Dreaming On
Thanks to everyone who responded to my initial sally on dreams and machines. Naturally I have arrogated the right to plagiarise your helpful comments in what follows, which is an aphoristic synthesis of my understanding of the main points that have emerged thus far. I hope this will be helpful for future discussion. THE APHORISMS We do not see the mind, we see *through* the mind. What we see through the mind - its contents - is mind-stuff: dreams. Hence dream content - i.e. whatever is capable of being present to us - can't be our ontology - this would be circular (the eye can't see itself). So the brain (i.e. what the eye can see) can't be the mind; but the intuition remains that mind and brain might be correlated by some inclusive conception that would constitute our ontology: Kant's great insight stands. It is similarly obvious that 'identity' theories and the like are non-sense: it would indeed be hard to think of two descriptions less 'identical' than brain-descriptions and mind-descriptions: hence again, any such identification could only be via some singular correlative synthesis. Hence any claim that the mind is literally identical with, or 'inside', the brain can be shown to be false by the simple - if messy - expedient of a scalpel; or else can be unmasked as implicitly dualistic: i.e. the claim is really that 'inside' and 'outside' are not merely different descriptions, but different ontologies. By extension of our individual introspecting, a plurality of minds, and the 'external world' that includes brains, can be conceived as correlated in some way - to be elucidated - in a universal synthesis or context: that context being our mutual ontology. Such a universal context, or in common terms 'what exists', cannot be fully known (i.e. can't be exhausted by description) although - or rather because - it constitutes what we are, and by extension what *everything* is. Nonetheless we may seek a logic of dreaming so far as it goes, and this will indeed be as far as anything goes in the way of knowledge claims. Mathematics may be deployed as a dream-logic: but mathematical physics, restricted to 'physical heuristics', prototypically gets stuck at the level of describing the content and behaviour of dreams, not their genesis. To go further and deeper we need an explicit mathematical specification of dreamers and their dreams, and of generative mechanisms by which dreamers and their dream contents can be constructed. Such a schema will by its nature form an analysis of how we come to believe that we and our world are real, and in what terms: i.e. how we come to know a world in a present and personal manner. Consequently such a schema must subsume within its universe of discourse: being, knowing, perceiving, acting and intending - as the foundations of what it means to be real: i.e. it must be capable of invoking the Cheshire Cat *to the life*, not merely leave its grin hanging in the void. Moving beyond bare analysis and description, any move to universalise and 'realise' the axioms of such a schema is to make a claim on ontological finality. It has not been completely clear (to me) whether COMP necessarily makes such a stipulation on realisation, in the sense of a claim that its axioms *literally are* what is present and personal (i.e. RITSIAR). However I'm coming to suspect that it does not in fact make such a claim, although it allows any one of us to take this as a personal leap of faith, specifically through the acid test of saying yes to the doctor. COMP may turn out to be false in its specific predictions - i.e. empirical tests could rule out the possibility of our being finite machines; or perhaps we can never be sure one way or the other. Nonetheless, the inescapable implication is that any alternative schema must from the outset explicitly and fearlessly address the same problem space or else run foul of the same intractable 0-1-3 person ontological and epistemological issues. This has profound implications for virtually all current cosmological TOEs: i.e. a view from nowhere turns out to be nobody's view. As has been observed in other writings, our understanding remains profoundly obscured and distorted unless we restore the personal to the view from nowhere. Only then can we conceive why indeed there is somewhere rather than nowhere. --~--~-~--~~~---~--~~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en -~--~~~~--~~--~--~---
Re: Seven Step Series
