Thelemic Materialism (Thelemic Philosophy)
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@Avshalom Binyamin said
"An idea is much more real than a dog in the sense that it can have a much greater impact on the world. A dog is more real in the sense that it has more hair."
Maybe, but I wouldn't say that an idea itself can have an impact on the world...it's the processes of spreading those ideas and it's the actions that people take on the basis of those ideas that impact the world...the idea itself isn't an agent of any of that impact.
"And our personal identity is just an idea (it's imagined, our consciousness is not a physical entity, like our bodies). So it's fair to say that a goblin is as real as "you" or "me"."
In the sense of having-the-property-of-a-relatively-coherent-identity, a made up creature can indeed have that property, just like a human can. But in other sense of, say, having the ability to go down to the store and buy me a sandwich, a made up creature cannot have that property in the same way that a human can.
What's happening here is that you're trying to conflate a few different uses of the word "real." The word real can denote that which is detectable -- in which we can say imaginary things are real acts of imagination -- but the word has another definition in which it's used to contrast things not created by the imagination with things created by the imagination. We're all familiar with that definition. We all know that a new movie of Aleister Crowley's life with Brad Pitt in the lead isn't really coming out, despite the fact that I'm picturing it right now and it could be said to be a real imaginary thing inside my head.
You can't confuse the two meanings.
Take Darth Vader, as an example. Vader has an identity and a relatively consistent characterization (as long as we ignore those awful prequel movies), so in that sense we could say he's a "person" just like me, but he's an imaginary person, not a real person (using the second sense of "real"). He can't do the kinds of things that real (in the second sense) people can do, like pick up the book that's next to me right now.
And in a similar way, your make believe goblin buddies can't help you find money in the street.
If I picture Darth Vader in my mind, that's a real (first sense) mental image of him. If I go to a movie with him in it, there's really a collection of lights on the screen that form a real moving picture of Darth Vader doing stuff. That moving picture causes my brain to imagine him doing these things and to imagine what he's doing when he's not on screen, and those are all real acts of make believe.
But Vader isn't real (second sense) at all because he's entirely the product of imagination and only exists as imagination. He's not an autonomous being who can stroll up and down the movie theater aisles and go out to the lobby to buy me a soda.
All of this is perfectly obvious, but you insist on confusing yourself and twisting yourself up into mental pretzels, all because you're trying to hold on to this odious idea that if you can play with words in a slippery enough way, you'll somehow justify claims like talking to goblins can make you find money in the street. It's just silly.
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@Legis said
" I "detect" all kinds of things that you refuse to accept as something "humans have ever detected.""
Like what?
"It begs the question of what*** you personally accept as "detected,"*** the standards of which I have attempted to illustrate in the above imaginary conversation since you refuse to own up to what is patently obvious."
I told you already, there are objective standards that are going to vary depending on the exact claim, evidence, and argument that connects the evidence to the claim. But for every set of claim, evidence, and argument, we can objectively determine whether the evidence and argument are sufficient to support the claim. The evaluation has nothing to do with what I, you, or any particular person feels about the claim under discussion...it has everything to do with whether or not the evidence and argument are objectively sufficient.
Now maybe we won't agree on whether the evidence is sufficient -- just like maybe we won't all agree on what the answer is to the calculus problem we all do -- but there still is an objective answer, despite the fact that some people are objectively bad at performing the operations.
Here's a great chance for us to make our discussion more specific. Name one thing that you think you detected that you're pretty sure I won't accept. Explain what evidence leads you to think that it really was the thing you thought it was (and not, say, a figment of your imagination).
We'll look at it objectively together.
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" Maybe, but I wouldn't say that an idea itself can have an impact on the world...it's the processes of spreading those ideas and it's the actions that people take on the basis of those ideas that impact the world...the idea itself isn't an agent of any of that impact."
Sure, you need a hand to lift a glass of water. But where does the hand get the idea?
" In the sense of having-the-property-of-a-relatively-coherent-identity, a made up creature can indeed have that property, just like a human can. But in other sense of, say, having the ability to go down to the store and buy me a sandwich, a made up creature cannot have that property in the same way that a human can."
A human needs a body to do it. An ego can't walk to the store and buy a sandwich. An ego is a made up creature. A made up creature would similarly require a body to walk to the store.
" What's happening here is that you're trying to conflate a few different uses of the word "real." The word real can denote that which is detectable -- in which we can say imaginary things are real acts of imagination -- but the word has another definition in which it's used to contrast things not created by the imagination with things created by the imagination. We're all familiar with that definition. We all know that a new movie of Aleister Crowley's life with Brad Pitt in the lead isn't really coming out, despite the fact that I'm picturing it right now and it could be said to be a real imaginary thing inside my head.
You can't confuse the two meanings."
