Posted on 03/15/2005 2:41:19 PM PST by Michael_Michaelangelo
The Future of Biology: Reverse Engineering 03/14/2005 Just as an engineer can model the feedback controls required in an autopilot system for an aircraft, the biologist can construct models of cellular networks to try to understand how they work. “The hallmark of a good feedback control design is a resulting closed loop system that is stable and robust to modeling errors and parameter variation in the plant”, [i.e., the system], “and achieves a desired output value quickly without unduly large actuation signals at the plant input,” explain Claire J. Tomlin and Jeffrey D. Axelrod of Stanford in a Commentary in PNAS.1 (Emphasis added in all quotes.) But are the analytical principles of reverse engineering relevant to biological systems? Yes, they continue: “Some insightful recent papers advocate a similar modular decomposition of biological systems according to the well defined functional parts used in engineering and, specifically, engineering control theory.”
One example they focus on is the bacterial heat shock response recently modeled by El-Samad et al.2 (see 01/26/2005 entry). These commentators seem quite amazed at the technology of this biological system: In a recent issue of PNAS, El-Samad et al. showed that the mechanism used in Escherichia coli to combat heat shock is just what a well trained control engineer would design, given the signals and the functions available.
This is no simple trick. “The challenge to the cell is that the task is gargantuan,” they exclaim. Thousands of protein parts – up to a quarter of the cell’s protein inventory – must be generated rapidly in times of heat stress. But like an army with nothing to do, a large heat-shock response force is too expensive to maintain all the time. Instead, the rescuers are drafted into action when needed by an elaborate system of sensors, feedback and feed-forward loops, and protein networks.
Living cells defend themselves from a vast array of environmental insults. One such environmental stress is exposure to temperatures significantly above the range in which an organism normally lives. Heat unfolds proteins by introducing thermal energy that is sufficient to overcome the noncovalent molecular interactions that maintain their tertiary structures. Evidently, this threat has been ubiquitous throughout the evolution [sic] of most life forms. Organisms respond with a highly conserved response that involves the induced expression of heat shock proteins. These proteins include molecular chaperones that ordinarily help to fold newly synthesized proteins and in this context help to refold denatured proteins. They also include proteases [enzymes that disassemble damaged proteins] and, in eukaryotes, a proteolytic multiprotein complex called the proteasome, which serve to degrade denatured proteins that are otherwise harmful or even lethal to the cell. Sufficient production of chaperones and proteases can rescue the cell from death by repairing or ridding the cell of damaged proteins.
The interesting thing about this Commentary, however, is not just the bacterial system, amazing as it is. It’s the way the scientists approached the system to understand it. “Viewing the heat shock response as a control engineer would,” they continue, El-Samad et al. treated it like a robust system and reverse-engineered it into a mathematical model, then ran simulations to see if it reacted like the biological system. They found that two feedback loops were finely tuned to each other to provide robustness against single-parameter fluctuations. By altering the parameters in their model, they could detect influences on the response time and the number of proteins generated. This approach gave them a handle on what was going on in the cell. The analysis in El-Samad et al. is important not just because it captures the behavior of the system, but because it decomposes the mechanism into intuitively comprehensible parts. If the heat shock mechanism can be described and understood in terms of engineering control principles, it will surely be informative to apply these principles to a broad array of cellular regulatory mechanisms and thereby reveal the control architecture under which they operate.
With the flood of data hitting molecular biologists in the post-genomic era, they explain, this reverse-engineering approach is much more promising than identifying the function of each protein part, because: ...the physiologically relevant functions of the majority of proteins encoded in most genomes are either poorly understood or not understood at all. One can imagine that, by combining these data with measurements of response profiles, it may be possible to deduce the presence of modular control features, such as feedforward or feedback paths, and the kind of control function that the system uses. It may even be possible to examine the response characteristics of a given system, for example, a rapid and sustained output, as seen here, or an oscillation, and to draw inferences about the conditions under which a mechanism is built to function. This, in turn, could help in deducing what other signals are participating in the system behavior.
The commentators clearly see this example as a positive step forward toward the ultimate goal, “to predict, from the response characteristics, the overall function of the biological network.” They hope other biologists will follow the lead of El-Samad et al. Such reverse engineering may be “the most effective means” of modeling unknown cellular systems, they end: “Certainly, these kinds of analyses promise to raise the bar for understanding biological processes.”
1Tomlin and Axelrod, “Understanding biology by reverse engineering the control,” Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences USA, 10.1073/pnas.0500276102, published online before print March 14, 2005.
2El-Samad, Kurata, Doyle, Gross and Khammash, “Surviving heat shock: Control strategies for robustness and performance,” Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences USA, 10.1073/pnas.0403510102, published online before print January 24, 2005. Reader, please understand the significance of this commentary. Not only did El-Samad et al. demonstrate that the design approach works, but these commentators praised it as the best way to understand biology (notice their title). That implies all of biology, not just the heat shock response in bacteria, would be better served with the design approach. This is a powerful affirmation of intelligent design theory from scientists outside the I.D. camp.
