In terms of morality, are we advancing or retreating? I don't think we are advancing. Fear of reprisals holds back attacks against the better armed societies. However, asymmetrical tactics are undermining that. Pressure cookers tend to be safe until they explode. Meanwhile, morally incoherent people are multiplying and morphing into suicide agents for igniting explosions.
Google can imagine a web-based cloud that eventually and transcendentally may absorb the consciousness of every human being, from which cloud each transcendent being may feed back from time to time, to take sabbaticals from the cloud. If so, why presume such a feedback-based cloud does not already abide? Why assume that a spiritual cloud does not already abide? Why assume the world is purely one-way material predestination -- devoid of spiritual feedback, meaning and purposefulness? To assume we enjoy no quality of responsible feedback with the cloud is to assume that spirituality is pure myth. The more we assume a predestination that is devoid of responsibility, the more the world will sink into amorality. Insofar as spirituality is not purely myth, that is the road to actual evil.
Regarding the satisfaction of material wants, interpretations that are without seasoning with moral and spiritual meaningfulness seem bound to twist the masses towards becoming demonic debt slaves. Thus will rise the most demonic sociopaths to rule all others -- regardless of whether the system is rationalized as being governance ruled by socialists or as governance that is ruled by corporatists who rule socialists. Without assimilation of a moral philosophy, or theosophy, it seems absurd to expect that either international corporatism or international socialism, as any thing like existents in themselves, would help push us towards decent or enlightened society.
I think intelligence has to do with not letting yourself become fenced in. Intelligence combined with empathy has to do with not letting yourself become fenced in and not wanting to see others needlessly fenced in. Intelligence combined with empathy combined with vision has to do with wanting to inspire similar others to not want to be fenced in, to not want to fence in others, and to teach others the same. Inspiration has to do with intuiting and feeling meaningfulness and purposefulness as accompanying the expanding and unfolding of our cosmos.
Our main nemesis for the age in which we find ourselves consists in this: We are living in an age of increasing intelligence, declining empathy, muddled vision, and pleasure-addled inspiration. In short, ours is an age of demonic sociopathy. Among reduced empaths and visionless despirits, the reigning idea seems to be that our biggest problem is any idea or ideal of godliness that gets in the way of robotic scientism. In effect, we are being ruled by self-destructive suicide-bombers who want to inspire us to believe that there is nothing of our cosmos that is worth being inspired about. That is, that the cosmos is predestined and entirely closed to any reality of spiritual stock.
It will be interesting to watch the upcoming movie interpretation of Noah. A flood myth or metaphor has been borrowed in many religious traditions. Such a metaphor is useful to illustrate ideas that carry moral truth value. Some of those ideas include: That Beingness is haunted with potential for catastrophe. The here and now is not the end-all, be-all. Humanity is not the apex. Humanity is often depraved. God learns. We are in a feedback relationship with an appreciating Reconciler. We can tend towards better guidance by being, through good will and good faith, receptive to the Reconciler. Humanity needs to be receptive to a higher Source of guidance to have any hope against depravity.
22 comments:
I think we get to participate in how the Substance of our world is caused to appear and unfold. The more intellectually powerful we are given to become, the more we can alter laws that may otherwise have been thought fundamental to nature. We may perhaps create and define virtual worlds, perhaps of AI creatures, who may intuit but not be programmed with means to know of our existence. To them, the program would be their "Nature." As the program changes, what was clear may phase into fuzz, and what was fuzz may resolve into new worlds of clarity. 40 years ago, if someone had told me I would have the power of an Ipad at my fingertips, I would have thought them mad.
I know this is all a bit like freshman philosophy. And I know engineering realities necessitate ties to contingent constraints and practical goals. And science often leads us to "what the hell just happened?" Still, each person needs a pole star, even if it seems far beyond present practicalities. The less a society shares a polestar to assimilate ideas towards "the good," the more likely it seems to my intuition that such a society will unravel.
