- #316
Zero
AG, you forget that he doesn't have opinions...except that any position I support must be wrong, axiomatically.
Why the bias against materialism?
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In summary, the debate between materialism and idealism has been ongoing for centuries, with the focus being on the uniqueness of life and mind. Some anti-materialists may have a tendency to be preachers, leading to aggressive attacks on those who disagree with their beliefs. However, it is natural for humans to have differing opinions. Science, while a valuable tool, has limitations and does not encompass all aspects of life and the universe. There is still much to be discovered and understood about consciousness and thought, which science has not yet been able to fully explain.
- #317
Fliption
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Number 1 is true but it is true for everything. All words are "human created concepts imposed on characteristics of our universe." This goes for material things as well.
In number 2 I don't like the word "held".
And I don't understand number 3.
Do you believe there are laws of nature? Do you think they exists? Or do you believe they are just a byproduct description of the behavior of matter and energy? It's sort of like "which came first, the chicken or the egg?" So which came first in your mind?
- #318
Fliption
- 1,081
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Very mature. I have no clue whether you're wrong or right Zero. Couldn't care less either. I just dislike your disrespectful, insulting, condescending attitude and blatant disregard for any effort to defend your position other than to state "I'm right because I know I'm right".
I have given you my opinion on this topic and it differs from yours. So this is what that turns into? While I disagree with you I am open to being wrong. But I'm not waiting on someone to prove it to me. I have actually read through many websites and picked up several books since this thread started trying to more thoroughly understand the definitions being used by scientists studying this. I supposed you've done the same? Of course you have.
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- #319
Zero
You just hate me because I'm beautiful...and probably because I gave you hell over that 'Intelligent Design' nonsense last year.
I still think you have a crush on me, too.
- #320
Fliption
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That's hilarious because in my view you've done nothing in any thread discussion with me that "gives me hell". If anything you make yourself look like a hardheaded jackass who can't defend his position. LOL
- #321
Zero
What have you presented that I need to defend myself against? Let's get this back on topic, now that you have resorted to name-calling. Hopefully you have gotten it out of your system. Good?
Let's get on with the show!
- #322
Zero
Actually, I think part of teh problem is that people seem to think that I have a dogma, or some list of facts that I approve of. That is an incorrect assumption. I have a bias towards a way of looking at the world, which is different altogether. There aren't any facts that dispute my worldview, because for them to actually be a fact, they fit right in. I know it seems circular, but it is no more so than peole claiming that the Bible is true because it says so in the Bible. And, unlike a religious dogma, the facts which I accept(provisionaly, always provisionally accept)can change as new evidence is discovered.
- #323
Fliption
- 1,081
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I have given some examples of things that do not fit into your worldview. I then provided an article from a reputable science magazine that expands on the very same concept as a real, existing thing. The very existence of this article contradicts your view. From this article it would be easy to then get additional information on this topic. So there is no lack of information here.
And your response was "They will agree with my view once they figure out what they're talking about". Ridiculous, Zero. Absolutely ridiculous. And now you want me to provide you more? LOL. Sure, I love wasting my time.
- #324
Zero
No, I said that I will likely agree with them, once they work it all out, there's a distinction.
Crybaby.
- #325
Fliption
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Crybaby? Lol. Nice. What's next "My daddy can beat your daddy up?"
This is what you said. It is on page 20 of this thread for anyone who wants to see it first hand...
"...patience, Flip, I'm sure when THEY figure out what they are talking about, it will fit perfectly fine in my outlook."
Keep digging.
- #326
Zero
Well, if tehy have evidence, as accepted by the majority of scientists, it will fit into my philosophy. I don't see the contradiction. After all, if you look back, I stated that I would have no problem with the existence of something like ESP, if there was a scientific study that showed it to work.
