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necessity

Death Monkey
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Posted 05/19/08 - 06:05 AM:	#226
TecnoTut, All I'm saying is by subjective facts he probably meant epsitemically privately known facts, not the oxymoronic concept of true opinion. Maybe he did. If so, then those are still objective facts. Even if you believe that these facts are somehow fundamentally unknowable by anybody other than the experiencer, they are still objective facts. There's nothing unclear about the feeling of pain. When I feel it, I know its how it feels. I'm not going to go into whether all pains share a common property, but if they don't, then that still does not dispel the fact that each token pain has a certain feeling to it. Irrelevant. What is the truth claim that you are asserting is somehow both a true fact about the world, but not an objective fact? What would that even mean? Like I said, the experience of pain is something that happens, about which there are facts. This is true regardless of whether you subscribe to dualism, monism, or whatever. I don't see the analogy between your driving example and knowing how pain feels like, nor why the former makes the former in instance of non-factual knowledge. Just because the process of driving to the mall is not a fact, it doesn't follow that knowing pain has a certain feel to it isn't knowing a fact. It would appear that the concept of an analogy as a way to illustrate something is incomprehensible to you. Instead you seem to regard such analogies as claims that because it is true for the analogy, it is true for the other thing too, which of course is not the argument at all. The point is that it doesn't make any difference whether you define what you mean by "knowing what pail feels like" in such a way that it qualifies as being knowledge of facts or not. That is 100% irrelevant. The point is that if you are talking about a fact, then you are talking about something that is either a true claim about the world, or is not. That is an objective fact. End of story. If you are not talking about such a thing, then it has no relevance whatsoever to the point I made which spawned all of this, which is that it is only the true factual claims about the world that the mental predicate model of the mind makes, that need to be derivable from brain activity in order to say that the mind is reducible to brain activity. That's it. None of this tangential semantics about what is or is not knowledge, or what is or is not meant by "what the experience is like", makes even the slightest difference to that point. It is completely irrelevant. DM
Pseudoscience makes Baby Jesus cry.

TecnoTut
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Posted 05/19/08 - 06:13 AM:	#227
Death Monkey wrote: Maybe he did. If so, then those are still objective facts. Even if you believe that these facts are somehow fundamentally unknowable by anybody other than the experiencer, they are still objective facts. Now our difference is terminological, but I still want you to use the right terminology. He was not misusing the word "subjective". You're misusing the word "objective". If we're talking about factual knowledge fundamentally unknowable by anybody other than the experiencer or subject, then the proper term would be subjective, as in peculiar to the experiencing subject. Irrelevant. What is the truth claim that you are asserting is somehow both a true fact about the world, but not an objective fact? The certain feel of pain is the truth claim. Pain has this feeling. Like I said, the experience of pain is something that happens, about which there are facts. This is true regardless of whether you subscribe to dualism, monism, or whatever. I agree with the above, but the above doesn't dispel that the phenomenal content of pain known by the subject is factual. Only the subject can know that pain feels like this. It is a true matter of fact of the world that pain feels like this.
He that dies pays all debts - Shakespeare's Stephano from The Tempest Truth is its own measure - Spinoza, Ethics IIp43s Those who deny [Aristotle's] first principle should be flogged or burned until they admit that it is not the same thing to be burned and not burned, or whipped and not whipped. - Ibn Sina (Avicenna)

