Philosophy Discussion Forums | A Humans-Only Philosophy Club

[GE Morton]

Sure. Be happy to go back to the Searle thread and copy/past your quote where you said material neuron's exclusively cause all human behavior.

Yes, that is my claim.

1. Are you now claiming humans are not 'sentient'?

No, I have not claimed that. You appear to be assuming otherwise. Why?

2. Are you now claiming material neuron's in themselves, do not cause human behavior?

No. I've claimed many times that they do, and re-affirm that above. Why would you think otherwise?

3. And are you now claiming neuron's have no qualities of consciousness?

Correct; they do not. Do you see some inconsistency there? If so, point it out.

[GE Morton]

We can easily get a true statement by adding the following prefix: "According to the Harry Potter stories, students attend Hogwarts for seven years." But the question is whether the statement "Students attend Hogwarts for seven years" alone is true.

Whether a proposition is true or false depends upon the ontological realm assumed --- the phenomenal realm, the noumenal realm, or the conceptual construct/artifact realm.

[3017Metaphysician]

Sure. Be happy to go back to the Searle thread and copy/past your quote where you said material neuron's exclusively cause all human behavior.

Yes, that is my claim.

Does that mean angry neuron's cause human anger or, does some other thing cause human anger?

1. Are you now claiming humans are not 'sentient'?

No, I have not claimed that. You appear to be assuming otherwise. Why?

Because material neurons can't get angry (or can they) yet you claim they cause all human behavior?

2. Are you now claiming material neuron's in themselves, do not cause human behavior?

No. I've claimed many times that they do, and re-affirm that above. Why would you think otherwise?

Great. Are you now suggesting neurons are sentient?

3. And are you now claiming neuron's have no qualities of consciousness?

Correct; they do not. Do you see some inconsistency there? If so, point it out.

Sure. If neurons have no qualitative properties, how can they cause human feeling?

[Consul]

No, what exists only according to some fiction exists in no sense (of "to exist"). Fictional objects are nothing but nonexistent objects of thought or imagination, and there is nothing self-contradictory about saying so.

Think that through. If objects of thought don't exist, then of what are we speaking? By acknowledging or postulating an "object of thought" you per force assert its existence. You can say that nothing satisfying its description exists in the "external world" or within the scope of the laws of physics, but not that it "doesn't exist in any sense."

If something I think about doesn't exist, I still think of it.
Objects of thought needn't be mere objects of thought, since I/we can think both about existent things and about nonexistent ones. I do not "postulate" nonexistent thought-objects, because I do not claim self-contradictorily that nonexistent thought-objects exist. I'm merely claiming that some of my/our thought-objects don't exist, which is different from claiming that there (really) are nonexistent thought-objects.

Moreover, there are different kinds of existents, but no different meanings of "existence". Existing as an elephant is different from existing as a mouse, simply because elephants are different in kind from mice, and not because they exist in different senses of "exist". Existence is a genus with exactly one species, so to speak: Existence is existence, and there aren't any lower or higher forms of it—"subsistence" or "supersistence".

"If an object is non-existent, it is non-existent. End of story."

(Priest, Graham. An Introduction to Non-Classical Logic: From If to Is. 2nd ed. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2008. p. 296)

No, it is not the case that "anything we can denote with a term and usefully communicate about exists," because many things we meaningfully think or talk about, mention or refer to have no form of being, existence, or reality whatsoever. They are just not there, being nowhere and nowhen!

Of course they are somewhere --- wherever and whenever we think about them or talk about them. Do you really want to say thoughts, ideas, etc., don't exist?

There is a difference between an object of thought and the thought of an object. The existence of thought-objects is one thing, and the existence of object-thoughts is another. Of course, thoughts exist somewhere, namely in people's minds/brains. When I think of Sherlock Holmes, my thoughts of him are in my mind/brain; but he is not, and he isn't anywhere else either.

