Right, so i've had this idea banging around in my head for a bit, been wanting to let it out and see what other people think of it.
So in psychology, a problem you often have in doing research is trying to test things objectively when what you're talking about is inherently nonphysical. You can either refuse to deal with anything "inside the black box" which is to say cognition, emotions, subconscious processes, etc, like the behaviorists do, or you can choose to set up your experiments using Operational definitions, meaning that the abstract idea you are trying to study should have a strictly defined meaning for the purposes of the experiment and therefore have a way to observe and measure the subject within the experiment. So that got me thinking, what would be a an operational definition for the soul? After listening to Nigel talk about the mind as an emergent property of the neurological processes of the brain, that got me thinking, what if what we often refer to as the soul is a similar thing?
so first i guess i should clarify what i feel the difference is between the soul and the mind example i gave above. The Mind, being an emergent process of the brain, would be a product of our awareness of a self, so even an animal that is aware of itself as an individual could be said to have a mind, yet these animals wouldn't be said to have a soul in the same way that humans have souls, tho some philosophers argue that different forms of life have vegetative souls or animal souls yadda yadda yadda. So then, my argument is that the soul is something far more abstract than the mind, yet is important for how we perceive and interact with others. Simply put the soul is our "story". It's the "Meta" that tends to build up around any kind of game you get invested in for very long, kind of like how in Team Fortress, even though the classes are meant to be as well balanced against each other as they can possibly be, there are also various factors that pull players to choose certain clases over other, some classes to be more popular over others, and the community tends to attach subjective meanings to the different classes and the people who play them (pyros are unskilled noobs, snipers and spies are douchebags, etc). So when we talk about a soul in culture what we are talking about is our story, and when we talk about selling our soul or saving a soul, or this youtube video hurts my soul, what we are talking about is a change in what we perceive in these three elements: what we perceive/give meaning to about ourselves (I am a good person), what other people perceive/give meaning to about us (No, you're a piece of shit, Dave), and the interplay between those two elements; what we perceive/give meaning to about what others perceive/give meaning to about us (Hey fuck you, did i ask for your opinion, you bunch of wankers?) Applied to the animal examples i mentioned above, this could mean that the difference between a human soul and an animal's might be a lack of one of these components. Your dog for example, might be aware of itself, might be aware of whether or not you think hes a good boy who wants a treat, but might stop there and consider whether there's more to its existence than that.
So yea, just this recurring thought i keep having , thought i'd air it out and let you guys look at it. I have the vaguest sense that Shintoism has some belief like this, though I've never really done much reading on Shintoism, so if there is an influence its probably subconscious thru i dunno, Inuyasha or something. Tell me what ya think, it's late and i'm going to bed for now.
This kind of delves into the arena of psychology which most frequently makes me regret wasting my time on the degree, which is the self-indulgent wankery of "what separates us from the animals".
My answer is:
1. if you were a biologist you wouldn't ask this question, and
2. this is the reason the other scientists can't take psychology seriously.
I read soul and I think Cartesian dualism.
PROTIP: Cartesian dualism is a false dichotomy.
I don't know if your post is more nuanced than that because I am too tired to read heavy stuff like that today.
So I may be completely off base. I have no reason to post this other than I like saying Cartesian dualism. it gives me a happy.
If you are going to redefine soul to mean, roughly, "that which represents the self as imagined through narrative", or "story", then it is a subset of memory, which is a function of mind, which is an emergent property of nervous system. So at that point, you have essentially just defined soul as a subset of mind; one which already has a name, ie. memory.
One of the biggest problems psychology has, IMO, is the tendency to fractionalize into philosophical camps that all use their own jargon and charts and are named for their own gurus, the people who initially wrote the book that spawned the school of thought that their followers subscribe to. This tendency seems to be seated pretty deeply in the discipline, to such an extent that students seem to strive to spawn their own schools of thought in order to prove that they're good enough thinkers, that they've arrived. To have a system named after you; that's the hallmark of being a big name in psychology.
Unfortunately, it's mostly smoke and mirrors that prevents anyone from making any kind of coherent, unified sense out of all the apparently competing theories about human behavior and human mind. If everyone has their own fucking jargon, you can't tell when they're describing the same thing from different perspectives. It's bullshit. This is the reason chemistry has IUPAC, and even biologists are starting to pull their heads out of their asses and name things in ways that are useful and descriptive rather than arbitrary and ego-stroking. Scientists need to all speak the same language and be on the same page for science to be done.
So if you want to write about the sense of self that we call soul, its biological origins and how we relate to it socially and linguistically, that is great, but don't get yourself dug into a place where you're shrouding existing concepts in a veil of redefined terminology and special reference.
Quote from: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on July 08, 2015, 08:32:43 PM
One of the biggest problems psychology has, IMO, is the tendency to fractionalize into philosophical camps that all use their own jargon and charts and are named for their own gurus, the people who initially wrote the book that spawned the school of thought that their followers subscribe to. This tendency seems to be seated pretty deeply in the discipline, to such an extent that students seem to strive to spawn their own schools of thought in order to prove that they're good enough thinkers, that they've arrived. To have a system named after you; that's the hallmark of being a big name in psychology.
Interestingly, I felt the same way about Power Studies in politics.
You've got about a dozen major thinkers who all work from their own definition of what power 'is', and to teach it the lecturer basically had to lay out what each individual theory meant.