astaire1
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Posted 05/19/08 - 11:19 AM:	#228
Greetings Death Monkey, It seems we have each granted each other various side claims. At this point, perhaps it would be useful to try to focus on what our disagreement is about. I get the feeling we may have different views regarding the notion of truth and meaning. You have said that you don't hold to absolute or foundational truth but I'd like to see what that comes down to in practice. So far, your stance seems to be simpler than I consider possible (though if it is indeed possible then I'd like to help myself to some of that simplicity). Edit: Not being entirely satisfied with this post, I'm adding this section as an attempted fix: It seems to me that the brain is a well defined notion whereas the mind is an abstract notion that is more elusive and perhaps necessarily so. Remember Minsky's book the Society of Mind ? Mind's and societies are perhaps 2 things that have somewhat elastic (or fuzzy) boundaries. So regardding the question can the mind be reduced to the brain: if the brain has a precise boundary and the mind does not, then this would seem to pose a serious obstacle to 100% reducibility. Another, seemingly related concept would be the self. I'm not sure how we want to define the self and the mind with respect to one another. However, in order to resolve this issue (reducibility) it seems esential to take on board Dennett's explanations of the self. He describes the elasticity and elusiveness of the self. The self can extend outward into the world to include the vehicle one is driving. Also its quite natural (and I would consider essential) to conceive of multiple selves inhabiting a single brain. Also siamese twins could be considered a single self with 2 brains (same for twins to a lesser degree). I tend to think you'd disagree with some or all of these claims 1) All scientific theories are provisional 2) No scientific theory perfectly describes reality 3) (reality, concepts, descriptions) aspects of reality in the shared world, external to the mind, provide feedback for our shared concepts which we imperfectly describe with words (and mathematics). 4) we accept some facts as objective when believed by multiple people whom we trust 5) its impossible to derive all scientific concepts from scratch therefore a modern scientific world view is not contained in a single mind but rather supported my multiple minds. 6) meaning derives from a web of mutually supporting concepts that containing circular "definitions". 7) truth is dependent on language and community 8) all rational thought and argument is circular or invalid Death Monkey wrote: I'm not sure what you mean. What is the "it" in your above post? Consciousness? No, not consciousness. I'll expand the instances of 'it'. Astaire wrote: We still seem to be mostly talking past each other. You don’t seem to be addressing the main thrust of my point. It seems I haven’t succeeded in getting it[my point] across. I’m saying that the very nature of language may be such that though its[language] indeed entirely physical, its[language] also circular in a way that could possibly preclude establishing the types of hierarchies we expect when we talk of perfect reducibility. DeathMonkey wrote: And what would "perfect reducibility" be? Reducibility that has no missing levels and especially that has no information loss at any of the levels. I'm referring to the reducible in principle claim that you wish to make. DeathMonkey wrote: Why is that even relevant? I consider the difference been the 2 relationships to be relevant (QM vs. Chemistry, QM vs. intention or the mind) because I would agree with your claim if the 2nd relationship was as well estanlished as the first. Its relevant for demonstrating that in what way your claim could be considered speculative. DeathMonkey wrote: Besides, I'm not even so sure that is true. For example, QM tells us things about Chemistry, which in turn tell us things about Biology, which in turn tell us things about the mind. The connections just aren't very obvious. I agree, but for the time being, I have a cautious stance on what you wish to imply here. I tend to agree with this line of reasoning by I think its import for scientists (or people discussing science or the philosophy of mind) to we wary of greedy reductionism. In particular, its easy to say physics supports chemistry which supports biology which supports psychology. However, that glosses over the fact that high level biology has not been redcuced to low level biology. (I assume its the same for chemistry to a lesser degree and possibly even within physics examples could be found). DeathMonkey wrote: But even if what you say is correct, so what? The claim of reducibility has nothing to do with the practicality or usefulness of actually being able to perform the reduction. I see your point. However, so long as it hasn't been fully established that perfect and comprehensive reduction is possible, then the usefulness of alternative explanations is going to be an important criteria. DeathMonkey wrote: Precludes what being reduced to QM? What possible utility could be gained from a way of understanding the mind by assuming that there is more going on than just quantum mechanical interactions? Precludes various particular explanations of intentional behavior being reduced... I don't assume that there is more than QM going on, in the sense that you mean here. As I've described, there is more going on only in the sense that QM is not the only way of explaining things. I assume that if we take each molecule in each neuron individually we'll be able to apply QM in the usual way. DeathMonkey wrote: In fact, if you are talking about what I think you are talking about, this is not just an issue of the mind. If the nature of the brain is such that its activity can not be accurately described in terms of simpler interacting functional units, then of course we should not expect that the mind can be. But that does not have anything to do with the mind's reducibility to brain activity. This might be worth exploring. Suppose we abandon trying to reduce brain activity and instead consider only the reduction of the mind to brain activity. I've already granted that mind processes are caused by brain processes. I'm not clear myself on how to discuss this because I fear that the concept of mind is not as concrete as the concept of brain. Perhaps we need a definition of mind. Consider the following hypothetical situation: 1) There is an intentional explanation of Jane's behavior that is useful for answering certain questions and predicting the future so as to make a useful decision. 2) That explanation is composed of words and concepts which are inter-related in a web which is self reinforcing (and also dependent on the community for those concepts to function properly over an extended period of time such as weeks or months). 3) Some these words and concepts can be correlated with various areas of the brain in various circumstances. 4) Therfore we can predict that by damaging some of these areas we can diminish the proper functioning of that web of concepts. 5) I'm not sure where to go from here??? DeathMonkey wrote: Now, maybe you mean it cannot be broken down into neural activity. If so, then I fail to see how this is not equivelent to saying that there is something more than brain activity involved. It could perhaps be non equivalent depending on what this breaking down or reducing is supposed to be. My belief is that there is nothing more to it[behavior, personality, intentions] than the configuration of the matter in the brain and body (and the social context: job, family, friends etc.). However, it may be that there is no useful comprehensive mapping between the neurons and the concepts/beliefs that form the intention. For example, the mapping may be such that 1 neuron is involved in all but 2 of the relevant beliefs and that each belief is supported by 70% of all the brains neurons. DeathMonkey wrote: This is only a criticism of a particular strategy that could be used by neuroscience. And again, what you are describing applies to the ability of neuroscience to accurately describe brain activity in the first place, not the reducibility of the mind to brain activity. I don't see clearly what you are getting at here. Doesn't reducibility require achieving accurate descriptions ? -Astaire Edited by astaire1 on 05/20/08 - 09:58 AM
Heaven, I'm in heaven, and my heart beats so that I can hardly speak. And I seem to find the happiness I seek. When we're out together dancing cheek to cheek.

