Re: Chosen-ness
Hi John Mikes, Very Brunoish! besides: you may invest in an s at the end of my (last) name, my son even puts sh as an ending. I don't care if John Mike is duplicated anywhere. John Mikes (active on THIs list since ~1998?) All my apologies John. It is* because* you are a long standing every- thinger, that the name misspelling probability became high, if only by repetition. I will try to not doing that error again. Brno On Mon, Feb 18, 2013 at 10:59 AM, Bruno Marchal marc...@ulb.ac.be wrote: On 17 Feb 2013, at 21:36, John Mikes wrote: Bruno - we, at least, having learned the English language, should 'dig' into the meaning of the words. Chosen is the result of a selection from more than one alternates. Who are the others, from which WE may be CHOSEN? Perhaps those who don't handle so well the english language. (I am joking). Look, I am not the one saying that we have been chosen. On the contrary, I defended the Copernician idea, that we are not chosen at all. Like I said below, comp explain why we *might* feel like having been chosen. the devils in hell, or the angels in heaven? or the other animals? This is why I like to clarify the WORDS before submerging into verbose treatises on debatable concepts. Then again: chosen is ambiguous, e.g. in a certain decimation (war? revolution?) the 'chosen' get executed, so it is not such a joy to be CHOSEN. You are right. Anyone surviving a crash plane, among many passengers who died, develops a kind of guilt and a feeling of having been chosen, but this is an illusion easily explained by comp (and accepted by those surviving passengers most of the time, but this might not change their direct feeling). If you are duplicated into Washington and Moscow, in the usual manner, both the copies will feel like having be chosen for that city, but there is only memories, personal diaries and direct access to them. Now comp is not developed so much that we can be sure that we are NOT chosen, independently of the fact that we might find this not really reasonable to think. That might indeed remain forever undecided, except locally, when, after dying you wake up in a matrix build by our descendant 10^4 after JC, and remembering things like Oh, I will try to relive that John's Mike life which looks interesting. Then, you will know, locally, who made the choice of being John Mike, for awhile. Perhaps a descendent of you. Bruno John Mikes On Sun, Feb 17, 2013 at 9:12 AM, Bruno Marchal marc...@ulb.ac.be wrote: On 27 Jan 2013, at 23:35, freqflyer07281972 wrote: Hey everyone, I've been following this group a lot. I read it everyday and enjoy all of the wonderful stuff that comes up, even if some of it tends towards ad hominem, argument from authority, and petitio principi. Hey, we're humans, right? That means we get to make these fallacies, in good conscience or bad. Anyway, I wondered about what anyone/everyone thought about the notion of 'chosenness' as a way to understand where we are here in the world. It seems to me that concepts like MWI, Bruno's comp/ mech hypothesis and the 'dreams of numbers' ideas of subjectivity, and even Leibniz's 'best of all possible worlds' don't actually do something like flee away from our everyday responsibility to accept the basic fact that we have been CHOSEN -- and when I say this, please don't immediately put a bunch of theological baggage on it. I'm not saying God chose this reality as opposed to another, although this might be a convenient shorthand. But what I am saying is that, out of all the staggering possibilities that we know exist with regards to our universe, our galaxy, our solar system, our planet, our society, and even our individual selves, things could have very easily turned out to be different than they were. The fact that they have turned out in just this way and not another indicates this kind of chosenness, and along with it, comes a certain degree of responsibility, I guess? It seems to me that all the various 'everything' hypotheses (MWI, comp, Leibniz, and others) try to apply the Copernican principle to its breaking point. True enough, there is from a purely 3p point of view nothing special about our cosmic situation re: our planet and our sun. BUT, from an existential 1p point of view there is a huge privilege that we have, i.e. we are sentient observers, who love, feel pain, feel desire, and long for transcendence. Moreover, the 3p point of view is a pure abstraction, kind of like eating the picture of a meal rather than the actual meal. How do we know what any kind of 3p account of truth would be? What would it even look like? A universe with no observers. A falling tree without a hearer/listener. This, to me, is nonsense. Aren't things like MWI of quantum physics and comp hypothesis of universal dovetailer trying to, at a fundamental and existential
Re: Chosen-ness
Very Brunoish! besides: you may invest in an s at the end of my (last) name, my son even puts sh as an ending. I don't care if John Mike is duplicated anywhere. John Mikes (active on THIs list since ~1998?) On Mon, Feb 18, 2013 at 10:59 AM, Bruno Marchal marc...@ulb.ac.be wrote: On 17 Feb 2013, at 21:36, John Mikes wrote: Bruno - we, at least, having learned the English language, should 'dig' into the meaning of the words. Chosen is the result of a selection from more than one alternates. Who are the others, from which WE may be CHOSEN? Perhaps those who don't handle so well the english language. (I am joking). Look, I am not the one saying that we have been chosen. On the contrary, I defended the Copernician idea, that we are not chosen at all. Like I said below, comp explain why we *might* feel like having been chosen. the devils in hell, or the angels in heaven? or the other animals? This is why I like to clarify the WORDS before submerging into verbose treatises on debatable concepts. Then again: chosen is ambiguous, e.g. in a certain decimation (war? revolution?) the 'chosen' get executed, so it is not such a joy to be CHOSEN. You are right. Anyone surviving a crash plane, among many passengers who died, develops a kind of guilt and a feeling of having been chosen, but this is an illusion easily explained by comp (and accepted by those surviving passengers most of the time, but this might not change their direct feeling). If you are duplicated into Washington and Moscow, in the usual manner, both the copies will feel like having be chosen for that city, but there is only memories, personal diaries and direct access to them. Now comp is not developed so much that we can be sure that we are NOT chosen, independently of the fact that we might find this not really reasonable to think. That might indeed remain forever undecided, except locally, when, after dying you wake up in a matrix build by our descendant 10^4 after JC, and remembering things like Oh, I will try to relive that John's Mike life which looks interesting. Then, you will know, locally, who made the choice of being John Mike, for awhile. Perhaps a descendent of you. Bruno John Mikes On Sun, Feb 17, 2013 at 9:12 AM, Bruno Marchal marc...@ulb.ac.be wrote: On 27 Jan 2013, at 23:35, freqflyer07281972 wrote: Hey everyone, I've been following this group a lot. I read it everyday and enjoy all of the wonderful stuff that comes up, even if some of it tends towards ad hominem, argument from authority, and petitio principi. Hey, we're humans, right? That means we get to make these fallacies, in good conscience or bad. Anyway, I wondered about what anyone/everyone thought about the notion of 'chosenness' as a way to understand where we are here in the world. It seems to me that concepts like MWI, Bruno's comp/mech hypothesis and the 'dreams of numbers' ideas of subjectivity, and even Leibniz's 'best of all possible worlds' don't actually do something like flee away from our everyday responsibility to accept the basic fact that we have been CHOSEN -- and when I say this, please don't immediately put a bunch of theological baggage on it. I'm not saying God chose this reality as opposed to another, although this might be a convenient shorthand. But what I am saying is that, out of all the staggering possibilities that we know exist with regards to our universe, our galaxy, our solar system, our planet, our society, and even our individual selves, things could have very easily turned out to be different than they were. The fact that they have turned out in just this way and not another indicates this kind of chosenness, and along with it, comes a certain degree of responsibility, I guess? It seems to me that all the various 'everything' hypotheses (MWI, comp, Leibniz, and others) try to apply the Copernican principle to its breaking point. True enough, there is from a purely 3p point of view nothing special about our cosmic situation re: our planet and our sun. BUT, from an existential 1p point of view there is a huge privilege that we have, i.e. we are sentient observers, who love, feel pain, feel desire, and long for transcendence. Moreover, the 3p point of view is a pure abstraction, kind of like eating the picture of a meal rather than the actual meal. How do we know what any kind of 3p account of truth would be? What would it even look like? A universe with no observers. A falling tree without a hearer/listener. This, to me, is nonsense. Aren't things like MWI of quantum physics and comp hypothesis of universal dovetailer trying to, at a fundamental and existential level, an attempt to try to run away from the concreteness and absolute 'givenness' (gift) of the world as we find it? Those things are not necessarily in opposition, once we find a way to attribute first-person-ness to some entities. We only try to figure out what is happening.