Sure, they referred to evolution a couple of times, but the statements were incidental and worthless. Reverse engineering needs Darwinism like teenagers need a pack of cigarettes. Evolutionary theory contributes nothing to this approach; it is just a habit, full of poison and hot air. Design theory breaks out of the habit and provides a fresh new beginning. These commentators started their piece with a long paragraph about how engineers design models of aircraft autopilot systems; then they drew clear, unambiguous parallels to biological systems. If we need to become design engineers to understand biology, then attributing the origin of the systems to chance, undirected processes is foolish. Darwinistas, your revolution has failed. Get out of the way, or get with the program. We don’t need your tall tales and unworkable utopian dreams any more. The future of biology belongs to the engineers who appreciate good design when they see it.
It’s amazing to ponder that a cell is programmed to deal with heat shock better than a well-trained civil defense system can deal with a regional heat wave. How does a cell, without eyes and brains, manage to recruit thousands of highly-specialized workers to help their brethren in need? (Did you notice some of the rescuers are called chaperones? Evidently, the same nurses who bring newborn proteins into the world also know how to treat heat stroke.) And to think this is just one of many such systems working simultaneously in the cell to respond to a host of contingencies is truly staggering.
Notice also how the commentators described the heat shock response system as “just what a well trained control engineer would design.” Wonder Who that could be? Tinkerbell? Not with her method of designing (see 03/11/2005 commentary). No matter; leaders in the I.D. movement emphasize that it is not necessary to identify the Designer to detect design. But they also teach that good science requires following the evidence wherever it leads.
Was Aristoltle a scientist? No, he didn't test his theories with experiment and discard or refine them if they failed. Were the alchemists? Well, maybe a little more so; but they never discarded or modified their primary goals when those goals were clearly unobtainable, and they weren't really motivated by a desire to find out how the world works. To find scientists in the modern sense, you've really got to wait until Galileo or Robert Boyle or WIlliam Harvey.
Excellent post - informative links. Thanks.
I understand your point. In terms of formal, modern science, I would agree. But, to a certain extent, it seems obvious that human beings, collectively, all have a bit of the "scientist" in them, whether it's the cook in the kitchen or the farmer trying out new seeds.
Well have to do this again, sometime soon! :^)
This Begs the Question that there is any "veracity" to your statement, which cannot be objectively proven or confirmed in any way (the defintion of "veracity.) It is a belief, and wholly dependent upon belief, therefore only a belief, by its own definition.
Assertion Without Proof. I can prove that "universals" are, in fact, abstract concepts. Their only "substantive" content is within the human mind. And you cannot prove this false. All you have is an unfounded belief system and philosophy that is only dependent upon your opinion.
I assert that your “world” is merely a subset of my own. Thus, you can cannot disprove “universals” or anything else to me.
I'd go you one further than that, Alamo-Girl. Logic Wing's "world" is but a projection of his own personal preferences. Nothing more, nothing less.
No, she is not working in a larger context, because I am not working in any "context." I am analyzing the content of her assertions for logical coherence. You can assert that I am "straddling the tip of the iceberg" but you fail to understand what it really is I am doing. I am questioning the logic of how she knows the "level of its depths" without proving there are any "depths" in the first place, other than the mystical "belief."
Naturally enough then, you and she are not really speaking of the same things.
You don't know what I am talking about, you cannot see inside my head. I may know more than you have any idea. Your condescending tone is appreciated though, and duly noted.
You deny the existence of any such “depths” in principle.
A classic mis-statement of my position. I "deny" nothing in principle. I await one shred of proof that the assertion of the aforementioned "depth" has any validity. In the context of the argument (Platonic realism) the very definition renders it impossible of verification and proof. Pointing out this fact isn't denial, it is re-cognition of the truth.
Please let me just briefly note here that direct experience of universals is possible for the human mind.
There are no "universals" to "directly" experience. Cannot be proven to exist (sigh . . . ) by definition. However, there are "abstract concepts" some people mistake for universals but simply because some people make this philosophic mistake doesn't make the mistaken concept valid.
So I guess I must gather that for you, what cannot be “proved” is by your definition unreal.
You guess wrong. I have no definition for what is "unreal." It is a philosophically void concept. What is unproven is simply unproven, not unreal. This is a classic Reification of an intellectual position.
By proof I expect you mean a test conducted according to the rules of formal logic.
Once again you demonstrate you don't understand my position. We haven't even gotten to "tests" yet, were are merely stuck on self-contradictory definitions.
But there are other logics – free logics, for instance
And how are the terms of those other logics defined? Hmmmmm? Demonstrate for me how those other logics define their terms outside that of formal logic. As I have said before, all forms of "other logic" are dependent upon formal logic for their definitions and formulations.
In fact, try to define the terms of any language, any system of thought, any philosophical system, or any religion for that matter while completely abandoning formal logic.
The fact is, it cannot be done without relying upon the very formal logic you question the absolute importance of.
