Objectivism and Atheism

William would have it that mathematical and logical propositions are always conceived in the form of sense:
The visual-auditory symbols take a sensory form. For instance, the number "3" has a recognized shape and sound, and stands for three separate units, viz., |||; so do the logical symbols "P" and "Q," which stand for propositions, which are themselves composed of visual-auditory symbols.
But this is clearly false. The number three does not have a recognized shape and sound. It is only the Arabic numeral '3' and its English pronunciation which does.
If you go back and re-read the statement you just quoted, you'll see that I was referring not to concepts per se, but to visual-auditory symbols -- the form in which concepts are held and expressed.
If I were a Roman, I would represent 3 by III, and pronounce it 'tres' as opposed to 'three.'
Of course.
And while 3 does in fact stand for 3 separate units, these units need not take any sensory form. The beauty of mathematics is that the numbers are extricable from their sensory attendants: 3 is still 3, and still possesses the same conceptual properties, whether we are talking about 3 people, 3 sides, or 3 atoms.

That's true of any concept, not just mathematical ones. But, remember, there are no units in reality that are pure 3, without being 3 something -- 3 people, 3 sides, 3 atoms, as you say. The visual-auditory symbol must refer to three particular units of some kind. They can be three units of any kind, but they must be three units of some kind.

William's error is highlighted when we consider that propositions, while composed of visual-auditory symbols, are not visual-auditory symbols, which is made clear by the consideration that Frenchmen and Germans can conceive of identical propositions (say, in logic) while using an entirely different set of symbols to refer to them.

I agree. I didn't say that propositions are visual-auditory symbols; I said they were composed of visual-auditory symbols, which was inexact. What I should have said is that propositions are composed of concepts which are held and expressed in the form of visual-auditory symbols. There is a difference between the symbol "3" and the concept 3; whereas symbols are perceptual concretes, concepts are not; they are mental entities. "A concept is a mental integration of two or more units which are isolated according to a specific characteristic(s) and united by a specific definition." (Rand, ITOE, p. 10) "A unit is an existent regarded as a separate member of a group of two or more similar members. (Two stones are two units; so are two square feet of ground, if regarded as distinct parts of a continuous stretch of ground.) Note that the concept "unit" involves an act of consciousness (a selective focus, a certain way of regarding things), but that it is not an arbitrary creation of consciousness: it is a method of identification or classification according to the attributes which a consciousness observes in reality." (Ibid., pp. 7,8)

I wrote, "You don't need pre-existing concepts. you can perceive that two objects bear a greater similarity to each other than they do to a third object. You then group the two objects together relative to the third, and thereby "differentiate" them from the third object. It is through the perceptual observation of relative similarities and differences that you build your concepts from the ground up. No pre-existing 'innate ideas' are required."

Only angels possess complete sets of innate ideas. Humans seem to have much less of them--mostly confined to logic and mathematics.
If you believe in angels, I'm not surprised that you believe in innate ideas. :-/
But I digress. It is not the case that certain basic concepts are not required for perception. Indeed, in the example you mention, it is apparent that one would need to have an operative concept of similarity in order to determine whether or not two objects are similar. If one were not formerly aware of certain criteria for similarity, one would never be able judge whether two objects were similar.

You don't need the concept 'similarity' in order to perceive that an orange is more like an apple than like a tree. You can directly observe that the orange bears a greater likeness to the apple than to the tree. You wouldn't yet have a term for (or concept of) the similarity that you're perceiving, just as you wouldn't yet have a term for (or concept of) the objects that you're comparing -- the orange, the apple and the tree -- but you don't need a term for (or concept of) something in order to observe its existence. In fact, you couldn't form the concept 'similarity' unless you first observed instances of it in reality, just as you couldn't form the concept 'chair' unless you first observed instances of it in reality. The way you form your concepts is by observing similarities and differences in the objects of your awareness and then grouping the relatively similar objects together as against those that are relatively different. In the process of doing so, you attach a symbol to the objects that you're grouping together, which helps you to keep them united under a single mental unit.

For example, you see that an orange is similar to an apple in contrast to a tree; you then group the orange and the apple together and give them a name (e.g., 'fruit'). Later, you see that other pieces of fruit bear a greater similarity to the orange than to the apple, so you group them together and give them a name (e.g., 'orange'). You don't need a pre-existing concept of 'orange' in order to see the similarity and group them together. You can directly observe that two objects are more like each other than either is like a third object. After engaging in this process on two or more occasions, you can then observe a certain similarity in the various cases of similarity themselves, and can group these together and give them a name (e.g., 'similarity').

This process applies to all concepts. There are no innate versus acquired concepts. All concepts are the product of experience.

I wrote, "If thoughts were not causally dependent on the brain, they could exist independently of the brain, but when brain processes cease, thoughts cease along with them."

This is false. Perhaps thoughts are not causally dependent on the brain, but the mental activity which is a necessary condition for them is.

