On The Contrast Between Appearance And Reality

@Scottydamion,

Scottydamion;134267 wrote:

Take a chunk out of a chocolate bar and it is still basically the same chocolate bar, just short a chunk.

A person can change, but the parts that make them up are still basically there. They still hold the same body and mind, although they may hold radically different thoughts later in life. If a person loses a leg are they not basically still the same person?

My parents were always going to be my parents, as is evidenced by my existence. So they were my parents before I existed, they just didn't hold the title until I came along. It is nothing but a word game if you ask me, I could rephrase it "the people who are now my parents" but I am still referencing specific people even though they now hold the title of parents.

In your opinion, exactly when does that chocolate bar cease to become a chocolate bar and become human waste? Or when does that particular bar, cease to be that particular bar.

Individual parents are particular things which are dependent upon their entire state of affairs. They are not immutable as the essence of "parenthood", they are dependent upon their children to be considered parents, and if they did not have the potential to conceive children, they would be different people entirely.

@MMP2506,

MMP2506;134262 wrote:

We have proven time after time the faultiness of the Natural Sciences

I must say, that statement makes me a little uncomfortable. I can't really recall an instance in which philosophy has proven science 'faulty', and if not philosophy, I can't think who else 'we' would refer to. But I am open to correction if I have misunderstood.

Much of the conflict between science and traditional metaphysic goes back to origin of the enlightenment and the Scientific Revolution. Since that time the natural sciences have always proceeded on the basis of a realist ontology. It has become second nature, and I think this is why it is so hard to question it. Whereas, for anyone schooled in a traditional-metaphysical outlook, there is an implicit acceptance of the possibility of transcendent or immaterial realities.

Now, of course, as you are saying, the discoveries of QM have in fact undermined the realist ontology of the European Enlightenment. Hence this discussion. But in this case, science has not been proven faulty. What is happening is that science itself is showing that the physicalist ontology is untenable. And that is why we are heading for a revolution. Not because of anything philosophers say:bigsmile:

@MMP2506,

MMP2506;134268 wrote:

Your existence was always a necessary component of their existence. Even before you were born, your parent's had the potential to give birth to you, and without that potential, they would've been different people, and you would never have been born.

Why are you mixing the terms necessary with the term potential? The past is the known branch out of the many on a tree, the future is all of the potential branches on the tree. So in the past, my parents had the potential to not have me, it is only necessary because it has happened.

Are you declaring nothing is random, or that everything is predestined?

@jeeprs,

jeeprs;134272 wrote:

I must say, that statement makes me a little uncomfortable.

It should. It is egregiously false.

@jeeprs,

jeeprs;134272 wrote:

I must say, that statement makes me a little uncomfortable. I can't really recall an instance in which philosophy has proven science 'faulty', and if not philosophy, I can't think who else 'we' would refer to. But I am open to correction if I have misunderstood.

Much of the conflict between science and traditional metaphysic goes back to origin of the enlightenment and the Scientific Revolution. Since that time the natural sciences have always proceeded on the basis of a realist ontology. It has become second nature, and I think this is why it is so hard to question it. Whereas, for anyone schooled in a traditional-metaphysical outlook, there is an implicit acceptance of the possibility of transcendent or immaterial realities.

Now, of course, as you are saying, the discoveries of QM have in fact undermined the realist ontology of the European Enlightenment. Hence this discussion. But in this case, science has not been proven faulty. What is happening is that science itself is showing that the physicalist ontology is untenable. And that is why we are heading for a revolution. Not because of anything philosophers say:bigsmile:

I meant humanity as a whole in "we," and instead of faultiness, I should have said something more along the lines of incompleteness of it. I do not wish to completely push Natural Science to the side, but I do think it needs to loosen its grip on reality a bit.

I would argue that in the occurrence of a revolution, philosophy would play a huge part as there are already Physicists reverting to a more Ancient view of cosmology. The existence of alternate universes for example couldn't possibly exist within the framework of modern thought, and it will require some sort of philosophy to make sense of it.

