Indeed, fresco, prediction and therefore control are expunged with the fall of causality. On that I think we agree. Do you also agree that the mind is an indivisible whole which cannot be understood by an analysis of perceived parts, ie, perceptions? Would you mind providing a brief summary of Capra's work for us?
Gelisgesti, would you mind providing a brief description of that "generally recognized 'model' of thought" for us here please?
Sure ....
a list of your current 'models' would be:
"Well, I've gone and done it now; ordered two Capra books and the Gurdjieff "In Search of the Miraculous." I wait with great anticipation."
Capra and Gurdjieff.
Wouldn't the nature of randomness and chance built into causality be of high value in the process of evolution .... if only to prevent stagnation?
0 Replies
pswfps
1
Reply
Sun 25 Mar, 2007 12:30 pm
I'm reading Capra's "Tao of Physics" at the moment. I must say I do like his style of writing so far. Very easy going yet so engaging. I've only got as far as chapter five but I'm already hooked. Absolutely fascinating stuff, so much to think about. Could it really be that the ancient mystics of the East had an intuitive grasp of that which modern physics is now only just discovering?
I also bought Capra's "Web of Life" for desert! Hope it's as good.
My thanks to fresco for the recommendation; Capra seems to be just what I needed!
0 Replies
fresco
1
Reply
Sun 25 Mar, 2007 01:01 pm
Nice comments thanks.
Capra is not without his critics. I think Dawkins is one.
0 Replies
pswfps
1
Reply
Mon 26 Mar, 2007 05:57 am
At first that comment surprised me, afterall, RD is generally known for his polemical commentary of Christianity and monotheism in general. On the other hand, I suppose it's not that surprising that an evolutionary biologist should be such a staunch supporter of classical reducto-mechanistic views. Evolution theory depends on it.
In a nutshell, what is his main critiscism of Capra?
0 Replies
fresco
1
Reply
Mon 26 Mar, 2007 06:30 am
As far as I recall RD (unlike the atheist Sam Harris) lumps together "spirituality" and "religion". Obviously Capra's paradigms which draw on Easten mysticism and transcend traditional logic are too iconoclastic relative to Dawkin's rather narrow view of "science".
0 Replies
pswfps
1
Reply
Fri 30 Mar, 2007 12:51 pm
It's clear to me how an ignorant person might lump together spirituality and religion and thus claim atheism. However, one whom correctly distinguishes the two, yet persists in atheism, is an enigma. I could accept agnosticsm from such but atheism seems a little too conclusive.
I've been thinking about the conflation of polar opposites. The concepts of "good" and "bad" are a simple example; each exists only in relation to the other therefore if one exists, so must the other. One cannot be said to be the cause of the other nor can one extreme eventually overcome the other. I then considered a cup and wondered what the polar opposite of a cup might be. Then it occurred to me that the opposite of a cup is "not a cup." By this I mean that a cup only exists in relation to it's non-existence. Following the simple example of good and bad, this must also mean that existence and non-existence are interdependent. Ie, something can only not-exist if it has the potential to exist and vice-versa. Further, existence (the concept) cannot be the cause of non-existence any more than non-existence can be the cause of existence. If this is correct then all things imaginable must simultaneously have the potential to exist and not-exist, which is a tad strange. I'm going to the pub now...
0 Replies
fresco
1
Reply
Fri 30 Mar, 2007 03:52 pm
pswfps,
Think of "existence" as "active relationship" NOT "a set and its complement." "Cups" exist relative to "drinkers". "Gods" exist relative to "believers". Do "trees" exist for birds or merely "perches" ? It is the persistence of "the word" which reflects persistence of potential functionality relative to human needs and lifespans.
"Non-existence" is essentially meaningless. All concepts have "existence" by virtue of being evoked by "a conceptualizer".
It is the nature of the relationship with the concept which we argue about e.g. whether there is a "physical relationship" or a "palliative relationship". Such relationships involve "expectancies" which are subject to consensus. Thus atheists (such as myself) might argue that they have no expectancies and no requirements regarding a "God concept" whether they be "physical" or "celestial" etc. It is futile to deny "Gods existence" per se because such denial is based on naive realism and potential physicality alone, rather than aspects of its functionality for some.
