Some further comments about the "contradiction":

"Real" and "Reality" are used with respect to contexts,and need to be interpreted contextually. ...aside from not even being metaphsically-defined.

For example, from the first introduction of my proposal here, I've been saying that of course this physical world is real in the context of our lives, and that our lives are real in their own context.

Likewise, I've been saying that a system of inter-referring abstract implication-facts about hypothetical propositions about hypothetical things needn't have any reality or existence other than in its own inter-referring context, and that I make no claim that it does.

I've been consistently saying that there's no particular reason to believe that either has any objective reality or existence, and that I make no claim that they do. ...though I don't know exactly what "objective reality" would mean.

There's obviously a worldly, everyday "reality' (and a storybook "reality", with respect to some storybook's story). That worldly, everyday reality is underlain by a different metaphysical "reality". ...without claiming objective reality, or "reality" as meant more demandingly in philosophical discussion, for either,.

So, as I said, the "contradiction" objection was a desperate and shabby grasp-at-straws.

Michael Ossipoff

I said I was going to post more thoroughly and systematically about “How can something completely hypothetical seem so non-conditionally real?”. But first I’d like to say a few more things about the claim that “there are abstract facts, in the sense that we can refer to and speak of them” is a brute-fact in my metaphysics:

1. When we say that a metaphysics (such as Materialism) posits a brute-fact, we’re saying that the proponent of that metaphysics expects you to believe the brute-fact without justification. Then I’ll remind that I’m not asking anyone to take my word for it that there are abstract facts, in the sense that we can mention or refer to them. That’s common knowledge, and I’ve used it as a premise in the argument for my metaphysics.

2. What if I can’t explain why there are abstract facts, in the sense stated above? It would be like saying that I can’t explain why there’s metaphysics. Is that somehow a fault of my metaphysical proposal? I’ve been saying all along that I make no claim that words, concepts, discussion and description cover &/or explain all that is.

So, if there being abstract facts, in the sense that we can mention or refer to them, or if there being metaphysics, were unexplainable by me, that would be fine, because I make no claim that words can explain everything.

3, But, as I’ve also said, we should try to explain as much as possible within metaphysics.

I suggest that maybe the claim that an explanation is needed and lacking for why there are abstract facts, in the sense that we can mention or refer to them, can be answered.

This has been discussed here before.

In reply to a claim that there could have not been any abstract facts, someone answered that if there were no facts, it would be a fact that there are no facts.

Someone else then countered that there could have been just one fact, a fact that there are no facts other than that one fact that there are no facts other than itself.

For one thing, that would be an unexplained brute-fact.

But I’ve suggested what sounds to me like a better answer:

When bringing up abstract facts, and a complex system of inter-referring abstract if-then facts (implication-facts), I’ve emphasized that they’re completely independent of any larger context, any context other than their own local inter-referring context. …and any sort of external permission or medium.

If you appreciate the completeness of that independence, then you’ll understand why it would be meaningless to say that there could have been some global prohibition or negation of all possible abstract facts. To believe in such a thing implies a belief in some kind of universal global propagating-medium for permission, or a common-context for all facts, like some kind of potting-soil. There’s no reason to believe in such a thing.

And if someone wanted to say that facts only exist for an experiencer, that’s fine, because the system of facts that I’m talking about is with respect to an experiencer. I’ve been saying that the experiencer is primary and central in the subjective metaphysics that I propose, and that all of the facts in your experience-story are with respect to, about, and for your experience and you.

(But, though the system that I speak of, your life-experience possibility-story, is experiencer-based, I’ve also said that I don’t support the animal-chauvinism of a belief that your experience-possibility-story’s abstract-facts are really, in principle, different from all the other abstract facts.

In an earlier post, some time ago, I gave a few other reasons for saying that.

But that’s another issue, maybe controversial, and is separate from my main metaphysical proposal.)
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How could something completely hypothetical seem so non-conditionally factual?:

That’s the main objection to my metaphysical proposal.

For one thing, as a character, even if the primary character, the protagonist, of your experience-possibility-story, of course it’s apparently factual to you. It’s a story about your experience. You perceive the experience, not the fact that it’s a hypothetical story. What else would you expect in an experience story?

Unfalisifable proposition? I remind you that the complex systems of inter-referring abstract facts that I’ve referred to are uncontroversially-inevitable. In contrast, for example, the Materialist explanation for your world posits a genuinely unverifiable and unfalsifiable brute-fact.

But many people might still perceive a sticking-point regarding the relation and reconciling between the uncontroversially-inevitable logical system, and your perception of non-conditional physical facts. I’m guessing that’s what has been meant by the expressed-issue about “substantive” vs logical facts.

Unsurprisingly, animals are designed to perceive and identify (non-conditional) “facts” about their surroundings. If it’s raining and cold, an animal might stay in its burrow or house (depending on what kind of an animal it is).

It’s practical, pragmatic and evolutionarily-adaptive for that organism to take that rain and cold as a “fact”, for the purpose of, and in the context of, its decision-making.

There’d be no adaptive advantage for that animal to regard it otherwise.

As I said, we use indicative/declarative grammar because it’s useful, not because it’s philosophically-supported. Conditional grammar describes the uncontroversially-inevitble implication-facts (if-then facts).

Evolutionarily-adaptive behavioral pragmatism vs philosophical explanation—do you really perceive a conflict between them?

Surely you’re familiar with the fact that, in physics, closer examination has shown that things are very different, radically-different, from how they previously appeared.

That’s even in physics. Why should you expect less in metaphysics?

