On 1 July 2014 19:24, meekerdb <meeke...@verizon.net> wrote: > I think you have created a strawman "exhaustively-reducible physical or > material ontology". Sure, physicists take "forces" and "matter" as working > assumptions - but they don't say what they are. They are never anything > other than "elements of a mathematical model which works well." And what > does it mean to work well? It means to explain appearances - exactly the > same thing you put forward as a uniquely different goal of comp.
Firstly, I'm not really persuaded by your contention that forces and matter, to use your example, are merely "elements of a mathematical model which works well". Rather, in terms of that very model, such elements are precisely those that (at least in principle) are supposed to comprise a fully-sufficient bottom-up ontology for the theory as a whole. The point, again in principle at least, is that nothing *above* the level of the basic ontology need be taken into account in the evolution of states defined in terms of it; put simply, there is no top-down causality. It is for this reason that I've been pointing out that whatever "levels" are posited above the basic ontology cannot possess, in terms of the theory, any independent ontological significance. Rather, what we *can* say is that such macroscopic, or composite, phenomena as temperature or, for that matter, the neural correlates of consciousness, are *explanatorily* relevant. We might go so far as to describe these phenomena as epistemological integrations over the ontological fundamentals. But if we do that the problem should become painfully obvious: the theory in which we are working has no explicit epistemological component. It is in fact explicitly designed to render a principled account of the relevant phenomena in the absence of any particular epistemological assumptions. Secondly, I think you may have missed the distinction I was attempting to make between a theory having the fundamental goal of "seeking to explain what appears" and one that "seeks to explain why and how appearance manifests to its subjects". In the first case the goal is to create a mathematical model of appearance (i.e. physics), on the assumption (should this be considered at all) that the phenomena of perception and cognition will fall out of it at some later stage. In the second case the goal is to justify from first principles the existence, in the first place, of perceivers and cognisers and, in the second place, the appearances that manifest to them; then to show that the latter constitute, amongst other things, an accurate model of physics. > Although I think comp is an interesting theory and worthy of study, I think > I look at it differently than Bruno. I look at it as just another > mathematical model, one whose ontology happens to be computations. But I have already said why I think comp can be distinguished from other theories in this respect. I may well be mistaken, but I don't see you have actually addressed the points I sought to make. > As I noted in another post, any explanation is going to be "exhaustively > reductive" or it's going to be "reduction with loss". You can't have it both > ways. Bruno's theory explicitly defines the "loss", i.e. unprovable truths > of arithmetic. That may be a feature, or it may be a bug. I don't agree that these alternatives exclude each other. In fact, I've been trying to point out that an exhaustively reductive physical theory cannot avoid "losing consciousness". Hence the stipulation "without loss" is only tenable when that unfortunate consequence is ignored or trivialised. My argument has also been that Bruno's theory, whatever else its merits or demerits, is not reductive in the relevant sense; so far I haven't seen you respond directly to these points. David > On 7/1/2014 5:00 AM, David Nyman wrote: >> >> Some recent discussions have centred on the (putative) features of >> hierarchical-reductionist ontologies, and whether comp (whatever its >> intrinsic merits or deficiencies) should be considered as just another >> candidate theory in that category, This prompts me to consider what >> fundamental question a particular theory is designed to answer. Making >> this explicit may help us to see what other questions are, by the same >> token (and perhaps only implicitly), treated as subsidiary or, as it >> were, merely awaiting resolution in due course in terms of the central >> explanatory thrust. >> >> I think it's fair to say that theories centred on an >> exhaustively-reducible physical or material ontology seek to answer >> the question of "What are the fundamental entities and relations that >> underlie and constitute everything that exists and how did things get >> to be this way?". Even if this is a rather crude formulation, if >> questions such as these are deemed central and definitive, the issue >> of "How and why does it *appear* to us that things are this way?" >> becomes subsidiary and presumably awaits ultimate elucidation in the >> same terms. IOW, both "we" and "what appears to us" will in the end be >> explained, exhaustively, as composite phenomena in a physical >> hierarchy that can be reduced without loss to the basic entities and >> relations. >> >> ISTM however that comp asks different questions from the outset: "How >> and why does it APPEAR that certain entities and relations constitute >> everything that exists, and what the hell is "appearance" anyway?" To >> be sure, in order to deal with such questions comp has to begin with >> "How does everything get to be this way?", but the crucial distinction >> is that "basic physical entities and relations" are, in this mode of >> question-and-answer, a complex by-product of the logic of appearance, >> and the subjects of said appearance. A further consequence is that it >> is no longer obvious that subjects, or what appears to them, are >> reducible in any straightforward way, either to physical entities and >> relations, or to the original first-order combinatorial ontology. > > > I think you have created a strawman "exhaustively-reducible physical or > material ontology". Sure, physicists take "forces" and "matter" as working > assumptions - but they don't say what they are. They are never anything > other than "elements of a mathematical model which works well." And what > does it mean to work well? It means to explain appearances - exactly the > same thing you put forward as a uniquely different goal of comp. > > Although I think comp is an interesting theory and worthy of study, I think > I look at it differently than Bruno. I look at it as just another > mathematical model, one whose ontology happens to be computations. I think > Bruno assumes the ontology first, notes that it can 'explain everything' - > and then sets out to see if 'everything' can be pared down to what appears. > > > >> >> It is true that we can pose questions in the first way and still say >> that we are non-eliminative about consciousness. The problem though is >> that because we have already committed ourselves to an exhaustively >> reductive mode of explanation, we can't help consigning such >> first-person phenomena to a subsidiary status, as an impenetrable >> mystery, an essentially irrelevant epiphenomenon, or some sort of >> weirdly-anomalous side-effect of basic physical activity. ISTM that >> this mode of question-and-answer, from the outset, essentially can't >> escape trivialising, ignoring, or rendering unanswerable in principle, >> the role of the first person. Consequently, I can't avoid the >> suspicion that, despite its phenomenal success (pun intended) it >> can't, in the end, be the most helpful way of asking the most >> fundamental questions. > > > As I noted in another post, any explanation is going to be "exhaustively > reductive" or it's going to be "reduction with loss". You can't have it both > ways. Bruno's theory explicitly defines the "loss", i.e. unprovable truths > of arithmetic. That may be a feature, or it may be a bug. > > Brent > > >> >> Whatever its independent merits or demerits, and its inherent >> complexity, ISTM that comp gets closer to a way of posing questions >> that might in the end yield more satisfying and complete answers. As >> it happens, in so doing it rehabilitates earlier attempts in the >> tradition stemming from the Greeks and Indians, and from later >> exemplars such as Berkeley and Kant. And perhaps most interestingly, >> its central motivation originates in, and simultaneously strikes at >> the heart of, the tacit assumption of its rivals that perception and >> cognition are (somehow) second-order relational phenomena attached to >> some putative "virtual level" of an exhaustively "material" reduction. >> >> David >> > > -- > 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 everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. > To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. > Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list. > For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. 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