On 12 January 2014 18:33, Stephen Paul King <[email protected]>wrote:
> Dear LizR, > On Sun, Jan 12, 2014 at 12:00 AM, LizR <[email protected]> wrote: > >> On 12 January 2014 14:52, Stephen Paul King >> <[email protected]>wrote: >> >>> Dear LizR, >>> >>> That is the claim and I show that it is false. A class that has a >>> particular set of properties and not the rest of the properties required to >>> "balance it all out to Nothing" is not neutral. It is biased! >>> >> >> So, can't arithmetic be balanced out to nothing? What can? >> > > Of course arithmetic be balanced out to nothing! By the class of physical > objects and their actions! They are what it isn't. Is this not making > sense? I don't see how it is complicated... > > I must admit to being a little confused. Brent said "everything is arithmetic" IS neutral monism: You appeared to disagree. But then you said "Of course arithmetic be balanced out to nothing!" I assume you meant to say it *can't *be balanced out to nothing, because later, you said "My claim is that arithmetic is not Nothing thus it is not neutral and cannot be the foundation of a neutral monism." So I'll assume that was a typo above, unless you tell me otherwise. So, if arithmetic *isn't* capable of being "balanced out to nothing", what *is *capable? (And what is involved in balancing out to nothing, anyway?) I'll have a stab at what "BOTN" may involve. I seem to recall that Russell Standish's book "Theory of Nothing" says that all possible information = zero information --- if you have information as bitstrings, then all possible bitstrings add up to a Library of Babel, a collection which contains all, and hence no, information --- so that is an example of something that "balances out to nothing". Similarly, a multiverse in which all possible things happen "balances out to nothing" *except for* the laws of physics that operate within it. (While a universe in which things could have happened differently doesn't - it has a single, definite history.) But surely one needs some form of logic to define information, and some form of logic to define the laws of physics? So aren't these prior to something *being able to* balance out to nothing? And if so, might not arithmetic also fall into the "logically prior basket" - i.e. be something that is required thath makes it possible for neutral monism to exist? (Did that make sense? I may be losing the thread here. ..) -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out.
