humanities.philosophy.objectivism

On Mar 5, 8:35 pm, Jim Klein wrote:
> On Mar 4, 10:32 pm, TC wrote:
>
> > > Besides, if it's tautological
> > > that you're thinking, then it's just as tautological that you
> > > exist.

> > No. I can exist without thinking. I can't think without
> > existing.

> This is correct as written and it makes my point, not yours.

> If you can't think without existing and it's certain that you
> think, then it's certain that you exist.

I believe I said that in a couple of different ways, the
first quoting Descartes "Cogito ergo sum"

Where I differ with you is what else can be concluded
by similar reasoning.

.......
> > > But for some odd reason, you're
> > > certain that it's thinking.

> > Because it _is_ thinking. Get it?

> An underline doesn't change the argument. The Himalayas
> _do_ exist. Get it?

Do they?
I cannot say that with regard to my own thinking.
Get it?

.....
> > The same reason does not apply.
> > Illusory thinking is nevertheless thinking.

> I suppose, but non-thinking isn't thinking.

I didn't say "non"-thinking, I said "illusory"thinking.
Thermostats don't think.
But a brain in a bat, or a complex enough computer
simulation is thinking even if what it is thinking of
is an illusion.

> Whatever the
> referent of "thinking," how can you be certain that someone
> or something that thinks it's thinking--or for that matter that
> you think is thinking--is necessarily thinking?

It is what I am doing. Maybe that is not the proper sort
of "thinking", but it is something that I experience.

It occurs to me that
"I experience therefore I am" is essentially equivalent
to the cogito.

> The answer is as you say...because it _is_ thinking. But that
> applies just as well to every other existent...they _are_. Get it?

Are you a panpsychist?
I don't get how "it is thinking" applies to every other existent.

..............
> > That is the most convenient theory, one of the possibilites
> > I don't reject as improbable.

> Why in the world would you reject anything because it's
> "improbable"? Surely you acknowledge that many
> things a person judges as improbable are nonetheless true.

If explanation A has .9 probability, B 0.09, C 0.009 ...
Which should I use as basis for decisions?

> > > You don't eat and drink because you think that it's
> > > "probably" necessary.

> > I'll have to think about that.

> Forget the thinking...just look. The last time you ate, did
> you do an odds calculation of its necessity?

My brain did something to decide whether I was hungry
enough to eat and stop what else I was doing?

>Did you ever?
> Yeah, I know...you might be doing it subconsciously, right?
You answered your own question.

> Now you 've got one of the highest abstractions possible, the
> rating of probabilities of future events based on knowledge of
> past ones, going on wholly subconsciously. Seems like a
> stretch to me, one that you would reject as improbable.

Did you ever hear of quantum mechanics or statistical
mechanics?

> > Those hundred million or so neurons are doing something.

> Big deal...they're doing plenty in cats or apes too. Do you
> have them likewise eating because they're bookies?

Bookies is silly terminology designed to ridicule.
But yes cat neurons work probabilitically.

> > I am thinking therefore thought exists.

> But you can't be certain. Even tautologies can be false, right?

Tautolgies can be false. I just don't see how I can be
wrong that I am thinking (or that I experience).

> How would you know otherwise?

If I weren't thinking I would know nothing.

> > > It's just "likely," according to your paradigm.

> > No thought is different.

> Why would one particular action referenced with one
> particular concept, be so different from any other action
> conceptualized with other concepts?

Because its epistemologically priveleged.
It is the perceiver perceiving itself in effect.

> That seems strange, maybe even bizarre. But regardless
> of that, and whatever your answer, you can't be certain.

Are you uncertain that you think then?

.............
> > I could be the brain in a vat you mentioned.

> You could be jello in a vat too, made to think it's
> thinking even if it's not. Point being, you can't be
> certain that you're thinking.

Jello thinking is jello ... thinking.
It thinks therefor it's jello - but it doesn't know it is jello.
.......
> > > Why can't you be just as certain
> > > that they exist, as you are of your own thought?

> > Because I really think certainty is dangerous.
> > Look at all the certain religious fanatics.

> Oh, c'mon. That's /psychological/ certainty, not what
> I call epistemological certainty.

There is no epistemological certainty except for the
cogito. To think there is feeds false psychological
certainty.

> I agree that pc can be
> very dangerous, but ec allows us to live.

Bookie odds are quite sufficient for life.
......
> > I am thinking therefore I am thinking,
> > If I'm not thinking I can't think that.

> But you can't be certain. Maybe you can think that you're
> thinking, even though you're not, through a process wholly
> unknown to you.

Whatever the process is, it is thinking.
That's why I keep calling it tautoligical.

> > > I am just trying to point out to you that whatever method
> > > is allowing you to achieve certainty on the point of
> > > whether you're thinking or not, can be used to achieve
> > > certainty with regard to other things as well.

> > Nope. Doesn't work. You are fooling yourself if you think so.

> Really? We're fooling ourselves that food and water are necessary
> to live?

So prove that you are not a computer simulation, thinking
real thoughts about eating simulated food.

> > Thinking entails thinking.

> So you're proposing.

So the language means.

> But you have no evidence of it except
> via word formation, as opposed to identification.

I know what I am thinking - or experiencing - do you?

> This, because
> according to you, identification can't lead to certainty.

I don't buy the Objective concept of identification as
you may have noticed.

> So according to you, it could be that thinking doesn't entail
> thinking...it might entail cosmic rays hitting vats of jello. You
> can't be certain, can you?

Cosmic rays shifting vats of jello and having the
thought "cogito ergo sum" would be thinking.

> > > As all tautologies must.

> > The concept of tautology is a thought.

> Then other concepts are thoughts too.

Yes. The question is whether they are true with certainty.

> So whatever leads you
> to conclude that one particular thought or concept can yield
> certainty, ought to indicate that others can too.

Doesn't work that way. My thought or personal experience
is in a unique epistemological position.

> > > Identification is /all/ an abstraction, at least in the
> > > human form.

> > There you go. Also all subject to doubt except
> > the identification that one is thinking.

> WHY THE EXCEPTION??? You can have no basis for it,
> except outright stipulation.

The basis is direct personal experience.

> > > As Ken likes to remind us, "Existence
> > > is identity; consciousness is identification."

> > Ken is wrong.

> It's not Ken's; it's Rand's.

Rand is wrong.

> > > Both your
> > > thinking and your identification of your thinking are
> > > abstractions. So what?

> > They are both thought. Thus part of the same
> > tautology.

> Again, so fucking what? You have no basis for knowing
> anything about thinking, let alone tautologies. At least
> not without some certainty, you don't.

I know I am thinking. That is the what.

.......

> > The brain in a vat thinking of a triangle is thinking of
> > a triangle. The brain in a vat fed sense data of a mountain
> > is not perceiving a mountain range.

> How do you know these things? Why is the BIV thinking of
> something such certain proof that it's thinking,

Because it directly experiences thinking. No as the result
of some indirect chain leading to "identification".

> but its
> perception of something not certain proof that it's perceiving?

Yes it is perceiving - something - but what that something
is is not known with certainty.

Tom