If something has no use (other than entertainment),
then how could it possibly be correct, how could it possibly be such that it should be held and used as the basis for further understanding?
Atheists also believe in souls
- Thread starter Pineal
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If something has no use (other than entertainment),
then how could it possibly be correct, how could it possibly be such that it should be held and used as the basis for further understanding?
Enmos
Valued Senior Member
..at the moment.
Not all scientific discoveries have any clear use at the moment of discovery.
You seem to be attempting to shift the burden. In any case, here's a counter example; almost all natural numbers will never be thought of by any human being, nevertheless, for each pair of those unthought numbers, there is a correct sum. Hopefully this will further your understanding.
So you've abdicated. Okay.
Truth is truth. What use you find for it is up to you.
The sky is blue, the sun is yellow and the grass is green.
The use of these snippets of insightful information, in and of themselves, is...? :shrug:
But are they correct? Yes.
Can they be used as a basis of further understanding? Yes. (i.e. how are they blue, yellow, green etc).
I could be even more facetious and say that 50% of the population has no use to me. Are those people inherently wrong?
I could go further and say that your comments are of no use to me... and thus by your own argument "how could they possibly be correct"?
But I won't go that far.
Replace everything but the brain, and you are still you, even if you replace the parts with metal parts. Actually, it would be even possible to replace a lot of the brain. I wonder how much you can replace?
Yazata
Valued Senior Member
Wynn/Signal wrote:
Enmos replied:
The language construction does suggest that there's some "you" that possesses a "personality".
If we ontologize this "you" thing, the principle of subjectivity, as an existent entity or substance that possesses the body and personality in perhaps the same way that a neighbor owns an I-pad, then we seem to have arrived at something like an idea of the soul.
The thing is, I don't know if language really reflects underlying ontology quite that exactly.
I don't think that that subjectivity is a substance or a thing in its own right. So the words "I" and "me" might not refer to anything real at all. (In other words, I seem to be denying Cartesian dualism, the Hindu jiva and atman (but not manas), the Christian soul and the existence of a Kantian-style transcendental "mind".)
The words aren't meaningless though. They do refer to something, even if it isn't a distinct kind of material or mental stuff or some occult source of will. I would argue that words like "I", "you" and "John Jones" refer to fluid and constantly changing processes taking place in physical biological organisms.
So I guess that I would join in collapsing the "you"/"your personality" distinction by equating them. "I" simply am "my personality". They are one and the same. As the latter evolves and changes, so does the former. That's how I look at it right now, anyway. Others would doubtless disagree with me, perhaps tomorrow's "I" might disagree with it too.
Enmos replied:
Enmos said:
The language construction does suggest that there's some "you" that possesses a "personality".
If we ontologize this "you" thing, the principle of subjectivity, as an existent entity or substance that possesses the body and personality in perhaps the same way that a neighbor owns an I-pad, then we seem to have arrived at something like an idea of the soul.
The thing is, I don't know if language really reflects underlying ontology quite that exactly.
I don't think that that subjectivity is a substance or a thing in its own right. So the words "I" and "me" might not refer to anything real at all. (In other words, I seem to be denying Cartesian dualism, the Hindu jiva and atman (but not manas), the Christian soul and the existence of a Kantian-style transcendental "mind".)
The words aren't meaningless though. They do refer to something, even if it isn't a distinct kind of material or mental stuff or some occult source of will. I would argue that words like "I", "you" and "John Jones" refer to fluid and constantly changing processes taking place in physical biological organisms.
So I guess that I would join in collapsing the "you"/"your personality" distinction by equating them. "I" simply am "my personality". They are one and the same. As the latter evolves and changes, so does the former. That's how I look at it right now, anyway. Others would doubtless disagree with me, perhaps tomorrow's "I" might disagree with it too.
Indeed.
It may reflect the underlying ontology, or it may not.
It may be that the underlying ontology cannot be adequately verbalized, but that only perspectives on it are possible.
It may be a particular language use that reflects a fashion trend of uncritically borrowing terms from popular(ized) psychology.
Consider how much dispute there is over what the terms "self-esteem," "self-respect" and others mean; or how it is usually taken for granted that there ontologically exists the triade ego-superego-id.
I find it quite likely that our distinction between "I" and "my personality" is the reflection of such a trend.
Collapsing it like that turns the use of language into a charade!
Enmos
Valued Senior Member
Did you see my post #21?
I've mentioned this before to people. Given the nature of our memory, if we were to live to be 500, that future person could possible considered someone completely different (no different than a great great great grandson); supposing we didn't age.
There's a sci fi story that I cannot remember the title of. It takes place on Mars, which has been terraformed. A group of people are climbing Olympus Mons. Medical technology now allows people to live for centuries, and at least two of the members of the climbing party are about 500 years old, and date from the earliest Mars colony. The main character can remember his entire life, which makes him very unusual. Both he, and a woman in the group, had climbed the mountain when they were in their twenties; he could remember all of it (including that they had been lovers) and she cannot remember any of it. When he tells her about it, it's as though he was talking about another person entirely from her perspective.
It would/will be interesting what human's memories are like living to 500. The nature of our memory is that we change it every time we recall it. So, if you recall something from your childhood, you're changing it when you store it (or so the theory goes). It's not like a computer that accesses memory and brings it up in RAM. We actually remove the memory while we're recalling it. If you are given a certain drug that disrupts actin polymerization during recall, bye bye that memory.
That said, I believe we will augment our memory by 500 years in ways that would probably render modern day humans somewhat obsolete? Or not, it's hard to know.
That said, I believe we will augment our memory by 500 years in ways that would probably render modern day humans somewhat obsolete? Or not, it's hard to know.
No I don't.
Fine, then you may well be an exception. But to be clear, it is not a matter of personality changing, it is that all the matter that you are changes.
So you don't think that the ten year 'you' is now experiencing adulthood? Or that it will be you who will retire in X years?
It's not about personality. It is about all the matter, everything that is you being replaced.
You are not the same person you were at 10. Not simply the same person who has changed, but a copy.
I don't think you understand the OP. All the matter in you changes well before death. The 10 year old you shared none of the matter you have now.