Re: Chosen-ness
On 27 Jan 2013, at 23:35, freqflyer07281972 wrote: Hey everyone, I've been following this group a lot. I read it everyday and enjoy all of the wonderful stuff that comes up, even if some of it tends towards ad hominem, argument from authority, and petitio principi. Hey, we're humans, right? That means we get to make these fallacies, in good conscience or bad. Anyway, I wondered about what anyone/everyone thought about the notion of 'chosenness' as a way to understand where we are here in the world. It seems to me that concepts like MWI, Bruno's comp/mech hypothesis and the 'dreams of numbers' ideas of subjectivity, and even Leibniz's 'best of all possible worlds' don't actually do something like flee away from our everyday responsibility to accept the basic fact that we have been CHOSEN -- and when I say this, please don't immediately put a bunch of theological baggage on it. I'm not saying God chose this reality as opposed to another, although this might be a convenient shorthand. But what I am saying is that, out of all the staggering possibilities that we know exist with regards to our universe, our galaxy, our solar system, our planet, our society, and even our individual selves, things could have very easily turned out to be different than they were. The fact that they have turned out in just this way and not another indicates this kind of chosenness, and along with it, comes a certain degree of responsibility, I guess? It seems to me that all the various 'everything' hypotheses (MWI, comp, Leibniz, and others) try to apply the Copernican principle to its breaking point. True enough, there is from a purely 3p point of view nothing special about our cosmic situation re: our planet and our sun. BUT, from an existential 1p point of view there is a huge privilege that we have, i.e. we are sentient observers, who love, feel pain, feel desire, and long for transcendence. Moreover, the 3p point of view is a pure abstraction, kind of like eating the picture of a meal rather than the actual meal. How do we know what any kind of 3p account of truth would be? What would it even look like? A universe with no observers. A falling tree without a hearer/listener. This, to me, is nonsense. Aren't things like MWI of quantum physics and comp hypothesis of universal dovetailer trying to, at a fundamental and existential level, an attempt to try to run away from the concreteness and absolute 'givenness' (gift) of the world as we find it? Those things are not necessarily in opposition, once we find a way to attribute first-person-ness to some entities. We only try to figure out what is happening. And isn't our role, in creation, as freely choosing beings (sorry, John Clark, free will is more than just a noise) to choose what will make other people with us now and in the future feel more love and less pain? And isn't this why we were chosen? I don't think we are chosen, at least no more than insects and plants. We have the tools for explaining whay we feel unique, and chosen, but that can be a sort of illusion, like with personal identity. But *we* can make choice, indeed. This makes intuitive sense, and is explainable in mechanical terms. Bruno I'll go back to lurking now, but I'd appreciate any thoughts you might have on this reflection of mine. Cheers, Dan -- 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 . Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en . For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out. http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/ -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out.
Re: Chosen-ness
On 28 Jan 2013, at 04:06, meekerdb wrote: On 1/27/2013 2:35 PM, freqflyer07281972 wrote: Hey everyone, I've been following this group a lot. I read it everyday and enjoy all of the wonderful stuff that comes up, even if some of it tends towards ad hominem, argument from authority, and petitio principi. Hey, we're humans, right? That means we get to make these fallacies, in good conscience or bad. Anyway, I wondered about what anyone/everyone thought about the notion of 'chosenness' as a way to understand where we are here in the world. It seems to me that concepts like MWI, Bruno's comp/mech hypothesis and the 'dreams of numbers' ideas of subjectivity, and even Leibniz's 'best of all possible worlds' don't actually do something like flee away from our everyday responsibility to accept the basic fact that we have been CHOSEN -- and when I say this, please don't immediately put a bunch of theological baggage on it. I'm not saying God chose this reality as opposed to another, although this might be a convenient shorthand. But what I am saying is that, out of all the staggering possibilities that we know exist with regards to our universe, our galaxy, our solar system, our planet, our society, and even our individual selves, things could have very easily turned out to be different than they were. The fact that they have turned out in just this way and not another indicates this kind of chosenness, and along with it, comes a certain degree of responsibility, I guess? It seems to me that all the various 'everything' hypotheses (MWI, comp, Leibniz, and others) try to apply the Copernican principle to its breaking point. True enough, there is from a purely 3p point of view nothing special about our cosmic situation re: our planet and our sun. BUT, from an existential 1p point of view there is a huge privilege that we have, i.e. we are sentient observers, who love, feel pain, feel desire, and long for transcendence. There's a desire to respect the Copernican principle (don't assume we're 'special') but also to avoid randomness. This then leads to the hypothesis that *everything* (in some sense) exists. That way you avoid randomness without assuming that we're special. Moreover, the 3p point of view is a pure abstraction, kind of like eating the picture of a meal rather than the actual meal. How do we know what any kind of 3p account of truth would be? What would it even look like? A universe with no observers. A falling tree without a hearer/listener. This, to me, is nonsense. Aren't things like MWI of quantum physics and comp hypothesis of universal dovetailer trying to, at a fundamental and existential level, an attempt to try to run away from the concreteness and absolute 'givenness' (gift) of the world as we find it? And isn't our role, in creation, as freely choosing beings (sorry, John Clark, free will is more than just a noise) to choose what will make other people with us now and in the future feel more love and less pain? And isn't this why we were chosen? To say we're chosen is just another way to avoid randomness. Or many computations, or many worlds, like you say above. I just want to amplify that point. Bruno Brent I'll go back to lurking now, but I'd appreciate any thoughts you might have on this reflection of mine. Cheers, Dan -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everything- l...@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com . Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en . For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out. No virus found in this message. Checked by AVG - www.avg.com Version: 2013.0.2890 / Virus Database: 2639/6054 - Release Date: 01/24/13 -- 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 . Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en . For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out. http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/ -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out.
