Kedaman & Simonm Reality Debate (and anyone else brave enough to enter)

Behemoth

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by dream, I don't mean picture it when asleep. I suppose I'm refering to the conceiving in the first place. How can physicist grasp the concept of multiple dimensions without visual reference?

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Well, there's a difference between visualising and conceptualising something. How can a mathematician conceptulise an imaginary number? He can never see it and any mental image he associates with it can only be make believe.

My personal belief is that we cannot visualise anything that we have not previously experienced (in other words, we cannot imagine experiencing something we have not actually experienced). However, we can conceptualise concepts in an abstract fashion by (somehow) making an intuitive leap to do so.

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Blind people can see colours. The don't know the names for them if they've been blind all their lives, but there are stories of people that gain sight they've never had and recognise colours they saw whilst blind.

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I think this may be an exception to my "visualisation" rule...Obviously our brains are designed to perceive colour and something could trigger those sensations even when we've always been blind. That's different, however, from a blind man visualising an elephant (for instance) which our brains are not specially designed to perceive.

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I believe imagination can generate things that we have no experience of, but as I said earlier, I am more inclined to believe that experience makes these concepts possible.

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You may be right (Kedaman seems to think so), but I just don't see how our minds can create something out of nothing. Imagine trying to do that with a computer program? It's effectively having the ability to break with cause and effect and that's very hard to conceive of.

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Originally posted by simonm Behemoth
How can a mathematician conceptulise an imaginary number? He can never see it and any mental image he associates with it can only be make believe.

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:)

maybe it's the renewed association power ...

Like saying :

Banana (usually yellow greenish)
the colour red (generally not associated with a banana)

yet we can visualise a red banana quite easily.

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yet we can visualise a red banana quite easily.

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Speak for yourself! ;)

besides the red banana (:)), could it be just that ?
The theory that we can make new associations between objects and visualise them ?

I mean, we can visualise a cube in a hundred different colours or having a hundred different smells or compose an object of two cubes. It doesn't have to exist right in front of you but you can imagine it, can you ?

Wally

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The theory that we can make new associations between objects and visualise them ?

I mean, we can visualise a cube in a hundred different colours or having a hundred different smells or compose an object of two cubes. It doesn't have to exist right in front of you but you can imagine it, can you ?

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Well, I guess it is a form of creativity but essentially, we would only ever be able to construct visualisations from entities we had already experienced previously.

That's not the same as visualising something entirely new, is it?

I don't know about that really. It can be used to construct something entirely new.

Think about a flying machine with 20 wings, 50 engines, 3 storeys high, looking like a squashed christmas cake and has a dual cockpit (front and back). It's entirely new, doesn't exist but still you can visualise it.

Wally

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Think about a flying machine with 20 wings, 50 engines, 3 storeys high, looking like a squashed christmas cake and has a dual cockpit (front and back). It's entirely new, doesn't exist but still you can visualise it.

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But how is that entirely new? You have just described it to me entirely in terms of familiar objects and concepts. Therefore, when I imagine it, I am merely using existing experiences (albeit in a novel way).

Agreed but you are using them in a new way. You are using objects for something else than you usually use it for.

Why not a pyramid shaped car ? They are not new objects but they are using objects in a new way. That's where imagination and dreams come in but does it reflect reality ? Or is it merely what you observe ?

OK then, it is a form of creativity but it rellies on having a pre-existing set of experience to draw from to work.

Thus, the fact that we experience anything attall is evidence that there is in fact some kind of underlying reality that we have (at some point) drawn experience from.

I never really contested that. Only we cannot see that objective reality as it is, we only observe our version of it. That version can and sometimes is clouded by circumstances.
We have to rely on perceptions who are probably accurate enough to let us go about our lives but not adequate enough to grasp the whole of reality. There are tones we can't hear, there are smells we can't smell, there are types of light we can't see, there are illusions we cannot distinguish from reality (fata morgana) etc ... all that adds to the idea that we're not nearly adequately equipped enough to experience true reality.
Or, conversely, we can experience it but we don't have the necessary tools to convert it to something graspable.

