Philosophy: Is it possible to imagine the impossible?

[tdgesq]

how can that be when i explicitly distinguished the two?

The only example I saw that you gave is of the latter, so I assumed that you weren’t making a distinction. I’m glad we have some agreement on the first part so we can advance.

Ani’s original question was whether it was possible to imagine something that was logically impossible; intentionally elliding “imagining” and “conceiving”, i said, yes, it is possible

And this is what I believe you have not established. I want to understand where you are going with this, so I have quoted from your previous post so I can keep it all in mind:

the historical example is frege: as the second volume of frege’s Grundgesetze der Arithmetik (The Basic Laws of Arithmetic) was being printed, russell famously wrote frege revealing a self-contradiction in the principles frege was using to formalize his logic (namely, Rule V); he pointed out that frege’s set theory entailed that there could be a set of all sets that do not contain themselves, but that such a set could only be a member of itself if it was not a member of itself.

until russell made this observation to frege (burali-forti and cantor himself made an earlier and similar observation about naive set-theory concerning sets of ordinals), frege believed his theory to be true; following the revelation of the paradox, however, it became clear that the theory, as stated by frege, was in fact logically impossible, despite his belief in its truth.

What I can’t understand is how Frege could have imagined anything about this since he is dealing in abstract concepts. He made a logical error. So be it. What was it that you claim he was imagining here that is impossible?

Or maybe you are saying that Ani (and all the rest of us) can imagine someone making a logical error by looking at this example. But imagining someone making a logical error is not to imagine the logically impossible. If so, demonstrate how. If I’m on the wrong track, let me know.

 

[john_doran]

What I can’t understand is how Frege could have imagined anything about this since he is dealing in abstract concepts. He made a logical error. So be it. What was it that you claim he was imagining here that is impossible?

well, i was purposely conflating “imagining” and conceiving" in an attempt to simplify the thread (i didn’t want to get into an exposition on the differences between the two concepts).

having said that, i agree that frege wasn’t imagining anything about the set of all self-membered sets (a fortiori, since it hadn’t even occurred to him that there might be such a thing at all); i don’t think anyone can have a mental picture of a logically impossible state of affairs (if someone does have some kind of image that she associates with such a thing, then it is the wrong image, and she has simply labelled it “logically impossible”).
tgdesq:

Or maybe you are saying that Ani (and all the rest of us) can imagine someone making a logical error by looking at this example. But imagining someone making a logical error is not to imagine the logically impossible. If so, demonstrate how. If I’m on the wrong track, let me know.

no, that’s not what i was saying…

 

[Randy_Carson]

Please post philosophy threads in the BackFence section. This is the Apologetics forum.

Thanks. :tiphat:

 

[tdgesq]

well, i was purposely conflating “imagining” and conceiving" in an attempt to simplify the thread (i didn’t want to get into an exposition on the differences between the two concepts).

I understand now.

having said that, i agree that frege wasn’t imagining anything about the set of all self-membered sets (a fortiori, since it hadn’t even occurred to him that there might be such a thing at all); i don’t think anyone can have a mental picture of a logically impossible state of affairs (if someone does have some kind of image that she associates with such a thing, then it is the wrong image, and she has simply labelled it “logically impossible”).

I am in full agreement with you. Thanks for the clarification.

 

[tdgesq]

What you describe is a paradox, not an impossibility.

What I described is a logical impossibility. It violates the law of noncontradiction. No P can be not P. No person who is burned while flying through the sun can be a person who is not burned while flying through the sun.

It’s certainly possible to imagine that which could never happen – I can imagine my skin turning green, for example, or imagine a crow suddenly growing to human size and speaking. It’s a common element, even the defining element, of fantasy.

I never said that we can’t imagine things that will never happen. In fact, I said the opposite.

 

[Mirdath]

What I described is a logical impossibility. It violates the law of noncontradiction. No P can be not P. No person who is burned while flying through the sun can be a person who is not burned while flying through the sun.

Something that violates the law of noncontradiction is by definition a paradox.

I never said that we can’t imagine things that will never happen. In fact, I said the opposite.

My bad, then

 

[Mike_Dye]

No we cannot imagine impossible things…our imagination is only capable of imagining possible things; it is a scientific fact that the human brain cannot concieve of the impossible.