I'm not confused. I think you are:
"My position, on the particular issue that we're discussing, is that the physical world demonstrably exists and that -- at least at the moment -- there is insufficient evidence to think that any worlds beside the physical world exist (that is to say, there is insufficient evidence to think that there are some "spirit" worlds or "astral" worlds)."
"Take Darth Vader, as an example. Vader has an identity and a relatively consistent characterization (as long as we ignore those awful prequel movies), so in that sense we could say he's a "person" just like me, but he's an imaginary person, not a real person (using the second sense of "real"). He can't do the kinds of things that real (in the second sense) people can do, like pick up the book that's next to me right now.
And in a similar way, your make believe goblin buddies can't help you find money in the street.
If I picture Darth Vader in my mind, that's a real (first sense) mental image of him. If I go to a movie with him in it, there's really a collection of lights on the screen that form a real moving picture of Darth Vader doing stuff. That moving picture causes my brain to imagine him doing these things and to imagine what he's doing when he's not on screen, and those are all real acts of make believe.
But Vader isn't real (second sense) at all because he's entirely the product of imagination and only exists as imagination. He's not an autonomous being who can stroll up and down the movie theater aisles and go out to the lobby to buy me a soda."
No, but Vader is detectable by way more people than you or me.
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All of this is perfectly obvious, but you insist on confusing yourself and twisting yourself up into mental pretzels, all because you're trying to hold on to this odious idea that if you can play with words in a slippery enough way, you'll somehow justify claims like talking to goblins can make you find money in the street. It's just silly."But your imaginary ego can help me find money in the street, if you happen to know where the money is, right?
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@Los said
"We'll look at it objectively together."
Righhhhht....
You will "objectively" hold it to your personal standard for "sufficient evidence" that "objectively" denies any cause, effect, or acausal connection that cannot be "detected" or explained in terms of material substance.
Thanks, but I think I'll pass on the offer of your particular brand of objectivity.
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@Avshalom Binyamin said
"Sure, you need a hand to lift a glass of water. But where does the hand get the idea?"
The idea of a glass, the knowledge of the function of glasses, and the knowledge that turning that doo-hickey on the sink makes water come out of the tap are all concepts in the brain. But none of those things cause me to fill up a glass and take a drink. We might say that they are necessary but not sufficient conditions of my filling up a glass and taking a drink.
The thing that causes me to take a drink is my True Will, and the True Will isn't an idea.
"Vader is detectable by way more people than you or me."
And thus he's "real" in the sense of the first definition I gave above, but not "real" in the sense of the second definition. Exactly as I said above.
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@Los said
"All of this is perfectly obvious, but you insist on confusing yourself and twisting yourself up into mental pretzels, all because you're trying to hold on to this odious idea that if you can play with words in a slippery enough way, you'll somehow justify claims like talking to goblins can make you find money in the street. It's just silly."But your imaginary ego can help me find money in the street, if you happen to know where the money is, right?"
I sure can, because I really am external to you and in possession of knowledge that you are not. Your imaginary friends aren't. You're making them up, which is why they can't give you any practical knowledge that you don't already have.
Don't you remember that little experiment we did on the forums a while back where one of the regulars here tried to "remote view" a piece of paper I had on my desk with random words printed on it? He failed miserably, and if we ran that test dozens of more times, he'd fail dozens of more times because this supernatural malarkey is make believe and incapable of giving you practical, confirmable information that you didn't already have or couldn't have already guessed on your own.
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@Legis said
"You will "objectively" hold it to your personal standard for "sufficient evidence""
No, we'll talk it through and determine whether or not the evidence you have was sufficient.
If you're not comfortable using your own experience, we can use someone else's, like Ray Comfort's claim that Jesus Christ spoke to him late at night and turned his life around.
Earlier on this thread, I made up an example of someone claiming that aliens took his keys and trying to support it by reporting his daydreams. There's an example of evidence that is objectively insufficient to support a claim. It doesn't matter what you, I, or he thinks about his claim...he's objectively wrong in thinking that he has sufficient evidence, and we can demonstrate it.
In the same way, we can demonstrate that Comfort objectively has insufficient evidence to conclude that he really detected Jesus, and I suspect that if you were willing to explain your evidence and reasoning for whatever it is that you think you detected, we would quickly see that in the same way you objectively have insufficient evidence to make the claims that you do.
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Los,
It will always boil down to the difference between your preference to accept an explanation that relies on astronomical improbabilities versus my preference to accept an explanation that relies on a materially undetectable causal factor.
As I have said before, one may only experience so many occurrences of astronomical improbability before one logically begins to doubt the pure randomness upon which probability relies to be a sufficient explanation.
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@Legis said
"...according to your personal standards... "
This is a weird position you're taking. Are you implying that it is impossible for anyone to ever draw objective conclusions?