I once got very excited when I realized that you could talk about all these different areas of 'Power' by using words like 'Influence' and 'Coercion' and 'Force' instead of just insisting on using 'Power' every time, and then combine all the theories to apply to their actual context instead of pretending they were all mutually exclusive because they were camping on the same word. My lecturer basically told me 'you aren't as smart as the people who came up with these definitions, drop it'. Which... yeah. In retrospect, that guy was kind of a dick.
Soul speaks less and says moor
Quote from: Demolition Squid on July 08, 2015, 10:32:35 PM
Quote from: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on July 08, 2015, 08:32:43 PM
One of the biggest problems psychology has, IMO, is the tendency to fractionalize into philosophical camps that all use their own jargon and charts and are named for their own gurus, the people who initially wrote the book that spawned the school of thought that their followers subscribe to. This tendency seems to be seated pretty deeply in the discipline, to such an extent that students seem to strive to spawn their own schools of thought in order to prove that they're good enough thinkers, that they've arrived. To have a system named after you; that's the hallmark of being a big name in psychology.
Interestingly, I felt the same way about Power Studies in politics.
You've got about a dozen major thinkers who all work from their own definition of what power 'is', and to teach it the lecturer basically had to lay out what each individual theory meant.
I once got very excited when I realized that you could talk about all these different areas of 'Power' by using words like 'Influence' and 'Coercion' and 'Force' instead of just insisting on using 'Power' every time, and then combine all the theories to apply to their actual context instead of pretending they were all mutually exclusive because they were camping on the same word. My lecturer basically told me 'you aren't as smart as the people who came up with these definitions, drop it'. Which... yeah. In retrospect, that guy was kind of a dick.
A dick and perhaps not so bright himself, because if anything he should have encouraged you to pursue that line of analysis and write a paper that could unite the work from the thinkers you were studying.
Yknow, the funny bit is i think this bit of philosophical ruminating was actually born more as a response to people who says things like, "What can your blasted SCIENCE tell us about the human soul, HUH? ANSWER ME THAT, SCIENCEMAN!!!"
I would like to lead them into an argument like the OP and say "basically this." and watch the wind leave their sails a little.
So if nothing else, this could be used as a pseudoscientific attempt to shut up idiots. You're welcome.
Also, i've been listening to a fair amount of Grant Morrison and Alan Moore, so yea, there's bit of them in this idea, also.
Quote from: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on July 08, 2015, 08:32:43 PM
If you are going to redefine soul to mean, roughly, "that which represents the self as imagined through narrative", or "story", then it is a subset of memory, which is a function of mind, which is an emergent property of nervous system. So at that point, you have essentially just defined soul as a subset of mind; one which already has a name, ie. memory.
well not exactly memory, at least not as it exists within the memory of one person. Stories tend to endure from generation to generation, and so what makes a soul "immortal" isnt some sort of divine essence so much as the collective memory of a person within a culture. like i said, way more abstract than one person's mind and biology. if anything, its an emergent property of many peoples minds intersecting with an individual's.
I gotta stop writing these so late a t night.
New to this forum.
Hello, and nice to meet everyone.
As a subset of mind, labeled as memory (learning). We can no longer infer that we are different from the animals. A dog can be trained, A cat can...do what a cat does...NVM cats don't have souls.
By this definition, if it can be taught something then it does have a soul/memory, then the absence without this ability.
Quote from: Chelagoras The Boulder on July 10, 2015, 07:50:34 AM
Quote from: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on July 08, 2015, 08:32:43 PM
If you are going to redefine soul to mean, roughly, "that which represents the self as imagined through narrative", or "story", then it is a subset of memory, which is a function of mind, which is an emergent property of nervous system. So at that point, you have essentially just defined soul as a subset of mind; one which already has a name, ie. memory.
well not exactly memory, at least not as it exists within the memory of one person. Stories tend to endure from generation to generation, and so what makes a soul "immortal" isnt some sort of divine essence so much as the collective memory of a person within a culture. like i said, way more abstract than one person's mind and biology. if anything, its an emergent property of many peoples minds intersecting with an individual's.
I gotta stop writing these so late a t night.
So, when you refer to "soul", you are talking about the anthropological definition of "culture"?
https://www.umanitoba.ca/faculties/arts/anthropology/courses/122/module1/culture.html
Or are you talking about stories ABOUT an individual person? Are you talking about mythology?
The thing is, I think there are already words for what you are describing, and I am not sure I see any particular value in making up a new way of talking about it. That's generally just called "obfuscation".
I choose to believe in a soul, because I choose to believe in an afterlife. I choose to believe in an afterlife, because I refuse to acknowledge a belief system in which something as cool as me disappears forever.
There's no science in that, of course, just a few 55 gallon drums of ego.
Of course, the effect is the same. If it's your "soul" that gets stained by committing bad acts, or your brain which grows accustomed to them is - to a non-neurologist - irrelevant. Same as the idea that my love for my wife is just a big pile of oxtossin burbling about in my brain. The oxytossin thing makes more sense intellectually, because love waxes and wanes over time.
But, again, the end result is the same. I am all for neurological research into behavior. But I'm not going to stop thinking of my feelings for Jenn as "love" in favor of "bog-standard brain chemistry".
Quote from: Doktor Howl on July 10, 2015, 07:11:58 PM
I choose to believe in a soul, because I choose to believe in an afterlife. I choose to believe in an afterlife, because I refuse to acknowledge a belief system in which something as cool as me disappears forever.
There's no science in that, of course, just a few 55 gallon drums of ego.
