• Metaphysician Undercover
    12.3k
    If constrain begets constraint, then what begat the first constraint?

    Oh I forgot. Must be God.
    apokrisis

    As soon as someone shows me the way around this problem, I'm fully prepared to ditch the idea of God. I don't want to believe in God, and I never did want to believe in God, but this issue demonstrates the necessity of God, so I am stuck with this. Of course we can dump God and choose an irrational ontological principle, like you do, but I prefer to keep my wits. So, I'm still seeking a logical alternative, and not about to succumb to your irrationality. That's why I keep impressing this point on you, perhaps you can help me come up with something better. To no avail though, because you're already convicted.

    Possibility itself will eliminate its own variety just by trying to express its every alternative at once. That is the essence of constraints-based causal self-organisation.apokrisis

    You still don't get it do you? Possibility doesn't do anything. It is not actual, it cannot do anything, by definition. To talk about possibility doing something, itself, is simple contradiction. Something actual must actualize any particular possibility. If this were not the case, then all possibilities would automatically be actualized, all the time, and there would be no difference between "possible" and "actual". That is really the issue with MWI of QM. See how this premise leads to irrational ontological principles?

    Nope. It pats you on the head and points you in the direction of the better alternative you've been ignoring.apokrisis

    I sure as hell haven't been ignoring this alternative. How could I? It's rampant all around me. That it's the better alternative is clearly false due to the fact that it is an irrational option.
  • apokrisis
    6.8k
    You still don't get it do you? Possibility doesn't do anything. It is not actual, it cannot do anything, by definition.Metaphysician Undercover

    In physics, we have got used to considering possibilities as "virtual particles". So the possibilities we can count - as in quantum mechanics - are also "actual" in a special way.

    This isn't empty metaphysics. We can actually measure the physical contribution that a cloud of ghostly possibilities adds to any physical property. It is why the vacuum has an irreducible zero point energy, why the magnetic moment of the electron has an added quantum correction.

    So I'm not making shit up. Our most accurate theory of nature forces us to take a constraints-based, sum over histories or path integral, view of material being. We can count the effect that unlimited possibility has on the actuality we then measure.

    If there is a God, he designed this system we observe. And it is constraints-based self-organisation all the way down to the Planck limit.

    Your alternative account - a classically-inspired tale - is experimentally proven as wrong.

    That is really the issue with MWI of QM. See how this premise leads to irrational ontological principles?Metaphysician Undercover

    Well MWI is just an interpretation of these proven facts. It is one way of preserving the kind of classical metaphysics you also hold dear. Just as you say you have no choice left but to believe "God did it", so MWI-ers say they have no choice but to believe every virtual possibility must then be something really happening in some other actual world (or mumble, mumble, another branch of the infinite wavefunction).

    Again, a logic of vagueness is the way out of this metaphysical impass.
  • Gooseone
    107
    Don't you think that if a higher order principle could be discovered by a more evolved living creature, that higher order principle must be already in essence knowable? We are all evolving living beings, and knowledge advances. No one knows when the higher order principle will be found, but we must keep striving to find it, and this takes effort. But if we posit as a first ontological principle, that the foundation of being, existence, is itself unknowable due to some sort of vagueness, then we will not be inclined to make the effort to find that higher order principle, assuming that such is impossible due to that inherent unintelligibility.Metaphysician Undercover

    I can agree with that but the issue here is the knowing. People adhered to the law of gravity by sticking to the ground before we started to share theories of gravity or even gave it a name, I see no issue to call such a previous state unintelligible / vague, I don't take that as a hard limit on what we can know metaphysically in the future. Inclinations, making efforts, for all I know they could also be something we will have a very different understanding of in the future, just like we did in the past.

    I have not seen you do it but some people tend to create false dichotomies where they claim to be pointing at the moon and others are looking at the finger doing the pointing. Experiencing and / or knowing beyond the 'mere' human capacity we are now endowed with seems to me to be a form of wanting to have your cake and eat it to. Even so I do think it's more fruitful to say "I don't know" instead of "It just happens" when an explanation is starting to resemble a metaphysical final cause.
  • Metaphysician Undercover
    12.3k
    In physics, we have got used to considering possibilities as "virtual particles". So the possibilities we can count - as in quantum mechanics - are also "actual" in a special way.