On 25 Jul 2009, at 15:35, m.a. wrote: > > One of my fundamental problems evidently has been a > misconception of the use of exponents (see below in bold). To be able to recognize a personal misconception is the key of the learning process. >> >> if a is a number, usually, a^n is the result of effectuating (a >> >> times a >> >> times a time a ... times a), with n occurences of a. For example: >> >> 2^3 = >> >> 2x2x2 = 8.I thought 2^3 meant (2*2)* (4*2)* (8*2)= 16 You have some weird thought. Think about this: 2*3 = 2+2+2 2^3 = 2*2*2 4*5 = 4+4+4+4+4 4^5 = 4*4*4*4*4 Take care: a*b = b*a (for any a and b) a^b is different from b^a (in general. For example 5^12 = 2441140625, but 12^5 = 248832). (And how could "(2*2)* (4*2)* (8*2)= 16" be true? (2*2)* (4*2)* (8*2) = 4*8*16 = 32*16, which is 32 times bigger than 16). >> >> * >> >> >> so a^n times a^m is equal to a^(n+m) >> >> >> >> This extends to the rational by defining a^(-n) by 1/a^n. In that >> >> case >> >> a^(m-n) = a^m/a^n. In particular a^m/a^m = 1 (x/x = 1 always), and >> >> a^m/a^m = a^(m-m) = a^0. So a^0 = 1. So in particular 2^0 = 1. >> >> From the above misconception you can perhaps get an idea of how >> utterly alien these symbols are to me. I have never run across them >> before in all my years (and you'd be surprised to learn how many >> years I'm talking about). It just means you don't have had to compute in your life (up to now!). If I enter in my pocket computer (TI Galaxy 67, a very old one), the machine wrote 1 E 12, which is its way to tell me the number I enter is about 1 times 10^12. Note that "a^n" is not the standard notation used by mathematicians, but it has become standard, we could say, in the electronic mails, or on some pocket computers. To write "2^7", which I recall is given by 2*2*2*2*2*2*2, they will wrote "2" with "7" as little upper index. Engineers use often other notations. >> When you say that I "could have found the mistakes by carefully >> reread the definitions" I did not said that. I was really just asking a question. And you provide me now a very clear answer: >> it's like saying that given a table of cyrillic letters I should be >> able to translate a passage of "Crime and Punishment". So your answer is "no". I could have read the definition ten times, I could remain wrong, because of the accumulation of seemingly senseless symbols. I have no problem to understand such difficulties. I can be blind myself on many things, not being able to find my pen on my desk, although it is in front of my eyes. I tend also to confuse bills and advertizing. But those are only handicaps, which, if not too severe, can be overcome by some amounts of work. Such handicaps could be a reason to panick the day before the exam, but should not deter someone who inquires, either for fun or for personal interrogations, in an environment without deadline or social pression (like here). >> A concept like a^(-n) = 1/a^n is like having to learn a new >> polysyllabic word. Not just that. You have to understand that it is a generalization of a^n on the integers. You have to learn a new concept. You will not need to remember all such notions for the "ultimate" understanding of the seventh step. At some moment I will introduce "many notions" just with the goal to generalize. The difficulty will be more conceptual and related to abstraction. I face the problem of either overwhelming you with too much concrete examples, or abstracting too quickly. No to people share the same "perfect" pedagogical path, but there is a sort of least common path, which can take time, but there is no rush. >> I see it and the next day I've forgotten it. Such a problem can be overcome by work and organization. I just hope you have enough fun, and personal curiosity for the result, or some results on the path. If you forget, I can recall. I really can sum up each time you want. And I can sum up what we have done, or what we will do (it is good to remember the real goal: to understand the UDA "reversal", and its "constructive" aspect). The math is needed just for grasping what a universal dovetailer is, and why both the UD and its universal dovetailing are "existing" (and in which sense) in elementary arithmetic. >> Having said that, let me reiterate that I do appreciate your >> efforts to simplify and explain every step of the way and I >> apologize for sometimes needing even more clarification. Your >> patience is saint-like and in my case, unfortunately, necessary. I appreciate so much people who are able to say "I don't understand" and ask question. >> > Which is why when I see you make a simple mistake, I don't feel so > bad because I know how easy it is to do. Ah ah! I am teaching you patience :) Thanks. I ask to all those who told me they were happy that I pursue this little teaching furth