I'm not sold that it clearly separates atheists, agnostics, and believers. I suspect there are a lot of believers who "know things that just aren't so." When you say "draw a conclusion," it's as if you mean a scientifically testable conclusion. I don't think reasoned concepts or beliefs about God are testable, beyond contingent testing. I don't think contingent testing can confirm an absolute idea about God. Even if we received confirmational signals that seemed miraculous, we could not "know" that they were not contrivances by a superior deceiver. I suspect what we would tend to do would be to apply such reason as we could to good faith intuition and empathy, in order to formulate beliefs about God -- not knowledge. Well, maybe the kind of "knowledge" that consists in "I know it when I see it."
In any event, such beliefs would seem always to remain subject to doubt, if not falsifiability. When one does not know, but only believes, then I think at least a grain of doubt is implicated -- whether consciously or subconsciously. That grain of doubt (open mind) seems to be the other side of the coin of belief. In that sense, it's hard to imagine the probability of a believer who can in complete virtue draw an unshakeable conclusion. And it's hard to justify why drawing an unshakeable belief based on less than perfect knowledge should be deemed a virtue when it seeks to confine God. So I think being a believer implicates, at least in part, in the quietness of one's own mind, being an agnostic.
As to whether one believes God abides, more or less likely than not, such efforts to define the probability of God seem more like stances taken to describe one's feelings, than positions that can be clearly defended based on how much one can know. The angst on such topics seems related to angst about salvation. I try to be more concerned about what is needed to live a good life. For that, good faith belief seems to be in the category of "I believe I know it as I see it." I'm not one who would fault doubting Thomas.
These attempts to communicate distinctions on such concerns are fraught with difficulties, to which men of science throw up their hands and sometimes think to "commit it all to the flames." They "save themselves" from such struggles by denying their pertinence. But I suspect, in the quiet recesses of their minds, they also continue to struggle with unavoidable cognitive fuzz and dissonance. Yet, each side tends to seek confirmational cheers among his fellow believers. Maybe because the Kingdom of God is within us already.
“Neither shall they say, Lo here! or, lo there! for, behold, the kingdom of God is within you.” (Luke 17:21). Leo Tolstoy, a Christian anarchist, wrote an opus entitled, The Kingdom of God is Within You. While I like free thinking, I do not consider myself an anarchist.
Deutch explains. We never get to "the explanation." We get to useful explanations. Which evolve. So as processing abilities evolve, so also would the practical impositions of limits evolve. To conceptualize beyond that calls for leaps of faith. I think everyone makes such leaps. I think we often take them in ways we may apprehend only subconsciously. And when we do apprehend them and try to bring them to conscious conceptual consistency, we often reach incoherent dissonance. All of us. So many of us punt to priests or professors of bafflegab. Or seek to resolve the dissonance, conceptually if not scientifically. Or follow Godel into madness. Still, God speaks in a still, quiet voice. So, I think it worthwhile at least to be aware of areas at the limits of conceptual comprehension. For that is what facilitates our occasional "aha moments." Both in science and in moral philosophy.
I would rather try to follow God as I am able in good faith to intuit or sense Him than as any priest, imam, or pretended venturer into measurable metaphysics might presume authority to curse me. If I profess to believe what I find to be incoherent and incomprehensible, rather than to seek to comprehend as I seem able, then I would be much more worthy of perdition. IMHO. I think God gave us brains to use, not just to regurgitate what man made authorities tell us we must believe. I seek God in good faith every day. If that is blasphemy, then I think you have confused perdition with heaven. If you find a god you can know and measure, I suspect he may be a deceiver.
Re: "the meaning is a weighted measure of how many goals can be achieved, and how much useful data for a given goal there is"
If each given data set could correlate to convey an infinity of potential meanings, then this would seem to entail practical impositions of artificial limits. It would seem to entail an idea of Information limited to such purposes as are contrived or deemed to be significant or practical. Also, of Information biased towards favored preferences for what may be deemed "useful" or worthwhile goals. This would seem to entail an idea of practical information more so than an idea of Information per se.
There abides some aspect beyond measurable Substance that avails us to make meaningful sense out of it, that is apart from the Substance itself. Insofar as that aspect is neither Substance nor itself Conscious, what is it? How may it most consistently, meaningfully, and parsimoniously be conceptualized? I would call it In-Form-ation. I think it is not limited to computational ideas about bits. Maybe related to Platonic forms. It seems to be as fundamental as Substance and Consciousness. Perhaps like an aspect of an interconvertible Trinitarian Source.
