2009/8/17 1Z <peterdjo...@yahoo.com>: > Look, I have already said that I am not going to get into an argument > about which pixies exist.
Forgive me for butting in, but I wonder whether there is a level at which your metaphysical disagreement is perhaps somewhat more resolvable? It might be supposed that materialism begins and ends with predicting and manipulating the observable and 'real', and consequently can dismiss further metaphysical speculation with Dr Johnson's robust kick. But we know this does not prevent physicists - even when not explicitly seeking a 'platonic' mathematical basis for physics - from speculating about theoretical entities - superstrings, loops, etc - far beyond the observable; IOW seeking to situate the observable within a more comprehensive interpretative background so that appearance can be explicated more coherently and with less arbitrariness. If this is true, it seems to me that the essential focus of comp is no different - to explain the appearance of the observable - though it places the observer (correctly IMO) in a more central role than current physical theory. Like physical theory, comp predictions are in principle falsifiable in terms of the observable. Like physical theory, comp privileges certain entities and relations as 'fundamental' with respect to others that supervene on, or are derivable from them. In fact, the most fundamental theoretical divergence would seem precisely to lie in the direction each postulates for the inference: mathematics <=> matter <=> mind; and how this plays out must, as you both have said, be central to our understanding of the scope and limits of the mathematical, the physical, and the mental. I think the core of the problem is a tendency to mentally conjure platonia as a pure figment; this will not do; nor is it presumably what Plato had in mind. Rather, platonia might be reconceived in terms of the preconditions of the observable and real; its theoretical entities must - ultimately - be cashable for what is RITSIAR, both 'materially' and 'mentally'. On this basis, some such intuition of an 'immaterial' (pre-material?) - but inescapably real - precursory state could be seen as theoretically inevitable, whether one subsequently adopts a materialist or a comp interpretative stance. David > >> Some are both absolutely real, and physically real, they live in >> "platonia", and then can come back on earth: they have a relatively >> concrete existence. For example, the games of chess, the computers, >> the animals, and the persons. But the concreteness is relative, the >> 'I' coupled with the chessboard is an abstract couple following >> normality conditions (that QM provides, but comp not yet). >> Some could have an even more trivial sense of absolute existence, and >> a case could be made they don't exist, even in Platonia, like the >> unicorns, perhaps, and the squared circles (hopefully). >> >> Each branch of math has its own notion of existence, and with comp, we >> have a lot choice, for the ontic part, but usually I take >> arithmetical existence, if only because this is taught in school, and >> its enough to justified the existence of the universal numbers, and >> either they dreams (if "yes doctor") or at least their discourse on >> their dreams (if you say no the doctor and decide to qualify those >> machines are "inexistent zombies"). >> >> There is a sense to say those universal machines do not exist, but it >> happens that they don't have the cognitive abilities to know that, and >> for them, in-existence does not make sense. > > If they don't exist, they don't exist. You don't have the > rigourous mathematical argument you think > you have, you have some baroque Chuang-Tzu metaphysics. > > > > > --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---