On Jun 19, 12:31 pm, Russell Standish <l....domain.name.hidden> wrote:
> Interaction is in terms of fields - electromagnetic for most of our
> everyday examples. The fields themselves are emergent effects from
> virtual boson exchange. Now how is this related to sensing exactly?
> (Other than sensing being a particular subclass of interaction)
Please, spare me the physico-mathematical imperialism! You say
"interaction is in terms of fields'". I think what you might claim
more modestly is something like "there is a mathematical formalism in
which interaction is modelled in terms of 'fields'". Fair enough. But
implicitly the formalism is a projection from (and reference to) a
*participatory* actuality which isn't simply 'mathematical' (pace
Bruno - and anyway, not in the sense he deploys it for the purposes of
COMP). And I'm not of course imputing 'sensing' to the formalism, but
to the 'de-formalised participants' from which it is projected.
'Participatory' here means that you must situate yourself at the point
of reference of your formalism, and intuit that 'thou-art-that' from
which the projection originates. If you do this, does the term
'sensing' still seem so 'soft'? The formalisms are projections from
the participatory semantics of a 'modulated continuum' that embraces
you, me and everything we know. When you situate yourself here, do
you really not 'get' the intuitive self-relation between continuum and
modulation? Even when you know that Russell's 1-person world - an
'emergent' from this - indeed self-relates in both sense and action?
If not, then as Colin is arguing, you'd have to erect a sign with
'then magic happens' between 'emergent' and 'reductive' accounts.
> Sensing to me implies some
> form of agency at one end of the interaction. I don't attribute any sort
> of agency to the interaction between two hydrogen atoms making up
> a hydrogen molecule for instance.
Same illustration. 'Hydrogen atoms' are again just projective
formalisms to which of course nobody would impute 'agency'. But
situate yourself where I suggest, and intuit the actions of any 'de-
formalised participants' referenced by the term 'hydrogen atoms' that
are implicated in Russell's 1-person world. From this perspective,
any 'agency' that Russell displays is indeed inherent in such lower-
level 'entities' in 'reduced' form. This is a perfectly standard
aspect of any 'reductive-emergent' scheme. For some reason you seem
prepared to grant it in a 3-person account, but not in a participatory
one.
The customary 'liquidity' and 'life' counter-arguments are simply
misconceived here, because these attributions emerge from, and hence
are applicable to, formal descriptions, independent of their 'de-
formalised' participatory referents. But you can't apply the
semantics of 'sensing' and 'agency' in the same way, because these are
ineluctably participatory, and are coherent only when intuited as such
'all the way down' (e.g. as attributes of 1-person worlds and the
participatory 'sense-action' hierarchies on which they supervene).
David
> On Tue, Jun 19, 2007 at 09:40:59AM -0000, David Nyman wrote:
>
> > On Jun 19, 5:09 am, Russell Standish <l....domain.name.hidden> wrote:
>
> > > David, I was unable to perceive a question in what you just wrote. I
> > > haven't a response, since (sadly) I was unable to understand what you
> > > were talking about. :(
>
> > Really? I'm surprised, but words can indeed be very slippery in this
> > context. Oh, well. To condense: my argument is intended to pump the
> > intuition that a 'primitive' (or 'reduced') notion of 'sensing' (or
> > please substitute anything that carries the thrust of 'able to
> > locate', 'knows it's there', etc.) is already inescapably present in
> > the notion of 'interaction' between fundamental 'entities' in any
> > feasible model of reality. Else, how could we claim that they retain
> > any coherent sense of being 'in contact'?
>
> Interaction is in terms of fields - electromagnetic for most of our
> everyday examples. The fields themselves are emergent effects from
> virtual boson exchange. Now how is this related to sensing exactly?
> (Other than sensing being a particular subclass of interaction)
>
> ...
>
> > implications. So my question is, do you think it has any merit, or is
> > simply wrong, indeterminate, or gibberish? And why?
>
> If I have to pick an answer: gibberish. Sensing to me implies some
> form of agency at one end of the interaction. I don't attribute any sort
> of agency to the interaction between two hydrogen atoms making up a
> hydrogen molecule for instance.
>
> --
>
> ----------------------------------------------------------------------------
> A/Prof Russell Standish Phone 0425 253119 (mobile)
> Mathematics
> UNSW SYDNEY 2052 hpco....domain.name.hidden
> Australia http://www.hpcoders.com.au
> ----------------------------------------------------------------------------
--~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group.
To post to this group, send email to everything-list.domain.name.hidden
To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list-unsubscribe.domain.name.hidden
For more options, visit this group at
http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en
-~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
Received on Thu Jun 21 2007 - 14:31:44 PDT