Ideas of Reality

Topic suggested by: http://EvC Forum: Treatment of the Bible as a historical text

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Ideas

An Overview of the New Physics[/i],The Philosophy of PragmatismThe mind is such that it deals only with ideas. It is not possible for the mind to relate to anything other than ideas. Therefore it is not correct to think that the mind actually can ponder reality. All that the mind can ponder is its ideas about reality. (Whether or not that is the way reality actually is, is a metaphysical issue.) Therefore, whether or not something is true is not a matter of how closely it corresponds to the absolute truth, but of how consistent it is with our experience. [/qs] The mind can only deal with ideas. For it to deal with an idea it must first either (a) be presented with the idea from an outside source, (b) deduce the idea from observation of the (individual's) perceived reality, or (c) combine previous ideas (including the ideas of observations) into a new idea.(a) Is the essence of education.
(b) Is the essence of rational thought.
(c) Is the essence of creating theories.For any of these ideas to be perceived by an individual as true, they must be consistent with the experiences of that individual. But each experience is recalled as an idea of what occurred, so the experiences of an individual are the sum total of all the previous ideas of that individual. The individual combines all previous ideas into a reality map against which new ideas are tested.Where there is a conflict between two ideas, then either one or the other or both must be incorrect (or incomplete) and it is time for a new idea. The new idea can either be a test to see which old idea is correct (or more complete), or it can be a new way of structuring the old ideas so that the conflict is resolved.Because it is impossible for the sum total of all [experiences / ideas] of one person to match the sum total of all [experiences / ideas] of another person, it follows that perceived truth for one person is necessarily different from perceived truth for another person.Where there is a conflict between two perceived truths, then either one or the other or both must be incorrect (or incomplete) and it is time for a new idea. The new idea can either be a test to see which perceived truth is correct (or more complete), or it can be a new way of structuring the old ideas so that the conflict is resolved.

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Reality

How then can we measure reality when there are differing subjective experiences?The key to me is to look for nonsense quotients: what [experiences \ views \ observations] must be declared nonsense for the subjective reality to be consistent and how does the total nonsense load compare to the total experience load? The higher the nonsense quotient the less likely the subjective experience measures an objective (actual) reality.Thus for someone to believe that the genesis of life as detailed in the (which one?) [bible \ torah \ vedas \ etc] is actual objective reality, they have to dismiss not only all the other [hundreds of contradictory] creation myths but several whole branches of science as nonsense, from physics to astronomy to biology to genetics to evolution to geology ... etcetera: a very high nonsense quotient compared to a person who accepts the science views and has to dismiss only one more [of hundreds of contradictory] creation myths as nonsense.Now at one basic level all our perceptions of reality are subjective experiences and there are no objective experiences of reality. This becomes obvious when you look at witnesses to an accident that recall different things happening, yet each is sure of what they saw.At one level we are all hypnotized to see sub-atomic particles agglomerations as physical objects like a glass and water when in reality they are 99% empty voids.At one level we are all working on an individual puzzle, trying to fit pieces into our picture of what the puzzle looks like.At one level we are all working on making reality fit our idea of realityThe only rational guides to the objective reality is the concurrence of many subjective realities and the wary measure of the nonsense quotients.

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Enjoy ... Let the games begin?This message has been edited by RAZD, 01-03-2005 20:12 AM

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we are limited in our ability to understand
by our ability to understand RebelAAmerican.Zen[Deist
{{{Buddha walks off laughing with joy}}}

thanks M4TWe can aspire to evolving the perfect brain ... ?

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we are limited in our ability to understand
by our ability to understand RebelAAmerican.Zen[Deist
{{{Buddha walks off laughing with joy}}}

Could you provide a link to what you think would be a good starting point?Sounds interesting, thanks.

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we are limited in our ability to understand
by our ability to understand RebelAAmerican.Zen[Deist
{{{Buddha walks off laughing with joy}}}

and is conciousness a quantum or continuous {function / emergent quality} of neuronal complexity? Does adding one neuron to a borderline non-conscious organism suddenly give it the "I think" epiphany?certainly other animals have displayed levels of consciousness as good as human children, unlocked as we find ways to communicate (sign-language and {other} apes). pet owners swear they communicate with their pets. awareness of impending death and attack by predators is also an observable phenom, as is the awareness of others of opposite sex at appropriate times. conversely is it possible for a human to live without being self-aware? do we assume that this is a complex function only "higher" organisms are capable of when it could be a much simpler mechanism?

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we are limited in our ability to understand
by our ability to understand RebelAAmerican.Zen[Deist
{{{Buddha walks off laughing with joy}}}

thanks. bookmarked for later reading.

And if it doesn't make sense it needs to be questioned even more. The places where science advances is where it doesn't make sense ... the lab results where the scientist doesn't say 'eureka' but 'that's funny ...' atheism or just a turning away from some hard core christian type beliefs? this is one of the side effects of making such a big deal out of the fundamental literal only approach ... that once that is questioned it is harder to accept the rest.The reality could be in between.

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we are limited in our ability to understand
by our ability to understand RebelAAmerican.Zen[Deist
{{{Buddha walks off laughing with joy}}}

It seems one of the dangers of insisting on fundamental literal interpretations is that when one comes into an unresovable conflict with reality it is not just the conflicted part that is discarded, but the baby goes out with the water as well.

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we are limited in our ability to understand
by our ability to understand RebelAAmerican.Zen[Deist
{{{Buddha walks off laughing with joy}}}