Kevin, Ron David, Take a seed. Consider it a nugget of possibility. It can be eaten by a squirrel, crushed by a car or as Jesus said:
"Behold, a sower went forth to sow; And when he sowed, some seeds fell by the way side, and the fowls came and devoured them up: Some fell upon stony places, where they had not much earth: and forthwith they sprung up, because they had no deepness of earth: And when the sun was up, they were scorched; and because they had no root, they withered away. And some fell among thorns; and the thorns sprung up, and choked them: But other fell into good ground, and brought forth fruit, some an hundredfold, some sixtyfold, some thirtyfold. Who hath ears to hear, let him hear." Seeds cast from a careless hand or blown upon the wind... A seed's destiny is largely determined by where it lands. It's environment bestows on it a range of possibilities. Given a comfy landing a seed may sprout. Those possibilities expand into roots and branches. Under some conditions growth occurs under others it doesn't. But we all know that possibilities are not created equally. And so we speak of probabilities; some possibilities are more likely than others. The more probable we think something is, the more real it becomes. So when someone is giving a professional estimate, she must be realistic. And if she is not she will more than likely be told to "Get real." Truth occurs when you are 100% positive something is true. This is an estimation of probability. As was discussed at length several months ago in one of the endless political discussions, jurors are asked to vote based on their best estimate of the truth beyond a shadow of doubt. How long is the shadow that possibility casts into probability and probability into conviction or dismissal? This essentially is the Argument According to Ahh ha! It is a Triple A position, It says that most possibilities dissolve into naught. Every possibility gets its chance but they do not start out even. Some possibilities have to persevere against all odds. They are long shots. But the smart money plays it safe. Solid investments on a secure foundation; that's the bedrock of a structured portfolio. Ron has spoken of what I take to be the "limits" of probability. Zero and infinity. All or Nothing. All possibility is strung between these poles and probabilities arc between them. We establish cause by saying that something always happens in a certain way. We declare something impossible by saying that it could never happen. Always and Never. Always is solid and dependable Never is flighty and rare. Static and Dynamic. Kevin says, "Better to say that the MoQ shows that "good is a noun" and leave it at that." As I have said before bad is a noun, too. If you define something as better is just gets better and better. Quality resists such definitions. It is neither confined by them nor ever free from them. It is the tension between how we have known Quality in the past and what we expect from it in the future. David said, " I see no clearknockdown argument against some kind of weak version of teleology that says that in any situation there are a number of possible outcomes and any active system can make choices about which outcome it will act to bring about, and exactly where we draw a line about what sort of systems can do this is unclear, maybe atoms make choices when they capture electrons even." Teleology however weakened is a vestige of Final Cause. It is the reason something happens. When you talk about an active system there are a range of probable future states and the system itself may act in a way to make some more probable than others. A thermostat turns on an off to alter the temperature of a room. If you want to limit teleology to some kind of willful effort to influence probabilities in the direction of some future imagined goal, well maybe. But that is a definition of teleology too weak to support the term, in my view. Claiming that there is a purpose in the inanimate, as in, a rock falls because it values being close to the ground may provide some sense of identification with our rock nature but it does little to enhance our understanding of falling bodies. But if simply giving us the mere illusion of understanding were all the term did perhaps it would be benign. But when we think we have found purpose in nature this lets us off the hook. Purpose, consciousness, intellect are all properties that emerge into nature through us. We have a purpose. It is to be fruitful and multiply. Individually it is whatever we elect it to be based on our biology and our history. In short this talk of inorganic matter having purpose and values strikes me as animism. Imbuing the mindless with mind and agency seem to me to be a regression in understanding not an advance. 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/
