The reasons are the degradation of moral values — lepriçok

What would this follow from?

the danger of technological disasters, adverse effects to life of artificial fields and materials — lepriçok

Those dangers are heavily influenced by political and economic factors, so I think it's difficult to make an assessment solely based on scientific advancement.

It's possible there are "suicide pact" technologies that inevitably lead to doom, but such technology would only be a danger on it's own if it were unpredictable, which means we cannot base any prognosis on the possibility.

What is the highest possible level of scientific achivement, before things going south to us? Is it possible to avoid this fate? — lepriçok

Assuming there are no inevitable suicide pact technologies, unless we manage to wipe ourselves out relatively soon, I think humanity stands a good chance of surviving for a long time. What we evolve into in that time is difficult to say though.

What would this follow from?

@Echarmion

By moral values I mean ethics in scientific research, the lack of which causes disrespect to life. Also, political, economic, and social power that technologies allow to accumulate and the following inequality, based on the ideology of technological supremacy, or technofascism.

Assuming there are no inevitable suicide pact technologies...

@Echarmion

There's no single scenario, I see a lot of possible dangers. Mass suicide would mean stupidity, bigger problem would be mass murder, downfall of civilization and extinction, as in mutual destruction deterrent technologies.

Also, the mentioned disrespect to life would open gates to technologies that do not value human beings, introduce technological slavery into society and create techno-fascist dictatorship. As in genetics, neuroscience, eugenics etc.

Since we know very little about the structure of reality, we can hardly fathom the full effect we make on the world and ourselves.

The more scientists know, the closer humanity is to the abyss.

By moral values I mean ethics in scientific research, the lack of which causes disrespect to life. Also, political, economic, and social power that technologies allow to accumulate and the following inequality, based on the ideology of technological supremacy, or technofascism. — lepriçok

Even given that, he asked what it would follow from. You just clarified a definition. You didn't at all address what it would follow from.

What is the highest possible level of scientific achivement, before things going south to us — lepriçok

I can't operate a smart phone, I can't start a keyless car and I can't drive a driverless car.

This is the beginning of Armageddon. Woooo... the winds of Yehuzabeb shalt kill all first birn with calorie-rich diet Cola.

You just clarified a definition. You didn't at all address what it would follow from. — Terrapin Station

I think Lepechaun uses his definition as an axiomatic truth. I bet you any amount of dried leaves that that is the case.

Since we know very little about the structure of reality, we can hardly fathom the full effect we make on the world and ourselves. — lepriçok

1. We don't know that we have very little knowledge about the sturctue of reality. Maybe we're very close to, maybe we are very far from, complete knowledge. But you can't assume that either one is true.

2. If we can't fathom that, then kapd be a fathom. == sorry, typo. If we can't fathom that, then we also can't fathom how little effect we make on the world and ourselves. Some measure should be available before making such a statement.

Even given that, he asked what it would follow from. You just clarified a definition. You didn't at all address what it would follow from. — Terrapin Station

The answer was addressed and dressed - it would follow from moral relativism and disrespect to life, inequality, technological supremacy of superpowers, technofascism. Like in becoming cyberpunked degenerates. Slavery.

I think Lepechaun uses his definition as an axiomatic truth. — god must be atheist

I bet this is more like a bad foreboding. What do you mean by 'truth' referring to future events?

If we can't fathom that, then we also can't fathom how little effect we make on the world and ourselves. Some measure should be available before making such a statement. — god must be atheist

I'd rather say FIAT! be the measure. :)

What do you mean by 'truth' referring to future events? — lepriçok

Prophecy.

I bet this is more like a bad foreboding. — lepriçok

I guess I was wrong. And yes, it is a foreboding. You are right.

By moral values I mean ethics in scientific research, the lack of which causes disrespect to life. Also, political, economic, and social power that technologies allow to accumulate and the following inequality, based on the ideology of technological supremacy, or technofascism. — lepriçok

But how are the ethics of scientific research related to the amount of knowledge? It seems to me the ethics would be the same regardless of the level of technology, all else being equal.

There's no single scenario, I see a lot of possible dangers. Mass suicide would mean stupidity, bigger problem would be mass murder, downfall of civilization and extinction, as in mutual destruction deterrent technologies.

Also, the mentioned disrespect to life would open gates to technologies that do not value human beings, introduce technological slavery into society and create techno-fascist dictatorship. As in genetics, neuroscience, eugenics etc. — lepriçok

I think we'd need to look at specific technologies in order to determine the danger they pose given current political and economic circumstances.

Humanity already has the means to destroy most of civilization. The bigger danger lies probably less in some new technology that allows you to enslave minds, and more in A.I. perfecting well known techniques of manipulation. That technological cat is out of the bag though.

