Something longer will drop today- and now I can’t stop giggling about poop- but I felt like serving up a morning snack (which now feels weird to write whie I’m thinking about poop).
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Yes, the categories here are weak. I’m mainly interested in the discussion.
I mostly believe in something like the notion of "probability waves"- there are (probably?) infinite outcomes to every interaction in the universe, with their likelihoods existing on a probability continuum, and when one happens, the wave collapses, but the outcomes aren't deterministic (i.e., can't be perfectly predicted from primary causes). I like the model of "near-infinite potential worlds when outcomes are viewed looking forward in linear time that contracts as you move along that line."
I also think that there are some things that ARE like fate- that are "more solid" in the continuum and would be nearly impossible if not possible to deliberately induce a different outcome- but this generally describes outliers.
But I've been reading a lot of more esoteric stuff since the holidays about rejecting linear time and trying to integrate this into how I think about things like determinism.
This kind of thing generally lives in the "sometimes interesting to think about but not of practical importance to anyone living in the real world," but I have a lot of extra cycles in my head and most Gutterballs are similarly well-endowed.
I'm especially interested in what folks with a strong faith practice think about these concepts as I think that- moving beyond the purely practical- they are big philosophical issues to contend with if being thoughtful about your relationship to the gods and the universe is important to you.
I am curious, how does rejecting linear time change one's behavior day to day, decision to decision? I have read folks recommending the notion, or at least that there is more to time than we can perceive, but never how to use that knowledge to save on your tax bill, or lose 5 lbs before the holidays. Always more along the lines of
For right now, my answer is "I don't know." I'm mainly interested in the subject because I've noticed (when reading people that do focus on this a lot) that I/most people have a strong cultural bias towards linearity but that this isnt, despite our bias, necessarily a human default. That's why it's interesting to me- I want to interrogate why I have that and if there's value there.
So it MAY change one's day to day behavior, or it may not. I'll let you know. But it also impacts one's spirituality, as I&K pointed out.
If all you want is conversations about tax writedowns and weight loss, so to speak, you are definitely in the wrong place. It's not like any of us are going to shift foreign policy on Ukraine, either, but we still waste a lot of bytes talking about it. :)
At the time (now 20 years ago) it was because I was excited about what was then-nascent AI studies (which look veeeeeeery different today) and was interested in how intelligence arises as a function of language.
The notion of what "training learning systems" looked like was very different then. We started with Star Trek and ended up with... new Star Trek.
Well, the reason I asked about taxes and weight loss was less about those two things and more about the general class of "how do I apply this and test that it works" activities. I was hoping you had perhaps come across someone who argues for accepting non-linear time and then how and why it changes things for you. I am just always leery of arguments that don't have an answer to "so what?" and it feels like something so big as nonlinear time should have one.
The short answer is, yes, there are people that argue for it. but thus far, I have not yet found a sufficiently complete understanding of WHY. (Or even really HOW.)
Yea, CS Lewis argues that at the god/spiritual/whatever level time is all at once, but doesn't really do anything with it other than "so chill and deal with your life in time and believe in God." Which, ok fine, but it still boils down to doing more or less what you were doing before, believing that such things are out there.
CS Lewis is Christian, and a particular sort of Christian, which makes that position fairly expected. It isn't mine.
I agree that an understanding with zero impact isn't of any value. Where I think we depart is that I think it's a mistake to presume that because an impact can't be predicted that it doesn't exist. I suspect there are important understandings about the nature of the universe/consciousness that MAY profoundly impact us- how, I'm mature enough to say "I don't know yet," but that's the challenge of communicating the value of anything theoretical. We might need this later, we might not.
My experience tells me that quite a lot of civilizational advancement happens when we have a food surplus and spend time exploring. But, of course, you can also end up with an evolutionary dead-end like postmodernism and maybe not get back onto the side street before it destroys you.
I like how you use "So what?", it is a seldom seen question in any ontological or philosophical (or indeed political) debate, much to all our detriment.
Possibly because all the high-faluting language and verbosity shrouds whatis in essence very basic thoughts in an air of almost supernatural guise and poise.
One of our tutors in pol sci used to direct his Argus' glare at us squeeking students and thunder: "Relevance!?" in a deep rumbling baritone, when one of us thought we had come uo with who killed Cock Robin, so to speak.
The moral being that the odds of anyone coming up with an actual new thought are rather remote. New to the person which certainly has merit, new to the field is almost unherd of, and has been for more than a century.
Thanks! I should credit my advisor Dan Klein with the formulation, although his wife is Lotta Stern of Sweden, so maybe the appeal suggests its source? :D I can't help think that "So what?" matches Klein's New York adjacent demeanor so perfectly that it has to come from him, however.
I suppose if I am being honest that the implications of a theory, moral, physical, or otherwise, are always more interesting to me than the theory itself, and so I am bit suspicious when someone claims to have come up with something that seems big but hasn't a good answer for so what. At very least, I begin to wonder if the person doesn't have a long commute, waits in line, or even poops. Not pooping is a big red flag for someone being a source of wisdom, in my experience!
Hahahaha! I've annoyed friends who are into this or that theory of economics with asking "How does that affect the growing of potatoes?", my way of asking "So what?" perhaps.
Philosophy, morals, ethics, creeds and -isms and faiths are fine, but a potatoe is a potatoe all the time. When it's not a potato of course.
Would that be the sociology professor Charlotta Stern of Stockholm University and swedish representative to Academics Roghts Watch by any chance? She is certainly a welcome voice in the desert when it comes to the social sciences and humanities, both in the US and here.
There's an element of magic to all debates such as the one of the poll too. By defining and naming, we bring it into being. But once having been brought into existence it gains momentum of its own and come under other influences than the ones of its originator.
Ad we never know beforehand if we are being the Sourceror's apprentice or dr Frankenstein or rabbi Loew or Melkor, and if our creation is Excalibur's sheath or the ring of Gygas.
Just look at where postmodernism started, what it caused and where it is today.
As time doesn't exist at all, other as a convenience for us humans, the question is only relevant within the frame of said convenience:
"How long does it take to boil an egg?"
Normal person: "Hardboiled or softboiled?"
Philosopher: "What kind of egg? Boiled in what?" and "Until it's done".
Using that fallacious and facetious exchange, the point of being that time is relative to our needs and wants, and nothing else. Outside the human conscious, time does not exist, only changing states.
Well, accepting for a moment that time does not exist outside of our perception of it, how does that change us? Is there a use for that information, or even a way to test that it is correct?
I think being able to definitively demonstrate that could have plenty of serious implications! As for testing it, there are definitely adjacent concepts being explored in physics at this very moment.
Forgive me, but this seems like a very anti-curious position. Do we have to know the specific application before something becomes worth trying to understand? Some of the most useful applications came afterwards.
I would say I am very curious, just about what is downstream.
Or maybe a better metaphor would be coming to a dam across a small, dry gully in the woods.
The dam itself is interesting: what's it made of? Who made it? When? Was it just to make a pond, or does it generate power?
It also interesting to ask: why is there a dam with no stream? What happened to the stream? If there is no stream, am I wrong about it being a dam? It is just a wall? Why would there be a wall there? Does it maybe hold back rain water flow down the gully? Is there a spring up the gully a bit that got blocked off at some point after the dam was built?