In any case, we aren't equipped enough to know whether we're right or not.

I guess we're in agreement then...:)

Simon

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So where does this information come from then? It comes from somewhere and I call that place "Objective Reality".

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Ask yourself, why does objects move? its not because someone started to push them, its because nothin is stopping them (newton first law) You know, in science there's some things that "can't just be explained", like why objects are moving in the first place, and some things that can be explained, but only down to these things which we call axioms, things you take for granted. You have two types of information, and what the realist does is connecting the axioms with reality. I think this is certainly unnessesary thing to do, and in fact we would be a lot happier without the notion of reality. I know its sounds weird, but i've come to discover it and i'm going to make sure everyone understands it too.

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OK, fair enough. Consiousness is just an abstract concept that we believe in but is not intersubjectively verifiable.

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You mentioned the black box analogy, now lets apply it on you. You are outside the black box, and what is inside the black box is reality, if something would be intesubjectively testable, both you and your friends would have to be outside the box, however you have decieved yourself, your friends are all inside the black box. When you think you compare measurements intersubjectively you infact just compare your own measurements - subjectively.
Next thing is, Consciousness is outside this box, not inside, its awareness, in other words the measurement itself, the tools that monitors the black box, imagine someone else inside the box, that is doing the same on you, monitoring you inside his black box, this is better pictured with black rooms instead with holes that you can look out from, since then you can have plenty of rooms where you look out at each other. But is it possible to measure the other person's consciousness? By definition - no. Everything that is emmitting information can be observed, everything that recieves information observes. consciousness is the awareness, the perception, and something that only recieves information. Thus its not possible to observe consciousness, we will only see the boxes outside, but not the room inside. The definition of reality, is everything observable, because if something cannot be observed then its nonexistent as well, it wouldn't affect anybody and is just imaginary. Consciousness does not exist in a reality. We discussed earlier why and i believe we came to the conclusion that you are open to the suggestion of a theory that could explain this as well, because as you said you believed you were "selfaware" I think this is an impossibility within the specs of a reality, since its a logical paradox, it breaks information flow... but in my theory, this is explained as well.

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Well, I am yet to find them satisfactory but perhaps I just don't understand what you're trying to say.

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well i'll try to do my best this time, i've got a little more insight this time, but its all abstract yet, but it can be applied on everything i'm certain of :)

Keddie -

First, hi. Long time no see :)

Second, don't take this the wrong way, but you really leave me behind when you start with your big words and complicated ideas. Could you simplify it any more for me?

Behemoth - Heya, nice to see you :) No i appreciate it very much that people are interested in what i'm saying, I'll try to "simplify" things, is there something specific or is everything just a sequence of random "big words" to you?

Whoa, I understood what keddie said ;)

Probably because I share some of those believes. But only some...

Hi.

Sorry, I can't post here from home and I had a weekend off.

Err...all of it really...:)

Behemoth
Ok, I have tried my best to make it understandable :)

Basically what I'm saying is that believing that there is an objective reality is unnessesary, that it complicates everything and makes your life harder in general :p

Simon says, that you could "intersubjectively verify" meaning that compare what you see with what your friends see, and agree that they see the same thing and thus it must exist.
What i'm saying is that you see your friends too and there's no friend you could ask if they're telling the truth or even if they exist themselves (although in practice you trust your friends), since this argument goes for all your friends.

Lastly, about Consciousness, what is it? That you see things at all makes you conscious, so a conscious being is basically an observer.
When you look yourself in the mirror you see yourself, but can you see your consciousness? Can you see anyone else's consciousness? The answer is no, anything that has the characteristics of a dog is by definition a dog, but there's no characteristics to consciousness, observers can never be observed.

so basically you're agreeing with me then keddie ? :)

Kedaman

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You mentioned the black box analogy, now lets apply it on you. You are outside the black box, and what is inside the black box is reality, if something would be intesubjectively testable, both you and your friends would have to be outside the box, however you have decieved yourself, your friends are all inside the black box. When you think you compare measurements intersubjectively you infact just compare your own measurements - subjectively.

