There is no light coming from the future, only from the past. You say 'looks' but it is not observation but imagination. — unenlightened

I agree, "looks" is metaphorical. The usage goes back at least as far as Plato, "the mind's eye". So I think that "to look" in this sense is to direct one's attention in that way. So when we look for something, or look at something, we direct our visual sense in a particular way, also focusing the mental attention on that visual sense. A person can focus the attention of one's mind, in a very similar way, but looking without the senses, at something, or for something, completely mental, without employing the senses. Very often this thing focused on is a goal for the future, which a person might direct one's attention toward.

I agree that this is "imagination", but it's a special type of imagination, just like prediction is a special type of imagination, because unlike more random imagination such as dreaming, and the somewhat less random imagination of fiction writing, we assign some sort of reality to this type of imagined thing.

As you say, this type of imagining, which brings the imaginary into the real, is "the trick to anticipation". As a child I suffered from false anticipation. If I expected something really good, and it didn't pan out, I'd be greatly disappointed. I think that directing one's anticipation towards the real is a very important aspect of dealing with anxiety. The problem though, is that in relation to the past we have very clear principles as to what constitutes "real", we can refer to what has been sensed, "observed". But when I look to the future, how do I determine whether or not I will be disappointed, if I assign "real" to an anticipated event?

Fairy dust is like dark matter. The only evidence that it exists is that all our theories will be wrong unless it does. — T Clark

In this situation, the proper conclusion is that the theories are wrong. What's the point in sprinkling fairy dust to support a bad theory?

If Plato did excuse sophists and their method as simply misguided or self-delusional, great! It jibes with Socrates' pronouncement that no one is knowingly evil. — Agent Smith

This is another issue, and it really strikes at the heart of Plato's attack on sophistry. Socrates actually demonstrates that people are knowingly evil. We often do what we know is wrong. Augustine discussed this issue, as derived from Plato, at great length. Through this principle Plato demonstrates that virtue is not a form of knowledge. Since the sophists claim to teach virtue as a form of knowledge, and virtue is argued to be distinct from knowledge, sophistry is refuted in this way.

This is consistent with what I posted above. The sophists' claim to be able to teach virtue is based in the assumption that they knew virtue, in order to be able to teach it. Socrates demonstrated that they really did not know virtue. So what they taught was really a form of deception, even though they truly believed that they knew virtue, and that they could teach it.

You can tell because we can see where we've been, but not where we're going. — unenlightened

I think this is a very good point, unenlightened. This looking backward in time is fundamental to observation, and the basis of the empirical sciences. But when we turn around, to face the future directly, we are faced with possibilities, anticipations, wants, needs, desires, and the moral obligations of ought. There is what I think of as a wall of non-existence in front of us in time. The future cannot be sensed, nor has it been sensed, and it's as if there is a wall of unintelligibility directly in front of us, which we relate to through prediction.

The act of predicting involves a turning around, from facing the past in observation, to facing the future in anticipation. Any such turning requires a system of orientation to account for the reality of the turn. In our society we seem to be lacking in such a system. It's as if we believe that we can turn back and forth, from past to future, at will, without adapting the principles we apply in understanding, to account for the change in direction. The first step I believe, toward rectifying this, is accepting what you've pointed out, that there is a change in direction, between "where we've been" and "where we're going".

I am simple minded; I define 'forwards' as the way I am facing, my eyes being at, in, or on my face. I cannot see where I am going in time, but only where I have come from. Therefore the future is behind me and the past in front of me, and I progress backwards. "At or in?" I give not a fig. "on", why not? — unenlightened

We need to learn the true orientation, and this is where the mind is looking, not where the senses are looking. The mind looks to the future in anticipation, and the senses look rearward at the past. Therefore we need to adapt the rearward facing principles derived from observation, to be consistent with the true frontward facing direction of the mind, which is the future. The solution is not to try and tell the mind that it is facing the wrong direction, because the senses are facing backward in time, so backward is supposed to be forward. The solution is to understand that the senses are really facing backward.