I don't declare Reality. I conceptualize. I don't pretend to know God's nature. At best, I think we may intuit, not measure, God's spiritual presence. The reason I refer to one God is in respect of the apparent reconciliaton, conservation, and synchronization that occurs. I conceptualize the Godhead as consisting with a Trinity, that may be conceptualized as signified (relatively measurable) Substance, mathematically conserved Information, and signifying Consciousness. In respect that Consciousness is Consciousness, the idea of a multitude of eternal identies seems unnecessary, unhelpful, and incoherent. To me, it is more parsimonious and makes more sense to conceptualize that each of us is an avatar or perspective of a reconciling consciousness. "My" Identity, insofar as bound to any present expression of Substance, seems to grow, change, recede, get replaced. My dissolution does not kill Consciousness. Kurzweil has some interesting ideas about Singularity (although, his "cloud" seems too artificially limited).
I would say that ideas have meanings. Words and languages help signify and convey ideas.
Unless circularly or trivially defined, completeness seems not presently to be available to us. Read about Godel and Godot. Which is the reason I agree that "measurable progress" makes little sense. I think there is Truth, and a Reconciling God. And I think that Truth guides all who are receptive. Some may be better equipped than others to sense or rationalize patterns, purposes, and principles. We can try to follow those in good faith. But to scientifically or logically prove that any particular approach to any unfolding event was or is the morally best, end-all, be-all approach --- that I think is beyond us. We are and will be reconciled, and our approaches are and will be judged and reconciled. For that, I think good faith interpretation of the Good Book of Parables, in the light of the Metaphorically Modeled and Signified Cosmos, is enough. While mortal, we reach for Pilgrim's Progress, but we do not here measurably achieve it. What we achieve are contingencies towards receding purposes. Aside from God, events, as I apprehend them, cannot be completely or measurably categorized as being either absoutely moral or relatively moral. I tend not to think in terms of absolutes or relatives, but in terms of relative absolutes, contingent morals, and renormalized reconciliations. Sort of like the way a rainbow recedes. Or the way the speed of light renormalizes to a constant, absolute value, regardless of the relative locus or vector of any particular observer.
"Atheist" seems hard to define. It seems more like a dramatic stance than a philosophy. More like a way to spit and say, "I don't like your parables or system of morality." So atheists seem usually to bring in a god-substitute, to bless their own concepts of morality, even without appreciating it. As to agnosticism, I don't see how it can be avoided. Unless one knows, then one only believes. That is, one doubts that one can know (at least while mortal). In that science and math can never avail a complete or even progressive explanation for the cosmos, as opposed to contingently practical explanations, I don't see how leaps of moral faith can be avoided. But when some people say they are atheists, they take dramatic offense if you call them mere agnostics. No doubt, "atheists" have written much to try to square the circle and clearly differentiate themselves.
Compare some of the models that try to clearly differentiate the cosmos. Such as the expanding bubble model. It helps us conceptualize why space has sometimes presented the expansion of things beyond our view and faster than the speed of light. It helps us conceptualize a way to apprehend why surrounding densities seem much the same from every perspective and why there is no favored point of reference. Yet, the bubble idea is sometimes accompanied with a concept that everything exploded in a Big Bang from a point. A point which cannot be gridded, much less looked back to. A point whose existence seems to abide only in our minds, or, at least, not to have abided at any position that could ever be determined from any present position. Here, ideas are defined circularly, to try to make them true by definition. For example, the original point may be defined as all that space-time that then existed. So, since we still indirectly experience all the space-time that has ever existed, we are conceptually still at that point. So the bubble model seems to be circularly and conceptionally useful.
But not for every purpose. It implicates a projection of 3 (or more) dimensions on a surface of a bubble. But we do not see such projection itself. Rather, we see what looks like stuff in every direction, as if the entire sphere within the bubble were inhabited, not just the surpace. So I suppose other models are brought in, to try to conceptualize why that is.
I doubt we will ever achieve a grand unifying model or conception. Yet, many people have faith that a complete model is "out there." which is entirely closed and reducible to mathematical formulation, not subject to any reconciling and qualitative feedback that is beyond eventual measure.