Of course, the effect is the same. If it's your "soul" that gets stained by committing bad acts, or your brain which grows accustomed to them is - to a non-neurologist - irrelevant. Same as the idea that my love for my wife is just a big pile of oxtossin burbling about in my brain. The oxytossin thing makes more sense intellectually, because love waxes and wanes over time.
But, again, the end result is the same. I am all for neurological research into behavior. But I'm not going to stop thinking of my feelings for Jenn as "love" in favor of "bog-standard brain chemistry".
I feel like that's a slightly different argument; we already have a vocabulary for "love" that pretty much everyone agrees on, even if not everyone agrees on the mechanism that causes it. If we want to study love or write poetry or songs or a philosophical dissertation about love, we can do that, and we can all be understood, because for the most part we all agree on the phenomenon and the language we use to describe it.
What Chelagoras
seems to be attempting, if I understand him correctly, is to take a word that is a bit like love except which has a more abstract and nebulous meaning, and define it to mean something it is not generally taken to mean.
Quote from: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on July 10, 2015, 07:58:57 PM
Quote from: Doktor Howl on July 10, 2015, 07:11:58 PM
I choose to believe in a soul, because I choose to believe in an afterlife. I choose to believe in an afterlife, because I refuse to acknowledge a belief system in which something as cool as me disappears forever.
There's no science in that, of course, just a few 55 gallon drums of ego.
Of course, the effect is the same. If it's your "soul" that gets stained by committing bad acts, or your brain which grows accustomed to them is - to a non-neurologist - irrelevant. Same as the idea that my love for my wife is just a big pile of oxtossin burbling about in my brain. The oxytossin thing makes more sense intellectually, because love waxes and wanes over time.
But, again, the end result is the same. I am all for neurological research into behavior. But I'm not going to stop thinking of my feelings for Jenn as "love" in favor of "bog-standard brain chemistry".
I feel like that's a slightly different argument; we already have a vocabulary for "love" that pretty much everyone agrees on, even if not everyone agrees on the mechanism that causes it. If we want to study love or write poetry or songs or a philosophical dissertation about love, we can do that, and we can all be understood, because for the most part we all agree on the phenomenon and the language we use to describe it.
What Chelagoras seems to be attempting, if I understand him correctly, is to take a word that is a bit like love except which has a more abstract and nebulous meaning, and define it to mean something it is not generally taken to mean.
I know. I just don't know enough about any of this to refute either position, so I posted my opinion.
To my mind, my soul is "me". I am well aware that there is plenty of evidence that "me" is just a meat machine with some interesting quirks. Doesn't mean I have to like it.
And being 1/2 Good American™, that means I can pull my underwear over my head and bellow "LALALA I CAN'T HEAR YOU".
If I was fully a Good American™, I'd vote to have this sort of Godless nonsense de-funded, because knowledge is BAD and DANGEROUS and can only lead to moral degeneracy. Why, if I knew how my brain worked, I'd just do something else to spite it! And that only ends one way.
Quote from: Doktor Howl on July 10, 2015, 08:07:32 PM
Quote from: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on July 10, 2015, 07:58:57 PM
Quote from: Doktor Howl on July 10, 2015, 07:11:58 PM
I choose to believe in a soul, because I choose to believe in an afterlife. I choose to believe in an afterlife, because I refuse to acknowledge a belief system in which something as cool as me disappears forever.
There's no science in that, of course, just a few 55 gallon drums of ego.
Of course, the effect is the same. If it's your "soul" that gets stained by committing bad acts, or your brain which grows accustomed to them is - to a non-neurologist - irrelevant. Same as the idea that my love for my wife is just a big pile of oxtossin burbling about in my brain. The oxytossin thing makes more sense intellectually, because love waxes and wanes over time.
But, again, the end result is the same. I am all for neurological research into behavior. But I'm not going to stop thinking of my feelings for Jenn as "love" in favor of "bog-standard brain chemistry".
I feel like that's a slightly different argument; we already have a vocabulary for "love" that pretty much everyone agrees on, even if not everyone agrees on the mechanism that causes it. If we want to study love or write poetry or songs or a philosophical dissertation about love, we can do that, and we can all be understood, because for the most part we all agree on the phenomenon and the language we use to describe it.
What Chelagoras seems to be attempting, if I understand him correctly, is to take a word that is a bit like love except which has a more abstract and nebulous meaning, and define it to mean something it is not generally taken to mean.
I know. I just don't know enough about any of this to refute either position, so I posted my opinion.
To my mind, my soul is "me". I am well aware that there is plenty of evidence that "me" is just a meat machine with some interesting quirks. Doesn't mean I have to like it.
And being 1/2 Good American™, that means I can pull my underwear over my head and bellow "LALALA I CAN'T HEAR YOU".
If I was fully a Good American™, I'd vote to have this sort of Godless nonsense de-funded, because knowledge is BAD and DANGEROUS and can only lead to moral degeneracy. Why, if I knew how my brain worked, I'd just do something else to spite it! And that only ends one way.
:lulz:
You either have soul or you don't
Quote from: Doktor Howl on July 10, 2015, 08:07:32 PM
Quote from: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on July 10, 2015, 07:58:57 PM
Quote from: Doktor Howl on July 10, 2015, 07:11:58 PM
I choose to believe in a soul, because I choose to believe in an afterlife. I choose to believe in an afterlife, because I refuse to acknowledge a belief system in which something as cool as me disappears forever.
There's no science in that, of course, just a few 55 gallon drums of ego.
