Existence as a Manifestation of Consciousness

[Cascadian]

Let’s start by evaluating our methods of determining what reality is. You may say the scientific method, but that view is flawed because it can’t demonstrate its own validity. An experiment designed to test the validity of the scientific method would already be assuming the scientific method is valid. What demonstrates the validity of the scientific method is a more intuitive method. At the most fundamental level our mind simply tells us it makes sense.

I think the most extraordinary aspect of our universe is that it’s intelligible. The same intuition that tells me that the scientific method is valid tells me that the source of this is intelligence.Order is consciousness’ language, it’s signature. Again at the most fundamental level our mind is simply telling us it makes sense.

Now I’ve heard that the order in our universe is an illusion, so it’s meaningless, yet since reason is recognizing order, that’s the equivalent of saying reason is an illusion, therefore reason is untrustworthy yet its the same reason you’re using to say that order is an illusion. This is absurd. In fact this is why I’ll throw out any argument saying our intelligence is an illusion.

Throw in as many universes as you want, their order or lack of presupposes a reality that is order (and its implications of intelligence), which we find in our own universe. The same goes for hypothetical areas in the universe where there is no order.

I bet critics are going to say that our minds aren’t telling us that order means intelligence, if so I would like to know what property of something indicates that consciousness was involved with it if any at all.

Now you could say this is an argument for God, and it is but it doesn’t say anything besides the fact that consciousness was involved in the universe. You really gotta use more arguments to get a proper picture of God.

I’d like to write on elaborate essay on this but I’d like this post to get critiqued by the CAF community first.

 

[Living_Stats]

To me the fact that we are sentient, knowledgable, and able to comprehend is so amazing that it was one of the things that brought me closer to knowing God when I was an agnostic and it also kept me from killing myself. Thanks for posting!

 

[greylorn]

Let’s start by evaluating our methods of determining what reality is. You may say the scientific method, but that view is flawed because it can’t demonstrate its own validity. An experiment designed to test the validity of the scientific method would already be assuming the scientific method is valid. What demonstrates the validity of the scientific method is a more intuitive method. At the most fundamental level our mind simply tells us it makes sense.

I think the most extraordinary aspect of our universe is that it’s intelligible. The same intuition that tells me that the scientific method is valid tells me that the source of this is intelligence.Order is consciousness’ language, it’s signature. Again at the most fundamental level our mind is simply telling us it makes sense.

Now I’ve heard that the order in our universe is an illusion, so it’s meaningless, yet since reason is recognizing order, that’s the equivalent of saying reason is an illusion, therefore reason is untrustworthy yet its the same reason you’re using to say that order is an illusion. This is absurd. In fact this is why I’ll throw out any argument saying our intelligence is an illusion.

Throw in as many universes as you want, their order or lack of presupposes a reality that is order (and its implications of intelligence), which we find in our own universe. The same goes for hypothetical areas in the universe where there is no order.

I bet critics are going to say that our minds aren’t telling us that order means intelligence, if so I would like to know what property of something indicates that consciousness was involved with it if any at all.

Now you could say this is an argument for God, and it is but it doesn’t say anything besides the fact that consciousness was involved in the universe. You really gotta use more arguments to get a proper picture of God.

I’d like to write on elaborate essay on this but I’d like this post to get critiqued by the CAF community first.

First the favorable comments: I like the thrust of your thinking, as best I can understand it. That is because it reflects my own published ideas about the relationship between creation and consciousness. However, it is probable that if I learn more, I’ll be more critical. Or more approving, depending upon what you come up with.

The unfavorable comment is simple: Get yourself an editor before writing anything else. The quality of your writing is as bad as mine was, fifty years ago. Practice, and lots of rewriting under the guidance of a competent paid editor, will enhance your craft.

You did not even take the trouble to edit your OP. You just wrote it and submitted it. How do you expect anyone to take you seriously when you write like every other crackpot?

Never rely upon friends for editorial assistance. They will not risk the truth unless you get them drunk, and by then, you’ll be too drunk to get it.

If you have no ruthlessly honest friends and are too cheap to engage an editor, another alternative is to edit your own material, no sooner than two days after first writing, giving the words which seemed perfect at the time of their writing a chance to ferment, then to be re-measured more objectively against the concepts they were intended to present.

Another trick is to have someone read your stuff, then try to tell you what he, she, or it thinks it meant, while you shut up and listen, and never argue or explain.

Let me close on a positive note. IMO you are going in the right direction, and may even be a kindred spirit. Are you young? How young? What’s your educational background, not in the sense of how many degrees you have, but in the sense of, what educational backgrounds are the basis for your thoughts?

You seem not to have studied Descartes, else you’d surely have acknowledged him already for some of your ideas. ?? How’s your physics?

Are your ideas written down elsewhere, and available? If not, why not?

 

[tonyrey]

To me the fact that we are sentient, knowledgeable, and able to comprehend is so amazing that it was one of the things that brought me closer to knowing God when I was an agnostic and it also kept me from killing myself. Thanks for posting!

Philosophy saved your life!

 

[tonyrey]

Let’s start by evaluating our methods of determining what reality is. You may say the scientific method, but that view is flawed because it can’t demonstrate its own validity. An experiment designed to test the validity of the scientific method would already be assuming the scientific method is valid. What demonstrates the validity of the scientific method is a more intuitive method. At the most fundamental level our mind simply tells us it makes sense.