- #327
sascha
- 127
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Lately I've been reading through the whole of this thread. I am astonished that somehow the dialogue partners never get really to the crucial point. To my sense the question of the thread being "Why a bias against Materialism?" is misleading insofar as it does not address the more primal fact that Materialism itself introduces a bias in its world view, which must thus be justified and can legitimately be doubted. Its bias is in believeing the world is somewhere "out there", in the "things" believed to be real because they are perceivable. As has been hinted at several times on this thread, in this view reality does not consist also of the laws and forces that constitute the things, because these are not perceivable. As much Fliption as Zero made this point several times, from opposing sides. In Materialism, reality is being thought from the parts to the whole -- which can be fulfilled only in approximations, never in a strict way. On a materialist path, one can never know the overall order, because one has excluded an access to that from the outset, by imposing the basic split into the existent and the nonexistent -- even though, for actual intelligibility, the nonexistent part (eg. laws and forces) is decisive. The grasp of Materialism is self-limited by its very principle. But I get the impression that the opponents do not clarify the very basis and therefore do not talk about the same problem. In such situations it is not astonishing that they cannot agree.
On August 5, Fliption posted a need to define what one is talking about. Quite some time later, FZ+ did some nice summing up between Materialism and Idealism. As yet no one has mentioned the third one of the possible positions (Hylozoism / Panpsychism), in spite of the fact that it is implicitly quite widespread now because Materialism leads there when wanting to deal with the principle of life (eg. Prigogine tends to think this way). This is the position that attributes some alive quality to the allegedly fundamental material entities, since everything is assumed to consist of these. It is thus a scientific form of animism. Genetics is being nudged there, even if it does not like the idea. Saying information can exist on its own tends in this direction too, because information is always about something, while information about itself is a difficult thing in today's ways of thinking: none of the scientific systems can handle complete self-reference (the more formalized, the more they are self-limited).
Zero says he believs in science "as accepted by the majority of scientists". But this attitude does not offer the required certainty. The materialist position offers no secure criterion for securing fully against collective error. Not long ago, a majority believed eg. in the Ptolemaian system, or in phlogiston, or in atomism. Limited thinking is fine as long as people are tinkering around at a miniature scale. But now, by our "knowing" and doing, we are producing ozone holes and other global changes. Nothing to experiment with, because on the global scale we need totally secure knowledge. As a consequence of its primal bias, especially the materialist stance cannot develop any conceptual (categoreal) means with which to think securely and in a strictly complete way from the whole to the parts. As a consequence of this fact, the materialist stance must shift its question onto ever new levels. In this way, the atomistically imagined 'fundamental pieces' of matter dissolved into ever smaller entities. In the standard model one my say there are fundamental fermions, but there are problems which even the GUTs and SUSY do not fully solve. The inevitable trend still is to be pushed into ever more little pieces, compelled to add ever more epicyles to the basic system. This is the fate of wanting to think from pieces towards the whole.
Postulating a need for evidence can only reveal parts of what is relevant, because it remains in the incomplete idea stated above. The conceptual / categoreal problems are not solved by this postulate. Some people sense the weakness in this stance, and they oppose it. Is this really not legitimate, Zero? I don't think there is much hate in the opponents; to my sense, the situation is rather like two types of language encountering each other. This can exasperate some temperaments.
On August 5, Fliption posted a need to define what one is talking about. Quite some time later, FZ+ did some nice summing up between Materialism and Idealism. As yet no one has mentioned the third one of the possible positions (Hylozoism / Panpsychism), in spite of the fact that it is implicitly quite widespread now because Materialism leads there when wanting to deal with the principle of life (eg. Prigogine tends to think this way). This is the position that attributes some alive quality to the allegedly fundamental material entities, since everything is assumed to consist of these. It is thus a scientific form of animism. Genetics is being nudged there, even if it does not like the idea. Saying information can exist on its own tends in this direction too, because information is always about something, while information about itself is a difficult thing in today's ways of thinking: none of the scientific systems can handle complete self-reference (the more formalized, the more they are self-limited).
