Philosophy Discussion Forums | A Humans-Only Club for Open-Minded Discussion & Debate

[Sy Borg]

About emerging.

So there is an uninhabited world with no relationship to subjects. Now subjects emerge from this world - or do not emerge. Think of this latter alternative. What does it mean that such a world exists, instead of this world that we are experiencing? The uninhabited past of our world has meaning because we are here to give it a meaning, and we can say it exists or has existed, but without our being in the world the world and its possible existence has no meaning. Existence without subjects makes no sense. Matter without subjects makes no sense. In the same way as a transcendent God is purely fictitious, also transcendent matter, matter without a relationship with subjectivity, is purely fictitious.

I can consider a world without subjects - every one of them we know aside from Earth. There's a lot of exoplanets without a relationship to subjectivity until a researcher spots it.

I would also prefer not shift the emphasis from "existence" to "meaning". No point talking about meaning. Indeed, plasma, gas and rocks are not big on conferring meaning to things. However, celestial objects - without subjects - still always go through the same motions as conscious beings.

Consider the proto-planetary disc from which we emerged. There existed in that rubble of our star's ignition all manner of entities - some of them were dominant (a few of these ended up being the seeds of the known planets). Many smaller rocks were simply fodder, destined for assimilation or disintegration. Some were faster, slower, some more loose, others more compact. Most followed the heliocentric orbit but others followed eccentric paths in varying degrees. It was a community just like any other, except that its occupants were neither conscious nor sensate.

Rather than being fundamental, consciousness appears to be layered over - and typically subject to - pre-existing nonconscious dynamics.

[Felix]

I suppose the most you could say is that conditions in our universe, the structure of our universe, made life and sentient beings inevitable, which made the fact that it will have meaning inevitable.

[BigBango]

Not convincing BB. The quantum fluctuation was not in "nothing" but was one of truly countless fluctuations - just that one virtual particle that popped into existence did not pop out again and instead expanded.

Of course Greta, I understand there may have been many quantum fluctuations. Those fluctuations are understood by science as events that created visible matter. They may have created the other 90% of the mass of the universe but that is not an established fact. My point is not that I know for a fact that subjects existed separate from the collapse of the visible pre-world galaxies, my point is that it is possible. Your point seemed to be that because of the plasma, hot gasses that there could not be "subjects" before the BB. You are wrong and I may be right.

Humans are a minority, their existence emerging upon a much larger layer of animals.

Animals are a minority, their existence emerging upon a much larger layer of plants.

Plants are a minority, their existence emerging upon a much larger layer of microbes.

Microbes are a minority, their existence emerging upon a much larger layer of geology.

Geology is a small part of what constitutes geology, its existence emerging from much more prevalent plasma.

Baryonic matter (plasma and stuff) is a minority, its existence emerging upon a much larger layer of dark matter.

Dark matter is a minority, its existence emerging upon a much larger layer of dark energy.

We can confer subject status to any of these, but it will only be supposition.

I appreciate your very "ordered mind", but you fail to see the possibilities of a "fractal" evolution rather than simply a gradually evolution from the simple to the more complex.

I remember one of your earlier posts where you seemed to think that "similarity" between existents like atoms and galaxies may be "fractals" That is a misconception. In a 2-dimensial fract like rivers and coastlines there are no separate similar figures. We draw a river with straight lines which completely erases its fractal nature. The same with coastlines. At higher resolution you start to draw the rivers edge and you see that its line is broken by a rivulet that looks like a smaller river. The river is a fractal because its structure is formed from similar structures.

I never suggested that humans existed before the BB. I asserted that "subjects" may have existed before the BB. If they did they were the lower "fractal" subjectivity of our current world. Sure our human intelligence emerged from the evolution of cells, but not without the help of the "subjectivity" that existed before the BB.

[Sy Borg]

I suppose the most you could say is that conditions in our universe, the structure of our universe, made life and sentient beings inevitable, which made the fact that it will have meaning inevitable.