I think the most extraordinary aspect of our universe is that it’s intelligible. The same intuition that tells me that the scientific method is valid tells me that the source of this is intelligence.Order is consciousness’ language, it’s signature. Again at the most fundamental level our mind is simply telling us it makes sense.

Now I’ve heard that the order in our universe is an illusion, so it’s meaningless, yet since reason is recognizing order, that’s the equivalent of saying reason is an illusion, therefore reason is untrustworthy yet its the same reason you’re using to say that order is an illusion. This is absurd. In fact this is why I’ll throw out any argument saying our intelligence is an illusion.

Throw in as many universes as you want, their order or lack of presupposes a reality that is order (and its implications of intelligence), which we find in our own universe. The same goes for hypothetical areas in the universe where there is no order.

I bet critics are going to say that our minds aren’t telling us that order means intelligence, if so I would like to know what property of something indicates that consciousness was involved with it if any at all.

Now you could say this is an argument for God, and it is but it doesn’t say anything besides the fact that consciousness was involved in the universe. You really gotta use more arguments to get a proper picture of God.

I’d like to write on elaborate essay on this but I’d like this post to get critiqued by the CAF community first.

An excellent post! Continue expressing your ideas.

 

[Gaber]

Let’s start by evaluating our methods of determining what reality is. You may say the scientific method, but that view is flawed because it can’t demonstrate its own validity. An experiment designed to test the validity of the scientific method would already be assuming the scientific method is valid. What demonstrates the validity of the scientific method is a more intuitive method. At the most fundamental level our mind simply tells us it makes sense.

Graylorn made some excellent observations. For me, the test of Reality is “Does it change?” If it does, it may exist, but is not Real in a permanent sense, and is part of the dance of electrons and sub particles we call “living” at the level of perception we use, even if augmented by instrumentation.

I think the most extraordinary aspect of our universe is that it’s intelligible. The same intuition that tells me that the scientific method is valid tells me that the source of this is intelligence.Order is consciousness’ language, it’s signature. Again at the most fundamental level our mind is simply telling us it makes sense.

What is the most “fundamental level” of your mind? Can you, like Saints, Yogis, or Contemplatives, shut of your discursive mind and experience its substrate? If not, then you are engaged purely in mentality, not the actual nature of the mind as such.

Now I’ve heard that the order in our universe is an illusion, so it’s meaningless, yet since reason is recognizing order, that’s the equivalent of saying reason is an illusion, therefore reason is untrustworthy yet its the same reason you’re using to say that order is an illusion. This is absurd. In fact this is why I’ll throw out any argument saying our intelligence is an illusion.

It is not absurd to say that, because we can and do successfully use reason, again, at the level of perception on which we engage our experience with Universe and in the subject/object mode. And often what is referred to as the illusory nature of the universe has to do with the individual perception of it and the conclusions drawn from, or reasoned from on that limited basis. We make our presumptions and reason our conclusions often on false or incomplete data, under stress or influence and using low orders of logic. So the picture we paint for ourselves of the Universe and ourselves in it is very flawed, and as we can tell from the news, even our consensus realities don’t wash for everyone, and those for the same reason. One’s inculcation up to seven y.o. might as well be a course of hypnosis.

Throw in as many universes as you want, their order or lack of presupposes a reality that is order (and its implications of intelligence), which we find in our own universe. The same goes for hypothetical areas in the universe where there is no order.

If there is a perciever of any of those, then the test of reality is the same: “Does it change?”

I bet critics are going to say that our minds aren’t telling us that order means intelligence, if so I would like to know what property of something indicates that consciousness was involved with it if any at all.

Intelligence is a good candidate if you are looking from the subject/object viewpoint. There may be much more to it than that. Vamos a ver.

Now you could say this is an argument for God, and it is but it doesn’t say anything besides the fact that consciousness was involved in the universe. You really gotta use more arguments to get a proper picture of God.

Yes, but I’d say IS involved in the universe. It reminds me of the observation about breakfast: the chicken was involved, but the pig was committed. There are different theories about which applies to the God people make up or the one that can be usefully sought.

I’d like to write on elaborate essay on this but I’d like this post to get critiqued by the CAF community first.

Francis Bacon thought higly of writing as an exercise of clarification and exactitude. just keep at it, And use some of Graylorn’s advice. He speaks rightly.

 

[Gaber]

To me the fact that we are sentient, knowledgable, and able to comprehend is so amazing that it was one of the things that brought me closer to knowing God when I was an agnostic and it also kept me from killing myself. Thanks for posting!

Good you decided to stick around.

 

[paduard]

I wonder if it would be better to start with ‘I am therefore I think’ rather than the reverse?

 

[greylorn]

I wonder if it would be better to start with ‘I am therefore I think’ rather than the reverse?

I like this perspective. However, it does require a suitable definition of the “I”. Finding that definition was the point of Descartes’ reasoning.

Descartes was writing from the perspective of an objective philosopher, proceeding from known information to sensible conclusions about consciousness.

If you dip into religious belief for your definition of “I”, you will leave the realm of philosophy and revert to dogmatism.

Your notion of the “I” is…?

 

[Gaber]

I wonder if it would be better to start with ‘I am therefore I think’ rather than the reverse?

Yes, this is excellent. I agree with Greylorn that you will have to discover a working definition for “I” and do it on your own. This one has to be yours, or it is useless. But if you come up with something tenable, you may be in for a wonderful discovery.