Death Monkey
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Posted 05/20/08 - 12:15 PM:	#229
TecnoTut, Now our difference is terminological, but I still want you to use the right terminology. He was not misusing the word "subjective". I never said he was misusing the word. You're misusing the word "objective". I do not think I am misusing the term at all. A true fact about the world is an objective fact. Do you disagree with this? Why? If we're talking about factual knowledge fundamentally unknowable by anybody other than the experiencer or subject, then the proper term would be subjective, as in peculiar to the experiencing subject. It is clearly subjective. It is also an objective fact. As I explained before, the notion of subjective and objective being mutually exclusive is both inherently dualistic, and fundamentally incoherent. Irrelevant. What is the truth claim that you are asserting is somehow both a true fact about the world, but not an objective fact? The certain feel of pain is the truth claim. Pain has this feeling. If it is a true fact about the world that a particular experience of pain has a particular feeling, then that is an objective fact. I agree with the above, but the above doesn't dispel that the phenomenal content of pain known by the subject is factual. Only the subject can know that pain feels like this. It is a true matter of fact of the world that pain feels like this. Exactly. And that is an objective fact about the world. It is irrelevant who can and cannot know the fact. Even a fact about the world that nobody could know would be an objective fact. DM
Pseudoscience makes Baby Jesus cry.

astaire1
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Posted 05/20/08 - 11:58 PM:	#230
Hi DeathMonkey, I have some issues concerning your latest reply to TecnoTut but I will not yet go into them in this post. Instead, I must make a retraction as I've just realized that it was a serious mistake for me to grant that the mind is nothing more than brain activity. It seems there would actually be somewhat more hope for for the claim that the mind is no more than QM. This morning, after a chain of reasong regarding the society of mind, I remembered that Daniel Dennett devoted an entire book ("Kinds of Minds") to the theme that the mind cannot be reduced to brain activity alone. In particular, the body cannot be considered a mere energy source, or merely an I/O peripheral to the brain, or merely a hormone procuction and storage center, etc.. Also, Dennett's famous essay "Where Am I" makes it clear that drawing the boundary of the body is not always a simple and unambiguous matter. Just as the physics notion of a center-of-gravity derives its meaning from its usefulness in practical situations, so too, the notion of the mind must do likewise. It may be that the very nature of abstract concepts such as these would render them resistant to a complete and all encompassing reduction to more fundamental concepts. Is the notion of center-of-gravity "real" or is it a useful fiction? If its fiction, I would say that all concepts (scientific or otherwise) are useful fictions which are taken to be true in various contexts. -Astaire Edited by astaire1 on 05/21/08 - 05:05 AM
Heaven, I'm in heaven, and my heart beats so that I can hardly speak. And I seem to find the happiness I seek. When we're out together dancing cheek to cheek.