 

[RobedWithLight]

With God, all things are possible. So then, what is impossible?

Perhaps impossibility does not exist.

What is logically contradictory IS impossible. When I say the past never occurred, or being fully white and non-white at the same time, that is an impossibility.

 

[Ani_Ibi]

Thank you for the insights into logical impossibilities.

Can we agree to conceive of logical impossibilities as a kind underlying reality? But also that there are kinds of impossibilities which are merely analogous to that underlying reality? And that those analogous impossibilities ‘come into being’ by means of various agents? Language? Culture?

What agents are we talking about, do you think?

Then we can move forward with examining kinds of relationships which may exist between the Impossible-Always-and-Everywhere and the merely temporally impossible.

 

[promethius95945]

This is nonsense. If “understanding” and “concept” are mutually exclusive, then it is not possible to understand a concept. Better throw out physics as a discipline then. Somehow the applied sciences manage to use these concepts that can’t be understood day in and day out to accurately predict how things act in reality.

Since you are either choosing to abstain from reading towards understanding, or you are not above repeatedly putting words in someone’s mouth for your own argument, this is my last post to you in this thread. God bless and I hope you have a good day and take many physics classes in the future.

 

[tdgesq]

Since you are either choosing to abstain from reading towards understanding, or you are not above repeatedly putting words in someone’s mouth for your own argument, this is my last post to you in this thread. God bless and I hope you have a good day and take many physics classes in the future.

But it is not my last post. Your first sentence is a logical fallacy, the fallacy of false alternatives. I could be choosing to understand and not be putting words in your mouth. In fact, that is the alternative that I’ve chosen. If you claim I’ve chosen the alternatives you list, then support your assertion with reasons.

And a parting shot about the relative training in physics. I suppose I could put forth my training in mathematics (where using the concept of infinity was commonplace) my degree and post-graduate degree to show that I am much more suited than you to answer these questions. But that would be a fallacy, wouldn’t it? If the terms “understanding” and “concept” have some specialized meaning in physics, then define them. No one here gets a pass because of their relative formal education. I hope you now see that the argument that I and others just don’t understand because we don’t have a formal background in physics is utterly invalid. May God bless you as well.

 

[promethius95945]

I hope you now see that the argument that I and others just don’t understand because we don’t have a formal background in physics is utterly invalid.

Again, something I never asserted, which leads me to believe that option 2 of my (supposedly false) dichotomy was, indeed, correct. I see no point in carrying on further then.

 

[tdgesq]

Again, something I never asserted, which leads me to believe that option 2 of my (supposedly false) dichotomy was, indeed, correct. I see no point in carrying on further then.

So much for your previous post being your last. I don’t relish this, but since you continue to insist that I’m misrepresenting you:

I was merely seeking to help you understand that I’m discussing this as a scientific application with a formal education background in physics (since many claim to have a background in physics while lacking any formal education in the subject… and wikipedia hardly counts as physics background).

God bless and I hope you have a good day and take many physics classes in the future.

Your words. What I’m trying to get you to understand is your formal education is irrelevant to what infinity means in the context of physics. Just define it and declare that this is the definition of infinity in that context.

You hope I take many physics classes in the future. What am I supposed to take away from this statement if it isn’t that I just don’t understand what you are saying because I don’t have formal training in physics. Seriously.

Normally I wouldn’t belabor the point, but this happens to be a philosophy thread where logical fallacies don’t get a pass. I’m willing to chalk it all up to a misunderstanding with no blame assessed to either party if you are. Let us proceed on the basis that we define our terms and if they belong to a certain scientific nomenclature declare that as well. Fair enough?

 

[Ani_Ibi]

Normally I wouldn’t belabor the point, but this happens to be a philosophy thread…

prom and td:

This is a philosophy thread. And normally philosophy threads have ambled along in a leisurely and friendly manner. (As opposed to how the apologetics threads charge through)

Sometimes we have not understood each other. Sometimes we even get stuck on not understanding each other. Happens to all of us.

With respect to this particular misunderstanding, can we start over? If definitions are required then someone find a link and provide them. Thank you.

Also I posted some questions earlier on that might provide a different and less intense approach to the OP. Wanna try your hands at those for a bit?

