A Meccano model of two Incompatibilist Fallacies

Is the mind the same as the body? What is consciousness? Can machines have it?

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Terrapin Station
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Re: A Meccano model of two Incompatibilist Fallacies

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RCSaunders wrote: Sat Jun 05, 2021 1:06 pm
Terrapin Station wrote: Sat Jun 05, 2021 9:37 am So you've been studying philosophy for 50 years or whatever it was and this is the first you're hearing of propositional knowledge being justified true belief?
I rid myself of all such ancient irrational nonsense as magic, astrology, alchemy, and Plato's, "justified true belief," along with the rest of is, "realism," almost as soon as I learned of them, many years ago.

I suppose you'll be asking me next if I haven't heard or transcendental meditation yet. Good grief!

Studying philosophy (or anything else) is not just believing what your philosophy professors have taught you and repeating what other philosophers have written. You really need to start thinking for yourself.
Sure. So what thinking-for-yourself definition of "knowledge" do you use?
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Re: A Meccano model of two Incompatibilist Fallacies

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Terrapin Station wrote: Sat Jun 05, 2021 10:49 am
Sculptor wrote: Sat Jun 05, 2021 10:23 am
Terrapin Station wrote: Sat Jun 05, 2021 12:10 am

Again, knowledge is justified true belief.
Again you can find that and the judstification inside books.

That definition, as a definition of knowledge, has nothing to do with brain states.

Let's get that part straight first.

If you're saying that marks in a book are knowledge, presumably you're not using "justified true belief" as a definition. What definition would you be using?
You are contradicting yourself, with marks on a computer screen.
THink it over1
I never said that the definition of knowledge has anything to do with brain states.

The definition of (propositional) knowledge is that it's justified true belief. If beliefs are states of ink on paper, then that's not a brain state, right?
One collection of matter is a specific configuration is knowledge. You insist it is something to do with a brain, yet cannot say exactly how. I suggest whilst that might be true offer you a different spefcific configuration of matter b ut in this case I CAN tell you have it amounts to knowlege.

If beliefs are nonphysical real abstracts, then that's not a brain state either. The definition doesn't tell you what beliefs are, exactly, ontologically. The definition, as a definition, is different than the ontological facts of what the definition picks out.
Knoweldge is ideas, ideas can be coded on brain states and in the written word.

So again, if you're saying that marks in a book are knowledge, presumably you're not using "justified true belief" as a definition. What definition would you be using?
Justified true belief can be found in the written word.

Or alternatively, would you say that books literally have beliefs?
I would say that books contain knoweldge, wouldn't you?
Brains probably contain knowledge but we do not know how exactly.
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Re: A Meccano model of two Incompatibilist Fallacies

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Terrapin Station wrote: Sat Jun 05, 2021 2:29 pm Sure. So what thinking-for-yourself definition of "knowledge" do you use?
I'd be delighted to answer that question, if you are sincere, but its not the kind of question one can answer in, "25 words or less," which seems about all most of the characters on this site have the attention spans for.

If you really want to, these two articles (both mine) will provide the answer for what I mean by knowledge:

Epistemology, Concepts

Epistemology, Propositions
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Re: A Meccano model of two Incompatibilist Fallacies

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RCSaunders wrote: Sat Jun 05, 2021 6:00 pm If you really want to, these two articles (both mine) will provide the answer for what I mean by knowledge:

Epistemology, Concepts

Epistemology, Propositions
??? You never actually define (propositional) knowledge in either of those. You define how-to knowledge, but not propositional knowledge.
You do say that "Knowledge is about things . . . ," which means that it is intentionality in the Brentano sense, but unless you don't agree with "intentionality is the mark of the mental," that would mean that there is no knowledge (literally) in books.
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Re: A Meccano model of two Incompatibilist Fallacies

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Sculptor wrote: Sat Jun 05, 2021 3:21 pm
Terrapin Station wrote: Sat Jun 05, 2021 10:49 am
Sculptor wrote: Sat Jun 05, 2021 10:23 am
Again you can find that and the judstification inside books.

You are contradicting yourself, with marks on a computer screen.
THink it over1
I never said that the definition of knowledge has anything to do with brain states.

The definition of (propositional) knowledge is that it's justified true belief. If beliefs are states of ink on paper, then that's not a brain state, right?
One collection of matter is a specific configuration is knowledge. You insist it is something to do with a brain, yet cannot say exactly how. I suggest whilst that might be true offer you a different spefcific configuration of matter b ut in this case I CAN tell you have it amounts to knowlege.