They are contingent, first, on there being ultimate principles respecting both logic and geometry that can be systematized and articulated in various ways, and they are also contingent in the historical sense: those articulations were able to be made once a certain level of culture had been achieved that could motivate the search for such articulations. On this view, AG is correct to note that everything in space/time is relative to something else – a word which is virtually synonymous with the word contingent.
Since the word contingent means "dependent for existence, occurrence, character, etc., upon something something not yet certain" your use in this context doesn't make any sense. Ultimate principles (sigh . . . ) by definition would be "certain" upon which logic and geometry can be "contingent." IOW the statement makes no sense.
Again: that everything in space/time is relative to something else
This would require an absolute knowledge of space/time that AG asserts is impossible within space/time. The statement is an absolute statement about space/time that says such statements about space/time cannot be made, such statements being absolute and universally true.
This is the point, the assertion contradicts ITSELF! I am not making a statement about reality, but an analysis of an assertion about reality. It is internally inconsistent. Until this fault is corrected, I don't have to take it seriously.
AG’s assertion that there is nothing in space/time that is “objectively true” is to be understood in the sense (at least I understand it this way) that a mind intending objects is inevitably motivated by already-given subjective perceptions.
Then this statement is no more "objectively true" than any other, it invalidates itself. It is a universal, absolute statement (as signified by the word nothing - an absolute condition refuted by the rest of the premise) that states no such absolute premises can have any validity.
If a particular mind is convinced that the universe is a machine constituted only of matter in its motions, then it will frame its problems in a certain way. If another mind, a Platonist mind, say, frames its problems in terms of a living universe that massively incorporates “spiritual realities” in its essential nature, its problems would be framed differently.
Nice prejudicial terminology. One mind is "convinced" and the other merely "frames" its problems. What if one isn't "convinced" of either position but only seeks to have evidence of either position?
The term "spiritual realities" is undefined. From a 4D point of view, it is a contradiction in terms. "Spiritual" is that which transcends 4D and "reality" is that which is only 4D.
One could say that all phenomena unfolding or evolving in 4D space/time reality do so relative to the specifications or indications of a prior(sic) paradigm which is “set up in heaven.”
And one could say that all phenomena unfolding or evolving in space/time do so in an absolute sense, not relative to anything. There is no evidence of an a priore paradigm
and at this point I must point out that this is again Reification - a paradigm is an abstraction [I almost said a 'mental abstraction' because the point is continually lost, but this would be a redundundundancy]
Respecting the two views, ours is of very great antiquity, yours is a modern construction.
Yours held the world in poverty, ignorance and slavery for millennia. Mine, once embraced, raised the world out of poverty and gave you all the modern conveniences you take for granted, including the computer you are now reading these words on.
Neither your preferred point of view nor the Platonic/Christian is susceptible to falsification by means of the scientific method, or the application of (contingent) formal logic.
Once again, you don't know what my "preferred point of view" is, only the conclusions you have drawn by the questions I have raised. I can, contrary to your assertions, point out the contradictions in the Platonic Realist assertions.
Yet both are “logical” in form.
No, Platonic Realism demonstrably isn't "logical" in form, as I have demonstrated again and again. The attempt to assert such contradicts itself in the very formulation.
Plato held that the Universe – the “ultimate universal,” if you want to cast it in terms of abstract thinking -- is in fact “alive”:
Now we are getting somewhere. If you are postulating here that Plato meant the "Universe" - meaning everything that exists in this reality, the 4D Universe, is alive we might have something to talk about.
But this is a far cry from asserting some "transcendental" source for all the "universals" that constitute human thought. Do you understand the difference?
Goodness, but this supposed “fallacy of reification” of yours has a most ancient lineage.
As well it should, being so basic an error.
And believe it or not, Plato’s intuition has been enjoying a bit of a revival these days among some physicists and mathematicians.
It has never been abandoned. It is at the heart of the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle and the Copenhagen Interpretation. It is why QM is stuck in such a contradictory mire and hasn't moved forward in generations. Logical fallacy has been enshrined as dogma. And every mystic, from you guys, (oops, ladies) to Deepak Choprah have sought to capitalize on the error. As I said before, the contradictions between QM, Einstein's theories, Bell's Inequality and the like are evidence of error. Before we can move forward we must discover the error. And you won't do that outside of logic. Period.
A universal precedes the human mind. It would have to, or the human mind could not conceive of it in the first place.
No, experience precedes the concept. I will give you an example you can verify.
Take a child, any child, a young child. Show that child a 4 legged animal. Tell that child that it is Sam, and is a dog. Tell this to the child every day for a year.
Take that child outside and show it a cat. It will say, "Sam." You will laugh and say, "No, cat." The child will be confused but will then say, "Dog." You will laugh again and say, "No, cat."
Next day, take the child out and show it a dog. It will say, "Sam." You day, "No, dog." It will say, "Cat." and you will say, "No, dog."
After a few hundred or thousand examples the child will learn to tell the difference between dog, cat, cow, pig and any other 4 legged animal. But there was no universal "dog" that identified that class of creature to the child, but dogged, (don't pardon the pun) experience.
