Colin Geoffrey Hales wrote:
> Hi,
> A lot of the dialog below is a mismatch of ideas which indicates that I
> have underestimated the degree of difficulty to be expected in getting the
> idea of hierarchical structures across. Nevetheless..
>
> >> I think you are assuming a separateness of structure that does not
> >> exist.
> >
> >
> > It obviously does exist , up to a point. I am separate form this
> > keyboard.
> > (and let's not confuse separateness and difference...)
>
> If space and matter (have a look at the cover of this weeks NewScientist)
> are different expressions of a single structure then you and space are
> unified.
If they are different substructures within a further (different)
struture,
they are also unified, in that sense and to that extent.
The contentious claims here are:
a) That being multiple instances of the same structure is the only
way things can be "unified".
b) Things unified in that sense are devoid of any difference or
separaration
whatsoever.
> It is that unification that is at the heart of qualia production,
> for qualia result as another feature of the underlying structure.
> >> There is one and one only structure.
> >
> > If you want ot look at it that way. But it is no
> > undifferentiated within itself.
>
> Looking at it like that is the only way that makes any sense.
So you say. You have not said anythign at all about what
makes the alternatives nonsensical.
> >> We are all part of it. There is no
> >> concept of 'separate' to be had.
> >
> > yes there is: spatial separation.
>
> See above.
Doesn't address the point.
> >> Absolutely everything is included in the
> >> structure. No exceptions. Space, atoms, scientists, qualia. All
> >> interactions at all 'scales' (scale itself) are all interactions between
> >> different parts of the one structure. To interact at all is to interact
> >> with another part of the structure.
> >
> > "another" in what sense ? You just said there is *no* concept
> > of separation.
>
> eg. Matter passes through space. It is interacting with itself. Matter
> 'looks' separate to space, but deep down its not. The appearance of
> separateness is how it is presented to us.
It is entirely possible that they are unified deep down and
separate on the surface. Separation need not be dismissed
as appearance.
> >> The idea of there being anything else
> >> ('not' the structure) is meaningless. If there is any 'thing' in the
> >> structure then the balance of the structure expressed a perfect
> >> un-thing.
> >> There is nothing else. That is the coincept I am exploring.
> >
> > None of that has anything to do with your claim that there is
> > a single *type* of structure, and that everything is composed of
> > recursive combinations of its instances.
> >
> > It may be the case that everything is ultimately part of one strucutre,
> > but
> > that does not imply that everything within the Great Strucutre is
> > self-similar.
>
> The structure is hierarchical layers of organisation only. Members of a
> layer share morphological invariance to some characteristics of layer
> layer. Properties are inherited by child layers from paretn layers. All
> the layers are contained by each other.
How very c++-ey.
Do you have any evidence, or are you appelaing to the comfort
zone of Sofware Engineers ?
> >> Their presentation bestows intrinsic knowledge as a measurement to the
> >> embedded structure member called the scientist. This is knowledge as
> >> intrinsic intentionality.
> >
> > Are yu saying that qualia are marked by intentionality ?
> > That would be novel.
> >
> > ",, qualia are intrinsic, consciously accessible, NON-INTENTIONAL
> > features of sense-data and other non-physical phenomenal objects that
> > are responsible for their phenomenal character."
> >
>
> When we experience redness it is painted onto some'thing'.
Not if it is adream or hallucination ,
or the
result of pressing your eyeball.
> In _use_ it has
> intrinsic 'aboutness'.
Then that comes from the use, not the quale.
> In themselves they have none. At the instance of
> their creation they acquire intentionality _because_ they are meant for
> that very purpose - to inform 'aboutness'...That is the distinction I
> think useful.
> > S.E.P, my emphasis.
> >
> >> Within the experiences is regularity which can
> >> then be characterised as knowledge attributed to some identified
> >> behaviour
> >> in the structure. This attribution is only an attribution as to
> >> behaviour
> >> of the structure, not the structure. These attributions can be used by a
> >> another scientist in their 'first person' world.
> >
> > I still think "strcuture" is an unhappy term for soemthign which
> > cannot be reduced to abstract relations and behaviour.
>
> The structure can be abstracted and studied. But what you do is simulate
> it, not abstract it in the traditional sense, except to characterise the
> rules of the simulation and let them run. For example, one of the
> structural statistics that will fall out of analyses of the structure is G
> (graviatational const), another is the speed of light.and so on. The
> natural constants are statistics of the underlying structure. They are
> simulataneously constants in empirical laws of the apparent behaviour of
> the structure.
You could just as well say the apparaent behaviour of the universe.
> >> All of this is derived from a first person presentation of a
> >> measurement.
> >> Ergo science is entirely first operson based.
> >
> > The fact that science happens to be performed by persons
> > doesn't make it irreducibly first-personal. That would
> > depend on whether persons can remove themselves from
> > scientific descriptions. As it happens they can. That
> > is still true with much-misunderstood issue of
> > quantum "observer" involvement, since
> > that is really apparatus-involvement. No observer
> > ever influenced an experiment without changing the settings of some
> > apparatus.
>
> I think we are at odds here. The mere presence of a human involing
> themselves in observation means that a direct causal impact is established
> between the observer and the observed.
No it doesn't. All "observer influence" is mediated
by apparatus, as I have said. There is zero evidence
of direct influence.