If beliefs are nonphysical real abstracts, then that's not a brain state either. The definition doesn't tell you what beliefs are, exactly, ontologically. The definition, as a definition, is different than the ontological facts of what the definition picks out.
Knoweldge is ideas, ideas can be coded on brain states and in the written word.

So again, if you're saying that marks in a book are knowledge, presumably you're not using "justified true belief" as a definition. What definition would you be using?
Justified true belief can be found in the written word.

Or alternatively, would you say that books literally have beliefs?
I would say that books contain knoweldge, wouldn't you?
Brains probably contain knowledge but we do not know how exactly.
I don't at all agree that ideas and beliefs can obtain in things like ink marks and sounds (such as those made by speech). There's zero evidence of that. All evidence suggests that ideas and beliefs are brain states only.

I wouldn't say that books contain knowledge, no (unless I were speaking extremely loosely/metaphorically).

Re the old "explanation" crap about mentality, the problem there, which no one is willing to get into, lies with just what counts as explanations or not and why.
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Re: A Meccano model of two Incompatibilist Fallacies

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Terrapin Station wrote: Sat Jun 05, 2021 8:03 pm
Sculptor wrote: Sat Jun 05, 2021 3:21 pm
Terrapin Station wrote: Sat Jun 05, 2021 10:49 am

I never said that the definition of knowledge has anything to do with brain states.

The definition of (propositional) knowledge is that it's justified true belief. If beliefs are states of ink on paper, then that's not a brain state, right?
One collection of matter is a specific configuration is knowledge. You insist it is something to do with a brain, yet cannot say exactly how. I suggest whilst that might be true offer you a different spefcific configuration of matter b ut in this case I CAN tell you have it amounts to knowlege.

If beliefs are nonphysical real abstracts, then that's not a brain state either. The definition doesn't tell you what beliefs are, exactly, ontologically. The definition, as a definition, is different than the ontological facts of what the definition picks out.
Knoweldge is ideas, ideas can be coded on brain states and in the written word.

So again, if you're saying that marks in a book are knowledge, presumably you're not using "justified true belief" as a definition. What definition would you be using?
Justified true belief can be found in the written word.

Or alternatively, would you say that books literally have beliefs?
I would say that books contain knoweldge, wouldn't you?
Brains probably contain knowledge but we do not know how exactly.
I don't at all agree that ideas and beliefs can obtain in things like ink marks and sounds (such as those made by speech). There's zero evidence of that. All evidence suggests that ideas and beliefs are brain states only.
Rubbish.
A man in a booth gets handed a piece of paper and is capable of repeat the ideas that another person has put on it.
Are you having a fugue state or something, you are sounding ridiculous.
Now prove your point about "brain states" - you can't
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Re: A Meccano model of two Incompatibilist Fallacies

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Sculptor wrote: Sat Jun 05, 2021 9:41 pm
Terrapin Station wrote: Sat Jun 05, 2021 8:03 pm
Sculptor wrote: Sat Jun 05, 2021 3:21 pm
One collection of matter is a specific configuration is knowledge. You insist it is something to do with a brain, yet cannot say exactly how. I suggest whilst that might be true offer you a different spefcific configuration of matter b ut in this case I CAN tell you have it amounts to knowlege.

Knoweldge is ideas, ideas can be coded on brain states and in the written word.

Justified true belief can be found in the written word.

I would say that books contain knoweldge, wouldn't you?
Brains probably contain knowledge but we do not know how exactly.
I don't at all agree that ideas and beliefs can obtain in things like ink marks and sounds (such as those made by speech). There's zero evidence of that. All evidence suggests that ideas and beliefs are brain states only.
Rubbish.
A man in a booth gets handed a piece of paper and is capable of repeat the ideas that another person has put on it.
Are you having a fugue state or something, you are sounding ridiculous.
Now prove your point about "brain states" - you can't
So what do you think that ideas are--just sounds people can make? Marks they can make on paper and the like? Or are you positing some sort of "abstract realm" that somehow obtains alongside the sounds/marks? How would that obtain? Just what would it be materially? Or are you really an ontological dualist?
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Re: A Meccano model of two Incompatibilist Fallacies

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Terrapin Station wrote: Sat Jun 05, 2021 11:31 pm
Sculptor wrote: Sat Jun 05, 2021 9:41 pm
Terrapin Station wrote: Sat Jun 05, 2021 8:03 pm