 

[Touchstone]

Let’s start by evaluating our methods of determining what reality is. You may say the scientific method, but that view is flawed because it can’t demonstrate its own validity. An experiment designed to test the validity of the scientific method would already be assuming the scientific method is valid. What demonstrates the validity of the scientific method is a more intuitive method. At the most fundamental level our mind simply tells us it makes sense.

“Validity” is a regressive concept. That is, as you are applying it, “validity” always entails a vicious regress, because any subsequent validation for any proposition would immediately be then subject to scrutiny of its validity. Suppose we were, somehow, able to validate the validity of science through some meta-scientific test. What, then, would underwrite the validity of that meta-scientific model? On and on it goes, ad infinitum.

That’s a non-starter, as you’re offering it (or, more precisely, a ‘can’t-ever-finisher’).

With scientific epistemology, we understand via our sense experience that we may be able to render some of those experiences as intelligible to some degree. We don’t need ‘validity’ or ‘permission’ for the hunch, all we need is a way to see if that conjecture is useful, if that hunch does enable us to produce models that render the extra-mental world somewhat intelligible. And as it happens, that does appear to be the case! One has to be committed to the metaphysical axiom that our sense are veridical to some degree, and this cannot be “validated” a priori, or a posteriori. It must be accepted as axiomatic, as necessary for getting scientific epistemology off the ground.

I think the most extraordinary aspect of our universe is that it’s intelligible. The same intuition that tells me that the scientific method is valid tells me that the source of this is intelligence.Order is consciousness’ language, it’s signature. Again at the most fundamental level our mind is simply telling us it makes sense.

But the scientific intuition is not superstitious in the way that the “intelligence is the source” superstition is. We can just be ambivalent about the ‘truth’ of the scientific intuition, and look at the utility of the models we can build through science. Even if you doubt the ‘truth’ of our senses as veridical (to some degree), you cannot deny the empirical performance of the models built by science.

That leaves the “divine mind superstition” in the dust. There’s no utility or practical applications of this that stand apart from the intuition itself. It’s just and only an intuition.

Now I’ve heard that the order in our universe is an illusion, so it’s meaningless, yet since reason is recognizing order, that’s the equivalent of saying reason is an illusion, therefore reason is untrustworthy yet its the same reason you’re using to say that order is an illusion. This is absurd. In fact this is why I’ll throw out any argument saying our intelligence is an illusion.

This only holds if one insists on binary thinking, here, false dichotomies. It can be the case that order is objectively real, but only partly intelligible for humans. In some sense, parts of the world around us may be illusory and misleading, even as other features of the universe are highly intelligible, predictable, manageable, given to our manipulation.

If that’s a possibility, there’s no basis to throw out models that allow for elements of illusion and unintelligibility mixed in with strongly veridical models of the world.

Throw in as many universes as you want, their order or lack of presupposes a reality that is order (and its implications of intelligence), which we find in our own universe. The same goes for hypothetical areas in the universe where there is no order.

OK, no problem. But this is in no way entails divine mind, or intelligence as transcendent. Perhaps order is fundamental, intrinsic, a brute fact of reality, and intelligence, the cognitive process that beholds and contemplates the universe that mind is in, is an emergent, post facto property of nature.

Even if this is not your intuition – and humans are evolved psychological in such a way as to be deeply disposed toward an anthropocentric, teleocentric view of the world around them (this is called a “stance of intentionality”), it’s an alternate option at epistemic parity with your own (our own, I have the same intuitions!) conceits. It’s a defeater for your intuition just because it’s just as powerful, and arguably more parsimonious, if not as satisfying to our conceits.

I bet critics are going to say that our minds aren’t telling us that order means intelligence, if so I would like to know what property of something indicates that consciousness was involved with it if any at all.

Properties are not intrinsically invested with “marks of intelligence”, outside of models that incorporate intelligent agents. That is, we attribute intelligence to cases where that is a plausible explanation on the evidence. If we find an putative arrowhead in “recent geological strata”, that object doesn’t have to be extraordinarily featured as fashioned by a human or other intelligent being; if we understand this object to be recovered from a archaeological site where we know humans or other tool-using beings were around, “fashioned arrowhead” is a reasonable conclusion, even if we could allow that the crudeness of the arrowhead is such that it is conceivable it “happened by natural circumstance without intelligent agents”.

But if that same artifact is found in pre-Cambrian strata, the reasonableness of concluding that object is an “arrowhead” in the sense that it was fashioned by intelligent agents evaporates, and the competing hypothesis that this is just a product of natural forces that happens to look like what we call an “arrowhead” goes way up, and prevails. Why? because we have no intelligent agents anywhere close to that context to attach our idea to, in terms of fashioning the object.

In both cases, the artifact is EXACTLY the same. This is important, because it shows how the “designedness” does not and cannot inhere in the object itself, but instead obtains in the theories and models we maintain about the phenomena we observe.

Now you could say this is an argument for God, and it is but it doesn’t say anything besides the fact that consciousness was involved in the universe. You really gotta use more arguments to get a proper picture of God.

Actually, I don’t think any of that really helps or changes what you’ve offered, which is a stripped down superstition: order, and intelligibility, therefore God. All the baroque ornamentation on this intuition fails to change its status as a very basic and simple intuition.

I’d like to write on elaborate essay on this but I’d like this post to get critiqued by the CAF community first.

That’s my two cents.

