Picture a tranquil mountain meadow. Butterflies flit back and forth amongst the buttercups and daisies, and off in the distance, a snow-capped mountain peak provides a picturesque backdrop. The melodious clunk of the cow-bells, the chirping of crickets, and the calling of birds provide the soundtrack to the vista, with not a human to be seen.
Now picture the same scene — but from no point of view. Imagine that you are perceiving such a scence from every possible point within it, and also around it. Then also subtract from all these perspectives, any sense of temporal continuity — any sense of memory of the moment just past, and expectation of the one about to come. Having done that, describe the same scene.Now picture the same scene — but from no point of view. Imagine that you are perceiving such a scence from every possible point within it, and also around it. Then also subtract from all these perspectives, any sense of temporal continuity — any sense of memory of the moment just past, and expectation of the one about to come. Having done that, describe the same scene.
“Impossible!” you object. “How can I imagine any such thing?! It is really nothing at all, it is an impossibility, a jumble of stimuli, if anything — this is what you are asking me to imagine! It is completely unintelligible.”
But that is my point. By this means I am making clear the sense in which perspective is essential for any judgement about what exists — even if what we’re discussing is understood to exist in the absence of an observer, be that an alpine meadow, or the Universe prior to the evolution of h. sapiens. The mind brings an order to any such imaginary scene, even while you attempt to describe it or picture it as it appears to exist independently of the observer. — The Mind–Created World
SO let's go back to your meadow. I stand facing you. A butterfly flutters between us. You say "See the butterfly flutter from left to right!" I reply "Beautiful! But it went from right to left!"
"Ah," says you, "and from this we see that what is happening in this world is true or false only with reference to the perspective of some observer! For you, it is true that the butterfly went right to left, but for me it is that the butterfly flew left to right!"
But me being Banno, you know I'm going to disagree. "How can something be true for one of us and not for the other?" I ask, scratching my nose. You carefully explain again how truth, the way things are, is dependent on perspective, and that as a result mind is integral to the whole of reality; how we cannot have the "view from nowhere" required for truth to be independent of some point of view.
"Oh." says I. Then I sit quietly for a while, arms folded, staring at the ground, while you glory in the vista.
"If we swapped places, it would be you who says that the butterfly flew right to left, while I would say it flew left to right"
"Yes", you explain patiently, "The truth is dependent on one's perspective, so if we swap perspectives, we swap truths".
"But we agree that the butterfly was flying away from the river and toward the mountain", I finally offer.
"S'pose so", says you, in the hope of shutting me up.
So on we traipse, over the foothills, through the pass to the valley beyond the mountain; all the while, butterflies flitting past us, heading in the same direction.
Over a cup of coffee, I return to the topic. "Yesterday, the butterflies were going towards the mountain. Now, they are going away from the mountain. And yet they are going in the same direction. How can that be?"
"Well," you patiently begin, "both the butterflies and we are heading East, towards the rising sun. Yesterday the mountain was before us, and now it is behind us".
"Oh. So yesterday the butterfly was heading East, and today it is still heading East, and this is a way of saying which way the butterfly is heading?"
"Yes", you agree, thinking to yourself that next time you might choose a different companion.
"Yesterday we disagreed that the butterfly was heading left to right or right to left, and that this was because we each have a different perspective. But even though we had different perspectives, we agreed that for you it was left to right, while for me it was right to left - that if we swapped places, we would also swap perspectives. We agreed that the butterfly was heading towards the mountain. And now, even though the butterfly is heading away from the mountain, we agree that it is heading East. Is that right?" I puzzle.
"Yes!", your disinterest starting to show.
"So hasn't it been the case that the Butterfly was always heading East, regardless of our perspective? Isn't this a way of describing the situation that removes the need to give the perspective of the observer? And if that is so, then perspective is not an attribute of the world, but of how we say things about the world. We can rephrase things in ways that do not depend on where we are standing...."
Taking a breath, I continue "We started with butterflies moving left and right, but found ourselves disagreeing; then we said the butterflies were flying towards the mountain, but after we crossed the pass found that they are flying away from the mountain. Then we said that they are flying East. Each time, our view became broader, and where we were standing became less important. Sure, I can't talk about taking a point of view from nowhere, but it makes sense to try to talk about things in such a way that it doesn't matter were I am standing. Not a point of view from nowhere, but a point of view from anywhere. We can set out some truths in such a general way that we can agree, and it doesn't matter where we are standing. And if we do that, our personal perspective becomes irrelevant."
"Of course I can say what it is - it's mountains and poppies and butterflies... we agree on this. The thing is, you think as if you started this walk by yourself, and forgot about other people. That's the trouble with idealists - they are all of them closet solipsists."