I don't follow you. If mental activity is necessary for thought, and the brain is necessary for mental activity (because mental activity depends on the brain), then why isn't the brain necessary for thought?

I wrote, "It is true that thoughts can cause further mental action, but they do so as brain activity, for mental activity is simply the subjective aspect of cerebral activity."

This cannot be. Otherwise, it would be the case that brain activity is responsible for the derivative of 7 to be 0, whereas it is actually the case that what is responsible is the fact that 7 lacks a variable responsible for a changing functional value.

You're failing to distinguish between what is responsible for the fact that the derivative of 7 is 0, and what is responsible for the identification of that fact. Brain activity is not responsible for the mathematical relationships themselves, which exist even if no one identifies them, but it is responsible for the identification of those relationships. Again, brain activity and mental activity are simply two sides of the same ontological coin, just as "the morning star" and "the evening star" are two appearances of the same celestial body.

I wrote, "To think is to activate the cerebrum, just as to see is to activate the eye, the optic nerve and the visual cortex. One thinks conceptually by means of the brain, just as one sees visually by means of the eye. The mind and the brain are not two separate entities that interact with each other, any more than vision and the eye are two separate entities that interact with each other. Just as one sees through the eye, so one thinks through the brain. When one engages in logical reasoning, one activates a specific physiological process. One's reasoning is simply the subjective aspect of that process. Just as without the relevant optical physiology, seeing is impossible, so without the relevant brain physiology, thinking is impossible."

This is all assertion followed by an attempted analogy between the brain and the eye which I have already refuted elsewhere.
Oh, really? Then please point me to the refutation.
The only reason one sees through the eye is because a brain is connected to the optic nerve as opposed to a ball of wax. But the causal efficacy of the mind transcends the causal power of the brain--as can be supported by numerous examples of how mental content in the form of will determines action, and how the analysis of ideas determines the nature of the conclusions based upon them. And this is enough to show that there is not only an analytical distinction between the mind and the brain, but also an ontological one.

Yes, mental content in the form of will determines action, but it doesn't do so independently of the brain, because mental content is simultaneously brain content. By the same token, the analysis of ideas determines the nature of the conclusions based upon them, but that analysis and those conclusions are simultaneously actions of both the mind and the brain.

I wrote, "First of all, you have zero evidence for any of these claims [about the knowledge of God, etc.], which you assert as though they were self-evident truths."

Well, this is plainly false, and can be translated as "I believe you have zero evidence for any of these claims." In actual fact, William has not entertained the evidence to which I have referred countless times--especially as found in Swinburne's book The Existence of God.

When I said that you have zero evidence, I meant that you�ve presented zero evidence. Referring me to Swinburne�s book is not presenting evidence; it�s simply referring me to someone who claims to have evidence. If you want me to address Swinburne�s arguments, then you�ll have to present them here. I'm not going to read his book, and then do an exhaustive refutation of its content on this thread. Nor can you expect me to.

I continued, "Yet when you argue with me, you dispute the most obvious facts, by continually posing imaginary counter-examples, as though they constituted some kind of contrary evidence. I would expect you to demand of yourself the same epistemological standards that you demand of me."

These 'facts' are only obvious to you and your ilk. If they were categorically obvious, then no one would dispute them. But many very intelligent people have.

Suppose I were to argue that the earth is flat and the moon landing a hoax. Would you say that the earth's shape and the moon landing are not obvious facts, because there are intelligent people who dispute them? To call these people �intelligent� is to beg the question; they may be �intelligent� in the sense that they�re literate and well-educated, but their intelligence is not in evidence when they deny facts this obvious. The same is true for well-educated people who are religious; they may be intelligent in other areas, but their intelligence is not in evidence when they defend a belief in the existence of gods and angels. Besides, my point was not that there aren�t many well-educated people who are so wedded to their religious upbringing that they�re willing to deny the obvious just in order to defend it. My point was that your method of argument is to dispute plain empirical facts by offering imaginary counter-examples, not by presenting contrary evidence; yet you complain that I�ve failed to present evidence for my views when I�ve been very careful to do so.

I wrote, "Secondly, one doesn't perceive concepts, nor can one form them without a process of abstraction from particulars. Concepts presuppose particular things; particular things don�t presuppose concepts. So without an already existing world of particulars, there could be no concepts for a God to be aware of."

Only if God were a material being, but He is not. And only if logical and mathematical truths depend on particulars, which they do not.

If, as you say, perception does not require a material means, then in what form does God perceive the world? He has to perceive it in some form, and that form can only be determined by the nature of his sense organs. If he has no sense organs, he has no perception.

I wrote, "More arbitary assertions! Liebniz, you toss around these floating abstractions like they were self-evident truths, when there is no evidence whatsoever to support them. It�s simply impossible for a consciousness to know and will all things immediately. Knowledge requires a process by which a consciousness acquires information over time."