In my opinion, all thought starts with some philosophical outlook, but I may be a bit biased.

@MMP2506,

MMP2506;134276 wrote:

I meant humanity as a whole in "we," and instead of faultiness, I should have said something more along the lines of incompleteness of it. I do not wish to completely push Natural Science to the side, but I do think it needs to loosen its grip on reality a bit.

.

There is always the part where you say it, and the part where you take it back.

I would not want science to loosen its grip on reality. Why should I? It is those who think that philosophy and science are competitors in the same business that need to tighten their grip on reality. That theory, that philosophers and scientists are each trying to increase their market share, has been discarded by most thinking philosophers.

@Scottydamion,

Scottydamion;134273 wrote:

Why are you mixing the terms necessary with the term potential? The past is the known branch out of the many on a tree, the future is all of the potential branches on the tree. So in the past, my parents had the potential to not have me, it is only necessary because it has happened.

Are you declaring nothing is random, or that everything is predestined?

A thing's potentiality is part of that thing. An acorn has the potential to become a tree, therefore, that potential is necessary for the acorn to exist they way it does.

It may not become a tree someday, in which case hindsight will allow us to get a better understanding of the true essence of that particular acorn, as it was never destined to be a tree.

We are finite beings, but we do have the ability to use hindsight to evaluate the past, and it is quite clear the present exists the way it does necessarily because the past was how it was. In which case the opposite must also be true, because if the present was different, that would mean that the past necessarily would've been different as well. It can't work one way and not the other.

@kennethamy,

kennethamy;134246 wrote:

I'll take Manhattan. What makes you think there is such a distinction, whatever it is? Is it also true that pragmatically speaking Quito in the capital of Ecuador, but that transcendentally speaking it isn't? I think that the next student who takes an examination on the capitals of South America should give that answer.

I stand by my words, which were really quite clear. From my perspective, your position is a confusion of these two types of philosophy. Scientific correspondence is always approximate, as it is the application of one transcendental faculty against another kind of transcendental, intuitive time and space which are continuous, not digital/numerical. Both Einstein and Wittgenstein knew this.

Transcendental truth is limited, and is not ideal for the description of the non-human...but natural science is human, so transcendental philosophy can investigate its methods, advantages, disadvantages.

In my opinion, you have not investigated your method enough to distinguish between correspondence and consensus....

Quote:

Albert Einstein stated that "as far as the laws of mathematics refer to reality, they are not certain; and as far as they are certain, they do not refer to reality."[6]

Quote:

6.1262 Proof in logic is merely a mechanical expedient to facilitate the
recognition of tautologies in complicated cases.

6.234 Mathematics is a method of logic.

6.2323 An equation merely marks the point of view from which I consider
the two expressions: it marks their equivalence in meaning.

6.31 The so-called law of induction cannot possibly be a law of logic,
since it is obviously a proposition with sense.---Nor, therefore, can it
be an a priori law.

6.32 The law of causality is not a law but the form of a law.

6.362 What can be described can happen too: and what the law of
causality is meant to exclude cannot even be described.

6.363 The procedure of induction consists in accepting as true the
simplest law that can be reconciled with our experiences.

6.3631 This procedure, however, has no logical justification but only a
psychological one. It is clear that there are no grounds for believing
that the simplest eventuality will in fact be realized.

6.36311 It is an hypothesis that the sun will rise tomorrow: and this
means that we do not know whether it will rise.

6.37 There is no compulsion making one thing happen because another has
happened. The only necessity that exists is logical necessity.

6.371 The whole modern conception of the world is founded on the
illusion that the so-called laws of nature are the explanations of
natural phenomena.

@kennethamy,

kennethamy;134280 wrote:

There is always the part where you say it, and the part where you take it back.

I would not want science to loosen its grip on reality. Why should I? It is those who think that philosophy and science are competitors in the same business that need to tighten their grip on reality. That theory, that philosophers and scientists are each trying to increase their market share, has been discarded my most thinking philosophers.