I don't at all agree that ideas and beliefs can obtain in things like ink marks and sounds (such as those made by speech). There's zero evidence of that. All evidence suggests that ideas and beliefs are brain states only.
Rubbish.
A man in a booth gets handed a piece of paper and is capable of repeat the ideas that another person has put on it.
Are you having a fugue state or something, you are sounding ridiculous.
Now prove your point about "brain states" - you can't
So what do you think that ideas are--just sounds people can make? Marks they can make on paper and the like? Or are you positing some sort of "abstract realm" that somehow obtains alongside the sounds/marks? How would that obtain? Just what would it be materially? Or are you really an ontological dualist?
Are you saying that the British Library has not knowledge stored in it?
Are you having a fugue state or something, you are sounding ridiculous.
Now prove your point about "brain states" - you can't
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Re: A Meccano model of two Incompatibilist Fallacies

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Sculptor wrote: Sun Jun 06, 2021 11:49 am Are you saying that the British Library has not knowledge stored in it?
Yes. I already answered this. There is no literal knowledge stored in any library. Saying there is "knowledge stored in the library" is a very loose, metaphorical manner of speech.
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Re: A Meccano model of two Incompatibilist Fallacies

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Terrapin Station wrote: Fri Jun 04, 2021 7:58 pm
RogerSH wrote: Fri Jun 04, 2021 5:31 pm Why? Because freedom of choice by a will as a concept requires two separate parts of the world to be referred to: a mind which has a will, and something outside the mind which the will is about. So if we define our terms in relation to the mind, its state is internal and the state of the object of choice is external. If you can't admit that distinction, how can you talk about freedom of choice by a will?
So, two issues here:

One, we can choose, for example, to think about one thing rather than another. Say, for example, that one relaxes by thinking of something like walking through a forest or sailing on the ocean. Well, one can choose to think about one or the other there. Thinking about walking through a forest or thinking about sailing on an ocean isn't something outside of the mind that the will is making a choice about. It's something very much of the mind that the will is making a choice about in that case.
The first is a useful point to clarify. I was aiming for clarity of exposition, and evidently sacrificed generality. To cover this sort of case, System A has to be defined more precisely as "the mind in its role of making the current choice". (Thinking about what to think about is clearly distinct from the actual thinking about one thing or another that follows.) The thing that cannot coherently be the object of choice is the current choosing process itself. Like you, I was trying to focus on the "simplest possible scenario"...
Two, as I tried to stress a number of times, thinking clearly about freedom vs determinism is easiest if we first stick to the simplest possible scenario, which is something like imagining the interaction of two different particles. In that case, we're not dealing with minds at all, and just what incompatibilists are saying can come into sharper focus.
My first reaction is that this couldn't be useful because I couldn't see how particles could be doing the choosing in such a scenario, but on reflection I wonder whether this may be getting rather close to the heart of the different perspectives. Perhaps your idea of freedom is nothing to do with freedom to choose as I understand it? When I speak of the degree of freedom associated with a physical system, I might loosely call it "freedom of the system", but it is not freedom of the system to choose, but rather to be chosen - to be determined by the output of another system, for example. If freedom of the will is equated to "freedom to have its state chosen by a hypothetical demon" then I can see that it is definitionally opposed to determinism of the non-hypothetical world. But if that is the case, I can't think why anyone should ever be worried by its lack, since such a lack puts no constraint on the ability of the mind to do the choosing.

So perhaps a different simple scenario would be helpful in focusing the difference. Take a digital thermostat whose software simply says: "If external temperature TE > upper limit TU and heater is on, turn off heater; if TE < lower limit TL and heater is off, turn heater on". Does this algorithm have freedom to choose? You might say no, because the output is determined by TE, TU & TL, which are inputs. But that is not quite right, because that data is not sufficient: it has to be integrated by the algorithm; that is it's contribution. Then you say, but the algorithm didn't write itself: that's another input. And I say, that leaves no chooser, nothing for it to be the input to. You might say it is an input to the hardware. But then the design of the hardware has by the same token to be treated as an input, which again leaves nothing for it to be an input to. "It's turtles all the way down", as another critic wrote, is actually the accusation that I am making against the attempt to treat ontological freedom as equivalent to freedom to choose. Wherever the regress is stopped - whatever is treated as the chooser, cannot be treated also as an input to the choice, and so the question of it being determined or undetermined in origin does not arise.
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Re: A Meccano model of two Incompatibilist Fallacies