An omniscient, omnipotent being is not subject to such limitations, and does not require a process by which to acquire information, since all information is possessed by Him connaturally.

Suppose I said that Santa Claus flies from house to house on Christmas Eve and you disputed this on the grounds that Santa and his sleigh do not, by their nature, have the capacity for flight. And suppose I replied, ah, but you see, Santa Claus is not subject to these natural limitations, because he is not bound by the laws of nature. Would you accept this as a reasonable answer? If not, then why do you expect me to accept as reasonable your answer that God is not bound by the laws of nature when it comes to the acquisition of knowledge?

To be continued . . .

- Bill

Post 221

Monday, June 25, 2007 - 7:12am

William: "Yet when you argue with me, you dispute the most obvious facts, by continually posing imaginary counter-examples, as though they constituted some kind of contrary evidence. I would expect you to demand of yourself the same epistemological standards that you demand of me."

I don't understand you, Bill. Given all your opponents have said on this very long thread, can you really infer their intellectual honesty on this issue? If you can't, then why are you shocked by their failure to hold themselves to proper espistemic standards?

You may get value out of going around and around with people like Leibniz. It may help you in your presentation of Objectivist ideas to discuss philosophical issues with people antagonistic to them. But you should stop discussing a topic with someone who, over the course of over 200 posts one one thread, has clearly demonstrated his irrationality on that topic. Either that, or you should stop insisting that he "play fair," which they obviously have no interest in doing.

Post 222

Monday, June 25, 2007 - 2:04pm

Jon,

I understand and appreciate your concerns. And I certainly wouldn't expect you or other list members to carry on this kind of dialogue. But I've found that it does help me to clarify and refine my views on some of these issues. The point in the passage you quoted that I wanted to stress was the tactic, so often engaged in by Leibniz, of posing imaginary counter-examples, rather than ones based on actual evidence. His approach is a dramatic illustration of the methodology of rationalism, in which modern philosophy is so heavily invested. It arises from of a view of possibility which Peikoff attributes to the philosopher Leibniz and which is reflected in spades by the pseudonymous Leibniz. In OPAR, Peikoff writes:

As with so many errors, the historical root of the fallacy of rewriting reality lies in religion -- specifically, in the idea that the universe was created by a supernatural Omnipotence, who could have created things differently and who can alter them if He chooses. A famous statement of this metaphysics was offered by the philosopher Leibniz in the eighteenth century: "All is for the best in this best of all possible worlds." In Leibniz's view, the universe is only one of many worlds; the others happen not to exist, because God in his goodness chose the present one as the best; but the others have always been possible and still are so today. This is the kind of metaphysics that tempts men to spend their time projecting and wishing for alternatives to reality. Christianity, indeed, invites such wishing, which it describes as the virtue of "hope" and the duty of "prayer."

By the nature of existence, however, such "hope" and "prayer" are futile. Leaving aside the man-made, nothing is possible except what is actual. [I understand what Peikoff is saying here and I agree, but I wouldn't have put it quite that way; I would have said that nothing is possible except what is entailed by the actual.] The concept of "omnipotence," in other words, is logically incompatible with the law of identity; it is one or the other. [This is the key point, and one that I have stressed throughout this discussion.]

As with the doctrine of the primacy of consciousness, so with the idea of "possible universes": it has been taken over uncritically from religion by more secular thinkers, including even those who call themselves atheists and naturalists. The result is an entire profession, today's philosophers, who routinely degrade the actual, calling it a realm of mere "brute" or "contingent" -- i.e., unintelliglble and rewritable -- facts. The lesson such philosophers teach their students is not to adhere to reality, but to brush it aside and fantasize alternatives. (OPAR, pp. 27, 28)

It is precisely this last -- the fantasizing of alternatives -- that my respondent, who has taken his cue from the philosopher Leibniz, has resorted to time and again in our exchanges. But it is not just his philosophical namesake that has inspired this approach; it is almost certainly his philosophy teachers, many of whom are probably atheists or naturalists, as Peikoff says, who are responsible for fostering it. This sort of thinking is rife in contemporary philosophy, and has poisoned the discipline virtually beyond redemption.

The disingenuousness that you observe in Leibniz's replies can, to some extent, be laid at the feet of his instructors. He has been well schooled in evading reality. ;-)

- Bill

Post 223

Monday, June 25, 2007 - 6:23pm

I'm sure Jon Trager is having fits at my continuing this thread (see his Post #221). Jon, I promise not to complain about Leibniz's intellectual dishonesty and simply to accept it as a fait accompli! :-) Nevertheless, for the philosophically sensitive, viewer discretion is advised.

Aeons ago, I argued that vision is �non-physical inasmuch as it is a perceptual experience, but that experience is simply the subjective aspect of the operation of a physical sense organ, not something that exists independently of it.� The reincarnated Leibniz replied,

This is false, as I've said before, inasmuch as the objective aspect of vision can be replicated merely by running a camera into a computer screen on live.