Zero says he believs in science "as accepted by the majority of scientists". But this attitude does not offer the required certainty. The materialist position offers no secure criterion for securing fully against collective error. Not long ago, a majority believed eg. in the Ptolemaian system, or in phlogiston, or in atomism. Limited thinking is fine as long as people are tinkering around at a miniature scale. But now, by our "knowing" and doing, we are producing ozone holes and other global changes. Nothing to experiment with, because on the global scale we need totally secure knowledge. As a consequence of its primal bias, especially the materialist stance cannot develop any conceptual (categoreal) means with which to think securely and in a strictly complete way from the whole to the parts. As a consequence of this fact, the materialist stance must shift its question onto ever new levels. In this way, the atomistically imagined 'fundamental pieces' of matter dissolved into ever smaller entities. In the standard model one my say there are fundamental fermions, but there are problems which even the GUTs and SUSY do not fully solve. The inevitable trend still is to be pushed into ever more little pieces, compelled to add ever more epicyles to the basic system. This is the fate of wanting to think from pieces towards the whole.
Postulating a need for evidence can only reveal parts of what is relevant, because it remains in the incomplete idea stated above. The conceptual / categoreal problems are not solved by this postulate. Some people sense the weakness in this stance, and they oppose it. Is this really not legitimate, Zero? I don't think there is much hate in the opponents; to my sense, the situation is rather like two types of language encountering each other. This can exasperate some temperaments.
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- #328
Zero
Wow. That was a hell of a post!
I know we got a bit off track with this one. I know earlier, I was trying to explore the notion that a materialist worldview is very practical, in that it is an approach which has the advantage of giving concrete answers most of the time. Does that sound reasonable? If it does, then why would anyone want to reject materialism? I would agree that it is a rough tool, that can always be sharpened further, but I see a situation where people abandon it completely, which seems counterproductive to me.
As far as the two sides 'speaking over each others' heads', I would have to agree. There seems to be a communication barrier, and I think that the position that Fliption has presented most recently is closer to agreeing with my position than he realizes. Oh well, back to running in circles on it!
As far as a weakness in the materialist's viewpoint, I would appreciate you clarifying a bit more? Actually, if you could just zoom in on this single issue, I think we can narrow this thread back to something approaching its initial intent.
I know we got a bit off track with this one. I know earlier, I was trying to explore the notion that a materialist worldview is very practical, in that it is an approach which has the advantage of giving concrete answers most of the time. Does that sound reasonable? If it does, then why would anyone want to reject materialism? I would agree that it is a rough tool, that can always be sharpened further, but I see a situation where people abandon it completely, which seems counterproductive to me.
As far as the two sides 'speaking over each others' heads', I would have to agree. There seems to be a communication barrier, and I think that the position that Fliption has presented most recently is closer to agreeing with my position than he realizes. Oh well, back to running in circles on it!
As far as a weakness in the materialist's viewpoint, I would appreciate you clarifying a bit more? Actually, if you could just zoom in on this single issue, I think we can narrow this thread back to something approaching its initial intent.
- #329
Zero
Oh, and use layman's terms, if you would? You are a philosopher, while I am simply the smartest himan being alive...
- #330
Another God
Staff Emeritus
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True, but it is important to see a distinction between words for things which are supposed to actually exist as tangible items, and then words which exist just to express ideas, or concepts.
As such, the point I am making with my option is that information is a human created 'concept' applied to a thing (the thing having its own name: Matter). The concept does not actually exist, only the matter does.
OK. So change it. I am curious to know what you think, and what you think they think... I am not sure that I understand their position yet.
A category error, is a mistake where you basically miss the forest for the trees (in the most literal sense.) "Where's the forest? I only see a whole bunch of trees..." When obviously, the forest IS the collection of trees
And so: Are they, because of a language confusion, looking at matter, and wondering where the Information is, how the information exists, what information really is etc? When in reality, the matter right in front of them IS the information.