I saw this with my own sister who called anything with 4 legs, "dog" for months. It was only by mentally integrating the similarities and differences between species that she was able to finally do so. The "universal" was based upon a countless number of experiences.
The proof is also in those poor unfortunates who get raised by wolves or in rooms with little human contact. They never learn language and thus, never learn, "universals" which if they truly existed, would never have to be learnt. (love those archaichisms.)
Where do the unmanifested possibilities of the various probability spaces “hang out?”
Reification. A probability is an abstract, a very high level abstract! It doesn't hang out anywhere. You demonstrate my point. You confuse abstractions with existence.
Why do you think all these theories “contradict each other?” Each is a partial perspective.
I think they contradict each other because some or all are wrong, not because each is a partial view. If they were all true they would be coherent with one another, which they aren't. The trunk of the elephant is coherent with the tail if you know where it goes. But the trunk of the elephant won't work on the donkey.
BTW, it is so kind of you to imply that I am “the local schizoid,”
Nice try, but that's not what I said. I said unfounded conjecture made no more sense than the ramblings of the "local schizoid" - not the same thing. You are much too senstitive.
I’m quite used to seeing certain proponents of certain arguments around here “abusing” their opponents, apparently in an effort to disqualify the latter as having any rational standing at all to raise “unpopular,” “unblessed,” or uncustomary points of view. This spares one the trouble of engaging in a decent argument.
To quote you again:
Unlike you, she is not straddling the “tip of the iceberg,” but is working at the level of its depths.
Can't stand the heat, don't dish it out.
What evidence do I have for contingency as an essential feature of the 4D block? Jeepers, LW – why not try your own fr**king eyes, will ya! Look at your own life experience, look deeply and draw your own conclusions. Then perhaps you will realize that your own existence is contingent on an infinite number of possible variables arising in space/time. The fact that you continue to exist at all against this background of unpredictable change, and maintain yourself as you are -- as a particular individual, having a particular nature -- should cause you to realize that the “you” of you – the part that does not change – must have a root outside of the 4D block on logical grounds.
Aside from the fact you are using "contingency" in the wrong context, you have no idea what my "life experiences" are. I have seen more with my "f**king eyes than you can imagine. You tell me to "draw my own conclusions" and I would tell you to "learn how to draw conclusions!" You clearly don't have a clue.
My existence isn't "contingent" upon anything, since I clearly exist to write this to you. How do you know it is "unpredictable change" unless "unpredictable change" is an absolute principle which cannot be known absolutely in this 4D space/time. Do you see how your positions consistently contradict themselves?
It seems the relatively simple force-field driven reactions of classical physics and chemistry – by virtue of the fact that such reactions generally involve near-neighbor relations -- cannot alone account for the organizing principle that effects such unity and integrity of this vast complexity, which is in a state of constant change from moment to moment.
Why not? You state an absolute, cannot alone but hold a position that such absolutes cannot be known in the 4D universe. So on what basis do you make such an assertion?How do you know we are in such a state of "constant change" (an absolute) without violating your own premise, or conclusion?
So where do we look for the organizing principle that can reconcile and constantly maintain such unity in diversity? Show me where it is in 4D space/time, point it out to me, and I will stop talking about “meta”-physical things.
But you are doing the very thing you accuse me of, putting me in a box that I don't accept as valid. There is no such separation between spirit and 4D space/time, can't be tested, can't be proven. As I have said on previous occasions, I accept no such divisions to the Universe. There is no evidence of such. The proof of the organizing principle in this 4D existence (as you put it) is that it manifests in this 4D existence, or you wouldn't exist. Look for it in yourself.
The problem is you insist that the Universe must conform to your conclusions, and then you seek to find premises to support those conclusions. Instead, you need to examine the premises you have and then arrive at valid conclusions that derive from those premises.
Platonic Realism is a faulty conclusion based upon sloppy premises. By its own definition, it is an invalid conclusion. There is no way to verify the premises, so the conclusion is, must be suspect.
You don't know what my understanding of "reality" and "truth" is, you are making an assumption here.
This difference is rooted in qualia (universals)–
"Universals" as you have defined them are an abstraction without referents. By the very nature of the definition they cannot be shown to exist, nor confirmed to exist. They are a theoretical construct that has no "reality" to theorize about.
understandings which are experienced and cannot be fully communicated.
Ever occur to you that they cannot be "fully communicated" because they are incorrect or are entirely subjective fantasy?
You and I can point, but the understanding cannot be reduced to an algorithm or program code because it cannot be fully communicated.
And therefore suspect as to its veracity.
To that I agree but also add that “all that there is” consists of more than the physical and the universals (including mathematical structures) from which they manifest.
You're contradicting yourself. Here you say "universals" exist in space/time, yet they are defined as existing outside of space/time (as Platonic philosophical Realism) which makes space/time possible. Which is it?
IOW, there also exists the non-physical "beyond" space/time which has no physical manifestation in space/time.