-TS

 

[tonyrey]

Let’s start by evaluating our methods of determining what reality is. You may say the scientific method, but that view is flawed because it can’t demonstrate its own validity. An experiment designed to test the validity of the scientific method would already be assuming the scientific method is valid. What demonstrates the validity of the scientific method is a more intuitive method. At the most fundamental level our mind simply tells us it makes sense.

Indisputable! Science doesn’t exist in a vacuum!

I think the most extraordinary aspect of our universe is that it’s intelligible. The same intuition that tells me that the scientific method is valid tells me that the source of this is intelligence.Order is consciousness’ language, it’s signature. Again at the most fundamental level our mind is simply telling us it makes sense.

Indisputable! There is no obvious reason why the universe need be orderly or intelligible.

Now I’ve heard that the order in our universe is an illusion, so it’s meaningless, yet since reason is recognizing order, that’s the equivalent of saying reason is an illusion, therefore reason is untrustworthy yet its the same reason you’re using to say that order is an illusion. This is absurd. In fact this is why I’ll throw out any argument saying our intelligence is an illusion.

Indisputable! Intelligibility presupposes the existence of intelligence with the power of understanding.

 

[Gaber]

“Validity” is a regressive concept. That is, as you are applying it, “validity” always entails a vicious regress, because any subsequent validation for any proposition would immediately be then subject to scrutiny of its validity. Suppose we were, somehow, able to validate the validity of science through some meta-scientific test. What, then, would underwrite the validity of that meta-scientific model? On and on it goes, ad infinitum.

That’s a non-starter, as you’re offering it (or, more precisely, a ‘can’t-ever-finisher’).

Yes, as far as I know, what is valid can be distinguished from what is true in that relatively valid statements can be made that are not necessarily true as absolutes.

With scientific epistemology, we understand via our sense experience that we may be able to render some of those experiences as intelligible to some degree. We don’t need ‘validity’ or ‘permission’ for the hunch, all we need is a way to see if that conjecture is useful, if that hunch does enable us to produce models that render the extra-mental world somewhat intelligible. And as it happens, that does appear to be the case! One has to be committed to the metaphysical axiom that our sense are veridical to some degree, and this cannot be “validated” a priori, or a posteriori. It must be accepted as axiomatic, as necessary for getting scientific epistemology off the ground.

Yes, save that you postulate an extra-mental world. One man said about metaphysics that “It’s not mind over matter, it’s Mind instead of matter.” What is meant is that no matter how you slice it, what you categorize as “not me” is still in the quale of mental assessment experienced both as a judgement and and a consensus reality with others who are also ultimately perceived mentally. If you look at the four quadrants idea, you will see a way of demonstrating how all exteriors are dependent on the interior of the viewer and ultimately of the source of that viewer’s awareness.

So while there can be an interior agreement with commonality and valid descriptions of exteriors, even predictive models, those yet are, as far as nay on individual is concerned, ultimately an interior matter.

But the scientific intuition is not superstitious in the way that the “intelligence is the source” superstition is. We can just be ambivalent about the ‘truth’ of the scientific intuition, and look at the utility of the models we can build through science. Even if you doubt the ‘truth’ of our senses as veridical (to some degree), you cannot deny the empirical performance of the models built by science.

Yes, this is accurate, because while both awareness (including intelligence) and scientific intuition are both interiorly experienced, the scientific part can be checked against the commonality of surfaces, though the study of surfaces exclude depth.and are therefore flat, as they treat of relative dynamics, not of meaning.

That leaves the “divine mind superstition” in the dust. There’s no utility or practical applications of this that stand apart from the intuition itself. It’s just and only an intuition.

No, it relegates it to it’s proper place of study as primarily an interior matter treating of the Source of individual awareness. it is an escape from identification solely with dust. Also, it is a persuable intuition subjectable to attention and analysis. Unfortunately, this possibility is very largely occluded by the exoteric religious structures of emotionalism, ignorance, and “faith” with its burden of stumbling blocks.

This only holds if one insists on binary thinking, here, false dichotomies. It can be the case that order is objectively real, but only partly intelligible for humans. In some sense, parts of the world around us may be illusory and misleading, even as other features of the universe are highly intelligible, predictable, manageable, given to our manipulation.

Yes, and the primary duality in all that is the mistaking of the subject/object modality of awareness as the sole possibility for humans, even in the face of other modes being commonly utilized to reach the ends even of science.

If that’s a possibility, there’s no basis to throw out models that allow for elements of illusion and unintelligibility mixed in with strongly veridical models of the world.

Exactly. What works for the Eskimo. the Tuareg, the Pacific Islander, the plains farmer, the jungle dweller, all these are parochial adaptations, though fundamentally the laws of existence apply equally to all of them at a more basic level. And from these parochialism spring the various models of Gaposis (my word for God of the Gaps) including modern ones supported by partial truths mortared together by leaps of faith.

OK, no problem. But this is in no way entails divine mind, or intelligence as transcendent. Perhaps order is fundamental, intrinsic, a brute fact of reality, and intelligence, the cognitive process that beholds and contemplates the universe that mind is in, is an emergent, post facto property of nature.