Well, my personal belief, as entirely unfounded and uneducated as it is (I am the first to admit that) is that the Universe is most likely a mathematical function in action...and matter is just some sort of perverse consequence of that.
But that isn't really important. Look back at my explanation of Option 3 and you will hopefully understand better how I think it works. Information and the medium that holds that information is not a matter of cause and effect. They are the one thing.
Oh wait, OK, it is true, my view is important to it. The 'laws' came first in my mind, and matter is a consequence. And it is because of the laws that matter = information, because matter is just a manifestation of the laws...
that makes some sort of sense to me.
- #331
Iacchus32
- 2,315
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Yes, I agree.
And just as sure as day follows night, we are all part of the "overall design."
- #332
Fliption
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OK I'm glad you answered that wya because it will be easier for me to explain what I'm thinking. Assuming what you've said is true, then the laws are the instructions by which all matter operates. The laws are information. Where are they? The laws aren't "held" by any matter are they? Hopefully you can see why I struggled with the word "held".
Also, let me go ahead and clarify before someone goes ballistic. I use the word "instructions" not to mean anything about intent or design. I use it to draw the analogy to software which is also just a set of instructions that directs the hardwares behavior.
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- #333
Zero
Well, Fliption, if you thing about it, there is a lot of information 'held' by even the simplest matter, that 'instructs' it on how to behave. Say you have an atom of carbon. The mass of the nucleus 'instructs' the atom on how to 'react' to gravity. The number of electrons 'instruct' the atom on how to form chemical bonds, react to a magnetic field, etc. I'm sure there's lots more 'information' in a single atom when you get into quantum stuff.
Some people would ask: how does DNA 'know' what to do? I would counter that it doesn't know any more than a single carbon atom knows about bonding to other atoms...but it does it the same way every time in the same situation.
Some people would ask: how does DNA 'know' what to do? I would counter that it doesn't know any more than a single carbon atom knows about bonding to other atoms...but it does it the same way every time in the same situation.
- #334
sascha
- 127
- 2
Zero, I agree fully that a materialist worldview is practical (and I will try to use only laymen's words in my posts -- thanks for the hint). Insofar it is quite reasonable.
Did the fight not start when some tried to think everything in materialist terms, i.e. not just specific aspects -- eg. tools, gadgets -- for which this perspective is adequate? For finding laws, the presently fashionable form of science operates by 'generalization'; so some feel that something successful in one realm should be applicable in other, and -- swoosh -- they generalize eg, the materialist approach. The trouble with the principle of generalization is that it can secure laws in a limited realm only, it can't secure strictly universal laws (eg. even the law of entropy is subject to entropy -- while there are universal laws: eg. the principle of truth is subject to truth).
So I don't think the problem is that people would not admit practical solutions to real problems, but that some refuse to accept the materialist position as the solution for everything. It is no coincidence, for example, that since the upsurge of materialism a new wave of ethics arose -- because knowing how to manipulate things does not warrant knowing about the context as a whole, into which all manipulations must fit.
The weakness in the materialist's viewpoint is in its wanting to handle material things while choosing a way of setting out that limits understanding the ultimate nature of material things. On this path, one can caclulate bits and pieces to an amazing degree, but not know what they are in their own right. On this path, one can't know what it is to be an electron, or a quark. Or mass / energy and information. We can depict such structures in many systems, and they make sense depending on the system. The crux shows fully with the aliveness of living beings. And while we can't say we have really understood the nature of the things -- not even of inert matter, for that matter -- the principle itself of approaching things in looking at them from outside limits the potential as such of this attempt. This approach seems to offer objectivity, but it is limited already because no empirical data can cover everything. Insofar, the idea that one day one will eg. be able to understand even difficult things such consciousness is not a secure idea. One can depict aspects of awareness to some extent, eg. in real time on a tomograph, but that is not the actual nature of awareness, it is only a picture of it. One may know what somebody is thinking about, but that does not improve human understanding. For getting along with each other, we don't need such gadgets. This does not exclude that some will believe what such gadgets show is the reality of their awareness, just as there are always some who robotize themselves, or believe they are in reality Napoleon. One can produce even collective beliefs (look at what the media are doing).