Re: Chosen-ness
Bruno - we, at least, having learned the English language, should 'dig' into the meaning of the words. Chosen is the result of a selection from more than one alternates. Who are the others, from which WE may be CHOSEN? the devils in hell, or the angels in heaven? or the other animals? This is why I like to clarify the WORDS before submerging into verbose treatises on debatable concepts. Then again: chosen is ambiguous, e.g. in a certain decimation (war? revolution?) the 'chosen' get executed, so it is not such a joy to be CHOSEN. John Mikes On Sun, Feb 17, 2013 at 9:12 AM, Bruno Marchal marc...@ulb.ac.be wrote: On 27 Jan 2013, at 23:35, freqflyer07281972 wrote: Hey everyone, I've been following this group a lot. I read it everyday and enjoy all of the wonderful stuff that comes up, even if some of it tends towards ad hominem, argument from authority, and petitio principi. Hey, we're humans, right? That means we get to make these fallacies, in good conscience or bad. Anyway, I wondered about what anyone/everyone thought about the notion of 'chosenness' as a way to understand where we are here in the world. It seems to me that concepts like MWI, Bruno's comp/mech hypothesis and the 'dreams of numbers' ideas of subjectivity, and even Leibniz's 'best of all possible worlds' don't actually do something like flee away from our everyday responsibility to accept the basic fact that we have been CHOSEN -- and when I say this, please don't immediately put a bunch of theological baggage on it. I'm not saying God chose this reality as opposed to another, although this might be a convenient shorthand. But what I am saying is that, out of all the staggering possibilities that we know exist with regards to our universe, our galaxy, our solar system, our planet, our society, and even our individual selves, things could have very easily turned out to be different than they were. The fact that they have turned out in just this way and not another indicates this kind of chosenness, and along with it, comes a certain degree of responsibility, I guess? It seems to me that all the various 'everything' hypotheses (MWI, comp, Leibniz, and others) try to apply the Copernican principle to its breaking point. True enough, there is from a purely 3p point of view nothing special about our cosmic situation re: our planet and our sun. BUT, from an existential 1p point of view there is a huge privilege that we have, i.e. we are sentient observers, who love, feel pain, feel desire, and long for transcendence. Moreover, the 3p point of view is a pure abstraction, kind of like eating the picture of a meal rather than the actual meal. How do we know what any kind of 3p account of truth would be? What would it even look like? A universe with no observers. A falling tree without a hearer/listener. This, to me, is nonsense. Aren't things like MWI of quantum physics and comp hypothesis of universal dovetailer trying to, at a fundamental and existential level, an attempt to try to run away from the concreteness and absolute 'givenness' (gift) of the world as we find it? Those things are not necessarily in opposition, once we find a way to attribute first-person-ness to some entities. We only try to figure out what is happening. And isn't our role, in creation, as freely choosing beings (sorry, John Clark, free will is more than just a noise) to choose what will make other people with us now and in the future feel more love and less pain? And isn't this why we were chosen? I don't think we are chosen, at least no more than insects and plants. We have the tools for explaining whay we feel unique, and chosen, but that can be a sort of illusion, like with personal identity. But *we* can make choice, indeed. This makes intuitive sense, and is explainable in mechanical terms. Bruno I'll go back to lurking now, but I'd appreciate any thoughts you might have on this reflection of mine. Cheers, Dan -- 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. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out. http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/ -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything
Re: Chosen-ness
On Wednesday, February 13, 2013 10:15:53 PM UTC-5, Craig Weinberg wrote: On Wednesday, February 13, 2013 7:05:39 PM UTC-5, freqflyer07281972 wrote: Hi Craig, Thank you for your very well considered point of view on my original post. I have some interjections that I would enjoy hearing a response to: Thanks Dan, I'll try my best. On Sunday, January 27, 2013 9:37:03 PM UTC-5, Craig Weinberg wrote: On Sunday, January 27, 2013 5:35:22 PM UTC-5, freqflyer07281972 wrote: Hey everyone, I've been following this group a lot. I read it everyday and enjoy all of the wonderful stuff that comes up, even if some of it tends towards ad hominem, argument from authority, and petitio principi. Hey, we're humans, right? That means we get to make these fallacies, in good conscience or bad. Anyway, I wondered about what anyone/everyone thought about the notion of 'chosenness' as a way to understand where we are here in the world. It seems to me that concepts like MWI, Bruno's comp/mech hypothesis and the 'dreams of numbers' ideas of subjectivity, and even Leibniz's 'best of all possible worlds' don't actually do something like flee away from our everyday responsibility to accept the basic fact that we have been CHOSEN -- and when I say this, please don't immediately put a bunch of theological baggage on it. I'm not saying God chose this reality as opposed to another, although this might be a convenient shorthand. But what I am saying is that, out of all the staggering possibilities that we know exist with regards to our universe, our galaxy, our solar system, our planet, our society, and even our individual selves, things could have very easily turned out to be different than they were. The fact that they have turned out in just this way and not another indicates this kind of chosenness, and along with it, comes a certain degree of responsibility, I guess? It seems to me that all the various 'everything' hypotheses (MWI, comp, Leibniz, and others) try to apply the Copernican principle to its breaking point. True enough, there is from a purely 3p point of view nothing special about our cosmic situation re: our planet and our sun. BUT, from an existential 1p point of view there is a huge privilege that we have, i.e. we are sentient observers, who love, feel pain, feel desire, and long for transcendence. Moreover, the 3p point of view is a pure abstraction, kind of like eating the picture of a meal rather than the actual meal. How do we know what any kind of 3p account of truth would be? What would it even look like? A universe with no observers. A falling tree without a hearer/listener. This, to me, is nonsense. Aren't things like MWI of quantum physics and comp hypothesis of universal dovetailer trying to, at a fundamental and existential level, an attempt to try to run away from the concreteness and absolute 'givenness' (gift) of the world as we find it? And isn't our role, in creation, as freely choosing beings (sorry, John Clark, free will is more than just a noise) to choose what will make other people with us now and in the future feel more love and less pain? And isn't this why we were chosen? I'll go back to lurking now, but I'd appreciate any thoughts you might have on this reflection of mine. Cheers, Dan What I propose is that a complete description of the universe must include: 1. The experience of significance. This speaks to the idea of chosen-ness, of choice, of free will, of improbability as a quality as the subject of appreciation. There is a difference between choosing and being chosen. The former takes place on the level of the agent -- it is where 'free will' is exercised. The latter has no free will associated with it Sure, but they are ontological conjugates, i.e. you can be chosen locally without having the ability to make choices yourself (theoretically anyways), but you can't be chosen without the presence of some choosing agency in the universe. BINGO - here's a smuggled premise, the premise of 'choosing agency' - why would there be agency to any choosing force? this is like making the same mistake as eager adaptationist versions of evolution that import 'just so' stories to explain what are, in essence, really quite blind and arbitrary design decisions that propagate from one generation to the next (spandrels- steven j. gould), for the simple reason that they a) didn't die before they had more offspring and b) had offspring to propagate that feature...I would say, on the contrary, that is is quite easy to be chosen without the presence of a choosing agency, and the fact of natural selection proves this (as far as i am aware, no one has ever said natural selection is an 'agent', complete with all of the free will ramifications that this term implies) -- if you are chosen to go to war by your government, then you go, regardless
Re: Chosen-ness
On 2/15/2013 12:05 AM, freqflyer07281972 wrote: Sure, but they are ontological conjugates, i.e. you can be chosen locally without having the ability to make choices yourself (theoretically anyways), but you can't be chosen without the presence of some choosing agency in the universe. BINGO - here's a smuggled premise, the premise of 'choosing agency' - why would there be agency to any choosing force? this is like making the same mistake as eager adaptationist versions of evolution that import 'just so' stories to explain what are, in essence, really quite blind and arbitrary design decisions that propagate from one generation to the next (spandrels- steven j. gould), for the simple reason that they a) didn't die before they had more offspring and b) had offspring to propagate that feature...I would say, on the contrary, that is is quite easy to be chosen without the presence of a choosing agency, and the fact of natural selection proves this (as far as i am aware, no one has ever said natural selection is an 'agent', complete with all of the free will ramifications that this term implies) Hi, Wait, what? Flyer, you didn't define the symmetry that made agency vanish! y offspring are not perfect copies of me! Thus their choices are different from my choices. So how do I get credit for the appearance of agency of my off-spring? If there is no agency, how the heck does it seem to me that I have agency to the point of experiencing it's 'agency-ness' directly 1p? Spandrels must be all exactly isomorphic to Gould's reasoning to be sound. I am saying that natural selection is an 'agent'! Any act of selection implies an agent of some kind unless that act is forced. -- Onward! Stephen -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out.