Now imagine you ran into someone and got to talking and they told you about a dam they found in the woods in a dry gully. They talk about the dam itself, what color it is, how big, and begin to speculate on how it generates power. If you were to ask them "Why do you suppose it is in a dry gully?" and their answer is "Who knows? Isn't it interesting that it is made of concrete, though?" and when you follow up with "Why? what does being made of concrete tell you?" they reply "Oh, nothing, but concrete is interesting. Why aren't you curious about the concrete?" well... that would be a little odd, right? I mean, being made of concrete helps nail down when it was made, and by whom, so that's something. Yet, almost all the questions about the dam are interesting in context of its environs, and in fact can largely only be answered through that context. Once you accept the existence of the dam it is all the interconnected context that one needs to know about to understand it.
What's more, if all of that context had zero bearing on whether you should think that was a dam or a wall, or whether it was even there in the woods at all... well, that would be really strange, right? That should make you wonder if maybe there wasn't some fundamental problem with how you understand the idea, or each other.
I think we'd need to get mr Rigger in here to help with (dis)proving that, at least from a physicists point of view.
As for changing us, to me it offers a relief of stress and a longer, more open-ended perspective since it liberates me from slaving away under the Grottekvarn* that is clock-time.
By ignoring time I don't mean a lackadaisical or fatalist view either, just mastery of myself, something which I can tie** to Descartes' presupposing the existence of the thinker in the first place in his well-known quote (and much lesser known argument leading up to it) - if no thinker exists to question his existence by thinking the question.... Same thing, only with time instead of thought.
*Grottasöngr, (Song of Grotte), an old poem. It is sometimes included in the Poetic Edda, though exactly where it belongs is contested.
**As mentioned elsewhere, this type of debate invariably leads to "proof by name-dropping", but I'll argue that I mention "Sweden's contributon to french philosophy"*** to give credit, not credibility.
***He died in Stockholm having contracted pneumonia, in no small part due to Queen Kristina's habit of wanting to have un petit discourse at 0500 in January.
Are you saying Sweden's contribution to French philosophy was killing Descartes? If so, I would be more impressed if you all had managed to off Rousseau :D
More to your point, does it make a difference to say "time doesn't exist outside of my perception of it" and "time does not matter so much, whether it exists or not" to relief of stress? To kind of think of it a slightly different way, time as space, does it really make a difference to think "Jupiter is very far away" vs "Jupiter doesn't exist?" I would say yes, but for most people only in corner cases. It is still worth understanding the difference, because those corner cases exist, and might be useful in some distant way. The point would be though that the better understanding has relevant corner cases to test the differences. I someone was really worried about Jupiter crashing into their house, either understanding might do the trick, but I think one is preferable.
Sorry if that doesn't make a lot of sense. I am dealing with some last moment (week) house closing problems, and the sprogs are home with their random drama. Can't concentrate well for being angry and tired.
See, I disagree with that. Aesthetics does impact the mundane, quite a bit, and the mundane impacts aesthetics. Often in quite predictable ways.
I do agree with the notion that not all thoughts have to impact the mundane, certainly, but if something is important, or just real, there probably ought to be implications for how you can or should adjust behavior to account for it, or at least to test it out a bit. I'd be a little worried if someone were to say come up with an elaborate proof that Satan actually created existence and God was an angel rebelling against him, yet the end result was "but don't worry about doing anything differently than before you believed this was true." Whether I should be worried about the new belief or my old beliefs is an open question, but a huge change in perception should imply some changes in behaviors.
I gotta be honest, there are a few people (including you) that I'm especially excited to hear from... among them being Doc Holliday because he's a firm but thoughtful believer and Rikard who has a similar ideo background to me but a lot more wisdom and experience.
I'm not going to make myself look good...or even cognizant here. Typing sucks. Also..the damn freezing weather sucks ( im outside with Cammie pup...at 14 she gets me with her most of the time...)
But yes,I'm very excited to explore what others here experience- my joke about endowment aside- because despite the gutterness...you have amazing substackers in general and specific.
I've witnessed few freeloaders, myself excluded ( l can be laaaaame...)
Fun fact: I had a boyfriend that was very into paintball, which meant I got very into paintball. (I'm like that. I don't subsume my identity but I'm religious about 'shared interests').
I used to have long hair. Long story short, you show up with a ponytail ONCE to paintball and everyone calls you Sarah Connor for the rest of eternity.
Try the new movie. I don't want to call it "dumbed-down," but it moves a lot better. Fathermouth, who loved the original fully-nerdy one, also loved it, FWIW.
I've loved "popcorn"-flicks, the not-so-serious movies of any genre since I was a teenager. The wife positively loves turkeys like 'Plan9 from Outer Space' and such too.
The scene where the Hero mounts the big worm causes her to giggle like a tweeny-bopper at some highly-marketable "artists" meet the fans-event.
I liked the miniseries, the one with William Hurt. He is awful in it, but I thought the rest of the cast were good. I haven't seen it lately, to see if it stood up to the test of time.
This is where I get interested when physicists talk about the whole "observing the event alters it." I understand the completely frank, non-woo framework that statement is coming from, but it makes me wonder, "what makes something an observer? How is observer status gained/lost? Is this just anthrocentric?"
For me, there's a middle bit. I think there are dimensions of consciousness and differently-material existence that we currently cannot clearly perceive or test. (This may or may not include perception of time.) What we would call "gods" are simply bigger/more complex/'powerful' intelligence patterns capable of interacting with lower dimensions in ways we are not. This does not necessarily map onto the specific faiths that humans devise, but my strong suspicion is that many spiritual conceptions are highly diluted or faint grasps at real and coherent things in such a space, i.e., I do not think "Odin" is literally a hooded dude who wanders around with ravens but is a way of understanding a higher-order thing whose behavior was understandable to Iron-age humans in this way.
I think that's probably true of the core community here, which is why the discussions are generally so good.
A truly heterodox free-for-all devolves before too long and doesn't hold much appeal for me. It's easy enough to find a hundred different voices eventually battling for supremacy. A perhaps less-disparate community striving for intellectual and/or philosophical rigor holding each other to account is more satisfying.
It is observed by interaction? As existing in confluence to the "observed " ...is that observation? Is observing knes thoughts about the " observed " even separated by time/space Observation?
This sort of question always strikes me as odd, in that, to me, it is almost perfectly useless to know the answer. It seems to me that neither extreme option can change our behavior, because our behavior is driven by decisions made moment to moment. Whether or not we have free will or are running on rails via Fate, we perceive and act as though we have free will.
The question of gods and a greater realm where time is non-linear and everything is as at once is sort of besides the point: whether that exists in some form or not we don't access it, and our creator made it that way on purpose.
One could probably build a cosmology where it mattered more, but the human default always seems to be to make decisions to act for good or ill, with very limited knowledge of causes and outcomes. I suspect there's a good reason that's the standard across all humans, despite periodically there being philosophies or religions popping up suggesting that decisions don't matter.
I mean, as I said before, it doesn't "matter" in certain senses, and yet it's absolutely something that (many if not you) humans spend a lot of time thinking about.
Arriving at different conclusions would absolutely shape the way I govern myself, and probably the way larger systems (societies, etc.) govern themselves. Certainly the status quo that you've summarized here has defined the way our existing systems are governed.
You're right that it isn't necessary or functional to engage this variable to function as a human in daily life. But thank goodness that alone doesn't dictate what we may be interested in or discuss.
