On 28 Aug, 21:30, John Mikes <jami....domain.name.hidden> wrote:
> *Is the 'hard problem' and 'outside' factor? Maybe, for the closed inventory
> we have in today's conventional sciences. Our interpretations are temporary,
> as I call it (after Colin H) our "perceived reality" (of today), but
> different from the ancient formulations - without 'stepping outside
> ourselves into nowhere'. Soi-disant or else.*
Yes, when all is said and done, we must be humble in the face of
posterity. Particularly we must trying to realise (impossible though
this may be to envision) how utterly different things will look after
a paradigm shift of the magnitude of the one that precipitated the
modern mechanistic age. Will the next age be computational? Or
something entirely unexpected? Personally, if I had my wish, I'd want
us to rediscover some of that lost pre-mechanistic enchantment, but in
some manner that doesn't jettison the genuinely empowering insights of
the intervening phases. Nonetheless, when I contemplate the current
quality of 'insight' of science so far as mentality is concerned I'm
irresistibly reminded of Groucho Marx's querulous entreaty "Who are
you going to believe - me, or your own eyes?"
David
> David,
> your logic is very hard to attack, it is impressive and perfect - ALMOST.
> (That "almost" comes to me like my "somehow" in such discussions<G>)
> To save copying, please accept my "nested reflections" in Italics inserted
> into your text below. Thnx.
>
> John
> ---------------------------------------------
>
>
>
> On Tue, Aug 25, 2009 at 8:00 PM, David Nyman <david.ny....domain.name.hidden> wrote:
>
> > 2009/8/25 John Mikes <jami....domain.name.hidden>:
>
> > > David, (and Stathis?)
> > > I appreciate David's 1,2,3, variations on the "it's or "our", but you
> > just
> > > destroyed my position with
> > > "I should perhaps emphasise that purely for the purposes of the
> > > argument I'm assuming brain = mind to be a one-for-one correlation."
> > > Well, not entirely.
> > > If WE cannot desipher the 'meanings' ('context') of our brainwork how can
> > an
> > > alien observer do it? Or better: if we need the
> > > "historic and current context of experience and action"
> > > what 'meanings will the alien decipher in THEIR context and action in
> > THEIR
> > > experience?
> > > Do the aliens base the world on human numbers?
> > > Just musing
>
> > > John M
>
> > Just so. To recapitulate the (approximate) history of this part of the
> > discussion, Peter and I had been delving into the question - posed by
> > him - of whether a complete scan of a brain at the subatomic level
> > could in principle capture all the available 'information'. So my
> > rider about brain-mind correlation was in the context of that specific
> > question posed in that specific way.
>
> *Let us accept "BRAIN"* *as the functional organ we use as a tool in our
> mentality - more than just the flesh-in-the-box with physiology/physics and
> biochem churnings - the stuff we know of. So we may be congruent. *
>
> (DN): As to your more general musings John, I suppose the line I've been
> pursuing is questioning the applicability of the soi-disant 'view from
> nowhere' - i.e. the notion of 'information' as being comprehensible in
> any totally extrinsic, abstracted, uninterpreted sense. Because we
> can't help being fish, we can't help but swim in our interpretations.
> And we can only guess what oceans alien fish may swim in.
>
> *Does the fish know about the water? Do we know about circumstances we don't
> know about, but which DO exercise their input upon our "mind" ? (whatever
> that may be - someone on another list said: "experience of the experienc",
> cute, but does not say much?) i.e. the "=brainexpansion"? *
>
>
>
> > It seems as though we can comprehend 'mind' only in terms of some
> > self-instantiating, self-interpreting context, in which meaning
> > depends always on the self-relating logic of differentiation and
> > interaction. Hence the 'perspective' of mind is always intrinsic,
> > and 'meaning' doesn't survive abstraction to any extremity of
> > 'external' observation. We can comprehend the 'externalised' flux -
> > i.e. what is abstractable out-of-context - as somehow correlative of
> > mind with mind, and mind with matter. But whatever meaning is finally
> > recoverable will again be 'as received' - i.e. as re-interpreted in
> > its context of arrival.
>
> *I do not stick to the word "mind", call it "mentality", 'happenings' or
> else. *
> *I do not step outside for phenomena, just extend the scope from the 2009
> level to more. (Since the 3000B.C. level was 'less' than the 2009AD, you may
> not state that the 7000AD lrevel CANNOT be more comprehensive than today's,
> with all of the unknowns (even beyond those) acting out upon our conclusions
> of - if you like - 'mind'. *
> *Is the 'hard problem' and 'outside' factor? Maybe, for the closed inventory
> we have in today's conventional sciences. Our interpretations are temporary,
> as I call it (after Colin H) our "perceived reality" (of today), but
> different from the ancient formulations - without 'stepping outside
> ourselves into nowhere'. Soi-disant or else.*
>
>
>
> > This reminds me of the aphorism that "the meaning of a communication
> > is the response it elicits". Just consider the regress of nested
> > interpretations *that* implies!
>
> > David
>
> *John*
>
>
>
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Received on Tue Sep 01 2009 - 16:27:13 PDT