Is anyone willing to defend a mind-independent view? — noAxioms

I have no problem at least holding to a mind-independent view or notion or idea, of reality, given a particular set of presuppositions, those in turn given from the kind of intelligence supposed as immediately in play.

Perhaps the key to the inevitable circularity of human reason, is not to get spun out by it.

Is anyone willing to defend a mind-independent view? I am not positing idealism, where there is no distinction between a concept and the ding-an-sich. I'm just noting that human biases tend to slap on the 'real' label to that which is perceived, and resists slapping that label on other things, making it dependent on that perception. — noAxioms

If it isn't idealism then it must be some form of panpsychism. Minds are not fundamental. Information is. Minds are one of those complexities that arise from exponential information processing. Brains are mental models of other minds and brains are one of the most complex things we know. We understand that complex things arise from an interaction of less complex things.

What do we take away from all this? Perhaps that ontology runs backwards. The existence of a causal thing is not objective, but rather works backwards from the arrow of time. Future measurements cause past measured events to come into existence, at least relative to the measurement done. And by 'measurement', I mean any physical interaction, not a mind-dependent experiment does with intention. Such a definition would be quite consistent with the Eleatic Principle, no? — noAxioms

Sure, but what about your mind? Is your mind in the past? Based on what you are saying, another's observation of your brain would be in the past, but your mind, for you, is in the present. One might say it is the present, and the past and future are processed information in the mind. The past and future would actually be in the present. Solipsism seems to logically follow from this.

If you're going to make an argument for causal systems being real, but the world is not mind-independent, then what are the causes of your experiences, if not mind-independent? I just don't see how you can say, "mind-independent" and not mean idealism, panpsychism or solipsism.

If you're saying it's backwards then you are saying that complexity is fundamental and simplicity arises from complexity, not the other way around. Is this what you are saying?

Is anyone willing to defend a mind-independent view? — noAxioms

Start with Johnson's stone - or anything else, really. You argue it does not exist? Kindly make that argument clear and explicit. I myself distinguish between ideas and (material) things, both real, but ideas not "independently" existing.

I myself distinguish between ideas and (material) things, both real, but ideas not "independently" existing. — tim wood

If ideas are real then how can you say that they do not independently exist? Do ideas exist independent of rocks? If rocks do not need ideas to exist, do ideas need rocks to exist? You might say that ideas of rocks need rocks to exist, but what about ideas of things that do not exist in the world, like leprechauns? Are ideas of leprechauns independent of rocks?

Is saying that some thing exists independently saying that it can exist without interacting with anything else causally, or that it is a property of one thing and not another (ideas are properties of minds and not properties of rocks so ideas exist independently of rocks), or something else?

Is anyone willing to defend a mind-independent view? — noAxioms

Yes. I would defend the following, more or less from Frege (and paraphrased by Michael H. McCarthy):

1. There is an objective reality, independent of, but accessible to human knowledge.

2. Though human error is abundant, and it's often hard to discriminate between mind-independent and mind-dependent reality, we do in fact possess much genuine knowledge of this reality, including the standard parts of mathematics.

3. Not only the natural sciences, but logic and mathematics have objective truths as their subject matter.

Frege wrote:

If we want to emerge from the subjective at all, from the realm of ideas, we must conceive of knowledge as an activity that does not create what is known but grasps what is already there. — Basic Laws of Arithmetic, 23

I think this is too strong. I would replace "grasps" with "interacts with and displays," to allow for the role of human cognition in this process.

Here's what I would not defend:

1. A use of the term "objective" to mean "out there in a timeless, changeless way that is not only independent of how human consciousness pictures it, but also somehow identical to it." (Frege probably did believe this.)

2. A meta-vocabulary in which human knowledge is itself defended as knowably objective and certain. We don't have any such knowledge or certainty. My beliefs -- and yours -- about mind-independent reality are not verifiable in the way that statements in science are.

3. An either/or conception of objectivity and subjectivity, leading to the view that if mind-independent reality is apprehended by a subject, it has therefore been transformed into non-mind-independent reality, and is hence "only subjective."