Well I believe that applying natural science to the study of people is a faulty method, but for the purpose of the argument, it is better to say incompleteness.

I think it is downright wrong that the mind is a byproduct of biological factors. I think it is wrong that personalities are things-in-themselves that can be accurately studied. I also believe it is wrong to study behavior using quantifiable data, as behavior is the result of of people's motives, which can only be understood qualitatively.

Natural Science can tell us much about the world, but it must work within its limits, and not cross into area that it is not equipped to research.

Science hasn't traditionally meant Natural Science, but recently that is all it has been reduced to. An expanded notion of Science is inevitable, but that doesn't mean that there is any competition, human sciences and natural sciences can coexist.

@MMP2506,

MMP2506;134281 wrote:

and it is quite clear the present exists the way it does necessarily because the past was how it was. In which case the opposite must also be true, because if the present was different, that would mean that the past necessarily would've been different as well. It can't work one way and not the other.

But although the present is the causal outcome of the past, it is not true that the past is the causal outcome of the present. Causation does not work backwards.

@MMP2506,

MMP2506;134283 wrote:

Well I believe that applying natural science to the study of people is a faulty method, but for the purpose of the argument, it is better to say incompleteness.

I think it is downright wrong that the mind is a byproduct of biological factors. I think it is wrong that personalities are things-in-themselves that can be accurately studied. I also believe it is wrong to study behavior using quantifiable data, as behavior is the result of of people's motives, which can only be understood qualitatively.

Believe what you will, but there are interesting statistics concerning behavior. It may be more researchable than you would like it to be.

Either way, why is it important what you believe? Even to yourself? Is it not more important why you came to that belief?

@kennethamy,

kennethamy;134284 wrote:

But although the present is the causal outcome of the past, it is not true that the past is the causal outcome of the present. Causation does not work backwards.

Efficient causation may not work that way, but in my opinion, that is part of the incompleteness of modern science.

For Aristotle, a things final cause is just as important to its essence as its efficient case, and a change in either would result in a change in that particular thing. You can't simply view the world as existing in a straight line, because things are contingent upon their past and future equally.

@MMP2506,

MMP2506;134286 wrote:

Efficient causation may not work that way, but in my opinion, that is part of the incompleteness of modern science.

For Aristotle, a things final cause is just as important to its essence as its efficient case, and a change in either would result in a change in that particular thing. You can't simply view the world as existing in a straight line, because things are contingent upon their past and future equally.

But although we know that there are efficient causes, we do not know that there are final causes. And if there are none, then they cannot be very important to anything. I had been under the impression that Galileo had given the coup de grace to the notion of final causes. And, it he did not, Spinoza did. But, apparently not. Have you a case of explanation by final cause?

@Scottydamion,

Scottydamion;134285 wrote:

Believe what you will, but there are interesting statistics concerning behavior. It may be more researchable than you would like it to be.

Either way, why is it important what you believe? Even to yourself? Is it not more important why you came to that belief?

If you must know I've came to that belief by doing research on behavior and by reading books written by people who have taken different approaches to Psychology. I have studied with multiple certified Psychologist and I fail to see a useful application for their results, or even the validity of many of their results. I think the goal of overall quality of mental health has taken a backseat to trying to predict people's behavior based on previous behavior, but the problem with that paradigm is that people are constantly changing, therefore their behavior also changes. Even most Personality Psychologist accept how insignificant their findings are, but they insist insignificant knowledge is better than no knowledge at all, and I happen to disagree with that statement.

---------- Post added 03-01-2010 at 08:22 PM ----------

kennethamy;134289 wrote:

But although we know that there are efficient causes, we do not know that there are final causes. And if there are none, then they cannot be very important to anything. I had been under the impression that Galileo had given the coup de grace to the notion of final causes. And, it he did not, Spinoza did. But, apparently not. Have you a case of explanation by final cause?