astaire1
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Posted 05/28/08 - 12:38 PM:	#231
Greetings DeathMonkey, My apologies for not being specific of what my complaint was regarding your last post. Now I seem to have forgotten some of it (so it must not have been very important). At this time, I only object to the final claim. DeathMonkey wrote: Exactly. And that[how pain feels] is an objective fact about the world. It is irrelevant who can and cannot know the fact. Even a fact about the world that nobody could know would be an objective fact. I don't see how to make sense of your claim here. Apparently you wish to claim that truth is independent of descriptions and language. But how could you support such a claim and how does that jive with the notion that only statements can be true or false. In a way, it seems you wish to have a notion of truth somewhat like Plato's perfect forms. Its as if you want to claim that perfect circles really exist. On the other hand, I too assume that external reality exists independent of whether we observe describe or understand it. And yet, a fact about reality cannot be found to be true or false until it has been postulated by someone. Also, wouldn't "a fact that noone could know" imply that relevant observations could not be made? - - - - - - - Now getting back to the main issue, I'm trying to work out for myself to what extent truth is relative and to what extent it is universal. That's why I considered the discussion between you and Dunamis to be important. On the one hand, I agree with Dunamis that all descriptions (including all scientific theories and all concepts) are provisional and imperfect. How can this be reconcilde with a scientific worldview? Then again, I share much of your world view as well (such as the common ground of physicalism). In addition, Darwinian evolution demonstrates that there are various truths that contribute to survival strategies. Also, as you mentioned, engaging in discussion presupposes truth. -Astaire
Heaven, I'm in heaven, and my heart beats so that I can hardly speak. And I seem to find the happiness I seek. When we're out together dancing cheek to cheek.

Death Monkey
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Posted 05/28/08 - 11:37 PM:	#232
astaire1, Exactly. And that[how pain feels] is an objective fact about the world. It is irrelevant who can and cannot know the fact. Even a fact about the world that nobody could know would be an objective fact. I don't see how to make sense of your claim here. Apparently you wish to claim that truth is independent of descriptions and language. But how could you support such a claim and how does that jive with the notion that only statements can be true or false. I think that "truth", and "facts about the world", are not quite the same thing. If you recal from earlier in this thread, the basic assumption upon which all epistemology is based, is that our experiences are not all that exist, but rather that there is a world that exists, and that our experiences are (1) part of this world, and (2) can be used by us to infer information about the rest of the world. This is what I mean by objective fact. The facts about the world that we (assume) can at at least approximately be inferred with a reasonable degree of accuracy from our experiences. Truth, on the other hand, seems to be more a judgement about those inferences, their coherency with each other, and the degree to which those inferences are found to be useful. In a way, it seems you wish to have a notion of truth somewhat like Plato's perfect forms. Its as if you want to claim that perfect circles really exist. Not at all. On the other hand, I too assume that external reality exists independent of whether we observe describe or understand it. And yet, a fact about reality cannot be found to be true or false until it has been postulated by someone. Exactly. Nevertheless, there are facts about the world, as you just said. Also, wouldn't "a fact that noone could know" imply that relevant observations could not be made? Yes. Just to clarify, in my previous statement I was not suggesting that I think there are any such unkowable facts, or even that I think that a coherent epistemology could allow one to make truth-claims about such unknowable facts. I do not. But there are many people out there who do, so it would be presumptuous of me to try to assert that the meaning of "objective fact" be limited in that way. Now getting back to the main issue, I'm trying to work out for myself to what extent truth is relative and to what extent it is universal. That's why I considered the discussion between you and Dunamis to be important. On the one hand, I agree with Dunamis that all descriptions (including all scientific theories and all concepts) are provisional and imperfect. I agree with that as well. How can this be reconcilde with a scientific worldview? I don't see any need for a reconciliation. The scientific worldview is largely based on that observation (at least, the modern scientific worldview). Scientific theories are, by their very nature, provisional and imperfect, and this is a key factor in how the scientific method works. Maybe you mean something different by "scientific worldview" than I do? I would regard the scientific worldview as the view that we can use the scientific method to better understand the world we live in. That everything in this world functions in a logical way, according to some set of natural laws that can be inferred through observation. I see this as an ongoing iterative process, whereby our inferences about the world are understood to always be approximate and provisional, and whereby the somewhat naive classical notion of a "perfect description" is something that is strived for and asymptotically approached, rather than actually ever being obtained. I do not see this as something that needs to be reconciled with the observation that all descriptions are provisional and imperfect. On the contrary, that observation seems to me to be an implicit part of the worldview. Then again, I share much of your world view as well (such as the common ground of physicalism). In addition, Darwinian evolution demonstrates that there are various truths that contribute to survival strategies. Also, as you mentioned, engaging in discussion presupposes truth. I think that a big part of the problem here is that "truth" is a pretty nebulous concept to begin with. It seems to have a wide range of meanings associated with it, which go from rather concrete concepts like a claim being an accurate statement about its subject, to ones that implicitely presuppose some sort of impossible to obtain "perfect knowledge" about the world. DM
Pseudoscience makes Baby Jesus cry.