What about when your doctor tells you that you have a disease and that you need X treatment? Do you say, "Bah! How dare you apply your personal standards to me! Every person is an unique individual, and I will not be subjected to your subjective standards of 'health!' Begone, slaver! Let fire from heaven cleanse this space, for it is only for the free!! Huzzah!!!"
I mean, do you think it's actually impossible for medical experts to sit down, examine the evidence and conclude, as objectively as possible, that person A has disease Y and needs either treatment Q, R, or S?
If you're right, and if we apply what you say consistently, it would mean that all conclusions of any kind are merely the results of "personal standards" and that nobody has any claim ever to be objectively correct, and thus all conclusions are more or less equivalent, and we might as well be picking conclusions out of a hat.
But if that's true, how do you explain the vast technological progress that we've made by consistently applying evidence-based inquiry? Obviously, the conclusions that people have been drawing about the world around us must be correct enough so as to allow us to manipulate reality in miraculous ways (such as, for obvious example, enabling us to send messages around the world by pressing a few keys on a machine in the comfort of our homes or offices). That would seem to suggest that not all conclusions are created equal and that not all conclusions are merely the result of "personal standards"...there must be some way to evaluate claims as objectively as possible (that is, to remove personal bias from the analysis as much as possible).
I'm sorry to say, Legis, it comes off sounding like you're very selective how you apply these arguments. When someone presents a position you don't want to believe -- presumably because it contradicts the ideas that give you the warm and fuzzies -- you dismiss it as "personal standards" and subjective...but when it comes to practical matters of actual import -- such as your health -- I'll bet you actually do act as if it's possible for someone to come to objective conclusions about your health that aren't just motivated by "personal standards."
It's completely dishonest, and anyone who pays even partway attention can see that this is what you're doing.
As ever, our conversation has been instructive for people who are paying attention.
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@Legis said
"It will always boil down to the difference between your preference to accept an explanation that relies on astronomical improbabilities versus my preference to accept an explanation that relies on a materially undetectable causal factor."
There's no preference about it: if object X is utterly and completely undetectable, one cannot validly conclude it is the cause of anything.
That's objectively the case, regardless of what any single person thinks about it or whatever the X is under discussion.
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@Los said
"What about when your doctor tells you that you have a disease and that you need X treatment? Do you say, "Bah! How dare you apply your personal standards to me! Every person is an unique individual, and I will not be subjected to your subjective standards of 'health!' Begone, slaver! Let fire from heaven cleanse this space, for it is only for the free!! Huzzah!!!""
Imagine this Legis guy talking to his mechanic, if he really and truly wanted to consistently apply his ideas. The mechanic would look under the hood and say, "Whoa, you need a new engine," and Legis would respond, "How dare you apply your 'personal standards' to my unique car! Begone, slaver! My mind refuses to wear your shackles. I am a free man. Come, fire from heaven!!"
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"But if that's true, how do you explain the vast technological progress that we've made by consistently applying evidence-based inquiry?"
Every advance was at one time a hypothesis lacking sufficient evidence. People suspended disbelief and experiemented.
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Los,
Save your straw-man shtick for the under-educated and weak-minded. Here, it just makes you look like a gawping imbecile.
@Los said
"Are you implying that it is impossible for anyone to ever draw objective conclusions?"
No, I am not implying that it is impossible for anyone to ever draw objective conclusions. You should have asked that before you went into your absurd pantomime.
@Los said
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@Legis said
"It will always boil down to the difference between your preference to accept an explanation that relies on astronomical improbabilities versus my preference to accept an explanation that relies on a materially undetectable causal factor."There's no preference about it: if object X is utterly and completely undetectable, one cannot validly conclude it is the cause of anything.
That's objectively the case, regardless of what any single person thinks about it or whatever the X is under discussion."
"X" is not required to be an "object." That's you inserting more of your "objectivity."
I did not say, "utterly and completely undetectable." That's still more of you inserting your "objectivity." I said, "materially undetectable." But I will make a note, once again, of how you automatically equate the two.
"X" represents an unknown causal factor whose effects are* detectable *to the degree that they violate probability.
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I am deadly afraid of getting myself into this merry-go-round again.
But, if you guys are to continue anywhere, you will have to define the term "Objective Standard of Detectability" and find a consensus on that definition, or you will be doing a merry-go-round around the axis of that undefined or not consensuated (is that a word?) definition.
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Simon, I think we've reached a consensus.
There is no physical evidence of non physical things. Imagination is real, but not in the same way as a brick, or dog. A goblin can't buy a sandwich.
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@Avshalom Binyamin said
"Simon, I think we've reached a consensus.
There is no physical evidence of non physical things. Imagination is real, but not in the same way as a brick, or dog. A goblin can't buy a sandwich."