Sophists want to fool you with flowery language, philosophers want only to make the truth pleasing to behold. — Agent Smith

I don't think this is the case. As Plato demonstrated, through the actions of Socrates, the sophist most often truly believes oneself to be doing the right thing, professing the truth. The problem is that the sophist is not properly educated in the true nature of right and wrong, good and bad. This means that the sophist's attempt to persuade, through the use of rhetoric, can be in the wrong direction, while the sophist truly believes it is the right direction.

There is no necessity for intent within this form of deception. The sophist simply attempts to, and claims to, teach what is beyond one's qualifications. Misinformation, is not necessarily disinformation. And there is a form of deception, like when a person deceives oneself, which does not require malintent.

Sophistry is rather rampant in our society, because mass media and an abundance of information, has turned us all into "know-it-alls", and we will go around showing off our knowledge in subjects which we are really quite ignorant of.

And anything non-physical is un-real, hence un-important. — Gnomon

I think the contradictory nature of this statement is at the heart of the problem. The importance, or "un-importance" of a subject is determined relative to its good, or purpose. The good of a thing, as what is desired, wanted, or needed, is a state not yet existent. Things not yet existent are non-physical, as mere possibility.

Therefore, to say that the non-physical is un-important is blatantly contradictory, because importance and unimportance are definitively non-physical. So if real and un-real are determined by importance, as your statement would suggest, it is necessary to class the non-physical as real, because importance and unimportance are non-physical.

My practical question for this thread, is why do Anti-Metaphysics Trolls, waste their valuable on-line time, trying to defeat something that they assume to be already dead, and although perhaps a ghostly nuisance, cannot by their definition, make any difference in the Real world? Metaphysical speculators are merely harmless drudges . — Gnomon

Hypocritical activity is often the direct result of contradictory beliefs, like the one expressed above. Despite the fact that the "Anti-Metaphysics Trolls" insist that metaphysics is unimportant and dead, they are still driven by the same non-physical sense of importance, to practice metaphysics. In other words they see some purpose to what you see as wasting time. Asserting and insisting that X is the case, does not make it so, especially if my actions serve as a demonstration that X is not the case.

That may be true in an abstract cognitive sense. But, if we didn't make the "connection" or "assumption" that a cliff edge (absence of solid ground) is really there, we could take a fatal step into the abyss. — Gnomon

The point was that we perceive it as a cliff edge, but whether the thing we perceive as a cliff edge is anything at all like what we perceive, is another question. So it's not a question of whether or not the perceived thing is dangerous, of course it is, the issue is what is that dangerous thing really like, and why is it dangerous.

Eugene was saying that the terrain (what is mapped), is the actual thing, but in reality, what is mapped is how the thing appears to us. And this is fundamental to map making in general, what is marked on the map, is things which seem to be important relative to some purpose. If the thing perceived as a cliff edge wasn't dangerous, we might not even notice it.

The noumenon and the phenomenon are equally real. — EugeneW

I agree they are equally real, but they are not the same, and are therefore "real" in completely different ways. That the noumenon is real, requires an assumption, the one dealt with by Descartes in the brain in a vat scenario. So I agree that the noumenon is real, but I do so only by rejecting scenarios like the brain in the vat, by saying that there must still be some sort of externally sourced stimulation to the brain to create the appearance of the phenomenon, even if it was just a brain in a vat.

If nobody perceives the sound as a sound, the sound waves are still there but the conscious experience of them is not. — EugeneW

This requires the assumption that the description, of sound waves, is actually true. Your proposition "the sound waves are still there", is only true if the description of what causes the phenomenon of hearing something (i.e. sound waves), is a true description. If the brain in the vat is the truth, then the sound waves description is actually false, and only what we were led into believing through some sort of deception.

An assumption which we can never proof, as we're not there in that scenario. But a reasonable one, seems to me. — EugeneW

The assumption that we know how the phenomenon relates to the noumenon is not a reasonable one in my mind.

So, there's the coding, then there's the proteins which are subject of - informed by - those instructions. Right there, there's a distinction between the instruction, and the material form. — Wayfarer

It's not actually the proteins which are "informed", it is the matter, which after being informed becomes a protein, which is informed. Notice the suffix "ed", which puts the act of information, the carrying out of the instructions, into the past, as causal.