It is a necessary truth that for all nonexistent thought-objects there is some existent object-thought representing it. The concept of a (conceptually, linguistically, or otherwise semiotically) nonrepresented nonexistent object is incoherent. Existent objects (of thought) aren't necessarily represented by some kind of signs or other, but nonexistent ones are.

[Consul]

If something I think about doesn't exist, I still think of it.

Of course, those who believe that aboutness or reference is a bilaterally existence-entailing relation will disagree; but I disagree with their disagreement, thinking that it can be a "thin" or purely intentional relation that isn't bilaterally existence-entailing. That is to say, aboutness or reference requires only the existence of thinkers and thoughts (or other kinds of representations). What the thoughts are about needn't exist. There can be reference without any existing referent!

[Consul]

We can easily get a true statement by adding the following prefix: "According to the Harry Potter stories, students attend Hogwarts for seven years." But the question is whether the statement "Students attend Hogwarts for seven years" alone is true.

Whether a proposition is true or false depends upon the ontological realm assumed --- the phenomenal realm, the noumenal realm, or the conceptual construct/artifact realm.

I'm talking about truth simpliciter, i.e. truth considered absolutely, without any qualification or condition. What is only fictionally true isn't really true! Is it really true that students attend Hogwarts for seven years?

[3017Metaphysician]

Commenting on a few early comments in the topic.

If we take a notion of something that doesn't exist, example, no matter or energy might have existed in zero-t conditions, can we say that the E =mc^2 is zero for E and m, or are we prohibited from asigning a number value to something that doesn't exist, and what would this mean for c?

At the instant of the big bang, things are singular and E, m, and c are essentially undefined.
Energy/momentum/etc. are not conserved in an expanding metric, so one cannot say that the universe of shortly after the big bang had comparable values to today. It is also questionable if the total energy of the universe (sum of both positive and negative energies) is/was greater than zero, but if it is zero, would you subsequently say that it doesn't exist?

We say that t is zero in zero t. By this argument, does it mean time exists

Yes. Zero is just a sync point and can be assigned anywhere. I cannot buy into zero meaning nonexistence. One's altitude is zero at sea level, which doesn't mean that things at sea level don't have a location.

To assign a number value, we must first have something to assign it to.

For instance, I don't buy this. We can assign 7 to the number of years one attends at Hogwarts despite the lack of existence of Hogwarts or pupils.

If zero-t is 'before time', then all bets are off. What would that even mean?

Totally agree with this.

There might be physics on the other side of the big bang, but it seems unlikely that time or velocity or distance as we know them are meaningful there.

Axiom. Two objects cannot occupy the same space.

Seems to be at least in need of some constraints then. My liver and my torso occupy the same space. OK, that's arguably the same thing, one being a component of the other. But your axiom is also classical. In quantum mechanics, an object doesn't occupy space, it simply has a probability of being measured at various locations in space, and more than one object has a probability of being measured at any given location in space, which doesn't violate your classical axiom, but it sure gets close.

Can we create a universe?

This is a category error. Creation is something that occurs in time to an object, by rearranging existing energy/material into a new configuration. It implies something containing the material from which it is made, which contradicts most definitions of 'universe'.

Halc!

Thank you again for imparting your wisdom. Of course, it's worth the redundancy to note that at zero elevation sea level there is something and not nothing. But I do want to ask you a question about numbers if I may. (Actually I want to ask more than one but I'll restrain myself.)

1. Do you think, since 'numbers' or equation's describe the initial conditions prior to the BB, that there is any significance to that? And a follow-up, as you alluded in your other replies, our equation's indeed only speak to 'subsequent' BB events, and does not capture the exact or precise moment in time. Does that in itself have any significance for you?