I don't know that different conclusions would make us behave differently, in part because many people claim to have come to different conclusions. For example, if one believes in a very deterministic world where people don't really have control over their behavior in a meaningful way, one might support more social welfare systems, because, hey, it isn't their fault they were born into a bad family in a bad neighborhood, yadda yadda. Lots of people take that as true, for example, basically all sociologists. Only, they don't carry that to the conclusion "and therefore, people who are born into circumstances recognized as being highly probably to cause bad life outcomes and criminal behavior should be euthanized." They don't even get as far as "euthanized after their first/second/third criminal offense". I suspect that is because humans can't quite believe in a very deterministic world because all of our experiences point the other way; we can only apply the concept in the abstract, because we can't see the future ahead of time and understand how it was going to happen no matter what we do, and we care about that because we fundamentally believe we control what we do.
All that to say at root, I roll to disbelieve that you would govern yourself any differently if you believed strongly in hard railed Fate without an ability to see the future. I simply have never seen an argument made that details how or why one would do that.
I think you came close to giving some examples where a decisively different "belief system" (imperfect term here) would manifest quite profoundly in a society, IF it is a majority or effectively unanimously-held framework.
When I look at religious fundamentalist societies that exist today, their first principles very clearly impact the trajectory of their societies, especially in areas like human rights, the sanctity of life, and criminal justice, which you've touched on.
Even our own historical Calvinist-type faiths in western civs behaved differently from their contemporaries as a result. Were they hypocritically or unevenly applying the theory? Absolutely- but it did impact their operating principles.
These are absolutely rooted in elements of how those societies view determinism and related topics.
Ok...so I believe in Guidance toward a Destiny/Fate.
My weirdness as follows:
You get to pick your gameboard ahead of time, along with significant players/team Integrity.
You get the situations/players necessary to create the growth/ game plan desired.
You always have the Free Will option to fuck it all up, but lucky for you...that's also Soul Growth. It's just growth that's different and perhaps counter to the original game plan ( I learned what NOT to do)
You are not a drop in the Ocean/gameboard. You Are the Ocean ,and the Ocean is you.
OK, and where does "guidance" come from, and does that "guidance" describe the movement of everything in the universe, or just certain actors (like the concept of "observation" in physics)?
I believe in an Oversoul...or Godforce( for lack of a better word) that I believe is undeniable...yet I don't have enough hubris to think I can declare what it is ( it's a dude wearing a beard! It's a goddess filled with vines!... ) because I have a knowing that humans are so very...limited in our perspective.
The Divine ( as I often call it) is Love and Energy and within everything...
It guides according to the agreed upon game plan.
" This time, I'd like to work on diligence, compassion,and self love...who's game to work with me on that?" ..
Team Integrity...for better or...better eventually 😂
We're fucking stardust. That means we return to stardust. Stars are formed from a first position energy change agent. That means we are all connected by some weird binding ....yet entropic force imo
Reminding me of Buddhism and Optimistic Nihilism here. I like that.
I turned 41 this year and had one of the most funny experiences. First time of its type, I think. You'll see what I mean.
Ages ago a woman and I divorced. Long story short, we were stupid kids that didn't know any better and were absolutely horrible for each other. Like you are. Ended up being pretty messy, as she was a vindictive bitch.
Earlier this month I get a call from a number with my old area code. I check the voicemail, and it's some guy asking about her saying they're going through a divorce and that he's got some questions for me.
Knowing people are people I text him, fishing for more info. Guy lays it out: she cheated on him with a woman from work 10 years her senior (why those details matter are beyond me, but clearly he was shooting straight at this stage). He wanted to see if there were any "red flags" with our relationship. Probably looking for some help coping, poor guy.
In any case, we didn't talk further than that but DAMN did me and my friends get a laugh (one of whom was with me through a lot of that bullshit). Never expected that to circle around in such an interesting way. Perks of having a history, it seems.
So what?
I don't believe in any kind of higher power, per se, but the universe makes me wonder. Was definitely guided out of that shitshow - by what? I suppose there's plenty of answers.
Optimistic Nihilism is like... if space is huge and big and we probably don't matter, damn it's kinda awesome to be alive to see all this and do good things for each other.
Regarding my experience, happy to say it was. Perhaps the experience was determined, while my own free will came into play regarding what I would learn and apply from it.
Regarding fate/deteminism. Fate implies a destination or outcome, and prerequires time. (other comment). What doesn’t seem to be required is that the destination is knowable a priori by us. I think the implication is there is a higher power that knows, or oracles and seers that can “know”, but not us directly. This raises the question of verifiable in advance. If it is not knowable and observable and verifiable in advance, then what is it that allows there to be a distinction between free will and fate? A course of free-will choices will lead to an outcome, one that is “determined” by those choices, and hence fateful, especially when viewed retrospectively. However if we don’t know the destination then we can believe in free will.The crux of the difference appears to be a priori observance or knowledge, as the differentiator. As we don’t know, it must be that all outcomes are therefore due to free-will that leads to an outcome determined and fated by choices. So both. I pick “both or Steve Gutenberg.” Akin to “string or nothing”, two guesses at once.
This sort of reasoning has always raised an interesting question for me. As mankind's ability to understand and predict- to push the boundary of the "knowable" you reference- increases, does the universe become more or less deterministic?
Determined by whom? Is determinism even an absolute concept, or is it relative to a perceptive observer? Distance and position and time exist (coexisting alongside perceptive observers) without requiring the human markings imposed upon them for our measurement and quantification (which are artifices that enable us to understand them better).
Perhaps determinism of the universe, in the absolute sense, exists without human predictive constructs (models and theories) imposed upon it. What will be will be, regardless of how well perceptive observers anticipate it.
Determinism of the universe, in the sense relative to and grounded by an observer, must by definition increase with the observer’s ability to model, know, and predict what will come.
Keeping things Newtonian, constructs that we create to quantify and describe our observable universe and characteristics of the entities that populate it. Example - position. A tree exists at a place on Earth. We can assign latitude and longitude (there is time again, without which longitude does not exist). Lack of construct - that tree can still exist at that place even if we had not yet invented our quantitative construct for measuring position and/or assigned a quantitative value for its position.
For the record, i’m informed out of band that the movie is Starship Troopers.
Without time there can be no change, no movement, and no force. By definition.
There are the scientific views on time - the linear approximation that is so useful for Newtonian mechanics, and the relativistic definition that explains the nonlinear features of time in gravity fields.
Then there are the human perceptions of time that reflect back to us our moods and perspectives - my how time flies when having fun, the years seem to pass so quickly as we get older, and how the hours drag in proportion to our loneliness and boredom.
Shannon’s information theory, loosely speaking, defines information as what is new, what is changing. There is no information without time.
What are we without time? Can we even be? Time is the existential elixir of life. Time defines the boundaries of a life and propels a life’s experiences , perceived and observed over the course of its duration.
Ah but without perception and observation, time does not exist. Hence time and perception are two sides of the same coin, one requires the other. As humans endowed with perception, time leaps into existence coincident with our existence. When there are none left who perceive, time is snuffed out.
In the beginning was the word, the word is magic, magic is a factor of imagination, will and intention, the point of which is found beyond the ring-pass-not, faith as important as science?
I think of it as the chaos of nature is perfect order, while attempts to impose order on nature tends to make a great mess, as does eschewing "order" for "chaos" or "nature's" sake. So, true order is something like tuning oneself to the rhythms of nature, nature in this sense being the biosphere, but also the solar system and the galaxy? So then we are living in something like a living, divine universe, but that is a matter of speaking, imagination and faith more than science.
Yeah, I think chaos is more like fractals, whereas our perception of chaos is more informed by our attempts to control nature, which of course are destroying the biosphere. I'm not sure about a "unified" self-intelligent universe, but more or less that is how I imagine it.