So, if an uncontroversial metaphysics free of assumptions and brute-facts suggests that things aren’t quite what they seem in ordinary life, as opposed to in metaphysical discussion, should that really be surprising, given the lessons from physics about the fallibility of initial impressions and intuition?

For that matter, an authority on quantum-mechanics said that QM lays to rest the notion of an objective physical “reality”.

(When I quoted that before, someone asked for the source of the quote, and I supplied it. Do I have to find it again each time?)

Michael Ossipoff

My reply to your questions will be along this afternoon, tonight or tomorrow morning. I'll make my best effort to have enough computer-time to send it this afternoon or tonight.

My replies tend to be long, because I like them to be complete, and that can mean that they take a little longer. — Michael Ossipoff

But of course. I have a similar custom.

(I don't use nested quotes, because they don't seem to work. I separately quote what I was quoted saying, and the other person's reply) — Michael Ossipoff

Interesting approach. Perhaps I'm just unaccustomed to this practice, but it would seem to make a series of three or four replies most cumbersome.

Yes. See my previous posts about it in this thread. — Michael Ossipoff

If there's anything in those posts that counts as "noncontroversial metaphysics", it's slipped by me again. Would you care to point out which of your statements is "noncontroversial"?

In particular, the claim "there's an uncontroversial metaphysics that implies reincarnation" seems highly controversial to me. I would contest it, if you would care to argue in support the claim here.

That's best answered by saying what I don't mean: I don't mean the reason in terms of physical causation in this world. I'm talking about a reason more fundamental and original than that. — Michael Ossipoff

What does it mean to say that a reason is "more fundamental and original" than an explanation in terms of physical causation?

I see no reason to suppose there is any such thing, and I expect on the basis of past experience that many others will agree with me.

In that regard it seems your view is controversial before it's even off the ground. For you affirm that this "fundamental and original" reason is supposed to "generate the implication" of reincarnation.

Nothing other than what you surely must interpret it to mean. — Michael Ossipoff

I interpret the phrase "in a life" variously depending on context.

In the context of your metaphysical speculations, I suppose you mean to suggest that something like a soul -- whatever it is that's said to be reincarnated -- is found now in one life, now in another. Perhaps from time to time as a hungry ghost, a lion, a deer, a washerwoman, a queen, and so on.

But I see no reason to suppose that there is such a thing. So in other contexts I interpret a phrase like "in a life" quite differently.

In terms of physical causation in this physical world, you're alive because you were conceived and then born. No one denies that.

But this is a philosophy forum, not a biology forum. — Michael Ossipoff

As it's a philosophy forum, I suppose to begin with it's an open question, how biology and physics are to be integrated into our philosophical conversations.

First, a brief summary of my metaphysics (which I describe and justify in more detail in previous posts in this thread):

In the metaphysics that I propose, and described and justified in previous postings in this thread:

There are infinitely-many complex systems of inter-referring abstract implication-facts (instances of one hypothetical proposition implying another). — Michael Ossipoff

What is a metaphysics? What does it mean to say that "in a metaphysics... there are... systems of ... facts"?

Is such a metaphysics just a story that someone tells? Can't we always tell another sort of story, even an incompatible one?

When you say "in the metaphysics I propose, there are such and such facts...", do you mean to suggest that this is an apt characterization of the way things are, or merely that this is one possible way to depict the world? Is it the only way? Is it a noncontroversial way?

Moreover, it seems to me perhaps you've jumped ahead, by claiming that your metaphysical picture is necessary and noncontroversial, before you've even cleared up your terms:

What is a fact? Is there a noncontroversial definition of "fact"?

What is an implication-fact? What is an abstract implication-fact, and is there any other sort of implication-fact?

What is a "complex system of abstract implication-facts"? In what sense are the abstract implication-facts in a complex system "inter-referring"?

Do you define an "abstract implication-fact' as an "instance of one hypothetical proposition implying another"? Then it seems hypothetical propositions are the basis, or basic unit of the "complex systems" you describe.

How do you distinguish between one such "complex system" and the "infinitely many others" you indicate? Why not say there is only one infinitely complex system? Do you have something like the "possible worlds" of modal logicians in mind here?

Among those infinitely many such systems, there is inevitably one whose events and relations are those of your experience. — Michael Ossipoff

Why "inevitable"? The fact that a system contains infinitely many subsystems does not entail that it contains every possible subsystem.

I suggest it's "inevitable" just because you have inserted this inevitability into your landscape, along with all the rest of the scenery.

What does it mean to say that a set of propositions and implications among propositions has "events and relations" that *are* the "events and relations of my life"?

So far as I can see, an event described is not the same as a description of that event. Surely it would be controversial to say so.

"It's raining (here, now)" may be called a proposition. That's not the same as the rain or the rain-event thus described.

What kind of propositions are we talking about here?

When does one hypothetical proposition imply another? For instance, "It's raining" doesn't imply that I'll take an umbrella on my walk, and "I'm hungry" doesn't imply that I'll eat before morning.

Can you give particular examples of the fine-grained propositions and implications you have in mind?

There’s no reason to believe that your experience is other than that. — Michael Ossipoff

Do you mean to suggest: There's no reason to believe that my experience is anything other than one subset of an infinite system of hypothetical propositions with implicatory relations?

Here's one reason: It seems my experience is actual, not hypothetical. In fact it seems our experience is the very basis of our concepts of actuality and possibility, among other concepts.