But that�s not vision, Leibniz; vision requires awareness. The computer doesn�t see anything.

William would have it that the computer 'sees' the content of the footage captured by the camera in the same sense that I see the desk sitting before me.

No, I don�t! Where did you get that idea??

But this is absurd, and proves the fact that vision involves some kind of mental recognition of visual content,
Vision involves awareness of the object of perception, not necessarily recognition of that awareness, which is the �visual content� you�re referring to, but this is a minor quibble. Your point is that vision must have a conscious component, which, of course, I agree with.
which further shows that any attempt to draw an analogy between vision and mental activity is flawed on account of it being the case that vision without mental content does not have a subjective aspect of its operation that is non-physical.

I was not drawing an analogy between vision and mental activity per se i.e., between vision and consciousness, which would be silly, since vision is obviously an aspect of consciousness. I was drawing an analogy between vision and a different kind of conscious activity, namely thinking. My original statement was, �Just as vision does not exist in isolation from the organ of perception which makes it possible -- the eye -- so thought does not exist in isolation from the organ of cognition which makes it possible -- the brain.�

In other words, you cannot have vision without a functional organ of sight. People without eyes or whose eyes are sufficiently inoperative have no vision. Similarly, those whose cerebral cortex is damaged by physical accident or disease are rendered incapable of certain kinds of mental activity. In short, just as you cannot see without a functioning eye, so you cannot think without a functioning brain.

It would behoove William, then, to cease making analogies between vision and mental activity as if they both had a non-physical aspect, since it is clear that vision does not have such an aspect.

I don�t follow you. Weren�t you just saying that vision must have a non-physical aspect? What am I missing? Of course, vision has such an aspect. Vision is a form of awareness. It is the eye and the visual cortex -- the physical receptors mediating vision -- that are physical.

(When William claims that vision does have a non-physical aspect, he conflates the terms of his analogy, for it is only in virtue of the fact that human vision involves the operation of a brain or mind having non-physical properties that vision itself can possibly be called non-physical.)

I agree. Vision is perceptual awareness, just as thought is conceptual awareness. How is this �conflating� the terms of my analogy? I am talking about two different forms of cognition.

I wrote, �Consciousness does not �influence� the brain any more than the brain influences consciousness; conscious activity (or thinking) is brain activity initiated and controlled subjectively.� And: �To think is the process of activating the cerebral cortex. One doesn't think independently of brain function and then influence the brain as a result of such thinking. [Emphasis added]

Interested to see how this assertion is supported.

Well, to say that consciousness �influences� the brain would imply that consciousness can exist independently of brain activity, but we know that when the brain ceases to function, conscious activity ceases as well. Without a properly functioning brain, there is no perception, no thought, no memory -- no conscious activity of any kind.

In other words, �If that were what occurs (consciousness influencing brain activity), then consciousness could exist independently of the brain, when in fact the brain is required for mental activity.�

False. How many times must I repeat myself? Just because a certain activity X [mental activity] requires the presence or activity of a certain apparatus Y [the brain], it does not follow that X [mental activity] cannot influence Y [the brain]. If you disagree with my response, address it as opposed to re-asserting that to which I responded in the first place.

If thought is simply an activity of the brain identified introspectively, then it would be the brain influencing itself, wouldn�t it? We don�t normally speak of a thing's having an influence on itself. We speak of things' having an influence on other things.

In any case, my point was that we have no evidence that the mind interacts with the brain. In order for such interaction to occur, the mind and the brain would have to exist as separate, independent entities. But there is no evidence that the mind exists separately from the brain. On the contrary, since consciousness requires physical organs of perception and cognition, it does not and cannot exist in isolation from the brain. Such experiences as illusions and dreams rely on mental content that is acquired only from perceiving external reality through the organs of perception and then activated via memory, which itself depends on the brain (i.e., on the neurons composing�the cerebrum).

Alzheimer�s disease and other forms of dementia that afflict people as they age result from the physical deterioration of the brain. Memory and cognition do not exist independently of the brain any more than perception exists independently of sense organs. There is no separation of the brain�s operation and that of conscious awareness. Consciousness is simply the introspective manifestation of the brain�s operation.

[Incidentally, it's worth noting that Nathaniel Branden doesn't agree with my analysis, but believes, as Leibniz does, that the mind and body are separate and distinct entities that interact with each other. See his The Art of Living Consciously.]

To be continued . . .

- Bill

Post 224

Monday, June 25, 2007 - 8:35pm

Liebniz wrote: "One can always attribute what appears to issue as an effect from a substance to that substance's nature, even though it is perfectly possible that the effect has a cause outside of that substance, and only appears to issue from it."

