There are no material objects

[Jonesboy]

Objects do not set their own physical limits. An object is a set of physical limits that we alone have drawn upon materials and space. For example, only the concept of entertainment distinguishes a TV from the carpet it stands on.

While this doen't rule out materiality, it rules out material objects. An object is a construction of sentient creatures.

[Tomtomkent]

Objects do not set their own physical limits. An object is a set of physical limits that we alone have drawn upon materials and space. For example, only the concept of entertainment distinguishes a TV from the carpet it stands on.

While this doen't rule out materiality, it rules out material objects. An object is a construction of sentient creatures.

Don't worry, this is all a dream, you are infact a pulsing shade of blue in a churning maelstrom of energy.


Now if we all ignore you do you cease to exist?:boxedin:

[Dancing David]

Um, it doesn't matter what the ontology is, objects behave as they do. In fact an ideal ontology is impossible to distinguish from a material one. We may all be godthought or butterfly dreams.

Funny thing however, whatever the ontology, things behave as though they are material.

If you can't distinguish the objects commonly labelled as 'carpets' from 'TVs', well perhaps you should repeat kindergarten.... :D

[Marduk]

umm, no, you are talking about non material objects, for instance when my TV is not displaying entertainment it is still distinguishable from the carpet

so, non material things
like for instance your ability to create a thread with an actual point, those sort of things don't exist
:p

[Tomtomkent]

Don't worry. Jonesboy doesn't exist. He is a really bad Turin test sent to annoy us. When he goes to bed at night he forgets what order his atoms are meant to be in.

He is infact cheesecake.


See. We can all do that "no point" thing...

[Jonesboy]

Um, it doesn't matter what the ontology is, objects behave as they do. In fact an ideal ontology is impossible to distinguish from a material one. We may all be godthought or butterfly dreams.

Funny thing however, whatever the ontology, things behave as though they are material.

If you can't distinguish the objects commonly labelled as 'carpets' from 'TVs', well perhaps you should repeat kindergarten.... :D


I can distinguish a carpet from a TV but only because I know about entertainment. Without that human value, there is no TV.

[yog_sothoth]

I for, one, do not exist. This post is a figment of your imagination.

[Jonesboy]

umm, no, you are talking about non material objects, for instance when my TV is not displaying entertainment it is still distinguishable from the carpet

so, non material things
like for instance your ability to create a thread with an actual point, those sort of things don't exist
:p

No. Non material objects are things like colours and sounds. I am talking about the physical limits of objects and how these are NOT set by material concerns.

[Jonesboy]

I for, one, do not exist. This post is a figment of your imagination.

I am not saying that the TV is not material. I am saying that it cannot be identified as a TV on materoial considerations alone. We need concepts like entertainment.

[Tomtomkent]

No. Non material objects are things like colours and sounds. I am talking about the physical limits of objects and how these are NOT set by material concerns.

Oh, so you are just wrong about the television and carpet in terms of the physical dimensions, chemical components, atomic structure and... well.. everything. Yes, there is a vast difference between the two that has nothing to do with function.

This is not science. Or philosophy, it is student prat trying to sound smarter than anybody who "doesn't get him".

[Ron_Tomkins]

For example, only the concept of entertainment distinguishes a TV from the carpet it stands on.

Not only you are dead wrong about that aspect being the only thing that differentiates those two objects, but what if I had a carpet that amused me as much as my Tv? Or if I had a Tv that I found equally as much tedious as my carpet?

[Jonesboy]

Not only you are dead wrong about that aspect being the only thing that differentiates those two objects, but what if I had a carpet that amused me as much as my Tv? Or if I had a Tv that I found equally as much tedious as my carpet?

Yes, I know. WE need some concept to set the physical limits.

[Comrade Raptor]

I can distinguish a carpet from a TV but only because I know about entertainment. Without that human value, there is no TV.

So if you had never seen the device on, nor watched a program, you would only see carpet?

You would not notice the rectangle-shaped thing?

So if you go to a hospital, or lab, and there are all kinds of devices that you don't know what purpose they serve - you cannot distinguish them? They're immaterial? Ghosts?

Watch out for The Phantom Centrifuge, he's a sneaky one.

[Tomtomkent]

I am not saying that the TV is not material. I am saying that it cannot be identified as a TV on materoial considerations alone. We need concepts like entertainment.

But the function of a television is not entertainment. It is to represent electromagnetic signals in a visual format through light producing media. With out the concept of entertainment there is still a function.

Really, you can't even be pointless with out being wrong?

[punshhh]

Objects do not set their own physical limits. An object is a set of physical limits that we alone have drawn upon materials and space. For example, only the concept of entertainment distinguishes a TV from the carpet it stands on.

While this doen't rule out materiality, it rules out material objects. An object is a construction of sentient creatures.

I agree that all things can be viewed as entities.

[Agatha]

It would probably be a bad idea to drop your TV on your foot. It would probably be less of a problem if you dropped the carpet on your foot.

[Jonesboy]

So if you had never seen the device on, nor watched a program, you would only see carpet?

You would not notice the rectangle-shaped thing?

So if you go to a hospital, or lab, and there are all kinds of devices that you don't know what purpose they serve - you cannot distinguish them? They're immaterial? Ghosts?

Watch out for The Phantom Centrifuge, he's a sneaky one.

Yes, for many creatures there is just a rectangle that gets in the way. Or for termites, it could be food, or for a murderer it could be the nearest dangerous object to hand.

There is no material property called TV.

[Tomtomkent]

Objects do not set their own physical limits

No, their physical dimensions do that.

[Comrade Raptor]

Yes, for many creatures there is just a rectangle that gets in the way. Or for termites, it could be food, or for a murderer it could be the nearest dangerous object to hand.

There is no material property called TV.


So if you don't call a tree a tree, then there is no tree?

This is silly. Whether you call it a tree, a trosslossloss, a farnkfarnk, or nothing at all it still exists, it is still material. It has form, shape, substance, and matter.

Even if you are not present to define it. Even if nobody is present to define it.

So, you are wrong.

[yog_sothoth]

I am not saying that the TV is not material. I am saying that it cannot be identified as a TV on materoial considerations alone. We need concepts like entertainment.

You seem to need them. Perhaps you should get over that.

[Tomtomkent]

Can I change my answer to "Yes there is!" Then hitting somebody with a material object like a frying pan?

[Greedo]

I could tell by the title this was a Jonesboy thread.

Content as expected.

[Lord Emsworth]

Can I change my answer to "Yes there is!" Then hitting somebody with a material object like a frying pan?

Should be entertaining.

[John Albert]

I could tell by the title this was a Jonesboy thread.

Content as expected.


Lots of word salad, with no main course.

[Ersby]

Should be entertaining.

That means it's a TV. Right?

[Apology]

What if a tree fell in the woods and nobody else was around when it landed on your head, would it still be immaterial? Inquiring minds want to know.

[I Ratant]

I can distinguish a carpet from a TV but only because I know about entertainment. Without that human value, there is no TV.
.
The tv exists as a tv without it being powered up, or even removed from the box the manufacturer shipped it in.
Looking for entertainment on tv, now THAT'S a challenge!

[bottsranzee]

Is it only carpet that's interchangeable with a TV, or can it be an end table or something as well? If that's the case I'll just buy what's cheaper. Someone let me know soon please, I'm on my way to the furniture store.

[Dessi]

Objects do not set their own physical limits. An object is a set of physical limits that we alone have drawn upon materials and space. For example, only the concept of entertainment distinguishes a TV from the carpet it stands on.

While this doen't rule out materiality, it rules out material objects. An object is a construction of sentient creatures.

Ok, I know people have been implying this the whole time, but let's just be blunt here:

Your threads are weird as hell.

I know I could probably come up with the same sort of comments if I were sufficiently high, but you are likely sober, and that fact alone makes it borderline worrying.

Let me share something with you: The first time I tried salvia, it was the most frightening experience of my life. It gave me first-person view of falling through my own ego, seeing reality fold in on itself, being unable to distinguish myself from seams in reality, feeling my sense of self expand indefinitely through time and space in a chaotic pattern -- I assure you, it was one of the most intricate horrors I've ever seen, so much that I had nightmares about it for months, and my head bristling with wordless abstract thoughts not unlike the ones you've described.

The key here is understanding that those thoughts don't mean anything. If you dwell on them or try to make sense of them, you're going to find yourself plagued by an uncanny feeling of derealization (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Derealization).

Try thinking about more cheerful things. Have you seen, Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0844471/)? Have you ever tried to juggle with your feet (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=defHqBTKq3Y)?

[Piggy]

The first time I tried salvia, it was the most frightening experience of my life. It gave me first-person view of falling through my own ego, seeing reality fold in on itself, being unable to distinguish myself from seams in reality, feeling my sense of self expand indefinitely through time and space in a chaotic pattern -- I assure you, it was one of the most intricate horrors I've ever seen, so much that I had nightmares about it for months, and my head bristling with wordless abstract thoughts not unlike the ones you've described.

See, I find that kind of experience fun. But to each his/her own, I reckon.

[Piggy]

Objects do not set their own physical limits. An object is a set of physical limits that we alone have drawn upon materials and space. For example, only the concept of entertainment distinguishes a TV from the carpet it stands on.

While this doen't rule out materiality, it rules out material objects. An object is a construction of sentient creatures.

Jonesboy, this is a serious question.... Why are you posting this kind of thing here, on a skeptical forum?

Why aren't you posting this kind of stuff on a New Age forum?

I mean, it's a bit like going to a vegetarian forum and asking what folks think about your latest pulled pork recipe.

These aren't rhetorical questions, I really want to know what you think you're going to get out of this.

Are you trying to convince skeptics to stop being skeptical? Are you hoping to have your ideas debunked?

Or what?

[tsig]

Not only you are dead wrong about that aspect being the only thing that differentiates those two objects, but what if I had a carpet that amused me as much as my Tv? Or if I had a Tv that I found equally as much tedious as my carpet?

OMG, I just turned off my TV and stated staring at my carpet and I never knew the colors were so vivid and so deep, the designs practically swirl and dance which is strange since I have a wood floor.

[Resume]

I mean, it's a bit like going to a vegetarian forum and asking what folks think about your latest pulled pork recipe.


Do you have one, considering your handle and all?

[Piggy]

Yes, for many creatures there is just a rectangle that gets in the way. Or for termites, it could be food, or for a murderer it could be the nearest dangerous object to hand.

There is no material property called TV.

There are material things called TVs.

You can prove this to yourself by walking into an electronics store. You will see lots of objects designed to display motion pictures with sound, and they will have the terms "TV" and "television" associated with them, via signage, packaging, and spoken reference.

That's all that's necessary to make it true that there are material things called TVs.

The fact that termites don't call them TVs, and are even incapable of conceiving of a television, doesn't change the fact that there are indeed things called TVs.

This is like claiming that because blind people have no concept of color, the concept of color must be useless.

You seem to be conflating language with its referents.

[Piggy]

Do you have one, considering your handle and all?

Oh, yes, a very good one. And a wonderful Vidalia onion sauce to go with it. Takes about 15-19 hours to cook right, depending on the size of the shoulder you're cooking. Can pass it on by PM if you're interested.

[Resume]

Oh, yes, a very good one. And a wonderful Vidalia onion sauce to go with it. Takes about 15-19 hours to cook right, depending on the size of the shoulder you're cooking. Can pass it on by PM if you're interested.