The reasons are the degradation of moral values, the danger of technological disasters, adverse effects to life of artificial fields and materials, etc. — lepriçok

Ethics, for all it's made out to be, is, at heart, a selfish being. It came into existence only as a tool to maintain a fragile balance within the collective so that a group may outcompete another for survival, that being its main objective.

However, despite its lowly origins, morality has great potential if given the right materials to work with. By right materials I refer to information that leads us to the realization that we're all part of something bigger - the global ecosystem - which needs as much moral coverage as our own brethren. Only through recognizing our place in the great web of life can morality achieve its greatest incarnation - as a guardian of all life. Science, biological science to be specific, has made such a world, where humans are protectors of the global ecosystem, possible by revealing to us the interconnectedness of all life.

As for technology causing mass destruction you might want to consider that even eating, an absolute necessity, comes with the risk of choking to death. We just need to be careful we don't make silly mistakes. Pressing the nuclear launch button would count as one. Ignoring the ecosystem would be another.

The problem isn't science per se but the people who use its creations. Science doesn't give people reasons to kill and be immoral but it does give them the weapons to do it on a massive scale.

But how are the ethics of scientific research related to the amount of knowledge? It seems to me the ethics would be the same regardless of the level of technology, all else being equal. — Echarmion

To me the relation is obvious, it depends what morality and ethics are founded on. It may be sentiment, reason, 'reality', ideology, society, some .org, brainwashing etc. The more we know, the more shaky these foundations are. Also, there is a psychological factor - power perverts character, and technology is power. Also, we have here the dichotomy faith vs knowledge. Morals has a divine source in its origins - first we have human gods, then heavenly gods, finally GOD. Knowledge promotes logical destruction of these, along with all other arguments. Then we have only left the self preservation instinct, which is erased by mass media in the contemporary society. The result is the dumbing down of an average consumer and arrogance of our masters.

@TheMadFool Ethics, morality is inseparable from the question of free will and freedom. Human beings are free to choose to do good or bad. Generally, doing good is understood as more beneficial from the global point of view. But when the horizon is narrowed down to only ones Ego, the perception changes and there is room for setting oneself in conflict with the whole. This depends on the level of integration and disintegration of society. The more division, conflict, misunderstanding, disrespect, inequality there is the more disintegration. However, nobody has the right to force anyone to be good, therefore there is always room for mischief, wrong choices, mistakes and so on. To balance good and evil is very difficult in these circumstances. Control is not the solution. The more powerful technologies are, the more this situation is uncertain and potentially dangerous. Our fate will eventually depend on chance, and one day our civilization will lose control. (Just a methodical pessimism).

Our reality has three main realms: mind, external matter and the process of their cognition. — lepriçok

This makes no sense. There can be no cognition without mind and there are strong arguments suggesting that without matter there can be no mind. That mind is a realm of reality is a questionable assertion. The positing of mind as if it were a fundamental aspect of reality independent of rather than a feature of some animals is a metaphysical assumption. That is to say, a creation of the human mind.

When cognition connects mind and matter ... — lepriçok

Cognition does not connect mind and matter. Cognition is a function of the mind.

... reality is converted into information, having a form of scientific notation. — lepriçok

In general, modern science is mathematized, but information is not a conversion of reality into something else. For example, if a meteorologist tells me it is raining, that information is not a conversion of the fact that it is raining but rather a report of that fact. Dark cloudy skies may provide me with the information that it is going to rain, but that is not a conversion into a form of scientific notation. Long before the advent of modern science people knew how to read that information.

The product of cognition process is knowledge which has a quantitative characteristic. — lepriçok

Some knowledge is quantitative but other knowledge is not.

If the entire reality is 100% ... — lepriçok

This is a nonsensical statement. Is some reality not "100%"? 100% what, real?

On the other hand, I do not think this is possible, and before reaching the goal, humanity would self-destroy. — lepriçok

Ancient mythologies recognized that knowledge is a double edged. It brings with it both benefit and harm.

The reasons are the degradation of moral values — lepriçok

Are you claiming that knowledge degrades moral values or that moral values can limit the destructive power of knowledge?

What is the highest possible level of scientific achivement, before things going south to us? Is it possible to avoid this fate? — lepriçok

It may be that scientific achievement will be what keeps things from going further south. The most obvious example is global warming. Science has certainly contributed to the problem, but I see no way of solving the problem without advances in technology. Further, it is only because of science that we are even aware of the problem and the extent of the problem.

To me the relation is obvious, it depends what morality and ethics are founded on. It may be sentiment, reason, 'reality', ideology, society, some .org, brainwashing etc. The more we know, the more shaky these foundations are. — lepriçok

This doesn't really make any sense to me. In my opinion, only a false morality could be shaken by knowledge.