    This isn't empty metaphysics. We can actually measure the physical contribution that a cloud of ghostly possibilities adds to any physical property. It is why the vacuum has an irreducible zero point energy, why the magnetic moment of the electron has an added quantum correction.
    apokrisis

    These possibilities are derived from a particular actual state which is constructed in the laboratory, or wherever. The point is that any set of possibilities is dependent on the actual state which produces them. Each constructed state of "vacuum", or whatever state is produced in the lab, has possibilities which are proper to that constructed state. This is completely different from the claim that the universe emerged from an infinity of possibilities which is not dependent on any actual state. That is the claim which is irrational.

    So I'm not making shit up. Our most accurate theory of nature forces us to take a constraints-based, sum over histories or path integral, view of material being. We can count the effect that unlimited possibility has on the actuality we then measure.apokrisis

    The constraints based view of nature leads to an infinite regress of changing constraints. You seem to avoid the infinite regress by assuming an initial condition of infinite possibility (no constraints) where constraints magical emerge. That's where you're making shit up.

    Your alternative account - a classically-inspired tale - is experimentally proven as wrong.apokrisis

    No, actually no one has experimented with my "classically-inspired tale". Scientists, just like you, are uninterested in it.

    Well MWI is just an interpretation of these proven facts. It is one way of preserving the kind of classical metaphysics you also hold dear. Just as you say you have no choice left but to believe "God did it", so MWI-ers say they have no choice but to believe every virtual possibility must then be something really happening in some other actual world (or mumble, mumble, another branch of the infinite wavefunction).apokrisis

    There's a big difference between the two interpretations of reality. Giving actual existence to logical possibilities is irrational due to inherent contradiction, assuming "God did it" is naïve but not irrational.

    Again, a logic of vagueness is the way out of this metaphysical impass.apokrisis

    Assuming vagueness as a starting point is just another way of assigning actual existence to logical possibilities, and this is irrational. It is not the way out. Assuming God, as an alternative actuality is the way out. But physicalists, like yourself, seem to have a deep fear of God, and will posit any of a vast number of irrational principles in order to avoid what is logically necessary.
  • Rich
    3.2k
    I see no issue to call such a previous state unintelligible / vague,Gooseone

    It's fine to say "I don't have the foggiest idea", but that is not what is happening here. What is being suggested is that out of nothingness matter magically sprung (the Big Bang), and out of matter Mind magically sprung. That is not vagueness. That is a a pretty definite mythology born out of a specific goal to obliterate the notion of Mind.

    Peirce wove a different story from vagueness. For him, first came tychism (chance), then came Mind, and then came Matter. From Vagueness anything can spring since we are just manipulating words into sentences and sentences into stories, depending upon the biases of the story teller.

    And the Daoist story was first there was Mind.

    What is happening is storytelling is replacing evidence in science. Metaphysics is something else. And if someone takes the metaphysical stance that Mind burst out of Matter born out of a surrounding universe of Constraints, Purpose and Goals, well that's OK. It's just another transposition of the external story of God who provides Purpose and Constraints. It is nothing new. Scientism is just another religion masked with a new set of words and dogma.
  • Rich
    3.2k
    But physicalists, like yourself, seem to have a deep fear of God, and will posit any of a vast number of irrational principles in order to avoid what is logically necessary.Metaphysician Undercover

    In this case, the vast Infinite along with Thermodynamic Purpose and Cosmic Goals have been called upon as the new God. It's a reengineering of the oldest mythology. Somehow, someway, intent and purpose had to be introduced into any Genesis story.
  • Rich
    3.2k
    Here is an interesting essay written by an astrophysicist who directly addresses the issues at hand:

    http://www.npr.org/sections/13.7/2017/03/26/521478684/mind-matter-and-materialism

    "The trouble comes when materialists claim the reduction of consciousness to matter is "what science says." Nobody needs me to point out that the relationship between mind and matter (i.e. mind and brain) remains a cutting edge and contentious topic in philosophy and science. That means you can't just state that mind is purely a biological phenomena as if it were a scientific fact. In fact, that statement is a really a metaphysical stance. It's an assumption. It's the beginning of the argument, not the end."

    "So, in the end, it's all about being upfront about our metaphysical biases and their limits. As philosopher Roberto Unger and physicist Lee Smolin put it, our job in thinking about the world is to "distinguish what science has actually found out about the world from the metaphysical commitments for which the findings of science are often mistaken."