Re: Seven Step Series
Bruno, I am indeed ready to pursue further and since we'll be covering both topics anyhow, I would prefer that you choose which would be the most natural next step for us. Also, I assume you have seen the following and I wondered if it tends to confirm UDA. http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg19125645.800-you-are-made-of-spacetime.html?full=true - Original Message - From: Bruno Marchal To: everything-list@googlegroups.com Sent: Sunday, July 26, 2009 11:38 AM Subject: Re: Seven Step Series I ask to all those who told me they were happy that I pursue this little teaching further the following question. Are you ready that I pursue? Are you ready that I introduce a few bit of "new" material. Sometimes (actually most of the time) new materials can shed new light on what has been already seen. What do you prefer, that I continue with the sets (with the notion of couples, and then of cartesian products, and then of operation, relation, function, etc.) Or do you prefer I prove first that the square root of 2, you know, that number which multiplied by itself gives 2, is irrational (= does not belongs to Q, = is not a fraction, = is not a periodic decimal). ? I am sure many of you already know this, but this is an typical impossibility result, and somehow the whole machine 'theology' is a collection of impossibility results, so the irrationality of the square root of 2 is a good introduction to such type of result. Also I will give you a typical example of non constructive proof base on the square root of two. (And for those interested in the quantum confirmation of comp, the square root of 2 is the amplitude coefficient leading to the probability 1/2, which is rather important, if only for examples again). It is really like most prefer. You can tell me: "do like you want", but I prefer to ask. Bruno http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/ --~--~-~--~~~---~--~~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en -~--~~~~--~~--~--~---
Re: Dreaming On
Could somebody kindly tell me/explain to me what "RITSIAR" means? I cannot find any explanation of this in the threads which mention it. Sorry to be dumb, Kim On 27/07/2009, at 12:52 AM, David Nyman wrote: > > Thanks to everyone who responded to my initial sally on dreams and > machines. Naturally I have arrogated the right to plagiarise your > helpful comments in what follows, which is an aphoristic synthesis of > my understanding of the main points that have emerged thus far. I > hope this will be helpful for future discussion. > > THE APHORISMS > > We do not see the mind, we see *through* the mind. > > What we see through the mind - its contents - is mind-stuff: dreams. > > Hence dream content - i.e. whatever is capable of being present to us > - can't be our ontology - this would be circular (the eye can't see > itself). > > So the brain (i.e. what the eye can see) can't be the mind; but the > intuition remains that mind and brain might be correlated by some > inclusive conception that would constitute our ontology: Kant's great > insight stands. > > It is similarly obvious that 'identity' theories and the like are > non-sense: it would indeed be hard to think of two descriptions less > 'identical' than brain-descriptions and mind-descriptions: hence > again, any such identification could only be via some singular > correlative synthesis. > > Hence any claim that the mind is literally identical with, or > 'inside', the brain can be shown to be false by the simple - if messy > - expedient of a scalpel; or else can be unmasked as implicitly > dualistic: i.e. the claim is really that 'inside' and 'outside' are > not merely different descriptions, but different ontologies. > > By extension of our individual introspecting, a plurality of minds, > and the 'external world' that includes brains, can be conceived as > correlated in some way - to be elucidated - in a universal synthesis > or context: that context being our mutual ontology. > > Such a universal context, or in common terms 'what exists', cannot be > fully known (i.e. can't be exhausted by description) although - or > rather because - it constitutes what we are, and by extension what > *everything* is. > > Nonetheless we may seek a logic of dreaming so far as it goes, and > this will indeed be as far as anything goes in the way of knowledge > claims. > > Mathematics may be deployed as a dream-logic: but mathematical > physics, restricted to 'physical heuristics', prototypically gets > stuck at the level of describing the content and behaviour of dreams, > not their genesis. > > To