Well said.

[Sy Borg]

Not convincing BB. The quantum fluctuation was not in "nothing" but was one of truly countless fluctuations - just that one virtual particle that popped into existence did not pop out again and instead expanded.

Of course Greta, I understand there may have been many quantum fluctuations. Those fluctuations are understood by science as events that created visible matter. They may have created the other 90% of the mass of the universe but that is not an established fact. My point is not that I know for a fact that subjects existed separate from the collapse of the visible pre-world galaxies, my point is that it is possible. Your point seemed to be that because of the plasma, hot gasses that there could not be "subjects" before the BB. You are wrong and I may be right.

If you are a adjudicator, you would say that :D

However, now it is my turn to be adjudicator. Firstly, yes, I should have added some qualifiers. It should have read:

It is posited that the quantum fluctuation was not in "nothing" but was one of truly countless fluctuations. Krauss proposed that just that one virtual particle that popped into existence did not pop out again and instead expanded.

The only way I can imagine subjects existing before the BB is if some ultra advanced life (or post life) survived the death of their universe. That's possible IMO. Who is to say that the BB was the first? Ii may have been the billionth.

Humans are a minority, their existence emerging upon a much larger layer of animals.

Animals are a minority, their existence emerging upon a much larger layer of plants.

Plants are a minority, their existence emerging upon a much larger layer of microbes.

Microbes are a minority, their existence emerging upon a much larger layer of geology.

Geology is a small part of what constitutes geology, its existence emerging from much more prevalent plasma.

Baryonic matter (plasma and stuff) is a minority, its existence emerging upon a much larger layer of dark matter.

Dark matter is a minority, its existence emerging upon a much larger layer of dark energy.

We can confer subject status to any of these, but it will only be supposition.

I appreciate your very "ordered mind", but you fail to see the possibilities of a "fractal" evolution rather than simply a gradually evolution from the simple to the more complex.

I remember one of your earlier posts where you seemed to think that "similarity" between existents like atoms and galaxies may be "fractals" That is a misconception. In a 2-dimensial fract like rivers and coastlines there are no separate similar figures. We draw a river with straight lines which completely erases its fractal nature. The same with coastlines. At higher resolution you start to draw the rivers edge and you see that its line is broken by a rivulet that looks like a smaller river. The river is a fractal because its structure is formed from similar structures.

I never suggested that humans existed before the BB. I asserted that "subjects" may have existed before the BB. If they did they were the lower "fractal" subjectivity of our current world. Sure our human intelligence emerged from the evolution of cells, but not without the help of the "subjectivity" that existed before the BB.

Be glad not to be living in such an "ordered mind", BB - it takes a lot of chaos to motivate one to order things so :)

Actually, fractal evolution is my best guess as to what the universe is doing.

As for the idea of repeated dynamics in the fractal layers of reality, I reaffirm what I'd posited before that reality keeps throwing up areas of extreme density (be it energetically or informationally). These objects strongly influence the local environment, forming a feedback loops of varying "equality", eg. atoms, eukaryotic cells, planets, stars, black holes, galaxies. I posit an informational fractal relationship between such entities. If you refute that, I'd welcome a debate but maybe should start a new thread.

What do you mean by subjects in: '... the lower "fractal" subjectivity of our current world'?

[Mosesquine]

Consciousness should be physical. Every illusionary being like unicorns, flying spaghetti monster, gods, etc. is never physical. Consciousness is not an illusionary being. Every non-illusionary being is physical. This follows that consciousness is physical.

[Sy Borg]

... noting that there's probably still a fair bit of physical material in reality that we don't know about.

[Karpel Tunnel]

Consciousness should be physical. Every illusionary being like unicorns, flying spaghetti monster, gods, etc. is never physical. Consciousness is not an illusionary being. Every non-illusionary being is physical. This follows that consciousness is physical.