Of course, the effect is the same. If it's your "soul" that gets stained by committing bad acts, or your brain which grows accustomed to them is - to a non-neurologist - irrelevant. Same as the idea that my love for my wife is just a big pile of oxtossin burbling about in my brain. The oxytossin thing makes more sense intellectually, because love waxes and wanes over time.
But, again, the end result is the same. I am all for neurological research into behavior. But I'm not going to stop thinking of my feelings for Jenn as "love" in favor of "bog-standard brain chemistry".
I feel like that's a slightly different argument; we already have a vocabulary for "love" that pretty much everyone agrees on, even if not everyone agrees on the mechanism that causes it. If we want to study love or write poetry or songs or a philosophical dissertation about love, we can do that, and we can all be understood, because for the most part we all agree on the phenomenon and the language we use to describe it.
What Chelagoras seems to be attempting, if I understand him correctly, is to take a word that is a bit like love except which has a more abstract and nebulous meaning, and define it to mean something it is not generally taken to mean.
I know. I just don't know enough about any of this to refute either position, so I posted my opinion.
To my mind, my soul is "me". I am well aware that there is plenty of evidence that "me" is just a meat machine with some interesting quirks. Doesn't mean I have to like it.
And being 1/2 Good American™, that means I can pull my underwear over my head and bellow "LALALA I CAN'T HEAR YOU".
If I was fully a Good American™, I'd vote to have this sort of Godless nonsense de-funded, because knowledge is BAD and DANGEROUS and can only lead to moral degeneracy. Why, if I knew how my brain worked, I'd just do something else to spite it! And that only ends one way.
:lulz:
Meat machines are hella interesting though, please refrain from calling them 'just meat machines'. That is like saying 'just special relativity', or 'just spacetravel' or 'just wasabi'.
Premise complete
and then there's that other things called wanting
8)
Quote from: Reginald Ret on July 10, 2015, 10:04:31 PM
or 'just wasabi'.
It's like I don't even know you anymore.
Quote from: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on July 10, 2015, 07:58:57 PM
Quote from: Doktor Howl on July 10, 2015, 07:11:58 PM
I choose to believe in a soul, because I choose to believe in an afterlife. I choose to believe in an afterlife, because I refuse to acknowledge a belief system in which something as cool as me disappears forever.
There's no science in that, of course, just a few 55 gallon drums of ego.
Of course, the effect is the same. If it's your "soul" that gets stained by committing bad acts, or your brain which grows accustomed to them is - to a non-neurologist - irrelevant. Same as the idea that my love for my wife is just a big pile of oxtossin burbling about in my brain. The oxytossin thing makes more sense intellectually, because love waxes and wanes over time.
But, again, the end result is the same. I am all for neurological research into behavior. But I'm not going to stop thinking of my feelings for Jenn as "love" in favor of "bog-standard brain chemistry".
I feel like that's a slightly different argument; we already have a vocabulary for "love" that pretty much everyone agrees on, even if not everyone agrees on the mechanism that causes it. If we want to study love or write poetry or songs or a philosophical dissertation about love, we can do that, and we can all be understood, because for the most part we all agree on the phenomenon and the language we use to describe it.
What Chelagoras seems to be attempting, if I understand him correctly, is to take a word that is a bit like love except which has a more abstract and nebulous meaning, and define it to mean something it is not generally taken to mean.
I dont feel i'm using any different vocabulary than anyone else would use to discuss this topic, i feel like my posts have been mainly in language anybody can understand. Also, i didnt mention love, Doc did.
I'm just trying to use narratives to explain the "extra little bit" that people always perceive as being "left over" after any scientific theory, whether psychological, neurological, philosophical etc. Now i'm not saying that any of these theories are flawed or that science is bad or any of that. What i'm saying is that whenever humans feel their actions are being determined, they tend to create meanings for themselves(the idea of a soul, or also free will or whatever) using stories because stories (or culture of any sort really, music, art, anything creative, etc) tend to be the programming language for our brains. Tell a story about a magic man in the sky who loves you, people will run that code for thousands of years and will fight you if you ever try to change it. Write up a beautifully researched doctoral thesis that explains and enlightens a fundamental question of existence and good luck getting anyone to even read it, let alone accept it, especially if it clashes with that first story. We do this with everything, we want to make meanings and find patterns to everything, including people, and when we do it to ourselves it tends to look like the stuff we attribute to what we call our souls. the whole three parts thing is there because its hard for people to make meanings divorced of context, therefore the meanings of others effect the meanings we make for ourselves, even if its to decide to be the sort of person to tell those fuckers to take their meanings and shove it.
'What do you see when you turn out the lights?'
Taken together I suspect that IF the soul exists, as such, then it is a part of something rather different than the world we find ourselves in and experiencing. Something that deals with space/time very differently than, say, an atom, but like an atom may be subject to a certain malleability under exceptional conditions. Going to REALLY think on this for a bit before I try to articulate at all further, but want in on the thread for sure.
The "story" element of the soul discussed here seems certainly key to much thought about the soul, but I wonder if that's entirely the purpose of what such a thing might "do" or perhaps a sort of defensive reaction to something not truly native to the this little piece of reality from which we draw the experiences of our lives. A reaction of sorts upon something made of "eternal stuff" dipped into linear time. If so then it must be in some sense measurable, but we may lack the ability to do so from our "position" in things.
I can say that there exist many sincere and credible case histories of apparent mind or memory transferrence from life to life and I'm fairly convinced something is going on, but a collective unconscious capable of some sort of memory locus or node would also possibly account for it.