go further and deeper we need an explicit mathematical > specification of dreamers and their dreams, and of generative > mechanisms by which dreamers and their dream contents can be > constructed. > > Such a schema will by its nature form an analysis of how we come to > believe that we and our world are real, and in what terms: i.e. how we > come to know a world in a present and personal manner. > > Consequently such a schema must subsume within its universe of > discourse: being, knowing, perceiving, acting and intending - as the > foundations of what it means to be real: i.e. it must be capable of > invoking the Cheshire Cat *to the life*, not merely leave its grin > hanging in the void. > > Moving beyond bare analysis and description, any move to universalise > and 'realise' the axioms of such a schema is to make a claim on > ontological finality. It has not been completely clear (to me) > whether COMP necessarily makes such a stipulation on realisation, in > the sense of a claim that its axioms *literally are* what is present > and personal (i.e. RITSIAR). > > However I'm coming to suspect that it does not in fact make such a > claim, although it allows any one of us to take this as a personal > leap of faith, specifically through the acid test of saying yes to the > doctor. > > COMP may turn out to be false in its specific predictions - i.e. > empirical tests > could rule out the possibility of our being finite machines; or > perhaps we can never be sure one way or the other. > > Nonetheless, the inescapable implication is that any alternative > schema must from the outset explicitly and fearlessly address the same > problem space or else run foul of the same intractable 0-1-3 person > ontological and epistemological issues. > > This has profound implications for virtually all current cosmological > TOEs: i.e. a view from nowhere turns out to be nobody's view. As has > been observed in other writings, our understanding remains profoundly > obscured and distorted unless we restore the personal to the view from > nowhere. Only then can we conceive why indeed there is somewhere > rather than nowhere. > > > --~--~-~--~~~---~--~~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this gr
Re: Dreaming On
Hi Kim, RITSIAR means real in the sense that I am real. Cheers Brian Kim Jones wrote: > Could somebody kindly tell me/explain to me what "RITSIAR" means? I > cannot find any explanation of this in the threads which mention it. > > Sorry to be dumb, > > Kim > > > On 27/07/2009, at 12:52 AM, David Nyman wrote: > > >> Thanks to everyone who responded to my initial sally on dreams and >> machines. Naturally I have arrogated the right to plagiarise your >> helpful comments in what follows, which is an aphoristic synthesis of >> my understanding of the main points that have emerged thus far. I >> hope this will be helpful for future discussion. >> >> THE APHORISMS >> >> We do not see the mind, we see *through* the mind. >> >> What we see through the mind - its contents - is mind-stuff: dreams. >> >> Hence dream content - i.e. whatever is capable of being present to us >> - can't be our ontology - this would be circular (the eye can't see >> itself). >> >> So the brain (i.e. what the eye can see) can't be the mind; but the >> intuition remains that mind and brain might be correlated by some >> inclusive conception that would constitute our ontology: Kant's great >> insight stands. >> >> It is similarly obvious that 'identity' theories and the like are >> non-sense: it would indeed be hard to think of two descriptions less >> 'identical' than brain-descriptions and mind-descriptions: hence >> again, any such identification could only be via some singular >> correlative synthesis. >> >> Hence any claim that the mind is literally identical with, or >> 'inside', the brain can be shown to be false by the simple - if messy >> - expedient of a scalpel; or else can be unmasked as implicitly >> dualistic: i.e. the claim is really that 'inside' and 'outside' are >> not merely different descriptions, but different ontologies. >> >> By extension of our individual introspecting, a plurality of minds, >> and the 'external world' that includes brains, can be conceived as >> correlated in some way - to be elucidated - in a universal synthesis >> or context: that context being our mutual ontology. >> >> Such a universal context, or in common terms 'what exists', cannot be >> fully known (i.e. can't be exhausted by description) although - or >> rather because - it constitutes what we are, and by extension what >> *everything* is. >> >> Nonetheless we may seek a logic of