What do we take away from all this? Perhaps that ontology runs backwards. The existence of a causal thing is not objective, but rather works backwards from the arrow of time. Future measurements cause past measured events to come into existence, at least relative to the measurement done. And by 'measurement', I mean any physical interaction, not a mind-dependent experiment does with intention. — noAxioms

Hi,

The problem here, in my opinion, is that if every physical object is taken to qualify as an 'observer' (which seems to be implied by your assertion that any physical interaction is a measurement), then the number of 'perspective' is probably to high.

If QM could be in principle be applied at all scales, if you consider, say, the fall of a pen on a table, the 'perspectives' are incredibly many.
The impact between the pen and the table could be described with respect to the whole pen, the tip, the cap, the pen casing and so on. Yes, the advantage here might be that the 'mind' has no special role, but there is an explosion in the number of 'perspectives'.

Personally, I prefer to interpret QM epistemically, in which case there is no 'causal' role of the observer. However, it might mean that there is a limit of that we can know about mind-independent physical reality. I do believe that positing a mind-independent reality is simply necessary to do science, however.It seems the best explanation for the regularities in the world we experience, intersubjective agreement and so on. But maybe an accurate 'picture' of it is beyond our capabilities.

Anyway, I also believe that we now have no problems to interpret epistemically classical mechanics. We do not take literally the existence of 'forces' and so on. We now have no problems as interpreting the entities in classical theories as useful abstractions. So why we should take QM as a faithful 'picture' of reality?

You (decide to) call your dog, and it comes over: mind → world

Your dog comes over, making you happy: world → mind

So no, not independent.

First we have to consider the meta-metaphysics of "mind-independence"; should mind-independence be understood to be an existential claim that the world literally exists independently of the senses? Or should mind-independence be understood as merely a semantic proposal that physical concepts are definitionally not reducible to the senses?

And even if an apparently dogmatic realist insists upon the former interpretation, should we nevertheless interpret him to be a semantic realist? For can we really entertain the idea that the realist is conceiving the world as existing independently of his senses?

Minds are not fundamental. Information is. — Harry Hindu

Let's say you have a compact disk of Mozart pieces. In a mindless universe, that disk is just a collection of particles assembled in a disk with a bunch of tiny pits. There's no musical information, right? But the CD also obviously contains musical information. Mind is fundamental viz a viz the musical information.

Or take a book about Sherlock Holmes. In a mindless universe, that book is just a collection of inks and pages. There's no Sherlock Holmes there. But that book also contains information about Sherlock Holmes which only a universe with minds could detect.

If ideas are real then how can you say that they do not independently exist? — Harry Hindu

Ideas do not exist independently of the mind that has them. Rocks on the other hand do.

Ideas do not exist independently of the mind that has them. — tim wood

What about numbers?

What about numbers? — RogueAI

What about them? A number is an idea. Perfectly real as such. But have you ever seen one, ordered one at McDonald's with sauce? Seen one in the woods? And if no mind thinks two, then no two. Right? And similarly with any idea.

What about them? A number is an idea. Perfectly real as such. But have you ever seen one, ordered one at McDonald's with sauce? Seen one in the woods? And if no mind thinks two, then no two. Right? And similarly with any idea. — tim wood

I agree but mathematical platonism is very popular.

First we have to consider the meta-metaphysics of "mind-independence"; should mind-independence be understood to be an existential claim that the world literally exists independently of the senses? Or should mind-independence be understood as merely a semantic proposal that physical concepts are definitionally not reducible to the senses? — sime

This is good. I don't know what @noAxioms has in mind, but I take "mind-independence" to express the former, existential thesis. The semantic proposal would follow.

And even if an apparently dogmatic realist insists upon the former interpretation, should we nevertheless interpret him to be a semantic realist? For can we really entertain the idea that the realist is conceiving the world as existing independently of his senses? — sime

(I think the realist can be one without being dogmatic!) Not sure what seems un-entertainable about that idea. Could you expand? As best I can tell, the sort of nuanced realism I was laying out earlier does allow me to conceive a world independent of my senses, if by this we mean "existing independently but not necessarily known independently." In the case of math and logic, I would say it's also known independently of the senses, though we may need the senses as a jumping-off place for noetic investigation.