Re: Chosen-ness
On 2/15/2013 12:38 AM, Stephen P. King wrote: On 2/15/2013 12:05 AM, freqflyer07281972 wrote: Sure, but they are ontological conjugates, i.e. you can be chosen locally without having the ability to make choices yourself (theoretically anyways), but you can't be chosen without the presence of some choosing agency in the universe. BINGO - here's a smuggled premise, the premise of 'choosing agency' - why would there be agency to any choosing force? this is like making the same mistake as eager adaptationist versions of evolution that import 'just so' stories to explain what are, in essence, really quite blind and arbitrary design decisions that propagate from one generation to the next (spandrels- steven j. gould), for the simple reason that they a) didn't die before they had more offspring and b) had offspring to propagate that feature...I would say, on the contrary, that is is quite easy to be chosen without the presence of a choosing agency, and the fact of natural selection proves this (as far as i am aware, no one has ever said natural selection is an 'agent', complete with all of the free will ramifications that this term implies) Hi, Wait, what? Flyer, you didn't define the symmetry that made agency vanish! My offspring are not perfect copies of me! Thus their choices are different from my choices. So how do I get credit for the appearance of agency of my off-spring? If there is no agency, how the heck does it seem to me that I have agency to the point of experiencing it's 'agency-ness' directly 1p? Spandrels must be all exactly isomorphic to Gould's reasoning to be sound. I am saying that natural selection is an 'agent'! Any act of selection implies an agent of some kind unless that act is forced. Essentially, Flyer, I am asking: What makes the feature of 'agency' special? -- Onward! Stephen -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out.
Re: Chosen-ness
Hi Craig, Thank you for your very well considered point of view on my original post. I have some interjections that I would enjoy hearing a response to: On Sunday, January 27, 2013 9:37:03 PM UTC-5, Craig Weinberg wrote: On Sunday, January 27, 2013 5:35:22 PM UTC-5, freqflyer07281972 wrote: Hey everyone, I've been following this group a lot. I read it everyday and enjoy all of the wonderful stuff that comes up, even if some of it tends towards ad hominem, argument from authority, and petitio principi. Hey, we're humans, right? That means we get to make these fallacies, in good conscience or bad. Anyway, I wondered about what anyone/everyone thought about the notion of 'chosenness' as a way to understand where we are here in the world. It seems to me that concepts like MWI, Bruno's comp/mech hypothesis and the 'dreams of numbers' ideas of subjectivity, and even Leibniz's 'best of all possible worlds' don't actually do something like flee away from our everyday responsibility to accept the basic fact that we have been CHOSEN -- and when I say this, please don't immediately put a bunch of theological baggage on it. I'm not saying God chose this reality as opposed to another, although this might be a convenient shorthand. But what I am saying is that, out of all the staggering possibilities that we know exist with regards to our universe, our galaxy, our solar system, our planet, our society, and even our individual selves, things could have very easily turned out to be different than they were. The fact that they have turned out in just this way and not another indicates this kind of chosenness, and along with it, comes a certain degree of responsibility, I guess? It seems to me that all the various 'everything' hypotheses (MWI, comp, Leibniz, and others) try to apply the Copernican principle to its breaking point. True enough, there is from a purely 3p point of view nothing special about our cosmic situation re: our planet and our sun. BUT, from an existential 1p point of view there is a huge privilege that we have, i.e. we are sentient observers, who love, feel pain, feel desire, and long for transcendence. Moreover, the 3p point of view is a pure abstraction, kind of like eating the picture of a meal rather than the actual meal. How do we know what any kind of 3p account of truth would be? What would it even look like? A universe with no observers. A falling tree without a hearer/listener. This, to me, is nonsense. Aren't things like MWI of quantum physics and comp hypothesis of universal dovetailer trying to, at a fundamental and existential level, an attempt to try to run away from the concreteness and absolute 'givenness' (gift) of the world as we find it? And isn't our role, in creation, as freely choosing beings (sorry, John Clark, free will is more than just a noise) to choose what will make other people with us now and in the future feel more love and less pain? And isn't this why we were chosen? I'll go back to lurking now, but I'd appreciate any thoughts you might have on this reflection of mine. Cheers, Dan What I propose is that a complete description of the universe must include: 1. The experience of significance. This speaks to the idea of chosen-ness, of choice, of free will, of improbability as a quality as the subject of appreciation. There is a difference between choosing and being chosen. The former takes place on the level of the agent -- it is where 'free will' is exercised. The latter has no free will associated with it -- if you are chosen to go to war by your government, then you go, regardless of what you personally want (barring conscientious objection, but you get my meaning, I hope). Our free will, internally, may have many features of improbability and uncertainty, but the fact that we were 'chosen' (i.e. came into this world without any kind of vote or say or decision on our own parts) is a different matter. 2. The experience of the significance of the idea of insignificance. I word the significance of the idea of insignificance in this convoluted way to reflect the natural sequence in which the revelation of objectivity has occurred across all human societies. Since as far as I know: a. *all* cultures begin their history steeped in animistic shamanism, divination, creation myths and charismatic deities and b. *no* cultures develop eliminative materialism, mathematics, and mechanism earlier than philosophy or religion, and c. *all* individuals experience the development of their own psyche through imaginative, emotional, and irrational or superstitious thought d. *no* individuals are born with a worldview based only on generic facts and objectivity. Healthy children do not experience their lives in an indifferent and detached mode of observation but rather grow into analytical modes of thought through experience
Re: Chosen-ness