Of course, most scientists discredited any cause besides efficient when the world was viewed as existing in absolute time, but when time becomes relative, doesn't a thing's future becomes much more important to its essence??

@MMP2506,

MMP2506;134283 wrote:

Well I believe that applying natural science to the study of people is a faulty method, but for the purpose of the argument, it is better to say incompleteness.

I completely agree. Natural science can study only the animal element of man. That part of man which transcends the animal cannot be addressed by natural science, which deals in tautologies/eternities.

Because man is essentially temporal, or essentially evolution, a tautological method is not appropriate. (Hegel)

To be fair, most humans act so like animals that natural science can usefully speak of them, but the remainder it misses is significant. After all, natural science itself is a product of man as a temporal or evolving being...

---------- Post added 03-01-2010 at 09:27 PM ----------

Scottydamion;134285 wrote:

Believe what you will, but there are interesting statistics concerning behavior. It may be more researchable than you would like it to be.

It seems that to the degree that we are animals, we can be described mathematically......

But that small human creative element is not predictable. Else we could predict the future of our species?

@Reconstructo,

Reconstructo;134296 wrote:

I completely agree. Natural science can study only the animal element of man. That part of man which transcends the animal cannot be addressed by natural science, which deals in tautologies/eternities.

Because man is essentially temporal, or essentially evolution, a tautological method is not appropriate. (Hegel)

To be fair, most humans act so like animals that natural science can usefully speak of them, but the remainder it misses is significant. After all, natural science itself is a product of man as a temporal or evolving being...

---------- Post added 03-01-2010 at 09:27 PM ----------

It seems that to the degree that we are animals, we can be described mathematically......

But that small human creative element is not predictable. Else we could predict the future of our species?

Every piece of data contains outliers that it cannot account for. That is where the +/- comes from in most statistics you read. While much of the world may be accounted for by natural science, shouldn't something account for the outliers that natural science can't explain?

Any law that has an exception to it isn't a law, it is merely a probability.

@Reconstructo,

Reconstructo;134296 wrote:

I completely agree. Natural science can study only the animal element of man. That part of man which transcends the animal cannot be addressed by natural science, which deals in tautologies/eternities.

Because man is essentially temporal, or essentially evolution, a tautological method is not appropriate. (Hegel)

How does natural science deal in tautologies/eternities? What the hell does that mean? Name a tautology from science. Or, does that word also have a transcendental meaning only you know? (An, while you are at it, what is the tautological method?) You must have made that up. Or you are kidding everyone. Or are you aware of what you are doing? It is starting to look like what abnormal psychologists call, "word salad".

@Pythagorean,

Maybe I am just not understanding you but

[QUOTE=jeeprs;134248] You might imagine the moon existing prior to our perception of it. But it is beyond doubt that your imagined image is implicitly dependent upon the picture you have of the moon within your human imagination from the standpoint of being on the earth. You might imagine the ancient moon, floating above an uninhabited earth. This is still imagined from a viewpoint. You might imagine the non-existence of the moon. But this is also an imaginative act on your part. Anything you can say about the moon, including its mass, composition, distance, direction of movement, and age, is predicated upon the fact that there is someone saying or thinking it. What it might be outside this context is impossible to say, as per Kant. .[/QUOTE] A lot of these arguments sound to me like:

The human notion of the moon did not exist prior to humans perceiving the moon, therefore the "moon" did not exist prior to it being perceived by man.
This is certainly true but it fairly misses the point, I think:

What ever there is in external independent reality which gives rise to the human conception, perception or notion of the "moon" certainly did exist prior to being perceived by man.

So yes the human perception of the "moon" requires humans, obviously.

Human perception does not create the external reality which gives rise to the human perception of the "moon".

It is true that all we can ever know about the external reality which gives rise to the "moon" are perceptions that gives rise to the human conception "moon" and that these do not correspond perfectly to the "thing in itself" (Kant). Kant did not deny the truth of an independent "external reality" only our ability to know it perfectly or even our ability to know how closely it corresponds to "external reality" or how complete our knowledge of the "external reality" moon" is.