Of course I can’t prove that the Materialist’s objectively, concretely, fundamentally existent physical world, and its objectively, concretely existent stuff and things don’t superfluously exist, as an unverifiable and unfalsiable brute-fact, alongside of, and duplicating the events and relations of, the hypothetical logical system that I described above. — Michael Ossipoff

This concession seems to threaten the claim that your picture is noncontroversial.

In this context, the adverb "superflously" seems grossly tendentious.

By now it seems you've begun to speak as if your complex system of hypothetical propositions is a thing that "exists", even apart from and independently of any physical world. But this claim is extremely controversial.

It's one thing to sketch a model of hypotheses, another to claim that the system of hypotheses "exists" apart from and prior to the physical world. How would you support such a claim, if that's what you're suggesting?

I emphasize that, in this metaphysics, I regard the experiencer and his/her experience as primary. — Michael Ossipoff

I'd say even more emphatically, that experience is a good starting point for all philosophy.

It seems we reach rather different conclusions from this starting point.

Part 1 of 2:

Somehow I didn’t notice this reply, and thought that I’d made the last post to this thread. So that’s why this reply is a month late.
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If this reply is long, then please understand that it’s in reply to a long post. I reply to everything that calls for a reply. That means copying the other person’s text, and including it in addition to my text. …inevitably making my reply even longer than the post to which I’m replying.
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”(I don't use nested quotes, because they don't seem to work. I separately quote what I was quoted saying, and the other person's reply)” — Michael Ossipoff
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Interesting approach. Perhaps I'm just unaccustomed to this practice, but it would seem to make a series of three or four replies most cumbersome.

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It surely does. Nowadays, where (as is usually the case) there are only 2 levels of quotes in my reply, I do as in this post: I put the whole thing in the system-provided quote, but I put quotation marks around my text, and italicize it and my name after it.
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If there's anything in those posts that counts as "noncontroversial metaphysics", it's slipped by me again. Would you care to point out which of your statements is "noncontroversial"?

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Well, I’ve tried to avoid saying anything that would be disagreed-with. So my effort was to make all of the statements uncontroversial.
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…starting with my uncontroversial statement that inevitably there are abstract implications, in the sense that we can speak of and refer to them.
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Perhaps you could specify a particular claim of mine that you disagree with. (You do so in the post that I’m now replying to, and I answer your objections.)
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In particular, the claim "there's an uncontroversial metaphysics that implies reincarnation" seems highly controversial to me. I would contest it, if you would care to argue in support the claim here.

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Alright, of course it requires 1) telling why my metaphysics is uncontroversial; and 2) Telling how my metaphysics implies reincarnation.
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First, to clarify what I mean by “uncontroversial”. I don’t mean that the conclusion isn’t drastically contrary to popular belief or Materialism. I don’t mean that no one will express disagreement. I mean that no one will express disagreement and point out a mis-statement or unsupported conclusion.
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I hope it’s alright if this isn’t very brief.
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1. Why my metaphysics is uncontroversial:
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It’s based on the uncontroversial fact that there are abstract implications, at least in the sense that we can mention them or refer to them. I make no other claim regarding their reality or existence.
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From that follows the conclusion that there are infinitely-many complex systems of inter-referring abstract implications about hypothetical propositions about hypothetical things, with all the mutually-consistent configurations of the hypothetical truth-values for those hypothetical propositions.
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Uncontroversially-inevitably, among that infinity of complex logical systems, there’s one about your experience of physical events and physical and logical relations, and the physical world that is the setting of your experience.
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That’s all I claim. How controversial is that?
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I don’t deny that your experience and the physical world might, superfluously, unverifiably and unfalsifiably be additionally more than that. …with some unspecified sort of reality or existence that the above-described logical system doesn’t have.
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In other words, for example, I don’t deny that the Materialist’s world, more real or existent in some unspecified way, might “exist”, whatever that would mean, as a brute-fact, alongside the above-described logical system, and duplicating its events and relations.
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What part of that is controversial?
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2. Why it implies reincarnation:
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First, due to Materialism’s avoidable brute-fact, let’s disregard Materialist dogma, and not use it as an argument.
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When I say that my metaphysics implies reincarnation, I don’t mean “imply” with its formal logical meaning. I mean it in its more informal usual conversational meaning of “suggest”. I say that reincarnation follows from my metaphysics, but I don’t mean “provably”. I don’t claim proof of reincarnation.
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First, just speaking generally: If there’s a reason why you’re in a life, and if that reason continues to obtain at the end of this life, then what does that suggest? It suggests that the same reason will have the same result, and that you’ll again be in a life.
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As I said, among that infinity of complex hypothetical logical systems, there timelessly is one that is the same as your experience of physical and logical matters. It’s about your physical-world experience, and it’s for you. I call it your “hypothetical experience-story”. That’s why you’re in a life. You, the protagonist of that story, are central and primary to it, though you and your physical surroundings are mutually complementary in that hypothetical story.
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Of course without you there wouldn’t be that experience-story. To use a term that Schope quoted from Schopenhauer, your Will to Life is the essential and central causative element to that hypothetical experience-story.
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At death, of course there’s eventually unconsciousness, by which I only mean absence of waking-consciousness and absence of knowledge and memory about this life. In the earlier stages of that unconsciousness there remains your subconscious Will to Life, and your own personal subconscious inclinations and predispositions.
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As I said, you’re unconscious in the sense that there’s no waking-consciousness or knowledge or memory about the recent life. In particular, you have no knowledge that a life has ended. You have no way of knowing, and of course aren’t even inclined to consider, whether you’re coming or going.
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In that setting, there remains the subconscious Will to Life, and subconscious inclinations and predispositions toward living.
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There’s inevitably a hypothetical experience-story about someone just like who you are at that time, but someone who is at the beginning of a life instead of at the end of one. Someone unconscious, but with subconscious Will to Life, and with the personal subconscious inclinations and predispositions that you have.
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At that time in your experience, you’re indistinguishable from that person. Your experience is that of that hypothetical protagonist in that hypothetical life-experience-story. It’s a continuation of experience rather than a transformation.
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If that sounds implausible, it’s no more remarkable or implausible than your being in this life in the first place.
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And, uncontroversially there is that other life-experience story, whose protagonist is you. …just as is the case for your experience of this life.
In various threads, I’ve discussed a much deeper unconsciousness, later in death, at which there are no inclinations, needs, wants, identity, individuality, worldly life, time, events, or even any knowledge or memory that there ever were or could be such things. But you won’t reach that stage. Not this time or anytime soon.
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As I said, I suggest these things, and I don’t claim proof. For one thing, I don’t remember personal experience of dying. And I admit that I don’t claim know enough of biology and psychology to guarantee the scenario that I’ve been speaking of. I merely say that it plausibly follows from my metaphysics.
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”That's best answered by saying what I don't mean: I don't mean the reason in terms of physical causation in this world. I'm talking about a reason more fundamental and original than that.” — Michael Ossipoff
What does it mean to say that a reason is "more fundamental and original" than an explanation in terms of physical causation?