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Terrapin Station wrote: Sun Jun 06, 2021 12:24 pm
Sculptor wrote: Sun Jun 06, 2021 11:49 am Are you saying that the British Library has not knowledge stored in it?
Yes. I already answered this. There is no literal knowledge stored in any library. Saying there is "knowledge stored in the library" is a very loose, metaphorical manner of speech.
I'm no expert on official terminology, if indeed there is such a thing, but I can see informal senses in which you are both right here. Call them "knowledge as represented" and "knowledge as understood". (The same distinction may be made about beliefs). I suppose it is agreed that "knowledge as represented" can be found in the BL, the question is what it means to say that it can't be understood by the BL or anything like it. One answer that I find helpful is that understanding an idea is relating it to the entire network of interconnected ideas represented by a human-style neurosystem. I don't get the impression that current AI's are very far along this road, but they have developed to some degree in that direction, & I don't see why it shouldn't be possible in principle for an AI to have understanding in this sense.
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Re: A Meccano model of two Incompatibilist Fallacies

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RogerSH wrote: Sun Jun 06, 2021 3:00 pm
Terrapin Station wrote: Sun Jun 06, 2021 12:24 pm
Sculptor wrote: Sun Jun 06, 2021 11:49 am Are you saying that the British Library has not knowledge stored in it?
Yes. I already answered this. There is no literal knowledge stored in any library. Saying there is "knowledge stored in the library" is a very loose, metaphorical manner of speech.
I'm no expert on official terminology, if indeed there is such a thing, but I can see informal senses in which you are both right here. Call them "knowledge as represented" and "knowledge as understood". (The same distinction may be made about beliefs). I suppose it is agreed that "knowledge as represented" can be found in the BL, the question is what it means to say that it can't be understood by the BL or anything like it. One answer that I find helpful is that understanding an idea is relating it to the entire network of interconnected ideas represented by a human-style neurosystem. I don't get the impression that current AI's are very far along this road, but they have developed to some degree in that direction, & I don't see why it shouldn't be possible in principle for an AI to have understanding in this sense.
We could say that what's contained in the library are representations of knowledge, but (a) that's not literally knowledge itself, and (b) it's only a representation of knowledge insofar as individuals parse it that way. It's not objectively the case, regardless of how anyone thinks of it, that it's a representation of knowledge.

It's just like this is a representation of a cow:
Image

But that's not LITERALLY a cow. You couldn't milk it, for example.
Last edited by Terrapin Station on Sun Jun 06, 2021 4:25 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: A Meccano model of two Incompatibilist Fallacies

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Terrapin Station wrote: Sat Jun 05, 2021 8:01 pm ... that would mean that there is no knowledge (literally) in books.
Of course there is no knowledge in books. As you said, "They're collections of paper with marks on them. There's no literal knowledge in them."

There is no knowledge at all outside human consciousness.
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Re: A Meccano model of two Incompatibilist Fallacies

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RCSaunders wrote: Sun Jun 06, 2021 4:23 pm
Terrapin Station wrote: Sat Jun 05, 2021 8:01 pm ... that would mean that there is no knowledge (literally) in books.
Of course there is no knowledge in books. As you said, "They're collections of paper with marks on them. There's no literal knowledge in them."

There is no knowledge at all outside human consciousness.
Correct.

Yet some people are arguing otherwise.
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Re: A Meccano model of two Incompatibilist Fallacies

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Terrapin Station wrote: Sun Jun 06, 2021 4:26 pm
RCSaunders wrote: Sun Jun 06, 2021 4:23 pm
Terrapin Station wrote: Sat Jun 05, 2021 8:01 pm ... that would mean that there is no knowledge (literally) in books.
Of course there is no knowledge in books. As you said, "They're collections of paper with marks on them. There's no literal knowledge in them."

There is no knowledge at all outside human consciousness.
Correct.

Yet some people are arguing otherwise.
Somehow or another, since we seem to agree on so many essentials, I have the impression our disagreements, in the final analysis, may be more semantic than substantive. At least we agree on that aspect of the nature of knowledge.

I think we also agree that existence, or reality, or, "the ontological," exists and has the nature it has independent of whether any human being knows or is aware of that existence and its nature.

If that's true, it's a pretty good foundation for both ontology and epistemology, don't you think?
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