I'd be grateful.

[Piggy]

An object is a construction of sentient creatures.

Sorry to be crude, but Ted Bundy's victims still died when he bludgeoned them in their sleep. This would not have happened if the object he used to kill them were a construction of sentient creatures. Only the ones he murdered while they were awake would have died.

[Piggy]

I'd be grateful.

I'll need to transcribe it from the old, stained pieces of paper I have them written on, which will take some time. I've made a note to myself and posted it in the kitchen. Will get it to you over the weekend. I promise you'll love it!

[Resume]

I'll need to transcribe it from the old, stained pieces of paper I have them written on, which will take some time. I've made a note to myself and posted it in the kitchen. Will get it to you over the weekend. I promise you'll love it!

Take your time and thanks very much.

[Bram Kaandorp]

There are material things called TVs.

You can prove this to yourself by walking into an electronics store. You will see lots of objects designed to display motion pictures with sound, and they will have the terms "TV" and "television" associated with them, via signage, packaging, and spoken reference.

That's all that's necessary to make it true that there are material things called TVs.

The fact that termites don't call them TVs, and are even incapable of conceiving of a television, doesn't change the fact that there are indeed things called TVs.

This is like claiming that because blind people have no concept of color, the concept of color must be useless.

You seem to be conflating language with its referents.

But without language or a human observer, the TV is very similar to a table.

In other words: If we take away all that is "us" (if we leave the room, so to speak), then the objects in the room have no meaning.

Whilst this is technically true, (since, what use does a TV have if there is nobody to use it), it still doesn't change the fact that it's a TV.

Jonesboy really needs to work on his skills. He is still in the ignore-the-thread stage, where others, like someone else who was in the thread, has progressed to the just-type-anything-to-keep-the-illusion-of-knowing-what-to-say stage.

[Piggy]

But without language or a human observer, the TV is very similar to a table.

It is just as similar to a table in a roomful of people as it is on a planet devoid of life.

In other words: If we take away all that is "us" (if we leave the room, so to speak), then the objects in the room have no meaning.

The objects themselves never had any meaning anyway.

Whilst this is technically true, (since, what use does a TV have if there is nobody to use it), it still doesn't change the fact that it's a TV.

Bingo.

[bottsranzee]

Well no thanks to anyone, I came home with an end table. I tell you what, it sure the heck isn't very entertaining.

[Craig4]

So what is the application for this idea?

[JohnG]

I miss Interesting Ian.

[fuelair]

Objects do not set their own physical limits. An object is a set of physical limits that we alone have drawn upon materials and space. For example, only the concept of entertainment distinguishes a TV from the carpet it stands on.

While this doen't rule out materiality, it rules out material objects. An object is a construction of sentient creatures.

We have only two options here. The first is that you are joking. Stating in detail the second would result in something between an infraction and being banned. So I shan't

[citizenzen]

Objects do not set their own physical limits ...


This is why I love Buddhism.

Buddhism has a wonderful tradition of answering the question, "Isn't everything nothingness and life just an illusion," with a solid and sobering sock to the nose.

Sounds like Jonesboy is in need of one.

[Leumas]

I can distinguish a carpet from a TV but only because I know about entertainment. Without that human value, there is no TV.

Yes, I know. WE need some concept to set the physical limits.


Jonesboy,

There is an OBJECTIVE REALITY regardless what you think or don't and despite you existing or not.

RATIONALITY is a mark of how close you can approximate reality with your inner constructs about it.

The closer you approximate reality the better your ability to survive would be and thus the more you are likely to reproduce and pass on the genes that afforded you to better approximate reality.

The next generation then can either be more or less rational than your.


Consider this scenario:
You are sick and need an operation. They anesthetize you and operate on you. Since you are asleep according to your theory nothing can happen since nothing then exists while you are asleep.

However when you wake up, there is pain and a cut and you have to take pain killers to stop all the pain and antibiotics to stop an infection.

According to your philosophy none of this should be happening and especially infections since you cannot even see the bacteria awake or asleep.

If things only take on material existence when people know about them...how did most of Europe get wiped out by a plague virus that no one on earth even knew it existed?

What about the American Natives and Small Pox?

For that matter...where did the Conquistadores materialize from if the Natives never knew there were people or a world outside theirs.

Likewise...how did the Americas come into existence if Columbus did not even know they existed....are we in China right now?

Can you see how meaningless your ideas are.

Remember.....there is an OBJECTIVE reality out there outside your brain.

You can elect to try and approximate to it as closely as you can or you can elect to go around DELUDED...it is up to you....just thank your lucky stars that you have the luxury to think the way you do and still survive.... other people have to interact with reality so as to survive.

[Ron_Tomkins]

Yes, I know. WE need some concept to set the physical limits.

No.

[bruto]

Objects do not set their own physical limits. An object is a set of physical limits that we alone have drawn upon materials and space. For example, only the concept of entertainment distinguishes a TV from the carpet it stands on.

While this doen't rule out materiality, it rules out material objects. An object is a construction of sentient creatures.

Dear Abby: I recently embraced postmodernism. Since I don't find TV very entertaining it morphed into a carpet but I cut my feet walking on it. Seeking entertainment I groped for something to plug in but the carpet caught fire. What should I do next?

signed: Mad Ludwig II

[slingblade]

Dear Abby: I recently embraced postmodernism. Since I don't find TV very entertaining it morphed into a carpet but I cut my feet walking on it. Seeking entertainment I groped for something to plug in but the carpet caught fire. What should I do next?

signed: Mad Ludwig II

Dear Luddite,

Put out the fire, put on your shoes, and check your bedside table. The medications you need are in the top drawer.

Abby

[JJM 777]

An object is a set of physical limits that we alone have drawn upon materials and space.
"we alone" is an exaggeration

What we perceive as objects are mostly groups of atoms that cling together permanently, and move together in unison. Nearly any possible intelligent creature would perceive the objects similarly as we do: what clings together and moves together, related to what is around it, is a separate object.

[Craig4]

Okay, I have a beer. I pour it in a glass. I set it on the table. The table supports the beer. I can think or define the table anyway I like. It still supports the beer. My definitions do not impact the table. An object is simply defined by what it does. Any further thought on that topic is pointless.

[Dancing David]

I can distinguish a carpet from a TV but only because I know about entertainment. Without that human value, there is no TV.

Uh huh, and some TVs show train schedules, ergo you are wrong...

the label 'TV' is a human label, duh

[Dancing David]

No. Non material objects are things like colours and sounds. I am talking about the physical limits of objects and how these are NOT set by material concerns.

So, do you see better if you pluck out your eye?

Sidhartha Shakyamuni Gautama

[Dancing David]

I am not saying that the TV is not material. I am saying that it cannot be identified as a TV on materoial considerations alone. We need concepts like entertainment.

No, non-functioning 'TV' may still be labelled a 'TV", as do ones not 'used for entertainment'.

[Dancing David]

Yes, for many creatures there is just a rectangle that gets in the way. Or for termites, it could be food, or for a murderer it could be the nearest dangerous object to hand.

There is no material property called TV.

Wow, welcome to the JREF where we seem to already know what labels are. So maybe you should join the conversation. These issues have been many sources of ongoing conversations that longest running of which are the 'nature of mathematics' and the nature of 'consciousness'.

I beleive that language takes meaning only by idiomatic self reference to objects and behaviors between communicants.

However since both material and ideal ontologies are identical, it makes no difference what the basis of what 'shared reality is'.

[Dancing David]

Well no thanks to anyone, I came home with an end table. I tell you what, it sure the heck isn't very entertaining.

You should have got an entertainment center...

[Cainkane1]

No you have matter and energy. Matter exists obviously.

[I Ratant]

This is why I love Buddhism.

Buddhism has a wonderful tradition of answering the question, "Isn't everything nothingness and life just an illusion," with a solid and sobering sock to the nose.

Sounds like Jonesboy is in need of one.
.
I'll donate one of my socks after my bike ride this morning...

[I Ratant]

No.
.
You've been told before... have you forgotten already?

[I Ratant]

Okay, I have a beer. I pour it in a glass. I set it on the table. The table supports the beer. I can think or define the table anyway I like. It still supports the beer. My definitions do not impact the table. An object is simply defined by what it does. Any further thought on that topic is pointless.
.
I prefer coffee.
And use a coaster!!!!!!!

[I Ratant]

You should have got an entertainment center...
.
She made him buy the table!

[Ichneumonwasp]

There is no material property called TV.

I'm a little confused by your series of posts in this thread. Are we discussing properties or things/objects?

No one argues that there are TV atoms that comprise something that we call a television.

Your basic point seems be pretty self-evident -- we define objects in terms of their function. Objects assume functions based on the way that we use/define them.

For instance, I can use a rock as a table while hiking in the woods, but that does not mean that the rock suddenly changed form or became something different. It's function, for me, changed in my mind; but the physical object is still the physical object with no change whatsoever.

At one point you called color a non-material 'thing'. That is simply false. Color is not, properly speaking, a 'thing'; it is an interaction between light and the nervous system with the concept being a construction of prior experiences, language use within a language community, activation of a subset of receptors, etc. All of that is physical, though it is not a 'thing' but an action occurring within a nervous system as a result of that nervous system interacting with a physical substance known as a photon.

[Elypsis44]

If you don't think carpet can be entertaining, then you clearly don't know what a 'shag rake' was.


;)

[bottsranzee]

You should have got an entertainment center...

Dammit! You're right!

[Lord Emsworth]

TVishness

[Leumas]

.
I prefer coffee.
And use a coaster!!!!!!!



Who is house trained now?:p

[bruto]

Yes, for many creatures there is just a rectangle that gets in the way. Or for termites, it could be food, or for a murderer it could be the nearest dangerous object to hand.

There is no material property called TV.But that does not make it indistinguishable from the carpet, or from other objects. The TV, whether or not we know what it is or what it is for, or what to call it, is an object distinct from those around it. Even if we look at objects as undifferentiated, such that the TV and carpet are just two things in the sea of things, and even if we lack the perception or the language to differentiate them, they are still not the same thing. I brought them into the room at different times from different places. Even if they were to me as functionless and indistinguishable as the pieces of gravel in the driveway they would exist as separate objects.

[Minoosh]

what if I had a carpet that amused me as much as my Tv?

Hallucinogens help with that

[dafydd]

I just got back home after a gig. I played guitar,fiddle and mandolin. They felt like material objects to me.

[bruto]

I just got back home after a gig. I played guitar,fiddle and mandolin. They felt like material objects to me.But when you and your instrumentalist bias are out of the room the guitar fiddles with the mandolin and nobody can remember whose G-string is whose.

[Andrew Wiggin]

Reality is what doesn't go away when the drugs wear off...

[Jonesboy]

Originally Posted by Jonesboy
Objects do not set their own physical limits
No, their physical dimensions do that.

A physical dimension of an object IS its physical limits.

[Jonesboy]

Originally Posted by Jonesboy View Post
Yes, for many creatures there is just a rectangle that gets in the way. Or for termites, it could be food, or for a murderer it could be the nearest dangerous object to hand.

There is no material property called TV.


So if you don't call a tree a tree, then there is no tree?

This is silly. Whether you call it a tree, a trosslossloss, a farnkfarnk, or nothing at all it still exists, it is still material. It has form, shape, substance, and matter.