There is a relationship between the instructions, and the informed matter (which is the protein), but the matter itself escapes this relationship. And this was how "matter" was defined originally by Aristotle, what is left out from the formula, and is therefore not changed in the act of being informed. This is essential to the nature of "change", that there is an aspect which is not affected (matter), and something which changes (form). The aspect which does not change (matter) is proven to be unintelligible. That is why there is a distinction to be made between the instruction and the material form The matter is an unknown aspect, not properly accounted for in the instructions, hence the reality of accidents.

The circumference of a circle / sphere / torus / Möbius loop ... (E.g. circumnavigating / orbiting the Earth.) — 180 Proof

Aristotle dispelled this idea a long time ago. When you traverse a circle, you arrive back at the same point where you started. The circle does not go on forever. And, we cannot assume that there is no starting point because motion requires a cause.

The terrain is still there when I don't look. — EugeneW

This is the falsity which Kant taught us about. What the map maps, i.e. "the terrain", is phenomena, which is a product of sensation. Therefore the terrain really is not there when you don't look. That there is some sort of correlation between "the terrain", as a product of your sensations, and the thing itself, is just an assumption people make.

There is still no indication that the Russians plan to take any cities with significant urban combat. Most Ukrainians aren't fanatics and will want to surrender once they run out of food (most Ukrainians are not fanatical jihadists actually willing to fight to the death). — boethius

I hear there's a bit of an influx of foreigners, going to fight Russia, in Ukraine. That's a different situation altogether.

Sure there's plenty clever people around, but if they don't work on issues that matter: they're the worst kind of stupid. — boethius

This statement is the worst kind of stupid. The issues which matter to me are not the same as the issues which matter to you. So what are you saying, if you do not agree with the importance of an issue which someone takes up, that person is stupid?

The world's greatest intellectual, by a pretty big margin, Noam Chomsky, has been criticizing American wars ... for a while now, pretty thoroughly, accurately, potent reasoning and exhaustive facts ... haven't seen the US end it's war policies. — boethius

"Greatest intellectual", that's a stretch. "A while now"? Like what, sixty years? That's a pretty good legacy. Imagine if he was born in Russia, criticizing the policies of his him country like that. He probably wouldn't have lasted for sixty days. It's a real nice life being a great proponent of freedom of speech, when you live in a country which allows it.

What I believe is that measurement is fundamentally unlimited. This does not mean that any measuring process will go on forever, but it could in principle go on forever. This allows that we can measure anything and everything. The measurement of time for example would go on forever, if time went on forever. But things that we measure are all finite, all limited, and nothing goes on forever, so we end up measuring everything we try to measure, and the measuring process never needs to go on forever.

It just doesn't make any sense to assert that doubt is fundamental. — Harry Hindu

Does it make sense to say that living beings were certain before they became uncertain? Is knowledge prior to a lack of knowledge. Of course not. Therefore it make sense to say that doubt (the mental state of uncertainty) is prior to, therefore more fundamental than certainty.

You seemed to be berating scientism in the other thread, but here you are embracing it. All I know is that when I decide to do something I can often times take time to simulate different actions and predictions of their outcomes of those actions and then choose the one that has the best predicted outcome. It can also involve comparing what is presently observed and integrating it with a vision of how I would like things to be and applying the best action to achieve that goal. So the way I am using "decide" is such that computers can make decisions to. It's simply a matter of being able to process sensory information (input) and then producing actions (output) based on one's programming (instincts and learned behaviors). — Harry Hindu

OK, so you do not even need to be certain in order to make a decision. How does this help your argument that certainty is more fundamental than doubt? It just shows how human acts, which are based in conscious decisions, do not even require certainty to be engaged into.

You don't need language to know you or anyone else is running. — Harry Hindu

Yes you do need language to decide whether something is running. I can't understand why you don't apprehend this. "Running" stands for a specific activity. If you do not know what "running" stands for (which would be the case if you had no language), it is impossible that you could judge whether something is running or not.