    Metaphysical commitments are fine. We all have them. But when it comes to quantum physics and what it tell us about matter and materialism, we must work hard to distinguish what's solid ground and what is swamp."
  • Gooseone
    107
    It's fine to say "I don't have the foggiest idea", but that is not what is happening here. What is being suggested is that out of nothingness matter magically sprung (the Big Bang), and out of matter Mind magically sprung. That is not vagueness. That is a a pretty definite mythology born out of a specific goal to obliterate the notion of Mind.Rich

    That's not my interpretation of the current consensus, a consensus which (to my mind) states that the big bang is the point where the known laws of physics break down and things become "unknowable". Similarly the "something from nothing" has also been described as the vacuum of space not being as empty as previously thought. It's not as if all scientists are fundamental reductionists or something.

    Personally, I find it likely that mind does indeed emerge out of matter, even though science cannot explain fully how life springs from inanimate matter I don't feel the need to invoke some sort of elan vital to make it happen, I don't see why there needs to be an equivalent of such a force when it concerns minds.
  • Rich
    3.2k
    feel the need to invoke some sort of elan vital to make it happenGooseone

    No, but you do need to invoke some faith that "mind just happened", because that is all there is. Faith comes in many forms and when it is part of one's belief system, it simply has to be acknowledged.

    Those who place mind (or Elan vital) as primary, do not need to invoke such faith, because mind was always there and still is here exactly as we experience it.
  • Gooseone
    107
    No, but you do need to invoke some faith that "mind just happened", because that is all there is.Rich

    That doesn't follow, I said I find it likely that mind emerges out of matter. The faith I have is the progress which will be made in understanding the subject better in the future. Saying "mind just happened" is a caricature of the complexity which lies beneath what is already known about human cognition.

    Also, placing mind as primary is a form of faith in my book, not something with which you can claim you are not invoking some form of faith.
  • apokrisis
    6.8k
    No, but you do need to invoke some faith that "mind just happened",Rich

    So a foetus develops, the child is born. We kind of know that another mind just happened due to the growth of a nervous system, don't we? Or do you have evidence to the contrary.
  • Rich
    3.2k
    We kind of know that another mind just happened due to the growth of a nervous system, don't weapokrisis

    Is this the new story that the mind pops out of the nervous system? It keeps changing. I thought it was the child of Cosmic Goals and Thermodynamic Purpose, couple with an Infinite Possibilities.

    I love stories as much as the next person, but even the Greeks kept their mythology pretty much straight.
  • Rich
    3.2k
    I said I find it likely that mind emerges out of matter.Gooseone

    This is specifically your faith. One can equally say, I find it likely that God created the universe. There is no difference other than the belief of one is different than the belief of the other. Problems only arise when materialists claim that science is on their side. That science says we are just chemicals. Using science as a shield for a faith.
  • apokrisis
    6.8k
    So you are saying the nervous system is not the cause? On what grounds?

    Oh that's right. All reality is a mind field projected hologram.
  • Rich
    3.2k
    Listen, it's your story. You just don't seem to know how to keep it straight. Don't look for me for help.
  • apokrisis
    6.8k
    Keeping a straight face is the problem here, Rich.

    Just give a straight answer. Is the new born mind (a) the result of the development of another infant nervous system or (b) a projected mental quantum hologram just like Bergson-Bohm said?

    You've told us your story, remember. Have you suddenly lost faith in it after all? That's good to know.
  • Rich
    3.2k
    My view of life is that it is exactly as sit appears. The reason I can be so matter of fact is that I am not part of huge chemical/machinery industrial complex that requires everything to be chemicals. I don't make a living evangelizing stories. In other words I am not laden with biases.
  • apokrisis
    6.8k
    So was it a or b? Why are you suddenly silent here?
  • Rich
    3.2k
    The mind, creative intelligence, is it. Peirce was correct except for that bit about tychism. Mind evolves and as it evolves it creates things from what it learns. It even, out of sheer boredom, creates stories that it magically popped out of chemicals. Well not entirely out of boredom, it figured out it can make lots of money from such a story.
  • Metaphysician Undercover
    12.3k
    I can agree with that but the issue here is the knowing. People adhered to the law of gravity by sticking to the ground before we started to share theories of gravity or even gave it a name, I see no issue to call such a previous state unintelligible / vague, I don't take that as a hard limit on what we can know metaphysically in the future. Inclinations, making efforts, for all I know they could also be something we will have a very different understanding of in the future, just like we did in the past.Gooseone