On Wednesday, February 13, 2013 7:05:39 PM UTC-5, freqflyer07281972 wrote: Hi Craig, Thank you for your very well considered point of view on my original post. I have some interjections that I would enjoy hearing a response to: Thanks Dan, I'll try my best. On Sunday, January 27, 2013 9:37:03 PM UTC-5, Craig Weinberg wrote: On Sunday, January 27, 2013 5:35:22 PM UTC-5, freqflyer07281972 wrote: Hey everyone, I've been following this group a lot. I read it everyday and enjoy all of the wonderful stuff that comes up, even if some of it tends towards ad hominem, argument from authority, and petitio principi. Hey, we're humans, right? That means we get to make these fallacies, in good conscience or bad. Anyway, I wondered about what anyone/everyone thought about the notion of 'chosenness' as a way to understand where we are here in the world. It seems to me that concepts like MWI, Bruno's comp/mech hypothesis and the 'dreams of numbers' ideas of subjectivity, and even Leibniz's 'best of all possible worlds' don't actually do something like flee away from our everyday responsibility to accept the basic fact that we have been CHOSEN -- and when I say this, please don't immediately put a bunch of theological baggage on it. I'm not saying God chose this reality as opposed to another, although this might be a convenient shorthand. But what I am saying is that, out of all the staggering possibilities that we know exist with regards to our universe, our galaxy, our solar system, our planet, our society, and even our individual selves, things could have very easily turned out to be different than they were. The fact that they have turned out in just this way and not another indicates this kind of chosenness, and along with it, comes a certain degree of responsibility, I guess? It seems to me that all the various 'everything' hypotheses (MWI, comp, Leibniz, and others) try to apply the Copernican principle to its breaking point. True enough, there is from a purely 3p point of view nothing special about our cosmic situation re: our planet and our sun. BUT, from an existential 1p point of view there is a huge privilege that we have, i.e. we are sentient observers, who love, feel pain, feel desire, and long for transcendence. Moreover, the 3p point of view is a pure abstraction, kind of like eating the picture of a meal rather than the actual meal. How do we know what any kind of 3p account of truth would be? What would it even look like? A universe with no observers. A falling tree without a hearer/listener. This, to me, is nonsense. Aren't things like MWI of quantum physics and comp hypothesis of universal dovetailer trying to, at a fundamental and existential level, an attempt to try to run away from the concreteness and absolute 'givenness' (gift) of the world as we find it? And isn't our role, in creation, as freely choosing beings (sorry, John Clark, free will is more than just a noise) to choose what will make other people with us now and in the future feel more love and less pain? And isn't this why we were chosen? I'll go back to lurking now, but I'd appreciate any thoughts you might have on this reflection of mine. Cheers, Dan What I propose is that a complete description of the universe must include: 1. The experience of significance. This speaks to the idea of chosen-ness, of choice, of free will, of improbability as a quality as the subject of appreciation. There is a difference between choosing and being chosen. The former takes place on the level of the agent -- it is where 'free will' is exercised. The latter has no free will associated with it Sure, but they are ontological conjugates, i.e. you can be chosen locally without having the ability to make choices yourself (theoretically anyways), but you can't be chosen without the presence of some choosing agency in the universe. -- if you are chosen to go to war by your government, then you go, regardless of what you personally want (barring conscientious objection, but you get my meaning, I hope). Our free will, internally, may have many features of improbability and uncertainty, but the fact that we were 'chosen' (i.e. came into this world without any kind of vote or say or decision on our own parts) is a different matter. Right. In general I don't have an opinion on human experience in particular. I'm happy to speculate for fun, but I don't have any special insight into whether we choose to incarnate or anything like that. Could be? Doesn't have to be. 2. The experience of the significance of the idea of insignificance. I word the significance of the idea of insignificance in this convoluted way to reflect the natural sequence in which the revelation of objectivity has occurred across all human societies. Since as far as I know: a. *all* cultures begin their history steeped
Re: Chosen-ness
On Sunday, January 27, 2013 10:24:57 PM UTC-5, Brent wrote: On 1/27/2013 7:13 PM, Craig Weinberg wrote: On Sunday, January 27, 2013 10:06:37 PM UTC-5, Brent wrote: On 1/27/2013 2:35 PM, freqflyer07281972 wrote: Hey everyone, I've been following this group a lot. I read it everyday and enjoy all of the wonderful stuff that comes up, even if some of it tends towards ad hominem, argument from authority, and petitio principi. Hey, we're humans, right? That means we get to make these fallacies, in good conscience or bad. Anyway, I wondered about what anyone/everyone thought about the notion of 'chosenness' as a way to understand where we are here in the world. It seems to me that concepts like MWI, Bruno's comp/mech hypothesis and the 'dreams of numbers' ideas of subjectivity, and even Leibniz's 'best of all possible worlds' don't actually do something like flee away from our everyday responsibility to accept the basic fact that we have been CHOSEN -- and when I say this, please don't immediately put a bunch of theological baggage on it. I'm not saying God chose this reality as opposed to another, although this might be a convenient shorthand. But what I am saying is that, out of all the staggering possibilities that we know exist with regards to our universe, our galaxy, our solar system, our planet, our society, and even our individual selves, things could have very easily turned out to be different than they were. The fact that they have turned out in just this way and not another indicates this kind of chosenness, and along with it, comes a certain degree of responsibility, I guess? It seems to me that all the various 'everything' hypotheses (MWI, comp, Leibniz, and others) try to apply the Copernican principle to its breaking point. True enough, there is from a purely 3p point of view nothing special about our cosmic situation re: our planet and our sun. BUT, from an existential 1p point of view there is a huge privilege that we have, i.e. we are sentient observers, who love, feel pain, feel desire, and long for transcendence. There's a desire to respect the Copernican principle (don't assume we're 'special') but also to avoid randomness. This then leads to the hypothesis that *everything* (in some sense) exists. That way you avoid randomness without assuming that we're special. Moreover, the 3p point of view is a pure abstraction, kind of like eating the picture of a meal rather than the actual meal. How do we know what any kind of 3p account of truth would be? What would it even look like? A universe with no observers. A falling tree without a hearer/listener. This, to me, is nonsense. Aren't things like MWI of quantum physics and comp hypothesis of universal dovetailer trying to, at a fundamental and existential level, an attempt to try to run away from the concreteness and absolute 'givenness' (gift) of the world as we find it? And isn't our role, in creation, as freely choosing beings (sorry, John Clark, free will is more than just a noise) to choose what will make other people with us now and in the future feel more love and less pain? And isn't this why we were chosen? To say we're chosen is just another way to avoid randomness. To say we are avoiding randomness is to assume that there is something other than randomness to be embraced. That's what being 'chosen' implies - that there is a 'choser', an alternative teleology to be embraced. There doesn't have to be just one chooser. The universe could be made of choosers that can appear random when seen from a distant or incomplete frame of reference. But in a universe where there were no choosers, how would it be possible for anything to be 'embraced', let alone non-randomness? Why should anything that exists want to avoid randomness? Ask somebody else, I'm not avoiding it. I'm talking about in principle, ontologically, how is it possible for anything to 'want to avoid randomness' if there is no ontological alternative? Brent -- 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. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out.
