Discussion Topic |
|
This thread has been locked |
WBraun
climber
|
|
|
Mar 16, 2018 - 05:33pm PT
|
Yes, so personality and individuality must and will always be there in life itself.
Without these qualities, there is no life, just dead sterile matter.
It is life itself which makes matter appear alive ......
|
|
Ed Hartouni
Trad climber
Livermore, CA
|
|
|
Mar 16, 2018 - 08:28pm PT
|
At the Robbins Memorial last week I was talking with Ed about this and he mentioned the idea of abiding with the machine till the machine broke. IME, what happens is that our enmeshment to the machine (the ultimate map maker) is what breaks, but we cannot direct this process, we can only be still and present as we slowly become aware and awaken to living in a map, or brain generated interpretation of our life.
I was talking more about doing science then finding the "truth" of our life's meaning, science is a much more limited domain to apply this practice to.
One takes the scientific arguments to their limits, pushing them until you find a contradiction, and then examining the assumptions upon which you got to that point. At least one of the assumptions are will turn out to be wrong, and you then are able to learn something.
This works because we believe that everything is described in physical terms, and that is quantifiable which makes the predictions testable. The amount of wiggle room is greatly reduced making the predictions more precise, and defining just how good a test we need.
Feynman was very good at this. Krauss is also a very good scientist. But I learned long ago that good scientists, extraordinary scientists, are not necessarily good people. They are people and have many of the same foibles the rest of us have. It doesn't mean we should throw out their scientific body of work because of their otherwise inappropriate behavior. Their work stands on its own. They are also responsible for their acts without regard for their excellent science.
More reprehensible is the appropriation of priority on a discovery. For instance, Rosalind Franklin's part in the discover of DNA structure, Jocelyn Bell Burnell's discovery of pulsars as a graduate student did not receive the Nobel Prize for it, her advisor did... etc..
I find this more vexing from the science perspective.
|
|
jogill
climber
Colorado
|
|
|
Mar 16, 2018 - 08:56pm PT
|
The notion that someone skilled at calculations . . .
A shallow perspective that science is little more than skillful calculations inferred.
One of the best mathematicians I knew had difficulty manipulating fractions, to the amusement of his grad students.
|
|
RussianBot
climber
|
|
|
Mar 16, 2018 - 09:15pm PT
|
It’s all humans on this bus.
Take what you want and leave the rest.
Yep, that’s what we humans do. We take what we want to incorporate into our beliefs, and leave the rest, without understanding where the want comes from. We want to figure we’re the ones who create and drive the want, the way we created ourselves. Some of us do, anyway.
|
|
Ed Hartouni
Trad climber
Livermore, CA
|
|
|
Mar 16, 2018 - 09:26pm PT
|
do you think that human foibles are being 'baked in' to the machines we are dead set on being dependent on?
yes
|
|
Largo
Sport climber
The Big Wide Open Face
|
|
|
Mar 17, 2018 - 12:22pm PT
|
I was talking more about doing science then finding the "truth" of our life's meaning, science is a much more limited domain to apply this practice to.
-
Ed, I have never met anyone in any philosophical discussion, class, or meditation hall who was trying to "find the truth of life's meaning."
For most of us, we are basically looking at a phenomenon - say, consciousness - and asking the most basic questions possible: What IS this? What do I believe it is? What direct, empirical evidence can I find to discover what it is I believe in. Empirical in this case is concerned with, or verifiable, by observation or experience rather than theory, figures, definitions, or pure logic. And not by way of a mapping exercise, rather going directly to the territory and seeing for myself what is there.
The wormhole into this is, IME, a much more proscribed process then trying to wrangle things like "the meaning of life?" I'm talking about the most fundamental things and phenomenon and assumptions one can possible investigate. We always hear things like, "Pay attention!"
What does that mean in phenomenological terms? What is actually involved, not one step removed, but with attention itself, right now, right here, in this body. By investigating the thing or phenomenon itself, directly, right now.
|
|
Largo
Sport climber
The Big Wide Open Face
|
|
|
Mar 17, 2018 - 01:25pm PT
|
You're missing it, Mark. Or perhaps I'm flubbing the description.
Thinking and evaluating (which are interpretations or maps) shouldn't come into play till you've dropped into the phenomenon for a good long time. It's also essential to investigate in a way in which you can't be mistaken, which can only happen at very basic levels dealing with very basic phenomenon.
|
|
Mark Force
Trad climber
Ashland, Oregon
|
|
|
Mar 17, 2018 - 01:49pm PT
|
So far, it still seems like you're overthinking it.
|
|
jogill
climber
Colorado
|
|
|
Mar 17, 2018 - 04:48pm PT
|
It's also essential to investigate in a way in which you can't be mistaken
You're assuming the mind as trickster is not in play. How do you know?
