h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

az:

I'm delighted that you are now more relaxed with my Fred-knocking tendencies.



They are different things, az. I can recognise a persons face without being able to say how I do it or to tell you how to do it. On the other hand, for me even that is the beginning of an investigation into how we do it. If, however, you say that there's no way in principle that we could describe or explain Fred, I shall get stroppy again and start muttering: "Mumbo jumbo".

toxx

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You seem to be thinking here of wyrd as some sort of ´luminiferous ether´ that "carries" cause and effect, which isn´t how I read it (though I´ll admit that I´m not familiar enough with the pagan tradition to say which of us might be correct). And I arrived at something similar (if less poetic) by the exercise of science and philosophy.

Why is it necessary to separate mind and matter or creator and created when they are part of the same ´game´ (to recall an earlier conversation)? But if you can get back to "an abstract conserved quantity" as prime necessity how much further can you go?

The Ontological Argument is about "conceptions". Without conceptions the argument does not exist. And this implies the existence of "beings with conceptions" as the real starting point or ground of the argument.

Noggin

"You seem to be thinking here of wyrd as some sort of ´luminiferous ether´ that "carries" cause and effect, which isn´t how I read it (though I´ll admit that I´m not familiar enough with the pagan tradition to say which of us might be correct). And I arrived at something similar (if less poetic) by the exercise of science and philosophy. "

Hmm...interesting. Wyrd appears to be a means by which the phenomological and numinous worlds connect and through which the causes and effects of both work. It seems to be able, to some degree (I don't know to what degree) to be able to be controlled by Norns, but I don't see that that presupposes it has substance: it could equally well presuppose that Norns can see what effects are generated by what causes and manage to 'jog' an elbow here or there to influence actions to manipulate events.

The usual metaphor is of a web, but it would be a mistake to confuse metaphors with reality.

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Yeah well, save it toxx, cos I'm not really.

<>

In principle I don't think it can be explained or described, other than by individual experience. But how does my experience of Fred make me a spouter of mumbo-jumbo? Surely it is much less bizarre than believing in a 'heavenly father' who has created all of us and who is watching over every move we make.

In any case, the Fred concept isn't a belief and has nothing to do with god(s) per se. I have certainly never tried to 'convert' anyone to 'Fredism' nor even said that this concept exists outside my own perception of it.

Have you ever felt god, toxx?


az

marking

This is an interesting point in itself, Noggin. I've discussed the Ontological Argument as though it were about ontology; whereas you approach it via epistemology. Surely, the most perfect being in question exists or not regardless of whether there is anyone to conceive of the said being. Compare my chewing gum example.

It seems to me that the epistemological route can easily fall into psychologism. I know Kant and W'stein wouldn't accept my approach any more than I would finally accept theirs. For me, there are true propositions and valid arguments regardless of whether anyone entertains them. OK, we use our minds and language to discuss them but if we are, in fact, discussing *only* language and our minds, we shall not do as much useful work as if we discuss what is or might be the case.



Isn't this 'game' a 'language game'? I think W is back to discussing how we think and speak rather than what there is. Perhaps I could ask you a direct question, in order to aid my understanding: "Is there an abstract conserved quantity", or is that expression perhaps a description of something else that there is?

toxx

OK, az, I'll use a politer term instead of 'mumbo-jumbo'. If we have here something that can't be explained or described, to me it is so much 'arm waving'.

You ask "Have you ever felt god, toxx?". I'm sure I've felt things I couldn't describe or explain. But I don't base my thinking on them. I spell out the details of a belief in a creator being who is omniscient. That is a fair move, because you can criticise it and argue against it knowing what it is. These elusive, nebulous concepts amount to 'taking your ball away'. We can't play the game any more!

toxx

Would you say that the phenomenological world and the numinous world exert cause and effect on each other, or is one of them an epiphenomenon? If they do interact, then Noggin will, I suspect, have to say that they are part of the same abstract conserved quantity and therefore not different. I'm not sure whether that would be a problem for him.



I like it, a twitch somewhere can be felt everywhere else, to some extent. It's the hurricane and the butterfly again. OK, 'the ether' turned out to be nothing but a metaphor too.

toxx

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Indeed I would say that. And it´s not a problem for me.

Ontology is not a feature of the universe; it´s a feature of minds. The "thing-in-itself" is not a "thing-in-itself-for-itself", but a "thing-in-itself-for-us".

This does indeed seem to leave us at the mercy of some form of psychologism, but I would argue that psychologism is itself a form of language game that embraces, at least in part, some form of solipsism. If solipsism is rejected then we are left with language games whose structure includes an external world and therefore "what is or might be the case."

<>

Definitely *not* the latter. The former (like "thing-in-itself") seems to be a logically necessary term in any language game that embraces "consistency" as an epistemological necessity.

Noggin

Do you also think that the noumenal and phenomenal interact - or do you say that 'noumenal' is non-existent - a category mistake, perhaps?

The 'thing-in-itself-for-us' analysis suggests the latter. I guess this makes you an idealist, which commits you to an epistemological approach. Here I do become concerned about the implication that all knowledge is self-knowledge, in the final analysis.