Sure, as long as we keep expanding the definition of what can be called physical, which we did for example through the whole of the 20th century, consciousness will also end up being called physical. But the word only means real, it is not a comment on substance type. Not any more.

[Tamminen]

There may be vast regions of the universe without consciousness, inaccessible to any conscious being. There may have been a time in our universe prior to consciousness and there may be a time in which there no longer will be consciousness.

We all understand this. I expected you would read the discussion we have had on the subject so you would understand that this is not the point I made. The question is if there must be subjects in the alternate universe seen as a spatiotemporal totality, for us to be able to consistently imagine the world without subjects, an alternate world for our world, not a parallel one. The answer is not as simple as you suggest. Or for me it is simple, but others do not seem to get the point, of which I am a bit surprised. But I admit it requires a reflective insight to see this. We can say that the subject turns the light of existence on or off. And it is never off, because nonexistence is self-contradictory.

Only Halc understands the holistic viewpoint. Greta ignores it repeatedly. I trust you because I have seen you can go deep if you reach another's horizon of thinking.

So, from the holistic perspective, can we consistently imagine the world without subjects, and can such a world, an alternate or possible world exist? It is a question of what we mean by 'existing'. We can imagine an uninhabited world as an abstraction, as I wrote in a recent post, but this picture before our eyes proves to be internally inconsistent and the whole idea breaks down. Existence is necessarily related with subjectivity.

The idea of matter being transcendent is purely fictitious, but this does not mean there cannot be matter without a relationship with subjectivity. It may be that matter gives rise to subjectivity under the right conditions. Once it does there is a relationship but where it does not there is no relationship until or unless a conscious being becomes aware of it.

From the holistic perspective the being of subjectivity and its individual manifestations is necessary, although it has its history of course, a history of becoming and "emerging" from uninhabited phases, like a conscious human being has its non-conscious history as an embryo. I see the universe, as well as the living organism, as a process of becoming conscious.

[Fooloso4]

Tamminen:

We can say that the subject turns the light of existence on or off. And it is never off, because nonexistence is self-contradictory.

There is a logical gap here. It does not follow from the fact that there are subjects that are aware of existence that without subjects there would be no existence, unless you define existence in such a way that it entails existence. But such a priori reasoning tells us nothing about what must be.

I won’t get into the semantical problems of nonexistence that lead to misleading claim that nonexistence is self-contradictory.

We can imagine an uninhabited world as an abstraction, as I wrote in a recent post, but this picture before our eyes proves to be internally inconsistent and the whole idea breaks down. Existence is necessarily related with subjectivity.

This means nothing more than that to imagine entails a subject that imagines.

From the holistic perspective the being of subjectivity and its individual manifestations is necessary … I see the universe, as well as the living organism, as a process of becoming conscious.

Your image of the universe becoming conscious tells us nothing about necessity unless you insist on a strictly deterministic universe in which each and every thing is and happens of necessity.

[Tamminen]

I would also prefer not shift the emphasis from "existence" to "meaning".

If we want to posit the possibility of the existence of something, we must give some meaning to its existence, be able to imagine it. I am arguing that we cannot consistently give any meaning to the existence of the subjectless universe. We only believe we can. It is something like trying to imagine what it is like to not-exist personally. Some have tried and seen Heavens and Paradises, some others see nothing and say there will be nothing, which means that there is non-being, which is self-contradictory. So there remains a paradox in the case of our personal lives as well as in the case of the universe. The only consistent solution to the paradoxes seems to be the absolute nature of subjectivity.

[Tamminen]

Tamminen:

We can say that the subject turns the light of existence on or off. And it is never off, because nonexistence is self-contradictory.

There is a logical gap here. It does not follow from the fact that there are subjects that are aware of existence that without subjects there would be no existence, unless you define existence in such a way that it entails existence. But such a priori reasoning tells us nothing about what must be.