What is the history of Infinity? I know it exists at least for the sake of math, but has anything ever been to indicate that anything about it goes on forever? — TiredThinker

I believe "infinite" was established as a fundamental principle of measurement, which would allow that anything and everything could be measured. There cannot be more items than can be counted, because there is no limit to how high we can count. There cannot be something bigger or smaller than what can be measured, because we can always come up with a bigger or smaller measurement.

"Infinite" only refers to something which "goes on forever" when we're talking about temporal extension. And then, it could only be said to go on forever under the assumption that time has no end.

It's the question if this is the case. — EugeneW

That's not the case with mathematics. The axioms are not produced with the intent of representing 'what is the case'. And the ones which get accepted are the ones which prove to be useful. So they are produced by imagination, and accepted by pragmaticism, and there is no question of if what they say is the case.

But your analysis is interesting. — jgill

It's my opinion. There is a fundamental needlessness when mathematics employs multiple infinities. We might say that a thing could be infinite in this respect, and infinite in another respect, but quantitative is one category, so there is really no need for numerous quantitative infinities.

For example, if there is an infinite number of points between any two points, then why would there be a need for another infinite number of points between each one of those points between the two points. That's basic redundancy. And to say that the second bunch of infinities, the infinity of infinities, is somehow different from the first infinity, really makes no sense.

Will "straight" rulers be banned? — Ciceronianus

Well, space-time is curved so straight rulers ought to be a thing of the past anyway.

Ritual humiliation of singular individuals having always been a mover and shaker of world history of course. — StreetlightX

In politics, individuals who are movers and shakers, is a bad thing. So this needs to be discouraged. As movers and shakers, these individuals are out of line with "the will of the people", which exists as the establishment. In science and engineering, there is high esteem for the innovations of the movers and shakers. People like Einstein receive high respect. Shaking up the political order (which dictates right and wrong), is necessarily wrong. That's why democracies don't ever seem to be able to proceed with real change.

Semiosis doesn't seem like the sort of thing that could produce a mind. Semiosis seems like a product of the mind. — Daemon

That's the problem with apokrisis' metaphysics, it gets the temporal relation of cause and effect backward. But that's just the manifestation of a deeper problem, inherent within scientism in general, a complete misunderstanding of the nature of time. When physics represents fundamental processes as reversible, it's obvious that they are employing a misrepresentation of time. This is the "denial of the obvious" I refer to above. When we deny the obvious, we can produce a very simple model of reality which appears to avoid all the hard problems, such as the causal role of the free will of the individual. But then instead of having an unbridgeable gap within the theory (dualism), there is an incompatibility between the theory and the fundamentals of experience. The theory does not correspond with basic observation. This is the manifestation of a failure to respect the difference between past and future.

...where the self~world distinction is bridged from the start and so doesn't build in a dualistic Hard Problem. — apokrisis

In other words, the obvious is simply denied in the first place. If we dismiss what is obvious, the hard problem is no more. That's very similar to the scientific way of dealing with the problem of time. Deny that time is real, and the problem of 'what is time', goes away. It's just denial of the obvious.

It looks like the law is meant to encourage frivolous lawsuits. If you have pent up sexual misgivings, seek "injunctive relief".

A person or animal decides to doubt.. — Harry Hindu

I don't think you know the meaning of "doubt", Harry. It signifies an uncertain state of mind. Therefore your assertion that a person must decide to doubt is directly contradict to the nature of "doubt", as deciding signifies a form of certainty.

How can an organism decide to do something without knowing it's doing it?? — Harry Hindu

Now you are misusing the word "decide". Many, in fact most, actions performed by living beings are not produced from a decision. Biologists don't really know the true impetus behind most living actions, but we can surely say that the majority of them are not derived from decisions. So your question here is derived from the false premise, that an act of an organism proceeds from a decision, when in reality most of these acts do not derive from decisions.

A person doesn't need to know language to know it is running. Knowing how to use a language and knowing how to run are two different things. — Harry Hindu

I agree, knowing how to use language is completely different from knowing how to run. But notice that the question here concerns knowing that oneself is running, which is completely different from knowing how to run. In order for a person to know that oneself is running, I think It's quite obvious that the person must know what "running" is. Otherwise it is more likely that the person would misjudge oneself as running, because the judgement would be nothing better than a guess, when the person doesn't know what "running" signifies.