Re: Chosen-ness
On 1/28/2013 5:37 AM, Craig Weinberg wrote: On Sunday, January 27, 2013 10:24:57 PM UTC-5, Brent wrote: On 1/27/2013 7:13 PM, Craig Weinberg wrote: On Sunday, January 27, 2013 10:06:37 PM UTC-5, Brent wrote: On 1/27/2013 2:35 PM, freqflyer07281972 wrote: Hey everyone, I've been following this group a lot. I read it everyday and enjoy all of the wonderful stuff that comes up, even if some of it tends towards ad hominem, argument from authority, and petitio principi. Hey, we're humans, right? That means we get to make these fallacies, in good conscience or bad. Anyway, I wondered about what anyone/everyone thought about the notion of 'chosenness' as a way to understand where we are here in the world. It seems to me that concepts like MWI, Bruno's comp/mech hypothesis and the 'dreams of numbers' ideas of subjectivity, and even Leibniz's 'best of all possible worlds' don't actually do something like flee away from our everyday responsibility to accept the basic fact that we have been CHOSEN -- and when I say this, please don't immediately put a bunch of theological baggage on it. I'm not saying God chose this reality as opposed to another, although this might be a convenient shorthand. But what I am saying is that, out of all the staggering possibilities that we know exist with regards to our universe, our galaxy, our solar system, our planet, our society, and even our individual selves, things could have very easily turned out to be different than they were. The fact that they have turned out in just this way and not another indicates this kind of chosenness, and along with it, comes a certain degree of responsibility, I guess? It seems to me that all the various 'everything' hypotheses (MWI, comp, Leibniz, and others) try to apply the Copernican principle to its breaking point. True enough, there is from a purely 3p point of view nothing special about our cosmic situation re: our planet and our sun. BUT, from an existential 1p point of view there is a huge privilege that we have, i.e. we are sentient observers, who love, feel pain, feel desire, and long for transcendence. There's a desire to respect the Copernican principle (don't assume we're 'special') but also to avoid randomness. This then leads to the hypothesis that *everything* (in some sense) exists. That way you avoid randomness without assuming that we're special. Moreover, the 3p point of view is a pure abstraction, kind of like eating the picture of a meal rather than the actual meal. How do we know what any kind of 3p account of truth would be? What would it even look like? A universe with no observers. A falling tree without a hearer/listener. This, to me, is nonsense. Aren't things like MWI of quantum physics and comp hypothesis of universal dovetailer trying to, at a fundamental and existential level, an attempt to try to run away from the concreteness and absolute 'givenness' (gift) of the world as we find it? And isn't our role, in creation, as freely choosing beings (sorry, John Clark, free will is more than just a noise) to choose what will make other people with us now and in the future feel more love and less pain? And isn't this why we were chosen? To say we're chosen is just another way to avoid randomness. To say we are avoiding randomness is to assume that there is something other than randomness to be embraced. That's what being 'chosen' implies - that there is a 'choser', an alternative teleology to be embraced. There doesn't have to be just one chooser. The universe could be made of choosers that can appear random when seen from a distant or incomplete frame of reference. But do they then make a random choice? And how do they effect this choice? And where do they appear? It seems you are just spinning fairy tales. But in a universe where there were no choosers, how would it be possible for anything to be 'embraced', let alone non-randomness? Before QM, determinism was embraced by many thinkers. Why should anything that exists want to avoid randomness? Ask somebody else, I'm not avoiding it. I'm talking about in principle, ontologically, how is it possible for anything to 'want to avoid randomness' if there is no ontological alternative? Why do you think there is no alternative? You've introduced 'choice' which I assume you consider non-random. Brent -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to
Re: Chosen-ness
On Monday, January 28, 2013 12:34:32 PM UTC-5, Brent wrote: On 1/28/2013 5:37 AM, Craig Weinberg wrote: On Sunday, January 27, 2013 10:24:57 PM UTC-5, Brent wrote: On 1/27/2013 7:13 PM, Craig Weinberg wrote: On Sunday, January 27, 2013 10:06:37 PM UTC-5, Brent wrote: On 1/27/2013 2:35 PM, freqflyer07281972 wrote: Hey everyone, I've been following this group a lot. I read it everyday and enjoy all of the wonderful stuff that comes up, even if some of it tends towards ad hominem, argument from authority, and petitio principi. Hey, we're humans, right? That means we get to make these fallacies, in good conscience or bad. Anyway, I wondered about what anyone/everyone thought about the notion of 'chosenness' as a way to understand where we are here in the world. It seems to me that concepts like MWI, Bruno's comp/mech hypothesis and the 'dreams of numbers' ideas of subjectivity, and even Leibniz's 'best of all possible worlds' don't actually do something like flee away from our everyday responsibility to accept the basic fact that we have been CHOSEN -- and when I say this, please don't immediately put a bunch of theological baggage on it. I'm not saying God chose this reality as opposed to another, although this might be a convenient shorthand. But what I am saying is that, out of all the staggering possibilities that we know exist with regards to our universe, our galaxy, our solar system, our planet, our society, and even our individual selves, things could have very easily turned out to be different than they were. The fact that they have turned out in just this way and not another indicates this kind of chosenness, and along with it, comes a certain degree of responsibility, I guess? It seems to me that all the various 'everything' hypotheses (MWI, comp, Leibniz, and others) try to apply the Copernican principle to its breaking point. True enough, there is from a purely 3p point of view nothing special about our cosmic situation re: our planet and our sun. BUT, from an existential 1p point of view there is a huge privilege that we have, i.e. we are sentient observers, who love, feel pain, feel desire, and long for transcendence. There's a desire to respect the Copernican principle (don't assume we're 'special') but also to avoid randomness. This then leads to the hypothesis that *everything* (in some sense) exists. That way you avoid randomness without assuming that we're special. Moreover, the 3p point of view is a pure abstraction, kind of like eating the picture of a meal rather than the actual meal. How do we know what any kind of 3p account of truth would be? What would it even look like? A universe with no observers. A falling tree without a hearer/listener. This, to me, is nonsense. Aren't things like MWI of quantum physics and comp hypothesis of universal dovetailer trying to, at a fundamental and existential level, an attempt to try to run away from the concreteness and absolute 'givenness' (gift) of the world as we find it? And isn't our role, in creation, as freely choosing beings (sorry, John Clark, free will is more than just a noise) to choose what will make other people with us now and in the future feel more love and less pain? And isn't this why we were chosen? To say we're chosen is just another way to avoid randomness. To say we are avoiding randomness is to assume that there is something other than randomness to be embraced. That's what being 'chosen' implies - that there is a 'choser', an alternative teleology to be embraced. There doesn't have to be just one chooser. The universe could be made of choosers that can appear random when seen from a distant or incomplete frame of reference. But do they then make a random choice? No. It just seems random from the outside because outsiders only see a small part of what is going on. And how do they effect this choice? Through the active primitive of sense: efferent participation. And where do they appear? It's their behaviors which 'appear' to be random (or determined). I wasn't saying that anything unusual appears. It seems you are just spinning fairy tales. See what I mean? You are only getting some of what I am trying to explain, so your view is that my explanation appears random or senseless. But in a universe where there were no choosers, how would it be possible for anything to be 'embraced', let alone non-randomness? Before QM, determinism was embraced by many thinkers. Sure, because they use their free will (efferent participation) to do that. I am talking about the hypothetical universe which lacks free will and creative choosers. Why should anything that exists want to avoid randomness? Ask somebody else, I'm not avoiding it. I'm talking about in principle, ontologically, how is it possible for anything to 'want to
Chosen-ness
Hey everyone, I've been following this group a lot. I read it everyday and enjoy all of the wonderful stuff that comes up, even if some of it tends towards ad hominem, argument from authority, and petitio principi. Hey, we're humans, right? That means we get to make these fallacies, in good conscience or bad. Anyway, I wondered about what anyone/everyone thought about the notion of 'chosenness' as a way to understand where we are here in the world. It seems to me that concepts like MWI, Bruno's comp/mech hypothesis and the 'dreams of numbers' ideas of subjectivity, and even Leibniz's 'best of all possible worlds' don't actually do something like flee away from our everyday responsibility to accept the basic fact that we have been CHOSEN -- and when I say this, please don't immediately put a bunch of theological baggage on it. I'm not saying God chose this reality as opposed to another, although this might be a convenient shorthand. But what I am saying is that, out of all the staggering possibilities that we know exist with regards to our universe, our galaxy, our solar system, our planet, our society, and even our individual selves, things could have very easily turned out to be different than they were. The fact that they have turned out in just this way and not another indicates this kind of chosenness, and along with it, comes a certain degree of responsibility, I guess? It seems to me that all the various 'everything' hypotheses (MWI, comp, Leibniz, and others) try to apply the Copernican principle to its breaking point. True enough, there is from a purely 3p point of view nothing special about our cosmic situation re: our planet and our sun. BUT, from an existential 1p point of view there is a huge privilege that we have, i.e. we are sentient observers, who love, feel pain, feel desire, and long for transcendence. Moreover, the 3p point of view is a pure abstraction, kind of like eating the picture of a meal rather than the actual meal. How do we know what any kind of 3p account of truth would be? What would it even look like? A universe with no observers. A falling tree without a hearer/listener. This, to me, is nonsense. Aren't things like MWI of quantum physics and comp hypothesis of universal dovetailer trying to, at a fundamental and existential level, an attempt to try to run away from the concreteness and absolute 'givenness' (gift) of the world as we find it? And isn't our role, in creation, as freely choosing beings (sorry, John Clark, free will is more than just a noise) to choose what will make other people with us now and in the future feel more love and less pain? And isn't this why we were chosen? I'll go back to lurking now, but I'd appreciate any thoughts you might have on this reflection of mine. Cheers, Dan -- 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. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out.