What it is not is science. Not all knowledge is scientific, but all genuinely scientific knowledge must be measured and repeated. No two moments of subjective temporal experience are ever able to be either truly measured nor even once perfectly repeated, science is the best we've managed in the face of this. And so we have an enigma.
Just my basic off the top thoughts, but please note the big IF in first line.
My two cents: you do not need a soul to explain anything.
Anything the soul is supposed to do can be attributed to various other mechanisms.
TGRR said something about his reason to believe in a soul, in relation to a '55 gallon drum of ego', which I think is a great remark.
As Reginald stated, we may be meatmachines, but we are far from JUST meatmachines.
And, similarly, gravity is not JUST gravity, life is not JUST life, love is not JUST love, etc.
Value exists only in our heads, but why should that make it any less real? It's something we all (mostly) share, isn't it?
So, yes, you are only your 'bodymind', but, isn't that a pretty cool thing in and of itself?
This discussion reminds me of a discussion I once had, back when I had the illbegotten idea of studying philosophy.
This Dutch Dude gave a lecture about how something like altruism, isn't really altruistic. His reasoning was that since altruism, just like any other trait, was selected by the evolutionary process, it per definition had to give an advantage to the individual possesing the trait. Hence, altruism is selfish.
One of my fellow student made the counterpoint: Well, the tendency towards masturbation has been selected. Maintaining quality of sperm is just one of the benifits it offers. But when I'm alone in my room at night, and I'm horny, bored, or both, I do not think to myself: "Ya know what, I think I'll maintain my sperm quality""
His point is, that cognition basically creates another level, above reality. I think he said 'meta-level' :p
Our thoughts, perceptions of reality, are a product of our minds. Our minds are a product of our bodies, and our environment, in present and past. Those bodies are a product of your genetic codes, and again, environment. Those codes are a product of the evolutionary process and all that good stuff.
Why should any level of reality be given any more validy, or level of truthfullness, or value, over another? Focusing on the level most applicable seems like a pretty good way of handling it to me. For day-to-day life, at the very least.
On the distinction between mind and soul, it reminds me of trying to reconcile the Buddhist concept of anatman (no self) with transmigration (reincarnation). I think it's all in how you slice it. Once we draw all these distinctions, we then look for a unifying principle: enter soul. The problem is that we would not be so concerned with these things had we not fallen from grace into sin, in the first place.
*LuciferX takes a wistful look at his costume
Quote from: Chelagoras The Boulder on July 08, 2015, 09:06:28 AM
so first i guess i should clarify what i feel the difference is between the soul and the mind example i gave above. The Mind, being an emergent process of the brain, would be a product of our awareness of a self, so even an animal that is aware of itself as an individual could be said to have a mind, yet these animals wouldn't be said to have a soul in the same way that humans have souls, tho some philosophers argue that different forms of life have vegetative souls or animal souls yadda yadda yadda. So then, my argument is that the soul is something far more abstract than the mind, yet is important for how we perceive and interact with others.
We're talking about the soul, so the best I can offer is to shoot another pot shot in the direction I saw you shoot. It's dark and foggy out, so it's impossible to know if we're aiming at the same target.
(This is a bit William James)
First, the soul is the self that remains after ego death - if you can shut off the procession of labels and judgments that the ego loves to bask in, what you've got left is the zen mind.
Second, that soul is just a component... Just as you describe mind as an emergent phenomenon of all these independent systems, GOD is the emergent phenomenon of all these independent souls.
Individuals are the fingers, god is the palm.
i can jive with that. I've been trying to revisit this concept after I had a better grasp on my idea of it. so far, here are my basic assumptions
The universe has no inherent meaning, only formless chaos.
There is only the meaning that we, as sapient life, imprint upon the universe, like finding patterns in a random sequence
This is the meaning of life, giving life a meaning
Therefore,
what we call a soul is the sum total of all those subjective meanings we give to other living things. Those meanings, viewed over a persons entire life, create a kind of story that persists for as long as that person is remembered.
I've actually run into the idea that we are all bits of god experiencing life as flawed imperfect monkey people, and I like it personally, but i'm not sure how that fits in with the ideas I laid out above yet.
Quote from: Chelagoras The Boulder on November 04, 2015, 01:55:26 AM
I've actually run into the idea that we are all bits of god experiencing life as flawed imperfect monkey people, and I like it personally, but i'm not sure how that fits in with the ideas I laid out above yet.
Depends on how you define God.
Which kind of reveals the nature of the concept of God, it changes depending on what people want God to be.
I think the premise of a universe that allows for the existence of meaning (however "subjectively" apprehended) is a universe of which meaning is inherent.
Quote from: Chelagoras The Boulder on November 04, 2015, 01:55:26 AM
i can jive with that. I've been trying to revisit this concept after I had a better grasp on my idea of it. so far, here are my basic assumptions
The universe has no inherent meaning, only formless chaos.
There is only the meaning that we, as sapient life, imprint upon the universe, like finding patterns in a random sequence
This is the meaning of life, giving life a meaning
Therefore,
what we call a soul is the sum total of all those subjective meanings we give to other living things. Those meanings, viewed over a persons entire life, create a kind of story that persists for as long as that person is remembered.
I've actually run into the idea that we are all bits of god experiencing life as flawed imperfect monkey people, and I like it personally, but i'm not sure how that fits in with the ideas I laid out above yet.
Do you think the premise of a universe that allows for the existence of God (even, as you said, experienced in some subjective manner) is a universe of which God's existence is inherent? What about other concepts and beings?
