Defining Reality: A Scientific Approach to Truth, Knowledge, and Consciousness

[moving finger]

Hi Paul

The first words at the start of this thread were :

It seems to me that we too frequently use the terms 'truth', 'knowledge', 'belief', 'faith', 'reality', 'existence', and 'consciousness' without first defining them.

I agree 100% with this statement. What I have been trying to do since then is to understand your own definitions of these very terms. “Knowledge” for example you define in terms of something you call the Receptive Principle, but you refuse to define what you mean by the Receptive Principle. This seems to me simply to be replacing one undefined term (“Knowledge”) with another (“the Receptive Principle”), thus I cannot see how it is supposed to be a step forward.

it seems to me that you don't understand enough mathematics to understand my proposal.

It may indeed be the case that I don’t understand enough mathematics, since I am not a mathematician like yourself. However I do not believe there is much in the way of mathematics in your proposal, and I see your response here (with the greatest respect) as simply a possible attempt at evading the real issue, which is the meaning of the term “knowledge”.

I doubt that one can grasp the significance of the power of abstract mathematics to solve, in this example, problems of squaring the circle and trisecting an angle with ruler and compass, unless one has done the hard work of studying and understanding enough Galois Theory.

Forgive me, but I simply don’t see what relevance this has to understanding the meaning of English language terms such as “Knowledge” and “Consciousness”.

Are you saying that you cannot offer any definition or meaningful interpretation of this thing you call the Receptive Principle?

Of course I could offer a definition or interpretation. But if I did I would be violating a fundamental rule of mathematics. It is strictly forbidden in mathematics to define or describe or interpret any primitive. That's the whole idea. Primitives are undefined.

It seems to me that you are adopting mathematical conventions to suit your philosophical argument (and then accusing anyone who does not understand enough maths as being unable to understand your argument). The assertion that knowledge is to be defined in terms of the receptive principle (which is your assertion) is not a definition in terms of a mathematical primitive (no matter how much you would like it to be), it is a definition of one concept in terms of another concept. If you wish to present a true mathematical argument then I would probably not attempt to enter into any discussion with you because I freely admit that my maths is appalling, but you have not presented a mathematical argument.

Calling “the receptive principle” a mathematical primitive is thus (it seems to me) simply a convenience in this case, so that one may avoid giving any further explication of what one means by “the receptive principle”. I have no idea what you mean by the term “receptive principle”, and when asked to explain what it is supposed to mean you then seem to hide behind your “mathematical primitive” excuse in order to avoid further explication, hence your argument is totally unintelligible to me.

I thought you understood more math.

Understanding math has nothing to do with understanding what the term “receptive principle” is supposed to mean.

Any “set of bits” (including a random set) qualifies as “information”?

No. In a mathematical development you must remain consistent with all previously taken definitions, axioms, and primitives. It is not permitted to simplify the definition of a defined term later on.

My question was in response to your definition in post #26 :

First, I would define 'information' as sets of bits.

I was simply asking a question regarding your claimed definition.
Are you now saying that your definition is incorrect?

According to your definition, X can correctly claim to possesses knowledge that Y, even if ~Y? (ie Y is false).

Yes.

As AKG has also pointed out, this leads to the absurd notion that X can know something which is false, such as for example “Paul knows that Hitler won the 2nd World War”. You may believe this statement makes sense, but most users of the English language would agree that in this case Paul does not in fact possesses knowledge, instead he is simply mistaken in believing that Hitler won the 2nd World war.

That is consistent with ordinary usage. Think of the generations of scientists and technologists prior to Einstein who did exactly that with respect to Newton's "Laws". Take 'Y' to be 'F = ma'. Y is extremely useful knowledge in spite of its being false.

It is most certainly not consistent with ordinary usage. You seem to have adopted a private meaning for the word “knowledge”. I might claim (based on my belief that Y) that I know that Y, but if Y is in fact false (ie if ~Y) then I do not in fact know that Y (I simply believe that I do). Just as you claim that I am ignorant of mathematics and therefore cannot understand your argument based on mathematical primitives, I respectfully suggest that you need to study a little more epistemology so that you can understand your mistake regarding the meaning of knowledge.