I watched a talk on TED about Intelligence. The speaker equated intelligence in a fundamental way with capacity to keep options open. I think he is on to something. Capacity to apprehend many degrees of freedom and options and to appreciate and learn from the feedback that comes with choices made does seem to relate not just to intelligence, but also with learning how to live a meaningful and moral life. An intelligent, moral person does not want to be micro-managed. And if he believes in morality, he wants to encourage a society of like believers. I take your stand on anarchism to lean in that direction. The teleology seems right. It's the present practicality that cautions me. I find much in the ideas of athests, such as Deutch, that I agree with. It's their seeming unwillingness to conceptualize that something good may abide and guide, beyond measurable materiality, that I find unnecessary, hubristic, uninspiring, and troubling.
Don't immanentize the eschaton. Don't expect to make heaven on earth. Don't make the perfect the enemy of the good. Don't try to reduce the immeasurable Signifier to the measurable signified.
I don't think we can have moral progress in any absolute sense. What we have is an expansion of space-time that seems to be co-extensive with an expansion of shared experience. We seem to be trading Information for Entropy, secondary to a a directional, sequential expansion of space-time in-form-ation. We are accumulating In-form-ation, but much of the accumulation makes us dangerous to one another. I suspect there is a qualitative kind of moral progress, or Pilgrim's Progress, but not a measurable kind of progress. Unless you want to equate "progress" with something like increasing age of the cosmos or increased population or GDP. But trying to quantify moral progress in scientific terms is, I think, a non-starter. "Measurable Progress" seems to be like dog whistling by demagogues in search of homies who choose to measure and value the same things and ignore the same things. Although some neurologists seem to think the way out of the cycling eddy is to measure electronic signals of "states of happiness." I fear such people.
People are sociable. Ye shall always have gangs among you. Gangs share codes, whether they respect them as values or enact them as laws. No society of individual deer will be able to conserve or thin itself without prides of predators. There is no freedom without structure, and structure will be imposed -- either by gov laws or by tribal conventions. Nor will any utopian idea stop the unfolding evolution of the cosmos. We can strive to assimilate societies that seem to make meaningful sense for a time within unfolding situations. Beyond that, I don't think it is given to us to find "true individual freedom." But faith helps. And anarchism, I suppose, is a form of faith.
If it can be measured, then it can be expressed subject to mathematical terms. What seems not feasible to measure precisely is often well punted to statistical analysis. That begs questions: Are individual events really statistical or random, or is the appearance of randomness just an artifact of our incomplete access to information? But even if we could account for the sum of all information, would not the potential from the standpoint of the holism still be beyond the measure of the sum? When you say "make rape less desireable," you are relating that to a contingent purpose. That is, you are assuming that decent civilization "should" be a desireable good. But that also begs questions. Why should we desire or seek "decent" civilization? As best I recall, Sagan's "answer" was something like, I don't know, but we would not be here otherwise. My point is, you, like religionists, are assuming that decent civilization is a good. To other animals, maybe not. To machine evolution, maybe not. To demonic personages, maybe not. So how do we inculcate and assimilate a functional and meaningful idea of decent civilization? Well, it helps, I think, first of all, to take a leap of faith: that a continued search for decent civilization is consistent with the unfolding of the cosmos. Neil deGeasse Tyson wants us to follow him on a quest to explore the cosmos. But to begin the quest, he seems to want to impose a simplistic and fundamentalist idea of "science," that assumes what he wants to prove: that the cosmos is closed to a feedback relationship with any holism. See Deutch's "The Beginning of Infinity" for some pointed issues taken with common simplistic ideas about science.
I don't think the idea of a cosmos that is closed and completely explicable in measurable terms is conducive to practical moral philosophy. The Trinitarian idea seems more conducive to a search for a way to make peace with otherwise cognitive war and incoherence. How does God "stand outside of time," yet love us in the here and now? How is it that the appearance of Substance and Information seem to implicate at least the potential for Consciousness? How is it that each such constituent seems to express a different aspect of a single Source? Measurable Reality seems to reduce to either-or, 0-1, digital kinds of analysis, but only in respect that such analysis serves a third aspect: conscious perspective within contexts for contingent purposefulness. Thus, Reality seems to be Trinitarian when its implication of conscious, contingent purposefulness that is not reducible to preset formulation is not overlooked or assumed not to abide.
