I see no reason to think that universals exist independently of the minds thinking them. They have a foundation in reality, in the potential of each instance to evoke the same concept, i.e in the intelligibility of their instances. But, being potential is not being actual. — Dfpolis

I'm curious how you would describe a concrete scenario prior to sentient life emerging on Earth with respect to universals.

For example, consider a molecule of water consisting of two hydrogen atoms and one oxygen atom. Among the universals here are the kinds water, molecule and atom, the numbers one and two, and the relations between the atoms.

Philosophically, first there's the question of whether water molecules (as particulars) could have existed prior to sentient life on Earth (in a similar sense to Einstein asking whether the moon exists when nobody looks). If so, there's the second question of whether the relations between the atoms, their structure and their quantity would also have been real prior to sentient life on Earth (i..e, that a water molecule really has two hydrogen atoms independent of mind).

My reading of Aristotle's immanent/moderate realism about universals is that the answer would be "yes" to both those questions. You seem to be saying "no" to at least the latter question.

Einstein felt compelled to exclaim, frustratedly: ‘Does the moon not continue to exist when nobody’s looking at it?’ Of course he posed that as a rhetorical question, as he felt the answer was obvious. But he still had to ask.

My view is that the mind is inextricably involved in every judgement about every matter, even those things that are so-called ‘mind-independent’. But this is precisely what was lost sight of in the advent of modernity. It comes from treating mythological naturalism as a metaphysical principle, which it isn’t.

My view is that the mind is inextricably involved in every judgement about every matter, even those things that are so-called ‘mind-independent’. — Wayfarer

It is, unarguably, since you're talking about judgments. But Einstein's question is whether the mind is inextricably involved in every matter (including matters prior to life having emerged on Earth and thus prior to judgments about them).

Matter and form are just the useful conceptions that divide reality for us. Being is a whole. So we are speaking of taking a dialectical opposition to its limits so as to have a causal tale that makes a generalised sense. It sustains a mode of metaphysical analysis that works better than any other general scheme. — apokrisis

This demonstrates your misunderstanding of the categories of matter and form. This is a categorical separation, it is not a dichotomy of dialectical opposition. That is the difficult part of understanding this division. It is a categorical difference, so it is impossible to reduce it to dialectical opposition. All dialectical opposition is contained within the category of form, is/is not, have/have not, etc., all are formal dichotomies. This is why matter is left as indefinite, it is what is not suited to dialectical opposition. So there cannot be dialectical opposition between matter and form because that would put matter into the category of form.

Consider wayfarer's quote from Pattee above. The categorical separation is a requirement. And, the logical dichotomies of dialectical opposition all belong to the one category. Therefore the division between the two categories cannot be presented as a dialectical opposition, because that would annihilate the categorical separation, placing the two categories into the one, as a logical dichotomy.

For me, matter and form both have to be active in the sense that both have to themselves develop. And both have to be causes - a reason for concrete change. Yet still, those other contrasts, like active vs passive, will start to apply somewhere along the line. We wouldn’t hold on to these other dichotomies of existence if they didn’t have strong explanatory value. — apokrisis

You can say "for me matter and form are both such and such", but unless you remain true to the conception, of what use is that saying? You are not talking about matter and form anymore, you are talking about something completely different. Why use those words unless you remain true, or perhaps you are trying to be misleading?

So you are wrong to say all this metaphysical talk is purely conceptual. It is an attempt to dissect reality in terms of its actual logical oppositions. But also, it is definitely an exercise in modeling. So it is conceptual. But what seems missing in your replies is an understanding that what is central to the conception is the dialectical logic - the logic of symmetry breaking - that is at the heart of a hylomorphic analysis of nature. — apokrisis

Actually this is where you seem to go astray, you feel a need to model reality within your dichotomous logic. You do not allow for that part of reality, that category which is classed as outside of dichotomization. All of reality is forced into your logical box of "symmetry". So instead of putting matter where it is placed by Aristotle, as categorical separate from form, it is simply a mode of formal existence which you call symmetry breaking.

And I agree. That is the very point I make. Metaphysics only makes sense once all the conceiving is understood in terms of how the logic of symmetry breaking or dichotomisation would work. It is the mechanism by which primal divisions arise that is the key take home here. Categories are limits - the complementary limits of some deeper process of dichotomisation. — apokrisis

See, you are placing the "categories" within the logic of dichotomization. All categories are therefore representations of formal dichotomies. So you deny yourself the possibility of a category for things which are outside of formal dichotomy. That is where matter is placed by Aristotle, in a category outside dichotomization. But you deny yourself the possibility of any such category, by placing all categories within logical dichotomization, saying that categories themselves are limits. That categories are not limits is clearly evident when you consider the category of infinite.

My approach starts by granting the reality of finality in nature. And goals are constraints. Once a purpose has been adequately served, anything more doesn’t make an intelligible difference. — apokrisis

The point is, that your purpose is to state an example. In your example, a change occurs. So for the purpose of your example, the change qualifies as a change because you call it that, a 'change'. If you proceed to argue that the change is so insignificant that it doesn't even qualify as a 'change', then you cannot hold it up in your example, as a 'change', saying "look at this 'change' it's so insignificant that we can't even call it a change". Why are you calling it a change then? To do so is simple deception. You are saying we can't call it a change, but to make my demonstration, I will call it a change.