Chaos. Those things /orders/ systems which have we do not yet see the order within. Fractals are a damn mess...until you back up and look at them from a further perspective.
Hm. Peculiar topic. It is after all an issue that's been around longer than writing, so most of it is us humanoids reinventing the wheel.
Which is fine in this instance, since the issue is unsolvable save for choosing a solution that feels right, or sticking with the answer one was raised to have as their ontological/epistemological boundaries.
For starters, the word "believe"* would be my angle of approach. Believe as in judged probable, faith, the likeliest explanation based on experience/perception and/or reason/logic, or that it just feels right?
Second, in academia this debate is disco, i.e. dead. Not because it's solved but because everyone with titles and tenure "debates" by rattling off names and ideas of other people - there's a point to that of course, like saying "The statement of NN in tome XX makes sense to me because...", but that's not what it sounds like most of time- insetad it is "NN proved that..." or "Statement XX is true because NN said so in...". Just listen to a Peterson interview/lecture. He's one of the better and he still talks about Freudian psychology as if it ever proved any claim it ever made, instead of remembering to separate claim from actual proof: "Freud argued that..." is perfectly fine, "Freud proved that..." is not. Or Kant or Nietzsche or Stirner or Hegel or Swedenborg or...
It's a bit like confusing the binoculars and what you see with them.
A person who believes scripture X is the truth, and that the deity/-ies have a set plan has an equally valid point as the one claiming that the movement of every wave and particle since creation, how or whenever that occurred is determined since they all cause eachother, as the one who thinks that chaos** actually exists.
To understand the question of the poll, I argue one must therefore be able to, and more important wlling to understand a different viewpoint /as/ that viewpoint and its proponents/opponents understands itself. Yes, opponents too.
To oppose or deny something is to acknowledge its existence, sometimes even to prove or validate that which is opposed. Just look at the term "anti-racist". To be anti-racist, one must first acknowledge the importance and validity of race as an explanation for differences, causes, effects et cetera, which is exactly what a normal racist (or racialist) would do too. (I hestiate to use real-life examples but that one feels like such a well-flogged horse it's bordering on beng trite.)
*Swedish has the same problem with the word "tro", which can mean anything from "Jag tror det kommer att regna/I believe it will rain" to "Jag tror på spöken/I believe in ghosts". I don't know, but I believe (Sic!) that non-germanic, or non-aryan/indo-european languages and hence thought-patterns which use different words for the various different meanings of [believe] would approach the issue in a different manner.
**Chaos, like darkness or cold, isn't something which exists. It is simply the absence of Order, or Order of a degree or magnitude yet to be comprehended.
The tutors and professors at Lund hammered that line home with great vigilance - firmly but fairly, even the most esoteric post-structuralist ones held on to that distinction.
I wonder why the app won't support these elements ( polls) . I gotta go to the website...I'll be damned ( probably anyhow lol) if I'm gunna have to have another poll explained to me...
What a pain in the ass that is. :) The poll is barely important to the discussion: simply, do you believe the universe is largely deterministic/fate, largely chaos/indeterminism, or some other model?
I cannot make the poll work from the web site. It always tells me that only subscribers can respond and asks me to put in my email. When I do it just hangs.
So I can ONLY take the poll from the email. This applies to all sites. Very irritating if you want to make a complaint, GM>. :)
Nope. I avoid using my phone for anything other than things that absolutely require it...like talking. But I find it an issue across PC-based Edge, Brave, Chrome and Firefox...
Addendum: the best way to debate issues such as the one of the poll is when doing physical labour, or out walking (cane and pipe optional).
Also, the ideal number for such a debate is three or multiples of three since there will then be one talking or two debating while the third person is listening and analysing.
As we’ve discussed, I believe most if not all human outcomes are mostly or entirely predetermined. But I’m not 100% certain about that, nobody can be. Since only a Supreme Being existing outside of time can know for sure, we have no choice but to behave as if everything came down to our personal decisions.
Therefore, I selected ‘get a job.’ Christians believe that subjection to toil - having to make a living - is the both the defining punishment for our Fall, and a necessary but very insufficient first step along the path back toward grace and salvation.
Best wishes to the entire Gutterclan for a happy, healthy, prosperous and blessed 2023!
I mostly believe in something like the notion of "probability waves"- there are (probably?) infinite outcomes to every interaction in the universe, with their likelihoods existing on a probability continuum, and when one happens, the wave collapses, but the outcomes aren't deterministic (i.e., can't be perfectly predicted from primary causes). I like the model of "near-infinite potential worlds when outcomes are viewed looking forward in linear time that contracts as you move along that line."
I also think that there are some things that ARE like fate- that are "more solid" in the continuum and would be nearly impossible if not possible to deliberately induce a different outcome- but this generally describes outliers.
But I've been reading a lot of more esoteric stuff since the holidays about rejecting linear time and trying to integrate this into how I think about things like determinism.
This kind of thing generally lives in the "sometimes interesting to think about but not of practical importance to anyone living in the real world," but I have a lot of extra cycles in my head and most Gutterballs are similarly well-endowed.
I'm especially interested in what folks with a strong faith practice think about these concepts as I think that- moving beyond the purely practical- they are big philosophical issues to contend with if being thoughtful about your relationship to the gods and the universe is important to you.
interesting coincidence that i was watching this yesterday, they talk about probability waves
https://youtu.be/K5Po5R-1rgY
I usually hate video link posting, but you consistently deliver good stuff.
its a long one but fascinating and brings quantum mechanics into something approaching understandable and might help explain my answer
This is worth watching fyi
Will watch this in a bit, Ray...thanks!
I am curious, how does rejecting linear time change one's behavior day to day, decision to decision? I have read folks recommending the notion, or at least that there is more to time than we can perceive, but never how to use that knowledge to save on your tax bill, or lose 5 lbs before the holidays. Always more along the lines of
1: Reject Linear time
2: ??
3: Profit
For right now, my answer is "I don't know." I'm mainly interested in the subject because I've noticed (when reading people that do focus on this a lot) that I/most people have a strong cultural bias towards linearity but that this isnt, despite our bias, necessarily a human default. That's why it's interesting to me- I want to interrogate why I have that and if there's value there.
So it MAY change one's day to day behavior, or it may not. I'll let you know. But it also impacts one's spirituality, as I&K pointed out.
If all you want is conversations about tax writedowns and weight loss, so to speak, you are definitely in the wrong place. It's not like any of us are going to shift foreign policy on Ukraine, either, but we still waste a lot of bytes talking about it. :)
Have you seen this before? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RKK7wGAYP6k
Fascinating stuff about language and the brain. She uses one tribe as an example of how people think about time differently.
Oh yeah, I've studied a lot of Boroditsky. Before I decided to be a clinician, I originally wanted to do cognitive linguistics.
That's fantastic! Shit blows my mind.
At the time (now 20 years ago) it was because I was excited about what was then-nascent AI studies (which look veeeeeeery different today) and was interested in how intelligence arises as a function of language.
The notion of what "training learning systems" looked like was very different then. We started with Star Trek and ended up with... new Star Trek.
Well, the reason I asked about taxes and weight loss was less about those two things and more about the general class of "how do I apply this and test that it works" activities. I was hoping you had perhaps come across someone who argues for accepting non-linear time and then how and why it changes things for you. I am just always leery of arguments that don't have an answer to "so what?" and it feels like something so big as nonlinear time should have one.
The short answer is, yes, there are people that argue for it. but thus far, I have not yet found a sufficiently complete understanding of WHY. (Or even really HOW.)