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First, it means that I don’t believe that the physical world is fundamental or the origin of all. In other words, I don’t believe in Materialism. Materialism has a brute-fact (Its fundamentally-existent, metaphysically prior physical world). There’s a metaphysics (the one that I’ve described) that has no brute-fact and needs no assumptions.
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If Materialism were true, it would refute all that I’m saying here on the subject of reincarnation, but, due to its brute-fact nature, I’m disregarding Materialism in this reincarnation discussion. What I say about reincarnation assumes that Materialism isn’t true, though I can’t prove that Materialism isn’t true.
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Yes, you’re here because your parents got together. No one denies it. Idealists don’t deny it. In particular, I, an Idealist, don’t deny it.
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Physical law isn’t contravened in the physical world. There’s a physical explanation, in terms of other physical things, for every physical thing that happens, including your birth. I and other Idealists don’t deny that.
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I see no reason to suppose there is any such thing..

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…any such thing as something "more fundamental and original" than an explanation in terms of physical causation?
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You have no reason to believe that the physical world isn’t fundamental, metaphysically-prior to all, and the origin of all. Of course you don’t. I can’t prove that it isn’t. I don’t claim that there isn’t that brute-fact. I’ve said that many times.
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I can’t prove that the fundamentally-existent physical world that you believe in doesn’t exist as a brute-fact, as I explained earlier. It’s impossible to disprove an unfalsifiable proposition.
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So I’m not saying that you’re wrong, or that your brute-fact isn’t true. I’m saying only that it’s a brute-fact.
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If you believe in a brute-fact…well, suit yourself.
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, and I expect on the basis of past experience that many others will agree with me.

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I didn’t mean that my conclusions aren’t drastically different from popular belief.

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In that regard it seems your view is controversial before it's even off the ground.

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I fully admit that the conclusions I’ve been speaking of are drastically contrary to popular belief.
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I clarified above that I’m not saying that Materialists won’t disagree. I merely mean that they won’t disagree and specify a mis-statement or un-supported conclusion to justify their disagreement.
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For you affirm that this "fundamental and original" reason is supposed to "generate the implication" of reincarnation.

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See above.
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”Nothing other than what you surely must interpret it to mean.” — Michael Ossipoff
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I interpret the phrase "in a life" variously depending on context.

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In the context of your metaphysical speculations, I suppose you mean to suggest that something like a soul

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No. I have no idea where you get that. I’ve never mentioned a soul.
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-- whatever it is that's said to be reincarnated -- is found now in one life, now in another.

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No. What? Found by whom?
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When you speak of a soul, you’re using Biblical Literalist or Fundamentalist religious terminology. Fine, but don’t attribute it to me.
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You’re asking what is reincarnated, but all I said was that there’s continuity of experience from one life to another. In that sense, it’s (sequentially, in your experience) you in both lives, though there’s no memory of a previous life. I didn’t apply a name to what you are. You can if you want to.
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Perhaps from time to time as a hungry ghost

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I’m not a Buddhist, so I wouldn’t know about that. It hadn’t occurred to me, and I don’t know how I’d justify it metaphysically. But I’m not saying that there couldn’t be some justification.
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, a lion, a deer

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You’re speculating. My speculation would be that reincarnation would be to a next life that is at least somewhat like the previous one, because one’s predispositions and inclinations are presumably not so different from what they were before, and, to the extent that they relate to a world, or kind of world, it’s reasonably to a world of the approximate kind that you lived in before.
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So the incarnation would, at least usually, be to the same (or a very similar) species, in a world that is at least in some ways similar to the previous one. That’s just my speculation.
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, a washerwoman, a queen, and so on.

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Go for it. But don’t count on being royalty. You weren’t this time, after all.
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But I see no reason to suppose that there is such a thing.

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See above. But suit yourself of course.
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”First, a brief summary of my metaphysics (which I describe and justify in more detail in previous posts in this thread):

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In the metaphysics that I propose, and described and justified in previous postings in this thread:

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There are infinitely-many complex systems of inter-referring abstract implication-facts (instances of one hypothetical proposition implying another).” — Michael Ossipoff
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What is a metaphysics?