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OK, I hear what you're saying. But why should two (or more) different observations from the black box corroborate each other? The huge variety of data that we get from the black box indicates a consistant and persistant universe. That it should behave in such a fashion is not to be underestimated.

What is it exactly that you are denying about the notion of reality? That it is persistant outside of our consiousness? If you could tell me exactly what it is in my notion of reality that you object to, and what you would replace it with (and why it would be better), then maybe I will begin to understand.

Wally
We agree on more things you could imagine ;)

Simon

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OK, I hear what you're saying. But why should two (or more) different observations from the black box corroborate each other? The huge variety of data that we get from the black box indicates a consistant and persistant universe. That it should behave in such a fashion is not to be underestimated.

What is it exactly that you are denying about the notion of reality? That it is persistant outside of our consiousness? If you could tell me exactly what it is in my notion of reality that you object to, and what you would replace it with (and why it would be better), then maybe I will begin to understand.

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By the same analogy Einstein's theory was more explanatory than Newton's, my theory is more explanatory than a reality. You address a phenomenon that reality explains, Newton's theory gives very accurate results for most practical problems, but so does Einstein's and it further explains why you get inaccurate results with Newton's close to speed of light. Similarly I have explanations for the mentioned problems
a) with the nonexistence of consciousness.
b) with subjectivity

Kedaman

You haven't answered my question. What is it about my notion of reality that you disagree with. What, exactly, are you replacing it with. You say that your theory has a deeper explanatory power than the conventional one so what is it?

ah. right.

I kind of agree with both perspectives, but I guess a Cartesian imaginary existence seems too nihilistic to me - depressing even. However its not right for me to bring my sentiments into this discussion.

Simon
In reality you have a medium for information, in my theory there is only information, everything consists of information, a world of ideas, and those are of course consistent.

Consciousness is a selection of information, that splits all infomation into two, conscious information and subconscious information. The information that defines your consciousness, is in turn part of my subconscious, and thus everyone can be said to exist within each other.

Behemoth
It is right for you, and it is right for me, otherways I would have stayed with a solipsistic view and watch my life pass without meaning

Kedaman

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In reality you have a medium for information, in my theory there is only information, everything consists of information, a world of ideas, and those are of course consistent.

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Why "of course"? Why should it be consistant if there is not a physical persistance to it? The information itself gives the impression that it is int physically persistant world. Why deny it?

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Consciousness is a selection of information, that splits all infomation into two, conscious information and subconscious information. The information that defines your consciousness, is in turn part of my subconscious, and thus everyone can be said to exist within each other.

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You are using the "Subconsious" concept as a vessel that holds all the universe of informaiton while it is out of our consious awareness.

Why should information in our subconsious be the same when it re-enters our consious thoughts? Information persists in our subconsiousness so why not call it reality? Why reject the medium of persistance? You reject my notion of reality by replacing it with a myserious pouch of subconsious information.

Quite frankly, I don't find that explanation any more satisfactory or useful.

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Originally posted by kedaman
SimonConsciousness is a selection of information, that splits all infomation into two, conscious information and subconscious information.

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...conscious:
Having an awareness of one's environment and one's own existence, sensations, and thoughts. See Synonyms at aware.

Mentally perceptive or alert; awake: The patient remained fully conscious after the local anesthetic was administered.

Capable of thought, will, or perception: the development of conscious life on the planet.

Subjectively known or felt: conscious remorse.

Intentionally conceived or done; deliberate: a conscious insult; made a conscious effort to speak more clearly.

Inwardly attentive or sensible; mindful: was increasingly conscious of being watched.

Especially aware of or preoccupied with. Often used in combination: a cost-conscious approach to further development; a health-conscious diet.

n.
In psychoanalysis, the component of waking awareness perceptible by a person at any given instant; consciousness.

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...subconscious
Not wholly conscious; partially or imperfectly conscious: subconscious perceptions.

n.
The part of the mind below the level of conscious perception. Often used with the.

