reality" - are basic and can be found historically in discussions on Epistemology, Metaphysics, and especially Ontology.

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