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“Metaphysics” has lots of definitions, some of them mutually-contradictory. Metaphysics is often taken as a broad term that encompasses ontology.
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I use “metaphysics” to refer to a description of what describably is. …about what is, and is describable and explainable.
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Should I call it “ontology”? Maybe, but ontology is often included in metaphysics.
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Others use “metaphysics” more broadly, to include what might not be explainable or describable. But, to clarify about that, I now speak of “describable metaphysics”.

To be continued...
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Part 2 of 2:

So, as I use the term, “a metaphysics” it refers to an account of what describably is.
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What does it mean to say that "in a metaphysics... there are... systems of ... facts"?

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Are you sure that all of that was in one sentence said by me?
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I said, above in this reply, that there are abstract implications, in the sense that we can refer to them, and that there consequently are infinitely-many complex systems of inter-referring abstract implications”.
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If you ask what that means, then I invite you to specify a particular word, phrase or term that I used, that you don’t know the meaning of.
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Is such a metaphysics just a story that someone tells?

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No. Did I say it was? As I use the term, “a metaphysics” is an account of what describably is.
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Can't we always tell another sort of story, even an incompatible one?

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Of course. You can tell any story you want to. You can even believe in and advocate a metaphysics based on a brute-fact. I can’t prove that your brute-fact isn’t true, if it isn’t inconsistent with observation, because it’s impossible to disprove an unfalsifiable proposition.
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When you say "in the metaphysics I propose, there are such and such facts..."

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That doesn’t sound like my wording, saying that the facts are in my metaphysics. I say that there are abstract implications, in the sense that we can refer to them.
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We don’t put things in quotes unless we’re making a direct quotation of one specific sentence that was actually said.
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, do you mean to suggest that this is an apt characterization of the way things are

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Yes. It’s an apt characterization of how describable things are.
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, or merely that this is one possible way to depict the world? Is it the only way?

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No. There are all sorts of metaphysicses based on brute-facts and depending on assumptions. …Materialism, for example.
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My proposal differs by not depending on any assumptions or brute-facts.
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When I propose a metaphysics, I propose the logical systems that I’ve referred to. …without our physical world being other than that.
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However, I don’t claim that our physical world isn’t more than that, in some (usually unspecified) brute-fact way. Obviously it wouldn’t be possible to prove such a claim. …to disprove an unfalsifiable proposition.
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Is it a noncontroversial way?

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My limited claims are uncontroversial as I defined that term above.
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Moreover, it seems to me perhaps you've jumped ahead, by claiming that your metaphysical picture is necessary and noncontroversial, before you've even cleared up your terms:

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What is a fact? Is there a noncontroversial definition of "fact"?

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A fact is usually defined as a state of affairs, or as a relation among things. The implications that I speak of are facts by those definitions.
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But, as I say it now, I avoid that definitional issue by speaking instead of “abstract implications”, and clarify that, by “an implication”, I mean an implying of one proposition by another proposition.

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What is an implication-fact?

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It’s a fact that is an implication, as I defined “implication” above. But (as I said) I now just say “implication”, and define it as an implying of one proposition by another proposition, to avoid issues about definitions of “fact”.
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What is an abstract implication-fact

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I use “abstract implication” to refer to an implication about hypothetical things that needn’t have any particular “reality” or “existence” status.
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, and is there any other sort of implication-fact?

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“If there’s a car parked in front of your house, then that car was built by someone and parked or placed in front or your house by someone.”
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…where that car is actually observed there by the speaker and the person spoken to, and isn’t hypothetical (You could say it’s hypothetical if we haven’t looked out the window yet—but the implication in quotes above is say-able even if we have looked out the window and know that there’s a car parked in front).
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Of course yes, the use of “if “ can be argued to make every implication “hypothetical”. …except in the example above, if we’re looking out the window and the car is in front of us as we speak.

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What is a "complex system of abstract implication-facts"?

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It’s a system of implications that is complex.
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I speak of a complex system of inter-referring abstract implications. …inter-referring in the sense that there are instances in which one or more implication is/are about one or more propositions or things that one or more other of the implications is/are about. …or in which one or more of the propositions is/are about things that one or more other propositions is/are about.
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In what sense are the abstract implication-facts in a complex system "inter-referring"?

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See directly above.
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Do you define an "abstract implication-fact' as an "instance of one hypothetical proposition implying another"?

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Yes. But now I just call it an “abstract implication”. …by which I mean an implying of one hypothetical proposition by another hypothetical proposition.
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Then it seems hypothetical propositions are the basis, or basic unit of the "complex systems" you describe.

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\Yes. …and implications about them.

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How do you distinguish between one such "complex system" and the "infinitely many others" you indicate?

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They consist of different abstract implications, about different propositions, about different things, with different consistent configurations of hypothetical truth-values for those hypothetical propositions.
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Why not say there is only one infinitely complex system?

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Because not all abstract implications are inter-referring, as I defined that term above.
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That’s the sense in which they aren’t all in the same inter-referring system.
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These separate, different, hypothetical logical systems are entirely isolated and independent of eachother, and each is independent of any outside context…any context other than its own inter-referring context.

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”Among those infinitely many such systems, there is inevitably one whose events and relations are those of your experience.” — Michael Ossipoff
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Why "inevitable"? The fact that a system contains infinitely many subsystems does not entail that it contains every possible subsystem.

I was referring specifically to the infinity of systems of abstract implications about hypothetical propositions about hypothetical things. Tautologically it includes all such systems.