Your definition seems to imply that one can know things which one does not believe, and even worse that one can know things which are false. Would you agree?

Yes, I agree, except that I would get rid of the word 'worse'. I don't think it is bad at all.

Then I must conclude that you and I have fundamentally different understandings of the word “knowledge” – which gets right back to the first sentence of your first post in this thread - that we too frequently use the terms 'truth', 'knowledge', 'belief', 'faith', 'reality', 'existence', and 'consciousness' without first defining them. Your suggested definition of “knowledge” in terms of “apprehending bits” (with respect) is not a definition that makes sense on its own, and it is only when we try to understand just what it is you are trying to say (via the discourse we have just had) that we realize that you have a very peculiar and personal interpretation of just what you think “knowledge” means.

Best Regards

 

[Tournesol]

1. My uniqueness. - It is very hard for me to articulate exactly what this mystery is to me, but it goes something like this: How can it be that my conscious experience is constrained to this tiny interval in such a vast expanse of time and to this tiny locality on this blue speck at the edge of the Milky Way which seems insignificant itself in the vastness of space? I think most people would brush this off and tell me, "Well, dummy, it's because that's where you happen to be. What's the mystery?" That doesn't satisfy me. What exactly is this thing you refer to as "you"?

That is easily explained by the physicalist assumption that
your consciousness i sgenrated by your brain.

2. The phenomenon of sleep. - There are two mysteries here, one more important to me than the other. The first is, How can we account for the fact that virtually all individual animals, of nearly all species, and nearly each and every day each one lives, and for a significant percentage of each day's duration, and for no plausible reason, and at significant risk to survival in most of these cases of sleep events (which IMHO should present nearly fatal blows to the theories of evolution), routinely, willingly, and even eagerly, lose consciousness? The second, and IMHO less important, mystery is, Why is it that in the face of the foregoing profound mystery, and the fact that we humans are among the vast majority of animals who sleep, and the inconvenience caused by sleep cutting into our work/play time, and the cost of furnishing bedrooms, and the in-your-face obvious necessity for sleep, do people take it so for granted and hardly question it or wonder about it? (This includes scientists who IMHO only dabble with the question.)

To save energy.

3. Contradictory notions of time. - We have two common notions of time: Our conscious experience of time (the subjective notion) and the parametric notion of time in physical theories (the objective notion). The mystery is, How can we account for the following contradictions between the two notions?:

There isn't a single theory of time in physics

c. The "arrow of time" which is so obvious in subjective time, hardly appears (except for the contrivance of the 2nd Law) in objective time. In most cases, the direction of objective time is reversible.

The arrow of time doesn't exist in micrphysics, but emerges in co,mplex systems.

4. The seemingly narrow scope of consciousness. - How do we account for the seemingly improbable, but seemingly obvious, fact that conscious awareness is situated only in a small range in size (on the order of a meter) and not at all at the scale of intergalactic space or of subatomic particles?

It's generated by the brain.

Now, IMHO, this scenario satisfactorily explains all the above mysteries
as well as all other mysteries I know of, including the mystery of quantum state reduction, quantum non-locality, Bell's inequality, the origin of life, the origin of consciousness, the meaning of life, the prevalence of all the goofy religious notions, etc., etc., etc.

I don't see how it addresses the time issue at all. And it addreses
the localisation of copnscuousness much less naturally than
the physicalist alternative. And you didn't even
mention the most mysterious aspect of consciousness, qualia.

 

[moving finger]

you didn't even mention the most mysterious aspect of consciousness, qualia.

Mystery? What mystery?

ohhhh, you mean the "hard problem"

Understanding consciousness (and qualia) is quite elementary, once one understands that phenomenal consciousness is a uniquely 1st person perspective emergent property of the physical world, which property by definition is inaccessible from any other (literal or metaphorical) perspective.

