My head hurts now.
*PING*
My head hurts now.
Hey w33, come check this out, see if it makes sense to you...(Sorry, not satire, just boring old logic...)
If I were to come to this thread, would anyone hear me clicking?
Just kidding, Ronzo! It's good stuff. Thanks for the ping!
My previous post was inspired by an old episode of Police Story from years ago (I realize there are adults who have been born since that old series was on TV; yikes!) In this episode a young cop is married to a hippie philosophy major, and as time goes along they have less and less in common. Finally, he comes in from a particularly horrifying crime scene to find her discussing this particular conundrum with her other college friends, and as a put-down they ask him "if the tree falls ...." to which he replies "if a girl is beaten to death in the forest, and there is no one there to hear her scream, is she really dead" (and from the look on his wife's face we can imagine their marriage is pretty much over).
In any case, it pays to keep in mind that events exist outside your ability to perceive them.
If there is no "listener" then there is no sound. Sound is only given substance by a listener who can perceive sound.
This is true. To look at it another way, if there is an event that you wish to monitor, you must find a way to sense the event. If the event makes some physical change, we can devise an instrument that will sense that change, and translate it into a form that our eye and brain can recognize. We can devise a way for the shock wave to generate an electronic signal that will be displayed on my monitor as a sine wave or a flashing red icon. If there is no instrument to sense the event, and translate it into an electronic signal, then there will be no graphic display. But the tree did fall, and the shock wave that our instrument captured or (failed to capture) did occur.
it is simply impossible for a single person to know of everything that exists. Nor is it possible for mankind, collectively, to know of everything that exists, and I'm speaking of just those things that are possible to detect given our limitations.
That would be a truism.
Imagine a non-conscious being that is completely impossible to perceive with our senses, could such a being exist? The answer is no.
I don’t think my existence is contingent on your ability to see me, and atoms didn’t spring into existence in this past century. I might seem deliberately obtuse here, but it isn’t deliberate (I am obtuse, as my friends will attest), but I will reject this point. Those things that exist, existed prior to and independently of my ability to instrument them.
If there is no conscious rational being to perceive a non-conscious being, then it is not possible for that being to exist, it is a logical contradiction.
No.
And if we are using our rational consciousness to perceive a non-conscious being, then that being is being perceived, if only in our mind's eye.
Imagine the shock to the space-time-continuum that must occur each and every time we blink.
The only way such a universe can exist is if there is a rational, conscious being that can perceive it--if only through thinking--that such a thing exists!
No.
the earth, the sun, and even the stars never existed before the first conscious, rational human being! They literally did not exist. Why couldn't they exist before the first human? Because existence and consciousness are bound together, and cannot be logically separated.
This is what happens when you shoot long range with open sights. A very tiny error in your sight picture can lead to a man-sized error at 300 yards, and a Volkswagen sized error at a thousand yards. Existence and consciousness are not bound together. Only your existence and your consciousness are bound together.
The rock does not exist because I saw it. It moved because I kicked it, but it existed whether or not I was ever born.
I am also a platonist, I suppose, I believe that there are principles by which this universe is designed. But those principles and the universe designed by them exist separately from my ability to draw breath or conceptualize them.
Tag, you're it.
Well, the correct answer is "no." Since "sound" is only possible given the following conditions:
The writer begins with the above axiom, as if it were a universal Truth; whereas, it is actually only a tenet (Article Of Faith) within his philosophy/religion.
But there is something we can be sure of: if we perceive that a being exists, it exists,
Dreams, hallucinations, products of the human imagination: all of these can cause us to perceive “beings” which have no counterpart in objective reality.
The only way we can know, for sure, that something exists is through our sense perceptions.
Hallucinations, magician’s tricks, etc.
This piece may be a useful tool for showing those who are mired in Platonism that extra-temporal, extra-material intelligences exist, but it leaves them open to reverence (or worship) spiritual entities which pretend to be, but are not, those beings: which are, in truth, the triune God of the Bible, and His angels.
The initial axiom is a pile of sand, upon which it is unsafe to build a useful edifice.
DG
The most important point to remember is this: consciousness and existence are inseparable, but since our knowledge as human beings of all that exists is very limited, then there must be other beings who are perfect in knowledge, and who act as the means by which our universe exists.
If saying it made it so, you'd be correct. Alas, it doesn't.
PING!
Just thought you'd like to see that someone is boldly going where we have already transcended before.
The animals in the fossil record, could we say they were able to perceive their environment? The creatures studying the fossil record, can we say they are conscious and intelligent enough to understand their research? ... Are we so certain that our perception level is as far as it will ever rise?... If there are Angels, we certainly don't perceive them on a regular basis, but that doesn't preclude their existence, it just defines the limits of our perception abilities.
(Lost rare classic from the "Not Just Another Pretty Foot" album)
If an essay on existence exists, but is not read, does it really exist?
Baloney. Sound is energy. Energy is given off as a result of the tree falling. Some of that energy is in the form of sound waves. They do not need a human or hearing witness to "exist."
Your consciousness seemingly did not include an understanding of basic physics. Therefore, you are not as conscious as I am. Do you exist?
What does it matter if you exist? If you do not exist, but your body is living, may we forbid you any food or water, even by natural means?
If there is dualism between consciousness and the body, how does conscious thought result in movement of the muscles? How does deciding to hit a nail result in a nail getting hit? What is the mechanism whereby thought acts on material objects?
"If a tree falls in the forest, and no one is there to hear it, does it make a sound?"
YES.
"can something exist (object) if no one exists (subject) who is aware of it's existence?"
YES. Objects exist irrespective of the existence of other objects/subjects.
The phone rang earlier, and my wife answered it. I yelled out from the living room, "I'm not here!" She didn't hear me. Do I still exist?
So if I play a Memorex tape of Ella Fitzgerald in a crystal shop, and no one else is around, the glasses won't break because there is no sound? Not sure I agree.
The logical endpoint of your discussion is that "things exist because I perceive them." As such, the possible existence of "other perceivers" is completely irrelevant -- it's my perception that causes things to exist.
Once you try to explain why things can exist independent of my perception of them, then you've effectively tossed out your original premise: it's now the case that things existed before I could perceive them, and thus my perception is not a necessary condition for things to exist. And if not my perception, why must existence rely on anybody's perception?
I think what's going on here is that you've confused "existence" with "being able to prove things about existence" -- which is the same place where Descartes began to flounder in his Pensees.
Which takes us back to your initial question. Back in 1980 I heard Mt. St. Helens explode -- it shook the house from 200 miles away. Did the explosion occur because I heard it, or would it have occurred even if I were deaf? (As it happens, the blast wave that I heard also flattened trees in its path. So if sound causes trees to fall in the forest....?) Would the explosion have "occurred" only when I later observed the volcanic ash as it began settling in my yard?
If this is "nominalism", count me out. If a tree falls in the woods, with no ear attached to a head capable of reporting the event within hearing distance of the event, there still was a sound - created by the crash of the mass of wood hitting the ground, disturbing the air molecules in its passing as well as profoundly vibrating the air molecules as it expends its gravitationally generated energy upon the surface.
Physics is physics whether or not a nominalist is listening, IMHO.
I'm guilty of doing some philosophisying. I'm not a philosopher by trade, though I did stay at a Holiday Inn Express once...
Anyway, if you get a chance, review my little essay entitled "If A Tree Falls in the Forest..." and give it a quick critique. It kind of builds on the foundation of that of Bishop George Berkely, but makes the fantastic claim that existance and consciousness are two sides of the same coin...
Ping your list if you think it worthwhile. Thanks in advance.