0 Replies
JLNobody
1
Reply
Fri 30 Mar, 2007 11:01 pm
Extremely well stated, Fresco.
To me the notion (a very tentative notion) of non-existence is virtually meaningless, except,, perhaps, to signify the absence of something that is thought to exist. When one loses a friend or spouse, that perceived "absence" is palpable, but only in relation to the memory of the absent one and one's inabiility to "relate" to them.
But aside from this existential sense of "absence", the abstract notion of non-existence seems as meaningless as is the notion of one's own death. How can you be dead when there's no "you" to be dead or to experience death?
0 Replies
fresco
1
Reply
Sat 31 Mar, 2007 01:49 am
JLN,
...exactly...."life after death" has the same "status" as "life before birth" or "self identity when in dreamless sleep". It is evoked by "third party minds" only. For some, "God" is the ultimate third party. Berkeley's circular logic comfortably closes the void.
JLN, your discussion of "absence" reminds me of the mathematical discussions of the meaning of "zero" which I believe the Romans "lacked" as a symbol.
0 Replies
pswfps
1
Reply
Sat 31 Mar, 2007 06:25 am
fresco,
Indeed, the mind is a relational thing, we have established that. One perception only exists in so far as it can be distinguished and related to another. That said, I am trying to encapsulate this cup before me in isolation, without any preconceptions of usage etc. Just the cup as it's image exists in my mind, nothing more. This object is now rendered utterly meaningless yet it's form exists in my mind. Form in relation to what? Other forms? If these other forms are expunged from my mind then the form of the cup becomes everything. Everything in relation to what? Nothing? Nothing is impossible to imagine so as far as I'm concerned this "everything" exists absolutely since there is nothing to which it can be related to.
This is how I have come to see the totality of my consciousness: it is everything and so it exists absolutely. To understand it, one might break it down into individual perceptions but by doing so, one destroys (or changes but change is really a simultaneous death/rebirth) the very thing one is trying to understand. It is an indivisible whole, ever changing and a gestalt. An eternal wonder unto itself. Hence the subject of this thread.
0 Replies
pswfps
1
Reply
Sat 31 Mar, 2007 06:42 am
I might also add that I agree when you said that the fallacy is in trying to extract free-will from determinism but for slightly different reasons. As far as I can tell, free-will is actually dependant upon determinsm. Therefore, if determinsm falls with causality then the question of free-will is redundant. There is no free-will and no determinsm, just the inexplicable totality of everything, ie, "me."
0 Replies
Gelisgesti
1
Reply
Sat 31 Mar, 2007 08:20 am
The only thing certain in the 'allllllll' of things is chance ... pure random chance. Anything preordained by anything (sounds stupid but give it some thought) is doomed by the redundancy of 'linear cause and effect' . Freedom of choice/will is dictated by evolution .... not only of species but also environment. Out of chaos .... comes order.
0 Replies
pswfps
1
Reply
Sat 31 Mar, 2007 08:20 am
Following on from my previous thoughts, one has to wonder why it is the nature of consciousness to perceive a "self" as whole and as distinct from the rest of perception. It's almost as if consciousness actually requires an external reality to relate to. As if it cannot actualise without an external reality. If this is correct then one cannot say that consciousness creates an external reality and by extension "self" since this assumes the prior existence of consciousness. One could however assert that an extant external reality defines and actualises consciousness within it. On this basis, I suspect that consciousness can never be the totality of everything. It must, by it's very nature, be contained within a greater framework.
0 Replies
fresco
1
Reply
Sat 31 Mar, 2007 08:56 am
pswfps
You might find, as I did after reading Piaget and the Capra on the Santigo theory of cognition, that "conscious contained in something" is no more meaningful than to say "a wave is contained in an ocean". Conscousness is process.
0 Replies
pswfps
1
Reply
Sat 31 Mar, 2007 08:59 am
Gelisgesti,
On the one hand you state that preordination is not possible with the fall of causality, then, you state that free-will is dictated by evolution. This seems a little contradictory to me.