Even if you are not present to define it. Even if nobody is present to define it.

So, you are wrong.

There is a tree, but a tree 'is so' by its sentience. There is no material property that is a tree.

[Jonesboy]

Originally Posted by Jonesboy View Post
I am not saying that the TV is not material. I am saying that it cannot be identified as a TV on materoial considerations alone. We need concepts like entertainment.
You seem to need them. Perhaps you should get over that.



Hang on. It looks like you WANT the TV to be real.

[Jonesboy]

What if a tree fell in the woods and nobody else was around when it landed on your head, would it still be immaterial? Inquiring minds want to know.


That's easily answered. It's a beginners question.

[Jonesboy]

.
The tv exists as a tv without it being powered up, or even removed from the box the manufacturer shipped it in.
Looking for entertainment on tv, now THAT'S a challenge!

Yes, but only because YOU have set the physical limits that you want them to be.

[citizenzen]

That's easily answered. It's a beginners question.


Which for some reason was so easy that it remained unanswered.


Why a four year old child could understand this.

Run out and get me a four year old child, I can't make heads or tails out of it.

Groucho Marx

[Jonesboy]

Ok, I know people have been implying this the whole time, but let's just be blunt here:

Your threads are weird as hell.

I know I could probably come up with the same sort of comments if I were sufficiently high, but you are likely sober, and that fact alone makes it borderline worrying.

Let me share something with you: The first time I tried salvia, it was the most frightening experience of my life. It gave me first-person view of falling through my own ego, seeing reality fold in on itself, being unable to distinguish myself from seams in reality, feeling my sense of self expand indefinitely through time and space in a chaotic pattern -- I assure you, it was one of the most intricate horrors I've ever seen, so much that I had nightmares about it for months, and my head bristling with wordless abstract thoughts not unlike the ones you've described.

The key here is understanding that those thoughts don't mean anything. If you dwell on them or try to make sense of them, you're going to find yourself plagued by an uncanny feeling of derealization (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Derealization).

Try thinking about more cheerful things. Have you seen, Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0844471/)? Have you ever tried to juggle with your feet (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=defHqBTKq3Y)?

I studied with Stan Grof, the "Godfather" of LSD. I got certified as a facilitator on his non-drug technique and have run workshops. I can talk about this stuff.

[Jonesboy]

Which for some reason was so easy that it remained unanswered.


Why a four year old child could understand this.

Run out and get me a four year old child, I can't make heads or tails out of it.

Groucho Marx

It's easy. Sounds are not vibrations in the air. Sounds are a non-material perception of vibrations in the air. They have no material or spatial presence, such as a "sound IN the wood". There was no sound in the forest from the falling tree.

[Jonesboy]

Jonesboy, this is a serious question.... Why are you posting this kind of thing here, on a skeptical forum?

Why aren't you posting this kind of stuff on a New Age forum?

I mean, it's a bit like going to a vegetarian forum and asking what folks think about your latest pulled pork recipe.

These aren't rhetorical questions, I really want to know what you think you're going to get out of this.

Are you trying to convince skeptics to stop being skeptical? Are you hoping to have your ideas debunked?

Or what?

It's not New Age. Say it for what it is. A skepticism of Science.

I am a scientist, and I am a philosopher, and I say this - range your skepticism over everything that culture and learning has to offer you. Today my skepticism is directed at science, tomorrow it will be directed at religion.

[Jonesboy]

Sorry to be crude, but Ted Bundy's victims still died when he bludgeoned them in their sleep. This would not have happened if the object he used to kill them were a construction of sentient creatures. Only the ones he murdered while they were awake would have died.

oh yes I know. But then, as you say, it is creatures that are sentient.

[Jonesboy]

There are material things called TVs.

You can prove this to yourself by walking into an electronics store. You will see lots of objects designed to display motion pictures with sound, and they will have the terms "TV" and "television" associated with them, via signage, packaging, and spoken reference.

That's all that's necessary to make it true that there are material things called TVs.

The fact that termites don't call them TVs, and are even incapable of conceiving of a television, doesn't change the fact that there are indeed things called TVs.

This is like claiming that because blind people have no concept of color, the concept of color must be useless.

You seem to be conflating language with its referents.

We call them TV's just as we call certain shapes interesting. And useful.

[Jonesboy]

But without language or a human observer, the TV is very similar to a table.

In other words: If we take away all that is "us" (if we leave the room, so to speak), then the objects in the room have no meaning.

Whilst this is technically true, (since, what use does a TV have if there is nobody to use it), it still doesn't change the fact that it's a TV.

Jonesboy really needs to work on his skills. He is still in the ignore-the-thread stage, where others, like someone else who was in the thread, has progressed to the just-type-anything-to-keep-the-illusion-of-knowing-what-to-say stage.

Hi. Lost for words. Me that is. Not you. YOu started off well. Pink cheeks and rosy complexion.

[citizenzen]

It's easy. Sounds are not vibrations in the air. Sounds are a non-material perception of vibrations in the air. They have no material or spatial presence, such as a "sound IN the wood". There was no sound in the forest from the falling tree.


If that were the case, there'd be no measurable effect. You don't think a pine needle would quiver or a branch would shake from these vibrations?

I think they would.

Without ears, one might feel the vibrations. With ears, one hears the sound.

[Leumas]

It's easy. Sounds are not vibrations in the air. Sounds are a non-material perception of vibrations in the air. They have no material or spatial presence, such as a "sound IN the wood". There was no sound in the forest from the falling tree.


If you notice he made no reference to any sounds.....he said
What if a tree fell in the woods and nobody else was around when it landed on your head, would it still be immaterial? Inquiring minds want to know.

[Jonesboy]

I miss Interesting Ian.

You want interesting? I am interesting. I drink blood from the skulls of my enemies, and sup well upon their brains. I don't think "Ian" could accomodate that.

[citizenzen]

You want interesting? I am interesting. I drink blood from the skulls of my enemies, and sup well upon their brains. I don't think "Ian" could accomodate that.


Have you been playing too much D&D again?

[Jonesboy]

We have only two options here. The first is that you are joking. Stating in detail the second would result in something between an infraction and being banned. So I shan't

I've reported you for inractions 0 and 12 and making threats.

[Leumas]

Have you been playing too much D&D again?

:big:

[Jonesboy]

Have you been playing too much D&D again?


Too much D&D you said. Ha!
gReat joke.
What's D&D?

[Jonesboy]

Jonesboy,

There is an OBJECTIVE REALITY regardless what you think or don't and despite you existing or not.

RATIONALITY is a mark of how close you can approximate reality with your inner constructs about it.

The closer you approximate reality the better your ability to survive would be and thus the more you are likely to reproduce and pass on the genes that afforded you to better approximate reality.

The next generation then can either be more or less rational than your.


Consider this scenario:
You are sick and need an operation. They anesthetize you and operate on you. Since you are asleep according to your theory nothing can happen since nothing then exists while you are asleep.

However when you wake up, there is pain and a cut and you have to take pain killers to stop all the pain and antibiotics to stop an infection.

According to your philosophy none of this should be happening and especially infections since you cannot even see the bacteria awake or asleep.

If things only take on material existence when people know about them...how did most of Europe get wiped out by a plague virus that no one on earth even knew it existed?

What about the American Natives and Small Pox?

For that matter...where did the Conquistadores materialize from if the Natives never knew there were people or a world outside theirs.

Likewise...how did the Americas come into existence if Columbus did not even know they existed....are we in China right now?

Can you see how meaningless your ideas are.

Remember.....there is an OBJECTIVE reality out there outside your brain.

You can elect to try and approximate to it as closely as you can or you can elect to go around DELUDED...it is up to you....just thank your lucky stars that you have the luxury to think the way you do and still survive.... other people have to interact with reality so as to survive.

As I said, I am not saying that there is no material world. I am saying that the way we carve it up is down to us. And the way we carve it up is called objects.

[Jonesboy]

If that were the case, there'd be no measurable effect. You don't think a pine needle would quiver or a branch would shake from these vibrations?

I think they would.

Without ears, one might feel the vibrations. With ears, one hears the sound.


Yes, I agree. But the quivering is physical. The sound is a non-physical perception and can't be found anywhere.

[Jonesboy]

Dear Abby: I recently embraced postmodernism. Since I don't find TV very entertaining it morphed into a carpet but I cut my feet walking on it. Seeking entertainment I groped for something to plug in but the carpet caught fire. What should I do next?

signed: Mad Ludwig II


Rice pudding and nutmeg, with a skin. That's the good old recipe that, surviving food intolerances, will help your breed breed.

[Jonesboy]

"we alone" is an exaggeration

What we perceive as objects are mostly groups of atoms that cling together permanently, and move together in unison. Nearly any possible intelligent creature would perceive the objects similarly as we do: what clings together and moves together, related to what is around it, is a separate object.

Certainly, objects that get in the way and do not vanish, are a popular construction for creatures that need to get easily from A to B.

[Craig4]

It's not New Age. Say it for what it is. A skepticism of Science.

I am a scientist, and I am a philosopher, and I say this - range your skepticism over everything that culture and learning has to offer you. Today my skepticism is directed at science, tomorrow it will be directed at religion.

How do you know your conclusions are correct without science? If you don't have repeatable results and data what value are your conclusions?

[Jonesboy]

Okay, I have a beer. I pour it in a glass. I set it on the table. The table supports the beer. I can think or define the table anyway I like. It still supports the beer. My definitions do not impact the table. An object is simply defined by what it does. Any further thought on that topic is pointless.

You said "An object is simply defined by what it does."

Yes, but I say "which object?"

[Jonesboy]

How do you know your conclusions are correct without science? If you don't have repeatable results and data what value are your conclusions?

Results are important. But results do not judge the validity or relevance of results.

[Craig4]

You said "An object is simply defined by what it does."

Yes, but I say "which object?"

The table, the glass (okay, the coaster), the beer. Those objects.

[citizenzen]

Yes, I agree. But the quivering is physical. The sound is a non-physical perception and can't be found anywhere.


That doesn't make sense. If the quivering from vibrations is there, then it's physical.

If you want to argue that it takes a brain to process and interpret that vibration as a "sound" then okay ... your picking nits.

If your pet dog perks up it's ears and turns it's head because it hears a sound beyond your perception, do you think that there was no sound (physical vibration) at all and your dog was simply imagining things?

You see electromagnetic radiation at a very narrow bandwidth and interpret that as color. Other electromagnetic wavelengths are undetectable to our senses. Do you think they simply don't exist because you can't detect them?

[Jonesboy]

Uh huh, and some TVs show train schedules, ergo you are wrong...

the label 'TV' is a human label, duh

Thanks for expanding the definition. And..

[Jonesboy]

The table, the glass (okay, the coaster), the beer. Those objects.

Why not one third of the table joined to the glass? That's an object, isn't it?

[Jonesboy]

That doesn't make sense. If the quivering from vibrations is there, then it's physical.

If you want to argue that it takes a brain to process and interpret that vibration as a "sound" then okay ... your picking nits.

If your pet dog perks up it's ears and turns it's head because it hears a sound beyond your perception, do you think that there was no sound (physical vibration) at all and your dog was simply imagining things?