Yea, CS Lewis argues that at the god/spiritual/whatever level time is all at once, but doesn't really do anything with it other than "so chill and deal with your life in time and believe in God." Which, ok fine, but it still boils down to doing more or less what you were doing before, believing that such things are out there.
CS Lewis is Christian, and a particular sort of Christian, which makes that position fairly expected. It isn't mine.
I agree that an understanding with zero impact isn't of any value. Where I think we depart is that I think it's a mistake to presume that because an impact can't be predicted that it doesn't exist. I suspect there are important understandings about the nature of the universe/consciousness that MAY profoundly impact us- how, I'm mature enough to say "I don't know yet," but that's the challenge of communicating the value of anything theoretical. We might need this later, we might not.
My experience tells me that quite a lot of civilizational advancement happens when we have a food surplus and spend time exploring. But, of course, you can also end up with an evolutionary dead-end like postmodernism and maybe not get back onto the side street before it destroys you.
I like how you use "So what?", it is a seldom seen question in any ontological or philosophical (or indeed political) debate, much to all our detriment.
Possibly because all the high-faluting language and verbosity shrouds whatis in essence very basic thoughts in an air of almost supernatural guise and poise.
One of our tutors in pol sci used to direct his Argus' glare at us squeeking students and thunder: "Relevance!?" in a deep rumbling baritone, when one of us thought we had come uo with who killed Cock Robin, so to speak.
The moral being that the odds of anyone coming up with an actual new thought are rather remote. New to the person which certainly has merit, new to the field is almost unherd of, and has been for more than a century.
Agree about "So what?" Should be the initial response to almost everything!
Followed by "Then what?" in the tradition of Aristoteles.
Thanks! I should credit my advisor Dan Klein with the formulation, although his wife is Lotta Stern of Sweden, so maybe the appeal suggests its source? :D I can't help think that "So what?" matches Klein's New York adjacent demeanor so perfectly that it has to come from him, however.
I suppose if I am being honest that the implications of a theory, moral, physical, or otherwise, are always more interesting to me than the theory itself, and so I am bit suspicious when someone claims to have come up with something that seems big but hasn't a good answer for so what. At very least, I begin to wonder if the person doesn't have a long commute, waits in line, or even poops. Not pooping is a big red flag for someone being a source of wisdom, in my experience!
Hahahaha! I've annoyed friends who are into this or that theory of economics with asking "How does that affect the growing of potatoes?", my way of asking "So what?" perhaps.
Philosophy, morals, ethics, creeds and -isms and faiths are fine, but a potatoe is a potatoe all the time. When it's not a potato of course.
Would that be the sociology professor Charlotta Stern of Stockholm University and swedish representative to Academics Roghts Watch by any chance? She is certainly a welcome voice in the desert when it comes to the social sciences and humanities, both in the US and here.
There's an element of magic to all debates such as the one of the poll too. By defining and naming, we bring it into being. But once having been brought into existence it gains momentum of its own and come under other influences than the ones of its originator.
Ad we never know beforehand if we are being the Sourceror's apprentice or dr Frankenstein or rabbi Loew or Melkor, and if our creation is Excalibur's sheath or the ring of Gygas.
Just look at where postmodernism started, what it caused and where it is today.
As time doesn't exist at all, other as a convenience for us humans, the question is only relevant within the frame of said convenience:
"How long does it take to boil an egg?"
Normal person: "Hardboiled or softboiled?"
Philosopher: "What kind of egg? Boiled in what?" and "Until it's done".
Using that fallacious and facetious exchange, the point of being that time is relative to our needs and wants, and nothing else. Outside the human conscious, time does not exist, only changing states.
Engineer: At what altitude? Starting at what temperature? What constitutes "done"?
Yes! Exactly!
Economist: "What's in it for me? Whose egg is it?"
Law scholar: "I own the IP-rights to both 'eggs' and 'boil' so you owe me 1/8 egg plus interest for eachone you boil."
Chicken farmer: "This here is my shotgun, one barrel rocksalt, one barrel buckshot. Get away from my hen-house you perverts!"
Well, accepting for a moment that time does not exist outside of our perception of it, how does that change us? Is there a use for that information, or even a way to test that it is correct?
I think being able to definitively demonstrate that could have plenty of serious implications! As for testing it, there are definitely adjacent concepts being explored in physics at this very moment.
Forgive me, but this seems like a very anti-curious position. Do we have to know the specific application before something becomes worth trying to understand? Some of the most useful applications came afterwards.
I would say I am very curious, just about what is downstream.
Or maybe a better metaphor would be coming to a dam across a small, dry gully in the woods.
The dam itself is interesting: what's it made of? Who made it? When? Was it just to make a pond, or does it generate power?
It also interesting to ask: why is there a dam with no stream? What happened to the stream? If there is no stream, am I wrong about it being a dam? It is just a wall? Why would there be a wall there? Does it maybe hold back rain water flow down the gully? Is there a spring up the gully a bit that got blocked off at some point after the dam was built?
Now imagine you ran into someone and got to talking and they told you about a dam they found in the woods in a dry gully. They talk about the dam itself, what color it is, how big, and begin to speculate on how it generates power. If you were to ask them "Why do you suppose it is in a dry gully?" and their answer is "Who knows? Isn't it interesting that it is made of concrete, though?" and when you follow up with "Why? what does being made of concrete tell you?" they reply "Oh, nothing, but concrete is interesting. Why aren't you curious about the concrete?" well... that would be a little odd, right? I mean, being made of concrete helps nail down when it was made, and by whom, so that's something. Yet, almost all the questions about the dam are interesting in context of its environs, and in fact can largely only be answered through that context. Once you accept the existence of the dam it is all the interconnected context that one needs to know about to understand it.
What's more, if all of that context had zero bearing on whether you should think that was a dam or a wall, or whether it was even there in the woods at all... well, that would be really strange, right? That should make you wonder if maybe there wasn't some fundamental problem with how you understand the idea, or each other.
I think we'd need to get mr Rigger in here to help with (dis)proving that, at least from a physicists point of view.
As for changing us, to me it offers a relief of stress and a longer, more open-ended perspective since it liberates me from slaving away under the Grottekvarn* that is clock-time.
By ignoring time I don't mean a lackadaisical or fatalist view either, just mastery of myself, something which I can tie** to Descartes' presupposing the existence of the thinker in the first place in his well-known quote (and much lesser known argument leading up to it) - if no thinker exists to question his existence by thinking the question.... Same thing, only with time instead of thought.
*Grottasöngr, (Song of Grotte), an old poem. It is sometimes included in the Poetic Edda, though exactly where it belongs is contested.
**As mentioned elsewhere, this type of debate invariably leads to "proof by name-dropping", but I'll argue that I mention "Sweden's contributon to french philosophy"*** to give credit, not credibility.
***He died in Stockholm having contracted pneumonia, in no small part due to Queen Kristina's habit of wanting to have un petit discourse at 0500 in January.
Are you saying Sweden's contribution to French philosophy was killing Descartes? If so, I would be more impressed if you all had managed to off Rousseau :D
More to your point, does it make a difference to say "time doesn't exist outside of my perception of it" and "time does not matter so much, whether it exists or not" to relief of stress? To kind of think of it a slightly different way, time as space, does it really make a difference to think "Jupiter is very far away" vs "Jupiter doesn't exist?" I would say yes, but for most people only in corner cases. It is still worth understanding the difference, because those corner cases exist, and might be useful in some distant way. The point would be though that the better understanding has relevant corner cases to test the differences. I someone was really worried about Jupiter crashing into their house, either understanding might do the trick, but I think one is preferable.