Having said that, we have good reason to think our objective scientific view of the world corresponds pretty closely to those aspects of reality which we can measure. The predictive and manipulative power of science can not be denied.

[QUOTE=Pythagorean;134251] But if we are to accept that science exists only in human minds then you can not prove that the moon existed before people existed out side of human minds. .[/QUOTE] You know, I do not converse with young earth creationists because the scientific and perceptual gap is just too large to be bridged. Science clearly shows the approximate age of the universe, the earth, the moon and the appearance of the first hominids. The "reality" which gives rise to the human perceptual object we call the "moon" existed long before humans existed to perceive it.

[QUOTE=Pythagorean;134251] You can not experience the unexperienced. And you cannot prove that the unexperienced corresponds to what is experienced; we only see it under our limited human perspective, a circumstantial light, because we have no absolute frame of reference upon which you could hang the unexperienced. .[/QUOTE] I am going to depend on science for this. The existence of ultimate reality, external reality, independent reality (whose existence I do not doubt) does not depend on human perception or human minds to "be". The only thing that depends on human minds is the human concept or perception of the "moon" and there are two moons the one humans perceive (the perceptual moon)and the one (the real moon)that gives rise to that human perception. (pure Kant).

[QUOTE=Pythagorean;134251]Man is not the measure of things.[/QUOTE] Under your definition of "exist" and "real", this would seem to be an oxymoron but please feel free to clarify how this corresponds or correlates with your other views. If there is no existence independent of human perception then man clearly would be the "measure of all things" in fact the "creator of all things" as well.

@Pythagorean,

kennethamy;134300 wrote:

It is starting to look like what abnormal psychologists call, "word salad".

I'll have a chicken leg with mine, thanks.

kennethamy;134289 wrote:

But although we know that there are efficient causes, we do not know that there are final causes. And if there are none, then they cannot be very important to anything. I had been under the impression that Galileo had given the coup de grace to the notion of final causes. And, it he did not, Spinoza did. But, apparently not. Have you a case of explanation by final cause?

The existence of final cause or teleology

I recommend a brief perusal of From Aristotle to Darwin and Back Again by Etienne Gilson.

Personally, I think the idea that evolution proceeds 'without cause' is quite absurd. I believe that life exhibits purposeful behavious on every level from its inception

Question: if evolution were, or were not, directed towards an outcome, how would it be possible to frame a testable hypothesis?

Answer: compare the process of evolution on this planet with the process of evolution on various other planets and see if there are any similarities.

Obviously this is not possible. In the absence of this data, any hypotheses for or against final causes is speculative.

@MMP2506,

MMP2506;134299 wrote:

Every piece of data contains outliers that it cannot account for. That is where the +/- comes from in most statistics you read. While much of the world may be accounted for by natural science, shouldn't something account for the outliers that natural science can't explain?

Any law that has an exception to it isn't a law, it is merely a probability.

In my opinion, there will probably always be an unknown that awaits our logos and our equations. I think natural science is the right tool for the non-transcendental experience of man. Essence of essence, or Truth. Or essence of accident: "truth-in-progress....always in progress..."

---------- Post added 03-01-2010 at 10:09 PM ----------

kennethamy;134300 wrote:

How does natural science deal in tautologies/eternities? What the hell does that mean? Name a tautology from science.

Pick any EQUATION you like......

Quote:

6.022 The concept of number is simply what is common to all numbers, the
general form of a number. The concept of number is the variable number.
And the concept of numerical equality is the general form of all
particular cases of numerical equality.

6.1 The propositions of logic are tautologies.

6.2323 An equation merely marks the point of view from which I consider
the two expressions: it marks their equivalence in meaning.

6.234 Mathematics is a method of logic.

6.2341 It is the essential characteristic of mathematical method that
it employs equations. For it is because of this method that every
proposition of mathematics must go without saying.

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