    I can't understand your principles. You seem to be saying that when people can't understand something, then it is correct for them to say that this thing is unintelligible. Would a child in grade school, who can't understand algebra be correct to say that algebra is unintelligible? Would someone in high school be correct to say that university level physics is unintelligible. I would think that "unintelligible" refers to something which is impossible to understand, for any intellect

    Do you not see that there is a difference between something which appears to be unintelligible because you do not have the capacity to understand it, and something which is unintelligible because it is impossible for any intellect to understand it? If you accept that there is such a difference, then consider the problem which arises when something appears to be unintelligible. How are you going to determine whether the thing in question just appears to be unintelligible because you do not have the capacity to understand it, or whether it is impossible for any intellect to understand? Suppose you ask others, and no one seems to have the capacity to understand it. Does this justify the claim that it is impossible for any intellect to understand it? I don't think so, and that's why it's always wrong to designate something which you do not have the capacity to understand, as unintelligible.
  • Gooseone
    107


    I was under the impression that the context in which Apo used the term "unintelligible" had more to do with how things would be if brains weren't perceiving stuff. (As opposed to those who feel there is something 'higher', like knowing without a knower, awareness being really 'REALLY' special, etc.)

    Not to get into the: "If a tree falls into the forest....bla bla", but for now I find the whole concept of intelligibility a human thing. Things might exist and the way this stuff behaves might very well be intelligible but if there isn't anything resembling human cognition perceiving it I can just as well call it unintelligible.

    You say it yourself, you need a capacity to understand for things to become intelligible, it's my opinion we need something resembling human cognition to do so and I feel 'that' is something very physical.
  • Metaphysician Undercover
    12.3k
    I was under the impression that the context in which Apo used the term "unintelligible" had more to do with how things would be if brains weren't perceiving stuff. (As opposed to those who feel there is something 'higher', like knowing without a knower, awareness being really 'REALLY' special, etc.)Gooseone

    Apokrisis posits an apeiron, which is inherently unintelligible, as the beginning from which substantial existence emerges. The apeiron is an infinite potential, a vast vagueness. Vague is described as a situation where the law of non-contradiction does not apply. So it is implied that this apeiron is something which is impossible for a brain, or any form of intellect to understand, because it defies the basic principles of logic which are used in understanding. Therefore it is inherently unintelligible, impossible to understand, whether or not a brain is attempting to understand it. That is the principle which I object to.

    Not to get into the: "If a tree falls into the forest....bla bla", but for now I find the whole concept of intelligibility a human thing. Things might exist and the way this stuff behaves might very well be intelligible but if there isn't anything resembling human cognition perceiving it I can just as well call it unintelligible.Gooseone

    I don't see how you can make that statement. "Intelligible", and "unintelligible", refer to whether or not a thing may be understood by an intellect. Suppose there are four chairs at a table. This situation is intelligible (possible to be understood) whether or not there is a human being there, actually perceiving it. Do you recognize the difference between being actually understood, and having the possibility of being understood? You seem to think that if something is not actually understood, then you are justified in calling it unintelligible. But the "ible" suffix implies having the possibility of being understood, so just because something is not actually understood, this does not justify calling it unintelligible, it is simply unknown.

    You say it yourself, you need a capacity to understand for things to become intelligible, it's my opinion we need something resembling human cognition to do so and I feel 'that' is something very physical.Gooseone

    I agree, that if there was no capacity to understand, no mind anywhere in the universe, we couldn't call anything "intelligible". But to call something "intelligible" requires a mind itself, and it is clearly not the case that there is no mind anywhere in the universe. So that primary prerequisite. that there be a mind for something to intelligible, is already fulfilled, necessarily, by the present conditions of existing minds. Now, what is at issue is what type of things do we label as intelligible or unintelligible. The fact that I can't understand something, or even that no living human being can understand this thing, doesn't warrant it being entitled unintelligible. In the future, someone might figure it out.