[The Beast]

The Beast wrote: ↑August 26th, 2022, 2:24 pm
Axiom. Two objects cannot occupy the same space.
Seems to be at least in need of some constraints then. My liver and my torso occupy the same space. OK, that's arguably the same thing, one being a component of the other. But your axiom is also classical. In quantum mechanics, an object doesn't occupy space, it simply has a probability of being measured at various locations in space, and more than one object has a probability of being measured at any given location in space, which doesn't violate your classical axiom, but it sure gets close.

Halc. Yes and no. It is an expression.
OP 'Assigning number values to non-existing things. E= mc2.
If mass equals zero, then E=0'
However, we might substitute m with heat and gravity/pressure. There is the Universe “object” in the initial format per the Standard theory having no mass as particles yet as a Universal volume. There is volume (original), density, collisions, temperature, gravity, Energy phases, electronvolts… predicates in the ontology of existence since it is a mathematical construct based on outcomes (beliefs). There is a volume… may as well be “there is mass” in the electronvolt conversion and particle conversion. Then at some t the Big Bang happened. In relative numbers t=ignition.
I am considering numbers as part of the senses. Reality perception by the numbers as in synesthesia. So, I’m sensing the Universe as an object existing/occupying the Universal space at t = x. (t) being defined by collisions and formations. At some point t=x1 photons achieved their speed and E= mc2 its energy conversion spectrum. The question of zero is a philosophical one. However, a definition of zero as non-significant is allowed if stated in declarations. A non- significant time would be the time needed for light to travel one micromillimeter and yet quantifiable and expressible (non-significant expressed by the mathematical sense)

[GE Morton]

Sure. If neurons have no qualitative properties, how can they cause human feeling?

Because causes, in general, need not have the properties of their effects. Indeed, most causes do not have the properties of the effects they cause. E.g., lightning is caused by interactions between air currents with different charges. Air currents don't emit light or start fires; lightning has those properties. Or, some bacteria and viruses cause diseases, with fevers and tissue damage, to other organisms. Bacteria and viruses don't have diseases, fevers or tissue damage. Burning hydrogen in the presence of oxygen causes water to form. Water is wet; neither hydrogen, oxygen nor heat are wet. Or, charged particles moving faster than light in a medium cause Cherenkov radiation, which has a blue glow. The moving particles are not blue. Etc.

Your assumption that the causes of an effect must have the properties of the effect is false.

As for, "How can they cause feelings?," --- we don't know. But we don't need to know how X causes Y to know that it does cause it. Before the development of thermodynamics and atomic theory people didn't know just how heating water caused steam to form. But they certainly knew it did cause it.

[Halc]

Thank you again for imparting your wisdom.

Bit of a stretch to call it that, unless it is sarcasm, something for which I've been told I have little radar.

1. Do you think, since 'numbers' or equation's describe the initial conditions prior to the BB, that there is any significance to that?[/quote]I sure didn't say that. I wouldn't say the phrase 'prior to the BB", and I said that things are singular at the BB, so no meaningful 'conditions'.

And a follow-up, as you alluded in your other replies, our equation's indeed only speak to 'subsequent' BB events, and does not capture the exact or precise moment in time. Does that in itself have any significance for you?

That only subsequent conditions are described. It's been a sort of Zeno thing, where they've driven their descriptions ever closer to the goal line, but they never reach it.

The interesting question is whether statements such as this one are true; and if they are, what makes them true given that Hogwarts and its students don't exist?

The truth of any statement (concerning fiction or reality) is probably context dependent, so it's the relevant context that makes them true, false, undetermined, or meaningless.
What you call 'nonlinguistic numbers' is what I call 'number', the vast majority of which cannot be expressed via any language or abstraction. For instance, the set of expressible real numbers are countable, but set of real numbers is not.
I have ideas about numbers themselves (as opposed to any abstraction of them), but that would seem off-topic.

[GE Morton]

If something I think about doesn't exist, I still think of it.
Objects of thought needn't be mere objects of thought, since I/we can think both about existent things and about nonexistent ones.

