Hi Craig --
To my assertion that there is no evidence that things exist in the absence of their being experienced, you wrote: > There was evidence for the existence of ether, phlogiston, > the orbit of the sun around the earth, even though none of > these things were experienced. Although it probably wasn't your intention, you've just proved my point. All knowledge is intellectualized from experience. You say that ether, phlogiston, and the sun's orbit were not experienced. No, but the void of space and fire were. Alchemists, observing that air fills all voids on earth, surmised that something had to fill the void of outer space as well. They called it Ether. Likewise, observing materials erupt in flame when heated, they deduced that flame must be another element, which they called Phlogiston. The notion of the sun circling earth was derived directly from experience. Had pre-scientific observers not experienced fire, the void between objects, and the rising and setting sun, these intellections would not have been made. As it turned out, they were all wrong according to the more sophisticated theories of Science. Again, empirical evidence is experiential, even when it is the reading on an instrument. The scientific perspective of reality is only what conforms to laws and principles intellectualized from empirical data and confirmed by universal consensus. Experience is primary to existence. Things exist because we experience them. As astro-physicist Andrei Linde mused, "The moment you say that the universe exists without any observers, I cannot make any sense out of that. I cannot imagine a consistent theory of everything that ignores consciousness. It's not enough for the information to be stored somewhere, completely inaccessible to anybody. It's necessary for somebody to look at it. In the absence of observers, our universe is dead." Thanks for the examples, Craig. Essentially yours, Ham Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org.uk/pipermail/moq_discuss_archive/