Some time ago there was debate on this thread about cultural dangers of the materialist viewpoint. You did not seem convinced that there is one, but I think if a culture were to rely only on this viewpoint, it would incur severe dangers, up to a moral decay. Look at how already small kids learn to kill off their emotional responsiveness by seeing everything only in terms of a manipulative control over things, up to cold killing that can be learned in video games. For sanity to be possible, there must be an overview. It is important that all this is the effect of conditioning. The interesting challenge is thus to find a world view that does not foster forms of disintegration, or impose a fundamentalist ideology, but allows to integrate properly all the -isms, letting all things 'fall into place'. That's my sort of work. I am trying to develop an approach that is not self-limited by assumptions. That's not just academic daydreaming, but also quite practical (even though it is not limited to the materialist stance). IMO this approach would allow also a better understanding even of the nature of material matter, and finally a better integration of the diverse physical theories (while not necessarily treading eg. the GUT path, which is still based on a 'look from outside'). To my sense, a physics is possible that integrates life fully.
But maybe I have not yet hit on the head the nail that you had in mind?
Did the fight not start when some tried to think everything in materialist terms, i.e. not just specific aspects -- eg. tools, gadgets -- for which this perspective is adequate? For finding laws, the presently fashionable form of science operates by 'generalization'; so some feel that something successful in one realm should be applicable in other, and -- swoosh -- they generalize eg, the materialist approach. The trouble with the principle of generalization is that it can secure laws in a limited realm only, it can't secure strictly universal laws (eg. even the law of entropy is subject to entropy -- while there are universal laws: eg. the principle of truth is subject to truth).
So I don't think the problem is that people would not admit practical solutions to real problems, but that some refuse to accept the materialist position as the solution for everything. It is no coincidence, for example, that since the upsurge of materialism a new wave of ethics arose -- because knowing how to manipulate things does not warrant knowing about the context as a whole, into which all manipulations must fit.
The weakness in the materialist's viewpoint is in its wanting to handle material things while choosing a way of setting out that limits understanding the ultimate nature of material things. On this path, one can caclulate bits and pieces to an amazing degree, but not know what they are in their own right. On this path, one can't know what it is to be an electron, or a quark. Or mass / energy and information. We can depict such structures in many systems, and they make sense depending on the system. The crux shows fully with the aliveness of living beings. And while we can't say we have really understood the nature of the things -- not even of inert matter, for that matter -- the principle itself of approaching things in looking at them from outside limits the potential as such of this attempt. This approach seems to offer objectivity, but it is limited already because no empirical data can cover everything. Insofar, the idea that one day one will eg. be able to understand even difficult things such consciousness is not a secure idea. One can depict aspects of awareness to some extent, eg. in real time on a tomograph, but that is not the actual nature of awareness, it is only a picture of it. One may know what somebody is thinking about, but that does not improve human understanding. For getting along with each other, we don't need such gadgets. This does not exclude that some will believe what such gadgets show is the reality of their awareness, just as there are always some who robotize themselves, or believe they are in reality Napoleon. One can produce even collective beliefs (look at what the media are doing).
Some time ago there was debate on this thread about cultural dangers of the materialist viewpoint. You did not seem convinced that there is one, but I think if a culture were to rely only on this viewpoint, it would incur severe dangers, up to a moral decay. Look at how already small kids learn to kill off their emotional responsiveness by seeing everything only in terms of a manipulative control over things, up to cold killing that can be learned in video games. For sanity to be possible, there must be an overview. It is important that all this is the effect of conditioning. The interesting challenge is thus to find a world view that does not foster forms of disintegration, or impose a fundamentalist ideology, but allows to integrate properly all the -isms, letting all things 'fall into place'. That's my sort of work. I am trying to develop an approach that is not self-limited by assumptions. That's not just academic daydreaming, but also quite practical (even though it is not limited to the materialist stance). IMO this approach would allow also a better understanding even of the nature of material matter, and finally a better integration of the diverse physical theories (while not necessarily treading eg. the GUT path, which is still based on a 'look from outside'). To my sense, a physics is possible that integrates life fully.