    Suppose something is described in contradictory terms. Do you agree that this description is unintelligible, because it is contradictory? But just because the description of the thing is unintelligible, this does not necessitate the conclusion that the thing itself, which is described, is unintelligible. The person making the description may be mistaken. My argument is that it is unphilosophical, and wrong, to assume that anything itself is actually unintelligible. When something appears to be unintelligible (requiring a contradictory description or something like that), this is really due to a deficiency of the intellect which is trying to understand it.
  • apokrisis
    6.8k
    Knowing something to be unintelligible still counts as knowledge. It's the unknown unknowns you gotta loook out for. ;)
  • Metaphysician Undercover
    12.3k

    No, as I explained already, knowing something to be unintelligible is contradictory. If you know the thing, clearly it's not unintelligible. You can partially know a thing, and think that it's unintelligible, but this just means that you must make a better effort to understand it. It does not mean that you know it to be unintelligible.
  • apokrisis
    6.8k
    I don't think you've really thought through what it means for the PNC to fail to apply. Vagueness is defined by it not being actually divided by a contradiction. It is the intelligible which is the crisply divided.
  • Gooseone
    107


    Again, though I am not of the opinion that "reality" depends on a human observer to exist, for all practical purposes, if something cannot be known it is not dissimilar to it not existing.

    Would a child in grade school, who can't understand algebra be correct to say that algebra is unintelligible? Would someone in high school be correct to say that university level physics is unintelligible.Metaphysician Undercover

    For the child in grade school algebra would indeed be unintelligible, this points to the narrow framework we have to make sense of things. It's evident in a human life (you don't remember how you understood things when you were very young, you only know you were asleep when you wake up or when you remember a dream and you don't know what it's like to be dead). As a society we have become able to vastly improve our understanding of a lot of things but I feel it's still a narrow framework, maybe you could think of ancient cultures using myths to explain things which we can now understand as natural principles. The changing of the seasons might be such an example and things like gravity might have been an unknown unknown for a large part of human history because nobody was able to even conceptualize it could be other then self evident we tend to stick to the ground.

    This narrow framework we are operating in in this thread seems to be the one of the known unknowns where Apo points to the lower end where we can fathom things becoming unintelligible (we do not assign agency to ants yet when we look at the behaviour of an ant colony it can appear to behave intelligently, still we don't assume ants are intelligent) and others point to the higher end where we can fathom more things becoming intelligible (assigning anthropomorphic qualities to the universe, believing in god, having faith in human progress, etc).

    When we're talking about, say, physics, we(!) are able to determine various causes for what we see and I do not find it inappropriate to state that some things "just happen" (with the caveat that you're looking at something in a specific framework, still, no need to explain the universe to bake an apply pie). The limit to our knowledge when it concerns the mechanistic / deterministic framework of viewing universe lies in the resolution with which we're able / unable to view things (both in size, time and even place it seems). When we're looking at life, causes become hidden from plain sight in a novel way, though I am able to fathom we might become able to look (back?) at our current situation and describe it in a physical / mechanistic / deterministic framework, it's just as much off the mark to claim we are sure of that at this point as it is to claim we need an equivalent to an elan vital or god to ever make sense of things.

    Being able to fathom everything being intelligible to an intellect does not mean it will be so per se. As Apo mentions, you seem to exclude the possibility for unknown unknowns which are, at this moment, unintelligible. And, if you are excluding the possibility for unintelligibility and claim that everything can, in principle, be intelligible, do you then also believe we have the potential to become god-like?

    Also there is, for example, Rich, who seems to take issue with Apo trying to lay out a framework of understanding our current situation because it's not to be interpreted fully mechanistically / deterministically and does not provide a succinct final cause nor disproves the existence of a higher power. I guess you could accuse Apo of being a fundamental / reductionistic "emergentist" yet I don't see an issue with taking some consistent constraints (causes?) and using them to see what we can make sense of.
  • Metaphysician Undercover
    12.3k
    I don't think you've really thought through what it means for the PNC to fail to apply. Vagueness is defined by it not being actually divided by a contradiction. It is the intelligible which is the crisply divided.apokrisis

    When the PNC does not apply, it is and it is not. This means contradiction is united within the same object. To say "not being actually divided by a contradiction" is slight of hand, because what is really said is that contradiction is allowed to be united in the same object. So the object may be described in contradictory terms.

    For the child in grade school algebra would indeed be unintelligible, this points to the narrow framework we have to make sense of things.Gooseone

    All you are saying here, is that in relation to the child's intellect, algebra is unintelligible. So you are judging the object, algebra, by relating it to a child's intellect, and coming to the conclusion that the object is unintelligible. You have proposed a system of relativity, and have chosen the child's intellect, as an arbitrary frame of reference, and concluded that within this frame of reference the object is unintelligible. Therefore your use of "unintelligible" is completely subjective, arbitrary. and totally meaningless without a qualifier which designates relative to what.