(I think the realist can be one without being dogmatic!) Not sure what seems un-entertainable about that idea. Could you expand? — J

Suppose a realist insists "Metaphysical realism is true". If we understand the realist's beliefs as having a causal explanation in terms of the realist's psychological conditioning and sensory input, then we cannot interpret the realist's assertion "metaphysical realism is true" as representing metaphysical realism. Instead we must interpret his assertion as meaning what we might prefer to express by saying "metaphysical realism is false".

If we understand the realist's beliefs as having a causal explanation in terms of the realist's psychological conditioning and sensory input . . . — sime

But why need we do this? I myself don't view realism as a fancy sort of physicalism. There are all kinds of ways to get reasons, ideas, intentions, propositions, what have you, into realism. (Which of these might be mind-independent is a different, and complicated, question.) But now I understand what you meant. If the metaphysical realist doesn't countenance reasons, as opposed to psychological and physical causes, then their case is much harder to make. A typical self-referential paradox would seem to result.

"Principle 1 (The Eleatic Principle) An entity is to be counted as real if and only if it is capable of participating in causal processes" — noAxioms

As if causal processes were clearer than the chair on which I sit.

The Eleatic Principle looks pretty useless.

You argue it does not exist? — tim wood

The stone stands out to me, so it exists to me. But that's expressed as a relation. Most people's concept of existence is a relation, even if they don't call it that.

Kindly make that argument clear and explicit. I myself distinguish between ideas and (material) things, both real — tim wood

So do I, to the point where at any point I want to reference the idea, I will say 'perception of X', 'concept of X', or whatever.

If ideas are real then how can you say that they do not independently exist? — Harry Hindu

Not independent at least of the process via which they are implemented.

You might say that ideas of rocks need rocks to exist — Harry Hindu

Nah... My ideas of unicorns exist despite the typical assertion of the nonexistence of the unicorns.

I have no problem at least holding to a mind-independent view or notion or idea, of reality, given a particular set of presuppositions, those in turn given from the kind of intelligence supposed as immediately in play. — Mww

Cannot parse this. Are you speaking of the intelligence making the presuppositions? Would that be you? Is reality dependent on your suppositions?
How is a presupposition distinct from a supposition?

If it isn't idealism then it must be some form of panpsychism. — Harry Hindu

You seem to misunderstand the OP. I'm not suggesting that mind causes the existence of things, but rather that the minds cause the concept of existence of things. Whether that concept corresponds to objective fact is an open issue. People tend to assert the existence of things perceived. (They're presumed to exist) because they are perceived, but I think you're reading it more as They're presumed to (exist because they are perceived). The latter is the idealism I'm not talking about.

Minds are not fundamental. Information is. — Harry Hindu

:up:

What do we take away from all this? Perhaps that ontology runs backwards. The existence of a causal thing is not objective, but rather works backwards from the arrow of time. Future measurements cause past measured events to come into existence, at least relative to the measurement done. And by 'measurement', I mean any physical interaction, not a mind-dependent experiment does with intention. Such a definition would be quite consistent with the Eleatic Principle, no? — noAxioms

Sure, but what about your mind? Is your mind in the past? — Harry Hindu

More to the point, are 'you' in the past, and per the reasoning quoted above, the answer is yes. A relational view is described there, and Rovelli (from Relational Quantum Mechanics) says that a system at a moment in time does not exist since it hasn't measured itself. It can only measure the past, so only prior events exist relative to a measuring event.

Based on what you are saying, another's observation of your brain would be in the past, but your mind, for you, is in the present. — Harry Hindu

Well, not being a presentist, I would word such comments more in B-series. Any particular brain state includes observation of past states, binding those states into a meaningful identity. I (some arbitrary noAxioms state event) have but one causal past (a worldline terminating at said event), but no causal future since no subsequent state is measured.

This is quite different from a more classical presentist view where only current state exists (all unmeasured, all counterfactual), and the past is but a memory, not real.

If you're going to make an argument for causal systems being real — Harry Hindu

Eleatic Principle says that all causal states are real. The principle has an objective wording, not the weird backwards-arrow causal ontology described by the paragraph quoted.