I admire your level of confidence. You adhere to your belief system admirably.
|
|
WBraun
climber
|
|
|
Mar 17, 2018 - 05:00pm PT
|
Man, you so-called scientists are terrible.
How do you know?
You test it!!!
Of course like I've said so many times the gross materialists NEVER do the experiment.
They just babble endlessly, do tons of guessing and mental speculations and say horsesh!t like "You believe" and "Faith", "NO ONE KNOWS" etc.
No science at all the gross materialists do except their gross materialism .......
We can't see it with our material eyeballs say the gross materialists, thus it doesn't exist is their motto.
St00pid ..... you purify your eyeballs and then it is revealed.
Then these fools will tell you your mind is tricking you.
These fools think they are experts on everyone on the planet and are mind readers.
They haven't been anywhere yet ......
|
|
MikeL
Social climber
Southern Arizona
|
|
|
Mar 17, 2018 - 06:17pm PT
|
Wayno: Ah yes, the cult of personality.
The New York Times has proclaimed Stephen Hawking a pop cultural icon today.
I’d say that’s a pretty good benchmark for the times and its beliefs. I wonder what would be considered sacrosanct or immune to cultural influences? You know, . . . beyond the pale?
|
|
Ed Hartouni
Trad climber
Livermore, CA
|
|
|
Mar 17, 2018 - 10:39pm PT
|
?
not sure what you are reacting to MikeL
|
|
healyje
Trad climber
Portland, Oregon
|
|
|
Mar 18, 2018 - 01:52am PT
|
It's also essential to investigate in a way in which you can't be mistaken, which can only happen at very basic levels dealing with very basic phenomenon.
Arriving at something from nothing without mistake and sure of everything - genius.
|
|
Mark Force
Trad climber
Ashland, Oregon
|
|
|
Mar 18, 2018 - 07:08am PT
|
It's also essential to investigate in a way in which you can't be mistaken, which can only happen at very basic levels dealing with very basic phenomenon.
Isn't that a form of reductionism? Useful along with some distinct limitations.
reductionism (rĭ-dŭkˈshə-nĭzˌəm)
n. An attempt or tendency to explain a complex set of facts, entities, phenomena, or structures by another, simpler set: "For the last 400 years science has advanced by reductionism ... The idea is that you could understand the world, all of nature, by examining smaller and smaller pieces of it. When assembled, the small pieces would explain the whole” ( John Holland).
|
|
High Fructose Corn Spirit
Gym climber
|
|
|
Mar 18, 2018 - 08:24am PT
|
along with some distinct limitations.
There's no need for this qualifier.
|
|
WBraun
climber
|
|
|
Mar 18, 2018 - 08:28am PT
|
Yep, classic reductionism Mark.
An infinite amount of missing pieces will be missing.
Classic gross materialism science masquarading itself as authoritiuve ......
|
|
Wayno
Big Wall climber
Seattle, WA
|
|
|
Mar 18, 2018 - 08:50am PT
|
I wonder what would be considered sacrosanct or immune to cultural influences? You know, . . . beyond the pale?
Taking a real good crap.
|
|
High Fructose Corn Spirit
Gym climber
|
|
|
Mar 18, 2018 - 09:07am PT
|
The Wizard and the Prophet: On Steven Pinker and Yuval Noah Harari...
http://quillette.com/2018/03/18/wizard-prophet-steven-pinker-yuval-noah-harari/
"intellectual life in the 21st century is defined by a civil war between Wizards, who believe that technology will save us, and Prophets, who see various kinds of disaster on the horizon"
"Will liberal humanism be taken down by religion? Nope. Like Pinker, Harari maintains that religion has no future:
“More than a century after Nietzsche pronounced Him dead, God seems to be making a comeback. But this is a mirage. God is dead—it just takes a while to get rid of the body. Radical Islam poses no serious threat to the liberal package, because for all their fervor, the zealots don’t really understand the world of the twenty-first century, and have nothing relevant to say about the novel dangers and opportunities that new technologies are generating all around us.”
...
the cambridge analytica scandal...
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/video/2018/mar/17/cambridge-analytica-whistleblower-we-spent-1m-harvesting-millions-of-facebook-profiles-video
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cambridge_Analytica
"On March 17, 2018, The New York Times and The Observer reported on Cambridge Analytica's use of personal information acquired by an external researcher who claimed to be collecting it for academic purposes. In response, Facebook banned Cambridge Analytica from advertising on its platform. The Guardian further reported that Facebook had known about this security breach for two years, but did nothing to protect its users."
|
|
|
SuperTopo on the Web
|
Let us know!