The so-called "hard problem" is a non-problem which is created within the minds of those who insist on clinging on to the notion that 3rd person perspective access to 1st person perspective properties is always possible.

As with many concepts in science, philosophy and mathematics, once one looks at it in the right way there is no problem, and no mystery.

Best Regards

 

[Tournesol]

Now, let's suppose that by some accident, one of our radios fell into their possession. They turned it on and discovered that it played music. (The signals from our radio stations could reach that continent.) Their scientists would try to understand where that music came from. The chemists among them would claim that it had to be purely physical, that is, it must be generated completely within the chemical structures of the radio itself. As a test, someone suggested reproducing the radio exactly atom for atom to see if the duplicate also played music. They did, and it did, so they concluded that the music must have come strictly from the physical arrangements and patterns and functions of the atoms in the radio. Of course, we know that is wrong.

But it could have been right. The claim that the music
was being gerneatd internally is simpler than the claim
that is coming from elsewhere, and the scientists
were right to adopt that approach as the initial hypothesis.
They were right to abandon it when it didn't work.

I claim that there is a possibility that the same sort of thing holds true for the relationship between consciousness and brains. I think that if we could construct a duplicate brain, atom for atom, it might be just as conscious as the original. But just as in the case of the radio, it wouldn't prove that there wasn't something outside our physical world that is necessary for consciousness.

Not being false isn't the issue. The issue is whether
the radio analoguy is the simplest and best explanation.
For instance, the claim that qualia are no-physical
properties of brains also explains conciousness,
and it gives a natural explanation of the localisation
of consciousness ina way that the PC theory doesn't.

I respectfully disagree and claim that consciousness does not supervene on the physical world of our perceptions.

So why is it affected by drugs, sugery and injuries ?

First, I would define 'information' as sets of bits. This is the same as in classical information theory so I don't think that part is Greek to you. If it is, let me know.

Bits do not need to be true of even meaningful. But any
definition of knowledge emust say someing about
truth.

The reason I reject JTB is that it is too anthropomorphic. By that definition, knowledge is a belief, held by a conscious human being, that is true and that is justified by that conscious human being.

I don't know where you got that idea. The definition doesn't say anyhting about
human beings at all.

 

[Tournesol]

Understanding consciousness (and qualia) is quite elementary, once one understands that phenomenal consciousness is a uniquely 1st person perspective emergent property of the physical world, which property by definition is inaccessible from any other (literal or metaphorical) perspective.

Doesn't work. Metaphorical perspective (subjective bias)
is not a necessary entailment of literal
perspective (geometry).

The so-called "hard problem" is a non-problem which is created within the minds of those who insist on clinging on to the notion that 3rd person perspective access to 1st person perspective properties is always possible.

It may not be possible as a matter of fact,
but it is entailed by physicalism in
the sense that Chalmers uses the word, so his
claim that there is a HP is entirely consistent.

 

[moving finger]

Doesn't work. Metaphorical perspective (subjective bias)
is not a necessary entailment of literal
perspective (geometry).

I never said it was. I said

inaccessible from any other (literal or metaphorical) perspective

If I claimed that "A is neither B nor C", does that imply I am claiming that B entails C, or that C entails B? No, I don't think so.

It may not be possible as a matter of fact,
but it is entailed by physicalism in
the sense that Chalmers uses the word, so his
claim that there is a HP is entirely consistent.

That must be some kind of "private meaning" of physicalism then. Physicalism is simply the thesis that everything supervenes on the physical, this thesis does not entail that all properties of the world are accessible from all perspectives.

It is only because some people seem to believe that all properties of the world must be accessible from all perspectives (which is in fact not entailed by physicalism) that they then create the HP for themselves (ie qualia are then mysterious and inexplicable). Accept the truth that not all properties of the world are accessible from all perspectives and the HP doesn't exist (ie qualia are trivially explained as 1st person perspective properties of the world) - and all still consistent with physicalism.

Best Regards

 

[Evo]

Thank you all that participated, but the thread has been allowed to remain open too long. Paul's "personal theory" claims fall outside the bounds of what is allowed here.