Re: Chosen-ness
On Sunday, January 27, 2013 5:35:22 PM UTC-5, freqflyer07281972 wrote: Hey everyone, I've been following this group a lot. I read it everyday and enjoy all of the wonderful stuff that comes up, even if some of it tends towards ad hominem, argument from authority, and petitio principi. Hey, we're humans, right? That means we get to make these fallacies, in good conscience or bad. Anyway, I wondered about what anyone/everyone thought about the notion of 'chosenness' as a way to understand where we are here in the world. It seems to me that concepts like MWI, Bruno's comp/mech hypothesis and the 'dreams of numbers' ideas of subjectivity, and even Leibniz's 'best of all possible worlds' don't actually do something like flee away from our everyday responsibility to accept the basic fact that we have been CHOSEN -- and when I say this, please don't immediately put a bunch of theological baggage on it. I'm not saying God chose this reality as opposed to another, although this might be a convenient shorthand. But what I am saying is that, out of all the staggering possibilities that we know exist with regards to our universe, our galaxy, our solar system, our planet, our society, and even our individual selves, things could have very easily turned out to be different than they were. The fact that they have turned out in just this way and not another indicates this kind of chosenness, and along with it, comes a certain degree of responsibility, I guess? It seems to me that all the various 'everything' hypotheses (MWI, comp, Leibniz, and others) try to apply the Copernican principle to its breaking point. True enough, there is from a purely 3p point of view nothing special about our cosmic situation re: our planet and our sun. BUT, from an existential 1p point of view there is a huge privilege that we have, i.e. we are sentient observers, who love, feel pain, feel desire, and long for transcendence. Moreover, the 3p point of view is a pure abstraction, kind of like eating the picture of a meal rather than the actual meal. How do we know what any kind of 3p account of truth would be? What would it even look like? A universe with no observers. A falling tree without a hearer/listener. This, to me, is nonsense. Aren't things like MWI of quantum physics and comp hypothesis of universal dovetailer trying to, at a fundamental and existential level, an attempt to try to run away from the concreteness and absolute 'givenness' (gift) of the world as we find it? And isn't our role, in creation, as freely choosing beings (sorry, John Clark, free will is more than just a noise) to choose what will make other people with us now and in the future feel more love and less pain? And isn't this why we were chosen? I'll go back to lurking now, but I'd appreciate any thoughts you might have on this reflection of mine. Cheers, Dan What I propose is that a complete description of the universe must include: 1. The experience of significance. This speaks to the idea of chosen-ness, of choice, of free will, of improbability as a quality as the subject of appreciation. 2. The experience of the significance of the idea of insignificance. I word the significance of the idea of insignificance in this convoluted way to reflect the natural sequence in which the revelation of objectivity has occurred across all human societies. Since as far as I know: a. *all* cultures begin their history steeped in animistic shamanism, divination, creation myths and charismatic deities and b. *no* cultures develop eliminative materialism, mathematics, and mechanism earlier than philosophy or religion, and c. *all* individuals experience the development of their own psyche through imaginative, emotional, and irrational or superstitious thought d. *no* individuals are born with a worldview based only on generic facts and objectivity. Healthy children do not experience their lives in an indifferent and detached mode of observation but rather grow into analytical modes of thought through experience of the public world. We are so convinced by the sophisticated realism of objective insignificance that we tend to project it into a default position, when in fact, it does not occur naturally that way. It is we who choose subjectively whether or not to project objectivity beneath our own ability to choose it. The fact is, that were it that simple; were objectivity be the final word, then we should have had no reason to be separated from it in the first place. The whole notion of illusion depends on the non-illusory capacity of our own reason to deduce and discern illusion from reality, so that to question our own ability to freely choose, to some extent, how we reason, gives us no possibility of ever contacting any truth to deny. Looking at 1. and 2. more scientifically, I would link significance with teleology (choice
Re: Chosen-ness
On 1/27/2013 2:35 PM, freqflyer07281972 wrote: Hey everyone, I've been following this group a lot. I read it everyday and enjoy all of the wonderful stuff that comes up, even if some of it tends towards ad hominem, argument from authority, and petitio principi. Hey, we're humans, right? That means we get to make these fallacies, in good conscience or bad. Anyway, I wondered about what anyone/everyone thought about the notion of 'chosenness' as a way to understand where we are here in the world. It seems to me that concepts like MWI, Bruno's comp/mech hypothesis and the 'dreams of numbers' ideas of subjectivity, and even Leibniz's 'best of all possible worlds' don't actually do something like flee away from our everyday responsibility to accept the basic fact that we have been CHOSEN -- and when I say this, please don't immediately put a bunch of theological baggage on it. I'm not saying God chose this reality as opposed to another, although this might be a convenient shorthand. But what I am saying is that, out of all the staggering possibilities that we know exist with regards to our universe, our galaxy, our solar system, our planet, our society, and even our individual selves, things could have very easily turned out to be different than they were. The fact that they have turned out in just this way and not another indicates this kind of chosenness, and along with it, comes a certain degree of responsibility, I guess? It seems to me that all the various 'everything' hypotheses (MWI, comp, Leibniz, and others) try to apply the Copernican principle to its breaking point. True enough, there is from a purely 3p point of view nothing special about our cosmic situation re: our planet and our sun. BUT, from an existential 1p point of view there is a huge privilege that we have, i.e. we are sentient observers, who love, feel pain, feel desire, and long for transcendence. There's a desire to respect the Copernican principle (don't assume we're 'special') but also to avoid randomness. This then leads to the hypothesis that *everything* (in some sense) exists. That way you avoid randomness without assuming that we're special. Moreover, the 3p point of view is a pure abstraction, kind of like eating the picture of a meal rather than the actual meal. How do we know what any kind of 3p account of truth would be? What would it even look like? A universe with no observers. A falling tree without a hearer/listener. This, to me, is nonsense. Aren't things like MWI of quantum physics and comp hypothesis of universal dovetailer trying to, at a fundamental and existential level, an attempt to try to run away from the concreteness and absolute 'givenness' (gift) of the world as we find it? And isn't our role, in creation, as freely choosing beings (sorry, John Clark, free will is more than just a noise) to choose what will make other people with us now and in the future feel more love and less pain? And isn't this why we were chosen? To say we're chosen is just another way to avoid randomness. Brent I'll go back to lurking now, but I'd appreciate any thoughts you might have on this reflection of mine. Cheers, Dan -- 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. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out. No virus found in this message. Checked by AVG - www.avg.com http://www.avg.com Version: 2013.0.2890 / Virus Database: 2639/6054 - Release Date: 01/24/13 -- 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. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out.