astaire1
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Posted 06/02/08 - 10:57 PM:	#233
Greetings Death Monkey, Thanks for the clarifications. We seem to have a lot of agreement and yet I'd still like to be able to establish what we can say about the scientific worldview. Or, to be less ambitious: what is an appropriate physicalist stance? (one with a minimum of incoherencies). DeathMonkey wrote: I think that "truth", and "facts about the world", are not quite the same thing. But I don't see the difference you are trying to put forth. How is it that "facts about the world" are less nebulous? To me, the word 'fact' is just a way to say "I believe this statement to be true. Its a fact" I want to see if you've defined 'fact' in some other way that avoids the problems inherent in the notion of "truth". DeathMonkey wrote: If you recal from earlier in this thread, the basic assumption upon which all epistemology is based, is that our experiences are not all that exist, but rather that there is a world that exists, and that our experiences are (1) part of this world, and (2) can be used by us to infer information about the rest of the world. No, I don't recall that from this thread but off hand the claims seem acceptable to me and the description seems quite helpful DeathMonkey wrote: This is what I mean by objective fact. The facts about the world that we (assume) can at at least approximately be inferred with a reasonable degree of accuracy from our experiences. I agree with this. However, the problem seems to be when we try to establish a method for inferring facts with a reasonable degree of accuracy. As far as I know, science assumes that it has a method for achieving this. Off hand the assumption seems reasonable since its pretty obvious that science has been succeeding. However, when we try to pin down what the method is we may discover that we're not being as "scientific" about the process as we were assuming. Recently I have tried to defend the scientific method (to Dunamis for example). However, since then I read in Smolin's latest book that this "method" is not clearly defined. His claim is that science is an ethic NOT a method. I found his discussion to be rather convincing. DeathMonkey wrote: Truth, on the other hand, seems to be more a judgement about those inferences, their coherency with each other, and the degree to which those inferences are found to be useful. You seem to have been shying away from the criteria or "usefulness", saying at times that it is irrelevant. However, I tend to think that you may be mistaken on that. Maybe you DO NOT have an alternative criteria to that of agreement-within-a-community or that of usefulness-to-a-given-purpose. If you're willing, I'd like to explore what your alternative is and establish whether Smolin's claim is correct. -Astaire Edited by astaire1 on 06/04/08 - 01:15 AM
Heaven, I'm in heaven, and my heart beats so that I can hardly speak. And I seem to find the happiness I seek. When we're out together dancing cheek to cheek.

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