I replied: �Even if one mistakenly attributes an effect to something other than its real cause, it�s still the case that how a thing behaves depends on the kind of thing it is.�

Not necessarily. That every effect has a cause does not entail that everything behaves according to the kind of thing it is. If you think it does, show me how.

A cause acts a certain way in virtue of the kind of thing it is. If it didn�t, then one couldn�t say that there is any connection between what it is and its effect, which is what we are saying when we say that it was the cause of that effect. To deny this kind of connection is to deny causality itself.

The law of causality is true by definition, insofar as an effect must have a cause by definition. But this has nothing to do with the purported fact that "all things must act according to their nature" . . .

Yes, it does, because it is in virtue of what a thing is that it has the kind of effect it does. If it were sufficiently different, it would not have that effect. For example, it makes a difference whether I expose water to fire or to frigid air. If I expose it to fire, it will turn to steam; if I expose it to frigid air, it will turn to ice. Fire has the effect it does, because of the kind of thing it is � because, in fact, it is fire. If it were frigid air, it would have an entirely different effect.

I wrote, �No, perceiving what are ostensibly causes and effects depends on a recognition of the law of causality, which is established by reference to the law of identity -- i.e., by recognizing that a thing must act according to its nature, because if it didn�t, it wouldn�t be the same thing. �

It is certainly the case that the logical law of identity is incontrovertible, for it is certainly the case that for X to be Y, X must have all of the same properties as Y.
Exactly! So how is this not an expression of the metaphysical law of identity? For a person to be you, he must have all the same properties as you.
But the metaphysical law of identity, which you seem to accept as self-evident, is hardly incontrovertible.

Example: Let us say that it looks as though X, who is a cat, acts by raising its left paw, over the interval [T1, T2]. Could it not equally be the case that the difference between the state of affairs at T1 and T2 is explicable not only in terms of X's action, but also in terms of T1 and T2 being different cats?

You mean that the appearance of a single cat�s raising its paw could be an illusion fabricated in the context of (say) a video in which one cat is replaced by another cat, without the viewer�s being aware of it, and that it is really the second cat that raises its paw instead of the first? Okay, but that doesn�t contradict what I�m saying, for in that case, the cause of the second cat�s raising its paw is the second cat! I�m not saying that we can�t be mistaken as to what the cause of an action is. All I�m saying is that whatever the cause, it must lie in the nature of the acting entity.

This consideration alone ought to be enough to cast doubt on the metaphysical law of identity.

You�re confusing metaphysics with epistemology. The fact that we could fail to identify correctly the entity responsible for the action does not mean that it doesn't act according to its nature.

I wrote, �The law of identity implies the law of causality, but the law of identity is the more fundamental of the two laws. The law of causality is a special case of the law of identity: it is the law of identity applied to action.�

In other words, if I can deny the metaphysical law of identity, I can deny the law of causality. Fair enough. I'll just deny them both (for the sake of argument, of course).

But you can�t deny the metaphysical law of identity without contradiction. To deny it is to say that a thing -- an actual existent -- is not what it is, which is a contradiction.

I wrote: �Since there is no Lockean "substratum" underlying and uniting its characteristics, a thing just is all of its characteristics. If it exists under the same conditions, it will possess the same characteristics, including the same action."

False. How could you ever prove this? You've just never experienced an instance to the contrary. But that hardly amounts to establishing it as a necessary truth that the same thing in the same conditions will undertake the same action, since necessary truths are only those truths whose contraries entail contradictions."

What do you mean, how could I ever prove it? I am advancing a proof for it. I�m saying that since there is no substratum, a thing just is all of its characteristics, and must therefore act the same way under the same conditions, because it must possess the same characteristics under the same conditions. Joseph explains the relationship as follows:

Uniformity of action is not indeed the fundamental element in the causal relation, for it depends on repetition of the action; the causal relation has nothing to do with the number of instances, so far as its existence -- though much so far as its detection -- is concerned; it is bound up altogether with the nature or character of things, and the nature of anything is not a question of the number of such things that may be or have been fashioned. Yet if a thing is to have any determinate nature and character at all, there must be uniformity of action in different things of that character, or of the same thing on different like occasions. If a thing a under conditions c produces a change x in a subject s -- if, for example, light of certain wave-lengths, passing through the lens of a camera, produces a certain chemical change (which we call the taking of a photograph of Mount Everest) upon a photographic film � the way in which it acts must be regarded as a partial expression of what it is. It could only act differently, if it were different. As long therefore as it is a, and stands related under conditions c to a subject that is s, no other effect than x can be produced; and to say that the same thing acting on the same thing under the same conditions may yet produce a different effect, is to say that a thing need not be what it is. But this is in flat conflict with the Law of Identity. A thing, to be at all, must be something, and can only be what it is. To assert a causal connexion between a and x implies that a acts as it does because it is what it is; because, in fact, it is a. So long therefore as it is a, it must act thus; and to assert that it may act otherwise on a subsequent occasion is to assert that what is a is something else than the a which it is declared to be. (H.W.B. Joseph, An Introduction to Logic, pp. 407-409)

This is metaphysics, not logic. Logic is strictly analytic, while Joseph appears to take liberty to make unfounded metaphysical suppositions. In logic proper, conditionals are always hypothetical [e.g. "Let us suppose that Y necessarily follows from X"] and causation is completely bracketed.