Re: Chosen-ness
On Sunday, January 27, 2013 10:06:37 PM UTC-5, Brent wrote: On 1/27/2013 2:35 PM, freqflyer07281972 wrote: Hey everyone, I've been following this group a lot. I read it everyday and enjoy all of the wonderful stuff that comes up, even if some of it tends towards ad hominem, argument from authority, and petitio principi. Hey, we're humans, right? That means we get to make these fallacies, in good conscience or bad. Anyway, I wondered about what anyone/everyone thought about the notion of 'chosenness' as a way to understand where we are here in the world. It seems to me that concepts like MWI, Bruno's comp/mech hypothesis and the 'dreams of numbers' ideas of subjectivity, and even Leibniz's 'best of all possible worlds' don't actually do something like flee away from our everyday responsibility to accept the basic fact that we have been CHOSEN -- and when I say this, please don't immediately put a bunch of theological baggage on it. I'm not saying God chose this reality as opposed to another, although this might be a convenient shorthand. But what I am saying is that, out of all the staggering possibilities that we know exist with regards to our universe, our galaxy, our solar system, our planet, our society, and even our individual selves, things could have very easily turned out to be different than they were. The fact that they have turned out in just this way and not another indicates this kind of chosenness, and along with it, comes a certain degree of responsibility, I guess? It seems to me that all the various 'everything' hypotheses (MWI, comp, Leibniz, and others) try to apply the Copernican principle to its breaking point. True enough, there is from a purely 3p point of view nothing special about our cosmic situation re: our planet and our sun. BUT, from an existential 1p point of view there is a huge privilege that we have, i.e. we are sentient observers, who love, feel pain, feel desire, and long for transcendence. There's a desire to respect the Copernican principle (don't assume we're 'special') but also to avoid randomness. This then leads to the hypothesis that *everything* (in some sense) exists. That way you avoid randomness without assuming that we're special. Moreover, the 3p point of view is a pure abstraction, kind of like eating the picture of a meal rather than the actual meal. How do we know what any kind of 3p account of truth would be? What would it even look like? A universe with no observers. A falling tree without a hearer/listener. This, to me, is nonsense. Aren't things like MWI of quantum physics and comp hypothesis of universal dovetailer trying to, at a fundamental and existential level, an attempt to try to run away from the concreteness and absolute 'givenness' (gift) of the world as we find it? And isn't our role, in creation, as freely choosing beings (sorry, John Clark, free will is more than just a noise) to choose what will make other people with us now and in the future feel more love and less pain? And isn't this why we were chosen? To say we're chosen is just another way to avoid randomness. To say we are avoiding randomness is to assume that there is something other than randomness to be embraced. Why should anything that exists want to avoid randomness? Craig Brent I'll go back to lurking now, but I'd appreciate any thoughts you might have on this reflection of mine. Cheers, Dan -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Everything List group. To post to this group, send email to everyth...@googlegroups.comjavascript: . To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-li...@googlegroups.com javascript:. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out. No virus found in this message. Checked by AVG - www.avg.com Version: 2013.0.2890 / Virus Database: 2639/6054 - Release Date: 01/24/13 -- 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. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out.
Re: Chosen-ness
On 1/27/2013 7:13 PM, Craig Weinberg wrote: On Sunday, January 27, 2013 10:06:37 PM UTC-5, Brent wrote: On 1/27/2013 2:35 PM, freqflyer07281972 wrote: Hey everyone, I've been following this group a lot. I read it everyday and enjoy all of the wonderful stuff that comes up, even if some of it tends towards ad hominem, argument from authority, and petitio principi. Hey, we're humans, right? That means we get to make these fallacies, in good conscience or bad. Anyway, I wondered about what anyone/everyone thought about the notion of 'chosenness' as a way to understand where we are here in the world. It seems to me that concepts like MWI, Bruno's comp/mech hypothesis and the 'dreams of numbers' ideas of subjectivity, and even Leibniz's 'best of all possible worlds' don't actually do something like flee away from our everyday responsibility to accept the basic fact that we have been CHOSEN -- and when I say this, please don't immediately put a bunch of theological baggage on it. I'm not saying God chose this reality as opposed to another, although this might be a convenient shorthand. But what I am saying is that, out of all the staggering possibilities that we know exist with regards to our universe, our galaxy, our solar system, our planet, our society, and even our individual selves, things could have very easily turned out to be different than they were. The fact that they have turned out in just this way and not another indicates this kind of chosenness, and along with it, comes a certain degree of responsibility, I guess? It seems to me that all the various 'everything' hypotheses (MWI, comp, Leibniz, and others) try to apply the Copernican principle to its breaking point. True enough, there is from a purely 3p point of view nothing special about our cosmic situation re: our planet and our sun. BUT, from an existential 1p point of view there is a huge privilege that we have, i.e. we are sentient observers, who love, feel pain, feel desire, and long for transcendence. There's a desire to respect the Copernican principle (don't assume we're 'special') but also to avoid randomness. This then leads to the hypothesis that *everything* (in some sense) exists. That way you avoid randomness without assuming that we're special. Moreover, the 3p point of view is a pure abstraction, kind of like eating the picture of a meal rather than the actual meal. How do we know what any kind of 3p account of truth would be? What would it even look like? A universe with no observers. A falling tree without a hearer/listener. This, to me, is nonsense. Aren't things like MWI of quantum physics and comp hypothesis of universal dovetailer trying to, at a fundamental and existential level, an attempt to try to run away from the concreteness and absolute 'givenness' (gift) of the world as we find it? And isn't our role, in creation, as freely choosing beings (sorry, John Clark, free will is more than just a noise) to choose what will make other people with us now and in the future feel more love and less pain? And isn't this why we were chosen? To say we're chosen is just another way to avoid randomness. To say we are avoiding randomness is to assume that there is something other than randomness to be embraced. That's what being 'chosen' implies - that there is a 'choser', an alternative teleology to be embraced. Why should anything that exists want to avoid randomness? Ask somebody else, I'm not avoiding it. Brent -- 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. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out.