That’s right, as far as far as linear thinking and strictly considering only surfaces goes. But each one, as well as being able to describe their circumstances, even if in their categorizations mentally those are what constitute their person, there is yet the feeling of “I” which is not circumstantial upon examination. That “I” is the dimension that is the source of the reflexive nature of awareness and has inherent in it the possibility of depth, and due to the sense of individuality that goes with it, the feeling of meaning. Both depth and meaning are, as described above, occluded by identification with parochialisms as “reality” and that defeats useful examination of depth, whether one is a faither or an atheist. In this sense the two are identical

Even if this is not your intuition – and humans are evolved psychological in such a way as to be deeply disposed toward an anthropocentric, teleocentric view of the world around them (this is called a “stance of intentionality”),

No kidding!!! it’s an alternate option at epistemic parity with your own (our own, I have the same intuitions!) conceits. It’s a defeater for your intuition just because it’s just as powerful, and arguably more parsimonious, if not as satisfying to our conceits. “Parsimonious” is too kind and weak.

Properties are not intrinsically invested with “marks of intelligence”, outside of models that incorporate intelligent agents…(agreed, and sniped for brevity.)

But if that same artifact is found in pre-Cambrian strata, the reasonableness of concluding that object is an “arrowhead” in the sense that it was fashioned by intelligent agents evaporates, and the competing hypothesis that this is just a product of natural forces that happens to look like what we call an “arrowhead” goes way up, and prevails. Why? because we have no intelligent agents anywhere close to that context to attach our idea to, in terms of fashioning the object.

Yes, and that is why a few, not all archaeological anomalies are so fascinating in terms of other models of human culture and intelligence.

In both cases, the artifact is EXACTLY the same. This is important, because it shows how the “designedness” does not and cannot inhere in the object itself, but instead obtains in the theories and models we maintain about the phenomena we observe.

Quite on.

Actually, I don’t think any of that really helps or changes what you’ve offered, which is a stripped down superstition: order, and intelligibility, therefore God. All the baroque ornamentation on this intuition fails to change its status as a very basic and simple intuition.

And one gone clearly awry by its cumbersome ornamentations, each of which is in a larger context, a hole.

That’s my two cents.

-TS

Thanks for sharing. I enjoyed you post! Rather excellent!.

 

[greylorn]

…
That’s my two cents.

-TS

Only two cents for your Post #11? How about a couple of gold quarter-eagles?

 

[greylorn]

Properties are not intrinsically invested with “marks of intelligence”, outside of models that incorporate intelligent agents. That is, we attribute intelligence to cases where that is a plausible explanation on the evidence. If we find an putative arrowhead in “recent geological strata”, that object doesn’t have to be extraordinarily featured as fashioned by a human or other intelligent being; if we understand this object to be recovered from a archaeological site where we know humans or other tool-using beings were around, “fashioned arrowhead” is a reasonable conclusion, even if we could allow that the crudeness of the arrowhead is such that it is conceivable it “happened by natural circumstance without intelligent agents”.

But if that same artifact is found in pre-Cambrian strata, the reasonableness of concluding that object is an “arrowhead” in the sense that it was fashioned by intelligent agents evaporates, and the competing hypothesis that this is just a product of natural forces that happens to look like what we call an “arrowhead” goes way up, and prevails. Why? because we have no intelligent agents anywhere close to that context to attach our idea to, in terms of fashioning the object.

In both cases, the artifact is EXACTLY the same. This is important, because it shows how the “designedness” does not and cannot inhere in the object itself, but instead obtains in the theories and models we maintain about the phenomena we observe.

TS–

Gaber’s contribution to this discussion got me thinking about this somewhat troubling aspect of your Post #11.

What if, in some pre-Cambrian strata, you found not one arrowhead, but thousands?

Then suppose that you examined sections of such strata all over the planet, and kept finding more of the darn arrowheads.

Some of these are fairly crude and simple, but others are rather nicely structured, with common characteristics suggestive of intelligent design, such as a symmetrically tapered shape and a nub that might facilitate its attachment to a stick, perhaps even a hole at its center, opposite from the pointed tip.

Would you not regard these mysterious arrowheads with greater scrutiny and thought about their origin, despite your certainty that no humans existed to fashion them?

Hey, you might even find yourself clandestinely tuning into the History Channel’s horrid Ancient Aliens series, despite incompetent narrators who sound like retarded people because they punctuate their sentences at the end of teleprompter lines instead of at natural breaks. .

Now let’s shift the analogy a bit. Instead of arrowheads in pre-Cambrian strata, how about galaxies in the Hubble deep space images?

 

[Touchstone]

TS–

Gaber’s contribution to this discussion got me thinking about this somewhat troubling aspect of your Post #11.

What if, in some pre-Cambrian strata, you found not one arrowhead, but thousands?

I think it would not even take thousands, but perhaps just dozens, but I take your point. Look, in a Bayesian analysis, that one putative arrowhead I mentioned is rather cleanly dismissed as a coincidence, something maybe like seeing the face of Jesus in a piece of toast; we are prone to see patterns and symbols, even where they are not intended.

But yes, its not hard to imagine having to re-examine our knowledge of timelines and agent capabilities if we were to begin unearthing dozens, hundreds, thousands of artifacts that all closely fit a “manufactured arrowhead” description. That as a coincidence becomes problematic. Or, more compellingly, finding something like a compact disk or DVD or some such, with digital encoding of math theorems, digits of pi, geometrical proofs, etc., assuming we could decipher the symbology…

Then suppose that you examined sections of such strata all over the planet, and kept finding more of the darn arrowheads.

Right. That would tend to undermine the ‘non-designed’ conclusion. We still don’t have any direct evidence of agents capable of manufacturing anything by design, but we are increasingly less confident in the ‘illusion of design’ conclusion that we are not bothered by in a single artifact.