Well, here is empirical evidence that says otherwise, published by some colleagues.
PLUG:
gallantlab.org/semanticmovies/
Fascinating stuff and sweet use of the web browser for those interested.
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@Legis said
""X" represents an unknown causal factor whose effects are* detectable *to the degree that they violate probability."
Are you saying that "X" cannot be directly detected but its effects can be detected?
Certainly, that's a valid way to detect things, if one (objectively) evaluates the evidence correctly. For example, if someone were to claim that there was a planet out in such-and-such position that our telescopes couldn't directly perceive because of some other celestial body in the way, one could still detect the planet by detecting its gravitational effect on other bodies. In other words, one could work out the math and determine that if there actually were a large body out in such-and-such position, the gravitational effects would have to be so-and-so. And then going out and detecting so-and-so gravitational effects would indeed be equivalent to detecting a planet at such-and-such position.
What you propose above, however, isn't anything like this. You say effects are detectable "to the degree that they violate probability." I'm guessing by this -- and I can only guess since you (not for the first time) refuse to just come out and say what you mean -- you mean that a bunch of improbable things have happened to you and that this bunch of improbable things is an "effect." And you postulate factor "X" as the necessary explanation for these effects, in the same way that the planet in the above analogy would be a necessary explanation for the gravitational effects.
The problem with your logic here -- and it's an objective problem with it -- is that the occurrence of improbable events (even a bunch of them) in no way implies that they share a common cause. That's objectively the case because it doesn't matter what you, I, or anyone else thinks, and it doesn't matter who makes the claim. Anybody who simply points to a bunch of improbable things happening just has a bunch of improbable things happening...nothing -- absolutely nothing -- about improbable events occurring, in and of themselves, suggests that they share a common cause or that they are anything more than the regular ol' happenstance of life. More evidence would be needed. Again, this is an objective conclusion because it doesn't depend on anyone's particular feelings...it would hold true for anyone making similar claims.
Now, doubtlessly you'll object that there's more to your story, and maybe there is, but if you refuse to share anything, you hardly have grounds for objecting to people misinterpreting your vague clues.
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@Legis said
"No, I am not implying that it is impossible for anyone to ever draw objective conclusions."
Well, ok, let's look at this, then. I grant that I'm possibly misreading you, so I really want clarification on this point.
A brief recap: you said that you had once detected something that I wouldn't accept. I asked what it was. You refused to say because you say you just know I'm going to judge it according to my "personal standards."
So there's only two possibilities. Either you think that there are no objective standards for evaluating claims about having detected whatever-you-think-you-detected (and thus only "personal standards," which vary from individual to individual, meaning that neither of us has any more claim to be right than the other) OR you think that there are objective standards for evaluating claims about having detected whatever-you-think-you-detected (and, presumably, you think that the standards you're using to evaluate these claims are the objectively correct ones, and I'm the one who's got it wrong and am just using "personal standards" instead of the objectively correct ones).
Which is it?
[By the way, that's a true dichotomy -- for those of you with a compulsive need to imagine "logical fallacies" being present in every piece of communication]
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@Los said
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Except that, as our above conversation demonstrates, you’re incapable of explaining why it makes sense without tripping all over yourself in making logical error after logical error.
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Irony in this thread, not dead
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@Los said
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@Legis said
"but matter/energy existing in what?"Nobody knows. It’s quite possible that matter/energy doesn’t exist “in” anything at all. It might be all that exists."
oddly, it actually does exist in something, it exists in time and space.
in the news related cool stuff
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Ah, the old “I don’t know what the answer is so I’ll randomly declare that it must be consciousness” argument."
Oh come on Los - your being a bit unfair here to Legis. There is nothing random about suggesting this, it's certainly not ruled out in cosmology, it's the core tenet of pan psychism. And if you dont like Legis and others making connections between consciousness and cosmology, then what's the difference about the physical sciences assuming images of neurons firing in the brain is consciousness? If Legis is guilty, then so are you too, no doubt.
everybody assumes where they believe consciousness to reside.
And look how you use things like logic to bully in discussions with those whom are your polar opposite in this dialectic..
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Even if this conclusion of yours wasn’t a gross logical error, there would be another problem: if matter/energy exists in consciousness, then what does that consciousness exist in? Maybe more matter/energy. Hmm, but what would this more matter/energy exist in? Etc."
lol well to Legis point and yours, maybe consciousness does not exist in anything, everything is consciousness.
Both sides can play that game. His argument is the same as yours logically speaking.
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Either way, we’re back to “nobody knows,” which is the only honest answer."
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This is a textbook argument from ignorance. “I can’t think of any answer but X, so it must be X” is a logical fallacy."
It's only a logical fallacy if it's being applied to a bivalent logic problem.
Your being a bully here Los.