But maybe I have not yet hit on the head the nail that you had in mind?
- #335
Zero
[rant]This is nonsense, you are all mad, I give UP![/rant]
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- #336
Fliption
- 1,081
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Oh I don't think I would necessarily disagree with the idea that some information is held by matter. I just don't think that being "held" by matter is a necessary condition for information. As I am trying to illustrate with AG and the laws of nature.
Also, I wouldn't go so far as to claim that the mass of a nucleus is information. That is just a physical attribute. That is simply a variable in the equations of nature to help determine the result. The variables or inputs into the equations are part of matter but the underlying equation itself is the information.
- #337
Zero
I think we'll just have to agree to disagree on this point, don't you? I don't think either of our views is wrong, based on the evidence. I think it is more of an interpretation difference.
- #338
Royce
- 1,539
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Hey, Zero, I thought you gave up (days after declaring yourself the winner). If a law or formula is information then the variabes that are plugged into the formula are information too. Mass therefore would be information as well as an attribute or it could not be plugged into an informational formula. Is it all math and information then like whatshisface said or is math and information the means and rules of behavior for matter/energy. What form does this information take? Is it carried with or part of a photon or electron or quark?
This is really getting too deep for me. I'll have to think about this for a while. It would make a great new thread rather than hiding it 20 page deep in another entirely unrelated thread. Just a thought.
This is really getting too deep for me. I'll have to think about this for a while. It would make a great new thread rather than hiding it 20 page deep in another entirely unrelated thread. Just a thought.
- #339
Fliption
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Yes, Royce you could make the argument that it is information. But I've been trying to isolate the existence of a certain type that is not material since that's what a few people have been denying and is the topic of the thread.
- #340
Zero
Sorry to say, but I am almost 100% sure that you can't find evidence for information in the absence of matter...which may be a limitation of our perception as much as a statement about the universe.
- #341
sascha
- 127
- 2
Is madness something relative or absolute? Against what is it 'measured'? Should we not be careful in applying such judgments? It is amusing, for example, that those in the loony bin believing that in reality they are Napoleon believe that the wardens are mad because they do not recognize this 'fact'... In our debate, which are the ultimate facts that determine what is a wider rationality than previously adopted, and what is real madness? (To my sense, as long as a madness is only transitory, it can be useful for transcending previous thought barriers. Trouble arises when a madness becomes rigid and is institutionalized, as eg. in an ideology).
With a clarification of the interrelation between laws of nature and information we will advance more securely. In this domain, I distinguish strictly between the partial forms of order (as manifest in any given law of nature, which never covers the whole) and the overall order (the totality of all laws, which regulates that things arise and vanish just as it regulates that in certain query perspectives there is a need for ideas about laws of nature, forces, etc.).
In a first approach, the relevant point between laws of nature, information, matter, and energy, is not so much whether they exist separately -- eg. information in the absence of matter -- but rather that for a complete understanding we must distinguish conceptually the aspects (in this case of information versus matter; by the way, the originators of information theory -- people like Shannon and Weaver -- made this distinction very clearly; only lately there has been a certain sloppiness about it). In this sense, the overall order of all laws may be present in the universe as a whole. But a non-contradictory 'thinkability' of the whole requires the said distinction.
Beyond that, it is of little use to believe that information necessarily requires matter for existing. After all no phenomenon can show directly the overall law it obeys, since its appearing and disappearing is part of that law. This is why the postulate of palpable evidence is simultaneously a self-limitation in the laws that it allows to discover. The overall order of any process, phenomenon, 'thing', and especially of the universe as a whole, is occulted by applying this postulate. It allows to know aspects, but not the ultimate rule of the game.