I might just be prepared to meet you half way as a 'tree in the quad' phenomenalist. The tree is a permanent possibility of being a thing-in-itself (I think not just a possibility of a set of perceptions) for some (possibly non-existent) observer; but even this I find uncomfortable. Is it the same thing-in-itself for a blind and a sighted person, for example?



I'm not at all sure that you *are* finally rejecting solipsism here! Your 'external world' seem to be little more than a subset of the rules of a language game. "What is, or might be, the case" would have a sense but no reference, except when used to refer to your own 'mental furniture'!

toxx

Ah, I think your 'consistency' is my 'reality'. For me, consistency arises out of the fact that the world (the 'abstract conserved quantity'?) just doesn't support actual contradictions any more than it supports actual infinities. You make this a feature of the rules of discourse (the language game), while I make it a feature of what there is (not just 'the ontology game') .

toxx

"Would you say that the phenomenological world and the numinous world exert cause and effect on each other, or is one of them an epiphenomenon? If they do interact, then Noggin will, I suspect, have to say that they are part of the same abstract conserved quantity and therefore not different. I'm not sure whether that would be a problem for him. "

I'd have no problem with the hypothesis that they were part of the same quantity because (as the Original Jez has also said before now) Heathens (and most other pagans) do not differentiate between the natural and the supernatural. You remember that discussion?

Wow, toxxin, Noggin, this is a really heavy discussion, but it is fun to watch!

"It's probably the thing with two or less sides that we're looking for here." -- Moth

I was afraid you say something of that nature.

That particular comment was meant to be a credible analogy to the so-called "forbidden" things in Quantum Physics. I can see that doesn't appear to have sunk in. Oh well..

So then, might we suppose that it's credible then when particulate behavior deduced from tracks of so-called fragments in a cloud chamber conform to theory perhaps in a dozen instances in 20,000 trials that the existence of the particle is thereby confirmed?

I think the typical quantum physicist would affirm that supposition, contrary to the notion that a theory is NOT confirmed if one finds even one counter example, let alone 19,988. Most strange, don't you think?

So then would the self-same quantum physicist, when confronted with even one instance of a verifiable vision of Almighty God, out of ssy 19,988 no-shows, conclude that the existence of AG was thereby incontravertably confirmed?

I doubt it, which only goes to show just how arbitrary and capricious these Logical Methods really are. The quantum physicist believes in Quantum Physics, not because it's especially credible to do so, but because it gives him the BOMB!!, the fire flower you can actually see and by which you can be burned to a cinder if you get within a few kilometers, let alone close enough to touch. That's the compelling thing about Quantum Physics.

And what is compelling, then, about AG? Probably the Inquisition or whatever its more recent manifestations might have been. I call this the General Theory of Doctrinal Coercion aka The LORD is my shepherd, I shall not doubt. =0)

Hi Noggin

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Like Adelaide I'm admiring the conversation between you and Toxx. I was wondering, starting from your position, how do you break out into the external world (I mean apart from inferring that there is something out there)? Or is that just outside the terms of the game, so to speak?

<<...starting from your position, how do you break out into the external world?>>

This is an interesting question. To which the most obvious answer is that I don't *start* from this position; this position is where I end up starting from a position of "naive realism" and following it through to a logical conclusion. It is therefore "parasitic" (paradoxically) on the belief in an external world.

Consider. If my consciousness is all there is there can be nothing that I don't know or have control over. But this is not my experience. The circuit has to be completed by something outside my consciousness. And the language game itself seems to require this outside completion to gain a foothold in the first instance.

toxx suggests that I am making "reality" a feature of the language game, which is true to a point, but one must also ask about the history of the language game and how it came to be that way.

Noggin

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I agree, Della. It's also extra fun to watch Noggin writing his postings, slow two-fingered typer that he is. A slow thinker, though what he comes up with is pretty darn fine, doncha think? Anyhow, it's quite interesting to watch the process 'in process', as it were.

But it also must be said that I can totally slaughter him at Scrabble!


az

Toxxin,

Sorry to go back so far but reference your posting no.20720:

"The image that occurred to me as I wrote that 'playing with his toys' phrase was the game of 'life'. At least, though, we tend to play about with the initial conditions a time or two before we get bored. Not that some being might not have done that with the universe, although I wonder whether all traces of the previous setup would have been erased. Still, even the first run of the thing would be rather dull to an omniscient being, so where's the point. It wouldn't even be a novelty to say: "Just as I thought"!"

Well, yes, exactly. Where's the point? What would an omnipotent etc being want with a universe where everything is not merely predictable but fully predicted? Or am I being carelessly anthropomorphic here?

F

"But it also must be said that I can totally slaughter him at Scrabble!"

Insisting that he plays in Spanish is probably giving you an unfair advantage.

F

Do not!

We play proper English Scrabble, with my game that is at least thirty years old so that the tiles are actually made of wood. Quite a lovely thing, playing with those old wooden tiles.

Also especially lovely when I totally cheese the guy!


az