Begs the question. If it exists "in thought," it exists in some sense. You're just (arbitrarily and unnecessarily) restricting "exists" there to physical ("external world") existents. That restriction renders much of common (and highly useful) speech meaningless; i.e., you're forced to deny that love, anger, ideas, thoughts --- all conscious phenomena --- exist.

I do not "postulate" nonexistent thought-objects, because I do not claim self-contradictorily that nonexistent thought-objects exist. I'm merely claiming that some of my/our thought-objects don't exist, which is different from claiming that there (really) are nonexistent thought-objects.

"I'm merely claiming that some of my/our thought-objects don't exist" --- by which you mean, "Don't exist as physical (external world) entities." Right? Why not just add that qualifier, rather than denying that unicorns don't exist in any sense? Surely you'll agree that "thought objects" exist (as thought objects). If a unicorn is a thought object, then doesn't it exist as such?

" . . . which is different from claiming that there (really) are nonexistent thought-objects." "Nonexistent thought objects" is oxymoronic. It implies a "thought object" which is not thought.

Moreover, there are different kinds of existents, but no different meanings of "existence". Existing as an elephant is different from existing as a mouse, simply because elephants are different in kind from mice, and not because they exist in different senses of "exist". Existence is a genus with exactly one species, so to speak: Existence is existence, and there aren't any lower or higher forms of it—"subsistence" or "supersistence".

Actually I agree with that --- but only because I take "existence," "to exist," to have a meaning different from the one you assume. In my view, to say something exists is just to say that we can construct true and informative propositions about it. If we can construct true and informative propositions about Frodo Baggins, then Frodo exists. If we can construct true and informative propositions about quarks, then quarks exist. As long as we can construct true and informative propositions about the luminiferous ether, then the ether exists. When it turns out some of those propositions are false, the ether ceases to exist. The problem with "exists" is not one of ambiguity of the concept, but in mistaking the ontological category to which some existent belongs, or imputing properties applicable to one category to existents in another category.

There is a difference between an object of thought and the thought of an object.

Heh. That "difference" is pretty subtle. Contrived, even.

The existence of thought-objects is one thing, and the existence of object-thoughts is another. Of course, thoughts exist somewhere, namely in people's minds/brains. When I think of Sherlock Holmes, my thoughts of him are in my mind/brain; but he is not, and he isn't anywhere else either.

He need not be anywhere else to exist! (as a "thought object").

Existent objects (of thought) aren't necessarily represented by some kind of signs or other, but nonexistent ones are.

True. But that is the difference between physical, "external world" existents and phenomenal existents; not between existence and non-existence.

[GE Morton]

We can easily get a true statement by adding the following prefix: "According to the Harry Potter stories, students attend Hogwarts for seven years." But the question is whether the statement "Students attend Hogwarts for seven years" alone is true.

Whether a proposition is true or false depends upon the ontological realm assumed --- the phenomenal realm, the noumenal realm, or the conceptual construct/artifact realm.

I'm talking about truth simpliciter, i.e. truth considered absolutely, without any qualification or condition. What is only fictionally true isn't really true! Is it really true that students attend Hogwarts for seven years?

There is no such thing as "truth simpliciter." Truth (and falsity) are properties of propositions. Propositions always assume some context, and contextual variables can determine the truth value of the proposition. Your Harry Potter example illustrates that well.

[Consul]

The interesting question is whether statements such as this one are true; and if they are, what makes them true given that Hogwarts and its students don't exist?

The truth of any statement (concerning fiction or reality) is probably context dependent, so it's the relevant context that makes them true, false, undetermined, or meaningless.

I'm not happy with truth relativism, because I think truth is always grounded in the actual/real world, and there is only one such all-encompassing world. You can say that what makes it true that students attend Hogwarts for seven years is that there is a fictional world where students attend Hogwarts for seven years; but such a "truth-in-fiction" isn't grounded in the real world, so it isn't a real truth but a fictional one, with fictional truth being nothing but make-believe truth or fake truth.