With a clarification of the interrelation between laws of nature and information we will advance more securely. In this domain, I distinguish strictly between the partial forms of order (as manifest in any given law of nature, which never covers the whole) and the overall order (the totality of all laws, which regulates that things arise and vanish just as it regulates that in certain query perspectives there is a need for ideas about laws of nature, forces, etc.).
In a first approach, the relevant point between laws of nature, information, matter, and energy, is not so much whether they exist separately -- eg. information in the absence of matter -- but rather that for a complete understanding we must distinguish conceptually the aspects (in this case of information versus matter; by the way, the originators of information theory -- people like Shannon and Weaver -- made this distinction very clearly; only lately there has been a certain sloppiness about it). In this sense, the overall order of all laws may be present in the universe as a whole. But a non-contradictory 'thinkability' of the whole requires the said distinction.
Beyond that, it is of little use to believe that information necessarily requires matter for existing. After all no phenomenon can show directly the overall law it obeys, since its appearing and disappearing is part of that law. This is why the postulate of palpable evidence is simultaneously a self-limitation in the laws that it allows to discover. The overall order of any process, phenomenon, 'thing', and especially of the universe as a whole, is occulted by applying this postulate. It allows to know aspects, but not the ultimate rule of the game.
- #342
Another God
Staff Emeritus
Gold Member
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Photon?
- #343
Zero
No thanks, I've already had lunch.
- #344
amadeus
A little off-topic perhaps, but I'd like to mention it:
There's a mistaken notion that crazy people are crazy because they can't think straight. A little chat with a madman is enough to reveal the misconception. Crazy people are as rational as anyone else, quite often far more so. They have explanations for everything, including the fact that no one agrees with their explanations. Everything in a madman's mind makes perfect sense - which happens to be exactly the problem.
The really striking thing about insane people is not that they are poor at thinking, but rather that they are too good at it for their own sake. No one is as certain of his own ideas, as self-assured as a lunatic. Ordinary people always think they might be wrong about anything; insane people do not consider that a possibility.
Many people are bothered by the idea that, if they go mad, they won't be able to realize it. Which is true, but only because mad people are the only ones who don't worry about their mental health. So long as you think you might be mad, you're probably sane. As soon as you become certain you're not mad, you've already got one foot in the asylum. From then on, rational thinking does the rest.
- #345
sascha
- 127
- 2
Thanks, Amadeus, that's a neat insight. Not really off topic, since having or not having it determines much of what we say, also here.
- #346
Fliption
- 1,081
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Another option could be just poor semantics. No one has directly responded to why their definition is absolutely correct. I've heard that "it is not possible" and that we have to "agree to disagree" but yet I've seen no explanation for why instructions of nature aren't a nonmaterial existence.
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- #347
Zero
Uh huh...
- #348
Fliption
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Hmmm... seems we have a few lunatics participating in this thread then. But I could be wrong
- #349
Zero
You very well could be wrong...I've seen it before!
- #350
sascha
- 127
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For clarifying some more this issue of information and its role in matter, I would like to draw the attention to a conceptual problem. Here we have heard the opinion that information actively does something. As eg. Zero put it lately: "The mass of the nucleus 'instructs' the atom on how to 'react' to gravity. The number of electrons 'instruct' the atom on how to form chemical bonds, react to a magnetic field, etc." Adopting this idea implies attributing to information some kind of agency, a force aspect. This is not what information is generally meant to be (at least the link between regularity and agency should be clarified more exactly). What is going on in the minds here? A clear insight? (I don't think so, but what do the others say?) A conceptual conflation, by non-distinction? (This is what I feel is the case; such conflations are what usually pushes into having to pursue the problem -- here of information versus energy, in my jargon law versus force -- into ever smaller entities, which however does not solve the problems, as long as the conceptual conflation remains). Note that the empirical evidence is the same; only the interpretations vary -- according to the differences in the chosen concepts / categories at the outset.
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