On 8/17/2011 8:47 AM, Craig Weinberg wrote:
On Aug 17, 7:57 am, "Stephen P. King"<stephe...@charter.net> wrote:
On 8/17/2011 7:01 AM, Craig Weinberg wrote:> On Aug 17, 2:16 am,
meekerdb<meeke...@verizon.net> wrote:
On 8/16/2011 10:51 PM, Craig Weinberg wrote:
Molecules in a live brain behave differently
than those in a dead brain. What is this force? Cumulative
entanglement. Significance. Negentropy. Sense.
It already has had a name for a long time: elan vital.
Elan vital is an imaginary substance. Sense is an ordinary principle
that can be observed on every level of perception.
Elan vital is what you get when you try to shoehorn experiential
private qualitative phenomena in time into observable public
quantitative phenomena in space. If you turn it upside down it looks
just like a photon.
Hi,
Could it be that there is a bit of a category error in the idea of
elan vital in that emergent behavior is being considered as a 'separate
and independent' substance? This kind of error, prevanent in many
philosophers ideas (highlighted by Descartes), seems to still haunt us.
I think that we seriously need to reconsider the entire idea of
"substance". Bruno's point about substance is very valid, IMHO.
Yes, Elan Vital is a category error (as are photons, IMHO) I agree
that substance is not what it appears to be, but neither is it a
purely arithmetic simulation. It is a category consequence.
Craig
Hi Craig,
Perhaps the explanation in terms of arithmetic (modal logic
actually) is the best attempt at an explanation so far that circumvents
this category error... It automatically brings in the Stone duality
which in turn explains the appearance of 'substance' in terms of the
'behaviors' of the topological spaces associated with the logics in a
one to one way. At this point it only seems that we quibble over
semantics...
The key is to understand that our explanatory narratives must deal
with the appearances, the phenomena if you will. The Substance paradigm
has ruled supreme for almost 2,000 years and it is so habituated and
engrained in our language that is is almost impossible to comprehend
alternatives to it.
Onward!
Stephen
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