Moreover, truth relativism is self-undermining, because if you assert its absolute truth, you're contradicting yourself; and if you assert its relative truth, you "can avoid the standard charge of self-refutation by accepting that relativism cannot be proven true in any non-relative sense—viz., that relativism itself as a philosophical position is at best true only relative to a cultural or historical context and therefore could be false in other frameworks or cultures. But such an admission will undermine the relativist’s attempt to convince others of her position, for the very act of argumentation, as it is commonly understood, is an attempt to convince those who disagree with us of the falsehood of their position."

Relativism: https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/relativism/

[Consul]

There is no such thing as "truth simpliciter."

Don't you thereby assert self-contradictorily that it is true simpliciter that there is no such thing as truth simpliciter?

Truth (and falsity) are properties of propositions. Propositions always assume some context, and contextual variables can determine the truth value of the proposition. Your Harry Potter example illustrates that well.

There is an absolute context of truth: the actual/real world.

What the primary bearers of truth values are is a contentious issue. I don't believe in the existence of propositions (qua abstract meanings of declarative sentences), so I cannot choose them as the primary bearers of truth values. For instance, Russell believes that…

"Truth is a property of beliefs, and derivatively of sentences which express beliefs. Truth consists in a certain relation between a belief and one or more facts other than the belief. When this relation is absent, the belief is false. A sentence may be called 'true' or 'false' even if no one believes it, provided that, if it were believed, the belief would be true or false as the case may be."

(Russell, Bertrand. Human Knowledge: Its Scope and Limits. 1948. Reprint, Abingdon: Routledge, 2009. p. 135)

[3017Metaphysician]

Sure. If neurons have no qualitative properties, how can they cause human feeling?

Because causes, in general, need not have the properties of their effects. Indeed, most causes do not have the properties of the effects they cause. E.g., lightning is caused by interactions between air currents with different charges. Air currents don't emit light or start fires; lightning has those properties. Or, some bacteria and viruses cause diseases, with fevers and tissue damage, to other organisms. Bacteria and viruses don't have diseases, fevers or tissue damage. Burning hydrogen in the presence of oxygen causes water to form. Water is wet; neither hydrogen, oxygen nor heat are wet. Or, charged particles moving faster than light in a medium cause Cherenkov radiation, which has a blue glow. The moving particles are not blue. Etc.

Your assumption that the causes of an effect must have the properties of the effect is false.

As for, "How can they cause feelings?," --- we don't know. But we don't need to know how X causes Y to know that it does cause it. Before the development of thermodynamics and atomic theory people didn't know just how heating water caused steam to form. But they certainly knew it did cause it.

GE!

WOW. You said neuron's cause feeling, and I'm guessing action too. If you don't mind me saying, your theory is very very strange GE. Most of us are scratching our heads, but that's ok. Let's stay with it for awhile and continue to quickly parse its weaknesses. You claim material neuron's themselves exclusively cause consciousness behavior, right? So in trying to make sense of that, it requires unusual questions. I'll keep your proposition in the 'subject line' so we don't loose sight of it.

RE: GE claims all neuron's are the exclusive causes of all human behavior

1. In your foregoing analogy, is lighting, water, and other particles equivalent to 'conscious' neuron's?
2. If all neuron's cause human feeling, are those material neuron's waiting for us to somehow advise them we need to be angry over something?
3. If neuron's are the exclusive cause to human anger, can they cause us to feel angry when they feel like it?
4. Do neuron's have primacy over making me angry, or do we have primacy over them?
5. If you believe neuron's have primacy, does that mean we somehow have to communicate with them to advise we need to be angry?
6. If you believe neuron's are material objects (which they are) like your lightening, water, etc.,, do you also consider both men and women material objects, and should they be treated as such?
7. If you believe neuron's cause all human action and conduct, how do we take responsibility for that action and conduct?
8. Are all neuron's sentient in-themselves? (I'm not sure you ever gave us a straight answer on that).