You see electromagnetic radiation at a very narrow bandwidth and interpret that as color. Other electromagnetic wavelengths are undetectable to our senses. Do you think they simply don't exist because you can't detect them?

Yes, the quivering or vibrations are physical. The sound isn't. There is no sound IN the forest.

We always detect material objects, even when they are hidden, but their physical extent is determined by us.

[PixyMisa]

An object is defined by what it does.

What does "one third of the table joined to the glass" do?

[Jonesboy]

No, non-functioning 'TV' may still be labelled a 'TV", as do ones not 'used for entertainment'.

How can you define the phsical limits of a TV to an alien that has no concept of entertainment or information, and who thinks through intuition alone?

[Jonesboy]

Wow, welcome to the JREF where we seem to already know what labels are. So maybe you should join the conversation. These issues have been many sources of ongoing conversations that longest running of which are the 'nature of mathematics' and the nature of 'consciousness'.

I beleive that language takes meaning only by idiomatic self reference to objects and behaviors between communicants.

However since both material and ideal ontologies are identical, it makes no difference what the basis of what 'shared reality is'.


Thanks for that. Where do I go for such discussions?

As an aside, I would argue with your idea that material and ideal ontologies are identical. I can show you that they are not identical.

[Jonesboy]

I'm a little confused by your series of posts in this thread. Are we discussing properties or things/objects?

No one argues that there are TV atoms that comprise something that we call a television.

Your basic point seems be pretty self-evident -- we define objects in terms of their function. Objects assume functions based on the way that we use/define them.

For instance, I can use a rock as a table while hiking in the woods, but that does not mean that the rock suddenly changed form or became something different. It's function, for me, changed in my mind; but the physical object is still the physical object with no change whatsoever.

At one point you called color a non-material 'thing'. That is simply false. Color is not, properly speaking, a 'thing'; it is an interaction between light and the nervous system with the concept being a construction of prior experiences, language use within a language community, activation of a subset of receptors, etc. All of that is physical, though it is not a 'thing' but an action occurring within a nervous system as a result of that nervous system interacting with a physical substance known as a photon.

sorry. What I meant to say was, was that there was no physical property that could define the physical limits of a TV. Unless, of course, that you had a;lready defined a TV and its physical limits.


'Colour is not a thing' I said - I meant a physical thing. You used the term "interaction". But an interaction poses as a thing between two domains, in this case colour and nervous system. The two domains cannot be merged by the tern "interact". It only falls between them, as a reference to a metaphor.

[Jonesboy]

An object is defined by what it does.

What does "one third of the table joined to the glass" do?

Now you are asking. It might mean something to some poor creature, I mean the glass and one third of the table mered into one object.
How about the object that 'lifts the glass without the table moving' ?

[Jonesboy]

But that does not make it indistinguishable from the carpet, or from other objects. The TV, whether or not we know what it is or what it is for, or what to call it, is an object distinct from those around it. Even if we look at objects as undifferentiated, such that the TV and carpet are just two things in the sea of things, and even if we lack the perception or the language to differentiate them, they are still not the same thing. I brought them into the room at different times from different places. Even if they were to me as functionless and indistinguishable as the pieces of gravel in the driveway they would exist as separate objects.

The TV is distinguishable from the carpet only because you have distinguished the carpet and the TV. The material world sees, or holds, no such distinction.

[Jonesboy]

I just got back home after a gig. I played guitar,fiddle and mandolin. They felt like material objects to me.


So why didn't you play the kerbstone and the fence? Or have you already selected the instruments you want?
Are you saying that the instruments selected themselves?

[citizenzen]

We always detect material objects, even when they are hidden, but their physical extent is determined by us.


Or your dog.

Or your hot dog ... when it's in a microwave oven.

[Jonesboy]

Originally Posted by Jonesboy View Post
It's easy. Sounds are not vibrations in the air. Sounds are a non-material perception of vibrations in the air. They have no material or spatial presence, such as a "sound IN the wood". There was no sound in the forest from the falling tree.

If you notice he made no reference to any sounds.....he said
Originally Posted by Apology View Post
What if a tree fell in the woods and nobody else was around when it landed on your head, would it still be immaterial? Inquiring minds want to know.

Yes, quite right. No damage done. Just substitute sounds for landing.

[Ferguson]

Yes, but only because YOU have set the physical limits that you want them to be.

Not really. I want my TV to be bigger, and not have that blackish splotch in the picture on the left side. My TV's physical limits are what some electrical engineer in Japan wanted them to be.

[slingblade]

There is a tree, but a tree 'is so' by its sentience.

Evidence that a tree is sentient?


There is no material property that is a tree.

Definition of "material property?"

[Craig4]

Why not one third of the table joined to the glass? That's an object, isn't it?

But it's not joined to the glass. I pick up the glass of beer (which was on a coaster, a very nice one from a Gasthause near Innsbruck) and there's no table attached to it.

[dafydd]

So why didn't you play the kerbstone and the fence? Or have you already selected the instruments you want?
Are you saying that the instruments selected themselves?

Goodbye Mr. Troll.

[PixyMisa]

Now you are asking. It might mean something to some poor creature, I mean the glass and one third of the table mered into one object.
An object is defined by what it does.

What does "the glass and one third of the table mer[g]ed into one object" do?

How about the object that 'lifts the glass without the table moving' ?
How about it?

[Bram Kaandorp]

How can you define the phsical limits of a TV to an alien that has no concept of entertainment or information, and who thinks through intuition alone?

You should first prove that aliens exist, before entering them into the discussion.

Hi. Lost for words. Me that is. Not you. YOu started off well. Pink cheeks and rosy complexion.

Right, as Dafydd said: Hello, Troll!

[Elypsis44]

You want interesting? I am interesting.

No, you're not.


I drink blood from the skulls of my enemies, and sup well upon their brains.

Translation: "I am 36 years old and still live in my parent's basement, which is from where I wage my guild battles in WoW!"


Goodbye Mr. Troll.

Agree.

[Dancing David]

Originally Posted by Jonesboy
Objects do not set their own physical limits


A physical dimension of an object IS its physical limits.

Sort of, electrons are very fickle, they may be here but they may also be far away. There is more than its current position, there is a probability distribution ...

[Dancing David]

It's easy. Sounds are not vibrations in the air. Sounds are a non-material perception of vibrations in the air. They have no material or spatial presence, such as a "sound IN the wood". There was no sound in the forest from the falling tree.

So do you hear better with wax in your ears?

Paraphrase of
Sidhartha Shakyamuni Gotama

[Dancing David]

If that were the case, there'd be no measurable effect. You don't think a pine needle would quiver or a branch would shake from these vibrations?

I think they would.

Without ears, one might feel the vibrations. With ears, one hears the sound.

Um, sounds are perceptual events, noises are pressure waves, fine point. They are still material.

[Dancing David]

Thanks for that. Where do I go for such discussions?

As an aside, I would argue with your idea that material and ideal ontologies are identical. I can show you that they are not identical.

Not really, you can pretend that they are, but there is no way to tell the difference. For us, we could all be godthought, butterfly dreams, dancing energy and BIVs. The end result is teh same no matter what.

You can suppose that there are differences, but there would be no way to tell.

So how could you tell, this is an idea that many have rejected but those who ponder will understand.

Thanks to HammeGK for this understanding.

You can argue but there is no way to tell the two apart, yet it could be that the Great Mind manifests as 'material objects', idealists often speculate that there would be a difference. Many materialists disagree until they ponder it.

But this is just speculation...

[Dancing David]

sorry. What I meant to say was, was that there was no physical property that could define the physical limits of a TV. Unless, of course, that you had a;lready defined a TV and its physical limits.


'Colour is not a thing' I said - I meant a physical thing. You used the term "interaction". But an interaction poses as a thing between two domains, in this case colour and nervous system. The two domains cannot be merged by the tern "interact". It only falls between them, as a reference to a metaphor.

Nope from what it appears the 'colour' is a perceptual event of a biological body.

Words are mataphors, yes. 'cars' will still run you over.

[Dancing David]

The TV is distinguishable from the carpet only because you have distinguished the carpet and the TV. The material world sees, or holds, no such distinction.

Um, so?

We already know words are idiomatic referenecs between communicants. This does not mean that you can call a 'wall' a door and 'walk' through it.

And I am curious how you claim to have knowledge of what the material world 'sees, or holds', nice speculation there.

So lets cut to the chase, we already know that cars do not contain a property of 'fast', okay?

Now what?

[Dancing David]

Thanks for that. Where do I go for such discussions?



Use the search function of the forum you can set it to R&P 'consciousness', 'qualia' and 'mathematics'.

[Dancing David]

So why didn't you play the kerbstone and the fence? Or have you already selected the instruments you want?
Are you saying that the instruments selected themselves?

If you poke your finger in your eye, it does not become the moon.

Seriously, you are taking the flashlight of enlightenment and staring into it.

Maybe you should reread your Jung... especially the parts he wrote later in his life about the functions of age in self

[Elizabeth I]

There is a tree, but a tree 'is so' by its sentience. There is no material property that is a tree.
Are you saying that trees are sentient?


I studied with Stan Grof, the "Godfather" of LSD. I got certified as a facilitator on his non-drug technique and have run workshops. I can talk about this stuff.
Yes, you can - and do! Boy, do you - talk about it, but apparently you can't do so coherently or with any idea of communicating to someone else.

[Ichneumonwasp]

sorry. What I meant to say was, was that there was no physical property that could define the physical limits of a TV. Unless, of course, that you had a;lready defined a TV and its physical limits.


'Colour is not a thing' I said - I meant a physical thing. You used the term "interaction". But an interaction poses as a thing between two domains, in this case colour and nervous system. The two domains cannot be merged by the tern "interact". It only falls between them, as a reference to a metaphor.



Thank you, but you seem to define color, sound, nervous system, mind in such a way as to produce the result you would like -- either toward some form of property dualism or idealism.

To a physicalist, both sound/color/etc. and nervous system are physical -- so there is no issue in their interaction and interaction is not simply a reference to metaphor.


Physicalists speak of physical 'things' that act in the world and part of that action is interaction between two physical 'things'. The deeper insight is that those physical 'things' are themselves actions or interactions. We do not have a proper definition of 'energy'.

If you want to speak about interaction between the physical and non-physical, perhaps you could provide a mechanism? How do such things happen? Isn't interaction defined in physical terms and so impossible for the non-physical? I've yet to encounter a proper explanation of mind body dualism if that is what you are after, so I would appreciate your explanation if you have one.

As to the physical limits of a TV, properly speaking there is no precise physical limit when examined at an extremely small scale. At the scale in which we carry out our daily lives the physical limit, for vision, is created by edge detectors that begin their processing in the retina and carry on their processing in our brains. That aspect of object/ground distinction does not depend on language or the concept of function. The function of the TV produces another aspect of how we distinguish such an object from others that surround it, though.

But we can still define objects that serve one function in one setting as performing another function in another setting. That, in itself, should tell you that defining the function of an object is not the sine qua non of determining what is and what is not an object. We already saw the rock as different from its background because of those edge detectors (and other processing) before we ever decided to define its function as a table.

And, just to drive the point home, a physicalist views the 'mental' processes involved in all those perceptions as physical and not non-physical.

[Ichneumonwasp]

The TV is distinguishable from the carpet only because you have distinguished the carpet and the TV. The material world sees, or holds, no such distinction.