Quote from: thewake on November 06, 2015, 06:16:38 AM
Do you think the premise of a universe that allows for the existence of God (even, as you said, experienced in some subjective manner) is a universe of which God's existence is inherent? What about other concepts and beings?
No edge and goes on fucking forever through time, with an undecipherable amount of dimensions. So I mean, everything is inherent. Rather it effects you or not is unlikely.
Quote from: thewake on November 06, 2015, 06:16:38 AM
Do you think the premise of a universe that allows for the existence of God (even, as you said, experienced in some subjective manner) is a universe of which God's existence is inherent? What about other concepts and beings?
Perhaps it's easier to start with meaning, in the case of intelligibility, because it is not possible to deny, like:
"This sentence is meaningless"
Maybe meaning is inherent in how we perceive the universe and not necessarily in the universe beyond us as beings who impose a meaning on the inputs the universe puts into our senses.
Assuming this to be true, it's only our perception of the universe which has meaning, and not necessarily the universe itself.
Of course I don't really know, but I like to speculate.
Dealing with counterfactuals, like a universe distinct of your experience, does not lend credence to the speculation.
Quote from: thewake on November 09, 2015, 09:33:24 PM
Maybe meaning is inherent in how we perceive the universe and not necessarily in the universe beyond us as beings who impose a meaning on the inputs the universe puts into our senses.
Assuming this to be true, it's only our perception of the universe which has meaning, and not necessarily the universe itself.
Of course I don't really know, but I like to speculate.
This entire conversation is hopelessly stupid and I hate all of you idiots.
That said, yes, of course meaning is a function of perception and interpretation. The universe doesn't have inherent meaning, only inherent properties.
Think about the properties of light at the lowest end of the wave spectrum visible to humans, for example. Is that light blue? For that matter, is it light? Fuck no. It is short wavelength photon radiation, and the things that make it "blue" and "light" are the machinery of our biological receptors and interpretation of our brains.
(http://img.pandawhale.com/41397-Picard-clapping-applause-gif-vX3R.gif)
Thank you.
I hate to drop an incomplete thought like this (as I don't have the book handy), but doesn't Hofstadter take the opposite position in Godel Escher Bach?
He asserts that meaning emerges from these isomorphic relationships between concepts. The notion that meaning is generated only by humans, he called biological chauvinism. He thinks formal systems generate meaning, and humans don't create it, they decode it.
Personally, I disagree with Hofstadter there, but I wanted to put that out there. Please correct me if I've mis-characterized it!
Edit to add: I think he'd point out that the 'meaning' of 1+1 isn't a human construct
Quote from: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on November 10, 2015, 03:02:36 PM
This entire conversation is hopelessly stupid and I hate all of you idiots.
:pwned:
Quote from: Edward Longpork on November 10, 2015, 05:57:30 PM
I hate to drop an incomplete thought like this (as I don't have the book handy), but doesn't Hofstadter take the opposite position in Godel Escher Bach?
He asserts that meaning emerges from these isomorphic relationships between concepts. The notion that meaning is generated only by humans, he called biological chauvinism. He thinks formal systems generate meaning, and humans don't create it, they decode it.
Personally, I disagree with Hofstadter there, but I wanted to put that out there. Please correct me if I've mis-characterized it!
Edit to add: I think he'd point out that the 'meaning' of 1+1 isn't a human construct
Am I supposed to give a flying fuck what a professor of philosophy said about the nature of meaning, reality, and cognition in 1979?
I didn't say that meaning is imposed only by humans. Meaning is, as I said, a function of perception and interpretation. That doesn't mean "by humans alone": perception and interpretation are broad terms, and I don't have sufficient data to put hard perimeters on their definitions.
Quote from: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on November 10, 2015, 03:02:36 PM
Quote from: thewake on November 09, 2015, 09:33:24 PM
Maybe meaning is inherent in how we perceive the universe and not necessarily in the universe beyond us as beings who impose a meaning on the inputs the universe puts into our senses.
Assuming this to be true, it's only our perception of the universe which has meaning, and not necessarily the universe itself.
Of course I don't really know, but I like to speculate.
This entire conversation is hopelessly stupid and I hate all of you idiots.
That said, yes, of course meaning is a function of perception and interpretation. The universe doesn't have inherent meaning, only inherent properties.
Think about the properties of light at the lowest end of the wave spectrum visible to humans, for example. Is that light blue? For that matter, is it light? Fuck no. It is short wavelength photon radiation, and the things that make it "blue" and "light" are the machinery of our biological receptors and interpretation of our brains.
well then correct me if i'm wrong but it seems we agree on this much, that the universe has no inherent meaning, and meaning is a function of us interpreting the properties of the universe thru our senses. what we seem to differ on is whether or not those subjective meanings are worth considering. I would argue yes, seeing as how the only way we are able to read each others responses right now is that we ape descendants decided to attach subjective meaning to a bunch of squiggles that we all agreed were to stand in for words, which in turn, are a bunch of specific sounds we also agreed to attach subjective meaning to. Heck, we didn't even agree on the meanings across the board. Reading this paragraph out loud to a non-English speaker would sound like a bunch of random gibberish to them, because their subjective meanings are attached to a different set of sounds and squiggles.
Jesus fuck, of course our subjective interpretations are "worth considering", what does that even mean? :punchballs: They are the only structure we have with which to interact with the world around us.
Maybe the problem here is the word "meaning". What do you fuckers mean by it?