dreaming so far as it goes, and >> this will indeed be as far as anything goes in the way of knowledge >> claims. >> >> Mathematics may be deployed as a dream-logic: but mathematical >> physics, restricted to 'physical heuristics', prototypically gets >> stuck at the level of describing the content and behaviour of dreams, >> not their genesis. >> >> To go further and deeper we need an explicit mathematical >> specification of dreamers and their dreams, and of generative >> mechanisms by which dreamers and their dream contents can be >> constructed. >> >> Such a schema will by its nature form an analysis of how we come to >> believe that we and our world are real, and in what terms: i.e. how we >> come to know a world in a present and personal manner. >> >> Consequently such a schema must subsume within its universe of >> discourse: being, knowing, perceiving, acting and intending - as the >> foundations of what it means to be real: i.e. it must be capable of >> invoking the Cheshire Cat *to the life*, not merely leave its grin >> hanging in the void. >> >> Moving beyond bare analysis and description, any move to universalise >> and 'realise' the axioms of such a schema is to make a claim on >> ontological finality. It has not been completely clear (to me) >> whether COMP necessarily makes such a stipulation on realisation, in >> the sense of a claim that its axioms *literally are* what is present >> and personal (i.e. RITSIAR). >> >> However I'm coming to suspect that it does not in fact make such a >> claim, although it allows any one of us to take this as a personal >> leap of faith, specifically through the acid test of saying yes to the >> doctor. >> >> COMP may turn out to be false in its specific predictions - i.e. >> empirical tests >> could rule out the possibility of our being finite machines; or >> perhaps we can never be sure one way or the other. >> >> Nonetheless, the inescapable implication is that any alternative >> schema must from the outset explicitly and fearlessly address the same >> problem space or else run foul of the same intractable 0-1-3 person >> ontological and epistemological issues. >> >> This has profound implications for virtually all current cosmological >> TOEs: i.e. a view from nowhere turns out to be nobody's view. As has >> been observed in other writings, our understanding remains profoundly >> obscured and distorted unless we restore the personal to the view from >> nowhere. Only then can we conceive why indeed there is somewhere >> rather than nowhere. >> >> > > > > > > --~--~-~--~~--
Re: Dreaming On
David Nyman wrote: > Thanks to everyone who responded to my initial sally on dreams and > machines. Naturally I have arrogated the right to plagiarise your > helpful comments in what follows, which is an aphoristic synthesis of > my understanding of the main points that have emerged thus far. I > hope this will be helpful for future discussion. > > THE APHORISMS > > We do not see the mind, we see *through* the mind. > > What we see through the mind - its contents - is mind-stuff: dreams. > > Hence dream content - i.e. whatever is capable of being present to us > - can't be our ontology - this would be circular (the eye can't see > itself). > Yes. This is the big issue. (a) Descriptions of 'how it appears to us' (empirical science by the awake scientist!) and (b) Descriptions of 'what it is that appears to us as it does' (science of a noumenon) cannot be the same set of descriptions to the one in which 'the appearances' are being delivered. Especially when (b) descriptions are responsible for creating the way it appears in (a). Seems fairly self evident. Assuming (a) and (b) are identical (or that (b) is unapproachable) is not justified. The assumption in your comments is that there is/needs to be 'mind stuff' is wrong. /ALL/ of it is "some undescribed stuff", not just that resulting in mind. The assumption in your statement is that we need something extra just to explain mind pressupposes that everything else is sorted out. It hasn't. It never has been. The singular unique feature of mind is not 'stuff', it is merely the perspective of it first person. ask this instead What kind of universe is it (= wots the stuff?, (b) and its behaviour) such that a 'first person perspective' can result in which it appears (a)-ish to us all, and in particular, makes a brain look brain when it is delivering the first person perspective which delivers (a) to us? Does X being self-evident classify X as an aphorism? I think not. :-) col --~--~-~--~~~---~--~~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en -~--~~~~--~~--~--~---