When you were born and while you were an infant did you doubt anything your parents, or anyone in a position of authority, told you? — Harry Hindu

Of course. This is just more evidence that you do not understand the meaning of "doubt".

THE CASE AGAINST INFINITY :
mathematicians should abandon the use of infinity in making calculations in favor of a
more logically consistent alternative. . . . Fortunately, such a concept is available to us—a concept called indefiniteness. — Gnomon

Try considering "infinity" in this way Gnomon. It is a principle established for the purpose of allowing us to measure anything, or everything. There can be no quantity greater than what we can count, because we allow the numbers to continue indefinitely. Further, any quality which can be quantified, such as spatial extension, size, will be measurable, because we allow this principle, that numbers can extend beyond any physical thing. Therefore any, and every physical thing is deemed as measurable, because of this principle, numbers are infinite.

Now in modern mathematics, axioms have been produced which attempt to make infinity itself something which can be measured. But since "infinite" is correctly attributed to the tool by which we measure, allowing anything and everything to be measurable, and we now make it a thing being measured, we effectively create a thing which cannot be measured, infinity itself. Infinity is something which the mathematical axioms pretend to measure, but which really cannot be measured (this is the sophistry of the mathemagjicians).

That infinity cannot be measured is demonstrable logically. The first proposed infinite measuring system, the natural numbers for example, would require a larger infinite measuring system, to measure it. This would thwart the first infinite measuring system's capacity to measure anything, with the proposition that there is something larger, which by definition, it cannot measure, i.e. the system larger than the infinite system, proposed as the means to measure the infinite system. Now the meaning and purpose of "infinite", as the tool which can measure anything, is lost, because we now assume that the infinite numbers cannot measure everything, because there is something bigger which measures it.

This produces the principle that there is always something bigger than the measuring system applied, something which cannot be measured by that measuring system, a bigger measuring system, and our measuring capacity to measure everything, has been thwarted. We have posited the principle that our measuring system is not big enough, by allowing that it can, itself, be measured by a bigger system. So this is a new feature of any measuring system, subject to that axiom, it can be measured by a bigger system. Therefore we always have to come up with a new system to measure the last. So there is always a need to produce bigger and bigger infinities in an attempt to measure everything, and we proceed toward an infinite regress of larger and larger infinities, measuring systems. In reality, the definition of "infinite" has been altered, to switch it from a principle which allows us to measure anything, to make it something which can be measured, when we haven't provided ourselves with the tool to measure it. And of course this is self-defeating.

At a certain point, the contradictions... collapse under their own weight. — Count Timothy von Icarus

I think you might be surprised at how immense the structures supported by contradiction might be. The issue being that ideology is weightless and such metaphors are inapplicable. There is no straw that breaks the camel's back.

If physical symbols are thoughts materialized, my concern is there doesn't seem to be a mathematical law that governs/determines the transformation of thoughts into physical words (spoken/written), very uncharacteristic of matter & energy (the physical world). — Agent Smith

I guess that's why philosophers often say that thoughts are not part of the physical world, not matter and energy, but something else.

But I wouldn't say that the physical symbols are actually thoughts materialized, explicitly, I'd say they are more like things created as representations of thoughts.

How do you know that you are doubting anything? Can you be certain that you are doubting? As I have said before certainty and doubt go hand-in-hand. It seems to me that you cannot doubt without the certainty that you are doubting. If you doubt that you are doubting, then you are doing something. What are you doing if not exhibiting a certainty of what you are doing whether it be doubting or not? — Harry Hindu

I really don't see your logic Harry. Why do you think that when a person is doing anything, doubting for example, the person must be certain of what oneself is doing? Do I need to be certain that I am running, in order for me to be running? The person who doesn't even know the word "running" would still run, and it would be impossible for that person to know oneself to be running. Likewise, the person who doesn't know the word "doubt" would be doubting without the possibility of being certain that they are doubting.

