David Nyman wrote: > 1Z wrote: > > > > I'll try to nail this here. I take 'ontology' to refer to issues of > > > existence or being, where 'epistemology' refers to knowledge, or 'what > > > and how we know'. When I say that our 'ontology' is manifest, I'm > > > claiming (perhaps a little more cautiously than Descartes): 'I am > > > that which experiences here'. I take these to be an ontological > > > continuum or set of equivalences, not properties: I ->experience -> > > > here. For reasons of economy, I see no need to postulate any other > > > ontological status. > > > What about all the stuff that appears, subjectively , to be not-me ? > > > > If I ignore it, I am not making full use of my only epistemologial > > resource. > > > > If I treat is as 1st-personal as well as third-personal, I am > > overcomplicating things. > > Hi Peter > > I'd like to be really careful here to avoid getting into some of the > same loops that so frustrated Alan on the FOR list! I may well be dead > wrong in what I'm claiming, but at least I'd like us both to be clear > on precisely what in fact this is. > > Firstly, my overall enterprise is to arrive at some general description > of things that relies on as few explanatory entities as possible. Now, > IMO we cannot avoid taking first person into account - I find I can't > begin to have an intelligible discussion with anyone who doesn't accept > this (not you clearly).
I don't even know what you mean by "first person". You seem to think that the boundraries of the self are given by secondary, non-fundamental structures and properties, likewise qualia. > From this, if first person is to be a given, > the simplest approach is to explore whether, ontologically speaking, we > could take it to be the sole given, and my project has been to see > where this leads. One of the difficulties has been to pin down the > language to distinguish the different meanings associated with the term > 'first person', so I've attempted to define certain usages (which I'm > happy at any time to abandon for better ones). These are: > > 1) FP1g - primitive 'global' first person entity or context > 2) FP1i - individual person delimited by primitive differentiation > (which is agnostic to comp, physics, or anything else at this logical > level) > 3) FP2 - narrative references to first persons, as in 'David is a first > person', an attribution, as opposed to 'David-as-first-person', a > unique entity. > 4) TP - third person, or structure-read-as-information, as opposed to > structure-demarcating-an-entity > > Later on in the reply to Bruno from which you quote, and in some of the > earlier posts, I make the point that starting from such a generalised > or undifferentiated first person context we can see that certain sorts > of structural differentiation can create delimited zones within the > whole. Some of these zones take the form of individual first persons > (FP1i). Why shoukdn't FP1i be the most primitive 1st-person, arising from 0-personality ? > Within each FP1i person so constituted exists a 'set of > capabilities' and a 'structural model of the world'. Which part of the > FP1i acts as 'perceiver' and which 'perceptual model' is simply an > aspect of function-from-structure. It happens to be the former that > has the organisation for representing information and self-reporting, > so it's the one that gets to enjoy 'experience'. > > Within the structural model of the world - our only means of > representing, and through 'downloading', sharing information with other > first persons - there will of course be regions that we variously label > 'self' (e.g. 'my arm') or 'other' (e.g. Peter Jones'). The latter, I > presume, would be an example of what you call 'stuff that appears, > subjectively , to be not-me'. Of course I agree that 'If I ignore it, > I am not making full use of my only epistemologial resource'. So, I > don't ignore it. > > However, you go on: 'If I treat is as 1st-personal as well as > third-personal, I am overcomplicating things'. My response to this is > two-fold. First, of course, it is simply not the case that my > representation of 'Peter Jones' is the same as its presumed referent in > the world 'Peter Jones'. My assumption is that it is informationally > connected with this referent, and to an extent co-varies with it, but > it is well for me to remember that such representations are my > reponsibility and not yours. But more fundamentally, and this is why I > recapitulated my overall project at the outset, the intention is to > simplify, not complicate. My representation of 'Peter Jones' is a part > of my subjectivity, and it is a part I label 'third person' to > distinguish it from 'self', an evolutionarily useful distinction. All of that is structural and therefore seconfary to any prime substance. > Peter Jones in the world I take to be another first person entity > (FP1i) that derives this status in virtue of being another delimited > zone, appropriately structured, within FP1g, the single ontological > context. Outside of my subjective model of the world, and that of > other first persons, in no sense is Peter Jones in the world 'third > person'. Only the *references* to Peter Jones are subjectively > categorised as such within individual world-models, and these are FP2 > first-person analogs, or third person descriptions of first persons - > as distinct from 'instantiated first persons'. > > Now it seems to me that all of the above has been accomplished without > moving outside of a primitive first person ontology. I have > distinguished various zones within this single context, and I've > suggested how one information structure can be used to 'label' another > (i.e. stand in relation to it) as 'third person' (description or > narrative), 'self', or 'other', and all without deploying any other > ontological type, other than metaphorically. That's what I'm trying to > achieve. You could have done the same starting from a 0-personal position. --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected] To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
