I struggle to see the sense in defining anything as relative. — Matt Thomas

In the mind, definitions and relations between absolutes exist. The world, however, is another matter.

As the SEP article on Relations wrote:

Some philosophers are wary of admitting relations because they are difficult to locate. Glasgow is west of Edinburgh. This tells us something about the locations of these two cities. But where is the relation that holds between them in virtue of which Glasgow is west of Edinburgh?

Bradley's Regress makes the same point.

Either a relation R is nothing to the things it relates, in which case it cannot relate to them. Or, it is something to them, in which case R must be related to them. But for R to be related to a and b there must be not only R and the things it relates, but also a subsidiary relation R' to relate R to them. But now the same problem arises with regard to R'. It must be something to R and the things it related in order for R' to relate R to them and this requires a further subsidiary relation R'' between R', R, a and b. But positing more relations to fix up the problem is only throwing good money after bad. We fall into an infinite regress because the same reasoning applies equally to R' and however many other subsidiary relations we subsequently introduce.

IE, I can say "the Sun is larger than the Earth", in that "larger" exists as a concept in my mind, but where in the world does "larger" actually exist ?

So, I would describe the two examples you gave as equally absolute and relative, and equally neither. — Matt Thomas

I think the easiest way to have evidence for ' thesis is to admit that despite the ambiguities surrounding the concepts of relative and absolute, some things are more relative and some things are less relative. For example, the location of a trailer that is attached to a truck is more relative than the location of a trailer that is unattached and at rest; because the location of the first trailer is relative to something which is itself more variable. It is obfuscation to claim that the second trailer is relative to the movement of the Earth, and that they are therefore equally relative. It is obfuscation because the location of the first trailer is also relative to the Earth, but it is simultaneously relative to another variable body (the truck) and is therefore more relative than the second trailer.

I would say it requires obstinacy to deny that some things are more or less relative than others, but it also involves an inability to look at things from a different frame of reference or paradigm. The claim that 'relative' and 'absolute' are tricky concepts is understandable. The claim that they do not signify anything meaningful at all is unserious.

Not so much. Using words in the description of a subject is using the absolute definitions of those words.

A thing is either superior to something else or it is not. A thing is either flying or it is not. — Matt Thomas

That the claim absolutely was made or wasn't made, is irrelevant to the logic of the claim. I agree that the claim that something is superior to something else is either made or it isn't.

Anyway, perhaps you subscribe to an understanding of language that is incompatible with mine. You can't just interpret for yourself what it means for something to be relative and absolute, and then explain that the words are redundant. They're clearly not redundant, as long as you understand they convey a particular meaning, and not whatever meaning you've made up for them.

So I'm asking, what is the point in describing anything as relative if that 'relative' aspect can be defined completely synonymously in a way that most people here seem to describe as an example of absolute? — Matt Thomas

But to be absolute is a relative thing. The absolute only exists in terms of reciprocal bounds that mark the limits on being. Thus no thing itself can be absolute. All things are relative to those bounding limits.

I know, not quite what you mean. :cool: — jgill

But note how fractals neatly express the intermediate case between the continuous and the discrete. — apokrisis

Don't need fractals. There is no intermediate case. The continuous is the limit of the discrete.The limit definition of the common integral does the job. And when I write a computer program to obtain the image of a contour in the complex plane I choose a value of N and plot N points, then increase N to get a better image until reaching the limitations of my computer.

The continuous is the limit of the discrete. The limit definition of the common integral does the job. — jgill

And how are you defining the discrete? What grounds claims of there being a difference? Why is differentiation reciprocal to integration?

I agree maths likes to sweep its metaphysics under the carpet. And here you are on a philosophy site, doing just that. :roll:

Don't need fractals. There is no intermediate case. — jgill

You are missing the point. The real world of natural processes is pretty fractal, ain't it? Mountains, coastlines, rivers, earthquakes. Anything described in the language of dissipative structure.

So mathematically, we have an interest in modelling the fact that nature is indeed organised by emergent dynamical balance. It is not one thing or the other, but some equilibrium fluctuation around its opposed tendencies.

The earth's crust is a balance between cooling crust formation and weathering erosion. A coastline is irregular over every scale of observation because it is a dynamical balance between smoothness and roughness. Or "integration and differentiation".