I wasn't referring to just any infinite set of abstract propositions.


Every possible system of inter-referring abstract implications is one of the infinitely-many systems of inter-referring abstract implications.
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Maybe you’re questioning whether a system of inter-referring abstracts implications can match the physical events and relations of your experience in this physical world.
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I’ve mentioned that a set of hypothetical physical quantity-values, and a hypothetical relation among them (called a physical law, theory or hypothesis) together constitute the antecedent of an implication. …except that one of those hypothetical physical-quantity-values can be taken as the consequent of that implication.
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I’ve mentioned that a true mathematical theorem is an implication whose antecedent consists, at least in part, of a set of mathematical axioms.
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It isn’t controversial to say that a physical system of things and events is modeled by a complex system of inter-referring abstract implications.
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Michael Faraday, in1844, pointed out that there’s no reason to believe that our physical world is other than a complex mathematical and logical relational structure. More recently Frank Tippler and Max Tegmark have said the same thing.
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There are those mathematical and logical relations, with or without objectively-existent “stuff” (whatever “objectively-existent” would mean).
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My metaphysical proposal differs mostly in being about a subjective experience-story rather than an objective world-story.
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I suggest it's "inevitable" just because you have inserted this inevitability into your landscape, along with all the rest of the scenery.

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See above.
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What does it mean to say that a set of propositions and implications among propositions has "events and relations" that *are* the "events and relations of my life"?

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Yes, it’s not easy to word. Familiar topics are easier to word.
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I mean that that logical system models your physical experience in your physical world, in the sense that, if the hypothetical things, propositions and implications of that system are suitably-named, then a description of that system would be indistinguishable from an account of your experience.
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Yes, I know you don’t ordinarily experience all the things of physics. But you experience them when you more closely investigate and examine the physical world, or when you’re told of them by physicists, who find out about them when they more closely examine matter and its interactions.
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That’s one reason why I don’t just call it a mathematical system (like MUH).
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Because of my subjective emphasis, and because the only requirement of a subjective experience-story is consistency, I call it, more broadly, a logical system.
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Then I ask what you think this physical world additionally is, if you think it’s more than the hypothetical setting of such a hypothetical story.
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And I ask you in what context you want or believe this physical world to be or exist in, other than its own context.
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And I point out that whatever additional “objective reality” or “existence” you attribute to this physical world is an unverifiable, unfalsifiable brute-fact.
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Kiss Materialism goodbye unless you insist on believing in a brute-fact.
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So far as I can see, an event described is not the same as a description of that event. Surely it would be controversial to say so.

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There’s a logical system such that, with suitable naming of its things, a description of that logical system and its hypothetical things is the same as a description of your physical experience in your physical world.
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"It's raining (here, now)" may be called a proposition. That's not the same as the rain or the rain-event thus described.

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As you know, I’m speaking not only of hypothetical propositions, but also of implications about those propositions, and hypothetical things that the propositions are about, and a mutually-consistent configuration of hypothetical truth-values for the propositions.
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If it’s raining where you are, then, in the hypothetical experience-story that is your physical experience, with suitable naming of its things, it can be said that, in that experience-story, raindrops are now falling where you are.
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There’s an experience-story whose description matches a description of your experience.

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What kind of propositions are we talking about here?

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See above, where I discussed hypothetical quantity-values and a hypothetical relation among them. It is a proposition that a particular physical quantity-value has a certain value. It is a proposition that a certain hypothetical relation among the physical quantity-values obtains.
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But it isn’t just physical/mathematical matters. If you drop a heavy stone on your toe, it will at least hurt. No mathematics there. It’s a proposition that you drop the stone on your toe. It’s a proposition that it will at least hurt. One implies the other, unless you’re wearing boots with steel-reinforced toes.
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Closer examination of the situation, including some experiments, will result in directly experiencing relations among physical quantities.
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But, as I said, your experience isn’t entirely of physics and mathematics:
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As I often say, to say that there’s a traffic-roundabout at 34th & Vine is to say that if you go to 34th & Vine, you’ll encounter a traffic roundabout.
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But sometimes, via an experiment or observation, you experience the operation of a physical law. Sometimes you experience physical laws via reading about what physicists have found in their investigations and close examination of matter.
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When does one hypothetical proposition imply another?

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When the truth of one would mean that the other is true.
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In the physical example that I spoke of, I was speaking of an implication in which a certain hypothetical set of physical quantity-values, and a certain hypothetical relation among physical quantities, implies a certain value for another physical quantity-value.
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For a non-mathematical example: If I observe a traffic-roundabout at 34th & Vine, then I can tell you that “you go to 34th I Vine” implies “You encounter a traffic-roundabout”.
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For instance, "It's raining" doesn't imply that I'll take an umbrella on my walk, and "I'm hungry" doesn't imply that I'll eat before morning.

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Of course.
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Can you give particular examples of the fine-grained propositions and implications you have in mind?

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I gave the general example of some hypothetical quantity values, and a hypothetical relation among them; and the general example of a true mathematical theorem; and two non-mathematical examples.
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Is that an answer to your question?
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”There’s no reason to believe that your experience is other than that.” — Michael Ossipoff
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Do you mean to suggest: There's no reason to believe that my experience is anything other than one subset of an infinite system of hypothetical propositions with implicatory relations?

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Yes. Of course at any time, your experience is only one place in your overall life-experience-story. …which is one of infinitely-many (mutually unrelated, unconnected, isolated and independent) complex systems of inter-referring abstract implications about hypothetical propositions about hypothetical things, with their various mutually-consistent configurations of truth-values for those hypothetical propositions.
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Here's one reason: It seems my experience is actual, not hypothetical.