Which, by this very definition, you could know nothing about. So how do you know, other than theoretically, that it exists?
Your post is magnificent in explaining why there is so great a difference between our worldviews (you and I v LW et al) - and therefore, why it is struggle to communicate sometimes.
Again, you don't know what my worldview is. All I have done, all I ever do, is analyze the internal coherence of your statements and positions, which logically contradict themselves.
All I can add for the Lurkers is this: consider the difference in response between the two sides.
This too is a fundamental difference, you play to the crowd. I am talking to you. I am pointing out to you the weaknesses in your position so that you will, perhaps, rethink your already made up mind. You're evangelising, I'm not.
The side which LogicWings (and others here) asserts denies the very existence of what the side betty boop and I know is real, "all that there is" encompasses both the physical and the non-physical, within space/time (regardless of cosmology) and beyond space/time.
This constant insistence that I am denying anything is getting old. I have never "Asserted a Negative." I question how you know what you know, the logic by which you have arrived at your conclusions, which you readily admit aren't logical because they cannot be "fully communicated." They are unverifiable subjective experiences.
There is no way you can know, by definition that anything beyond space/time "exists" or is, to really destroy the meaning of words, "real."
The word “fantasy” used to describe our assertions captures this attitude of denial.
The word "fantasy" is the recognition that your position only takes place in your own mind, and nowhere else. It is the basis for your inability to "fully communicate" your experience because it is entirely subjective. It is the disconnect between the philosophical theory of Philosophic Realism and the utter inability, by its own definition, to confirm or verify any of it, which is impossible by its own terms.
Conversely, our side does not deny the existence of the boundaries of the other side - namely, space/time.
No, it postulates it without any evidence at all.
We recognize the physical as well as the non-physical. Space/time is a subset to “all that there is” as we know it.
Again, you are playing fast and loose with language here. Something can be "non-physical" and still not be beyond space/time as "we know it." The laws of logic are both non-physical, absolute, and do not exist beyond space/time. That space/time is a "subset" of anything is precisely what cannot be known, by definition (sigh . . . )
So one might ponder which carries more weight – the reality which contains the other reality or the reality which denies the encompassing reality exists?
Again, and again, and again. Simply destroying the meaning of words. If is outside of space/time then it isn't realilty by definition. Reification, again and again.
The reality that "contains" the other reality is like a finger pointing at itself. You can say it, but it means nothing. Your saying
All A contains all A that is not A.
It is logically absurd.Thus it carries nothing, not even weight.
I'm getting tired of this, let's cut to the chase here.
You have arrived at a given conclusion. You cannot demonstrate that this conclusion has any validity in reality so you are reasoning backwards.
Platonic Philosophic Realism with its Ideal Universal Forms that exist independently of space/time must exist because it confirms my religious conclusions. Therefore it must be correct.
This is circular reasoning, nothing more. It is counterfeit argument, (another definition of fallacy.) There is nothing you can say, no way you can couch the terms, where they will not contradict themselves, and can be demonstrated to contradict themselves. The very definition of the terms demands it. This is what "your side" fails to understand.
As I said to AG in my most recent post to her, the term "reality which contains the other reality" is logically absurd and is a destruction of language and the meaning of words. "Reality" is 4D space/time. If you want to have something else encompass that then you have to define another term. Problem is, it will only be an unprovable theoretical construct by its own definition. In other words, utterly useless.
To be perfectly blunt, it is absolutely idiotic to ever make any absolute asserations about "all there is" and asking those who belive that "there is more" to prove "there is more."
Either you didn't follow what I wrote very well, or the subject is beyond you because I never made any absolute assertions about anything. I analyzed the logic of assertions made by others, and found them wanting. That is all. That people draw wrong conclusions from that about what I am saying isn't my fault, it is theirs.
Shoot, there is a lot more that we don't know about our own little 4D slice of the universe than what we do know.
Excellent point. Then how do some others make the assumption that Platonic Philosphic Realism actually "exists" (to butcher language again) outside of the 4D-space/time Universe? You actually make my point. How do we know there is anything outside this 4D-space/time Universe until we know about everything inside it? This Universe may contain everything anyone here has asserted and more.
Alamo-Girl and betty boop are only stating what should be only too obvious: we really don't know that much about our own existence, except relative to those who came before us, and even then we sometimes find they knew a lot more than we thought!
AG and BB asserted a whole bunch more than just that. They asserted that Platonic Idea Universals exist outside space/time and manifest in space/time as universals such as mathematics and give rise to the very existence of space/time. Perhaps you should go back and read the whole thread before posting to me next time. Nothing you had to say here was related to the discussion.
The point that betty boop has asserted is evidenced by your insistence that whereas you are ”not working in any ‘context’” yet you demand logical proof of my worldview. Logic is your context; it is supreme to your worldview, overarching whatever you accept to be “all that there is”. Thus, anything that is not logical to you is not "real".