> The only quation is the magnitude
> of the disturbance thus invoked. Clearly until we start to look at very
> fine detail the magnitude of the disturbance is trivial. That's when the
> disturbances make things look quantum mechanical. At all times, however,
> deep down those disturbances are always there resolving the structures
> options. I hope that makes sense.
You seem to be leaning heavily on the disturbance interpretation
of the HUP
http://members.tripod.com/~Glove_r/Folse4.html
The Disturbance Principle
Though it forms no part of complementarity, the disturbance principle
was frequently defended as part of the Copenhagen Interpretation and
often identified with Bohr's view in the years following Heisenberg's
discovery. From the perspective of Heisenberg, it appeared that the
basis of the disturbance principle lay in the fact that the instruments
doing the observing "disturbed" the observed system such that its state
after observation is no longer what was determined in the measurement.
This interpretation compares observation of atomic systems to
measuring, for example, the inner workings of a wrist watch using a
yardstick.
However, the disturbance interpretation plays havoc with the facts
behind the genesis of the uncertainty principle and its status within
the mathematical formalism of quantum mechanics. The principle is a
straight forward deductive consequence of the quantum theoretical
formalism which provides a highly confirmed means of predicting the
outcome of interaction between radiation and matter. There is no
mention of disturbance in the derivation of the principle itself, nor
of how to go about determining the relevant parameters.
The design of experiments is relevant only to interpreting the physical
significance of the principle. The assumption that the classical system
really exists in a classical mechanical state supposes the question of
whether an experiment could be designed which will yield greater
knowledge about the state of the atomic system than the uncertainty
principle allows. If this could be done, the theory would be properly
judged incomplete.
The disturbance interpretation mistake becomes apparent when we
realize, that according to it, we could only approach classical ideals
of strict determinism if our measuring instruments were the size of
atoms. However, it is only an immense difference between the dimensions
of ordinary human experience and those involved in atomic processes
that made strict determinism a nearly obtainable goal. If our
instruments were the same size as atoms, then the role of the quantum
in an interaction would be ever increasing rather than decreasing, as
the disturbance interpretation suggest.
In classical mechanics, the observation also "disturbs" the observed,
but the disturbance is either negligible or "controllable" and so can
be accounted for in defining the state of an isolated system after the
observation interaction. In quantum theory, ordinarily the effect of
the interaction cannot be considered negligible nor "controllable".
Since the disturbance interpretation makes it appear that the
uncertainty principle is a empirical generalization, it's unable to
explain why this alleged disturbance cannot be determined in the
quantum framework, and allows a return to classical deterministic
formalism.
> >> Epistemic and Ontic
> >> characters are smatter throughout this description. I could label them
> >> all
> >> but you already know and the process adds nothing to the message or to
> >> sorting out how it all works.
> >
> >
> >
> >> >> I'd say that
> >> >> we formulate abstractions that correlate with agreed appearances
> >> within
> >> the
> >> >> first person view. However, the correspo0ndence between the
> >> underlying
> >> structure and the formulate abstractions is only that - a correlation.
> >> Our
> >> >> models are not the structure.
> >> >
> >> > *Could* they be the structure ? if it necessarily
> >> > the case that the "structure" cannot be modelled, then
> >> > it is perhaps no strcuture at all.
> >> >
> >>
> >> Which is the simpler and more reasonable basis upon which to explore the
> >> universe:
> >
> >> 1) The universe is literally constructed by some sort of
> >> 'empirical_law_in_ a_certain_context embodiment machine' by means
> >> unknown
> >> that has appearances that cannot be predicted by empirical laws.
> >> (logically equivalent to "the laws of nature are invoked by the purple
> >> baloon people of the horsehead nebula")
> >
> > ????
>
> Too hard basket thrshold has been reached! :-)
????
> >> or
> >>
> >> 2) The universe is a structure of which we are a part and which also has
> >> the property of delivering appearances of itself to us within which is
> >> regularity that can be captured mathematically.
> >
> > This is a combination of two claims:
> >
> > 2a) The universe is a structure properly-so-called of which we are a
> > part and
> > which also has the property of delivering appearances of itself to us
> > within which is
> > regularity that can be captured mathematically, with no residue, so
> > that
> > everything is full expressible in mathematical, structural and
> > relational
> > terms. (ie eliminative physicalism)
> >
> > 2b) The universe is a "structure" which we are a part and, but
> > contains
> > irreducibly non-relational and non-functional aspects (and is therefore
> > not a structure in the strict sense of the term)
> > which also has the property of delivering appearances of itself to us
> > within which is
> > regularity that can be captured mathematically and also aspects that
> > cannot
> > be so capture, leading to a Hard Problem. (property dualism)
> >
>
> The point is that science is stuck on 1).
Frankly, I found that unintelligible.
> Trying to shoehorn the situation
> into philosophical 'ism buckets is of no value.
It is a rare day when someone thinks of something
no-one has thought before. The overwhelming
likelihood
is that there is an pre-existing ism for hwat you
are saying.
> I'm after a real practical
> outcome.
So why is there nothing quantitative or predictive in what
you say ?
> A recognition that science is mis-structured and we have to
> change.
That is a bold claim. Science is an extremely succesful enterprise.
> And sooner rather than later!
>
> I recently had an article on dual-aspect science published in IEEE
> Intelligence Systems journal... have a look.
>
> Cheers
>
> colin
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Received on Thu Aug 17 2006 - 11:13:53 PDT