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What do you mean by “actual”?
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One consensus-meaning of “actual” that I’ve found is: “Part of or consisting of this physical world”. By that definition, whatever is or happens in this physical world is “actual”, even it it’s all only hypothetical.
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In fact it seems our experience is the very basis of our concepts of actuality and possibility, among other concepts.

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Of course.
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That’s why I say that the experiencer, the protagonist is complementary with his/her physical world, but primary and metaphysically prior to it in a meaningful sense.
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…and complementary with logic itself, for that matter, now that you bring that up--if you say that there are no abstract implications without someone to speak of them.
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”Of course I can’t prove that the Materialist’s objectively, concretely, fundamentally existent physical world, and its objectively, concretely existent stuff and things don’t superfluously exist, as an unverifiable and unfalsifiable brute-fact, alongside of, and duplicating the events and relations of, the hypothetical logical system that I described above.” — Michael Ossipoff
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This concession seems to threaten the claim that your picture is noncontroversial.

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On contrary, limiting my claim protects it from controversial-ness, by disclaiming something that could be controversial.
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Not only can I not prove what I said that I can’t prove, but I don’t claim it either.

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In this context, the adverb "superflously" seems grossly tendentious.

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No, it seems reasonable to use that word for something that is “an unverifiable and unfalsifiable brute-fact, alongside of, and duplicating the events and relations of, the [uncontroversially-inevitable] hypothetical logical system that I described above.”
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By now it seems you've begun to speak as if your complex system of hypothetical propositions is a thing that "exists", even apart from and independently of any physical world. But this claim is extremely controversial.

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…except that I’ve specified many times that I make no claims for its existence or reality.
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My only claim about these hypothetical systems’ “existence” is that there are abstract implications (and therefore systems of them) in the sense that we can speak of or refer to them.
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I make no other claim about their existence or reality.
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If you think that this physical world has “existence” “objective existence”, or “reality” that isn’t had by the logical system that I speak of, then what do you mean by “existence”, “objective existence”, or “reality”?
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In what context do you believe or want for this physical universe to “exist”, other than its own context?
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…and, if you have an answer to the above questions, or to one of them, are you sure that you aren’t positing a brute-fact?
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It's one thing to sketch a model of hypotheses

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Yes, the complex system of inter-referring abstract implications about hypothetical propositions about hypothetical things, with all the mutually-consistent configurations of hypothetical truth-values for those hypothetical propositions—to which I refer—is indeed hypothetical.
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However, that there are abstract implications, in the sense that we can speak of and refer to them isn’t a “hypothesis”. It’s uncontroversially-inevitable.
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…and , another to claim that the system of hypotheses "exists" apart from and prior to the physical world. How would you support such a claim, if that's what you're suggesting?

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See above. I don’t make any claims for its existence or reality, other than saying that there are abstract implications (and therefore systems of them) in the sense that we can speak of or refer to them.
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As for this physical world of your experience being something else, or something more, than such a hypothetical system—If you claim that, then I ask you in what way you think that this physical world is more than that. ...and be sure to define your terms.
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And after you answer that, I’ll ask you why there is whatever it is that you believe in. Brute-fact?
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”I emphasize that, in this metaphysics, I regard the experiencer and his/her experience as primary.” — Michael Ossipoff
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I'd say even more emphatically, that experience is a good starting point for all philosophy.

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It seems we reach rather different conclusions from this starting point.

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I’ll take your word for that, because you haven’t mentioned a metaphysical/ontological proposal that you claim is more parsimonious or supportable than mine, because you don’t know of one.
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There are other Subjective Idealists and Subjective Idealisms.
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I add mention of the premise that there are abstract implications (and therefore systems of them) in the sense that we can speak of and refer to them.
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Thereby, I talk about a completely parsimonious metaphysical “mechanism” and explanation for what describably is.
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There have been and are other Ontic Structuralists. The (Western, at least) ones I’ve heard of are Ontic Structural Realists (…but I haven’t heard enough about Michael Faraday to say that for sure).
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But I speak of subjective experience-stories, rather than objective world-stories.
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I don’t claim that all experience is logical, or that experience is entirely of logic, mathematics or physics.
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But a notable characteristic of our experience of this physical world’s physical things and events is that our experience of that isn’t inconsistent. Consistency seems be a requirement for that kind of experience.
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Arguably it would be impossible to really prove that a physical world is inconsistent, because a seeming inconsistency might merely be due to as-yet undiscovered physics (as has often been the case in the past), or mistaken memory, or hallucination, or dream.
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I agree with Litewave, that it would be meaningless to speak of an inconsistent physical universe, because there are no such things as mutually-inconsistent facts.
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But, in physics, there’s been a clear tendency for seeming inconstancies to later be explained by new physics that makes those seemingly mutually-inconsistent observations all consistent with the new physics.
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Most likely physics will be an open-ended endless sequences of explanations of physical things and laws by subsequently-discovered other physical things and laws. …and a never-ending revision of those laws.
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…unless maybe that endeavor eventually comes up against a final barrier due (for example) to high energies or small sizes that are infeasible for examination, or are inaccessible in principle.
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Michael Ossipoff

I’m posting this as a reply to Cabbage Farmer, not because there’s any longer a reason to try to communicate with him, but only because, as a matter of form and propriety, he should be notified of this reply to something that he asked that I hadn’t yet answered. Otherwise it could be suggested that I’m posting furtively,
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But this post isn’t to Cabbage Farmer. It’s to anyone else who notices this thread.
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Then why am I posting this answer (below in this posting)? Because, unlike some people, I answer questions that are asked of me.
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Of course the “conversation” with Cabbage Farmer ended as these conversations always do: …with Cabbage Farmer being asked what he means by some of his words, and not answering. …because he doesn’t know what he means.
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I posted this as a reply to Cabbage Farmer as a matter of form and propriety, because I don’t want to seem to be posting furtively, trying to evade possible criticism or refutation of what I say.
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Here’s Cabbage Farmer’s question that I didn’t answer:
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Do you have something like the "possible worlds" of modal logicians in mind here?

