But logic and "search for truth" relentlessly pursuit by scientists (who indeed are similar to truth or logic engines, though luckily there are exceptions) and applied to Nature brings our physical, and all the live in it, to the brink of extinction. Many species have already been swiped away from the Earth's surface, people suffer from science-based technology — GraveItty
There's a good paper by Friston (although very speculative, I should stress) on how this might come about.
https://discovery.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/1399513/1/Friston_Journal_of_the_Royal_Society_Interface.pdf — Isaac
I think we talk about different things here. Science use Logic of course, but aren't the same. Science itself isn't evil at all either but of course the use we make of some scientific achievements can bring evil indeed. — dimosthenis9
Yes. Technologically advanced aliens would presumably also be somewhat smarter in general. But it's not their intelligence that we need to look-out for -- it's their motives. Historically, when advanced humans invade a new territory, the inhabitants usually become extinct, or learn to survive as slaves. It's not only selfish predatory Genes though, but also the self-aggrandizing Memes, that disrupt the former balance of power. The conquistadors and colonizers were not primarily motivated by scientific exploration, but by the mandate for new resources to exploit.Basically, the point I'm trying to get across is that predators need to be more intelligent than prey. Planet earth is a case in point -the most intelligent organism viz. humans are predatory, in fact they're the apex predator. Makes me wonder about the wisdom of the Arecibo Message, SETI, Voyager Golden Record. Are we sending out an invite for a gala feast, us on the menu? — TheMadFool
But it's not their intelligence that we need to look-out for -- it's their motives. — Gnomon
True. But how could we convince a superior power to spend a month in quarantine, while we check them out.? Hopefully they will quarantine themselves, as humans do, by encapsulating themselves in spacesuits until safety is confirmed. That would be better for both of us. Many, if not most, early sci-fi movies portrayed invasive aliens as naked & unafraid. :joke:I'd be more concerned with their diseases. — James Riley
I have made my mind up this night and I stay with my original opinion. — FalseIdentity
I have the feeling that the majority of people here (or at least a large number) don't believe it makes a difference if a thinking entity runs it's minds operation for example on donated energy like the computer or if that thinking entity runs it's entire operations by stealing life energy. — FalseIdentity
I am pretty sure that your table does not exist in a propability cloud just because it's legs extend to several locations. — FalseIdentity
My original opinion is that human logic has something evil to it and that I don not fully trust it. If you don't like the word evil for historic reasons call it destructive. — FalseIdentity
I can imagine how a cylinder looks like a square when seen from fare away but I can not imagine how a quantum wave looks like a particle by any manipulation of my mind. — FalseIdentity
You just take the working and laws of your logics as a given, in the same way people take it for a given that apples fall to the ground: no further explanation required, it's just how nature is. — FalseIdentity
I'm sorry that I have not posted in the last few days as my other obligations have kept me from being able to visit the forum.I start to have a bad consciouness to bring up my health. One must say too that it is still not certain that I die but several health problems combine in an unfunny way. I am very happy that so many people here give me empathy but it completely crashes the subject of the conversation :) I am very interested in evolution (especially the evolution of primates) but I am actually a believer. I am open in how I imagine god, I consider both classical theist and pantheist options possible. However in both cases death itself is nothing I fear. As you see I am unhappy with my predature nature and death is the only option to finally exchange it against something truly new. — FalseIdentity
I recommend you take another glance at the Donald Hoffman TedTalk you linked to, or perhaps read the transcript. Hoffman isn't talking about logic -- where did you get that from? He's talking about perception. And despite his misleading rhetoric, he doesn't say we have no grasp on truth. In fact he leans the other way when prompted to clarify, at 20:24 in the video, in response to a remark from Chris Anderson.A new discovery in the science of evolution has shown that a logic developed through evolution will never seek to understand the truth, it just learns to maipulate it's environment without a deeper understanding of what it is manipulating: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oYp5XuGYqqY&t=997s [...] (I strongly reccomend watching the video in the link to understand this better) — FalseIdentity
So you think it's possible -- (Laughter) -- This is cool, but what you're saying I think is it's possible that evolution can still get you to reason. — Chris Anderson
It's not a startling discovery of 21st-century science that perceptual judgment is not in general immediately veridical. The fallibility of perceptual judgment is one of the oldest tropes in the history of philosophy. Progress in empirical knowledge depends on rigorous collection and analysis of observational judgments -- in the "direction of truth" that Hoffman acknowledges, when pressed, in the passage I've just quoted.Yes. Now that's a very, very good point. The evolutionary game simulations that I showed were specifically about perception, and they do show that our perceptions have been shaped not to show us reality as it is, but that does not mean the same thing about our logic or mathematics. We haven't done these simulations, but my bet is that we'll find that there are some selection pressures for our logic and our mathematics to be at least in the direction of truth. I mean, if you're like me, math and logic is not easy. We don't get it all right, but at least the selection pressures are not uniformly away from true math and logic. So I think that we'll find that we have to look at each cognitive faculty one at a time and see what evolution does to it. What's true about perception may not be true about math and logic. — Donald Hoffman (my emphasis)
I apologize for reminding you that The Matrix movie, like Hoffman's thesis, was also based on a computer metaphor. But perhaps, it seemed more realistic, because the fake-reality program's sub-routines had human faces, instead of abstract icons. Anyway, you are welcome to whatever "analogy" has personal meaning for you. I happen to prefer smiley-face icons, instead of evil icons. :smile: :naughty:↪Gnomon
We have a disagreement here on which are the best options for an analogy: you think it's the organisation of a business I think it's a matrix where the conscious part is imprisoned in the matrix and dosn't even understand what the matrix does or that there is one. — FalseIdentity
I don't quite understand the phrase "by the success of science". Also, I didn't mention anything about "proving" anything or about what you are conveying here.. More specifically, I said that "Logic, combined with data (evidence) and experiment is how science comes up with new discoveries", and "It is itself used to establish truths", not discover truths. Truths cannot be discovered. As facts can't either.You said that one can proof that logic discovers the truth by the success of science — FalseIdentity
I didn't say or mean anything like that or even closely. More specifically, The only thing I said about survivel is "I wonder howthis does not mean it can solve non-survival related questions — FalseIdentity
Our times do indeed seem, at least in politics & fake news, to be devolving into cynicism, bitterness, & apocalyptic thinking. For example, many blockbuster movies in recent years seem to be built upon apocalyptic themes (e.g. Zombie Apocalypse).More and more people I see retreat socially and trust only a very small number of friends. Attempts to make more contacts mostly end in fighting, injury and biterness. If we would give up the idea that our mind can be neutral or that we are fighting just for "the truth" in such disputes like this one we might be able to understand why our societies implode in this way and prevent it. — FalseIdentity
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