Re: Modern Physical theory as a basis for Ethical and Existential Nihilism
Stathis Papaioannou wrote: Take these two statements: (a) Dulce et decorum est/ Pro patria mori (Wilfred Owen) (b) He died in the trenches during WW I from chlorine gas poisoning The former conveys feelings, values, wishes, while the latter conveys facts. The former is not true or false in the same way as the latter statement is. This has always seemed obvious to me and it has been stated in one form or another by philosophers of an empiricist bent since David Hume. Does anyone subscribing to this list really disagree that (a) and (b) are different at some fundamental level? Well since I don't really read Latin, this will be a little tough. Luckily this website does read latin. http://lysy2.archives.nd.edu/cgi-bin/words.exe?Dulce+et+decorum+est http://lysy2.archives.nd.edu/cgi-bin/words.exe?Pro+patria+mori So I'll assume that the second one is something like It's good to die for one's country. So what is this saying? It may simply be explaining that countries would do better if people were willing to die for them. If one were to do some kind of game-theory model of geopolitical evolution, one might conclude that this is factually true. What does the first one say? flattery is pleasing? or sweetness is a virtue? I'm sure that given enough time, one could show that both of these have a basis in evolution and specifically the evolution of successful cooperative social behaviour. Moral truths are complex truths. That doesn't make them less true. Just harder to explain. Eric
Re: Modern Physical theory as a basis for Ethical and Existential Nihilism
At 14:54 29/01/04 +1100, Stathis Papaioannou wrote: (a) Dulce et decorum est/ Pro patria mori (Wilfred Owen) (b) He died in the trenches during WW I from chlorine gas poisoning The former conveys feelings, values, wishes, while the latter conveys facts. The former is not true or false in the same way as the latter statement is. This has always seemed obvious to me and it has been stated in one form or another by philosophers of an empiricist bent since David Hume. Does anyone subscribing to this list really disagree that (a) and (b) are different at some fundamental level? I agree. I could even say that it is such nuance that I like to capture in some formal way to make it clearer. Actually, without pretending it is exactly that, that fundamental difference you single out here, is akin to the difference between first person and third person. But I quasi take as an (uncommunicable as it may be) fact that there is such a deep difference. Some will say come on, the subjective apprehension cannot be formalised. True, but there are tools to formalize, after some shift of level things which are not formalizable, at the previous level. But my point here is that I agree the difference between a and b is fundamental. Like I agree with your post where you say that science (per se) has nothing to say about ethic, which is different from saying that we cannot have a scientific attitude when discussing about ethic principle. I agree with you but that comforts my point: perhaps you would agree, for a time, even to take such a difference as an axiom? What I really like in comp, is that grand-mother is just uneliminable; I mean grand-mother psychology, also called folk psychology (but then somehow if you look at the details you will see that grand-mother physics have to be eliminated...) Bruno
Re: Subjective measure? How does that work?
Wei Dai writes: Maybe a different example will make my point clearer. We could be living in base reality or a simulation. You can choose a measure in which the observer-moments like us living in base reality have a greater measure, or one in which the observer-moments living in simulations have a greater measure. These two measures have different implications on rational behavior. The former implies we should plan for the far future, whereas the latter says we should live for today because the simulation might end at any moment, and we should try to behave in ways that wouldn't bore the people who might be running and observing the simulation. (See Robin Hanson's How To Live In A Simulation, http://hanson.gmu.edu/lifeinsim.html). Can you offer any arguments that one of these choices is irrational? What about arguments that attempt to estimate the fraction of observers who are in simulations versus in base realities, such as Nick Bostrom's Simulation Argument, www.simulation-argument.com? Are you saying that such arguments are pointless, and that no matter how convincing they became, both choices would be equally rational? What is the difference between these kinds of arguments, and those based on observation? Or would you say that it is rational to reject observations? After all, among the infinity of universal distributions there are enough to justify rejecting any specific observation as a flying rabbit, a special case exception which is built into the UTM that defines the distribution. There exist universal distributions which can accommodate any such exceptions. Doesn't this philosophy ultimately reject all evidence, and further, make it impossible to make predictions? There is a universal measure which is consistent with my past observations and yet lets me conclude that the sun won't rise tomorrow. Is it just a matter of taste and not rationality that determines my beliefs on this matter? If my understanding of these questions is correct, we have to find a stronger set of rules and constraints on rationality, for the term to have a useful meaning. Maybe we don't have them yet, but it isn't acceptable to call such a wide range of behaviors rational. Hal
Re: Modern Physical theory as a basis for Ethical and Existential Nihilism
fact vs. value; formal vs. informal; precise vs. vague; objective vs. subjective; third person vs. first person; computation vs. thought; brain vs. mind; David Chalmer's easy problem vs. hard problem of consciousness: To me, this dichotomy remains the biggest mystery in science and philosophy. I have very reluctantly settled on the idea that there is a fundamental (=irreducible=axiomatic) difference here, which I know is something of a copout. I really would like to have one scientific theory that at least potentially explains everything. As it is, even finding a clear way of stating the dichotomy is proving elusive. Some previous posts in the current thread have attacked this idea by, for example, explaining ethics in terms of evolutionary theory or game theory, but this is like explaining a statement about the properties of sodium chloride in terms of the evolutionary or game theoretic advantages of the study of chemistry. Yes, you can legitimately talk about ethics or chemistry in these terms, but in so doing you are talking meta-ethics or meta-chemistry, which I think is what Bruno means by level shift. Stathis Papaioannou From: Bruno Marchal [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Re: Modern Physical theory as a basis for Ethical and Existential Nihilism Date: Thu, 29 Jan 2004 17:27:40 +0100 At 14:54 29/01/04 +1100, Stathis Papaioannou wrote: (a) Dulce et decorum est/ Pro patria mori (Wilfred Owen) (b) He died in the trenches during WW I from chlorine gas poisoning The former conveys feelings, values, wishes, while the latter conveys facts. The former is not true or false in the same way as the latter statement is. This has always seemed obvious to me and it has been stated in one form or another by philosophers of an empiricist bent since David Hume. Does anyone subscribing to this list really disagree that (a) and (b) are different at some fundamental level? I agree. I could even say that it is such nuance that I like to capture in some formal way to make it clearer. Actually, without pretending it is exactly that, that fundamental difference you single out here, is akin to the difference between first person and third person. But I quasi take as an (uncommunicable as it may be) fact that there is such a deep difference. Some will say come on, the subjective apprehension cannot be formalised. True, but there are tools to formalize, after some shift of level things which are not formalizable, at the previous level. But my point here is that I agree the difference between a and b is fundamental. Like I agree with your post where you say that science (per se) has nothing to say about ethic, which is different from saying that we cannot have a scientific attitude when discussing about ethic principle. I agree with you but that comforts my point: perhaps you would agree, for a time, even to take such a difference as an axiom? What I really like in comp, is that grand-mother is just uneliminable; I mean grand-mother psychology, also called folk psychology (but then somehow if you look at the details you will see that grand-mother physics have to be eliminated...) Bruno _ E-mail just got a whole lot better. New ninemsn Premium. Click here http://ninemsn.com.au/premium/landing.asp