The process of evolution is not independant from the entire process of the universe. Quantum and relativity theories require us to view the universe as a whole in which all processes/events are interdependant and co-existant. There are no discrtete "packets" of existence any more than there are independant processes such as evolution. It would be better to say that our "Freedom of choice/will" is shaped by the flow of the entire universe. A neural network seems to mimmick this phenomenon in microcosm. In a brain, we cannot localise the continual flow of neural activity and say "this is where it starts" or "this is where it ends." It is one holistic continual flow, a web of events in which causality fails.
0 Replies
pswfps
1
Reply
Sat 31 Mar, 2007 09:09 am
fresco,
I am aware of that. The whole universe is a process and consciousness an emergent property of this singular process. However, one must wonder why it is the nature of this process to produce consciousness which insists on establishing a "self" as separate from the very process which allows it.
0 Replies
Gelisgesti
1
Reply
Sat 31 Mar, 2007 10:11 am
Gelisgesti wrote:
The only thing certain in the 'allllllll' of things is chance ... pure random chance. Anything preordained by anything (sounds stupid but give it some thought) is doomed by the redundancy of 'linear cause and effect' . Freedom of choice/will is dictated by evolution .... not only of species but also environment. Out of chaos .... comes order.
pswfps wrote:
Gelisgesti,
On the one hand you state that preordination is not possible with the fall of causality, then, you state that free-will is dictated by evolution. This seems a little contradictory to me.
No, I wrote "Anything preordained by anything is doomed by the redundancy of 'linear cause and effect'.
Basic cause and effect is linear .... action --- reaction. Perhaps I should've used 'mandated' in place of dictated. Free will/choice facilitates the evolving nature of 'allll' things due to the (unknown) branching of choices thereby providing different or 'non linear' outcomes, or, randomness .... chance.
The process of evolution is not independant from the entire process of the universe. Quantum and relativity theories require us to view the universe as a whole in which all processes/events are interdependant and co-existant. There are no discrtete "packets" of existence any more than there are independant processes such as evolution. It would be better to say that our "Freedom of choice/will" is shaped by the flow of the entire universe. A neural network seems to mimmick this phenomenon in microcosm. In a brain, we cannot localise the continual flow of neural activity and say "this is where it starts" or "this is where it ends." It is one holistic continual flow, a web of events in which causality fails.
Yes we are part of the chaos and as such are ascending to order through the same random process.
0 Replies
pswfps
1
Reply
Sat 31 Mar, 2007 10:19 am
If we are "ascending to order" then this order you speak of is an emergent property of the universal process. Ie, order was always an inherent aspect of it's fundamental nature. I extend this to the existence of "self" which most obviously exists.
Personally, I see no reason to think that the universe is any more "ordered" today than it was 4 billion years ago.
0 Replies
JLNobody
1
Reply
Sat 31 Mar, 2007 11:32 am
Great discussion. It seems we are generating a community of people who are outside the norm expressed by dualism and naive realism.
pswfps, the question of the virtually universal existence among humans of a "self" (with varying boundaries across cultures/linguistic systems) is very important. It IS interesting that an illusion should be so common. It has been suggested that this is because of its survival value. Truths can, in principle, promote destruction and errors survival. The illusion of the ego/self may be a functional prerequisite for the formation and operation of the human communities necessary for species survival.
Yet for the sake of "spiritual fulfillment" we must see the self for what it is, a useful fiction/mirage that separates us from all that is not-self resulting in an alienated orientation to the world of other "things."
Things and beings (of which selves are examples) are, by the way, also illusions which promote survival. There is, in reality, only the unitary PROCESS of who knows what? doing what it does for its own mysterious (can't say "reasons" or "ends"). All I (think I) know is that my real nature--and yours--IS that unitary process. We are ONE moving PROCESS, but we talk to each other as if we were separate beings (MANY distinct THINGS) trying to connect.
Heraclitus is God.
0 Replies
JLNobody
1
Reply
Sat 31 Mar, 2007 11:45 am
Fresco, a speculation: the maya symbol for nothingness/zero was the sea shell. It seems to me that this symbol was chosen to signify nothingness because the sea shell is empty: it contains "nothing" or "empty space".
Yet look at the same "empty space" after the shell is removed and that particular space is no more; it is now a general space, a larger, perhaps positive, phenomenon, like the transformation of a drop of water when it merges with its oceanic ground, the sea.