So regardless of what you say, this way of conceiving of existence is already basic to the metaphysics of science. It just makes obvious sense. — apokrisis

If science operates in this deceptive way, I pity the poor scientists who are being deceived. Is this like saying light is not a wave, because waves require a medium and there is no medium, therefore it doesn't qualify as a wave, but we'll just call it a wave anyway?

And so the crucial question becomes how do you measure intentionality in your scheme? — apokrisis

We can only measure quantities and intentionality is not a quantity.

Information and entropy complement each other nicely as measurements in the two theatres of operation as physics and biology are coming to understand them. If you have some personal idea here, then you will need to say something about what would count as a measurement of your explanatory construct. — apokrisis

"Intentionality" does not name a construct. Constructs are inventions designed to bridge our ignorance. The concept of <Intentionality> is evoked when we experience an aspect of reality, the essence of which is to be "about" a target,i.e. that which it intends.

Information is related to intentionality, but quite different. Information is the reduction of (logical) possibility. It can be merely intelligible (capable of being known), or it can be actually known. My knowing information is an instance of intentionality because my knowledge is about what I have been informed of.

Merely intelligible information is not intentional. It's defining characteristic is not being about some intended target, but being an aspect of physical reality. Bits encoded in my computer's memory are electronic states with no intrinsic meaning. (The same computer state can encode many meanings as discussed in my "#24 Mind: Just a Computer?" - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=57466ekUlGE). It is only when my computer's encoded information informs an actual thought that we have intentionality.

[physicalism and universals]seem like incompatible positions. Physics has nothing to say about the logical order and universals belong to the logical order.

This has nothing to do with logical order, it relates what is. It just entails that the same property can be instantiated in multiple particulars. Look back at my example. "-1" electric charge is a property that exists in every instance of electron. Four-ness exists in every state of affairs that consists of 4 particulars. These are universals.

It seems to me, then, that you’re actually rejecting Aquinas’ hylomorphic dualism. — Wayfarer

I don't reject hylomorphism, but I do reject Aquinas's version. See my "A New Reading of Aristotle's Hyle" The Modern Schoolman 68 (March, 1991): 225-244 (https://philpapers.org/rec/POLANR).

I don’t think your analysis can account for ‘the unreasonable efficacy [or predictive power] of mathematics’. — Wayfarer

And as I answered before, the integration of constant laws over time gives us the predictive power of physics.

I see the metaphysics of it like this: that the types or forms of things correspond to their original ‘ideas’ in the divine intellect. — Wayfarer

Having been schooled in the Thomist tradition, I have given a lot of thought to this point.
1. The Divine Mind is perfectly simple -- leaving us with no ground for distinguishing diverse ideas in God.
2. Ideas are abstractions. Abstractions leave certain notes of intelligibility behind to focus on others in order to scale the complexity of reality down to human representational limitations. Thus, they are a "stupid human trick," and completely unnecessary in God, Who knows reality exhaustively, "numbering the hairs on our heads."
3. The well-documented evolution of species shows that there are no fixed species "forms."
4. As God is unchanging and so timeless, there can be no before and after in God. Thus, there is no need for exemplar ideas ("design plans") prior to the creation of individual members of a species. In other words, God does not "design" in any way analogous to human engineers.

God does intend what He creates, but we need to avoid thinking of creation in anthropomorphic terms.

The rational soul [unlike the sensory faculties] is able to grasp those forms or ideas by identifying their kind, type, etc; this is the role of the ‘active intellect’. — Wayfarer

I agree that the agent intellect (our power to be aware) actualizes the intelligibility encoded in sensory representations (phantasms) -- giving rise to ideas -- ideas of both species and of accidents. So, I see no reason to believe we're any more aware of essential than of accidental notes of intelligibility. Through experience we come to see what is common and what variable in various examples of a species, and so form, for example, a better defined <human> concept. Aristotle gives us the analogy of a military unit falling in, man by man, until its formation is clear.

Aquinas agrees that we have no direct knowledge of essences, but know them through accidents.

Aristotle’s comments on the ‘nous poetikos’ are regarded as controversial, difficult and obscure and have generated centuries of analysis. — Wayfarer

This is true. The way to avoid the controversy is not to try to get into Aristotle's mind (an impossible task) and not to treat Aristotle as an authority. Rather, we should treat Aristotle as a colleague -- standing beside him, and looking at what he is looking at. When I do that, I ask myself what aspect of my experience is he calling the "agent intellect" (nous poetikos)? What experience makes encoded information actually known to me? This is the phenomenological approach.

It seems clear to me that my awareness makes sensory data actually known. I can react to sensations, automatically (without awareness) and then i do not "know" what I'm doing, but as soon as I become aware of a bit of sensory data, it is no longer merely intelligible,but actually known. Thus, nous poetikos is just Aristotle's name for our power of awareness.

a passage in Augustine on ‘intelligible objects’ that has always been a source of interest to me. — Wayfarer

Yes, St. Augustine is a man of great insight. The more of him I read the more I see.

I also appreciate a sensible and respectful dialogue.

So - I am drawn to a form of dualism, but emphatically not the Cartesian form. — Wayfarer

First, I think we are all pretty much agreed that Galileo distinguished primary and secondary qualities without calling them by those names.

Second, the dualism I see is a consequence of what I have been calling the Fundamental Abstraction of Natural Science. It partitions reality into the physical and the intentional, but one point I hope to make is that physicality and intentionality are not separated in nature -- only mapped onto orthogonal (non-overlapping) conceptual subspaces.

Our conceptual space has a foundation in reality, but its structure is not predetermined. (Making our earlier discussion of Exemplar Ideas even more relevant.) We can abstract alternative concepts and project our experience into the resulting space.

Reading Aristotle, it seems clear that he didn't partition reality into the physical and intentional. The discussion in De Anima, for example, moves fluidly from the physical mechanisms of sensation to the intentional mechanisms of ideogenesis. In Physics i, 9 which I have been discussing in another thread, he explains physical change using "desire" as an explanatory principle. He brings "desire" in again to explain how lesser beings can be moved by the Unmoved Mover.

So, the duality of modern thought is culturally caused -- embedded in the way we have chosen to conceptualize reality.

Actually there isn't really any foundation in reality for your concept of "laws of nature". — Metaphysician Undercover

This would come as a surprise to most scientists. We do not see ourselves as engaged in fiction writing, but in describing reality and especially how specific phenomena reveal and fit into the order of nature.

We have descriptive "laws" such as the laws of physics which are really just inductive conclusions. — Metaphysician Undercover

This contradicts the previous sentence. How can you say there is no basis in reality for the concept of laws and then say that we arrive at the concept by induction from an evidentiary basis (a foundation in reality).

Does Newton's hypothesis of universal laws of nature go beyond its evidentiary basis? Certainly. That is the nature of hypotheses. Does that mean that there is no foundation in reality for the concept? Of course not. The hypothesis has been confirmed by over 300 years of observational data.

But just because the inductive conclusions are called "laws" it doesn't really follow that whatever it is in nature that is causing matter to act in consistent ways,.is anything like a "law", it's more like a cause. — Metaphysician Undercover

First, "cause" and "law" are not mutually exclusive terms.

Aristotle and the medieval logicians explained this kind of naming convention. They knew terms can be predicated not only univocally (with the same meaning) and equivocally (with completely different meanings), but also analogically (with different but coordinated meanings).

One type of analogical predication is an analogy of attribution. For example, food and a urine sample are not "healthy" in the sense that a person is healthy; nonetheless, the senses are related by an underlying dynamic. Food is not healthy because it's alive and well, but because eating it contributes to personal health. Similarly, a urine sample is not healthy in itself, but as a sign of good health.

In the same way, the laws of nature are not same as the laws of physics, but they are dynamically related and so laws in an analogical sense.

Whatever it is which acts on matter, causing it to behave in the way that it does, can't really be anything like any laws that we know of. — Metaphysician Undercover

Of course the laws of nature don't work like legislative acts. Still, the analogy is sufficient for the "fixed laws" to have been called "laws" or "ordinances" since their first appearance in Western literature (in Jeremiah 31 and 33).

Since you agree that something acts to produce the observed behavior of matter, it is pointless to argue about naming conventions.

Would you agree with me that the matter in motion is just a reflection of the real activity which is the laws in action? — Metaphysician Undercover

Of course. The concept <laws of nature> is one way to think about the order of nature. That does not mean that other ways are wrong. I am discussing <laws of nature> because it plays an important part in our current conceptualization of nature..

I wonder why one feels compelled to use a loaded term like "intentionality" for the tendencies of nature to form certain patterns or forms?

I wonder why one feels compelled to use a loaded term like "intentionality" for the tendencies of nature to form certain patterns or forms? — prothero

Good question! I tentatively submit that Nature has no intention. It just does what it does by being what it is. It is bound by no law or principle. It follows no instructions. It just is.

the laws of nature are not same as the laws of physics, but they are dynamically related and so laws in an analogical sense. — Dfpolis

Surely the laws of physics are laws of nature? The contrast, I think, is with human laws, which bind our behaviour, or are supposed to. :wink: They have authority. [Although this authority, over us, is given by us; it's not intrinsic to our laws.] Laws of nature/physics are descriptive of reality. They are non-binding. They just help us to understand. And they have no authority. On the contrary, they reflect reality, which is the master or reference, not the law(s).

I do think I understand your position. I've read Hegel, etc., too. — gurugeorge

Since I haven't read Hegel, and don't particularly want to read Hegel, the fact that you mention him gives me strong reason to think that you're burdening me with (Hegelian) baggage that isn't mine -- and so don't understand my position at all.

The only "subjective object" around is the person knowing, willing, etc., — gurugeorge

Agreed.

that is just the objective human animal accessible to all, and its qualities can be understood scientifically (e.g. its/our means of knowing, its/our capacity for knowledge, etc. — gurugeorge

Of course, the physical aspects of the human animal are available to all, but since the intentional aspects of the human animal have been excluded from natural sciennce by the Fundamental Abstraction, they are not physical. Experience shows that my intentionality is not intersubjectively available, though parts of it can be inferred from behavior. Further, the behaviorist approach to psychology has long since been discredited.

So, what can be known by a purely physical inspection of the human animal is limited, and does not exhaust its intelligibility.

its qualities can be understood scientifically (e.g. its/our means of knowing, its/our capacity for knowledge, etc. — gurugeorge

I agree that we can know our intentional operations "scientifically," if we mean by "scientifically" via empirically based rational analysis (without a priori limits on the kinds of experiential data allowed).

If, on the other hand, by "scientifically" one means to restrict, a priori, the data to the space of physical concepts, then such an approach is both non-empirical (being based on an a priori exclusion of experiential data) and irrational (being based on belief system inadequate to the full range of human experience).

On the other hand, if you mean something like "the knowing subject caught in the act of present knowing," then that's a misunderstanding of what knowledge is.. — gurugeorge

"Knowing" is a term with a vast range of analogous meanings. Preference for any one meaning does not invalidate other meanings of the term, So there is no "misunderstanding of what knowledge is." At most, my preferred meaning is not your preferred meaning. I am happy to concede that, but doing so does not grant your preferred meaning privileged status -- nor do I claim privileged status for my meaning.

I have defined what I mean by "knowing" as "awareness of present intelligibility." If humans are aware of neurally encoded information, then "knowing" in this sense exists. If knowing in this sense exists, there is no rational grounds not to examine its nature insofar as possible. If you wish to examine "knowing" in your preferred sense, I encourage you to so so.

It's actually not a momentary subjective relation in that sense (the momentary, present relation between a notional abstract subject and the abstracted contents of that subject's knowing). — gurugeorge

My definition does not speak to the duration of "knowing." It is not restricted to transient awareness, nor does it require eternal awareness. So, criticisms based on the assumption of a "momentary, present relation" address no essential feature of my concept of knowing. And, to avoid any confusion, I accept that "knowing" in a different sense can name the possession of latent, neurally-encoded contents. In the same way, I'm not considering "knowing how" (= the acquired ability to perform a task) -- and on and on as you note. It's not that there's anything "wrong" with these kinds of knowing - they're just not the kind of "knowing" I'm considering here.

So, now that we're agreed that "knowing" can mean many things, and that knowing in the sense of awareness of present is a subject-object relation, maybe you can say what you are objecting to.

Surely the laws of physics are laws of nature? — Pattern-chaser

I am using these as separate terms of art. By "laws of physics" I mean approximate human descriptions of the ordering relations in nature. By "laws of nature" I mean the laws operative in nature that effect the observed order.

As to the question of how laws of nature relate to human legislation, that is more about naming conventions and the psychology of analogy and association. I am not trying to make any philosophical point from the fact that the same word ("law") is used in both cases -- although clearly Jeremiah thought that the laws of nature were divine ordinances.

so I don't hold with the notion of there being substantive qualia at all. — Janus

Nor do I. I see "qualia" as naming the contingent forms of human sensation.

Other, qualitative aspects of cognition are then relegated to the subjective [and implicitly secondary] domain. That is the main characteristic of scientific naturalism, is it not? That what is real is measurable? — Wayfarer

Yes and yes.

Hence the conundrum posed by the ‘observer problem’ in quantum physics. — Wayfarer

Yes, but the observer problem goes even further -- abstracting away the observing apparatus (even though it is physical and subject to physics). Thus, the observer's apparatus is lumped in with the human observer as part of the neglected subjective object.

I'm curious how you would describe a concrete scenario prior to sentient life emerging on Earth with respect to universals. — Andrew M

There were no actual universals prior to subjects thinking them. There was common intelligibility. In the biological world, this can be traced back to the genetics of common descent. In the inorganic world, common structures often (but not always) reflect a common dynamics. For example, I suspect that most planets have the same origin story. Geological laminae are typically due to sedimentation. Spheroidal surfaces are mostly due to surface tension (drops and bubbles) or gravity (large astronomical bodies).

For example, consider a molecule of water consisting of two hydrogen atoms and one oxygen atom. Among the universals here are the kinds water, molecule and atom, the numbers one and two, and the relations between the atoms. — Andrew M

All of these are intelligible aspects of the molecule, not actual universal ideas. If we could see on hydrogen atom, we could form the universal <hydrogen>. Because other hydrogen atoms have the same notes of intelligibility, they have the objective capacity to evoke the same idea <hydrogen>. The universality of an idea rests on each of its instances having the objective capacity to evoke the same idea.

Thus, there is an objective basis for universal ideas, but there are no actual universals until some mind e3ncounters their instances.

there's the second question of whether the relations between the atoms, their structure and their quantity would also have been real prior to sentient life on Earth (i..e, that a water molecule really has two hydrogen atoms independent of mind). — Andrew M

All of these are real and intelligible, but not actually known until someone becomes aware of them.

The one fine point here, made by Aristotle in his definition of "quantity" in Metaphysics Delta, is that there are no actual numbers independent of counting and measuring operations. So, while counting the hydrogen atoms in a water molecule will always give <2>, there is no actual number 2 floating around the molecule.

In the same way, as we learned from Special Relativity, it we measure the distance between the nuclei, the answer will depend on how we perform the measuring operation.

"-1" electric charge is a property that exists in every instance of electron. Four-ness exists in every state of affairs that consists of 4 particulars. These are universals. — Relativist

No, they are a bunch of particulars with the same intelligibility -- the same power of evoke concepts.

Until a concept is actually evoked, there is no actual universal.

there are no actual universals until some mind encounter their instances. — Dfpolis

Analogous to: there is no actual electron until some measurement is taken. This is not coincidental.

Real numbers [and the like] don’t begin to exist by virtue of there being someone around who learns how to count. The mind evolves to the point where it is able to count, that is all. The same goes for ideas and universals, generally. They are the constituents of the ability to reason but they’re not the products of reason. Otherwise they would be merely subjective or socially constructed. But the grasp of universals is what enables the discovery of principles and laws.

I think the basic ground of contention between Plato and Aristotle revolves around the manner in which it can be said that universals exist. (I think Plato himself never was clear about that and it was subject to much more later development, particularly by the later neoPlatonists.) But my understanding is, that the sense in which numbers exist, is different to the sense in which phenomenal objects exist. The way I try and express it, is to say that numbers are 'real but not existent', although I know it's an imperfect way of putting it. But this is based on the argument that numbers (and here, 'number' is a symbol for universals generally) don't come into and go out of existence. In this they're unlike sensory phenomena, which are invariably compounded and temporal. But they're real, in the sense that the laws of mathematics are the same for all who think. So that is the sense in which number is transcendental.

When we think of any number, we're actually grasping what the tradition called an 'intelligible object', although again that is an imperfect expression, as numbers aren't actually 'objects' in any sense but by analogy. But this is very much the meaning of the passage that I mentioned previously in which it is said that 'Intelligible objects must be higher than reason, because they judge reason. Augustine means by this that these intelligible objects constitute a normative standard against which our minds are measured. We refer to mathematical objects and truths to judge whether or not, and to what extent, our minds understand mathematics. We consult the rules of wisdom to judge whether or not and to what extent a person is wise. In light of these standards we can judge whether our minds are as they should be. It makes no sense, however, to ask whether these normative intelligible objects are as they should be: they simply are, and are normative for other things'.

The point is, we mind operates according to these principles - they are what enable us to think rationally and to discover and exploit principles.

(This is the theme that I'm studying. I had the idea yesterday to google the phrase gradations of being which yields some interesting readings in this area, the first being Aristotle's Gradations of Being In Metaphysics E-Z by Joseph Owens who seems to have been a formidable scholar in this field.)

So there cannot be dialectical opposition between matter and form because that would put matter into the category of form. — Metaphysician Undercover

Your logic is a little out of whack. If you are framing matter as the indefinite - in opposition to the definite - then that is just putting matter in the category of the metaphysically dichotomous.

Dichotomies might be regarded as an intelligible form, but the whole point is that they are the intelligible form that subsumes differentiated categories, such as form and matter, into a higher level method of logical categorisation. Dichotomies talk about form and matter as being the limits of a common process of division.

So you are making the reductionist mistake of trying to reduce dynamical processes of opposition to mere standalone categories. And yet you know the logical definition of a dichotomy to be "mutually exclusive/jointly exhaustive". The coherent relationship - the asymmetry, or broken symmetry - is what it is all about.

"-1" electric charge is a property that exists in every instance of electron. Four-ness exists in every state of affairs that consists of 4 particulars. These are universals.
— Relativist

No, they are a bunch of particulars with the same intelligibility -- the same power of evoke concepts.

Until a concept is actually evoked, there is no actual universal.

I'm providing you a taste of a physicalist metaphysics. You have at least twice referred to my description as statements of faith, when all I've endeavored to do is to show there to be alternate metaphysical accounts. Your reaction here is pretty revealing about whose position is a product of faith.

We can only measure quantities and intentionality is not a quantity. — Dfpolis

Then there ain't anything to meaningful to talk about.

Concepts have to be cashed out in their appropriate percepts. And it is clear that you are doing the usual dualistic thing of wanting to claim that intentionality needs to be measured in terms of it being a qualia - a feel, an affect, something mental, something ineffably subjective and hence beyond simple objective measurement.

But taking the discussion in that direction is not much use if we want to deal with intentionality in some useful scientific modelling sense. For a start, it changes the subject at a basic level. You are stressing the abstracted "aboutness" of consciousness rather than the more prosaic thing of that aboutness being a modelling relation embodying some actual goal.

So yes, modelling the world involves the general thing of being able to take particular - personal and individual - points of view. We could say that there is that general quality of first person perspective which makes awareness intrinsically a matter of "aboutness". But that now leaves out the goal-centric nature of an embodied mind. The aboutness is also always about something that matters. Intentionality might speak to the existence of a subject, but it also speaks to an object in the same breath.

So intentionality ought to be measurable in terms of its objective satisfactions. It is not a free-floating subjectivity. It is a goal-directedness. And that is the bit science can measure. It can ask the question of what the Cosmos appears to be trying to achieve in general. Finality can be approached from that end, rather than having to start with ineffable "feelings" of aboutness.

Merely intelligible information is not intentional. It's defining characteristic is not being about some intended target, but being an aspect of physical reality. Bits encoded in my computer's memory are electronic states with no intrinsic meaning. — Dfpolis

Sure. But the information theoretic turn in physics is based on the realisation that the material world has a fundamental capacity in terms of intelligible bits. The bits might be signal, or noise. But there is a foundational limit on semantic possibility in this basic fact about syntactical quantity.

So what the formal dichotomy of information and entropy does is create a baseline ontology. It says that material energy and formal variety are not only both conserved quantities in nature, they are essentially exchangable. They are two views of the same stuff.

And having united the material and formal aspects of nature like that, right at its root, we can then start to make sense of the semantic aspect of being. Nature - considered as a memory, a record of syntactical markings - is now understood as being composed of atoms of form. And that gives us the ground to make the further distinction of the marks that are being interpreted in terms of being meaningful, or meaningless, to "someone".

We thus can move on from information as uninformed syntactical possibility to information as actually informed semantics - the reduced kind where the variety is collapsed in sharp fashion to a state of signal vs noise. We arrive at a condition of aboutness or intentionality where we know what marks or signs matter, what other marks and signs we can now treat as completely ignorable and meaningless background chatter.

So nature has to first provide the variety. And then develop the mechanism that sorts it into figure and ground, meaningful and meaningless.

Having built in a mathematics of measurement at the root of this ontology - one that understands reality to be composed of individuated marks or material degrees of freedom - we can hope to quantify our notions about semantics or intentionality. We can set up a definition of mind in terms of its ability to reduce the chaotic variety of the world to the simplest binary model of signal and noise.

For instance - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bayesian_approaches_to_brain_function

So you can see why I am being insistent on demonstrating that you are talking in concepts or qualities that are capable of being quantified. Physicalism has moved beyond hand-waving on the issue of semantics, intentionality, finality, etc.

Material variety and formal possibility have been united within scientific physicalism. Time to move on to the empirical modelling of semantics that this allows.

Real numbers [and the like] don’t begin to exist by virtue of there being someone around who learns how to count. The mind evolves to the point where it is able to count, that is all. The same goes for ideas and universals, generally. They are the constituents of the ability to reason but they’re not the products of reason. — Wayfarer

I think the basic ground of contention between Plato and Aristotle revolves around the manner in which it can be said that universals exist. — Wayfarer

When we think of any number, we're actually grasping what the tradition called an 'intelligible object', although again that is an imperfect expression, as numbers aren't actually 'objects' in any sense but by analogy — Wayfarer

This seems the old debate between “nominalism” and universals, forms or eternal objects which seems to have been ongoing for at least the last 2000 years.
Are “universals, forms, eternal objects” real, do they exist in some ethereal realm or some other reality?
Some it of course hinges on one’s definition of “exist” or “real”?
One’s religious inclinations (or lack thereof) also likely play a role in ones attitude towards the question.
The religiously inclined seem more likely to postulate a preexisting realm of ideal, permanent, eternal forms, universal laws which are created by or exist in the mind of “God”.
Plato seemed to propose that the realm of forms was more “real” than the realm of ephemeral imperfect objects of sense impression, so called Platonic realism sometimes called Platonic idealism except the realm of forms was separate from and independent of the realm of men’s minds.
Several other philosophers including Whitehead propose that universals are “actually deficient” and can only be recognized by their instantiation in perceived “objects”. The nature of “objects” being another subject of considerable philosophical inquiry.
Pierce, semiosis and signs also seems to be a rejection of nominalism.

Pierce, semiosis and signs also seems to be a rejection of nominalism. — prothero

It definitely rejects nominalism. But also Platonism.

The key psychological shift for me is to see that the general can be just as real as the particular ... because the particular ain't actually as real as nominalism pretends.

So it is the shift to a contextual view of existence where there are no ontic individuals - atoms of existence - just various relative states of individuation. Persisting regularities produced in the course of a larger process.

In the end, nothing just exists. It all emerges - form and matter. And so it is our notion of the real itself which gets deflated. Nothing qualifies for being real in a hard nominalist sense. Although nature can approach that kind of strong realisation with arbitrary closeness.

Pierce, semiosis and signs also seems to be a rejection of nominalism. — prothero

Peirce understood nominalism in the broad anti-realist sense usually attributed to William of Ockham, as the view that reality consists exclusively of concrete particulars and that universality and generality have to do only with names and their significations. This view relegates properties, abstract entities, kinds, relations, laws of nature, and so on, to a conceptual existence at most. Peirce believed nominalism (including what he referred to as "the daughters of nominalism": sensationalism, phenomenalism, individualism, and materialism) to be seriously flawed and a great threat to the advancement of science and civilization. His alternative was a nuanced realism that distinguished reality from existence and that could admit general and abstract entities as reals without attributing to them direct (efficient) causal powers.

From this review. Note 'the distinction between reality and existence' - you won't find that in many places.

The religiously-inclined seem more likely to postulate a preexisting realm of ideal, permanent, eternal forms, universal laws which are created by or exist in the mind of “God”. — prothero

Like Macbeth, Western man made an evil decision, which has become the efficient and final cause of other evil decisions. Have we forgotten our encounter with the witches on the heath? It occurred in the late fourteenth century, and what the witches said to the protagonist of this drama was that man could realize himself more fully if he would only abandon his belief in the existence of transcendentals. The powers of darkness were working subtly, as always, and they couched this proposition in the seemingly innocent form of an attack upon universals. The defeat of logical realism in the great medieval debate was the crucial event in the history of Western culture; from this flowed those acts which issue now in modern decadence.

Richard Weaver, Ideas Have Consequences (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1948), 2‒3.

From this review. Note 'the distinction between reality and existence' - you won't find that in many places. — Wayfarer

It seems to me a particularly good way of viewing it. Universals are "real" but do not have "causal efficacy" until they ingress or are incorporated into "actuality". Without universals however the universe would lack the constraints under which order, novelty, creativity, value and experience can develop.

My view is that the mind is inextricably involved in every judgement about every matter, even those things that are so-called ‘mind-independent’. — Wayfarer

Of course, for judgements are acts of mind. That does not mean that existence depends on our judgement of existence, a la Berkeley's esse est percipi.

Analogous to: there is no actual electron until some measurement is taken. This is not coincidenta — Wayfarer

Not quite. Necessarily, before anything can be measured, it has to be measurable. If the electron did not exist, it would not be measurable.

Let me suggest that existence is convertible with the capacity to act in some way. For anything to be measurable, it has to respond to our efforts to observe it. Imagine "something" that did not interact with anything in any way. it would be impossible to observe, let alone measure. If if had no interactions, it could not evoke the concept <being>, and so would not be an instance of being.

Real numbers [and the like] don’t begin to exist by virtue of there being someone around who learns how to count. The mind evolves to the point where it is able to count, that is all. — Wayfarer

There's no reason to think numbers exist before someone actually counts -- although nothing can be counted that isn't countable. If you have an argument to the contrary, I'd be glad to consider it.

The same goes for ideas and universals, generally. They are the constituents of the ability to reason but they’re not the products of reason. Otherwise they would be merely subjective or socially constructed. — Wayfarer

Not on the view I am defending. Rather than being baseless subjective or social constructs. ideas are the actualization of objective features of reality, i.e. the intelligibility of the known object.

Let's reflect on your view that universals are real. Lets take *2* (a substantial universal as an example. If this were so, then in knowing the "twoness" of H20, I would either know *2* or I would not. But, if the object of my knowledge were the substantial idea *2*, it would not be the hydrogen in the water molecule. If *2* were not the object of our knowledge, then *2* plays no role in the formation of my concept <2>. So on your theory, either we don't know the "twoness" of the hydrogen in H2O, or *2* plays no role in knowing it. Either way, *2* does play no role in us knowing there are two hydrogen atoms in a water molecule.

Now consider the judgement <a water molecule has two hydrogen atoms>. On my account, the same neural representation that evokes the concept <a water molecule> also evokes the concept <2>. If this were not so, if something else evoked the concept <2>, then we could not attribute "twoness" to the water molecule -- it would belong to whatever evoked it.

On your theory, there are universals: *water molecule*, *hydrogen*, *2*, etc. Presumably, these inform the corresponding concepts: <water molecule>, <hydrogen>, <2>, etc. If so, then what justifies the judgement <this water molecule has two hydrogen atoms>? First, we need a connection between the universals and this water molecule -- raising the participation problem that Aristotle used to destroy Platonic Idealism.

Second, we need connections between these various concepts. On my account this is provided by one thing (this water molecule) having all the required notes of intelligibility -- so that in knowing that object, all the relevant notes of intelligibility are present. On your account, there is no basis in reality for the judgement.

The way I try and express it, is to say that numbers are 'real but not existent', — Wayfarer

This is the problem Aristotle solved with the concept of potential (dynamis). Intelligibility is the power to evoke a concept without actually being that concept. Thus, it is real, but not yet actual.

numbers (and here, 'number' is a symbol for universals generally) don't come into and go out of existence. — Wayfarer

Certainly, intelligible bodies and universal ideas in our minds pass in and out of existence.

But they're real, in the sense that the laws of mathematics are the same for all who think. — Wayfarer

Because they reflect the same notes of real intelligibility.

Intelligible objects must be higher than reason, because they judge reason. — Wayfarer

Your "intelligible objects" must have minds or they could not judge, could not be aware of the truth of a proposition.

It makes no sense, however, to ask whether these normative intelligible objects are as they should be: they simply are, and are normative for other things'. — Wayfarer

It certainly makes sense to ask if norms are justified. We do not receive norms from on high, but develop them as a result of experience.

Joseph Owens — Wayfarer

Yes, he was very learned. I have a book with his collected articles.

When you have no adequate evidentiary basis for a claim, it is made on faith.

This would come as a surprise to most scientists. We do not see ourselves as engaged in fiction writing, but in describing reality and especially how specific phenomena reveal and fit into the order of nature. — Dfpolis

No I don't think there's any surprise here. I know some physicists, and they recognize that the laws of physics are descriptive principles based in inductive reason, and not representative of some "laws of nature" which are operating to cause matter to behave the way that it does. This assumption that there are "laws of nature" which are acting in the world is ontological, not scientific.

This contradicts the previous sentence. How can you say there is no basis in reality for the concept of laws and then say that we arrive at the concept by induction from an evidentiary basis (a foundation in reality). — Dfpolis

Descriptive laws are passive things, they are human descriptions. There is no basis in reality to assume that there are corresponding active laws of nature causing the occurrence of what is described. For example, let's say that there is a descriptive law which says that if the sky is clear, it is blue. There is no reason to believe that there is a law of nature which is causing the sky to be blue when it is clear. That's nonsense, the reason why the sky is blue is not that there is a law acting to make it that way.

Since you agree that something acts to produce the observed behavior of matter, it is pointless to argue about naming conventions. — Dfpolis

You are either completely missing, or totally ignoring something here. Notice you say "the observed behaviour of matter". The activity here, which produces "the observed behaviour of matter" is the activity of observation. So if there is an activity involved in the production of these "laws" which are derived from those observations, it is the activity of observation. To assign that activity over to the thing observed is a category mistake.

It seems to me a particularly good way of viewing it. — prothero

:up:

My view is that the mind is inextricably involved in every judgement about every matter, even those things that are so-called ‘mind-independent’.
— Wayfarer

Of course, for judgements are acts of mind. That does not mean that existence depends on our judgement of existence, a la Berkeley's esse est percipi. — Dfpolis

On the contrary, I take it to mean something quite similar, although I prefer Kant's 'transcendental idealism', which he took pains to differentiate from Berkeley's 'subjective idealism'.

But what scientific realists advocate is actually what Kant would describe as 'transcendental realism', i.e. the implicit acceptance that the world would appear just as it is, were there no observer. But the problem with this is that it forgets the role that the mind plays in organising cognition. The world is not truly 'there anyway' - or put another way, the 'there anyway' world of scientific realism is also a mental construction (in the sense that Schopenhauer means by 'vorstellung'). Now that doesn't mean that, if I close my eyes, the world ceases to exist - like Kant, I too an am empirical realist. But the entire vast universe described by science, is still organised around an implicit perspective - in our case, the human perspective, which imposes a scale and an order on what would otherwise be formless and meaningless chaos. But having imposed that order, it then forgets where it has originated, and believes that what it has discovered and knows has a reality over and above what is imputed or understood by the knowing subject.

Schopenhauer:

All that is objective, extended, active—that is to say, all that is material—is regarded by materialism as affording so solid a basis for its explanation, that a reduction of everything to this can leave nothing to be desired (especially if in ultimate analysis this reduction should resolve itself into action and reaction). But we have shown that all this is given indirectly and in the highest degree determined, and is therefore merely a relatively present object, for it has passed through the machinery and manufacture of the brain, and has thus come under the forms of space, time and causality, by means of which it is first presented to us as extended in space and ever active in time. From such an indirectly given object, materialism [we might as well say 'scientific realism'] seeks to explain what is immediately given, 'the idea' (in which alone the object that materialism starts with exists).

If the electron did not exist, it would not be measurable. — Dfpolis

Whether it exists, or the mode in which it exists, is exactly what is at issue. As you no doubt know, this question is at the heart of the so-called 'Copenhagen interpretation' which says there's not an electron lurking within the probability wave until we measure it; the probability wave is all there is, until the measurement is made. That is why Bohr remarked something along the lines that the particle doesn't exist until it is measured; which is why the ontology of the 'probability wave' is still such a vexed issue.

. Either way, *2* does play no role in us knowing there are two hydrogen atoms in a water molecule. — Dfpolis

But you have to know what 2 denotes - in other words, you have to be able to count - before you can make any deductions about the composition of water molecules. It's the fact that 2 = 2 and always has an invariant meaning that makes it a universal. Furthermore, that formula H²O thoroughly specifies the chemical compound called 'water' - the symbols specify something exactly. That is the sense in which concepts are deterministic, in a way that no physical thing can be. As Gerson says of Aristotle's argument in De Anima, 'thought is an inherently universalising activity - were materialism true, then you literally could not think'.

Your "intelligible objects" must have minds or they could not judge, could not be aware of the truth of a proposition. — Dfpolis

Not my invention - the passage is from St Augustine

Augustine managed, with the aid of Platonist direction, ...to see that certain things that clearly exist, namely, the objects of the intelligible realm, cannot be corporeal. When he cries out in the midst of his vision of the divine nature, "Is truth nothing just because it is not diffused through space, either finite or infinite?" he is acknowledging the discovery of intelligible truth that first frees him to comprehend incorporeal reality.

But you have to know what 2 denotes - in other words, you have to be able to count - before you can make any deductions about the composition of water molecules. It's the fact that 2 = 2 and always has an invariant meaning that makes it a universal. Furthermore, that formula H²O thoroughly specifies the chemical compound called 'water' - the symbols specify something exactly. — Wayfarer

That's a good case in point, actually.
H₂O specifies a molecule of water. H²O specifies H squared times O.
So, what universal does “2” denote?