I can see that we may be more likely to doubt knowledge coming from others than we are in doubting our own knowledge. This is why we have rules of logic about pleading to popularity and authority. In using these rules of logic, are we doubting the propositions of others or becoming more certain that what they are saying is wrong and you are right? — Harry Hindu

I can't grasp your question here. When I ask someone to justify something, then, generally I am doubting that person. What this says about my own belief is that I believe that I ought to doubt others. It doesn't mean that I am certain that I ought to doubt others.

Very often, the sign is in no way similar to the thing which it signifies. That's an indication of the lack of necessity between the two, such that the relation may be random. It is important that we remember this, in order that we recognize that a theory, even though it is the correct theory, does not necessarily hold a relationship of semblance with the thing that it represents. This non-necessary nature of this relationship excludes the possibility that the relationship is scientific, or mathematically precise.

So, in theory, if thoughts are energy, we can change it into matter. — Agent Smith

You pass your thoughts to another person by speaking them or writing them down. When they are spoken or written down they are "changed into matter".

...the brain controls EVERY aspect of the body... — Garrett Travers

Are you totally oblivious to the reality of reflexes?

No, your research agreed with me, not you. — Garrett Travers

Since eyes evolved before brains, we can conclude that these eyes were not tools of the brain. So the general statement that eyes are tools of the brain is not true.

No, your research agreed with me, not you. And I pointed that out to you by quoting it. Did you miss that part? Here, I'll do it again:

"This has never been shown before," says Levin. "No one would have guessed that eyes on the flank of a tadpole could see, especially when wired only to the spinal cord and not the brain." The findings suggest a remarkable plasticity in the brain's ability to incorporate signals from various body regions into behavioral programs that had evolved with a specific and different body plan."

You completely misunderstood your research. — Garrett Travers

Read what it says. The findings suggest that body parts had evolved with "a specific and different body plan" than that given to them by the brain. Therefore the body part does not require the brain for its existence, and the part did not exist as a tool of the brain. Nor did the brain create the body part as a tool of the brain.

And do some research on that eye thing, you're completely clueless about it. — Garrett Travers

The research has been done, and referenced above. You are in denial of the facts, because they are incompatible with what you believe. So be it.

Now, it's time for you to address even the first topic of the research I've posted, or scram. — Garrett Travers

Sorry Travers, just like you are uninterested in the truth about the relationship between the eye and the brain, I'm not interested in the research you posted.

You seem to have conveniently forgotten how to read now.

The brain and body are ONE, not separate: — Garrett Travers

Now you're really not making sense. Are my feet a part of my brain?

What do you think it means when it clearly states, overtly, "There is no need for an information-processing organ (brain) before there is information to process?" — Garrett Travers

It means, that there is no need for an information processing organ (brain), in order for there to be an organ which receives the information (eye). Therefore we can conclude that the organ which receives the information (eye) does not exist as a tool of the organ which processes the information (brain).

Your not paying attention Garrett. The eye does not need the brain, and most likely evolved into existence prior to the brain. Therefore it does not exist as a tool of the brain.

Check Wikipedia on "The Evolution of The Eye":

"Eyes and other sensory organs probably evolved before the brain: There is no need for an information-processing organ (brain) before there is information to process.[19] A living example are cubozoan jellyfish that possess eyes comparable to vertebrate and cephalopod camera eyes despite lacking a brain."

The eye is the tool that the brain uses to generate sight. It has no function without the brain. — Garrett Travers

Did you read the article, and see how the experiments showed the tool to function without the brain?

"How?" is still a mystery, but the leading theory is that all structures of the brain operate in a complex network of unparralleled sophistiction. By produce, I mean emit, generate, or otherwise enable. Much like eyesight is produced by the brain, so too is consciousness. — Garrett Travers

If you unite the eyes and the brain, in this way, you cannot say that it is the brain which produces eyesight, because it cannot be done without the eyes. And if you separate eyes from the brain, then you need to account for how an eye can see without a brain: https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/02/130227183311.htm#:~:text=2-,Eyes%20work%20without%20connection%20to%20brain%3A%20Ectopic%20eyes,without%20natural%20connection%20to%20brain&text=Summary%3A,neural%20connection%20to%20the%20brain.

Either way, you are wrong to say that eyesight is produced by the brain.

Momentum is a property of a body with mass. Photons have no mass. Photons do not transfer momentum.