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I didn’t answer because I’d already said what I meant, and answered questions about what I meant, and invited specific questions about particular sentences, terms, words or statements that Cabbage Farmer might not understand the meaning of—and questions about the justification of conclusions.
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…and because it seems best to let modal logicians speak for themselves about their positions.
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But I’ll say that, regarding the relation of our “actual” physical universe to the other hypothetical physical universes, David Lewis’s “Modal Realism” says much of what I say.
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Before I paste some of what I found about it, I’ll just say that one difference is that I speak of a subjective experience-story instead of an objective world-story.
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Here’s some of what I found:
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An important, but significantly different notion of possibilism known as modal realism was developed by the philosopher David Lewis."[1] On Lewis's account, the actual world is identified with the physical universe of which we are all a part. Other possible worlds exist in exactly the same sense as the actual world; they are simply spatio-temporally unrelated to our world, and to each other. Hence, for Lewis, "merely possible" entities—entities that exist in other possible worlds—exist in exactly the same sense as do we in the actual world; to be actual, from the perspective of any given individual x in any possible world, is simply to be part of the same world as x.

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According to the indexical conception of actuality, favoured by Lewis (1986), actuality is an attribute which our world has relative to itself, but which all the other worlds have relative to themselves too. Actuality is an intrinsic property of each world, so world w is actual just at world w. "Actual" is seen as an indexical term, and its reference depends on its context.[6] Therefore, there is no feature of this world (nor of any other) to be distinguished in order to infer that the world is actual, "the actual world" is actual simply in virtue of the definition of "actual": a world is actual simpliciter.
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At the heart of David Lewis's modal realism are six central doctrines about possible worlds:
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Possible worlds exist – they are just as real as our world;
[…but I make no claim that the hypothetical physical worlds (consisting of systems of abstract implications about hypothetical propositions about hypothetical things, and of self-consistent configurations of mutually-consistent hypothetical truth-values for those hypothetical propositions) exist other than in the sense that we can refer to them and speak of them.
In agreement with Lewis, I speak of our own “actual” physical universe as really no different in kind, or in existence-status, from all the other hypothetical logical systems called “physical worlds”.]
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Possible worlds are the same sort of things as our world – they differ in content, not in kind;
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Possible worlds cannot be reduced to something more basic – they are irreducible entities in their own right.
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Actuality is indexical. When we distinguish our world from other possible worlds by claiming that it alone is actual, we mean only that it is our world.
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Possible worlds are unified by the spatiotemporal interrelations of their parts; every world is spatiotemporally isolated from every other world.
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Possible worlds are causally isolated from each other.

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Michael Ossipoff

By now it seems you've begun to speak as if your complex system of hypothetical propositions is a thing that "exists", even apart from and independently of any physical world. But this claim is extremely controversial. — Cabbage Farmer

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Aside from the fact that I didn't say that it "exists" (whatever that would mean), let me comment on the following:
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...independently of any physical world.

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What? Some of the complex systems of inter-referring abstract implications are no different in kind for what I suggested that our physical world is. (I asked you in what way you think this physical world is different from or more than that--a question that objectors never seem to be able to answer.)
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Is it that Cabbage Farmer feels that a physical world needs observers/experiencers? No problem:
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In the hypothetical experience-stories that I speak of, the experiencer and the physical world of hir (his/her) experience are complementary to eachother. ...mutually-complementary parts of the same system.
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The physical worlds aren't independent of an experiencer. The physical worlds are only the complementary setting for the experiencer's experience in the hypothetical experience-story.
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Here, quoted from a Wikipedia article about David Lewis’s Modal Realism, is a good assessment of people’s problem with Modal Realism (…and what the objections to my metaphysics always really come down to):
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Catastrophic counterintuitiveness The theory does not accord with our deepest intuitions about reality.

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Yes, but intuition isn’t always helpful in philosophy.
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This is sometimes called "the incredulous stare", since it lacks argumentative content, and is merely an expression of the affront that the theory represents to "common sense" philosophical and pre-philosophical orthodoxy.

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Yes, that basically what the objections to my proposal come down to. But of course people try to portray their objections as arguments. …but always turn out to not know what they mean by the terms used in their objections.
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Lewis is concerned to support the deliverances of common sense in general: "Common sense is a settled body of theory — unsystematic folk theory — which at any rate we do believe; and I presume that we are reasonable to believe it. (Most of it.)" (1986, p. 134). But most of it is not all of it (otherwise there would be no place for philosophy at all), and Lewis finds that reasonable argument and the weight of such considerations as theoretical efficiency compel us to accept modal realism. The alternatives, he argues at length, can themselves be shown to yield conclusions offensive to our modal intuitions.

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Michael Ossipoff

I'd like to emphasize that I'm not saying that David Lewis speaks for me.

I just wanted to mention that he said some things that I say, but I also mentioned some differences, and found more at SEP.

Michael Ossipoff