 

[tdgesq]

I thought I had a already extended the olive branch, but maybe not far enough. I will try to answer some of your questions.

You are making a distinction between ‘mental image’ and ‘conceiving.’

Can you flesh that distinction out please so that I can understand you?

It is not an easy distinction to explain without some background work, but I’ll do my best to simplify it so that is still useful for discussion. Whenever we use our senses to know anything, for example say that you are looking at a chair, I have in my mind a mental image of a chair. It is the image of the particular chair I am viewing. On the other hand, from this particular chair, my mind also abstracts from it the general concept of a chair. In other words, I also have a general understanding of what a chair is. That it is something that people sit on as a piece of furniture. That is why I can intelligently speak with you about a chair that I will be buying at the store. You’ve never seen the particular chair that I am talking about, you have no image of a particular chair in your mind, but you understand the concept of what a chair is nevertheless.

We can also later on use our imagination to recall the image of a particular chair that we’ve seen in the past. This is what I’m referring to when I use the term “imagine.” We can’t really imagine the general concept of a chair, we can only imagine (have a mental image) of a particular chair.

I think many of us are talking about a range of impossibilities, not just one impossibility. Can you describe ‘a mistaken belief concerning an abstract concept’ and ‘imagination’ please? Thank you.

I’ve made the distinction between a concept and an image above. I would have a mistaken belief about the concept of a chair if I were to conceive of it as a mobile self-powered device that transports people. I would be confusing the concept of a motorized vehicle with that of a chair.

Notice that we can have concepts of things that don’t actually exist in reality. I have a concept of negative numbers, but there is no negative set of existing things that I have ever seen in the world. My intellect has abstracted this concept from watching a certain number of objects being subtracted from a whole set of objects - simple subtraction.

You make the distinction ‘logical’ impossibility. Can you take us down that road please? Thank you.

I gave an example in this thread of the law of noncontradiction. Try to imagine (make a mental image) of your hand being on fire and not being on fire at the same time and in the same way. You can’t do it. We can’t imagine a logical impossibility.

 

[Ani_Ibi]

We can’t imagine a logical impossibility.

Thank you for the insights into logical impossibilities.

Can we agree to conceive of logical impossibilities as a kind underlying reality? But also that there are kinds of impossibilities which are merely analogous to that underlying reality? And that those analogous impossibilities ‘come into being’ by means of various agents? Language? Culture?

What agents are we talking about, do you think?

Then we can move forward with examining kinds of relationships which may exist between the Impossible-Always-and-Everywhere and the merely temporally impossible.

 

[tdgesq]

Thank you for the insights into logical impossibilities.

Can we agree to conceive of logical impossibilities as a kind underlying reality?

If what you mean is whether we can have some understanding of a logical impossibility, then the answer is yes. For example, I could say that P can be not P. That is a logical contradiction. Does it have any kind of reality outside of the negation of things that are in being? I don’t believe it does.

But also that there are kinds of impossibilities which are merely analogous to that underlying reality? And that those analogous impossibilities ‘come into being’ by means of various agents? Language? Culture?

I can write down in words a logical contradiction. But I understand it as the opposite of something that is in being, namely the laws of logic. It will sit there on a piece of paper in the material world, but we will never see whatever the proposition stands for exist in the material world. So it will never come into being in the way you are expressing it.

This is your cue promethius.

 

[Ani_Ibi]

td: I am talking about realities which are analogous to underlying realities.

Take it promethius! :tiphat:

 

[Greg27]

I think if we try to imagine the impossible we will encounter paradoxes and antinomies at which reason starts to break down; this can be seen in fields from logic to mathematics and also in some philosophical paradoxes.

I feel a good way to approach the impossible is by defining what the impossible is not; a sort of ‘negative method’ which helps unveil the impossible by removing the possible.

 

[Ani_Ibi]

I think if we try to imagine the impossible we will encounter paradoxes and antinomies at which reason starts to break down; this can be seen in fields from logic to mathematics and also in some philosophical paradoxes.

I feel a good way to approach the impossible is by defining what the impossible is not; a sort of ‘negative method’ which helps unveil the impossible by removing the possible.

Yay, Greg! You found us. OK define away.