This is still the same formula, though, note. The design inference remains a function of the analysis of the artifact(s) IN CONJUNCTION with our knowledge or warrant for agents placed at the scene with plausible faculties to explain the artifact as a matter of design/manufacture.

Some of these are fairly crude and simple, but others are rather nicely structured, with common characteristics suggestive of intelligent design, such as a symmetrically tapered shape and a nub that might facilitate its attachment to a stick, perhaps even a hole at its center, opposite from the pointed tip.

Yes, that would diminish our confidence in “coincidence” and raise our suspicions about intelligent agents. It may not tip the scales in terms of producing a “designed” conclusion, but the needle would move that way, away from where it was for just a single artifact.

Would you not regard these mysterious arrowheads with greater scrutiny and thought about their origin, despite your certainty that no humans existed to fashion them?

Yes, certainly.

Hey, you might even find yourself clandestinely tuning into the History Channel’s horrid Ancient Aliens series, despite incompetent narrators who sound like retarded people because they punctuate their sentences at the end of teleprompter lines instead of at natural breaks.

Heh. Funny you should mention that. Got a long treatment of that subject from my father-in-law on the mind-blowing revelations in “Ancient Aliens” just this evening. As much as that makes me roll my eyes, though, your scenario would certainly diminish our confidence in “coincidence”.

Now let’s shift the analogy a bit. Instead of arrowheads in pre-Cambrian strata, how about galaxies in the Hubble deep space images?

I think that pushes the needle back toward the peg of “undesigned”, doesn’t it? If it doesn’t, it seems you have some knowledge of galaxies as incompatible with production via natural, impersonal forces. I find that quite a difficult bit of knowledge to accept that you have. But I certainly would be interested to hear who you would substantiate the analogy?

What, for example, is the “hole for the stick in the base of the arrowhead”, a feature of an arrowhead that seems quite specific to a design feature of a spear and at the same time quite hard to imagine occurring, especially by the thousands, as a matter of rocks grinding together and interacting with elements around them in nature in an impersonal, ‘just rocks being rocks’ way.

-TS

 

[paduard]

I like this perspective. However, it does require a suitable definition of the “I”. Finding that definition was the point of Descartes’ reasoning.

Descartes was writing from the perspective of an objective philosopher, proceeding from known information to sensible conclusions about consciousness.

If you dip into religious belief for your definition of “I”, you will leave the realm of philosophy and revert to dogmatism.

Your notion of the “I” is…?

My notion of the ‘I’ relates specifically to the ‘person’. Think of Christ One Person, two Natures - the Natures subsidiary and by assuption post the Person.

 

[greylorn]

I think it would not even take thousands, but perhaps just dozens, but I take your point. Look, in a Bayesian analysis, that one putative arrowhead I mentioned is rather cleanly dismissed as a coincidence, something maybe like seeing the face of Jesus in a piece of toast; we are prone to see patterns and symbols, even where they are not intended.

But yes, its not hard to imagine having to re-examine our knowledge of timelines and agent capabilities if we were to begin unearthing dozens, hundreds, thousands of artifacts that all closely fit a “manufactured arrowhead” description. That as a coincidence becomes problematic. Or, more compellingly, finding something like a compact disk or DVD or some such, with digital encoding of math theorems, digits of pi, geometrical proofs, etc., assuming we could decipher the symbology…

Right. That would tend to undermine the ‘non-designed’ conclusion. We still don’t have any direct evidence of agents capable of manufacturing anything by design, but we are increasingly less confident in the ‘illusion of design’ conclusion that we are not bothered by in a single artifact.

This is still the same formula, though, note. The design inference remains a function of the analysis of the artifact(s) IN CONJUNCTION with our knowledge or warrant for agents placed at the scene with plausible faculties to explain the artifact as a matter of design/manufacture.

Yes, that would diminish our confidence in “coincidence” and raise our suspicions about intelligent agents. It may not tip the scales in terms of producing a “designed” conclusion, but the needle would move that way, away from where it was for just a single artifact.

Yes, certainly.

Heh. Funny you should mention that. Got a long treatment of that subject from my father-in-law on the mind-blowing revelations in “Ancient Aliens” just this evening. As much as that makes me roll my eyes, though, your scenario would certainly diminish our confidence in “coincidence”.

I think that pushes the needle back toward the peg of “undesigned”, doesn’t it? If it doesn’t, it seems you have some knowledge of galaxies as incompatible with production via natural, impersonal forces. I find that quite a difficult bit of knowledge to accept that you have. But I certainly would be interested to hear who you would substantiate the analogy?

What, for example, is the “hole for the stick in the base of the arrowhead”, a feature of an arrowhead that seems quite specific to a design feature of a spear and at the same time quite hard to imagine occurring, especially by the thousands, as a matter of rocks grinding together and interacting with elements around them in nature in an impersonal, ‘just rocks being rocks’ way.

-TS

TS,

You did such an up-front job of dealing with the lead-in arguments that I’m inclined to be highly forgiving of your sidewise reply to their conclusion. I propose that you reconsider it in the context intended.

Just as you would be inclined to wonder about, perhaps even seek evidence of human designers in the case of a multiplicity of arrowheads, I’m inviting you to consider the same approach with respect to galaxies— including the plural on “designers.” (I prefer the term, engineers.)

I realize that you are arguing from a position that reads, “I trust the cosmologists, and the Darwinists,” but not the theologians. I invite you to distrust the entire lot.