Fractal maths showed up in that link as the kind of bug that the patch of "absolute continuity" is designed to fix.

But maybe the Cosmos just ain't a computation as maths would like to demand, and instead dynamical balance – self-organised emergence from symmetry-breaking – is the logical core of its being?

Why is differentiation reciprocal to integration? — apokrisis

You've got to be kidding. Reciprocal?

The real world of natural processes is pretty fractal, ain't it? Mountains, coastlines, rivers, earthquakes — apokrisis

In a very rough sense of the word. Not mathematically. No coastline is patterned the same upon closer and closer examination.

A coastline is irregular over every scale of observation because it is a dynamical balance between smoothness and roughness. Or "integration and differentiation". — apokrisis

Irregularity is a long way from fractal. Smoothness and roughness is comparable to integration and differentiation? :roll:

But maybe the Cosmos just ain't a computation as maths would like to demand, and instead dynamical balance — apokrisis

No reason to assert that "dynamical balance" is not mathematical.

You've got to be kidding. Reciprocal? — jgill

OK. Inverse if you prefer. And from there, the multiplicative inverse.

In a very rough sense of the word. Not mathematically. No coastline is patterned the same upon closer and closer examination. — jgill

Again you are talking about the absolutism built into the maths model and not the world of physical process that it then only roughly models.

Reality ain't a computation or a simulation. Coastlines aren't actually generated by an iterative algorithm.

No reason to assert that "dynamical balance" is not mathematical. — jgill

There you go again. Maths in its casual absolutism can provide pragmatic models of reality. But here you would need to start to think about how reality itself might be more deeply described.

Happy to be of service.
What I didn't get was how it relates to the concepts of 'relative' and 'absolute'. — Vera Mont

As I said, the relative is what is relative to human experience, and the absolute is what cannot be experienced, which in the context of this discussion is the existence of anything as it is pre-cognitively.

What you say here speaks precisely to this:

What is an object without its characteristics?
— Matt Thomas

unknowable — Vera Mont

The characteristics of objects are all and only those attributes of objects cognized by us. If we cognized no attributes, then there would be no object presenting itself to us.

I think the easiest way to have evidence for ↪apokrisis' thesis is to admit that despite the ambiguities surrounding the concepts of relative and absolute, some things are more relative and some things are less relative. — Leontiskos

Some things are relative to more other things than other things are is a better way of putting it. There are no degrees of relativity per se and certainly no degrees of absoluteness.

Nothing is absolute for us, everything is relative to us. However, we cannot but think that things have their own independent existence which is not dependent on, meaning not relative, to us. But even then, those things must be relative to other things, and then it would only be the sum of everything which is absolute, in the sense that there is nothing left out for it to be relative to. Is the sum of everything a thing, though? Seems like it is just an idea.

Edit: It just occurred to me that we might say the sum of everything is relative to everything in which case there would be no absolutes and the sum of everything would be the most relative thing of all. But then again, the question that arises is whether relation (being relative) is an actuality or merely an idea.

I am interested to hear what people have to say about this. I'm open to hearing an approach from any direction. — Matt Thomas

You're right. It's like left and right, up and down, big and small. If you could delete one side from human thought, the other side would also disappear.

It's a pervasive situation. Every object of thought appears to the mind against a backdrop of it's negation. It's part of how we think.

In philosophy, ordinarily the terms "absolute" and "relative" are modifiers which indicate that each instance of the latter R is dependent on – variable with respect to – the former A and that the former A is independent of – invariant with respect to – each instance of the latter R. For example: 'each path is relative – in relation – to (a/the) horizon'. (No doubt these terms are relative – dialectically related – to one another.)

As I said, the relative is what is relative to human experience, and the absolute is what cannot be experienced, which in the context of this discussion is the existence of anything as it is pre-cognitively. — Janus

I see. Is anything in the universe independent of humans?

I see. Is anything in the universe independent of humans? — Vera Mont

it seems there must be, but we cannot say what it is...

Maths in its casual absolutism can provide pragmatic models of reality. But here you would need to start to think about how reality itself might be more deeply described — apokrisis

No need to start thinking about the obvious. Thanks for the reminder. :smile: