No, for unlike Harrihood, the property of Tristanhood does have a flesh-and-blood-and-mind instance in our universe. Because of that, its manifestation is this universe is much realer than Harrihood’s. — Tristan L

Right, and that's just what I mean by "substantive" (as opposed to imaginary) existence. Not sure what you mean by "in this universe", though. If 'this universe' is the name given to the totality of everything that exists, or has existed; then there is nowhere else for his "manifestation" to be any different.

And even if there were how would you establish that any such entity was identical to the fictional Harry Potter? My answer would be that you could not establish this, because by definition any substantive entity could not be identical to a fictional one.

But that would mean that those two people didn't separately come up with the same idea, they just came up with two different, but identical, ideas.

Except we already agree that that's not correct, — Pfhorrest

No, this is where we disagree.

What you mean by "two different, but identical, ideas" is just what I mean by "the same idea independently". I've been asking you all this time why it is not possible for two people to come up with the same idea independently. I think it is perfectly possible for two people to come up with "different, but identical, ideas". To be clear, when you say "different" here, I take you to mean "had by two (different) people". Otherwise, the quote above makes little sense to me.

By "different" I mean numerically not the same idea. In the way that Alice and Bob might drive "the same car" as in the same year make model and condition (qualitatively identical), but "different cars" as in there are two cars (numerically non-identical). By Alice and Bob having different ideas, I mean there are two ideas involved in the scenario. By them having identical ideas, I mean that there are no features that differ between the two ideas.

And yeah, having numerically different but qualitatively identical ideas doesn't make much sense. That's why I called it absurd. And I know that you don't think that that's what's actually happening; neither do I. But that's what logically has to happen if coming up with an idea means bringing it into existence. Which is why coming up with an idea can't bring it into existence.

And yeah, having numerically different but qualitatively identical ideas doesn't make much sense. That's why I called it absurd. And I know that you don't think that that's what's actually happening; neither do I. — Pfhorrest

I don't find it absurd. I don't understand why you do! Whether or not it is "actually happening", I think it is very possible, and makes perfect sense.

We have to wait? I thought all ideas already existed? — Luke

We have to wait to actually see the ideas, but it is already forechosen now that we will see them. Hence, they must already exist now.

It seems that your algorithm will also produce (mostly) junk strings of symbols that aren't ideas. Is there some method to distinguish the ideas from the junk? — Luke

Might I ask why you keep failing to read through what I write again and again and again? I’ve already said that the system consists of the mechanical string-outputter, e.g. my program, and an understander, who is the person or group of people who reads/read every finite-length string put out by the string-outputter. My program even asks its user to “Please read and understand the following text if it is meaningful”. If the string is meaningless, the understander simply ignores it. If it is meaningful, the understander maps it to the idea which it represents, thus finding the idea. The understander’s mind is absolutely needed and indespensible, but only in its capacity to understand, not in its capacitity to create. The understander only has to be very good at understanding, but doesn’t need any creative ability at all. Of course, he (used gender-neutrally) has to actually read through the symbol-sequences, making the job rather unsuitable for some :wink:.

Why do you expect the number of years to be finite? — Luke

Because the algorithm systematically outputs all strings of finite length over the same finite alphabet one after the other (here, I only use lowercase letters for illustration): {empty string}, a, b, ..., z, aa, ab, ..., az, ba, bb, bc, ..., bz, ca, ..., ..., aaa, aab, ..., ..., elf, ..., ..., goc, god, goe, ..., ..., aaaa, ..., ..., fast, ..., ..., ..., igotoschool, ..., ..., eismcsquared, ... . It does this by first outputting all strings of length 0, then all strings of length 1, then of length 2, then of length 3, and so on. This gives a one-to-one function between the set of all natural numbers and the set of all finite symbol-sequences over the same finite alphabet. It follows that for every finite string str over the alphabet, there is a natural number n such that str is the nth string output by the algorithm. Don’t tell me that you don’t accept this basic mathematical fact ... do you?

Possibilities are not ideas. — Luke

I’ve never claimed that ideas are possibilities, and I’ve even said that I don’t think that they are. I’ve made it clear that my argument relies on the fact that every idea is essentially obviously linked to a possibility belonging to it. Yet here you are, still attacking the strawman.

Being the first one to think of an idea does make it a new idea. — Luke

I’ll say it again: Let EID be an arbitrary idea that someone, call her “Alice”, came up with. Since Alice came up with EID, it must always have been possible for someone to come up with EID. This means that the possibility Poss(EID) that someone could come up with EID must have always existed. But Poss(EID) is defined in terms of EID, so without EID, Poss(EID) could not exist. Hence, EID must have always existed along with Poss(EID).

Unless you believe that ideas do not require someone to have/think them? — Luke

No, I’ve shown just now that ideas cannot need someone to come up with them, for Poss(EID) is the very ground on which someone can come up with EID in the first place, so EID and thereby Poss(EID) depending on the coming-up would lead to a vicious circle.

Similarly, it seems to require someone to interpret a string of symbols in order to understand the idea it may contain. — Luke

As I’ve written above, I already said that a long time ago, for example here.

The direction of the implication is irrelevant to my point. It is all based on the same assumption. — Luke

Have you found a new logical law which says that the implication-operator is commutative? Please do tell! I have shown that if discovering an idea is possible, then the idea must fore-exist. Yet you claim the conclusion of that argument to be an assumption. You do know the difference between assuming and showing, don’t you? Could you please be clearer make your point less confused?

I don't know who that is, [...] — Luke

He’s the guy who invented the Van-de-Graff-generator (VdGG), that is, who created a mental (and then a physical) instance of the Shape of VdGG-hood.

but you could say that he invented the idea (not the possibility; the idea). — Luke

Could you back up this bare claim with a justification? But don’t worry if you can’t, for we’ve already seen it to be false, and what is false cannot be rightly justified, or so I think.

From which reference frame can the events be judged such that "neither event is first, but the events also don't happen at the same time"? — Luke

From every inertial under-lightspeed reference-frame. That’s because when the spacetime-interval between two events is space-like in one inertial under-lightspeed reference-frame, it’s space-like in all inertial under-lightspeed reference-frames.

Then the "someone" before Alice would have invented the idea — Luke

Actually, Alice is the first one, but the fact that someone could have found it before her means that the thing (the Idea itself) which underlies the sameness of Alice’s idea and Bob’s idea must have been able to jump in and therefore to exist before Alice’s time.

But now consider an infinitely old and big world (which our world may well be; think eternal inflation for example). In such a world, it’s almost certain that for every idea EID and anyone who finds, there is someone who found it before him (again gender-neutral). Therefore, nobody could have invented EID, because there is always someone who came up with it earlier. Yet EID still exists. Hence, it can’t have been invented. Since whether or not ideas are invented is an essential feature of ideahood and thus can’t depend on the features of our concrete universe, it follows that ideas can’t be invented.

we might just say that they both came up with the same idea independently. That is, we could go back to your own example of Leibniz and Newton. — Luke

Yes, they both discovered calculus independently of each other, each thereby creating his own mental manifestation thereof.

In the preceding discussion on the previous page. — Luke

Could you be more precise?

I had in mind a definition of abstract such as this: "existing in thought or as an idea but not having a physical or concrete existence." — Luke

Actually, according to my understanding, abstractness is the property of being not-physical, not-mindly, not-timely, not-spatial, and simple. However, it’s not just according to my understanding that abstract things aren’t mindly (see e.g. the SEP-entry on abstract objects and in particular the definition given in the second paragraph of its third section).

As far as I know, only physical, temporal, living beings have thoughts and/or ideas. — Luke

Actually, the soul is an abstract entity, and the free soul is really the most aware, conscious, and thoughtful thing there is regarding abstract objects. Indeed, when it becomes embodied and thus forms a living being such as a plant or an animal (such as a human), it’s mindly abilities usually become weakened. How much depends on the computational power of the body which it lives with. Yet what it gains is knowledge of concrete and temporal objects and the ability to interfere in the temporal realm (and indeed the ability to interfere at all, for in the abstract world, nothing can be changed). A big part of this is the ability to make concrete instances of abstract things. However, all this is a matter rather different from the topic of this thread.

Not sure what you mean by "in this universe", though. — Janus

By “this universe”, I mean the spacetime-continuum which we live in, along with all the physical things inside it.

And even if there were how would you establish that any such entity was identical to the fictional Harry Potter? My answer would be that you could not establish this, because by definition any substantive entity could not be identical to a fictional one. — Janus

There’s a subtle point here. There isn’t actually any individual called “Harry Potter”. Rather, “Harry Potter” is a variable used to give a linguistic representation of Harrihood, just like “n” is a variable used to give a linguistic representation of primeness in the following:

Primeness is the property of being a positive whole number n such that for every positive whole number m, n can be divided by m if and only if m = 1 or m = n.

When you ask about the identity of the fictional Harry Potter, it’s like asking about the identity of n. The mistake lies in using “Harry Potter” or “n” as if they were proper names when they are in fact variables.

The same goes for names of real people other than myself. I can directly “see” only my own self with my “mind’s eye”, and therefore, I use “Tristan” as a proper name to refer to that self. However, not being a telepath, I can’t see your self, so I use the name “Janus” as a variable in defining the property Janushood:

Janushood is the property of being a person Janus such that Janus is a philosopher and Janus is active on the forum The Philosophy Forum and Janus is talking with Tristan about whether ideas are invented or discovered and ... .

Indeed, I can’t use Janus as a proper name. For all that I know, you might be several people sharing a single forum account, or you may be an extraterrestrial scientist studying human behavior, or you might even be a bot who just behaves in a way which suggests awareness; but the only thing which I can be sure to have awareness is that self which I call “Tristan”. Needless to say, if you are an aware being, then my awareness is equally unprovable for you.

I hypothesize that Janushood is instantiated by exactly one thing in this world. Under this hypothesis, when I say “Janus is/does so and so”, I mean the proposition that for all things x, if x has Janushood in this world, then x is/does so and so in this world.

any substantive entity could not be identical to a fictional one. — Janus

I think that there is no such thing as a fictional entity. Rather, the illusion of a fictional entity arises when a variable is treated as if it were a proper name. The same goes for proper names of other concrete things. In both cases, a variable used to specify a property is treated like a proper noun. The only difference is that in the case of fictional entities, the (real) property in question (such as Harrihood) is believed not to be instantiated in our world, whereas in the case of “real” things, the (equally real) property in question (such as Janushood, or from your POV Tristanhood*) is believed to be instantiated in our world.

*Remark: You use the word “Tristanhood” differently from me. You use it to mean a property which involves The Philosophy Forum, but I use it to mean the thisness of myself.

We have to wait to actually see the ideas, but it is already forechosen now that we will see them. Hence, they must already exist now. — Tristan L

They currently exist only as possibilities. Possibilities are not ideas, as you agree.

If the string is meaningless, the understander simply ignores it. — Tristan L

How does the "understander" know whether a string is meaningless or meaningful? Given that not all ideas have yet been "discovered" (right?), then wouldn't the "understander" require perfect knowledge or omniscience to be able to distinguish the meaningful from the meaningless? A symbol-string that seems meaningless to us now might be meaningful to someone 1000 years from now. Given your definition of an understander as "the person or group of people who reads/read every finite-length string put out by the string-outputter", how is it (humanly) possible that any understander will rightly distinguish the meaningful from the meaningless? Also, it is self-evident that the meanings of words and symbols change over time.

If it is meaningful, the understander maps it to the idea which it represents, thus finding the idea. — Tristan L

You mean to tell me that your algorithm produces only representations of ideas, rather than the ideas themselves? How can we be sure that we have ever interpreted the symbol-strings correctly? But maybe that's the point. Given every possible combination of symbols, you can read whatever meaning you want into it.

Why do you expect the number of years to be finite?
— Luke

Because the algorithm systematically outputs all strings of finite length over the same finite alphabet one after the other (here, I only use lowercase letters for illustration): {empty string}, a, b, ..., z, aa, ab, ..., az, ba, bb, bc, ..., bz, ca, ..., ..., aaa, aab, ..., ..., elf, ..., ..., goc, god, goe, ..., ..., aaaa, ..., ..., fast, ..., ..., ..., igotoschool, ..., ..., eismcsquared, ... . It does this by first outputting all strings of length 0, then all strings of length 1, then of length 2, then of length 3, and so on. This gives a one-to-one function between the set of all natural numbers and the set of all finite symbol-sequences over the same finite alphabet. — Tristan L

The set of natural numbers is infinite, and I assume that a particular symbol can appear in a sequence more than once. Doesn't that imply there will be at least some symbol-sequences of infinite length, requiring an infinite time to output? Also, why assume that all ideas can be expressed as finite symbol-sequences?

From which reference frame can the events be judged such that "neither event is first, but the events also don't happen at the same time"?
— Luke

From every inertial under-lightspeed reference-frame. That’s because when the spacetime-interval between two events is space-like in one inertial under-lightspeed reference-frame, it’s space-like in all inertial under-lightspeed reference-frames. — Tristan L

The events can be judged to be neither simultaneous nor non-simultaneous in all (<c) reference frames?

My mistake - I should have written Euclidian plane rather than configuration space.

Perhaps the observer finds an instance of a square and then creates an idea of it.
If I didn't know the idea of squareness, when looking at shapes in the world, I could discover a particular shape having four equal straight sides and four right angles and have the idea that in the world there are shapes having four equal straight sides and four right angles, which for convenience I could name squareness. Ideas are external to the shape, as there is no information within the shape that can establish the shape has a single identity. As the idea of squareness has come after the discovery of the shape, it cannot be the idea that was discovered.

True, the words invention and discovery have different meanings whether we are assuming a deterministic or non-deterministic world. Even in a deterministic world, it still makes sense to say that the billiard ball has discovered the corner pocket. It is likely that someone who assumes determinism when using the words invention and discovery means something different by them to someone who believes in non-determinism.

However, I could have an idea and invent a definition to express my idea - for example - I could define X as a square with red inside - as long as I told someone else my definition of X - they would find the same Xness in the world as I do

↪jgill
My mistake - I should have written Euclidian plane rather than configuration space. — RussellA

What I meant was that in this context each of the points {A, B, C, D} in the unit square [0,1]X[0,1] corresponds in a one-to-one manner with a point in [0,1], and we've seen that these points cannot be counted or determined by an algorithmic output. That's all.

There’s a subtle point here. There isn’t actually any individual called “Harry Potter”. Rather, “Harry Potter” is a variable used to give a linguistic representation of Harrihood, just like “n” is a variable used to give a linguistic representation of primeness in the following:

Primeness is the property of being a positive whole number n such that for every positive whole number m, n can be divided by m if and only if m = 1 or m = n. — Tristan L

I don't see this as a workable analogy.

What is "Harrihood"; that is, how could you explain it without reference to Harry Potter and all the events in his fictional life (actually should be 'Harry Potterhood')? Whereas primeness is explicable without any reference to "n".

So, I continue to think that 'Harry Potter' is not a variable, but a proper name for the fictional character presented in the books by J.K. Rowling.

Creativity: Random or deterministic? Invention or discovery?

Discovery suggests the absence of creativity, and this is incoherent as something must cause another thing to exist. Something must be created before it can be discovered.

A discovery cannot be made without consciousness – by something that is not conscious, and consciousness is a creative process absolutely! Like the tree in the forest, things do not exist until we become conscious of them, and in the process of becoming conscious of them, we subject them to a creative process - we create them in a certain light – consistent with our consciousness.

Thus things cannot be discovered until they are subjected to a consciousness process, and when they are subjected to such a process they are created in a certain light.




Art as well as all matter is created.
In the early universe information entangled energy to create matter. Subsequent to this event, infinite possibility no longer existed, and the causal chain follows from here, at every juncture choices are made and the breadth of possibility is reduced, until we are where we are today.

For art to be produced matter has to be entangled by a consciousness. – we have no experience of art that does not follow this rule. It is a process and choices are made along the way, thus reducing the subsequent possibilities until finally no more possibilities exist, other then the actuality that is the work.

EDIT:

A possibility is something that may exist, but before it can exist it has to be created. So it is not until something is created that you can definitely say it existed as a possibility.

So, it seems, not that everything is determined, but that everything becomes determined through our actions - through creativity.

They currently exist only as possibilities. Possibilities are not ideas, as you agree. — Luke

But the possibilities themselves are actual; it’s actually true now and has always been actually true that the ideas can someday be discovered. Moreover, in the case of my algorithm, the possibilities are actually certainties; it is certain now that the ideas will someday be discovered. But the always actual possibilities are defined in terms of their belonging ideas, which are therefore essentially bound to their actual possibilities. Hence, the ideas must always be actual as well, and in particular, they must be actual now.

How does the "understander" know whether a string is meaningless or meaningful? — Luke

The understander has perfect knowledge of the syntax and semantics of Modern English. He knows what individual English words mean, he knows how English words can be put together, and he knows how the meaning of the resulting composite term is defined in terms of the meanings of the individual English terms.

Given that not all ideas have yet been "discovered" (right?) — Luke

Yes.

Given that not all ideas have yet been "discovered" (right?), then wouldn't the "understander" require perfect knowledge or omniscience to be able to distinguish the meaningful from the meaningless? — Luke

No, just as you don’t need to be all-knowing in order to read and understand new books. If you can judge whether the Harry Potter books written by J. K. Rowling are meaningful or not, you can also judge whether the Harry Potter books output by my algorithm are meaningful or not. Indeed, if all-knowledge were needed to understand texts, then that would all the more need the pre-existence of all ideas.

A symbol-string that seems meaningless to us now might be meaningful to someone 1000 years from now. Given your definition of an understander as "the person or group of people who reads/read every finite-length string put out by the string-outputter", how is it (humanly) possible that any understander will rightly distinguish the meaningful from the meaningless? Also, it is self-evident that the meanings of words and symbols change over time. — Luke

These practical issues are beside the point. There is an infinite set of ideas expressible in Modern English (that is, the English speech spoken in 2020 CE, including its syntax and semantics), yet by far not all of them have been discovered, and new ones are being found all the time. For example, the idea of Harry Potter discovered by Rowling is described in Modern English. According to you, Rowling invented the idea of Harry Potter, but my algorithm will also spit out the Harry Potter books, and the understander will understand their meaning and thus find the idea of Harry Potter just as you can find it by reading Rowling’s books. (As a side note: You can’t be sure that Rowling knows anything about the idea of Harry Potter at all, for she might be an awarenessless automaton that just behaves in a way suggesting consciousness. What matters to you is only your own awareness and your ability to map texts to ideas.) If I give you copies of Harry Potter’s books, could you tell whether they were written by Rowling or by my program?

To remove the practical issues which make unneeded diversions, let’s regard a fixed formal speech and a creative process associated with it: a programming language and programming. According to you, a programmer who writes a new PASCAL-program invents that program itself, right? For example, you consider me as the inventor of the program AllEndlyStrings itself, am I right? Yet AllEndlyStrings will output each possible source-code of a PASCAL-program after a finite time, including the source code of AllEndlyStrings itself, but also all PASCAL-source-codes that will ever be written. And the Pascal Compiler can compile every one of those texts so long as it obeys the PASCAL-syntax. For that, the compiler doesn’t have to know all possible source-codes. Moreover, since PASCAL is Turing-complete, my program AllEndlyStrings, together with the Pascal Compiler, will deterministically write every Turing-machine / every program that could ever be written.

Why, then, have I included a copyright notice in my program AllEndlyStrings? Because that particular instance of the program has indeed been invented by me, not merely discovered. So I can’t hinder you from writing the same source-code as I per se, but I can hinder you from writing the same or a similar source-code based on my instance of it, for example from simply copying it. Of course, if you would write the same source-code, it would be overwhelmingly unlikely that you didn’t copy from me, so in that case, for all practical purposes, I could be pretty certain that you would have copied from me.

You mean to tell me that your algorithm produces only representations of ideas, rather than the ideas themselves? — Luke

Of course; since I’m arguing for the fore-existence of ideas all the time, how could I claim that my algorithm creates the ideas? What my algorithm does is get the understander to “see” ideas without the need for any creativity.

How can we be sure that we have ever interpreted the symbol-strings correctly? [...] — Luke

In the same way that the Pascal Compiler can decide whether a text obeys the syntax of PASCAL and in that case compile it, without having to know every thinkable source-code, and in the same way that you can do calculations with any natural number without having to know each natural number individually. Also see above.

[...] But maybe that's the point. Given every possible combination of symbols, you can read whatever meaning you want into it. — Luke

No, certainly not. Also see above.

The set of natural numbers is infinite, and I assume that a particular symbol can appear in a sequence more than once. [...] — Luke

Yes, that’s right.

[...] Doesn't that imply there will be at least some symbol-sequences of infinite length, requiring an infinite time to output? — Luke

Yes, that’s true. However, my program only outputs symbol-strings of finite length. It could be extended to output all symbol-strings of infinite length, but for that, it would also need infinite time. (For example, to output all strings of finite or countably infinite length, each of which is indexed by a countable ordinal, it would need an uncountable ordinal number of seconds.)

Also, why assume that all ideas can be expressed as finite symbol-sequences? — Luke

Firstly, I don’t do that, but if the algorithm argument (which isn’t as far-reaching as my other two arguments) shows that all finitely expressible ideas must fore-exist, then why should things stand otherwise with other ideas?

There are certainly not-finitely-expressible-ideas since there are uncountably many abstract things (e.g. real numbers), and there are also totally unsayable ideas, I think, but

1. why should they be any different in terms of fore-existence than finitely expressible ideas (bear in mind that each of the uncountably many reals also pre-exists)?

and

2. of what everyday practical importance are they (by “everyday practical”, I also mean actual “real-world” science, art, and philosophy)?

Secondly, could you please give me one example from our world (the “real world”) where an idea is expressible, but not finitely expressible?

I’d love to read the infinitely long tale about Alice and Bob and the Mystery of Infinity by Charlie Endless. Should I buy it from Amazon or from Google Books?

The events can be judged to be neither simultaneous nor non-simultaneous in all (<c) reference frames? — Luke

No, and that’s not what I said. I said that the events neither happen one before the other, nor at the same time. But there is a fourth option, for Minkowski-spacetime is only partially ordered by the light-cone-relationship. By “at the same time”, I mean absolute same-timed-ness, not the relative pseudo-simultaneity which is the case in one reference frame but not another.

The four absolute options are:

1. Event A lies in the past light-cone of event B.
2. Event A lies in the future light-cone of event B.
3. Event A and Event B happen in the same place at the same time.
4. Events A and B are separated by a space-like spacetime-interval; neither of them lies in the light-cone of the other, they don’t happen at the same place and time, and neither can influence the other.

By the way, I do have a theory of linear time, but that’s a wholly different matter.

If each of two people make a chair independently of the other, would you say that they create chairhood?

Would you say that the very first star to “forge” a magnesium atom in its heart invented magnesium?

Let’s say that you have two electrons which were created independently by different processes. On what ground can you say that they’re both the same kind of particle (indeed, even if you swapped them, you wouldn’t have changed anything, not even in principle)? On the ground that they’re both excitations of one and the same quantum field, namely the electron field. This field has been existing since long before the two electrons were created.

Perhaps the observer finds an instance of a square and then creates an idea of it. — RussellA

I have already given compelling arguments showing that the observer cannot create that idea. The square was a square (and many other things, too) before the observer saw it, so it must have been sharing in the idea of squareness (th.i. (that is) the Shape / Form / Idea of Squareness) before the obsever saw it. Hence, squareness itself must also have existed before the observer saw the shape. The observer has no might at all over squareness, so he (gender-netrally used) can’t have created it.

If I didn't know the idea of squareness, when looking at shapes in the world, I could discover a particular shape having four equal straight sides and four right angles and have the idea that in the world there are shapes having four equal straight sides and four right angles, which for convenience I could name squareness. — RussellA

Okay, so you’ve gotten a glimpse of the idea of squareness and given it the the name “squareness”. That’s all.

Ideas are external to the shape, as there is no information within the shape that can establish the shape has a single identity. — RussellA

Yes, the Shape of Squareness is external to, separate from, and independent of a particular square (be it an abstract square or an even more particular physical instance of that square). It’s also true that each particular has many properties, so it doesn’t contain enough info to define those properties. However, I never claimed that your discovery of a particular square is the same as your discovery of the Shape of Squareness itself. Rather, your discovery of a particular square can start an undeterministic chain of events which leads to your discovering of squareness itself, creating a mental image of that Shape (uppercase!) in the process. For that to be possible, though, you must have at least some basic, subconscious, intuitive awareness of squareness itself.

As the idea of squareness has come after the discovery of the shape, it cannot be the idea that was discovered. — RussellA

Actually, it is your conscious awareness of squareness that comes after your discovery of the particular shape. However, that neither means that the idea itself comes after your discovery, nor indeed that you didn’t have under-counscious knowledge of squareness itself before.

However, I could have an idea and invent a definition to express my idea - for example - I could define X as a square with red inside - as long as I told someone else my definition of X - they would find the same Xness in the world as I do — RussellA

Why? Because they “see” the same abstract Shape (Form, Idea) X as you do.

Basically, J. K. Rowling’s books contain a very long definition of Harrihood and a great many other properties, too, such as Hagridhood. Since the main variable used to give the characterization of Harrihood is “Harry Potter”, and since this variable isn’t often used to do other things, it has become very attached to the property. This is unlike n, which is used for many, many purposes. It becomes so attached that for every property E, the sentence

“Harry Potter has property E.”

is short for

“For all x, if x has Harrihood, then x has property E.”

It isn’t much different for names of “real-world” people. For example, “(Albert Einstein)hood” is the name we give to

the property of being a male human Albert Einstein such that Albert Einstein was born in Ulm and Albert Einstein has such and such genes and ... .

(I’m not sure that this is the right definition, but this is just an example.)

The sentence

“Albert Einstein discovered relativity theory.”

is short for

“For every x, if x has (Albert Einstein)hood in our world, then x discovered relativity theory is our world.”

actually should be 'Harry Potterhood' — Janus

True, though “(Harry Potter)hood” is even better. Then again, there are “real-world” people called “Harry Potter”, so even “(Harry Potter)hood” is ambigious in that sense. Likewise, “Janushood” not only means the property of being you, but also the property of being the Roman god of beginnings. That’s why we can stick with “Harrihood” rather than the other, cumbersomer terms.

By the way, I do have a theory of linear time, but that’s a wholly different matter. — Tristan L

Have you discussed this in another thread? If not, perhaps you could begin one on the subject.

The notion that all ideas have always existed as actual possibilities is illogical. Ideas can only exist relative to a consciousness. A consciousness has to create the ideas, otherwise what is the substrate that they exist on?

True, though “(Harry Potter)hood” is even better. Then again, there are “real-world” people called “Harry Potter”, so even “(Harry Potter)hood” is ambigious in that sense. Likewise, “Janushood” not only means the property of being you, but also the property of being the Roman god of beginnings. That’s why we can stick with “Harrihood” rather than the other, cumbersomer terms. — Tristan L

That's all true it seems, but "Harrihood" would seem to be an even broader term that "Harrypotterhood", given that there are many more Harrys than there are Harry Potters.

Dear Pfhorrest: you claim that if the world is deterministic, then there are no original, creative, created ideas, because conceptually all ideas that are possible to come up with can be arrived at with an iterative or with an other, but still deterministic approach.

This is true if we accept that the world is deterministic.

And I do think that the world is deterministic. Yet I believe without self-contradiction in man's creativity.

Man has limited brain power. To harness the huge amount of original ideas that had been made possible by the arrangement of the universe, is impossible for man, because man's brainwork capacity is not large enough to create or imagine all ideas. If it was large enough, yes, there would be no creativity. But that is not the case. Therefore creativity exists.

-------------

In other words: the model of creative thought is not that of picking off ideas from a presented full set of possible original ideas. Instead, the creative thought combines available elements and manipulates them into hitherto non-existing new thought. The combining and manipulating is what creativity comprises.

===============

To use your nature photography metaphor:

Yes, man can take infinite photos of nature, given infinite time and resources to make photos.

But he has neither infinite time, nor infinite resources.

So he is restricted to a finite set of photographs.

After taking some photographs, man IS capable of creating scenes on canvas that had never appeared to him in reality. He combines visual elements, he manipulates them, and bang, there is a photograph-like creation that most likely has a real equivalent, I mean, an equivalent in reality, but that the photographer can't access in his life time, yet he can create it without accessing it.

you claim that if the world is deterministic, then there are no original, creative, created ideas — god must be atheist

Nope, I just claim that creativity doesn't lie in non-determinism, for reasons that hinge on there not being a clear division between invention and discovery.

That lack of division means that the same problems that make the most obvious deterministic approach seem uncreative also make a random (non-deterministic) approach seem uncreative.

Because creativity is not in the (non)determinism of the process, but in specific features of the process. Which must be adequately determined to have identifiable features at all, but it doesn't have to be wholly determined, and being wholly undetermined doesn't help anything.

I kinda feel like nobody read past the first paragraph of the OP. That's all groundwork. The important part is the end:

it is a specific feature of the process, which requires that the process be at least partly deterministic, that grants the appearance of creativity.

That feature is that the invented or discovered idea must be recognizably similar to previously known ideas, and yet also noticeably different from them. That alone is only the bare minimum of creativity, however: something that is just like something else with a slight twist will be rightly called only a variation on a previous theme and not especially creative. However, something that is completely unlike any prior work will seem so random, out of context, and therefore unapproachable, that audiences will be unable to appreciate it. The kind of new ideas that seem really creative are the ones that make apparent the structure of the space of possibilities, connecting and re-contextualizing previously known ideas.

If two genres of some medium are well-known, for example, with many variations on the same theme, and then a new work of art is made in that medium that blends elements of both genres in a way that shows them both to be the ends of a longer spectrum of genres, then that will be seen as very creative. It will also open up the potential of still further creativity later, as other works located along that same line in the space of possibilities can then have the context of that spectrum to anchor them, to give them purpose in filling in the unexplored regions in the middle of that spectrum and beyond its known ends. If one such spectrum of possibilities is already known, and a new work can bridge between it and ideas that lie off of it in such a way as to expand the spectrum into a new dimension, suddenly even more structure in the space of possibilities is made apparent, and even more opportunity for further creativity is opened up.

In relating already known ideas to each other across a space of previously unexplored ideas, new works can give further context and significance to existing ones and draw context and significance from them, and it is that process of connection and contextualization, not mere nondeterministic randomness, that constitutes creativity. — Pfhorrest

you claim that if the world is deterministic, then there are no original, creative, created ideas
— god must be atheist

Nope, I just claim that creativity doesn't lie in non-determinism, for reasons that hinge on there not being a clear division between invention and discovery. — Pfhorrest

Well, if that's a true description of your claim, which I believe it is, and I shall treat it as such (and therefore please don't alter it in this thread), then I have a better answer for you.

What you claim as muddled distinction between invention and discovery is muddled because you do not differentiate between the two point of views: a human inventor, and an all-knowing discoverer.

I agree with you that all inventions can be formulated as ideas, and all ideas have existed in this universe. Therefore there are no original ideas.

But a human being simply does not have access to this warehouse of information. We do not mine the warehouse to discover useful ideas.

Instead, we, humans, gather, analyze, manipulate information (data) to come up with ideas that had been not known to man before. This is an invention.

A discovery is simpler: you see something or sense something in some way, which you haven't before, and you add it to your information base.

An invention by man is an invention from MAN'S POINT OF VIEW, and it is such due to the process HOW IT IS DEVELOPED.

An invention from the point of view of a hypothetical all-knowing being (whether it exists or not) is a discovery. The all-knowing being does not have to develop an idea, only has to find it in the warehouse of knowledge.

If two genres of some medium are well-known, for example, with many variations on the same theme, and then a new work of art is made in that medium that blends elements of both genres in a way that shows them both to be the ends of a longer spectrum of genres, then that will be seen as very creative. It will also open up the potential of still further creativity later, as other works located along that same line in the space of possibilities can then have the context of that spectrum to anchor them, to give them purpose in filling in the unexplored regions in the middle of that spectrum and beyond its known ends. If one such spectrum of possibilities is already known, and a new work can bridge between it and ideas that lie off of it in such a way as to expand the spectrum into a new dimension, suddenly even more structure in the space of possibilities is made apparent, and even more opportunity for further creativity is opened up.

In relating already known ideas to each other across a space of previously unexplored ideas, new works can give further context and significance to existing ones and draw context and significance from them, and it is that process of connection and contextualization, not mere nondeterministic randomness, that constitutes creativity. — Pfhorrest

This does not deal with the topic of whether creativty is discovery or not. This is a different topic, namely,how the creative process works.

I am not sure if you've realized that the true reason your second part is not answered by anyone, is because it is not an integral part of your firstly presented lemma. In this second part you try to point out how the creative process is a determined course of action. I have no argument against that, I agree with that, as I am a firm advocate of determinism and of the deterministic nature of the universe we liive in.

The notion that all ideas have always existed as actual possibilities is illogical. — Pop

Quite the contrary: In order for someone to come up with an idea, it must actually always have been possible that someone could someday come up with the idea. The actually existing possibility of finding the idea must necessarily fore-exist any and every actual coming-up with the idea, for if it wasn’t possible to come up with the idea, how could anyone find it?

Hence, the claim that the actual possibility of finding the idea doesn’t come before actually finding the idea is really unlogical. Therefore, and since the possibility itself always actually exists and is essentially bound to the idea, the idea must always actually exist, too.

Please also see my other arguments in this thread.

Ideas can only exist relative to a consciousness. — Pop

That is an unwarranted assumption. In fact, it’s even false, as I have already shown in this thread at length. Can you back your claim up?

A consciousness has to create the ideas, otherwise what is the substrate that they exist on? — Pop

They don’t need any substrate at all; they just exist. On the contrary, each individual awareness/consciousness needs ideas, specifically the Shape (Idea, Form) of Awareness/Consciousness, in which it has to share in order to be an awareness/consciousness in the first place.

This does not deal with the topic of whether creativty is discovery or not. This is a different topic, namely,how the creative process works.

I am not sure if you've realized that the true reason your second part is not answered by anyone, is because it is not an integral part of your firstly presented lemma. In this second part you try to point out how the creative process is a determined course of action. I have no argument against that, I agree with that, as I am a firm advocate of determinism and of the deterministic nature of the universe we liive in. — god must be atheist

The overarching question I start with in the OP is whether creativity requires nondeterminism. My answer is that it does not, but instead requires a certain kind of pattern of exploration or mapping of the abstract space of possibilities in relation to already known possibilities; a process that could be deterministically carried out, but by a different algorithm than just iterating through every possibility in order. (Or randomly picking them out in no order).

Giving that answer requires first establishing that abstract space of possibilities, which comes about from the dissolution of the distinction between invention and discovery. So I first mention that dissolution and the consequent concept of that abstract space of possibilities, so that I can then give my answer to what creativity actually is, if not mere indeterminism, in terms of that abstract space.

Quite the contrary: In order for someone to come up with an idea, it must actually always have been possible that someone could someday come up with the idea. The actually existing possibility of finding the idea must necessarily fore-exist any and every actual coming-up with the idea, for if it wasn’t possible to come up with the idea, how could anyone find it? — Tristan L

You seem to think ideas exist in the ether, and that they are not tied to a consciousness ground, and not subject to evolutionary principles.

You seem to be arguing that cave men could have flown to the moon?

A consciousness has to create the ideas, otherwise what is the substrate that they exist on?
— Pop

They don’t need any substrate at all; they just exist. — Tristan L

Really? What substrate do your ideas exist on?

Ideas can only exist relative to a consciousness.
— Pop

That is an unwarranted assumption. In fact, it’s even false, as I have already shown in this thread at length. Can you back your claim up? — Tristan L

Human ideas exist on a substrate of human consciousness.They are shared via a collective consciousness know as culture. Human ideas and human consciousness evolved together - inextricably linked - ideas are an expression of human consciousness!

Today's consciousness is not applicable to cave men, so the ideas of today are not possibilities for them, they are impossibilities.

For an idea to exist it must exist somewhere - If "they just exist", where do they just exist?

Nothing just exists, everything exists relative to something.

More on how art and consciousness are linked can be found here

The overarching question I start with in the OP is whether creativity requires nondeterminism. My answer is that it does not, but instead requires a certain kind of pattern of exploration or mapping of the abstract space of possibilities in relation to already known possibilities; a process that could be deterministically carried out, but by a different algorithm than just iterating through every possibility in order. (Or randomly picking them out in no order). — Pfhorrest

It seems what you are asking is what is creativity?
The short answer is that consciousness is creativity. The long answer is a theory of consciousness. :sad:
The interesting answer is that in art there exists an X factor. It is given as the difference in what one sets out to create ( the idea ), and what one actually creates. There is always a difference - sometimes for the better, and sometimes not. Sometimes it steers the work completely off course such that what is created is completely different to what one originally intended. To beat this sucker, sometimes artists have no original intention, but there is definitely an element of randomness that creeps in - entropy? The future being probabilistic? - who knows? The process of creating art, and I imagine in all creation, is one of trying to maintain order in the face of disorder - just like in biology, just like in consciousness. Creativity is a struggle - just like ordinary life. Who can predict that they will be here tomorrow? Who can predict that they will actualize an idea? Nobody. So the possibility has to be proven, through creation, before one can say that it truly existed.

Moreover, in the case of my algorithm, the possibilities are actually certainties; it is certain now that the ideas will someday be discovered. — Tristan L

This doesn't follow. Why is it certain that all existing things will be discovered?

But the always actual possibilities are defined in terms of their belonging ideas, which are therefore essentially bound to their actual possibilities. Hence, the ideas must always be actual as well, and in particular, they must be actual now. — Tristan L

I don't understand what "possibilities are defined in terms of their belonging ideas" means, or how it follows that "ideas must always be actual as well".

The understander has perfect knowledge of the syntax and semantics of Modern English. — Tristan L

You previously defined an "understander" as "the person or group of people who reads/read every finite-length string put out by the string-outputter". Do you know of anyone who has such perfect knowledge? You seem to be talking about a theoretically ideal "person or group", not an actual "person or group".

No, just as you don’t need to be all-knowing in order to read and understand new books. If you can judge whether the Harry Potter books written by J. K. Rowling are meaningful or not, you can also judge whether the Harry Potter books output by my algorithm are meaningful or not. Indeed, if all-knowledge were needed to understand texts, then that would all the more need the pre-existence of all ideas. — Tristan L

Perhaps, but your algorithm could take thousands or millions of years to output many of the symbol-strings, by which time Modern English (2020) will most likely have evolved or died.

Indeed, if all-knowledge were needed to understand texts, then that would all the more need the pre-existence of all ideas. — Tristan L

Yes, omniscience requires knowing every idea. The point is that nobody is omniscient, including any actual "understander".

These practical issues are beside the point. There is an infinite set of ideas expressible in Modern English (that is, the English speech spoken in 2020 CE, including its syntax and semantics), yet by far not all of them have been discovered, and new ones are being found all the time. — Tristan L

You are arguing that all ideas pre-exist, are discoverable, and will be output by your algorithm. But you think that the practical issue of being able to discover them in the output of your algorithm is beside the point?

According to you, Rowling invented the idea of Harry Potter, but my algorithm will also spit out the Harry Potter books, and the understander will understand their meaning and thus find the idea of Harry Potter just as you can find it by reading Rowling’s books. — Tristan L

Your algorithm will supposedly spit out every possible combination of symbols. This is virtually irrelevant to the supposed pre-existence of ideas. Your algorithm doesn't just output representations of ideas; it outputs mostly junk. This is hardly an algorithmic way of discovering ideas. Your algorithm will also take infinitely long to output all possible combinations of symbols and it requires someone with perfect knowledge of Modern English to understand each and every idea. This is all fanciful.

If I give you copies of Harry Potter’s books, could you tell whether they were written by Rowling or by my program? — Tristan L

Yes, because your program wouldn't be able to recreate those books in either of our lifetimes.

According to you, a programmer who writes a new PASCAL-program invents that program itself, right? For example, you consider me as the inventor of the program AllEndlyStrings itself, am I right? Yet AllEndlyStrings will output each possible source-code of a PASCAL-program after a finite time, including the source code of AllEndlyStrings itself, but also all PASCAL-source-codes that will ever be written. — Tristan L

The algorithm wouldn't be able to write its own program if you hadn't first invented the algorithm.

In the same way that the Pascal Compiler can decide whether a text obeys the syntax of PASCAL and in that case compile it, without having to know every thinkable source-code, and in the same way that you can do calculations with any natural number without having to know each natural number individually. — Tristan L

Is there a program that has perfect knowledge of Modern English? Unlike the output of your algorithm, I don't have to disregard a whole bunch of meaningless junk when dealing with the natural numbers. I can simply find any number I want whenever I want.

Yes, that’s true. However, my program only outputs symbol-strings of finite length. It could be extended to output all symbol-strings of infinite length, but for that, it would also need infinite time. — Tristan L

At what point does your program stop outputting?

Also, why assume that all ideas can be expressed as finite symbol-sequences?
— Luke

Firstly, I don’t do that, but if the algorithm argument (which isn’t as far-reaching as my other two arguments) shows that all finitely expressible ideas must fore-exist, then why should things stand otherwise with other ideas? — Tristan L

Your argument is that if your argument is true, then why shouldn't your argument be true? That's not much of an argument.

There are certainly not-finitely-expressible-ideas since there are uncountably many abstract things (e.g. real numbers), and there are also totally unsayable ideas, I think, but

1. why should they be any different in terms of fore-existence than finitely expressible ideas (bear in mind that each of the uncountably many reals also pre-exists)?

and

2. of what everyday practical importance are they (by “everyday practical”, I also mean actual “real-world” science, art, and philosophy)? — Tristan L

It is your claim that your algorithm will output every idea. If some ideas cannot be output by your algorithm, e.g., because they are "not-finitely-expressible" or because they are "totally unsayable", then your algorithm cannot output every idea and therefore your claim is false.

Secondly, could you please give me one example from our world (the “real world”) where an idea is expressible, but not finitely expressible? — Tristan L

I don't need to; you've already conceded that "There are certainly not-finitely-expressible-ideas".

@Pffhorest

Creativity seems to be popularly held to be some kind of non-deterministic, random process of some kind of magical, metaphysically free will, but I hold that that is not the case at all. — Pfhorrest

Creativity is simply the ability to discover previously undisocvered solutions to problems. How you're going to discover such solutions is completely irrelevant. In other words, you can use a deterministic process but you can also use a random process. It does not matter.

On the other hand, I do agree with you that most people discover such ideas by following a deterministic process. (Most are merely not aware that what happens under the hood is largely, if not entirely, deterministic.)

I hold that there really isn't a clear distinction between invention and discovery of ideas: there is a figurative space of all possible ideas, what in mathematics is called a configuration space or phase space, and any idea that anyone might "invent", any act of abstract "creation" (prior to the act of realizing the idea in some concrete medium), is really just the identification of some idea in that space of possibilities.

I disagree with the bolded.

I will repeat what @Luke said.

"Discovery" implies that the thing that is discovered existed before discovery whereas "invention" implies that the thing that is invented did not exist before.

If you are talking about the set of all possible ideas, these can't be invented, since they already exist; they can only be discovered.

But that's because we're talking about the set of all possible ideas. The set contains all ideas that are possible -- there is absolutely no room for new ideas. If we're talking about the set of all actual ideas, however, one can introduce new ideas to it so as long it does not contain all possible ideas. An actual idea, that one that either existed within someone's brain at some point in time or did not, can be invented, provided there was no brain within which it existed previously.

I haven’t yet, but I’ll gladly do that in due time, and I’m also going to tell you when I do.