BTW, minds do not come into play with either definition. Your example involved a mind, but it didn't need to.

If you're saying it's backwards then you are saying that complexity is fundamental and simplicity arises from complexity

No, no complexity required at all. Just causal interactions.

Frege wrote:

If we want to emerge from the subjective at all, from the realm of ideas, we must conceive of knowledge as an activity that does not create what is known but grasps what is already there. — Basic Laws of Arithmetic, 23 — J

Quite agree with this. Grasping what is objective truth. Does it being fact imply that 'it is already there'? Do the phrases mean the same thing?

Not so sure about McCarthy's quotes

1. There is an objective reality, independent of, but accessible to human knowledge. — J

If it's objective, there's an incredible lot more of it that the tiny spec accessible to humans. So I cannot agree with this statement, or that it follows from the Frege quote. Natural sciences seem to be only relevant to our world, not objectively relevant as is the case with mathematics.

Here's what I would not defend:

1. A use of the term "objective" to mean "out there in a timeless, changeless way that is not only independent of how human consciousness pictures it, but also somehow identical to it." (Frege probably did believe this.)

If reality isn't out there in a timeless way, then it is contained by time, a larger reality than 'all of reality', which seems very contradictory. Time seems very much to be a property of this world (and any other causal structure). Intuition might say otherwise, but truth is not the purpose of intuition.

The problem here, in my opinion, is that if every physical object is taken to qualify as an 'observer' (which seems to be implied by your assertion that any physical interaction is a measurement), then the number of 'perspective' is probably to high. — boundless

Some clarification then. I use 'observer' to mean something like people, any entity which can gather information and attempt to glean its own nature. 'Measure' on the other hand comes from quantum mechanics, the most simple interaction between two 'physical' states, say a rock measuring rain by getting wet and getting a jolt of momentum from the drop. That's a measurement, but not an observation.

If QM could be in principle be applied at all scales, if you consider, say, the fall of a pen on a table, the 'perspectives' are incredibly many. — boundless

Yes, hence there being an incomprehensible quantity of worlds under something like MWI. You list a classical interaction, but the tiny ones are far more frequent.

Personally, I prefer to interpret QM epistemically, in which case there is no 'causal' role of the observer. — boundless

Go Copenhagen then. It's the point of that interpretation. There's no causal role of the observer in any interpretation except the Wigner interpretation, which Wigner himself abandoned due to it leading to solipsism.

However, it might mean that there is a limit of that we can know about mind-independent physical reality. — boundless

I'm not too worried about not knowing about it. But positing that only the parts that we know are all that exists is what makes such a premise in an observer-dependent definition of existence.

I do believe that positing a mind-independent reality is simply necessary to do science — boundless

Positing that the stuff we see is mind independent is indeed necessary to do science. But positing that all of reality is confined to the stuff we see is what I typically see in assertions of what exists. It's a very pragmatic way of looking at it, but not an objective way of looking at it at all.

First we have to consider the meta-metaphysics of "mind-independence"; should mind-independence be understood to be an existential claim that the world literally exists independent of the senses? Or is mind-independence merely a semantic proposal that physical concepts are definitionally not reducible to the senses? — sime

You see the distinction then, articulating it in a different way than I had.

Let's say you have a compact disk of Mozart pieces. In a mindless universe, that disk is just a collection of particles assembled in a disk with a bunch of tiny pits. There's no musical information, right? — RogueAI

A CD player will still produce the air vibrations of the music. Nothing will be around to interpret those patterns as music though. Tree falls in forest. Ground shakes, as does air, but it that making a sound?

What about numbers? — RogueAI
What about them? A number is an idea. — tim wood

I think there is a thing in itself behind the idea. Sure, isolated minds can independently come up with the same mathematics (unlike any God story), so that's pretty hard evidence of it having more existence than just a shared idea.

As if causal processes were clearer than the chair on which I sit. — Banno

I think they are clearer. OK, the chair affects you personally, but I cannot conceive of any observer sans some sort of causality being involved. For as old as the definition is, I find it to be elegant and still applicable.