Meaning: When being mean is a verb
Basically, any trait we ascribe to a person, place, or thing. If someone gives to charity a lot, we say he's generous. If a house was the scene of a murder we say it's haunted. If we trust someone and they act contrary to that trust, we see it as betrayal. Stuff like that. See also the bit about stories and how these traits are seen over a lifetime.
Quote from: Chelagoras The Boulder on November 11, 2015, 05:10:15 PM
Basically, any trait we ascribe to a person, place, or thing. If someone gives to charity a lot, we say he's generous. If a house was the scene of a murder we say it's haunted. If we trust someone and they act contrary to that trust, we see it as betrayal. Stuff like that. See also the bit about stories and how these traits are seen over a lifetime.
It's a tricky word, meaning. Seems like it discloses the connections between things over space and time, like an interrelated web of relations. In the first place, it allows you to string together all these letters and words in order to apprehend a 'meaningful' sentence. How is this possible?
I mean, instead of knowing and acting on the premise that the object I see before me is the same keyboard as it was just a second ago, what stops me from perceiving it as an endless stream of 'keyboards' being replaced one after the other to match the sample rate of consciousness Or, how do I even recognize that it is the same 'I' perduring through all these different experiences? What is the ground of similarity upon which we experience such constant distinction?
Quote from: Chelagoras The Boulder on November 11, 2015, 05:10:15 PM
Basically, any trait we ascribe to a person, place, or thing. If someone gives to charity a lot, we say he's generous. If a house was the scene of a murder we say it's haunted. If we trust someone and they act contrary to that trust, we see it as betrayal. Stuff like that. See also the bit about stories and how these traits are seen over a lifetime.
So you're defining the word "meaning" as an attribution of a trait?
Is the speed of light an example of "meaning", then? Because the speed of light is a trait attributed to light. Most scientists would disagree with that definition, because a trait is a property inherent to an object or occurrence.
The examples you give are not consistent with that definition, as they are all
interpretations of events. That is far more consistent with how most cognitive psychologists and neuroscientists use the term "meaning".
Meaning is generally agreed to be a function of interpretation derived from perception and context. In other words, it is something that occurs within an observer, not an inherent property of a phenomenon.
I also like how Huxley put it in the Doors:
QuoteThe function of the brain and nervous system is to protect us from being overwhelmed and confused by this mass of largely useless and irrelevant knowledge, by shutting out most of what we should otherwise perceive or remember at any moment, and leaving only that very small and special selection which is likely to be practically useful." According to such a theory, each one of us is potentially Mind at Large. But in so far as we are animals, our business is at all costs to survive. To make biological survival possible, Mind at Large has to be funneled through the reducing valve of the brain and nervous system. What comes out at the other end is a measly trickle of the kind of consciousness which will help us to stay alive on the surface of this particular planet.
[Ed. Can't spell]
So, there's meaning that's an interpretation made by and within an observer, and multiple observers could infer different meanings from the same phenomenon based on biology, life circumstances, and context.
Meaning is also used to describe the interpretation intended by a conscious creator when they make something happen, the intended meaning. You know, the bane of every high school English Lit course. Maybe some of the nutpunching is miscommunication? Like, if I say "the Universe has no meaning" and someone else says "the Universe has no meaning," those are the same sentences, but I could mean "intended meaning" whereas that guy means "inferred meaning" and then we holler past each other because English is a shit language and can't decide which way up is?
That's why "defining your terms" takes up the majority of most philosophy books.
Or you could be a complete douche, like R.D. Laing, and write stuff like:
QuoteI get what I deserve
I deserve what I get.
I have it,
therefore I deserve it
I deserve it
because I have it.
You have not got it
therefore you do not deserve it
You do not deserve it
because you have not got it
You have not got it
because you do not deserve it
You do not deserve it
therefore you have not got it.
Quote from: LMNO on November 13, 2015, 02:42:57 PM
That's why "defining your terms" takes up the majority of most philosophy books.
Or you could be a complete douche, like R.D. Laing, and write stuff like:
QuoteI get what I deserve
I deserve what I get.
I have it,
therefore I deserve it
I deserve it
because I have it.
You have not got it
therefore you do not deserve it
You do not deserve it
because you have not got it
You have not got it
because you do not deserve it
You do not deserve it
therefore you have not got it.
While douchey, that does read like a good explanation of what's wrong with the just world fallacy.
Yeah. I'm not saying he's wrong, just that he's kind of a wanker.
Generally when I think of the "meaning of the universe," I take it to mean that it was made, or exists, for a purpose in the same way a burrito exists and its meaning is for me to eat it. Similarly with the "meaning of life." Aka, I'm talking some kind of inherent meaning. Not a subjective meaning/purpose. In fact, purpose would be a better word to get at how I'm thinking about it.
I do not mean to say that we cannot all individually, or collectively, assign a purpose to our particular lives and the world we live in from our particular point of view. But I rather think it's impossible to know if the universe has some kind of inherent meaning, at least it seems impossible for me to know it right now. On the other hand, it can be show that inherent in the burrito is the fact that it was made to be eaten (even if it never is eaten, and instead just sits in a freezer).
The amount of hubris required to believe the universe exists for your personal benefit, like something you'd order at Chipotle, is staggering.
Frankly, I'm kind of impressed at your level of self-involvement.