Jesus wept and expressed joy. Contemporaneous, unfolding appreciation. Many Christians think of their "personal relationship" with Jesus. God was dissatisfied with the antidiluvians. Evidently, God gets something out of a kind of companionship with us. To try to force that He does not is incoherent. Blasphemy is a word quickly resorted to by people who are prone to blinker their minds. I have not read from the Big Book of AA, so I would not be able to address whatever understanding you may have of that. I take religious texts and parables as valuable references for moral truths. I take the flood story as meaningful, but not factual. I can see how those who take it as factual might be more into an idea of authoritaran rule.
In terms of morality, are we advancing or retreating? I don't think we are advancing. Fear of reprisals holds back attacks against the better armed societies. However, asymmetrical tactics are undermining that. Pressure cookers tend to be safe until they explode. Meanwhile, morally incoherent people are multiplying and morphing into suicide agents for igniting explosions.
Google can imagine a web-based cloud that eventually and transcendentally may absorb the consciousness of every human being, from which cloud each transcendent being may feed back from time to time, to take sabbaticals from the cloud. If so, why presume such a feedback-based cloud does not already abide? Why assume that a spiritual cloud does not already abide? Why assume the world is purely one-way material predestination -- devoid of spiritual feedback, meaning and purposefulness? To assume we enjoy no quality of responsible feedback with the cloud is to assume that spirituality is pure myth. The more we assume a predestination that is devoid of responsibility, the more the world will sink into amorality. Insofar as spirituality is not purely myth, that is the road to actual evil.
Regarding the satisfaction of material wants, interpretations that are without seasoning with moral and spiritual meaningfulness seem bound to twist the masses towards becoming demonic debt slaves. Thus will rise the most demonic sociopaths to rule all others -- regardless of whether the system is rationalized as being governance ruled by socialists or as governance that is ruled by corporatists who rule socialists. Without assimilation of a moral philosophy, or theosophy, it seems absurd to expect that either international corporatism or international socialism, as any thing like existents in themselves, would help push us towards decent or enlightened society.
I think intelligence has to do with not letting yourself become fenced in. Intelligence combined with empathy has to do with not letting yourself become fenced in and not wanting to see others needlessly fenced in. Intelligence combined with empathy combined with vision has to do with wanting to inspire similar others to not want to be fenced in, to not want to fence in others, and to teach others the same. Inspiration has to do with intuiting and feeling meaningfulness and purposefulness as accompanying the expanding and unfolding of our cosmos.
Our main nemesis for the age in which we find ourselves consists in this: We are living in an age of increasing intelligence, declining empathy, muddled vision, and pleasure-addled inspiration. In short, ours is an age of demonic sociopathy. Among reduced empaths and visionless despirits, the reigning idea seems to be that our biggest problem is any idea or ideal of godliness that gets in the way of robotic scientism. In effect, we are being ruled by self-destructive suicide-bombers who want to inspire us to believe that there is nothing of our cosmos that is worth being inspired about. That is, that the cosmos is predestined and entirely closed to any reality of spiritual stock.
It will be interesting to watch the upcoming movie interpretation of Noah. A flood myth or metaphor has been borrowed in many religious traditions. Such a metaphor is useful to illustrate ideas that carry moral truth value. Some of those ideas include: That Beingness is haunted with potential for catastrophe. The here and now is not the end-all, be-all. Humanity is not the apex. Humanity is often depraved. God learns. We are in a feedback relationship with an appreciating Reconciler. We can tend towards better guidance by being, through good will and good faith, receptive to the Reconciler. Humanity needs to be receptive to a higher Source of guidance to have any hope against depravity.
If new management is brought in for the Internet, I wonder how much of the work that explains the effects of despotism will be shunted to the memory hole. The problem with p.c. speech is that the memory hole must be used each time a new thought regime changes the p.c. Civilization is crippled as p.c. removes its access to its history.