You�re ignoring Joseph�s proof that the law of identity is ontological, which I cited in a previous post, to wit:

The Law of Identity may be formulated by saying that �whatever is, is�: or symbolically, that �A is A�; the Law or Contradiction, that �a thing cannot both be and not be so and so�, that �contradictory propositions cannot both be true�, or that �A cannot be B and not be B�; the Law of Excluded Middle, that �a thing either is or is not so and so�, that �contradictory propositions cannot both be false�, or that �A either is or is not B�. In other words, if we think about anything, then (1) we must think that it is what it is; (2) we cannot think that it at once has a character and has it not; (3) we must think that it either has it or has it not. Now though these are called laws of thought, and in fact we cannot think except in accordance with them, yet they are really statements which we cannot but hold true about things. We cannot think contradictory propositions, because we see that a thing cannot have at once and not have the same character; and the so-called necessity of thought is really the apprehension of a necessity in the being of things. This we may see if we ask what would follow, were it a necessity of thought only; for then, while e.g. I could not think at once that this page is and is not white, the page itself might at once be white and not be white. But to admit this is to admit that I can think the page to have and not have the same character, in the very act of saying that I cannot think it; and this is self-contradictory. The Law of Contradiction then is metaphysical or ontological. So also is the Law of Identity. It is because what is must be determinately what it is, that I must so think. That is why we find difficulty in admitting the reality of absolute change, change when nothing remains the same; for then we cannot say what it is which changes; �only the permanent�, said Kant, �can change�. The Law of Excluded Middle is so far different as a disjunctive proposition expresses doubt, and doubt belongs to the mind, not to things. But to deny that this page need either be or not be white is to deny that it need by anything definite; determinateness involves the mutual exclusiveness of determinate characters, which is the ground of negation; and that is a statement about things. In other words, unless the primary Laws of Thought were Laws of Things, our thought would be doomed by its very nature to misapprehend the nature of things. (Joseph, Ibid., p. 13)

In any case, any hope of establishing the necessary truth of the metaphysical law of identity was exploded by Hume, who revealed that any alleged demonstration thereof relied on questionable premises.

Well, I think that Joseph has given the definitive answer to Hume. The notion that the Law of Identity is epistemological only is a modern misconception. The ancient Greeks, like Aristotle, recognized it as metaphysical. As an Aristotelian philosopher, Joseph has kept to that venerable tradition.

I wrote, �In short, to deny the law of causality is to deny the law of identity, and to deny the law of identity is to affirm a contradiction."

Oh, really? Please show me, logically, what contradiction I am affirming by denying the law of causality and the metaphysical law of identity.

See above.

To be continued . . .

- Bill

(Edited by William Dwyer
on 6/26, 1:00am)

Post 225

Tuesday, June 26, 2007 - 7:54am

Bill: "I'm sure Jon Trager is having fits at my continuing this thread (see his Post #221). Jon, I promise not to complain about Leibniz's intellectual dishonesty and simply to accept it as a fait accompli!"

I'm not having fits about it, Bill. I find it torturous to follow in places, but if you're getting value from it, then go ahead with my blessing :-)

My only point was that if you're going to continue to engage someone like Liebniz over more than 200 posts, it makes no sense to complain he isn't holding himself to proper epistemic standards. It's like dating a prostitute and then indignantly complaining about her promiscuity.

Post 226

Tuesday, June 26, 2007 - 11:01am

Yeah, I got that, Jon.

Thanks,

- Bill

Post 227

Sunday, July 1, 2007 - 12:45pm

Continuing on, in case anyone is still interested:

Leibniz: "I would take issue with the idea that it is necessarily true that death amounts to a cessation of consciousness. Perhaps God immediately provides the soul with a new hylomorphic compound after its bodily host dies out, but this hylomorph exists in a parallel universe, such that we assume that consciousness ceases since in our universe, empirically speaking, it does."

I replied: First of all, you have no evidence of a hylomorphic transformation, which is just sheer, arbitrary speculation on your part.�

Whether or not I have evidence of hylomorphic transformation is beside the point. The point is that such transformation is possible. And the possibility of hylomorphic transformation is enough to prove it is not necessarily true that death amounts to a cessation of consciousness.

But you have no more evidence that consciousness can exist as an independent, non-physical substance with no sensory input and no organic tool of memory and cognition than you do that any other attribute can exist independently of an entity. In fact, all of the evidence points in the other direction. Yet, you are willing to base your entire life not only on the premise that it can exist, but also and more importantly on the premise that it does in fact exist.

