On Wednesday, June 19, 2019 at 12:44:35 AM UTC+10, Terren Suydam wrote: > > Hi Pierz, > > Your writings remind me very much of the work of Gilles Deleuze, a > philosopher who similarly shifted ontology from *identity* to *relation, *and > explored many interesting consequences of making that shift. My exposure to > him came from the excellent Philosophize This podcast, which dedicated 5 > episodes to Deleuze. If you're interested, check out the first episode > here <http://philosophizethis.org/deleuze-pt-1/>. >
Thanks. I know of Deleuze of course - I believe he killed himself by jumping out his Paris apartment window to escape the sufferings of emphysema. He's one of the post-modern guys much beloved of the academics along with Derrida and Foucault et al. But I am admittedly not familiar with his ideas. I've been trying to find philosophers who might have gone down this path before but not turned up all that much, so I will definitely check him out. > > Terren > > On Mon, Jun 17, 2019 at 10:15 PM Pierz <[email protected] <javascript:>> > wrote: > >> >> I've been thinking and writing a lot recently about a conception of >> reality which avoids the debates about what is fundamental in reality. It >> seems to me that with regards to materialism, we find it very difficult to >> escape the evolutionarily evolved, inbuilt notion of "things" and "stuff" >> that our brains need in order to manipulate the world. Yet QM and >> importantly the expected dissolution of time and space as fundamental >> entities in physics have made any such simple mechanistic notion of matter >> obsolete - what is left of matter except mathematics and some strange thing >> we can only call "instantiation" - the fact that things have specific >> values rather than (seeming to be) pure abstractions? What does a >> sophisticated materialist today place his or her faith in exactly? >> Something along the lines of the idea that the world is fundamentally >> describable by mathematics, impersonal and reducible to the operation of >> its simplest components. With regards to the last part - reductionism - >> that also seems to be hitting a limit in the sense that, while we have some >> supposed candidates for fundamental entities (whether quantum fields, >> branes or whatever), there is always a problem with anything considered >> "fundamental" - namely the old turtle stack problem. If the world is really >> made of any fundamental entity, then *fundamentally* it is made of magic >> - since the properties of that fundamental thing must simply be given >> rather than depending on some other set of relations. While physicists on >> the one hand continually search for such an entity, on the other they >> immediately reject any candidate as soon as it is found, since the question >> naturally arises, why this way and not that? What do these properties >> depend on? Furthermore, the fine tuning problem, unless it can be solved by >> proof that the world *has* to be the way it is – a forlorn hope it seems to >> me – suggests that the idea that we can explain all of reality in terms of >> the analysis of parts (emergent relationships) is likely to collapse – we >> will need to invoke a cosmological context in order to explain the >> behaviour of the parts. It's no wonder so many physicists hate that idea, >> since it runs against the deep reductionist grain. And after all, analysis >> of emergent relationships (the parts of a thing) is always so much easier >> than analysis of contextual relationships (what a thing is part of). >> >> To get to the point then, I am considering the idea of a purely >> relational ontology, one in which all that exists are relationships. There >> are no entities with intrinsic properties, but only a web of relational >> properties. Entities with intrinsic properties are necessary components of >> any finite, bounded theory, and in fact such entities form the boundaries >> of the theory, the "approximations" it necessarily invokes in order to draw >> a line somewhere in the potentially unbounded phenomenological field. In >> economic theory for instance, we have “rational, self-interested” agents >> invoked as fundamental entities with rationality and self-interest deemed >> intrinsic, even though clearly such properties are, in reality, relational >> properties that depend on evolutionary and psychological factors, that, >> when analysed, reveal the inaccuracies and approximations of that theory. I >> am claiming that all properties imagined as intrinsic are approximations of >> this sort - ultimately to be revealed as derived from relations either >> external or internal to that entity. >> >> Of course, a purely relational ontology necessarily involves an infinite >> regress of relationships, but it seems to me that we must choose our poison >> here - the magic of intrinsic properties, or the infinite regress of only >> relational ones. I prefer the latter. (Note that I am using a definition of >> relational properties that includes emergent properties as relational, >> though the traditional philosophical use of those terms probably would not. >> The reason is that I am interested in what is *ontologically* intrinsic, >> not *semantically* intrinsic.) >> >> What would such a conception imply in the philosophy of mind? >> Traditionally, the “qualiophiles” have defined qualia as intrinsic >> properties, yet (while I am no fan of eliminativism) I think Dennett has >> made a strong case against this idea. Qualia appear to me to be properties >> of relationships between organisms and their environments. They are not >> fundamental, but then neither is the “stuff” of which organisms and >> environments are made. We simply cannot ask about fundamental properties, >> but must confine ourselves to the networks of relationships we find >> ourselves embedded in, and from which we, as observer-participants, cannot >> be extricated. “Third person” accounts, including physics, are abstractions >> from aggregations of first person accounts, and none can rise so high above >> the field of observation as to entirely transcend their origins in the >> first person. Thus there are certainly objective truths, but not Objective >> Truths, that is truths that are entirely unbound to any observer and which >> nominate the absolute properties of real objective things. >> >> Note that the “relationalism” I am proposing does not in any way imply >> *relativism*, which flattens out truth claims at the level of culture. Nor >> does it make consciousness “primary”, or mathematics. I cannot personally >> reconcile the interior views (qualia, if you like, though I think that >> terms places an unwarranted emphasis on “what experiences are like” rather >> than the mere fact of experience) with a purely mathematical ontology. >> >> One obvious objection to this whole idea is the counter-intuitiveness of >> the idea of relationships without “things” being related. Yet I think the >> fault lies with intuition here. Western thinking is deeply intellectually >> addicted to the notion of “things”. David Mermin has interpreted QM in >> terms of “correlations only” – correlations without correlata as he puts it >> – an application of similar ideas to quantum theory. Part of the objection >> I think lies in the semantics of the word “relationship”, which >> automatically causes us to imagine two things on either side of the >> relation. It would be better to think in terms of a web, then, than >> individual, related entities. Or simply say that the related entities are >> themselves sets of relationships. Mathematics provides a good example of >> such a purely relational domain – a number exists solely by virtue of its >> relationships with other numbers. It has no intrinsic properties. >> >> Yet what then of the problem of specific values – the instantiation >> aspect of materialism? To quote Hedda Mørch: “… physical structure must be >> realized or implemented by some stuff or substance that is itself not >> purely structural. Otherwise, there would be no clear difference between >> physical and mere mathematical structure, or between the concrete universe >> and a mere abstraction.” >> >> We can overcome such an objection by invoking the first person >> perspective. Mørch credits the specific values of entities in our >> environment (some specific electron having this position, that momentum and >> so on) to some property of “being instantiated in something intrinsic”, >> harking back to Kant’s *Ding an Sich*. Yet there is an alternative way >> of viewing the situation. Let us imagine that each integer was conscious >> and able to survey its context in the field of all numbers. Take some >> number, let us say 7965. When number 7965 looks around, it sees the number >> 7964 right behind it, and the number 7966 right ahead. Trying to understand >> itself and the nature of its world, it starts doing arithmetic and finds >> that everything around it can be understood purely in terms of relational >> properties. Yet it says to itself, how can this be? Why do the numbers >> around me have the specific values they do? What “breathes fire” into those >> arithmetical relations to instantiate the specific world I see? Yet 7965 is >> wrong. It is ignoring the significance of the first-person relation that >> places it within a specific context that defines both it and the world it >> sees. >> >> Note that I am not, like Bruno, actually suggesting that numbers are >> conscious. The point of the thought experiment is merely to show how >> specific values can exist within a first person account, without us needing >> to invoke some unknowable thing-in-itself or substrate of intrinsic >> properties. >> >> Grateful for any comments/critiques. >> >> -- >> You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups >> "Everything List" group. >> To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an >> email to [email protected] <javascript:>. >> To view this discussion on the web visit >> https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/everything-list/868bd041-299a-4618-9586-4b6362755cd7%40googlegroups.com >> >> <https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/everything-list/868bd041-299a-4618-9586-4b6362755cd7%40googlegroups.com?utm_medium=email&utm_source=footer> >> . >> > -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. 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