    This narrow framework we are operating in in this thread seems to be the one of the known unknowns where Apo points to the lower end where we can fathom things becoming unintelligible (we do not assign agency to ants yet when we look at the behaviour of an ant colony it can appear to behave intelligently, still we don't assume ants are intelligent) and others point to the higher end where we can fathom more things becoming intelligible (assigning anthropomorphic qualities to the universe, believing in god, having faith in human progress, etc).Gooseone

    It's one thing to say that from within my framework of understanding, it appears like the universe emerged from an unintelligible apeiron. But it is a completely different thing to state this, as apokrisis does, in a way which implies that it is a scientifically proven fact. The latter shows absolutely no respect for the fact that this is only how the object appears from one particular framework, and other frameworks will perceive the object in a completely different way. To base your application of the word "unintelligible" on a framework of relativity, which reduces intelligibility to something completely arbitrary and subjective, and then turn around and insist my framework is the correct one, is completely hypocritical if not actually contradictory.

    When we're talking about, say, physics, we(!) are able to determine various causes for what we see and I do not find it inappropriate to state that some things "just happen" (with the caveat that you're looking at something in a specific framework, still, no need to explain the universe to bake an apply pie).Gooseone

    I can't say that I have ever heard a physicist talk in this way, to say things "just happen". A physicist will claim to know why it happens this way, or to not know why it happens this way. When they say that they do not know why it happens this way, what is emphasized is that they do not know. They do not imply that they know that it just happens. Much of high energy physics today is concerned with statistical probabilities. The physicists acknowledge that they do not know why things must be understood in terms of probabilities, but the fact that statistical analysis is applicable, and is being applied, indicates that they do not believe that things just happen.

    Being able to fathom everything being intelligible to an intellect does not mean it will be so per se. As Apo mentions, you seem to exclude the possibility for unknown unknowns which are, at this moment, unintelligible. And, if you are excluding the possibility for unintelligibility and claim that everything can, in principle, be intelligible, do you then also believe we have the potential to become god-like?Gooseone

    To speak of unknowns, is completely different than speaking of things unintelligible. "Known" and "unknown" refer to an actual condition in relation to intellect. "Intelligible" and "unintelligible" imply potentiality in relation to intellect. For the reasons I described, it is irrational to assume that something is unintelligible. You have made it rational in a qualified sense with your system of relativity, described above. Things may be deemed as "unintelligible" in relation to particular intellectual frameworks. My argument is that these intellectual frameworks, are therefore deficient. My system allows that if there is something "god-like", then for that god-like being, all is intelligible. Why would you think that it allows that human beings could become god-like?
  • apokrisis
    6.8k
    When the PNC does not apply, it is and it is not.Metaphysician Undercover

    Or rather, metaphysically as a state, it is neither one thing nor the other.

    Where you just went wrong is to talk about vagueness or Apeiron as an object. An object of course is defined as an already crisply entified thing, although it may have vague properties.
  • Gooseone
    107


    I wondered if the potentiality for humans to become god-like was something which would follow from your philosophy, it was an actual question, not an assumption ;).

    For the rest, I don't see much difference between knowing / the unknown and intelligible vs unintelligible, to me they both fundamentally require a perceiving entity (which I can not absolutely rule out). I could try and differentiate between them by saying something about what might constitute an adaptive response (talking biology here) and how intelligibility might depend on communicating with other minds but I find the differences between the terms quite transient.

    Also I have not read this thread as thoroughly as might have been proper so I have not seen Apo claim an Apeiron as a fundamental and absolute scientific truth. Again to me it appeared as if some of his observations were declared null and void / strawmanned because he did not provide a succinct final cause ...or something like that.
  • apokrisis
    6.8k
    Also I have not read this thread as thoroughly as might have been proper so I have not seen Apo claim an Apeiron as a fundamental and absolute scientific truth.Gooseone

    Yep. The argument is one of metaphysical logic. And then I also show how science supports it.

    But note also that "intelligible" has a technical meaning in this discussion. It is about metaphysics. And it means the Cosmos is rationally structured, therefore capable of being understood in those terms.

    The unintelligible then means a "state" where that structure is lacking.
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