I wrote, �Second, and more important, such an hypothesis misconceives the nature of consciousness.�

I'm looking forward to seeing the support for this assertion.

It misconceives the nature of consciousness, because consciousness cannot, even theoretically, exist as an independent substance, since it requires a means and form of awareness. It is true that once information has been received through the physical senses, a person can retain these sensory images in memory even if his physical senses are no longer active or functional, but the memory itself depends on the physical brain. It is also true that a person�s brain can theoretically be cloned in such a way that the clone will retain the memory of images that were gained only through the senses of the original observer. But without functioning sense organs, the clone will not be able to perceive the external world or gain any new information about it. Moreover, in order for a cloned brain to exist, the original brain would require information gained through the senses. In any case, when we die, there is no possibility that our consciousness could be removed from our body, because its existence depends on a properly functioning brain for memory and properly functioning sense organs for perception. Without a brain and sense organs, there would be no consciousness to transform hylomorphically.

I wrote, �Consciousness is not an independent entity; it is simply an aspect or a manifestation of physiological processes (specifically of the brain and sensory nervous system), not an entity that co-exists alongside those processes. So once those processes cease, no consciousness remains to be provided with a hylomophic compound.�

Why am I not surprised? Have you not realized that the continued assertion of theses such as "consciousness is not an independent entity"--to which I have satisfactorily responded many times--does nothing? That it just wastes my time?

Well, I don�t think that you have responded satisfactorily to it. That�s why I�m still discussing it. If you think I�m wasting your time, then you�re certainly free to abstain from further debate. No one is forcing you to continue the discussion.

If you assert something which I contest, back it up.

I thought I had.

Liebniz wrote: "You've not shown that there is no such thing as an immaterial substance, though you admittedly have become quite adept at tirelessly repeating this assertion, as if its cogency might accrue from mere repetition."

I replied, �By �substance� I meant an independent entity. There is no evidence that consciousness exists as a separate, independent entity.�

Fine. Let "substance," for the purposes of our discussion, henceforth include those entities which are separate from other entities, although they nevertheless cannot exist independently of these or other entities.

You�re not understanding me. Let me try again. By metaphysical �substance� I meant that of which attributes and properties are predicated. Substance in this sense would be an entity, but not a faculty. A faculty depends for its existence on an entity, but an entity does not depend for its existence on a faculty. I regard consciousness as a faculty, not an entity, in that there is no such thing as a pure consciousness.

Liebniz wrote, "You've not shown that conscious is merely a property or faculty of a physical organism, though you admittedly have become quite adept at tirelessly repeating this assertion, as if its cogency might accrue from mere repetition."

I replied: Once again, if I said that there is a consciousness in the next room, you�d want to know who or what it is that�s conscious wouldn�t you? And if I said that it�s not anything that is conscious; it�s just pure consciousness, you most assuredly would balk at that reply. Why? Because you�d recognize that consciousness is an attribute of an entity, not an entity in its own right.�

Well, of course. Angels (from the Christian perspective) are conscious, immaterial beings. That doesn't mean they just are consciousnesses.
What else are they? They�re not material entities.
According to Mortimer Adler's book, The Angels and Us, angels are intellectual entities that are non-spatial-temporal.
Isn�t that just another way of saying that they�re pure minds? Also, I have no idea what it means to be non-spatial-temporal, or how something non-spatial-temporal could exist. Unless you�re talking about the totality of existence to which the concepts of space and time do not apply, if something exists, doesn�t it have to exist at some particular time and in some particular place?
Thus, you are right in thinking that a purely intellectual being could not exist in a room. This is why angels are only said to be in certain locations insofar as they act in these locations. (Angels act on physical objects through a species of telekinesis.)

If they don�t exist anywhere, then how could they act on anything, let alone act on it by a process as acausal as telekinesis?

Moreover, you have yet to explain to me how it is possible for a non-material entity, like a god or an angel, to be conscious in the first place. In what perceptual form would it be aware of reality? It would have to be aware of it in some form � visually, auditorially, tactically, etc. � which would be determined by its organ(s) of perception. If it had no organ(s) of perception, it would have no form of awareness and therefore would not be conscious of reality. So, what you are affirming is an entity that is conscious in no specific form, acts by no specific means, exists at no specific time, and occupies no specific place.

Quoting Rand, �To exist is to possess identity. What identity are they able to give to their superior realm? They keep telling you what it is not, but never tell you what it is. All their definitions consist of negating: God is that which no human mind can know, they say � and proceed to demand that you consider it knowledge � God is non-man, heaven is non-earth, soul is non-body . . . perception is non-sensory, knowledge is non-reason. Their definitions are not acts of defining but of wiping out.� (AS, p. 1035)

- Bill

Post 228

Sunday, July 1, 2007 - 2:29pm

The intellectual road that led me to discover hypercomplex numbers began with recognition of the following truth, cited by William:

[T]here are no units in reality that are pure 3, without being 3 something -- 3 people, 3 sides, 3 atoms, as you say. The visual-auditory symbol must refer to three particular units of some kind. They can be three units of any kind, but they must be three units of some kind.