Then set out what a causal process is.

When we talk about things being real, the paradigmatic cases are chairs and rocks and the screen on which you are reading this text. Or "This is a hand".

So set out what "causal processes" are in a way that is clearer than the hand you hold up in front of us.

The Eleatic Principle often gets treated like a clean-cut ontological razor—real only if causally efficacious—but it does so by assuming that "causal processes" are more intelligible than the very things we’re trying to assess as real.

The stone stands out to me, so it exists to me. — noAxioms

I should have that as exists-to-me. That might signal that the existence referenced is not existence qua, but instead existence-to-(a someone). And that leaves the question of existence itself - does the stone exist? And this gets Kantian. As a practical matter of course the stone exists. In some sciences the presupposition is that the stone exists, And in some other sciences, "exists" and "stone" might have to be defined as terms of art.

But unless the practical and scientific worlds are illusions, it's pretty clear that something exists. We may as well call it a stone - and that merely an issue of naming.
.

An entity is to be counted as real if and only if it is capable of participating in causal processes" — noAxioms

I've evolved - no cleverness on my part, just through reading - to an understanding that there is no such thing as a cause, that notions of causes are convenient fictions useful for assigning connections between events in a practical way for practical purposes - as such, just ideas surviving on the basis of their utility rather than being.

Near as I can tell, this understanding pretty well established even 100 years ago if not earlier.

When we talk about things being real, the paradigmatic cases are chairs and rocks and the screen on which you are reading this text. Or "This is a hand". — Banno

Yes, that's utilizing the pragmatic definition, but such a definition is necessarily confined to the entity finding utility in the definition, illustrating my point that such definitions are dependent on said entity, which presumably has something that qualifies as mental processes.
To reach for objectivity, one has to abandon the mind-dependent paradigm. The suggestion of a causal entities is floated as one way to go about it. I tend to go for examples not too close to what most of use would choose, so an example of a causal structure is Conway's Game of Life (GoL). It describes a 2D space+1D time structure where each 2D state is determined from application of its 'laws of physics' to the prior state. That makes it a causal structure. So an 'object' like a glider exists by such a causal definition, and yet you won't find one on your coffee table.

I should have that as exists-to-me. That might signal that the existence referenced is not existence qua, but instead existence-to-(a someone). — tim wood

a something, not a someone. Yes, it is a relation, and there can be no necessity of a 'someone' if it is to be mind independent. So yes, presuming such a relational definition, you get this:

And that leaves the question of existence itself - does the stone exist?

The question is meaningless with the relational definition, so a different meaning is implied by that usage. Does it exist? Does it matter? Would 2+2 not equal 4 if the 2's lacked existence? Must fire be breathed into the equation for it to be fact?

And this gets Kantian.

Which sucks because what little I know of Kant is his idealism, which seems off topic for a discussion of mind-independence, but what do I know of what Kant might contribute?

As a practical matter of course the stone exists. In some sciences the presupposition is that the stone exists, And in some other sciences, "exists" and "stone" might have to be defined as terms of art.

That practical usage is a relational one, despite most missing that there's a relation implied. I'm trying to go well beyond that practicality. I don't thing the existence of the stone is any sort of illusion. The true nature of it is hardly classical like it's treated, but classical treatment is quite pragmatic. The stone relates to me, and typically that is simplified to objectivity. Why not?

I've evolved - no cleverness on my part, just through reading - to an understanding that there is no such thing as a cause — tim wood

Physics being causal and there being 'a cause' are different things. Got some examples? I mean, a butterfly yawns in Brazil and a hurricane happens 3 months later. Had the butterfly not yawned (like they even can, I know...), the hurricane would not be, but other ones would Is the butterfly the cause of it? Heck no, but it contributed. Is there one cause of the storm? Is there one cause of the murder? Of course not. Does that mean that the guy that shoved in the knife isn't responsible? Probably not.

Maybe I'm off track and your example can let me know what is mean by their being no such thing as a cause.