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Simon

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Why should it be consistant if there is not a physical persistance to it?

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There is a logical axiom called non-contradiction, which is the basis of all consistent information. My theory adopts this axiom.

This axiom can be just used for anything, not nessesarily something physical.

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Why should information in our subconsious be the same when it re-enters our consious thoughts?

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There is also an axiom in the Zermelo-Fränkel Set theory, the axiom of Extensionality (check my sig) that plays a big role in my theory. two ideas that are conceptually the same is the same idea. If information is passed to your conscious its the same idea, its just a concept.

NotLKH

Conscious information and Subconscious information are definitions you only find in my theory.

Kedaman

What are the practical implications of your world view? How does it enable you to approach things differently?

Simon

There is a root to all unhappiness in the world, if the world realised how simply all problems could be solved, we have done the first progress toward a common achievable goal.

The capitalist world is headed for bankrupt, within 30 years all fossil fuel energy sources will become depleted, and no renewable energyforms could generate but a tiny fraction of the fossil fuel. The industrial revolution will end, half of the world population starves or freezes to death, burns up the biosphere in a last resort to survive, or become extinct in a nuclear war

Even if we could prevent titanic from hitting the iceberg, there's an iceberg which you can't prevent it from hitting, and its called entropy. We're fighting a lost battle, its time to switch strategy, and my theory is the basis for this strategy. I've posted it on Turtletips once, got it saved before it sank,
http://www.abo.fi/~ksugii/sq/TurtleT...ot%20Bored.htm

Kedaman

Perhaps you could quote the exact passages again here that are relevent because I am still confused as to how your world view makes any practical difference to the way one would live their life.

You have substituted my notion of reality with your notion of a "pouch" of subconsuious information but to what end? I do not see what philisophical problems that solves or what practical application it has.

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Originally posted by kedaman
Simon

There is a root to all unhappiness in the world, if the world realised how simply all problems could be solved, we have done the first progress toward a common achievable goal.

The capitalist world is headed for bankrupt, within 30 years all fossil fuel energy sources will become depleted, and no renewable energyforms could generate but a tiny fraction of the fossil fuel. The industrial revolution will end, half of the world population starves or freezes to death, burns up the biosphere in a last resort to survive, or become extinct in a nuclear war

Even if we could prevent titanic from hitting the iceberg, there's an iceberg which you can't prevent it from hitting, and its called entropy. We're fighting a lost battle, its time to switch strategy, and my theory is the basis for this strategy. I've posted it on Turtletips once, got it saved before it sank,
http://www.abo.fi/~ksugii/sq/TurtleT...ot%20Bored.htm

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Whatever I have been able to perceive from that one page:

Apart from the Squirrel language you talk about, there've been numerous attempts to provide an interface between two programming languages. The COM/DCOM is one such example. CORBA is another such example. However I have noticed that bringing the applications to a common platform or set of interfaces necessarily involves a performance penalty.

Dunno why, but I just compared it with a manager's task. There are many employees working under the manager. The manager has the ultimate goal of leading all of them (not out of the office you moron!) towards the goal of the organization. However, each of the employees has his/her own goals to pursue. Some employees are there because there's nothing else they can do. Some are for money, some for power, some for fun, some for work, and a few others (yeah, I am one of them :p) who really want to work towards the organizational goal. I compare these various groups of employees with the various programming languages available today. The manager has to find a common interface between them all, bring them all to a common platform so he can motivate them all towards the organizational goal. But it doesn't succeed. The manager has to find out what are the personal goals of each of the employees, then somehow convert them into goals which will take that employee closer to achieving the organizational goals. Doing this for each single employee or different sets of employees will be practically impossible. The only solution then remains to try to steer them towards the organizational goals, making up for defficiencies of some by more hardwork from some, in the long run weeding out those who stray from the organizational goals too much and taking on more people who get closer to the organizational goal.

Boy, I feel like a bag of heap :rolleyes: ;)

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Ked, lets have a layman's perspective. I'm fascinated by the ideas but I can't penetrate the jargon...:confused:

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Originally posted by kedaman
Simon

There is a root to all unhappiness in the world, if the world realised how simply all problems could be solved, we have done the first progress toward a common achievable goal.