Also, there is a psychological factor - power perverts character, and technology is power. — lepriçok

This saying is based on some truth on a personal level, but there is no evidence our modern, technological societies are, as a whole, more perverted than past societies. Quite the opposite.

Also, we have here the dichotomy faith vs knowledge. Morals has a divine source in its origins - first we have human gods, then heavenly gods, finally GOD. Knowledge promotes logical destruction of these, along with all other arguments. Then we have only left the self preservation instinct, which is erased by mass media in the contemporary society. The result is the dumbing down of an average consumer and arrogance of our masters. — lepriçok

Not everyone agrees morality has, or needs, a divine source.

This doesn't really make any sense to me. In my opinion, only a false morality could be shaken by knowledge. — Echarmion

I can partly agree with you, because there may be two kinds of moral sentiment - innate and instilled. What is innate is not easily perverted, whereas the instilled norms, if they are based on fallacious knowledge/faith, are shattered by truth.

This saying is based on some truth on a personal level, but there is no evidence our modern, technological societies are, as a whole, more perverted than past societies. — Echarmion

It only depends on where you 'sit' on the planet. Wouldn't say 'more perverted', I'd say 'as always', but more hypocritic, eyeorgasming and indifferent. More problematic are the elites, especially of a psychopathic breed. Technologies pacified societies in a way, because they solved the problem of survival and created some abundance, but at a big cost and it is growing.

Not everyone agrees morality has, or needs, a divine source. — Echarmion

Morality needs 'the gene of morality', its abundance and domination, curbing of psychopaths, beautiful theories, convincing logic, some control, understanding of the world we live in, the grand picture of universe which is not meaningless and so on.

'God' was a rather primitive 'technology'.

By moral values I mean ethics in scientific research, — lepriçok

This is a difficult cookie. Ethics are not defined anywhere in its literature, or wherever the word pops up.

There is no universal ethics. If there is, we haven't found it yet. So for the time being all ethical considerations are self-serving sermons by the righteous.

And as we know, the world is divided into two: the righteous and the wicked. And it's always the rigteous who do the dividing.

I don't know if ethics in our considerations can be separated from the notion of good.

Everyone seems to own ethics, yet nobody knows what it is. It's the buzzword of the twenty-first century.

Referring to ethics, therefore, must be done by a complete and exhaustive explanation what the author thinks it is; and the readers have a choice of accepting or rejecting that explanation or definition.

I have cut throats mutually with many ethicists, so to speak. Eventually we always come out physcally intact and unharmed from the debate... but with deep, black-and-blue bruises on our minds.)

Science has become the new religion, and since it hasn't given us any basis for objective morality, many have come to the conclusion that it must not exist. It's a dangerous trend. Science, when seen as the only way to truth, becomes the antithesis to philosophy, and philosophy is much of what seperates man from animals.

Cognition does not connect mind and matter. Cognition is a function of the mind. — Fooloso4

Cognition is both a function and an action. The function emerges from the mind, but acts on and of reality, by doing something to it, perceiving how it changes, observing the laws, relating to it, connecting onto it an so on. There is much more in cognition than a function, concealed in a mind-box. Mind is connection, intention, relation and so on. There is an object, the subject and some process bridging them. Now, I hope, I have expressed the thought more clearly. Everything else follows from this. Misunderstanding occurred only because our boundaries of perception and concepts are different. However, sense and absurdity is not polarized by mere difference in individual perception.

Science has become the new religion — Tzeentch

Jeez, here we go again.

This is a difficult cookie. Ethics are not defined anywhere in its literature, or wherever the word pops up. — god must be atheist

I understand ethics only as a consideration in ones action not to do gratuitous harm to anyone/anything. Why we should/shouldn't do harm? Because we put value in something and care for it. If the world is depicted as meaningless and valueless, to impose this obligation is rather difficult. Scientific knowledge is the main culprit here. Murder becomes only disintegration of living creatures into their natural atomic/molecular state, which is regarded with indifference, since the living state has no special value, it is only a source and resource to be used and exploited. Nothing more. I consider it blindness to what really is around us. The world has meaning not only put by people into it, there also is hidden meaning that is not owned by humans. This is what we should strive for, in my opinion.

Science has become the new religion, and since it hasn't given us any basis for objective morality, many have come to the conclusion that it must not exist. — Tzeentch

You have come to that conclusion, but not the atheists. Some of us do feel that morality exist, we just can't put our fingers on it.

It's a bit like gravity or something. You do know it exists, you do know how it behaves, but you don't knwo what it is.

No atheist who is like me will deny that ethics and morality exists. We just deny that we know what it is in its most fundamental.

I understand ethics only as a consideration in ones action not to do gratuitous harm to anyone/anything. — lepriçok

So to you there is no difference between good and ethical. If I read your sentence right.