Sorry if that doesn't make a lot of sense. I am dealing with some last moment (week) house closing problems, and the sprogs are home with their random drama. Can't concentrate well for being angry and tired.
I think the difference would be largely artificial, meaning purely emotional, as Jupiter exists no matter my existence.
Don't get me started on Rousseau, you'll here me screaming across the ocean :))
Got to go battle the brusselsprouts, it's supper.
Not all thoughts have to impact the mundane. If they did we'd never developed aesthetics due to preferences, imho
Ohhh, now you make me wish for a poll on aesthetics vs function, and the form/function-causality spiral!
Perhaps if we petition the gutter...?
It has been noted.
See, I disagree with that. Aesthetics does impact the mundane, quite a bit, and the mundane impacts aesthetics. Often in quite predictable ways.
I do agree with the notion that not all thoughts have to impact the mundane, certainly, but if something is important, or just real, there probably ought to be implications for how you can or should adjust behavior to account for it, or at least to test it out a bit. I'd be a little worried if someone were to say come up with an elaborate proof that Satan actually created existence and God was an angel rebelling against him, yet the end result was "but don't worry about doing anything differently than before you believed this was true." Whether I should be worried about the new belief or my old beliefs is an open question, but a huge change in perception should imply some changes in behaviors.
Does,isn't must. Should bs shall
Journey, not the destination.
Also...profit?
If you don't like profit you can replace it with "be better off than you were before."
I like it...this will be an awesome discussion. I totally get what you said...sou h more elegantly than I! Woooot!
I gotta be honest, there are a few people (including you) that I'm especially excited to hear from... among them being Doc Holliday because he's a firm but thoughtful believer and Rikard who has a similar ideo background to me but a lot more wisdom and experience.
I'm not going to make myself look good...or even cognizant here. Typing sucks. Also..the damn freezing weather sucks ( im outside with Cammie pup...at 14 she gets me with her most of the time...)
But yes,I'm very excited to explore what others here experience- my joke about endowment aside- because despite the gutterness...you have amazing substackers in general and specific.
I've witnessed few freeloaders, myself excluded ( l can be laaaaame...)
The universe and all within it are/is fractal in nature I believe. Dimensiality and time...its all there.
Also..".As Above,So Below..." esoteric teaching...or statement of facts? Why not both 😊
Whatever the answer, I’m reading your posts in Sarah Connor’s voice.
Fun fact: I had a boyfriend that was very into paintball, which meant I got very into paintball. (I'm like that. I don't subsume my identity but I'm religious about 'shared interests').
I used to have long hair. Long story short, you show up with a ponytail ONCE to paintball and everyone calls you Sarah Connor for the rest of eternity.
I’m jealous! There are worst things to be called.
I’m going bald naturally in a world where not enough people know Patrick Stewart.
Oh well.
I love Patrick Stewart. Jean-Luc Picard. His beautiful accent makes everything seem, so much more important.
i often find my self sounding like him :)
<3
Call me. You talk, I'll listen. I just love that voice. 😋😊
im more of a listener, but if i have something to say i'll be sure to use the voice.
now i know you just read that but hearing jean-luc in your head
You have to admit he did a fine job portraying Gurney Halleck in 'Dune', ribbed and ridged rubber suit and all.
I've never been able to sit through all of "Dune." I get bored. 😞
Try the new movie. I don't want to call it "dumbed-down," but it moves a lot better. Fathermouth, who loved the original fully-nerdy one, also loved it, FWIW.
It is special, granted.
I've loved "popcorn"-flicks, the not-so-serious movies of any genre since I was a teenager. The wife positively loves turkeys like 'Plan9 from Outer Space' and such too.
The scene where the Hero mounts the big worm causes her to giggle like a tweeny-bopper at some highly-marketable "artists" meet the fans-event.
I liked the miniseries, the one with William Hurt. He is awful in it, but I thought the rest of the cast were good. I haven't seen it lately, to see if it stood up to the test of time.
Everything that could possibly be true is true at the same time, depending on where you are in the universe. So, all of the above.
I suspect the universe is ultimately deterministic, but it’s side eyeing us highly evolved monkeys pretty hard.
This is where I get interested when physicists talk about the whole "observing the event alters it." I understand the completely frank, non-woo framework that statement is coming from, but it makes me wonder, "what makes something an observer? How is observer status gained/lost? Is this just anthrocentric?"
Toss in Sagan’s, “We are a way for the cosmos to know itself” and things get real fucky for me.
This is about as close as I can come to something approaching spirituality.
For me, there's a middle bit. I think there are dimensions of consciousness and differently-material existence that we currently cannot clearly perceive or test. (This may or may not include perception of time.) What we would call "gods" are simply bigger/more complex/'powerful' intelligence patterns capable of interacting with lower dimensions in ways we are not. This does not necessarily map onto the specific faiths that humans devise, but my strong suspicion is that many spiritual conceptions are highly diluted or faint grasps at real and coherent things in such a space, i.e., I do not think "Odin" is literally a hooded dude who wanders around with ravens but is a way of understanding a higher-order thing whose behavior was understandable to Iron-age humans in this way.
I think I agree. Shades of, “through a looking glass, darkly” here.
The universe is very big, very old, and we’re but a speck of dust floating along.
Thankfully, we’ve written shit down so those that come after can try and make sense of it. Better than nothing, I think.
Odin isn’t real, but a whisper of something that probably is.
>> Odin isn’t real, but a whisper of something that probably is.
This is more or less what I'm saying, I'm just choosing to believe there is a slightly higher level of fidelity to the whisper than you.
Nice to see we're on the same page, though perhaps different sentences.
I think that's probably true of the core community here, which is why the discussions are generally so good.
A truly heterodox free-for-all devolves before too long and doesn't hold much appeal for me. It's easy enough to find a hundred different voices eventually battling for supremacy. A perhaps less-disparate community striving for intellectual and/or philosophical rigor holding each other to account is more satisfying.
It is observed by interaction? As existing in confluence to the "observed " ...is that observation? Is observing knes thoughts about the " observed " even separated by time/space Observation?
* ones thoughts
WINNER!
😂
theres rules but theres no fate, you can affect everything if you put in the work
I like this answer. My inner physicist is happy with it.
I believe in Ray!
and yet you never signed up to my page :p
I am a simple man. I see a pun in the title, I subscribe.
Well Ray. This is the first I've heard you have a page. But now I see you do...and now I will friend!
totally voluntary, its not for everyone!
This sort of question always strikes me as odd, in that, to me, it is almost perfectly useless to know the answer. It seems to me that neither extreme option can change our behavior, because our behavior is driven by decisions made moment to moment. Whether or not we have free will or are running on rails via Fate, we perceive and act as though we have free will.
The question of gods and a greater realm where time is non-linear and everything is as at once is sort of besides the point: whether that exists in some form or not we don't access it, and our creator made it that way on purpose.
One could probably build a cosmology where it mattered more, but the human default always seems to be to make decisions to act for good or ill, with very limited knowledge of causes and outcomes. I suspect there's a good reason that's the standard across all humans, despite periodically there being philosophies or religions popping up suggesting that decisions don't matter.
I mean, as I said before, it doesn't "matter" in certain senses, and yet it's absolutely something that (many if not you) humans spend a lot of time thinking about.