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There are many specific reasons for unhappiness, just as there are many entities that can experience unhappiness.

If we were to limit ourselves to unhappiness experienced by individuals, as opposed to groups of individuals, then I would perceive an underlying root of unhappiness would be dissatisfaction over an individuals current conditions, and/or the direction that an individuals conditions of existence is heading towards.

With that said, unhappiness is a motive force that an individual experiences to change to that individuals expectations of bettering his current conditions of existence.

It is sometimes easy to solve, but rarely often. Therefore, I would like you to explain what you mean when you suggest that it is a matter of realisizing how easily all problems can be solved, when the majority of individuals have to struggle to surmount there problems.

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Originally posted by kedaman
The capitalist world is headed for bankrupt, within 30 years all fossil fuel energy sources will become depleted, and no renewable energyforms could generate but a tiny fraction of the fossil fuel. The industrial revolution will end, half of the world population starves or freezes to death, burns up the biosphere in a last resort to survive, or become extinct in a nuclear war

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Interesting, and bleak, assumption.
darn! production meeting!!! oh well, i'll end it here.

NotLKH

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If we were to limit ourselves to unhappiness experienced by individuals, as opposed to groups of individuals...

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As an asside, what do you mean by groups of individuals? How can a group experience happiness?

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Originally posted by simonm
NotLKH

As an asside, what do you mean by groups of individuals? How can a group experience happiness?

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There are many entities that are composed by groups of individuals, and these entities seem to exist solely for expressing their unified displeasure {ie.. unhappiness} that generally single individuals don't even bother over.

These entities generally exist and operate as political social structures, and truly, once formed, seem to never attain any level of happiness whatsoever, even if they attain any of their stated goals.

For example, once upon a time, non-smoking individuals would, if bothered by smoke coming from their near neighbor in a restaurant, generally would think nothing of it, or perhaps move to another spot and then let life go on.

However, once one or two of those individuals happened to come across each other, and noticed that they both, after thinking about it, were really offended by smokers in a restaurant, banded together and went politically active.

Sure, they got smoking banned in restaurants, but were they happy? NOOOOO!

They then decided to ban smoking in all public buildings!

They got that, but were still miserable, so they went after banning smoking within private business....
then within 50 feet of businessess...
then in parking garages...

Are they happy???
NOOOOO!!!
Will they ever be happy???
I doubt it.

But, as a group, they are experiencing an unhappiness that, individually, they never truly noticed they felt.

;)

group poisoning ! :)

NotLKH

I see what you're saying about individuals banding together to gain political clout but groups of people don't suffer, individuals do.

HB
COM/DCOM/COBRA are interfaces (OOP interfaces btw, and OOP sucks) between applications compiled in different languages, not between the languages themselves. Its irrelevant. Your manager's task analogy describes interfacing well, but it also reminds of OOP :p

Simon
Squirrel is the idea that everything consists of information, even if this is just a philosophical issue, then its enough to make the difference to alter our perception forever. In practice experiencing unhappiness is rooted in our biological nature - which is just an idea.

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I do not see what philisophical problems that solves or what practical application it has.

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The problem with consciousness, the information that cannot be observed, will be part of the subconscious of all individuals, and individuals are by definition not shared, reason why we experience subjectiveness. There is no intersubjectivity, no objectivity. In practice you could solve all problems.

Behemoth
I will try and make another effort, its all abstract but i'll try to come up with examples too..

NotLKH

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It is sometimes easy to solve, but rarely often. Therefore, I would like you to explain what you mean when you suggest that it is a matter of realisizing how easily all problems can be solved, when the majority of individuals have to struggle to surmount there problems.

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The majority of individuals have their individual goals, but the majoirty of efforts made to achieve them are wasted. Squirrel is an ideology that could be the solution to exactly everything.

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Interesting, and bleak, assumption.

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its not a well known fact, but thats only because of politics. Some good reading: http://dieoff.org/