Quote from: thewake on November 13, 2015, 04:43:12 PM
Generally when I think of the "meaning of the universe," I take it to mean that it was made, or exists, for a purpose in the same way a burrito exists and its meaning is for me to eat it. Similarly with the "meaning of life." Aka, I'm talking some kind of inherent meaning. Not a subjective meaning/purpose. In fact, purpose would be a better word to get at how I'm thinking about it.
I do not mean to say that we cannot all individually, or collectively, assign a purpose to our particular lives and the world we live in from our particular point of view. But I rather think it's impossible to know if the universe has some kind of inherent meaning, at least it seems impossible for me to know it right now. On the other hand, it can be show that inherent in the burrito is the fact that it was made to be eaten (even if it never is eaten, and instead just sits in a freezer).
I'm going to quibble with your use of "inherent" here. The burrito has inherent properties, but meaning isn't one of them. You could have a burrito that was created for a television ad or a weird art project that was never intended to be eaten. The burrito has two meanings: the intended meaning from the one who created it (an internal interpretation of the creator "I am making this burrito for this asshole to eat") and the inferred meaning from the observer of the burrito (an internal interpretation of the object based on context and other factors "that burrito is meant for this asshole to eat because he paid for it," "this burrito is meant for me to eat," "this burrito is meant for me to eat but that asshole is eating it instead," etc).
Quote from: Q. G. Pennyworth on November 13, 2015, 05:03:47 PM
Quote from: thewake on November 13, 2015, 04:43:12 PM
Generally when I think of the "meaning of the universe," I take it to mean that it was made, or exists, for a purpose in the same way a burrito exists and its meaning is for me to eat it. Similarly with the "meaning of life." Aka, I'm talking some kind of inherent meaning. Not a subjective meaning/purpose. In fact, purpose would be a better word to get at how I'm thinking about it.
I do not mean to say that we cannot all individually, or collectively, assign a purpose to our particular lives and the world we live in from our particular point of view. But I rather think it's impossible to know if the universe has some kind of inherent meaning, at least it seems impossible for me to know it right now. On the other hand, it can be show that inherent in the burrito is the fact that it was made to be eaten (even if it never is eaten, and instead just sits in a freezer).
I'm going to quibble with your use of "inherent" here. The burrito has inherent properties, but meaning isn't one of them. You could have a burrito that was created for a television ad or a weird art project that was never intended to be eaten. The burrito has two meanings: the intended meaning from the one who created it (an internal interpretation of the creator "I am making this burrito for this asshole to eat") and the inferred meaning from the observer of the burrito (an internal interpretation of the object based on context and other factors "that burrito is meant for this asshole to eat because he paid for it," "this burrito is meant for me to eat," "this burrito is meant for me to eat but that asshole is eating it instead," etc).
I'd have to say your distinction makes quite a bit of sense, and avoids quite a bit of confusion.
Quote from: LMNO on November 13, 2015, 02:50:44 PM
Yeah. I'm not saying he's wrong, just that he's kind of a wanker.
This is generally true of all philosophers.
Except Wittgenstein, who was both wrong and a wanker.
Quote from: Cain on November 13, 2015, 05:30:05 PM
Quote from: LMNO on November 13, 2015, 02:50:44 PM
Yeah. I'm not saying he's wrong, just that he's kind of a wanker.
This is generally true of all philosophers.
Except Wittgenstein, who was both wrong and a wanker.
:lol::mittens::lol:
Quote from: Cain on November 13, 2015, 05:30:05 PM
Quote from: LMNO on November 13, 2015, 02:50:44 PM
Yeah. I'm not saying he's wrong, just that he's kind of a wanker.
This is generally true of all philosophers.
Except Wittgenstein, who was both wrong and a wanker.
:potd:
Quote from: Cain on November 13, 2015, 05:30:05 PM
Quote from: LMNO on November 13, 2015, 02:50:44 PM
Yeah. I'm not saying he's wrong, just that he's kind of a wanker.
This is generally true of all philosophers.
Except Wittgenstein, who was both wrong and a wanker.
:lulz:
Quote from: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on November 12, 2015, 07:51:54 PM
Quote from: Chelagoras The Boulder on November 11, 2015, 05:10:15 PM
Basically, any trait we ascribe to a person, place, or thing. If someone gives to charity a lot, we say he's generous. If a house was the scene of a murder we say it's haunted. If we trust someone and they act contrary to that trust, we see it as betrayal. Stuff like that. See also the bit about stories and how these traits are seen over a lifetime.
So you're defining the word "meaning" as an attribution of a trait?
Is the speed of light an example of "meaning", then? Because the speed of light is a trait attributed to light. Most scientists would disagree with that definition, because a trait is a property inherent to an object or occurrence.
The examples you give are not consistent with that definition, as they are all interpretations of events. That is far more consistent with how most cognitive psychologists and neuroscientists use the term "meaning".
funny thing is, i was all hyped to write up why no, the speed of light wouldnt be , and then i realized holy shit:
the speed of light is 299,792,458 miles/second
"miles" are an arbitrary unit of measure we monkeys made up. they dont exist inherently in the universes. if i wanted to I could decide to measure distance in Q-tips and the only difference is that no one else would agree to measuring things that way.
seconds are a measure of time, which is an illusion of human perception, at least if you go by what the zen buddhists have been going on about.
and "299,792,458" also falls into the category of "squiggles we made up to ascribe meaning to stuff" (example, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TbNymweHW4E (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TbNymweHW4E))
so yea, i guess it is Nigel. :lulz:
(https://i1.wp.com/www.pa.msu.edu/courses/2000spring/PHY232/lectures/relativity/clock_movie/moving.gif)