A problem develops when monopolies buy political clout to get access to cheap immigrant labor. Corporations don't go overseas because they want to improve conditions for labor. They go because they want cheap labor. They don't ruin our electorate because they want labor with dignity. They ruin our border because they want cheap labor. And an easily deceived electorate. What is going on with Chinese labor? The last half of Sinclair's The Jungle was a waste. However, the first half illustrated the problem with powerful monopolies creating conditions to take advantage of cheap labor. I don't want a lot of gov regulations. But they are unavoidable when monopolies use clout to flood us with cheap, defenseless labor. Stop oligarchs from creating flows of defenseless and cheap labor and most of the need for gov intrusion would be stopped.
Yes, my first sentence was ambiguous -- albeit dramatic. There may likely be great crime somewhere NEAR every great fortune, but I have to agree that not every great fortune is made because of great crime. (The phrase, "behind every great fortune, there is a great crime," seems to be a common quote, original author unknown, but probably twisted from Balzac.) In any event, I agree that it is not a crime to lobby for special tax breaks and then take advantage of them. Or to take advantage of the tax breaks lobbied for by others. Still, such activities, to my sensibilities, are often not good. IMO, thinking American voters should unite to stop some of the abuses that are availed to oligarchs that are ruining the country.
I am a generalist. (Those are needed, also. Indeed, most voters should be responsible enough to become political generalists.) However, I do read widely. I try to read enough about economics to get a reasonable feel for what is going on. Presently, I am reading Von Mises' Human Action, with which I am sure you are already well familiar.
My gut feel is this: Most business profit making ought not be taxed at all. We want businesses to make jobs domestically. It is the non-business related profligacy by gov and persons living beyond their means that is the problem. The solution is not reams and reams of more unenforceable gov regulations (that tend to be easily end-run anyway).
So how may oligarchic usages of wealth be moderated, without drowning the nation in stupid regulations? Well, why not define transfers of monies outside our boundaries as forms of "consumption," to be imputed to the authorizing corporate officer? Why not also define business monies used for lobbying and campaign contributions as forms of "consumption," to be imputed to the authorizing corporate officer? Then, rescind most corporate taxes. Indeed, rescind the Income Tax altogether. Replace with two kinds of consumption taxes: Flat rate sales taxes. And progressive consumption taxes.
Most people do not save, so their consumption would pretty much equal their annual income, less savings. We want to encourage savings, don't we? The result would be taxable consumption that would pretty much equal what was theretofore taxable income, except savings would be incented. The real purpose would come in play with regard to oligarchs. If oligarchs want to spend or invest money out of country, fine. But count most out of country money transfers as taxable-imputable-consumption. If they want to buy influence with politicians, fine. But tax it as imputable consumption. And tax it progressively.
If American efficiency is such that we do produce far more than most people realize by using machines that replace jobs, then that trend will probably continue. If machine technology is accelerating so that private enterprise cannot create the jobs needed in order to help people who are willing to work to acquire means of support, then I expect we will soon have big problems. Rather than paying welfare, I would rather see revenues collected as needed to incent jobs here, and to fund the general treasury. Use proceeds to pay down debt and to let government contracts to private contractors to repair infrastructure, to help replace jobs.
Actually, I doubt anything of the like will happen. I suspect we are too far gone. Oligarchs have too much power, and they will not have the desire or will to bring about what the citizenry should have brought about long ago. Rather, everyone will continue to party. Industries will continue to drive down wages by moving or keeping jobs overseas and by replacing old jobs with rote jobs. Cheap labor will continue to abuse our border. And the electorate will be dumbified, so that oligarchs will have a free hand to use useful idiots to pull most workers around by their noses, forever.
It's idle to talk about ultimate or root causes. Or to say capitalism is necessary. We know that. The question is: We are in deep doo doo, so what are we going to do about it? What about to oligarchs trying to shove the Warmism agenda down our throats? Is your solution to just give free rein to oligarchs to erase our borders, divide and stampede voters with scare tactics, and make our republic a farce? Do you think that would restore the "free market?" On one hand, you seem to praise monopolists. On the other, you seem to imply monopolies constitute free markets. Your solution to the sell out of the country seems to reduce to: Let oligarchs, monopolists, and syndicates be oligarchs, monopolists, and syndicates. Is your primary loyalty to representative republicanism, or is it to some form of oligarchy?
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