I won’t get into the semantical problems of nonexistence that lead to misleading claim that nonexistence is self-contradictory.

I know this cannot be proved with formal logic, because of the limitations of logic, but imagining the world without subjects collapses into an internal inconsistency on an a priori basis. I am not saying anything more. Just think about it.

We can imagine an uninhabited world as an abstraction, as I wrote in a recent post, but this picture before our eyes proves to be internally inconsistent and the whole idea breaks down. Existence is necessarily related with subjectivity.

This means nothing more than that to imagine entails a subject that imagines.

No, the original argument was that it is possible to imagine the subjectless world, and I am arguing that it is not possible, because its imagining is inconsistent. The positing of such a world loses all meaning, and therefore it is impossible to imagine it in a consistent way. The next step is the question of its possible existence.

From the holistic perspective the being of subjectivity and its individual manifestations is necessary … I see the universe, as well as the living organism, as a process of becoming conscious.

Your image of the universe becoming conscious tells us nothing about necessity unless you insist on a strictly deterministic universe in which each and every thing is and happens of necessity.

Do you think that the embryo becomes conscious by accident? Is it possible that there is some kind of an internal tendency for that kind of evolution?

The question of the deterministic universe is interesting, but I think my view allows the kind of probabilistic nature of events that modern physics describes. I appreciate science.

[Fooloso4]

Tamminen:

I know this cannot be proved with formal logic, because of the limitations of logic, but imagining the world without subjects collapses into an internal inconsistency on an a priori basis. I am not saying anything more. Just think about it.

The inconsistency does not lie in the world that is imagined. What would be inconsistent is to deny the imagining subject, but this does not mean that a world must have an imagining subject, only that the imagined world must have an imagining subject who imagines it.

The next step is the question of its possible existence.

And this is where your argument falters. To take the step, to question its possible existence entails a subject that can take the step, a subject who asks the question of its possible existence. But this is self-reflexive. You are trapped in a closed logical loop.

Do you think that the embryo becomes conscious by accident?

Not wholly by accident but accident does play a part. First, not every embryo becomes conscious. Second, the conditions that gave right to life need not have occurred. Of course, in that case we would not be here talking about it.

Is it possible that there is some kind of an internal tendency for that kind of evolution?

What does internal tendency mean? If something exists is there an internal tendency for it to exist? If it is a tendency then it is not a necessity that it exist.

I do not know that evolution must lead to consciousness, only that in our case it has.

The question of the deterministic universe is interesting, but I think my view allows the kind of probabilistic nature of events that modern physics describes. I appreciate science.

What is probable is not necessary. None of us know the probability that conscious life-forms would evolve, only that the chances were good enough that they did evolve here and now. Are we unique? Maybe … maybe not.

[Tamminen]

The problem is that we try to posit a transcendent material world without subjects as the basis of subjects. But why should we posit a world that has no relationship with us? What is the motive to posit such an abstraction as concrete reality? Note that all the uninhabited regions and times of our universe have a relationship with us, because we live in the same universe as those regions.

All this leads to the question of what 'existence' means, and the answer tells the difference between materialists and anti-materialists.

[tommarcus]

Consciousness or more accurately self awareness (since we are not talking about just being awake) is not physical because it does not follow the natural laws of the physical world.

It did not result from evolution. All life seems to have self-awareness. It is hard to believe that my cat doesn't have self-awareness, or a bird, a fish or even an insect. These living creatures have been around for billions of years and so has self-awareness.

Life does not need self-awareness to exist or function. Theoretically, a robot can be programmed to act like us without being given self-awareness.

Self-awareness does not follow the cause and effect of the physical world. Either you have It completely or you don't. Nothing changes it by making it stronger or weaker.

Therefore, if self-awareness is not part if our three dimensional world, it must be evidence for and part of another dimension which is separate from the physical world. It must reside in some nonphysical state

As such, a corollary to this question is why do we have it in the first place since it is not necessary for us to operate in the physical world?