Yes, that's utilizing the pragmatic definition, but such a definition is necessarily confined to the entity finding utility in the definition, illustrating my point that such definitions are dependent on said entity, which presumably has something that qualifies as mental processes. — noAxioms

What does that argue? That becasue this hand is only recognised as such by someone, that therefore there is no real hand? That the rock is not real except when used by someone?

Maybe I'm off track and your example can let me know what is mean by their being no such thing as a cause. — noAxioms

Well, think about what (exactly) a cause is.

Let's suppose there's a condition C1 at time T1, and also a condition C2 at time T2. Now suppose you have a model/explanation/"cause" that for you accounts for C2 in terms of C1. We might call your account an account of a cause. But what is that but a description with at best some utility you think of as worthwhile - at best an idea. But in any case not a thing. And only a "cause" insofar as it's useful to you.

And, for any event, if causes are to be considered, are they one or many? An example from a book: a car rolls in a turn: what caused it to roll? Excessive speed says the policeman. Faulty suspension, says the mechanic. Poor road design, says the civil engineer. Ice on the road, says & etc. Or from the same book, a man uses dynamite to remove a tree stump (possible, once upon a time). What, exactly, caused the dynamite to explode?

Or, gravity causes things to fall. Except it doesn't and they don't.

It's generally understood that causes were basic presuppositions at one time. From the book referenced just above, the author observes that for Newton, some events had causes, others were the result of the operation of laws. For Kant, everything was caused. And for modern science, nothing is caused.

Causes can be useful descriptive ideas, but try to figure out what one is, exactly, and how exactly it works. Which, if a cause is a thing, should not be too difficult. My understanding is that much of science gave up on cause as an explanatory at least about 100 years ago, using it if at all as a convenient and informal fiction.

Which sucks because what little I know of Kant.... — noAxioms

An intro, to Kant needn't be too painful. This book, for example, Kant in 60 Minutes: Great Thinkers in 60 Minutes.

Excellent.

So we have the chair, and an ill- defined notion of one even following another. Which is more real? Which, more intelligible?

My understanding is that much of science gave up on cause as an explanatory at least about 100 years ago, using it if at all as a convenient and informal fiction. — tim wood

What are major causes of infant mortality?
Does polio virus cause paralysis?
Does increased atmospheric CO2 cause global warming?

The list could be extended indefinitely.

Yet none of these are considered in terms of causal relationships?

in fundamental physics causality might not be a basic term in the equations. But in biology, medicine, and climate science, etc causal inference is the basis of explanation, prediction, and intervention. We may not always know the deep metaphysical nature of causality, but we know enough to act on it.

@noAxioms - Kant primer

A CD player will still produce the air vibrations of the music. Nothing will be around to interpret those patterns as music though. Tree falls in forest. Ground shakes, as does air, but it that making a sound? — noAxioms

Yeah, the CD example wasn't that good. I think the Sherlock Holmes one is better. So what do you think of that? Isn't there information in the book about Sherlock Holmes? Can that information still exist in a mindless universe? I don't see how.

What are major causes of infant mortality?
Does polio virus cause paralysis?
Does increased atmospheric CO2 cause global warming? — Wayfarer

Try something simpler, in my example above what makes the dynamite explode. Or, you can say the polio virus can cause paralysis. Now say what that exactly means. I think you will find that it does not exactly mean anything.

But in biology, medicine, and climate science, etc causal inference is the basis of explanation, prediction, and intervention. We may not always know the deep metaphysical nature of causality, but we know enough to act on it. — Wayfarer

Which, if you're paying attention to what you're writing, you will see that it agrees with what I've said.

Now say what that exactly means. I think you will find that it does not exactly mean anything. — tim wood

For pragmatic purposes it is what enables the effectiveness of applied science. The difficulty of discerning the precise nature of causality notwithstanding.

Phenomena, by definition, are what appears — what shows up in experience and measurement. Causal explanation belongs to that domain. It may not tell us what things are “in themselves,” but it’s how science works in practice. Calling causality a “convenient fiction” overlooks its indispensable role in navigating and understanding the world as it appears.

As if causal processes were clearer than the chair on which I sit.

The Eleatic Principle looks pretty useless. — Banno

Yes. Determining what is and is not caused by what is as fraught a question as what is real. Just passing the buck.