Posted on 07/05/2003 4:20:08 PM PDT by betty boop
(i'll have to read it slowly since my eyes are starting to glaze over)
Not really. It's that your outputs are functions of your inputs, and something else. No one would deny out behavior is influenced by external inputs. You are making a ridiculous strawman with that statement.
I can see the point of your skepticism, mikegi. But on the other hand, as a predictive theory, QM is brilliant, on the grounds of "tried and tested and true as far as it goes." It has led to extraordinary technological achievements, whose by-products we employ and enjoy in our daily lives.
You just can't flush "credentials" like that down the toilet, now can you?
LOL!!!! I know the feeling, chilepepper!
Still, I thought it worthwhile to stick with it.... GREAT and important stuff here.... (IMO)
Try small doses. And small meditations in between. Or take the problem to bed with you, and sleep on it!
All of which work for me. :^) all my best -- bb
Hahahahahahahaa! LOL Justa! Don't assume too much. Dr. Grandpierre might have some surprises in store. :^) Maybe do a Google search, and see what I mean?
No but now I will.
But Determinism and Causality are fundamentally connected. If you really believe causality is the case--that every event has a cause or causes and nothing else you have determinism. With determinism you have no free will.
As I mentioned, I do not see (as others do) rescue in quantum effects. Those who appeal to quantum effects to 'rescue' free will are like drowning men who will grab anything they think will help them float.
But once you introduce influences external to space/time, or "fundamental consciousness" or Platonic ideals...you can imagine a world where both causality and consciousness can coexist in an uneasy harmony.
Funny that you should say "Run to Buddhism". Buddhism repeatedly refers to "taking refuge" in Buddhism. Refuge from what? From "suffering" or "anguish"--which is principally the essential angst of human knowledge that all of us eventually die. Attachments to things is the 'source' of anguish; letting go of such attachments is the balm. Hey, I'm not a monk; I just read a lot.
Now it so happens that I am in poor health (diabetic peripheral neuropathy among other things) and I would love to end that suffering. It appears I must detach from the physical world completely (die) to attain this; I am not anxious (yet) to take such refuge, although the thought has crossed my mind...
--Boris
I read philosophy kinda slowly, so this is as far as I got in this one. It is my understanding that consciousness is simply the latest, and maybe not the final, complexification of phenomena that are inherent in all matter and is latent in all atoms or subatomic particles until they become organized sufficiently. Whatever epiphenomena it might be, it is a level in itself but otherwise nothing special--totally natural and material.
Quantum Electrodynamics (QED) and its cousin, Quantum Chromodynamics, cannot be "rotten to the core". They are among the most successful theories in all of science; they allow predictions through pure calculation which are found to be true to a dozen decimal places (or more).
"Truth" can be said to mean "in conformance with the way the Universe behaves", and these theories certainly are "true". That is, they reveal part of the way the universe behaves. They are not absolute truth; they are subject to revision/extension/modification. But they certainly reveal something of the truth.
--Boris
OK, what 'something else'? It cannot be an "input" or it would be, well, an input. If it is not an input, how does it influence your behavior?
The Strawman of Oz awaits an answer.
--Boris
Seems you're unfamiliar with the increasingly popular phenomenon of the "Jew-Bu." :)
Buddhism (among many other things) tells us to cease our constant conceptualizing; the world cannot be understood via concepts. But my JOB is to do little more than fancy conceptualizing. .....So conceptualizing works (in a limited regime). But does it lead us anywhere that is not ultimately sterile?
Your question is answered thoroughly and brilliantly by Harry L. Weinberg in his (1950s) book Levels of Knowing and Existence in the chapter entitled "Religion." Suzuki is dealt with extensively, and Weinberg reveals the pros and cons of both Buddhist non-conceptualization and western thought processes and proposes an alternative. I have a copy somewhere around here, so perhaps I'll dig up an exerpt for you later tonight that deals with the topic in question.
Behavior, per Skinner, is action by the organism that is intended to influence the environment. Behavior is not merely influenced by external inputs, it relies on external inputs to judge efficacy.
Boris, you raise so many points to which I personally resonate, I strongly doubt I can reply to all of them tonight. It's late, and it's time for bed.
But we can begin with the italics, above. Have you ever seen the Mandelbrot set? I mean, the graphical representation of same, which I've seen in a couple different books by now?
The way I see it, determinism and causality are surely "fundamentally connected," just as you have said. I gather that you understand this as something being imposed on one. But the point of what Grandpierre is doing here, which seems to be supported by Kafatos and Draganescu, is that you have justification for supposing that you are equally the creative "doer," as you are the one being "done to." For the nature of the Fundamental Consciousness and your own natural consciousness are not fundamentally unalike. Indeed, they so resemble each other, that many people today still believe that God made man "in His image." Just think about that. The implications are staggering. Science has never demonstrated that as an ill-founded supposition....
What these guys are saying is the physical laws hold completely within the stuctural (physical/electromagnetic/chemical -- material) sphere. This is the "structural side" of the integrative science they propose.
Regarding the phenomenal side, however, they seem agreed that this dimension of human existence and experience is subject to different laws entirely. And free will has traction and purchase in that domain.
This is not an "either/or" situation/decision. It is the description of the "living tension" in which human life is lived -- with all its reason and free will, and the choices that follow from same.
So what? I could come up with a theory describing particles as incredibly small kennels with photons as even smaller St Bernards running around with barrels of "energy" on their collars. I could create a bunch of experimentally determined parameters for how these St Bernards interact with the kennels (precise to 12 decimal places). Would you believe my theory or say it was ridiculous at its core?
You wrote in an earlier post that you were/are an engineer. Go read Dodd's "Atoms and Light: Interactions", especially chapter 6, and tell me if that changes your view of photons and QM. I can put a paper I wrote on it out on the web if you're interested. It's a condensed version of his semiclassical Compton Effect theory. Also, check out Cole's semiclassical simulations of simple atomic states.
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