It is largely, but not exclusively, for this reason that I say my thinking about mathematics is based upon Rand's epistemology. (I gather that some have disputed this connection.)

Post 229

Monday, July 2, 2007 - 4:11pm

I wrote, �Certain visual sensations may be created by stimulating the brain, but not vision itself. I can have visual sensations in a dream, but there is no actual vision occurring in a dream. A true visual experience means that I actually see an object in the external world, not simply experience an hallucination.�

OK, how about the case of a blind man whose brain is electrically stimulated such that he sees a certain lamp in front of him.

Even if that were possible, he still wouldn�t be seeing an actual lamp or perceiving anything � he would simply be experiencing a mental image no different from an hallucination.

I wrote, �But the point was simply that consciousness emerges at the end of a process of evolutionary development; it does not exist at the beginning, which it would have to if God were the origin of the universe.�

God could very well be an eternal being to whom it belongs naturally to be conscious.

Then please tell me what this conscious being called �God� actually is. Is it an animal? Is it a plant? Is it an inanimate object? What is it that is conscious? Consciousness is not a fundamental constituent of existence, but a faculty that emerges within living organisms at a certain stage of their evolution.

There is no reason, in any case, why consciousness is something that has to emerge over time. Indeed, there are possible worlds in which conscious beings have existed for an eternity.

Are there? How do you know? You have no evidence for their possibility. The only evidence you have indicates that since consciousness evolved from material organisms, its existence depends on the prior existence of certain material conditions, in the absence of which it would not have arisen.

I wrote, �Well, according to the evolutionary record, animals evolved from lower, non-sentient forms of life, so before their emergence, there was no consciousness.�

What? First establish that life exists only on earth.

I don�t have to, because it�s rational to conclude that given similar conditions for life on other planets, living organisms would evolve in similar ways, with consciousness arising only after the emergence of lower forms of life and continuing to exist thereafter because of its survival value.

Leibniz wrote: "In a wholly materialistic universe, all laws--including biological or psychological laws--reduce to physics. Cf. grand unification and string theories."

I replied: �I don�t know what you mean when you say �reduce� to physics. The parts � i.e., the constituent elements � can themselves be subject to the laws of physics, but the integration of the parts are subject to altogether different laws.�

They wouldn't be "altogether different laws," for they would be wholly derivable from the fundamental laws of physics. How could they not be?

What do you mean by �wholly derivable�? Do you mean that the laws of chemistry just are the laws of sub-atomic physics, and that the latter is sufficient to explain chemical composition and interaction? I don�t think so. If that were true, why would we need a separate science of chemistry? Do you mean that the laws of biology � e.g., of plant growth, in which a plant�s roots move toward water and its leaves turn toward the sun � just are the laws of sub-atomic physics in which photons behave in altogether different ways? If that were true, why would we need a separate science of biology? Or do you mean that by studying the laws of sub-atomic physics, one can derive the laws of chemistry and biology, without studying the behavior of chemical elements or the nature of living organisms? I�m sure you recognize that that would be impossible.

There are clearly emergent properties that make the study of sub-atomic physics insufficient to explain the behavior of chemical elements or of biological organisms. Different laws of action and behavior apply to the macroscopic world than apply to the microscopic.

Quantum mechanics . . . must, apply to the action of conscious organisms if these organisms are in fact wholly physical beings.

So are you saying that if conscious organisms were wholly physical beings, they would act differently than they do now, because they would be governed by the laws of quantum mechanics instead of by the laws of biology and psychology? If so, how would their action be different? And if their action would not be any different, then what could it possibly mean to say that their action is governed by the laws of quantum mechanics instead of by the laws of biology and psychology?

I wrote, �Let�s be very clear what the argument is:

"All animals are physical organisms.
"All conscious beings are animals (because consciousness requires a brain and sense organs).
"Therefore, all conscious beings are physical organisms.

�This exactly parallels the rock example:

�All inanimate objects are non-sentient.
"All rocks are inanimate.
"Therefore, all rocks are non-sentient.�

I dispute premise 2 of the first argument. For there is no reason to think it necessary that all conscious beings are animals.

But I don't dispute premise 2 of the second argument, for it seems clear to me that all rocks are inanimate definitionally. But I don't believe it is similarly true that all conscious beings are animals definitionally.

Suppose I said that on some distant planet, we�ll find a rock that�s a living organism. Would you say that's impossible, because a rock is definitionally an inanimate object? Well, then I would say that it�s impossible on some distant planet to find a rock that�s conscious, because consciousness is definitionally the faculty of a living organism, specifically of an animal.

- Bill

Post 230

Sunday, July 8, 2007 - 12:39am