It depends what you mean by that. Let me hazard a guess -- do you mean there is no value in distinguishing between such 'things'? Without a valuer, it's all just 'stuff', after all?

Well, yes.

But it does not follow that there would be no physical limit defining a 'rock' as opposed to the ground beneath it in the radical absence of a valuer, depending, of course, how one defines value. For instance, we could build a robot without what a lot of folks would identify as emotion or motivation but who could distinguish between object and ground. That robot would see the limits of a rock as opposed to the ground on which it sat but wouldn't necessarily care a lick about it. In our radical absence, given a long-lasting power source, that robot would continue making that distinction. The robot would do so only because it was designed to make such distinctions.

We are also designed to make such distinctions by natural selection. We have feature detectors because we survive with them and would not survive without them. Those feature detectors are physical processes, though. There is nothing, from a physicalist viewpoint, that is immaterial here.

[Craig4]

So why didn't you play the kerbstone and the fence? Or have you already selected the instruments you want?
Are you saying that the instruments selected themselves?

Because a curbstone doesn't do what a musical instrument does. They have different functions.

[dafydd]

Because a curbstone doesn't do what a musical instrument does. They have different functions.

I selected the instruments when I bought them. This is a concept that Jonesboy will find hard to understand.

[tsig]

I studied with Stan Grof, the "Godfather" of LSD. I got certified as a facilitator on his non-drug technique and have run workshops. I can talk about this stuff.

I see, you took the train to fantasy land and forgot which station you got off at.

[Craig4]

Once again, what is the application for this?

[tsig]

How can you define the phsical limits of a TV to an alien that has no concept of entertainment or information, and who thinks through intuition alone?

As you suggested earlier I'd pick it up and hit him in the head with it.

[tsig]

Evidence that a tree is sentient?






Well, compared to some posters a tree is sentient.

[Dessi]

I studied with Stan Grof, the "Godfather" of LSD. I got certified as a facilitator on his non-drug technique and have run workshops. I can talk about this stuff.

You, sir, are ok by me.

[slingblade]

Well, compared to some posters a tree is sentient.

No arguing with that.

[slingblade]

Translation: "I am 36 years old and still live in my parent's basement, which is from where I wage my guild battles in WoW!"


Hey, hey, hey! Are you saying our JREF guild's defeat of Cho'Gall this weekend wasn't a valuable life experience?

You must be Alliance.





:p

[Elizabeth I]

I see, you took the train to fantasy land and forgot which station you got off at.

Did tsig's post make anybody besides me think of this? :)

Picture yourself on a train in a station,
With plasticine porters with looking glass ties.
Suddenly someone is there at the turnstile,
The girl with kaleidoscope eyes.
- The Beatles, Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band

[Piggy]

It's not New Age. Say it for what it is. A skepticism of Science.

I am a scientist, and I am a philosopher, and I say this - range your skepticism over everything that culture and learning has to offer you. Today my skepticism is directed at science, tomorrow it will be directed at religion.

You didn't answer my question.

And no, nothing you post has anything to do with science, nor does it demonstrate even a basic understanding of either the scientific method or contemporary scientific work.

Nor is this "skepticism" on your part.

Skepticism means basing your conclusions on evidence.

What you're doing is certainly not being skeptical of science.

Rather, it is attempting to posit non-scientific ideas as alternatives to science.

And yes, it all reeks of New Age.

[Piggy]

As I said, I am not saying that there is no material world. I am saying that the way we carve it up is down to us. And the way we carve it up is called objects.

It is and it isn't "down to us".

The way we "carve up" reality depends on two things: (1) the properties of the external reality, and (2) the properties of our brains/bodies.

We do not have an arbitrary level of freedom.

[Piggy]

Yes, I agree. But the quivering is physical. The sound is a non-physical perception and can't be found anywhere.

What do you meant it "can't be found anywhere"? If that were true, it wouldn't exist.

The "sound" is the result of an interaction between movements in air (or water, or wood, or whatever) and the physical apparatus of your body.

Of course it can be spatially located.

[Piggy]

How can you define the phsical limits of a TV to an alien that has no concept of entertainment or information, and who thinks through intuition alone?

1. Who cares? It's irrelevant. (Substituting "alien" for "termite" makes no difference -- there are still things called [by humans] TVs, which are different from other things that are not TVs, such as rugs.)

2. The alien doesn't have to have any of these concepts in order to understand that the TV is over there and the coffee maker is over here. Just as I don't have to understand alien concepts in order for them to show me that the dfjewisi is over here and the lkktirso is over there.)

3. You're still conflating language and mental concepts, on the one hand, with physical structures on the other. The ocean differs from the shore in objective ways that do not depend on conceptualization.

[bruto]

How can you define the phsical limits of a TV to an alien that has no concept of entertainment or information, and who thinks through intuition alone?Pick it up and move it! Its boundaries relative to the rest of the world are immediately apparent without ever touching on its function or its reason for being there.

[dafydd]

If there are no material objects what is Jonesboy using to post here?

[Bram Kaandorp]

If there are no material objects what is Jonesboy using to post here?

Solipsism.

[Dave Rogers]

Objects do not set their own physical limits. An object is a set of physical limits that we alone have drawn upon materials and space. For example, only the concept of entertainment distinguishes a TV from the carpet it stands on.

While this doen't rule out materiality, it rules out material objects. An object is a construction of sentient creatures.

Since the concept of "an object" is, therefore, a classic example of a common sense definition, and the idea expressed above is clearly antithetical to that common sense definition, we can therefore deduce that the idea expressed above is not common sense. How should this best be reconciled with the clear statement, recently made in another part of the forum, that:

There are no ideas that are not commensense.

Discuss.

Dave

[dafydd]

Solipsism.

I would like to know how Jonesboy functions in daily life without material objects.

Originally Posted by Jonesboy
There are no ideas that are not commensense.


What is 'commensense'?

[bruto]

I would like to know how Jonesboy functions in daily life without material objects.




What is 'commensense'?If we look at the examples presented here, I'd suggest that it's a word constructed of "commensurate" and "sense," denoting a statement the magnitude of whose silliness corresponds to the magnitude of the reality it ignores.

[JoeBentley]

I would like to know how Jonesboy functions in daily life without material objects.


Just fine because he doesn't use solipsism in everyday life because he doesn't really believe what he is saying. Nobody outside of a straightjacket in a padded room does. It's an almost universally dishonest position because while I keep meeting people that promote it in various arguments, I have never met anyone that actually lives their life as if it is true.

To paraphrase Dr. House "He can talk about there being no such object as a car all he wants, but I guarantee you when he crosses the street he still looks both ways."

People only use solipsism for one of two reasons:

1. As a counter to reasonable skepticism as a way to excuse away irrational beliefs.
2. As pseudo-intellectual gobbledygook to post on the internet or talk about at Starbucks as a way to make themselves feel smart.

[Belz...]

Yes, but only because YOU have set the physical limits that you want them to be.

That is patently ridiculous. The TV has dimensions that are the same for everybody, even robots. Please step into reality, or peddle your elementary school philosophy somewhere else.

I am a scientist

Nonsense.

[Belz...]

Yes, I agree. But the quivering is physical. The sound is a non-physical perception and can't be found anywhere.

You have no idea what you're typing. Go back to school.

[dafydd]

I am a scientist


And I am the King of China.

[dafydd]

You have no idea what you're typing. Go back to school.

If there are no material objects then he has no keyboard or monitor. No wonder he posts nonsense.

[Bodhi Dharma Zen]

Objects do not set their own physical limits. An object is a set of physical limits that we alone have drawn upon materials and space. For example, only the concept of entertainment distinguishes a TV from the carpet it stands on.

While this doen't rule out materiality, it rules out material objects. An object is a construction of sentient creatures.

And, if you take this to its last consequences, you cant talk about "physical limits", or "sentient creatures", because both are constructions.

[ferd burfle]

I am a scientist...


Yes, you claim to be a chemist who has synthsized novel compounds. No special training or knowledge needed for that. All you need is common sense. :rolleyes:

ferd

[Jontg]

It's all a construction--all definitions are arbitrary, attempts to define a universe as yet beyond our comprehension. Time is a direction, consciousness is an illusion, and everything is just weird vibrations whacking against each other.
But none of that changes the reality of what is being defined. The Buddhists nailed this in the BCs--there are two truths. One for contemplating the idea of a rock and the nature of self, and one for responding when yourself is about to get hit with a rock.

[autumn1971]

Shorter Jonesboy:

"Words mean what I want them to mean, nothing more, nothing less."

[Bodhi Dharma Zen]

It's all a construction--all definitions are arbitrary, attempts to define a universe as yet beyond our comprehension. Time is a direction, consciousness is an illusion, and everything is just weird vibrations whacking against each other.
But none of that changes the reality of what is being defined. The Buddhists nailed this in the BCs--there are two truths. One for contemplating the idea of a rock and the nature of self, and one for responding when yourself is about to get hit with a rock.

I like that, care to expand it?

[slingblade]

"There are no material objects."


Except actually, there are.


/thread

[Piggy]

Just fine because he doesn't use solipsism in everyday life because he doesn't really believe what he is saying.

Wow.

First troll confession I've ever seen.




Do you get kicked out of the union for that?

[JoeBentley]

It certainly wasn't meant as a trollish comment.

I was being completely serious. It's impossible to actually apply solipsism to everyday life. It is literally impossible to operate under the idea that reality isn't real and still function in anything resembling a normal life.

It's only used as a pseudo-intellectual and semantic "gotcha."

[Jontg]

I like that, care to expand it?

Just what I said, really. Just because a rock is actually a collection of particles whose properties are better defined as flavors and frequencies than as traits, any of which might spontaneously decide to be something else for reasons we barely understand because the whole thing is actually just a wavelength transmitting through some medium we don't even have a name for yet...*
(spends a minute catching his breath)
...doesn't change the intrinsic rock-ness of the object, because "rock" is just a word we made up in the first place, and our evolving awareness of what this thing to which we apply that word is just means we need to stick an asterisk on the end and move on. It's like money--just because it isn't backed by gold doesn't mean it has no value. It's still desirable--you can earn it through labor, and spend it on goods and services. Its intrinsic value is unchanged, because value is something we gave it by wanting it--and the same thing was true of gold in the first place. Objects and identities are just words we created. Their meanings are the result of consensus--but the things to which we attach these words are not fundamentally changed by the attachment. "I" is not an objectively real thing--my consciousness is an illusion in my own mind, my component particles don't know me from Adam, and chemically, I'm just a very, very complex lump of slime and calcium--but "I" is nonetheless a useful shorthand for the collection of wavelengths that caused this image to print on your screen.

*My quantum physics knowledge derives entirely from listening to people make fun of the worst errors committed in pop culture and pseudoscience. I'm probably wrong about most of this.

[MRC_Hans]

It's not New Age. Say it for what it is. A skepticism of Science.

I am a scientist, and I am a philosopher, and I say this - range your skepticism over everything that culture and learning has to offer you. Today my skepticism is directed at science, tomorrow it will be directed at religion.