So to you there is no difference between good and ethical. If I read your sentence right. — god must be atheist

The words 'good' and 'ethical' have a narrow meaning and a broad understanding, by which is meant a theory, a system of norms based on it and so on. Yes, the concepts 'good' and 'ethical' are closely connected, but I understand that 'good' may mean many things. Firstly, we have absolute and relative good, that is omnidirectional good and monodirectional good, also good 'according to something', such as an idea, a feeling, a law, a rule, an opinion... However, there is something like high standard ethics, based on high standard good that is the basis of the Western civilization to many people. Philosophy (and science) should try uncover the hidden meaning of the world which is nobodies property. And most rational people who have no flaws of character in their personalities believe that there is inherent good in it (rather than evil). Not owned.

I'm referring specifically to moral relativism, and I'm not suggesting that all atheists are moral relativists.

Many atheists however, (perhaps those less intellectually inclined) put blind faith in science to solve all of man's problems. Science will find a solution to man's habit of destroying the planet (so we don't need to adjust our behavior). Science will provide us with all we need (so we no longer need to look after one another) Medicine will provide the cure to depression (so we don't need to think critically about our beliefs), etc.

I think that's a dangerous trend.

Cognition is both a function and an action. The function emerges from the mind, but acts on and of reality, by doing something to it, perceiving how it changes, observing the laws, relating to it, connecting onto it an so on. There is much more in cognition than a function, concealed in a mind-box. Mind is connection, intention, relation and so on. There is an object, the subject and some process bridging them. Now, I hope, I have expressed the thought more clearly. Everything else follows from this. Misunderstanding occurred only because our boundaries of perception and concepts are different. However, sense and absurdity is not polarized by mere difference in individual perception. — lepriçok

You have missed the point. It is not a question of whether cognition is a function or an action or both. You claimed that reality has three main realms, mind, external matter and the process of their cognition. The process of cognition is a mental process, not something separate and distinct from mind.

You have missed the point. It is not a question of whether cognition is a function or an action or both. You claimed that reality has three main realms, mind, external matter and the process of their cognition. The process of cognition is a mental process, not something separate and distinct from mind. — Fooloso4

Put it simply how I see it - mind is brain and brain is both a structure and a process. So we have two structures and two processes: brain/mind structure-mental process-reality process-reality structure. So, we have micro-realms and cosmic realms that are connected this way: cosmic realm (conscious matter) - mind micro-realm (personal substance) - cosmic realm (unconscious matter). I missed your point because you missed mine.

mind is brain — lepriçok

In that case, mind is not in some separate realm but within the realm of matter.

So, we have micro-realms and cosmic realms that are connected this way: cosmic realm (conscious matter) - mind micro-realm (personal substance) - cosmic realm (unconscious matter). — lepriçok

There is a logical and evidential gap here. You have posited cosmic consciousness but claiming that there is such a thing does not mean that there is such a thing. You have posited conscious and unconscious matter but have not shown that there are two kinds of matter. If, for example, you claim that the brain is conscious matter it does not follow that there are two kinds of matter. It may be, that the difference is the organization of matter, that when matter is organized in one way we get unconscious things like rocks and when organized in another way we get brains.

What is the highest possible level of scientific achivement, before things going south to us? Is it possible to avoid this fate?

We’d probably die out naturally, long before we could ever build such technology.

It seems to me, though, that in order to build technology that might “transform [reality] into 100% of information through cognition, we’d have to already know 100% of reality. How could we know the process was complete if we didn’t already know where it ended?

If, for example, you claim that the brain is conscious matter it does not follow that there are two kinds of matter. It may be, that the difference is the organization of matter, that when matter is organized in one way we get unconscious things like rocks and when organized in another way we get brains. — Fooloso4

If we assume physicalism as true, 'matter' has two facets that are different in many ways. There's bosonic matter and fermionic matter in quantum physics. They are subsumed in one concept, but may be totally different. We have some understanding of the aspect in which they overlap, however, in their extremes they may be opposite forms or fundamental reality.

My belief is that consciousness is a separate quantum field having bosonic characteristics. This field is enmeshed into fermionic structures of the brain and is its 'soul structure'. Soul is a particular realization of a cosmic quasi-bosonic 'conscious matter'.

So, there should be a spectrum of matter with the extremes of conscious-unconscious and intermediary structures. Consciousness must be everywhere, but in most cases it has no channels to manifest itself. This is elaborated version of my 'realm theory'. It shows that I reject reductionism.

Mind construct and process has one place in the spectrum, body construct and process has another, 'material' and 'immaterial' reality - still another. Man is an intersection of different 'realms', that don't look like realms only because they are too closely knit together in this nexion.