Arriving at different conclusions would absolutely shape the way I govern myself, and probably the way larger systems (societies, etc.) govern themselves. Certainly the status quo that you've summarized here has defined the way our existing systems are governed.
You're right that it isn't necessary or functional to engage this variable to function as a human in daily life. But thank goodness that alone doesn't dictate what we may be interested in or discuss.
I don't know that different conclusions would make us behave differently, in part because many people claim to have come to different conclusions. For example, if one believes in a very deterministic world where people don't really have control over their behavior in a meaningful way, one might support more social welfare systems, because, hey, it isn't their fault they were born into a bad family in a bad neighborhood, yadda yadda. Lots of people take that as true, for example, basically all sociologists. Only, they don't carry that to the conclusion "and therefore, people who are born into circumstances recognized as being highly probably to cause bad life outcomes and criminal behavior should be euthanized." They don't even get as far as "euthanized after their first/second/third criminal offense". I suspect that is because humans can't quite believe in a very deterministic world because all of our experiences point the other way; we can only apply the concept in the abstract, because we can't see the future ahead of time and understand how it was going to happen no matter what we do, and we care about that because we fundamentally believe we control what we do.
All that to say at root, I roll to disbelieve that you would govern yourself any differently if you believed strongly in hard railed Fate without an ability to see the future. I simply have never seen an argument made that details how or why one would do that.
I think you came close to giving some examples where a decisively different "belief system" (imperfect term here) would manifest quite profoundly in a society, IF it is a majority or effectively unanimously-held framework.
When I look at religious fundamentalist societies that exist today, their first principles very clearly impact the trajectory of their societies, especially in areas like human rights, the sanctity of life, and criminal justice, which you've touched on.
Even our own historical Calvinist-type faiths in western civs behaved differently from their contemporaries as a result. Were they hypocritically or unevenly applying the theory? Absolutely- but it did impact their operating principles.
These are absolutely rooted in elements of how those societies view determinism and related topics.
Ok...so I believe in Guidance toward a Destiny/Fate.
My weirdness as follows:
You get to pick your gameboard ahead of time, along with significant players/team Integrity.
You get the situations/players necessary to create the growth/ game plan desired.
You always have the Free Will option to fuck it all up, but lucky for you...that's also Soul Growth. It's just growth that's different and perhaps counter to the original game plan ( I learned what NOT to do)
You are not a drop in the Ocean/gameboard. You Are the Ocean ,and the Ocean is you.
OK, and where does "guidance" come from, and does that "guidance" describe the movement of everything in the universe, or just certain actors (like the concept of "observation" in physics)?
I believe in an Oversoul...or Godforce( for lack of a better word) that I believe is undeniable...yet I don't have enough hubris to think I can declare what it is ( it's a dude wearing a beard! It's a goddess filled with vines!... ) because I have a knowing that humans are so very...limited in our perspective.
The Divine ( as I often call it) is Love and Energy and within everything...
It guides according to the agreed upon game plan.
" This time, I'd like to work on diligence, compassion,and self love...who's game to work with me on that?" ..
Team Integrity...for better or...better eventually 😂
Where and how do these deliberate plans come about?
Where- intradimensionally...or where we're One . Agreements among peers/ same selves/ different expressions of the same selves...
So a collective unconscious/awake universe?
Yes. Ever notice that galactic plasma pathways look exactly like neurons ? ( fractals...again...)
We're fucking stardust. That means we return to stardust. Stars are formed from a first position energy change agent. That means we are all connected by some weird binding ....yet entropic force imo
Re: pain in the ass...I know . 😂
Where... I cantvtell you right now...my Mistress is demanding she goes outside.
Reminding me of Buddhism and Optimistic Nihilism here. I like that.
I turned 41 this year and had one of the most funny experiences. First time of its type, I think. You'll see what I mean.
Ages ago a woman and I divorced. Long story short, we were stupid kids that didn't know any better and were absolutely horrible for each other. Like you are. Ended up being pretty messy, as she was a vindictive bitch.
Earlier this month I get a call from a number with my old area code. I check the voicemail, and it's some guy asking about her saying they're going through a divorce and that he's got some questions for me.
Knowing people are people I text him, fishing for more info. Guy lays it out: she cheated on him with a woman from work 10 years her senior (why those details matter are beyond me, but clearly he was shooting straight at this stage). He wanted to see if there were any "red flags" with our relationship. Probably looking for some help coping, poor guy.
In any case, we didn't talk further than that but DAMN did me and my friends get a laugh (one of whom was with me through a lot of that bullshit). Never expected that to circle around in such an interesting way. Perks of having a history, it seems.
So what?
I don't believe in any kind of higher power, per se, but the universe makes me wonder. Was definitely guided out of that shitshow - by what? I suppose there's plenty of answers.
Guided into for the experience, out of for the healing and integration? Hard to say.
Thanks for helping that other guy with his closure.
I've never heard of Optimistic Nihilism...but I'm def not a nihilist.
That was, I hope, a one of a kind experience!
Optimistic Nihilism is like... if space is huge and big and we probably don't matter, damn it's kinda awesome to be alive to see all this and do good things for each other.
Regarding my experience, happy to say it was. Perhaps the experience was determined, while my own free will came into play regarding what I would learn and apply from it.
Hmm. Good thought food.
Nutritional thought food!
Thanks for the explanation!
Regarding fate/deteminism. Fate implies a destination or outcome, and prerequires time. (other comment). What doesn’t seem to be required is that the destination is knowable a priori by us. I think the implication is there is a higher power that knows, or oracles and seers that can “know”, but not us directly. This raises the question of verifiable in advance. If it is not knowable and observable and verifiable in advance, then what is it that allows there to be a distinction between free will and fate? A course of free-will choices will lead to an outcome, one that is “determined” by those choices, and hence fateful, especially when viewed retrospectively. However if we don’t know the destination then we can believe in free will.The crux of the difference appears to be a priori observance or knowledge, as the differentiator. As we don’t know, it must be that all outcomes are therefore due to free-will that leads to an outcome determined and fated by choices. So both. I pick “both or Steve Gutenberg.” Akin to “string or nothing”, two guesses at once.
This sort of reasoning has always raised an interesting question for me. As mankind's ability to understand and predict- to push the boundary of the "knowable" you reference- increases, does the universe become more or less deterministic?
Determined by whom? Is determinism even an absolute concept, or is it relative to a perceptive observer? Distance and position and time exist (coexisting alongside perceptive observers) without requiring the human markings imposed upon them for our measurement and quantification (which are artifices that enable us to understand them better).
Perhaps determinism of the universe, in the absolute sense, exists without human predictive constructs (models and theories) imposed upon it. What will be will be, regardless of how well perceptive observers anticipate it.
Determinism of the universe, in the sense relative to and grounded by an observer, must by definition increase with the observer’s ability to model, know, and predict what will come.
I would like to know more about a lack of constructs ...
Oh great...now I'm thinking of that Bug movie ...and I can't even recall the title.
" Would you like to know more?"
Men in Black?
Starship Troopers. Apparently if I just wait awhile, the notifications will catch up and bring me to a comment.
Keeping things Newtonian, constructs that we create to quantify and describe our observable universe and characteristics of the entities that populate it. Example - position. A tree exists at a place on Earth. We can assign latitude and longitude (there is time again, without which longitude does not exist). Lack of construct - that tree can still exist at that place even if we had not yet invented our quantitative construct for measuring position and/or assigned a quantitative value for its position.
For the record, i’m informed out of band that the movie is Starship Troopers.
In the simulation, you both do and don't do everything, so 'fate' doesn't really exist.