"But you've set me another puzzle: the tent might not be where I think I left it. I might turn out to be mistaken about it's location. That'd be a puzzle for someone who understood the word as being created by the mind. If mind creates the world, how could the world ever be different to what the mind supposes - how could one ever be wrong about how things are? In order to be mistaken, there must be a difference between how things are and how one thinks they are - but how could that happen, if everything is in the mind..."
I sigh. "You know, we have followed this path each time, only to backtrack when the going gets tough. There are three problems - the puzzle of other people, the fact that we are sometimes wrong, and the inevitability of novelty - each of which points to there being meadows and butterflies and other people, despite what you have in mind. I think you know that idealism won't cut it." — Banno
There are three problems - the puzzle of other people, the fact that we are sometimes wrong, and the inevitability of novelty - each of which points to there being meadows and butterflies and other people, despite what you have in mind. I think you know that idealism won't cut it." — Banno
Cartesian anxiety refers to the notion that, since René Descartes posited his influential form of body-mind dualism, Western civilization has suffered from a longing for ontological certainty, or feeling that scientific methods, and especially the study of the world as a thing separate from ourselves, should be able to lead us to a firm and unchanging knowledge of ourselves and the world around us. The term is named after Descartes because of his well-known emphasis on "mind" as different from "body", "self" as different from "other".
So we will all agree on north and south and many other facts. But all of those agreements still rely on perspective, we're part of a community of minds agreeing and disagreeing. — Wayfarer
The sense that the world exists entirely outside and separately to us is part of the condition of modernity, in particular, summarized by the expression 'cartesian anxiety': — Wayfarer
If we couldn't generalise, your landscapes would just be a blooming, buzzing confusion of specks of light. We would not parse into shapes and objects of some more generalised type. We couldn't imagine the land held stories that might connect it as a more general historical flow. — apokrisis
So yes, modernity might create Cartesian anxiety. But that arises from a dichotomising logic being allowed to make an ontic claim – mind and matter as two incommensurate substances, two general forms of causality – and failing to see that the ontic position is that the cosmos just happens to have these epistemising organisms evolving within it as a further expression of the Second Law. — apokrisis
But how does that detract from what I’m saying? — Wayfarer
First job was to wind you back from confusing cognition as epistemic method with cognition as some kind of ontological mind stuff that grounds mind-independent reality. — apokrisis
The second objection is against the notion that the mind, or ‘mind-stuff’, is literally a type of constituent out of which things are made, in the same way that statues are constituted by marble, or yachts of wood. The form of idealism I am advocating doesn’t posit that there is any ‘mind-stuff’ existing as a constituent in that sense. The constitution of material objects is a matter for scientific disciplines (although I’m well aware that the ultimate nature of these constituents remains an open question in theoretical physics). — Wayfarer
If you looked at the Mind Created World piece, I explicitly state that I am not arguing for any such thing. — Wayfarer
The only salient point for my argument is the sense in which the measurement problem undermines the presumptively mind-independent nature of sub-atomic particles - that at some fundamental level, the separation of observer and observed no longer holds. And that’s because in the final analysis, reality is not objective but participatory. We’re not outside of or apart from reality - one of the fundamental insights both of phenomenology and non-dualism. It’s easy to say, but hard to see. — Wayfarer
Do you assume that 'the wavefunction' itself is mind-independent¹ (whether it 'collapses' (Copenhagen) or not (Everett))? — 180 Proof
The deep question, to refer you to Pattee again, is how can a molecule be a message? How does genetic information regulate a metabolic flow? — apokrisis
This thread has strayed away from the relatively simple yes/no/maybe question of a Just World --- where your opinion is just as valid as mine --- onto the open-ended (infinite ; non-empirical ; unverifiable) question of Subjective vs Objective Reality.It’s not a question of whether the ‘wave function’ is or isn’t mind-dependent. The equation describes the distribution of probabilities. When the measurement is taken the possibilities all reduce to a specific outcome. That is the ‘collapse’. Measurement is what does that, but measurement itself is not specified by the equation, and besides it leaves open the question of in what sense the particle exists prior to measurement. — Wayfarer
One might even say that the latter has little if anything to do with the former - that how things are is a different type of question to what we should do.This thread has strayed away from the relatively simple yes/no/maybe question of a Just World --- where your opinion is just as valid as mine --- onto the open-ended (infinite ; non-empirical ; unverifiable) question of Subjective vs Objective Reality.