I, on the other hand, see logic as a subset – and in fact, a universal, like pain/pleasure, within “all that there is”. Logic exists but is not necessarily applicable across reality. As an example, in my worldview both predestination and free will exist – whereas in your worldview they would be mutually exclusive with predestination the most “logical”.
You object to universals because they cannot be logically proven to exist in your worldview. To the contrary, I assert qualia as universals - that all of us (including you) experience such things as pain and pleasure which are known only to the one experiencing it and cannot be fully expressed to anyone else. If a thing cannot even be expressed, it surely cannot be proven according to your rules for logic.
There are however universals – such as sound and color and geometries – which have physical characteristics and thus can be expressed and thereby, shown to exist across space/time regardless of the observer’s coordinates “in” space/time.
This would require an absolute knowledge of space/time that AG asserts is impossible within space/time. The statement is an absolute statement about space/time that says such statements about space/time cannot be made, such statements being absolute and universally true.
This is the point, the assertion contradicts ITSELF! I am not making a statement about reality, but an analysis of an assertion about reality. It is internally inconsistent. Until this fault is corrected, I don't have to take it seriously.
Most importantly, only Christians who have the indwelling Spirit have the direct experience of being alive “beyond” space/time while yet existing “in” space/time. Without that direct experience, you’d have to “grasp” with your mind “a mere image of the lofty structure of all that there is” (as Einstein put it).
Einstein understood that reality is an illusion, albeit a very persistent one. So did Godel, so did Heisenberg.
You: And one could say that all phenomena unfolding or evolving in space/time do so in an absolute sense, not relative to anything. There is no evidence of an a priore paradigm
you: Now we are getting somewhere. If you are postulating here that Plato meant the "Universe" - meaning everything that exists in this reality, the 4D Universe, is alive we might have something to talk about.
But this is a far cry from asserting some "transcendental" source for all the "universals" that constitute human thought. Do you understand the difference?
In your next post (addressed to me) you said: You don't know what my understanding of "reality" and "truth" is, you are making an assumption here.
You: But you are doing the very thing you accuse me of, putting me in a box that I don't accept as valid. There is no such separation between spirit and 4D space/time, can't be tested, can't be proven.
Previously I had surmised your worldview as materialist – microscope to telescope – like many of our correspondents here. But it appears I overreached in that you do not accept that which defies logic: non-locality, superposition and the ilk. My apologies. However that makes your worldview a subset of the materialist subset of my worldview.
BTW, because of this new understanding of your worldview, I have not bothered to respond to your objections to my previous statements about your worldview in the subsequent post.
you: You're contradicting yourself. Here you say "universals" exist in space/time, yet they are defined as existing outside of space/time (as Platonic philosophical Realism) which makes space/time possible. Which is it?
I however in my statement go beyond what Tegmark declares and say that “all that there is” consists of more than this. I know this is true on personal experience, the indwelling Spirit. That is also my answer to your next challenge:
you: Which, by this very definition, you could know nothing about. So how do you know, other than theoretically, that it exists?
you: The word "fantasy" is the recognition that your position only takes place in your own mind, and nowhere else. It is the basis for your inability to "fully communicate" your experience because it is entirely subjective. It is the disconnect between the philosophical theory of Philosophic Realism and the utter inability, by its own definition, to confirm or verify any of it, which is impossible by its own terms.
Of a truth, God will not prove Himself to you as long as you deny Him. Further, as one tries to write God out of his mind, God removes Himself from the thinker's mental ability so that he becomes a self-fulfilling prophesy of God’s righteous judgment. But, of course, one who has chosen to write God out of his mind cannot see what has happened to his own mind – but it is obvious to those who have “ears to hear” and spiritual insight.
For Lurkers interested in this judgment of the mind:
In closing, you said:
No objective truth at all in space/time? Then you're very existence is subject to question. All the science, theory, mathematicians and all the rest that you continually quote to bolster your point are all meaningless then. Every word you utter is devoid of meaning. There are no attributes, qualities, concepts and, more importantly, NO UNIVERSALS! There is no earth, no "space/time" no anything that has any meaning.
You cannot prove anything in my worldview – only in your own worldview which is materialist, metaphysically naturalist, from microscope to telescope.
You, by your own assertion above, cannot prove anything about your world view, nor mine. There is no objective basis by which to determine my worldview (which you know nothing about) is materialist, metaphysically naturalist, from microscope to telescope since, according to your view, none of these things objectively exist. They are just subjective figments of everybody's imagination, including yours.
I assert that your “world” is merely a subset of my own. Thus, you can cannot disprove “universals” or anything else to me.
True, nothing can be proven to you, or disproven to you because there is nothing objectively to prove or disprove by your own assertion. Thus your assertion that "my worldview" is a subset of yours is also not objectively true, so meaningless.
You know nothing about my world. You know nothing of what I actually think or view the Universe. You have no idea what my experiences are. You know nothing about me at all, and to use your own words, know "Nothing more, nothing less."
Since He has revealed to me through the indwelling Spirit an understanding of "all that there is" I can indeed speak with certainty of that which is a subset of the understanding. I cannot however "logically" prove it to you or anyone else; but those who also are Christian and have the indwelling Spirit know this is "objective truth".
For Lurkers: the revelations of the indwelling Spirit include both the direct mind of Christ and His bringing Scriptures alive within us. Jesus Christ is the Word from the beginning and was made flesh.
You want proof and verification. Well, that's understandable, LogicWings. But to live a life often we must act without the helps of proof and verification. If we had to wait for proof and verification everytime before we could do anything, or think anything, then we wouldn't be able to move or think.
Proof and verification pertain to the scientific method. The scientific method does not deal with everything that exists, because it is based on direct observation of physical things. There are other real things which are not physical, and thus not directly observable, that is, not available to sense perception (including scientific laws and logic itself). And so the scientific method can give us a trustworthy account only about a limited sector of total reality. What it cannot tell us is how to live as human beings.
When Alamo-Girl tells you that "your 'world' is merely a subset" of hers, I believe she has the above considerations in mind. When I say that your 'world' is the expression of personal preference, to the extent that you reduce the "world" to its 4D space-time expression it seems to me you are expressing a personal preference about how you wish to regard and deal with the world.
I take your point about how Platonist realism posits things which cannot be directly "proved" on direct observational grounds. Thus you seem to conclude that it is "illogical" to speak of them. The same can be said of religious experience, which is a completely real universal phenomenon. Or consciousness, qualia. By subjecting such real existents to your standard of proof, it seems they cannot then exist for you. You have "edited the world down" to a shade of its former self (so to speak) -- to "the tip of the iceberg" -- simply because it is easier for you to conduct logical explorations/analyses of it in that reductive state. One of the things that gets edited out is the vast majority of lived human experience, which always involves more than purely physical phenomena.
Proof and validity are terms that essentially deal with confirmations of observations. As such, they do not deal directly with truth per se, which is the context in which both the visible (4D) and invisible (extra-4D) realms of the Universe have their being -- the "depths of the iceberg."
And though it may be superfluous to point this out, logic is not the same thing as truth. That is, it is not truth itself but a technique by which truth can be ascertained. But if you're throwing out a huge body of evidence because it cannot be directly validated by means of the scientific method, in what sense can we say that any such application of logic will give us truthful results?
No, I don't demand logical proof of your worldview because it cannot be done, I have merely pointed out the contradictions in yours. Logic isn't my context and it isn't supreme to my worldview, it is a tool for analyzing assertions and discovering their errors. It isn't overarching anything. You continually mistake definitions about reality with reality. I don't.
I, on the other hand, see logic as a subset – and in fact, a universal, like pain/pleasure, within “all that there is”.
But you defined universals as being outside space/time. You continually want to have it both ways.
Logic exists but is not necessarily applicable across reality.
An absolute statement that if true, negates itself. Any attempt to "prove" logic isn't applicable across reality will invariably depend upon it for that very proof. Stolen Concept Fallacy.
As an example, in my worldview both predestination and free will exist – whereas in your worldview they would be mutually exclusive with predestination the most “logical”.
Wrong. I see predestination and freewill as a differential, fixed at one point and free at the other, with varying mixtures in between depending upon the context. See, you don't have a clue what my worldview is.
You object to universals because they cannot be logically proven to exist in your worldview.
No, I object to universals as you stated them as Philosophic Realism because the definition contradicts itself and there is another, more reasonable explanation.
To the contrary, I assert qualia as universals - that all of us (including you) experience such things as pain and pleasure which are known only to the one experiencing it and cannot be fully expressed to anyone else.
There is a disease where a person feels no pain, so this qualia isn't universal at all. You also state, "experience such things as pain and pleasure which are known only to the one experiencing it and cannot be fully expressed to anyone else" which would make this an objective truth (that it cannot be fully expressed to anyone else.)
If a thing cannot even be expressed, it surely cannot be proven according to your rules for logic.
Wrong again. That's what happens when researchers do an MRI on ten people, stick a pin in their finger, and register what portions of the brain activate. We are going a long way towards proving your "qualia" objectively exist.
And by the way, they aren't "my rules of logic." This is another mistake you make. There are only the laws of logic, they aren't different from person to person. They are absolute.
There are however universals – such as sound and color
Sound is an abstract concept for the perception of vibrations in the air. That perception is just as incapable of complete expression as the experience of pain. People with some forms of color blindness see the world in a completely different way than most everyone else, but there is no way they could "completely express" that difference according to your assertions. There is no way to assure that the yellow I see is the same yellow you see, even though it is the same wavelength.
and geometries
Reification. Geometries are a high level abstraction based upon a long chain of mathematical logic for their proofs and do NOT have independent existence as say, a star does.
shown to exist across space/time regardless of the observer’s coordinates “in” space/time.
More of the same, reified concept.
Without that direct experience, you’d have to “grasp” with your mind “a mere image of the lofty structure of all that there is.”
There might just be another experience outside both of your premises. You, and Einstein are claiming that one thing you deny for everyone else, absolute knowledge about what can be known.
Einstein understood that reality is an illusion, albeit a very persistent one. So did Godel, so did Heisenberg.
This statement makes no sense. There are certain aspects to reality that are illusory, (such as the function of time); but if reality is an illusion, the reality that reality is an illusion, is an illusion. (I just love when people make absolute statements about what other people "understood" when the idea that no one can know what another person thinks, feels, or knows is considered absolute.)
To the contrary, there is always a beginning.
You only think you know this.
What a fascinating reply, LogicWings! It appears the object of your rejection is God Himself – not the concept of a “collective consciousness”.
Appearances can be deceiving since all reality is illusion. And if reality isn't an illusion, then maybe I'm saying something you are incapable of understanding.
To the contrary - non-locality, superposition and the ilk are evidence of physical reality which are not fully knowable and thus cannot be fully expressed and therefore cannot be subjected to “logical” proofs as you would have them.
Now you are saying what Ronzo(?) took me to task for saying, even though I never said it. You are saying it is impossible to know. How do you know that it is impossible to know? Some genius make come up with a new view of the universe, just as Einstein did, that resolves these contradictions and makes all these things knowable. Once again, you are claiming absolute knowledge while claiming absolute knowledge is impossible.
Your dog/cat experiment has nothing to do with universals but everything to do with language.
Universals have everything to do with language, that is the point. They do not exist separate from language. Take pain for example. If you had never learned language, would you know the sensation you were feeling was "pain?" That would be impossible. It is the projection of the "concept of pain" as a universal "abstract concept" that allows us to empathize with the torture of an animal. The concept is the universal, not the other way around. That is why we all know what each other means when we say "pain" without being able to "completely express" the concept. The fact that we all understand the concept of "pain" means it objectively represents the reality of the sensation.
Fish existed long before there were humans to describe them, etc.
What, are you evolutionist now?
And therein you define your worldview – “all that there is” is that which can be “logically” proven to exist.
That is a mis-characterization of what I am saying. I am saying your assertion that there is a separation cannot be proven, therefore is an invalid assertion. That may just mean there is more to this 4D-space/time than you are willing to admit. That which you think stands outside space/time may actually exist as the Universe. (To put it as Bucky Fuller did.)
Previously I had surmised your worldview as materialist – microscope to telescope – like many of our correspondents here. But it appears I overreached in that you do not accept that which defies logic: non-locality, superposition and the ilk.
This is another example of how you people continually mis-characterize what I am saying. I didn't say I didn't accept such phenomenon, I said they contradict each other so there must be something wrong in our understanding. If reality is an illusion then non-locality, Bell's inequality, superposition, Einstein's theories are all illusory as well. Nothing really can be known, so what's the point?
In your worldview of reality universals, qualia, epiphenomenon, spirit, soul and most especially, God – cannot “exist” since you cannot obtain any of them using logic. That is very sad, LogicWings.
How do you know they can't be obtained by logic? Depends how you arrive at the definitions. Sloppy thought. BTW, just love the condescending holier-than-thou attitude.
As Max Tegmark said (paraphrased) every thing (every where and every when) in space/time can be described by a mathematical structure which exists outside of space/time.
Can be described, i.e., language. In another words, conceptual development, i.e., abstract concepts. The mathematical structure doesn't "exist" outside of space/time but outside a specific space/time. This is again Reification.
That is radical Platonism. IOW, physical reality is a manifestation of such universals.
Opinion. Assertion Without Proof. Mathematical Structure is an abstract concept, not a mystical existent. That's why it is always a work in progress. It is manifested by reality, it doesn't manifest physical reality (a redundancy.) You confuse the language describing reality with reality itself. As I said, you are reasoning backwards in order to reach a certain conclusion.
As for the rest of your post and your mystical experiences. Lot's of people across the span of time have had lot's of mystical experiences. They all consider their experiences just as valid as you do yours, even though they are all mutually contradictory.
As for the function of religion and logic, you should try the Apologist Dr. Walter Martin. I've listened to probably a hundred hours of his lectures, maybe more. If you understood the importance of logic as he did, you wouldn't make so many fundmental reason mistakes.
There's really no end to this if we don't draw a line at what's objectively verifiable. Anyone can construct an intellectual model that is allegedly greater then the other guy's model.
For example, I could declare that all of you live in a pitifully tiny version of reality which is but an insignificant subset of mine. In my far-greater reality, which has at least 69 dimensions, all those Platonic thingies are a mere subset of other thingies, which exist beyond number.
There may very well be more to the world than the crude limitations imposed by objective verifiability. In fact, the domain of what's included in the scientist's limited version of reality has been greatly expanded by the inclusion of previously unsuspected forces, distant galaxies, etc. The observable world can be expected to expand again as new discoveries are made, such as dark energy, dark matter, and all sorts of other goodies that are yet to be verified. But the only way to know what's out there is to scientifically observe it (or its unmistakable effects). All else is philosophy (nothing wrong with that).
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