I choose to watch the one where I just pantsed you.
A popular choice! 😉
I can't always spend all my time on Cronenberg Earth.
Picking up on some other time-ly comments...
Without time there can be no change, no movement, and no force. By definition.
There are the scientific views on time - the linear approximation that is so useful for Newtonian mechanics, and the relativistic definition that explains the nonlinear features of time in gravity fields.
Then there are the human perceptions of time that reflect back to us our moods and perspectives - my how time flies when having fun, the years seem to pass so quickly as we get older, and how the hours drag in proportion to our loneliness and boredom.
Shannon’s information theory, loosely speaking, defines information as what is new, what is changing. There is no information without time.
What are we without time? Can we even be? Time is the existential elixir of life. Time defines the boundaries of a life and propels a life’s experiences , perceived and observed over the course of its duration.
Ah but without perception and observation, time does not exist. Hence time and perception are two sides of the same coin, one requires the other. As humans endowed with perception, time leaps into existence coincident with our existence. When there are none left who perceive, time is snuffed out.
I&K How do you mean? Elaborate some more please.
Very nice. .but...what if time is a contained subunit/observation/,mobius strip within the group reference?
In the beginning was the word, the word is magic, magic is a factor of imagination, will and intention, the point of which is found beyond the ring-pass-not, faith as important as science?
But does that synthesis describe the universe as orderly or disorderly, or something else altogether?
I think of it as the chaos of nature is perfect order, while attempts to impose order on nature tends to make a great mess, as does eschewing "order" for "chaos" or "nature's" sake. So, true order is something like tuning oneself to the rhythms of nature, nature in this sense being the biosphere, but also the solar system and the galaxy? So then we are living in something like a living, divine universe, but that is a matter of speaking, imagination and faith more than science.
So, "chaos" is simply improperly-perceived order, in the end, which gives rise to a unified self-intelligent universe?
Yeah, I think chaos is more like fractals, whereas our perception of chaos is more informed by our attempts to control nature, which of course are destroying the biosphere. I'm not sure about a "unified" self-intelligent universe, but more or less that is how I imagine it.
Chaos. Those things /orders/ systems which have we do not yet see the order within. Fractals are a damn mess...until you back up and look at them from a further perspective.
I enjoyed this thread.
Hm. Peculiar topic. It is after all an issue that's been around longer than writing, so most of it is us humanoids reinventing the wheel.
Which is fine in this instance, since the issue is unsolvable save for choosing a solution that feels right, or sticking with the answer one was raised to have as their ontological/epistemological boundaries.
For starters, the word "believe"* would be my angle of approach. Believe as in judged probable, faith, the likeliest explanation based on experience/perception and/or reason/logic, or that it just feels right?
Second, in academia this debate is disco, i.e. dead. Not because it's solved but because everyone with titles and tenure "debates" by rattling off names and ideas of other people - there's a point to that of course, like saying "The statement of NN in tome XX makes sense to me because...", but that's not what it sounds like most of time- insetad it is "NN proved that..." or "Statement XX is true because NN said so in...". Just listen to a Peterson interview/lecture. He's one of the better and he still talks about Freudian psychology as if it ever proved any claim it ever made, instead of remembering to separate claim from actual proof: "Freud argued that..." is perfectly fine, "Freud proved that..." is not. Or Kant or Nietzsche or Stirner or Hegel or Swedenborg or...
It's a bit like confusing the binoculars and what you see with them.
A person who believes scripture X is the truth, and that the deity/-ies have a set plan has an equally valid point as the one claiming that the movement of every wave and particle since creation, how or whenever that occurred is determined since they all cause eachother, as the one who thinks that chaos** actually exists.
To understand the question of the poll, I argue one must therefore be able to, and more important wlling to understand a different viewpoint /as/ that viewpoint and its proponents/opponents understands itself. Yes, opponents too.
To oppose or deny something is to acknowledge its existence, sometimes even to prove or validate that which is opposed. Just look at the term "anti-racist". To be anti-racist, one must first acknowledge the importance and validity of race as an explanation for differences, causes, effects et cetera, which is exactly what a normal racist (or racialist) would do too. (I hestiate to use real-life examples but that one feels like such a well-flogged horse it's bordering on beng trite.)
*Swedish has the same problem with the word "tro", which can mean anything from "Jag tror det kommer att regna/I believe it will rain" to "Jag tror på spöken/I believe in ghosts". I don't know, but I believe (Sic!) that non-germanic, or non-aryan/indo-european languages and hence thought-patterns which use different words for the various different meanings of [believe] would approach the issue in a different manner.
**Chaos, like darkness or cold, isn't something which exists. It is simply the absence of Order, or Order of a degree or magnitude yet to be comprehended.
Next time, just profess your love of Steve Gutenburg.
Only teasing. Great post. I often miss the line between "argued" and "proved".
Thank you.
The tutors and professors at Lund hammered that line home with great vigilance - firmly but fairly, even the most esoteric post-structuralist ones held on to that distinction.
I regret that I have but one like to apply to this comment.
Thank you.
It is in equal amounts reassuring and horrifying to receive praise, I've always felt.
The Devil whispering behind the bush, no doubt.
I try to keep my bush well trimmed, to avoid just such a hiding spot.
I wonder why the app won't support these elements ( polls) . I gotta go to the website...I'll be damned ( probably anyhow lol) if I'm gunna have to have another poll explained to me...
What a pain in the ass that is. :) The poll is barely important to the discussion: simply, do you believe the universe is largely deterministic/fate, largely chaos/indeterminism, or some other model?
I cannot make the poll work from the web site. It always tells me that only subscribers can respond and asks me to put in my email. When I do it just hangs.
So I can ONLY take the poll from the email. This applies to all sites. Very irritating if you want to make a complaint, GM>. :)
There are a small but persistent group of people that appear to have this problem. I may have a separate discussion to try and figure this out.
My theory right now is that it seems to be a browser thing. Are you on a mobile when you have these problems?
Nope. I avoid using my phone for anything other than things that absolutely require it...like talking. But I find it an issue across PC-based Edge, Brave, Chrome and Firefox...
Easy there. Woman!... I went and did my diligence lolol...
The app allows me to not clog my email with separate notifications...but thankfully I've overcome this " wtf ,how do.." of finding the poll 🤣
I meant what a pain in the ass for you. :P
Addendum: the best way to debate issues such as the one of the poll is when doing physical labour, or out walking (cane and pipe optional).
Also, the ideal number for such a debate is three or multiples of three since there will then be one talking or two debating while the third person is listening and analysing.
I hate you! Now you have me pondering metaphysics.
If an "earworm" is a tune you can't get out of your mind, this is a "gutterworm"!
And if you hum "Sitting in the gutter eating worms..." you get both at the same time! Bonus!
Low energy pathway is not to participate in the poll!
So I didn't.
And go take a shit...it'll wipe poop right away from your thought cage!...:)
As it relates to your thread on fate/determinism and time, yes.
As we’ve discussed, I believe most if not all human outcomes are mostly or entirely predetermined. But I’m not 100% certain about that, nobody can be. Since only a Supreme Being existing outside of time can know for sure, we have no choice but to behave as if everything came down to our personal decisions.
Therefore, I selected ‘get a job.’ Christians believe that subjection to toil - having to make a living - is the both the defining punishment for our Fall, and a necessary but very insufficient first step along the path back toward grace and salvation.
Best wishes to the entire Gutterclan for a happy, healthy, prosperous and blessed 2023!