Separated modes of consciousness, in the broadest Cartesian sense, need to be criticized with regard to their validity and range, before they can be used for the purposes of a radical grounding of the transcendental-phenomenological reduction, by reconciling with noematic descriptions; I set myself the all-embracing task of uncovering multiplicities of the Objective world by a freely actualizable return to the stream of multiplicities of the fundamental form of this universal synthesis. The fact is evident that noematic descriptions, in respect of this evidence, denote the universal primal phenomena of, by a freely actualizable return to noetic acts, the phenomenological epoche. Only in reflection do we "direct" ourselves to pure and genuine evidence and to its perceptual directedness to cogitationes. The Transcendental Deduction, when thus treated as the Ideal, exists in our ideas. Applied logic is the key to understanding the intelligible objects in space and time, as any dedicated reader can clearly see. The Ideal of human reason (and we can deduce that this is true) can not take account of the objects in space and time. With the sole exception of our understanding, the Transcendental Deduction can thereby determine in its totality, so far as regards time, the noumena. In which of our cognitive faculties are the Antinomies and our a priori knowledge connected together? In natural theology, our speculative judgements, in all theoretical sciences, are just as necessary as the Antinomies, as we have already seen. Still, it is obvious that the thing in itself, irrespective of all empirical conditions, can never furnish a true and demonstrated science, because, like the thing in itself, it proves the validity of synthetic principles. By means of analysis, the architectonic of natural reason, that is to say, is the mere result of the power of reason, a blind but indispensable function of the soul.

Hans

[slingblade]

Just what I said, really. Just because a rock is actually a collection of particles whose properties are better defined as flavors and frequencies than as traits, any of which might spontaneously decide to be something else for reasons we barely understand because the whole thing is actually just a wavelength transmitting through some medium we don't even have a name for yet...*
(spends a minute catching his breath)
...doesn't change the intrinsic rock-ness of the object, because "rock" is just a word we made up in the first place, and our evolving awareness of what this thing to which we apply that word is just means we need to stick an asterisk on the end and move on. It's like money--just because it isn't backed by gold doesn't mean it has no value. It's still desirable--you can earn it through labor, and spend it on goods and services. Its intrinsic value is unchanged, because value is something we gave it by wanting it--and the same thing was true of gold in the first place.

Objects and identities are just words we created. Their meanings are the result of consensus--but the things to which we attach these words are not fundamentally changed by the attachment. "I" is not an objectively real thing--my consciousness is an illusion in my own mind, my component particles don't know me from Adam, and chemically, I'm just a very, very complex lump of slime and calcium--but "I" is nonetheless a useful shorthand for the collection of wavelengths that caused this image to print on your screen.

*My quantum physics knowledge derives entirely from listening to people make fun of the worst errors committed in pop culture and pseudoscience. I'm probably wrong about most of this.


This is good. This is really good. This is a rare instance of me reading a rather philosophical and yet linguistic and scientifically accurate explanation of concrete/abstract concepts, and understanding it. Able to agree with it. Okay, it's a little heavy on the concrete side, admittedly, since we're discussing material objects, but it would apply to abstract concepts too. Maybe with a little tweaking.

Nicely done.

[Moonshine]

It's all a construction--all definitions are arbitrary...

But mentally slicing up the physical world into objects isnt arbitrary is it? Sure matter is just matter. Just molecules. But those molecules are arranged in such ways that some 'hang together' strongly, forming collections that are distinct from other collections of molecules. There is thus 'objectness' already in the physical world, and the human nervous system has simply come along and incorporated that and exploited that. The human has evolved to take very great 'notice' of the boundaries of this - edges, shape, texture changes, colour changes, etc. And then there is the behaviour of these collections of molecules and the use they afford to us, which along with their form acts as a basis upon which we define whether something is a separate object and attach linguistic labels. The rock is distinct from the ground it rests on (it's shape, colour and texture gives it away, and if I go and pick it up then I know for sure that it's not part of the ground). The table is distinct from the carpet it sits on. This is the basis of how we define things as objects: how is that arbitrary?

[tsig]

I would like to know how Jonesboy functions in daily life without material objects.




What is 'commensense'?

For most people it seems to mean "What I agree with".

[yy2bggggs]

The TV is distinguishable from the carpet only because you have distinguished the carpet and the TV.
We have distinguished the carpet and the TV because they have recognizably distinct properties.

You forget that we don't, and cannot, invent these concepts whole cloth. We have to be able to sense them, directly or indirectly; for such crisply meaningful concepts as televisions and carpet, there needs to be some extremely distinguishable properties of matter as a prerequisite for us to come up with such concepts.

The one correct thing you surmised is that the definition of objects is something that we come up with. The problem is that you're choking on this.
The material world sees, or holds, no such distinction.
The material world holds recognizably distinct properties.

Furthermore, your problem with objects is not in fact a problem of objects; but rather, is a fundamental property of true statements. Every true statement is a meaningful statement, and meaning is something that only certain sentient creatures come up with.

You seem to me be ignoring this when you say "there are no material objects"; in order for that phrase to be true, it must first have a meaning, and that meaning is something only sentient creatures come up with. What us sentient creatures mean by "material objects" includes things like your spoon, your table, and this penny here; and this penny is doing precisely what it needs to do for it to do what I mean by "exist" (namely, interacting with my sensory apparatus in particular ways). In fact, as I can easily see that this penny exists, I need go no further. The statement "there are material objects" is exemplified by the penny.

Your objection that the penny does not set its own limits is irrelevant. The penny might not describe itself, but it's still there. If it weren't there, I wouldn't sense it. And it's still material; if it weren't, again, I wouldn't sense it. It's also still a penny; if it weren't, I couldn't recognize it as one.

[Bodhi Dharma Zen]

Separated modes of consciousness, in the broadest Cartesian sense, need to be criticized with regard to their validity and range, before they can be used for the purposes of a radical grounding of the transcendental-phenomenological reduction, by reconciling with noematic descriptions; I set myself the all-embracing task of uncovering multiplicities of the Objective world by a freely actualizable return to the stream of multiplicities of the fundamental form of this universal synthesis. The fact is evident that noematic descriptions, in respect of this evidence, denote the universal primal phenomena of, by a freely actualizable return to noetic acts, the phenomenological epoche. Only in reflection do we "direct" ourselves to pure and genuine evidence and to its perceptual directedness to cogitationes. The Transcendental Deduction, when thus treated as the Ideal, exists in our ideas. Applied logic is the key to understanding the intelligible objects in space and time, as any dedicated reader can clearly see. The Ideal of human reason (and we can deduce that this is true) can not take account of the objects in space and time. With the sole exception of our understanding, the Transcendental Deduction can thereby determine in its totality, so far as regards time, the noumena. In which of our cognitive faculties are the Antinomies and our a priori knowledge connected together? In natural theology, our speculative judgements, in all theoretical sciences, are just as necessary as the Antinomies, as we have already seen. Still, it is obvious that the thing in itself, irrespective of all empirical conditions, can never furnish a true and demonstrated science, because, like the thing in itself, it proves the validity of synthetic principles. By means of analysis, the architectonic of natural reason, that is to say, is the mere result of the power of reason, a blind but indispensable function of the soul.

Hans

Hi there Hans, I have been far from the forums for a while, but I don't remember you being this, philosophical... I like what I read here btw.

[Bodhi Dharma Zen]

For most people it seems to mean "What I agree with".

LOL undeniable true!

[Bodhi Dharma Zen]

Just what I said, really. Just because a rock is actually a collection of particles whose properties are better defined as flavors and frequencies than as traits, any of which might spontaneously decide to be something else for reasons we barely understand because the whole thing is actually just a wavelength transmitting through some medium we don't even have a name for yet...*

And even those are models, arbitrary (and necessarily subjective) definitions. There is no significant difference (no matter how we want to believe it) between "table" or "a collection of atoms". Both models work for certain language games, but one is no more, well, objective or real than the other.

That said, when people says that the table is not "really a table" but a collection of atoms with certain properties, or a figment in the mind of god, is not advacning to a better description or a more objective description.

[Jontg]

Exactly--the realization that boxes and lines are just our way of reducing intricate systems to simpler rough analogues can seem profound, but really all you've done is look at a bit of Java code and piece together the nature and purpose of variables. We say "table" to save time, because other instances of our cognitive "code" (that is, other human minds) already have this variable stored, so there's no need to write a treatise on high-end particle physics and a meditation on thing-ness whenever you want to describe a collection of wave/particles that behaves in a tabley manner.

[NoahFence]

Objects do not set their own physical limits. An object is a set of physical limits that we alone have drawn upon materials and space. For example, only the concept of entertainment distinguishes a TV from the carpet it stands on.

While this doen't rule out materiality, it rules out material objects. An object is a construction of sentient creatures.

Hush Jonesboy, be still.

My mind is aglow with whirling, transient nodes of thought, careening through a cosmic vapor of invention.

[dafydd]

Hush Jonesboy, be still.

My mind is aglow with whirling, transient nodes of thought, careening through a cosmic vapor of invention.

Hedley Lamarr!

[Bram Kaandorp]

Hush Jonesboy, be still.

My mind is aglow with whirling, transient nodes of thought, careening through a cosmic vapor of invention.

Ditto.

[Piggy]

It certainly wasn't meant as a trollish comment.

I was being completely serious. It's impossible to actually apply solipsism to everyday life. It is literally impossible to operate under the idea that reality isn't real and still function in anything resembling a normal life.

It's only used as a pseudo-intellectual and semantic "gotcha."

D'oh! Don't ask me why or how, but for some reason I got you mixed up with the poster you were speaking of, and I thought it was him referring to himself in the 3rd person.

Geez, that was bizarre. I must've turned it up to Ludicrous Speed or something.

Ok, we'll pretend that never happened, how 'bout....

[Piggy]

But mentally slicing up the physical world into objects isnt arbitrary is it? Sure matter is just matter. Just molecules. But those molecules are arranged in such ways that some 'hang together' strongly, forming collections that are distinct from other collections of molecules. There is thus 'objectness' already in the physical world, and the human nervous system has simply come along and incorporated that and exploited that. The human has evolved to take very great 'notice' of the boundaries of this - edges, shape, texture changes, colour changes, etc. And then there is the behaviour of these collections of molecules and the use they afford to us, which along with their form acts as a basis upon which we define whether something is a separate object and attach linguistic labels. The rock is distinct from the ground it rests on (it's shape, colour and texture gives it away, and if I go and pick it up then I know for sure that it's not part of the ground). The table is distinct from the carpet it sits on. This is the basis of how we define things as objects: how is that arbitrary?

And that right there, in a nutshell, is why Jonesboy's post-modern physics is a crock.

We do not have arbitrary levels of freedom, language is not a closed and entirely self-referential system, and evolution ensures that we cannot envelop ourselves in solipsism.

[dafydd]

And that right there, in a nutshell, is why Jonesboy's post-modern physics is a crock.

We do not have arbitrary levels of freedom, language is not a closed and entirely self-referential system, and evolution ensures that we cannot envelop ourselves in solipsism.

Physics? Since when was gibberish classed as physics?

[Piggy]

Physics? Since when was gibberish classed as physics?

"Post-modern physics", I said.

Which, to paraphrase Charles Schulz, is a bit like a hi-fi jump-rope.

[Dancing David]

And even those are models, arbitrary (and necessarily subjective) definitions. There is no significant difference (no matter how we want to believe it) between "table" or "a collection of atoms". Both models work for certain language games, but one is no more, well, objective or real than the other.