Cosmological explanations for the development of the structured forms of the universe are entirely handwaving. No attempts to perform a rigorous mathematical description of pre- or post-Big Bang events have worked. The entire BB theory depends upon the reality of something which cannot exist, and that cannot be described-- a physical singularity. This bears striking similarities to the core of religious theories, which depend upon a spiritual singularity.

A little investigation (I can help you along if needed) will show you that cosmologists are not all in line with Big Bang theory. A lead article in a Sci.American issue a while back was on exactly that topic, proposing that BB theory be either discarded or fixed.

I invite you to consider discarding BB theory as a basis for explaining those pesky galaxies. While you are at it, toss Darwinism as a valid explanation for the fascinating complexity of both species and variations. Strike out for yourself!

After all, although theism and random natural events are the only two core idea sets that people are working from these days, who says that there is not a superior alternative, one that explains both the power of natural phenomena and incorporates the evidence for intelligent engineering?

BTW, the holes in the galaxies, analogous to the hypothetical holes in the arrowheads, are the black ones at their centers. With the enhancement of observing power, astronomers are finding a black hole at the center of every galaxy. (Including the proto-galaxies, even the magnificent globular clusters squirreled amid our own Milky Way.)

Having spent 20 years in astronomy, I know that the astronomical dogma declares that black holes are the products of some classes of decaying stars. However, that is only how we came onto them, via Al’s predictive equations. Who says that they could not be produced from other forces and energies?

Envision a swirl of mysterious dark energy, stirred by some mysterious counterforce, catching a clump of mysterious dark matter and concentrating it into a black hole, where the mysterious sub-atomic particles of ordinary matter are created and given the mysterious property of electric charge.

If you study a bit of current physics/astronomy lore, you’ll find that about 95% of the universe is formed of dark energy and dark matter, substances not predicted by Big Bang theory.

When their theories are working, scientists commonly tout the importance of predictions as the mark of a good theory. I agree with this. Yet, Darwinism cannot predict anything, and Big Bang theory neglected to predict 95% of the real universe.

Why attach your beliefs to such poor theories? Are you completely dominated by agreement systems? Would you bet good money on a lame horse injected with enough pain killers to enter a race?

Your bet against conventional religion is equivalent to a bet against an Indy car powered by a souped up Ford Model A motor. Safe bet. But your bet for conventional beliefs is like backing an Indy car with a 1950 Ford V-8 with a brand new carburetor and an electric fan helping push the air through a little faster.

If you went to a restaurant for a bowl of soup and were offered a choice between menudo and pig rectum puree, might you not consider going down the road a few ticks, rather than settle for the “soup of the day?”

There is more to this magnificent universe than any man can have an inkling of, at this point in human understanding. Why settle for the “theory of the day” when there is some unexplored road ahead?

I find that quite a difficult bit of knowledge to accept that you have. But I certainly would be interested to hear how you would substantiate the analogy?

I’ll PM you on that in a few days, after tidying up a website.

 

[iloveangels]

Let’s start by evaluating our methods of determining what reality is. You may say the scientific method, but that view is flawed because it can’t demonstrate its own validity. An experiment designed to test the validity of the scientific method would already be assuming the scientific method is valid. What demonstrates the validity of the scientific method is a more intuitive method. At the most fundamental level our mind simply tells us it makes sense.

I think the most extraordinary aspect of our universe is that it’s intelligible. The same intuition that tells me that the scientific method is valid tells me that the source of this is intelligence.Order is consciousness’ language, it’s signature. Again at the most fundamental level our mind is simply telling us it makes sense.

Now I’ve heard that the order in our universe is an illusion, so it’s meaningless, yet since reason is recognizing order, that’s the equivalent of saying reason is an illusion, therefore reason is untrustworthy yet its the same reason you’re using to say that order is an illusion. This is absurd. In fact this is why I’ll throw out any argument saying our intelligence is an illusion.

Throw in as many universes as you want, their order or lack of presupposes a reality that is order (and its implications of intelligence), which we find in our own universe. The same goes for hypothetical areas in the universe where there is no order.

I bet critics are going to say that our minds aren’t telling us that order means intelligence, if so I would like to know what property of something indicates that consciousness was involved with it if any at all.

Now you could say this is an argument for God, and it is but it doesn’t say anything besides the fact that consciousness was involved in the universe. You really gotta use more arguments to get a proper picture of God.

I’d like to write on elaborate essay on this but I’d like this post to get critiqued by the CAF community first.

So the biggest risk to any and all surgery is that once you are unconscious you pop out of existence and the doctor can’t see you to operate on you, right???

 

[Cascadian]

“Validity” is a regressive concept. That is, as you are applying it, “validity” always entails a vicious regress, because any subsequent validation for any proposition would immediately be then subject to scrutiny of its validity. Suppose we were, somehow, able to validate the validity of science through some meta-scientific test. What, then, would underwrite the validity of that meta-scientific model? On and on it goes, ad infinitum.

I think you misunderstood me, I explicitly note there is a terminator to prevent infinite regress in this matter. The scientific method doesn’t explain itself, it’s derived from the fact that the universe has order and is intelligible, the latter of which we know intuitively to be true. We don’t have to seek further explanation because it simply is and that’s what our minds are telling us.