To Wit : Various interpretations of Quantum "collapse" seem to split along the line of another non-empirical question : is there a truly general Objective Observer to maintain the cosmos in Potential (statistical uncertainty - probability) when no specific Subjective observer is looking (measuring) to make it locally certain (Actuality)? Is it true that, the quantum waveform, and the immaterial field within which it is waving, is a generalized mathematical abstraction (mental image), not an observed real event? — Gnomon
" ...it is empirically true that the Universe exists independently of any particular mind."Hence there is no need for me to deny that the Universe is real independently of your mind or mine, or of any specific, individual mind. Put another way, it is empirically true that the Universe exists independently of any particular mind. But what we know of its existence is inextricably bound by and to the mind we have, and so, in that sense, reality is not straightforwardly objective. It is not solely constituted by objects and their relations. Reality has an inextricably mental aspect, which itself is never revealed in empirical analysis ¹. Whatever experience we have or knowledge we possess, it always occurs to a subject — a subject which only ever appears as us, as subject, not to us, as object. — The Mind–Created World
" ...it is empirically true that the Universe exists independently of any particular mind."
yet
"...its existence is inextricably bound by and to the mind we have" — Banno
it is empirically true that the Universe exists independently of any particular mind. But what we know of its existence is inextricably bound by and to the mind we have, and so, in that sense, reality is not straightforwardly objective. It is not solely constituted by objects and their relations. Reality has an inextricably mental aspect, which itself is never revealed in empirical analysis. Whatever experience we have or knowledge we possess, it always occurs to a subject — a subject which only ever appears as us, as subject, not to us, as object.
It’s not a question of whether the ‘wave function’ is or isn’t mind-dependent. The equation describes the distribution of probabilities. When the measurement is taken the possibilities all reduce to a specific outcome. That is the ‘collapse’. Measurement is what does that, but measurement itself is not specified by the equation, and besides it leaves open the question of in what sense the particle exists prior to measurement. — Wayfarer
" ...it is empirically true that the Universe exists independently of any particular mind."
yet
"...its existence is inextricably bound by and to the mind we have" — Banno
Take this as granted.it is empirically true that the Universe exists independently of any particular mind.
We can grant the point that we only know things with our minds.But what we know of its existence is inextricably bound by and to the mind we have
Reality is just what is the case. It is neither subjective nor objective, it just is.and so, in that sense, reality is not straightforwardly objective.
Neither here nor there.It is not solely constituted by objects and their relations.
This has not been demonstrated. What has been shown is that what we know "has an inextricably mental aspect".Reality has an inextricably mental aspect, which itself is never revealed in empirical analysis.
What we experience and know, is about reality, but is not the whole of reality.Whatever experience we have or knowledge we possess, it always occurs to a subject...
Indeed, what we know is mental, but that does not imply that the world is mental...— a subject which only ever appears as us, as subject, not to us, as object.
Fairness is not something we come across in the world.
It's something we do in the world. — Banno
And I agree that there is a division here that needs acknowledgement. For Way, it is the difference between the world and mind. For me, it is the difference between how things are and how they ought be. — Banno
The argument attempts to show that the world is partially mental, but only succeeded in showing that the what we say about the world is "mental".
That is, the argument presented here does not demonstrate it's conclusion. — Banno
Epistemological idealism and ontological idealism both emphasize the centrality of the mind in understanding reality, but they focus on different aspects of the relationship between mind and world. Epistemological idealism concerns itself with the nature and scope of human knowledge, asserting that what we can know about the world is inherently shaped by the structures of our minds. This perspective holds that our understanding of reality is mediated by our perceptions, concepts, and cognitive faculties, suggesting that we cannot access the world as it is in itself, independent of our mental activities. Philosophers like Immanuel Kant exemplify this view, arguing that while things-in-themselves (noumena) exist, our knowledge is limited to phenomena—the world as it appears to us through our cognitive filters.
Ontological idealism, on the other hand, posits that reality itself is fundamentally mental or immaterial in nature. This viewpoint claims that what exists is inextricably linked to or constituted by consciousness. In its strong form, as articulated by George Berkeley, ontological idealism denies the existence of a mind-independent material world altogether, maintaining that only minds and their ideas exist. In this view, objects are collections of ideas perceived by a mind, and their existence depends on being perceived. Ontological idealism thus extends beyond the limits of human knowledge to propose a metaphysical thesis about the very nature of being.
Reality has an inextricably mental aspect, which itself is never revealed in empirical analysis ~ Wayfarer
This has not been demonstrated. What has been shown is that what we know "has an inextricably mental aspect". — Banno
But does anyone claim that your observation --- of a "collapsing" quantum event for instance --- creates the actual world that I personally routinely experience, apart from scientific experiments/measurements? Or that we collectively "participate" in creation of the world that we all more or less agree is out there? — Gnomon
we are also agents who make choices and hold ourselves responsible for our actions, and need to sense that we are participants in a meaningful cosmos, not just ‘heat sinks’ doing our own little bit towards maximising entropy. — Wayfarer
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