That said, when people says that the table is not "really a table" but a collection of atoms with certain properties, or a figment in the mind of god, is not advacning to a better description or a more objective description.

as the AHB said it is better to remove the arrow than to figure out where it came from and who fired it

[dafydd]

as the AHB said it is better to remove the arrow than to figure out where it came from and who fired it

True. My late wife was a Theosophist and they were more interested in who made the arrow,what it was made from,is there a Platonic archetype, could the arrow have been fired in a previous life, are arrows merely an illusion caused by Maya,etc etc........

[Belz...]

It certainly wasn't meant as a trollish comment.

I was being completely serious. It's impossible to actually apply solipsism to everyday life. It is literally impossible to operate under the idea that reality isn't real and still function in anything resembling a normal life.

It's only used as a pseudo-intellectual and semantic "gotcha."

And not a very good one, at that.

[Cainkane1]

Objects do not set their own physical limits. An object is a set of physical limits that we alone have drawn upon materials and space. For example, only the concept of entertainment distinguishes a TV from the carpet it stands on.

While this doen't rule out materiality, it rules out material objects. An object is a construction of sentient creatures.
Nah solid objects exist. I've see them.n

[Bodhi Dharma Zen]

as the AHB said it is better to remove the arrow than to figure out where it came from and who fired it

Hello David, who is AHB? and... I would agree, exept, when you are doing philosphy (or CSI).

[Dancing David]

Hello David, who is AHB? and... I would agree, exept, when you are doing philosphy (or CSI).

Alleged Historic Buddha, sorry

[dafydd]

Nah solid objects exist. I've see them.n

I've been struck by a few. I wish I had come across Jonesboy before, it might have been less painful.

[Bodhi Dharma Zen]

Alleged Historic Buddha, sorry

Got it, but he then was referring to the "ultimate goal" and not to philosphical ramblings. What I mean, any Buddha will eat and go to the bathroom, even when they (presumable) are able to see what we call reality from a different perspective.

[dafydd]

Got it, but he then was referring to the "ultimate goal" and not to philosphical ramblings. What I mean, any Buddha will eat and go to the bathroom, even when they (presumable) are able to see what we call reality from a different perspective.

Laying flat on their backs?

[Bodhi Dharma Zen]

Laying flat on their backs?

Lol...

I refer to an altered state of consciousness, of course, and imply that, to a point, we also live immerse in an altered state of consciousness (caused by a large extent by our culture).

[dafydd]

Lol...

I refer to an altered state of consciousness, of course, and imply that, to a point, we also live immerse in an altered state of consciousness (caused by a large extent by our culture).

Not so sure about that. I am of the opinion that there is only one reality. I have experienced altered states of consciousness by dint of industrial strength doses of Owsley's acid,but they were not real.

[Bodhi Dharma Zen]

Not so sure about that. I am of the opinion that there is only one reality. I have experienced altered states of consciousness by dint of industrial strength doses of Owsley's acid,but they were not real.

Oh.. they WERE real! thats the whole point!... a different way to perceive reality... I dont see the problem.

[Bram Kaandorp]

Oh.. they WERE real! thats the whole point!... a different way to perceive reality... I dont see the problem.

A different way to see something doesn't imply a different something.

It implies a different way to see something.

[Dancing David]

Got it, but he then was referring to the "ultimate goal" and not to philosphical ramblings. What I mean, any Buddha will eat and go to the bathroom, even when they (presumable) are able to see what we call reality from a different perspective.

Or he was reffering to suffering, that you should remove it and not dwell on it

[Ron_Tomkins]

OP: In short, concise sentences, define "Material" and define "Immaterial" for us, please.

[Elizabeth I]

OP: In short, concise sentences, define "Material" and define "Immaterial" for us, please.

...and use no more than fifty words and do not tergiversate. :D:p

[really, truly, REALLY, just joking, I promise!]

[Toontown]

OP: In short, concise sentences, define "Material" and define "Immaterial" for us, please.

Yeah. Then we'd know exactly what we're supposed to be arguing in favor of the existence of. It would be the shats if we spent an lot of time arguing for the existence of "Material", only to find that he meant something entirely different from what we thought he meant.

[Bodhi Dharma Zen]

A different way to see something doesn't imply a different something.

It implies a different way to see something.

err... that's what I said... duh

[dafydd]

Oh.. they WERE real! thats the whole point!... a different way to perceive reality... I dont see the problem.

They were not real,just a product of my brain chemistry being altered. It was all in my head.

[dafydd]

err... that's what I said... duh

No. You said they were real, not that they were different ways of looking at the one reality.

[MRC_Hans]

Hi there Hans, I have been far from the forums for a while, but I don't remember you being this, philosophical... I like what I read here btw.

Psst: http://www.tandj.net/~jpoirier/little_hacks/kant/

Note that the product is fully on par with anything Jonesboy produces. ;)

Hans

[Lamuella]

I now have an image of someone throwing a baseball at Jonesboy's face while saying "I refute it thus"

[MRC_Hans]

I now have an image of someone throwing a baseball at Jonesboy's face while saying "I refute it thus"

I was thinking more in the direction of a brick, but ......
.... in the interest of humanity, I will settle for a dead fish.

Hans

[Andrew Wiggin]

As inspired by another content free physics thread, I decided to translate the OP into finnish and back to english.

Objects do not put their own physical rajoituksia.Esine is a set of physical boundaries, which we alone have produced upon the materials and space. For example, only separated from the concept of TV entertainment, it stands on carpet.

Even if this doen't ruled out of materiality, it excludes material esineitä.Esine construction of sentient beings.

Nope. Still doesn't make much sense.

[Jonesboy]

[SIZE=2]Separated modes of consciousness, in the broadest Cartesian sense, need to be criticized with regard to their validity and range, before they can be used for the purposes of a radical grounding of the transcendental-phenomenological reduction, by reconciling with noematic descriptions;




Hans

Parts are already identified by the whole. The rest, wherever it came from, was a montage of the standardised misinterpretation of Kant.

[Jonesboy]

We have distinguished the carpet and the TV because they have recognizably distinct properties.

You forget that we don't, and cannot, invent these concepts whole cloth. We have to be able to sense them, directly or indirectly; for such crisply meaningful concepts as televisions and carpet, there needs to be some extremely distinguishable properties of matter as a prerequisite for us to come up with such concepts.

EVERYTHING has recognizably distinct properties. What you have to say is why you chose THESE particular properties. The properties themselves don't choose themselves for you.

[Jonesboy]

OP: In short, concise sentences, define "Material" and define "Immaterial" for us, please.

Materials would be objects that conform or subsist in the frameworks of space and time. Immaterial is something not relevant.

[Andrew Wiggin]

rajotuksia means restrictions, and esine means object. Not sure why google translate left them untranslated.

[Andrew Wiggin]

I was thinking more in the direction of a brick, but ......
.... in the interest of humanity, I will settle for a dead fish.

Hans

I'm not proud, I'll watch (holds up hand)

[Jonesboy]

Objects and identities are just words we created. Their meanings are the result of consensus--but the things to which we attach these words are not fundamentally changed by the attachment..

The same mistake, repeated.
WHICH things do you mean? You see, you assume the things are already there, in order to say that they are already there.

[Lamuella]

question: if there are no material objects, and thus jonesboy's computer does not exist, can we just agree that his posts are figments of our collective imagination?

[MRC_Hans]

Parts are already identified by the whole. The rest, wherever it came from, was a montage of the standardised misinterpretation of Kant.Good! You passed the Turing test.

Hans

[MRC_Hans]

EVERYTHING has recognizably distinct properties. What you have to say is why you chose THESE particular properties. The properties themselves don't choose themselves for you.

I chose them because they are the ones that make a difference for me. An object may have other properties, which I ignore, or are unaware of, because they appear to have no bearing on my relationship to the object.

Hans

[MRC_Hans]

Materials would be objects that conform or subsist in the frameworks of space and time.

That would be correct enough not to merit further discussion.

Immaterial is something not relevant.

According to that definition, your posts and thoughts are not relevant.

- Are you sure you want to go there?

Hans

[MRC_Hans]

The same mistake, repeated.
WHICH things do you mean? You see, you assume the things are already there, in order to say that they are already there.

That objects exist regardless of our perception of them is an axiom of materialism. As far as it can be tested, it has been shown to be true.

Hans

[yy2bggggs]

EVERYTHING has recognizably distinct properties.
No, objects having recognizably distinct properties does not come for free. You are probably missing that I'm describing objects, and that I use the term "recognizably".

Suppose we have 10 glasses of water. I take 3 of those glasses and define it as "foo water". But I don't tell you which 3 glasses are foo water.

Your task is to pick out which 3 glasses are foo water, versus which 7 are not foo water.

Compare that to this situation. We have something I call a carpet, and something I call a television, in a room. We shut the room, soundproof it, surround it with a Faraday cage, and so on, and I just rearrange the room to my heart's content. Then we open the room and let another person in. Her task is to identify which one is the carpet, and which one is the television.

Do you understand?
What you have to say is why you chose THESE particular properties. The properties themselves don't choose themselves for you.No. I do not have to say why I chose those particular properties. Why I chose a particular set of properties is entirely irrelevant; if there even are particular properties that are different for the television than there are for the carpet, then it follows that a television is not the same as the carpet.

The fact that we can perform experiments such as the second one I listed above, and have a person correctly identify the carpet and the television in nearly 100% of the cases, means that there are recognizably distinct properties, which necessarily means there are distinct properties.

[punshhh]

Psst: http://www.tandj.net/~jpoirier/little_hacks/kant/

Note that the product is fully on par with anything Jonesboy produces. ;)

Hans

I smelled a rat by the end of the first sentence;)

[yy2bggggs]

Or let's use this example, since it has more to do with the borders of the objects per se.

My neighbor Sue is about to cook, and finds herself short two cups of sugar, so she goes over to my house when I'm not home. A roommate of mine gives her a cup of sugar. Sue then goes to her neighbor on the other side--Harriet--and requests another cup of sugar. Harriet obliges.

Sue pours the two cups of sugar into a mixing bowl and starts prepping her recipe. The two cups from each neighbor she adds to a pile of cups in her kitchen sink, with the intention of washing them before returning.

Meanwhile I come home and am upset that my favorite cup has been loaned out. So I go to Sue's house and ask her to return my cup. Sue says, "Sure, it's in the kitchen sink", and I go to the sink, grab my cup, and am on my way.

Now for ending number two...

I come home and am upset that my favorite cup of sugar has been loaned out (let's say something silly; that cup of sugar was given to me by my late grandmother before she died, so it has sentimental value to me). So I go to Sue's house and ask her to give me back my cup of sugar. Sue says, "Sure, it's in the mixing bowl", and to my horror I see it is lumped in with Harriet's sugar. It is now impossible for me to identify which cup of sugar was loaned to me by my late grandmother, and which was simply Harriet's sugar.

My favorite cup has recognizably distinct properties from Harriet's cup or most other cups, as demonstrated by the fact that I can pick it out of a pile of cups. But my favorite cup of sugar does not have recognizably distinct properties from any other cup of sugar, once it is combined into a pile.

The carpet and the television, all in a "pile", is more like the former situation. It's easy for any person to separate the television from the carpet, picking out the television from the objects in the pile.

[bruto]

OP: In short, concise sentences, define "Material" and define "Immaterial" for us, please.That may not help if the problem word is "object."

[dafydd]

I smelled a rat by the end of the first sentence;)

It doesn't look any different from the usual new age claptrap,such as "beyond tghe event horizon of the formless"

[Bram Kaandorp]

question: if there are no material objects, and thus jonesboy's computer does not exist, can we just agree that his posts are figments of our collective imagination?

Hey, don't presume to know the extent of my mental degradation.:D

[Bodhi Dharma Zen]

They were not real,just a product of my brain chemistry being altered. It was all in my head.

No. You said they were real, not that they were different ways of looking at the one reality.

You don't get it... what was not real? what is "real"?

ANYTHING that you experience is real, and it is part of reality... what you see, feel, touch, is ALL in your head... I said both that they are both real and that they are both different ways of looking to reality. You fail to see that what you normally experience, is the result of the works of your brain, you are not in touch with reality, you are in touch with a highly specialized subjective abstraction of it... There you go.

[Elizabeth I]

I was thinking more in the direction of a brick, but ......
.... in the interest of humanity, I will settle for a dead fish.

Hans

Hard on the fish, however.

[punshhh]

You don't get it... what was not real? what is "real"?

ANYTHING that you experience is real, and it is part of reality... what you see, feel, touch, is ALL in your head... I said both that they are both real and that they are both different ways of looking to reality. You fail to see that what you normally experience, is the result of the works of your brain, you are not in touch with reality, you are in touch with a highly specialized subjective abstraction of it... There you go.

And Dafydd thought it was just the acid:D

[Mojo]

Objects do not set their own physical limits. An object is a set of physical limits that we alone have drawn upon materials and space. For example, only the concept of entertainment distinguishes a TV from the carpet it stands on.

While this doen't rule out materiality, it rules out material objects. An object is a construction of sentient creatures.


http://physics.nyu.edu/sokal/transgress_v2/transgress_v2_singlefile.html

There are many natural scientists, and especially physicists, who continue to reject the notion that the disciplines concerned with social and cultural criticism can have anything to contribute, except perhaps peripherally, to their research. Still less are they receptive to the idea that the very foundations of their worldview must be revised or rebuilt in the light of such criticism. Rather, they cling to the dogma imposed by the long post-Enlightenment hegemony over the Western intellectual outlook, which can be summarized briefly as follows: that there exists an external world, whose properties are independent of any individual human being and indeed of humanity as a whole; that these properties are encoded in "eternal'' physical laws; and that human beings can obtain reliable, albeit imperfect and tentative, knowledge of these laws by hewing to the "objective'' procedures and epistemological strictures prescribed by the (so-called) scientific method.

[dafydd]

You don't get it... what was not real? what is "real"?

ANYTHING that you experience is real, and it is part of reality... what you see, feel, touch, is ALL in your head... I said both that they are both real and that they are both different ways of looking to reality. You fail to see that what you normally experience, is the result of the works of your brain, you are not in touch with reality, you are in touch with a highly specialized subjective abstraction of it... There you go.

When I die and my brain ceases to function reality will still be there.

[dafydd]

And Dafydd thought knows it was just the acid:D

ftfy


Have you found any examples of my gibberish yet? Is lying part of the mystical tradition? We know that fantasizing plays a large part.

[MRC_Hans]

Some of the ideas here border on Solipsism, so I thought I'd post this again, here:


MRC_Hans' practical test of Solipsism .(tm)

Disclaimer: This experiment might not only bruise your ego, but also your body, so you undertake it entirely at your own risk. I will not be held responsible for any consequences, including, but not limited to, loss of pride, peace of mind, teeth, etc.

1) Find a busy city street.

2) Wait for large aggressive looking male to walk by (generally, the more tattoos, the better).

3) Walk up behind said large aggressive looking male and direct a solid kick at the lower, rear portion of his body.

4) When he turns, tell him: "That was because you mother is so ugly".

5) Observe.

You will soon have tangible evidence for the following:

a) You exist physically.

b) At least one other entity exists physically.

c) You and that other entity are in communication, both abstractly and physically.

d) The other entity probably has a mother.

You may conclude that all your observations are, after all, part of an illusion, but the experience should convince you that you had better treat the illusion as reality .

Good luck!

Hans :D

[dafydd]

Some of the ideas here border on Solipsism, so I thought I'd post this again, here:


MRC_Hans' practical test of Solipsism .(tm)

Disclaimer: This experiment might not only bruise your ego, but also your body, so you undertake it entirely at your own risk. I will not be held responsible for any consequences, including, but not limited to, loss of pride, peace of mind, teeth, etc.

1) Find a busy city street.

2) Wait for large aggressive looking male to walk by (generally, the more tattoos, the better).

3) Walk up behind said large aggressive looking male and direct a solid kick at the lower, rear portion of his body.

4) When he turns, tell him: "That was because you mother is so ugly".

5) Observe.

You will soon have tangible evidence for the following:

a) You exist physically.

b) At least one other entity exists physically.

c) You and that other entity are in communication, both abstractly and physically.

d) The other entity probably has a mother.

You may conclude that all your observations are, after all, part of an illusion, but the experience should convince you that you had better treat the illusion as reality .

Good luck!

Hans :D

I once asked punshhh what he would do if he looked up and saw a piano plummeting down on course for his head. I received a wishy-washy answer but of course he would jump out of the way,as all so-called mystics would. Reality is reality.

[Bodhi Dharma Zen]

When I die and my brain ceases to function reality will still be there.

:rolleyes: Are you familiar with logical fallacies? You are dealing with a strawman here, I never said that it would... ha, so typical in JREF... :rolleyes:

[dafydd]

:rolleyes: Are you familiar with logical fallacies? You are dealing with a strawman here, I never said that it wouldn't... ha, so typical in JREF... :rolleyes:

What? So when I die reality will disappear? That will come as a shock to the living. Typical of your sort to indulge in semantics. I just get on with my life.

[Bodhi Dharma Zen]

What? So when I die reality will disappear? That will come as a shock to the living. Typical of your sort to indulge in semantics. I just get on with my life.

oh.. :rolleyes: you are joking, right? I mean, I said you were fighting a strawman... you didnt get it (do yourself a favor and learn about logical fallacies)... To clarify, YOU are the one putting that assertion in my mouth.. I NEVER CLAIMED SUCH A THING... got it? Now, go back and read again what I said about perception and reality.

[tsig]

Psst: http://www.tandj.net/~jpoirier/little_hacks/kant/

Note that the product is fully on par with anything Jonesboy produces. ;)

Hans

Ouch, that should hurt. Somehow I think the reflection will bounce off the mirror mind.

[tsig]

I was thinking more in the direction of a brick, but ......
.... in the interest of humanity, I will settle for a dead fish.

Hans

If someone throws you a dead fish they have fed you for a day

If you're eating a steady diet of fish, you're a philosopher.

[Foster Zygote]

I can distinguish a carpet from a TV but only because I know about entertainment. Without that human value, there is no TV.

No, you could distinguish a carpet from a TV even if you had absolutely no idea what either object was.

[dafydd]

oh.. :rolleyes: you are joking, right? I mean, I said you were fighting a strawman... you didnt get it (do yourself a favor and learn about logical fallacies)... To clarify, YOU are the one putting that assertion in my mouth.. I NEVER CLAIMED SUCH A THING... got it? Now, go back and read again what I said about perception and reality.

I thought that you were joking.

[dafydd]

No, you could distinguish a carpet from a TV even if you had absolutely no idea what either object was.

You don't have to plug the carpet in, for a start. Was there ever a more pointless thread?

[tsig]

You don't have to plug the carpet in, for a start. Was there ever a more pointless thread?

Really?


http://inventorspot.com/articles/electric_carpet_keeps_heat_your_feet_35695


:)

[dafydd]

Really?


http://inventorspot.com/articles/electric_carpet_keeps_heat_your_feet_35695


:)

Ok, but I can't watch repeats of QI on my carpet. I could sit on the carpet while watching :)

[Ron_Tomkins]

Materials would be objects that conform or subsist in the frameworks of space and time. Immaterial is something not relevant.

How do you differentiate between the Material and the Immaterial?

[dafydd]

How do you differentiate between the Material and the Immaterial?

Easy. The immaterial does not exist except in the fevered imaginations of mystics

[Dancing David]

What? So when I die reality will disappear? That will come as a shock to the living. Typical of your sort to indulge in semantics. I just get on with my life.

dafydd, you may not like this. perceptual events are real, their validity may be suspect, but they are real.

[JoeBentley]

Is it just me or does this whole "Everything only exists in my own head" crap sound like some kind of ego boosting fantasy?

[dafydd]

Is it just me or does this whole "Everything only exists in my own head" crap sound like some kind of ego boosting fantasy?

I never said that everything exists only in my own head. I believe the opposite to be true. Everything will still be here when I am brown bread. I was referring to my experiences under the influence of LSD. I do not believe that they happened 'out there' in the real world. I'm quite a shy person, boosting my ego does not come naturally to me.

[dafydd]

dafydd, you may not like this. perceptual events are real, their validity may be suspect, but they are real.

Even perceptual events experienced under 600 micrograms of Owsley's Orange Sunshine?

[yy2bggggs]

Even perceptual events experienced under 600 micrograms of Owsley's Orange Sunshine?
Depends--did you really take 600 micrograms of Owsley's Orange Sunshine? If so, then yes, those experience were real. If not, then you had no such experiences.

Anything you actually do experience is experienced in reality. Reality is the only place you can experience things.

And yes, that is exactly what they are talking about.

[Elizabeth I]

Ok, but I can't watch repeats of QI on my carpet. I could sit on the carpet while watching :)

Yes, but you could sit on the TV and stare at the carpet. :D

[Elizabeth I]

Depends--did you really take 600 micrograms of Owsley's Orange Sunshine? If so, then yes, those experience were real. If not, then you had no such experiences.

Anything you actually do experience is experienced in reality. Reality is the only place you can experience things.

And yes, that is exactly what they are talking about.

Not to be pseudo-profound, but there is a difference between, "I really experienced something" (of course people who hallucinate really do have those experiences), and, "I experienced something and it really exists apart from me." (Hallucinations do not exist outside the mind of the person having them.)

[dafydd]

Depends--did you really take 600 micrograms of Owsley's Orange Sunshine? If so, then yes, those experience were real. If not, then you had no such experiences.

Anything you actually do experience is experienced in reality. Reality is the only place you can experience things.

And yes, that is exactly what they are talking about.

I did take it. I sampled his White Lightning and Blue Cheer too. I suppose it all depends upon what you mean by real. My first trip happened because somebody gave me a tab of Blue Cheer and I rather foolishly swallowed it in our local pub. At one point during the evening the landlord was washing the glasses and stacking them on the bar. I saw the glasses melt, run down the bar like lava and the tide flowed over to me , touched my shoes, which became glass too. I wasn't scared, I found it fascinating. Are you saying that this really happened? The friend I was tripping with didn't see it and the regulars in the pub just saw some wet glasses.

[dafydd]

Not to be pseudo-profound, but there is a difference between, "I really experienced something" (of course people who hallucinate really do have those experiences), and, "I experienced something and it really exists apart from me." (Hallucinations do not exist outside the mind of the person having them.)

Exactly. LSD visions are not reality. I doubt if any of the people who are arguing the point have any experience of psychedelic substances. A true argument from ignorance, and that is not intended as an insult.