With scientific epistemology, we understand via our sense experience that we may be able to render some of those experiences as intelligible to some degree. We don’t need ‘validity’ or ‘permission’ for the hunch, all we need is a way to see if that conjecture is useful, if that hunch does enable us to produce models that render the extra-mental world somewhat intelligible. And as it happens, that does appear to be the case! One has to be committed to the metaphysical axiom that our sense are veridical to some degree, and this cannot be “validated” a priori, or a posteriori. It must be accepted as axiomatic, as necessary for getting scientific epistemology off the ground.

We absolutely need validity but it’s intuitive. We don’t trust our senses for no reason. It would be irrational not to trust them. As far as I’m concerned reality is what our senses detect and I have no reason to think otherwise and this is simply what my mind tells me. Honestly, this should be obvious.

But the scientific intuition is not superstitious in the way that the “intelligence is the source” superstition is. We can just be ambivalent about the ‘truth’ of the scientific intuition, and look at the utility of the models we can build through science. Even if you doubt the ‘truth’ of our senses as veridical (to some degree), you cannot deny the empirical performance of the models built by science.

Now what do you mean by utility, it seems that you mean ability in detecting the truth. If that’s the case it doesn’t make sense to be ambivalent about the truth. Caring about “utility” is caring about the truth. Unless of course we have different definitions of truth. Sadly I wouldn’t be surprised if that’s the case. Anyways this seems to be veering away from the topic of my argument which is that our minds are telling us that order means intelligence. That’s it, no need to get sidetracked.

That leaves the “divine mind superstition” in the dust. There’s no utility or practical applications of this that stand apart from the intuition itself. It’s just and only an intuition.

Intuition is what we use to determine the truth. It was the entire point of my argument. I can already sense a semantics game on what intuition is, but I’m trying to say that our minds are telling us that order is the signature of intelligence. I also believe our minds tell us to trust our senses, but apparently you just accept it because it’s useful. I’d like to know more about this.

This only holds if one insists on binary thinking, here, false dichotomies. It can be the case that order is objectively real, but only partly intelligible for humans. In some sense, parts of the world around us may be illusory and misleading, even as other features of the universe are highly intelligible, predictable, manageable, given to our manipulation.

I don’t know what you mean by part of the universe being illusory. Even if you’re seeing an illusion in your daily life it’s still a real phenomenon. It’s just an imitation of something else. And it doesn’t matter if only part of the universe isn’t intelligible. The fact that some of it is, indicates intelligence. That’s what I’m trying to say.

OK, no problem. But this is in no way entails divine mind, or intelligence as transcendent. Perhaps order is fundamental, intrinsic, a brute fact of reality, and intelligence, the cognitive process that beholds and contemplates the universe that mind is in, is an emergent, post facto property of nature.

Now this is more of what I wanted to discuss. Order is absolutely a fundamental intrinsic part of reality and it’s evidence of intelligence. Since the order precedes us, so must some type of intelligence.

Even if this is not your intuition – and humans are evolved psychological in such a way as to be deeply disposed toward an anthropocentric, teleocentric view of the world around them (this is called a “stance of intentionality”), it’s an alternate option at epistemic parity with your own (our own, I have the same intuitions!) conceits. It’s a defeater for your intuition just because it’s just as powerful, and arguably more parsimonious, if not as satisfying to our conceits.

So I suppose that you consider logic, math, and science to be anthropocentric as well. Look all I’m saying is that our minds are telling us that order means intelligence was involved. I know this by the same intuition that tells me that the universe has order, hence the same intuition that tells me to trust logic and science.

Properties are not intrinsically invested with “marks of intelligence”, outside of models that incorporate intelligent agents. That is, we attribute intelligence to cases where that is a plausible explanation on the evidence. If we find an putative arrowhead in “recent geological strata”, that object doesn’t have to be extraordinarily featured as fashioned by a human or other intelligent being; if we understand this object to be recovered from a archaeological site where we know humans or other tool-using beings were around, “fashioned arrowhead” is a reasonable conclusion, even if we could allow that the crudeness of the arrowhead is such that it is conceivable it “happened by natural circumstance without intelligent agents”.

Actually according to materialism, “intelligence” such as the mechanics in your brain are happening by natural circumstance without intelligent agents. Why do you choose to call the collection of atoms that form human beings intelligent, but not the collection of atoms that result in natural processes.

But if that same artifact is found in pre-Cambrian strata, the reasonableness of concluding that object is an “arrowhead” in the sense that it was fashioned by intelligent agents evaporates, and the competing hypothesis that this is just a product of natural forces that happens to look like what we call an “arrowhead” goes way up, and prevails. Why? because we have no intelligent agents anywhere close to that context to attach our idea to, in terms of fashioning the object.

If I find an arrowhead I’ll be %100 sure it’s the result of an intelligence. Whether that’s human intelligence or the intelligence which produced natural processes remains to be decided by the circumstantial evidence.

In both cases, the artifact is EXACTLY the same. This is important, because it shows how the “designedness” does not and cannot inhere in the object itself, but instead obtains in the theories and models we maintain about the phenomena we observe.

You’re relying on empiricism which is admirable in of itself but I’d like to know why you rely on empiricism, why do you consider it to be useful, eventually it becomes intuitive and this intuition is also telling you that order means intelligence. It’s very fundamental and simple.

Actually, I don’t think any of that really helps or changes what you’ve offered, which is a stripped down superstition: order, and intelligibility, therefore God. All the baroque ornamentation on this intuition fails to change its status as a very basic and simple intuition.

Nope all I’m arguing is that order means simple intelligence or intelligences, hardly a worthy definition for God. Though I believe that with more arguments you’ll get there, but now is not the time to discuss those.