http://visionfiction.theotechne.com/WordPress/?p=713

I can double post it, if you like, but it’s quite long.

{AK} Sorry about the delay. Although I wrote this fairly quickly, after your post, I’ve held it back, to explore the issues more fully. I didn’t want to restrict things to glib refutations. The issues deserve deeper consideration.

(SM) “Could you clarify what you mean by limited identity? What would “unlimited” identity look like? Obviously a man’s “identity” pertains to his social roles – his relationships with others – as the term is typically used.”

{AK} Quite simply, all ‘identification’ indexes some form of structural or logical ‘limitation’, because a selectivity of inclusion & exclusion occurs. If a notion of identity is subscribed to, & any of its attributes involve finite extensions in time, then the identity has characteristics of temporal limitation, & it is a ‘limited identity’. But note, this ‘limitation’ is supervenient on a system of chronological conventions. So, “Mortality” is an appellation for the convention of limited identity.”
An ““unlimited” identity” would be ‘one’ that transcends limits, is not bound by whichever specific limitation is under consideration. If you’re suggesting an identity without any limits whatsoever, how would identification be possible?
My use of ‘Limited identity’ is, effectively, a tautology, as reminder of context.

(SM) “Anthropic pathos could mean a few different things. I’ll reply to one thing you may mean by this: the idea that man’s mortality in some sense demonstrates that the physical domain is compatible with the conscious life that perceives it is absurd. It is a tautology.

I’ll also note that nothing can be derived inductively, least of all an alleged anthropic pathos.”

{AK} “Anthropic pathos” refers to the culture of ‘human’ expressions concerning ‘mortality’.
When i said, “You can’t derive anything from it, except anthropic pathos. It isn’t a clarification, or refutation.”, I meant within the context of that specific dispute. Though, I’m sure, if I thought about it, I could find something. But it would involve considerable recontextualisation.

(SM) Well, sure. My mortality is not a component of my identity – and yet I’m mortal nonetheless!

{AK} Are there two senses of “mortality” there: factual & ideal?
A living ‘identity’ cannot experience its own physical non-existence as a ‘fact’, only as an ‘idea’?

In any case, that’s not what was meant.
That “eventuality’ is linked to the metaphysics of identity” means that the very positing of an event involves the conferral of identity, of significance, of a ‘limited’ role, to that ‘event’, in ensuing discursivities of thought, communication, & ‘experience’. That “all identities are contingent, ‘dependently originated'” means, or suggests, that this positing & conferral are not absolute, they are systematic & conventional. This indicates their interpretative nature, other systems are possible, convention does not preclude radically different interpretations.

(SM) “Light is empirical because it can be observed? Mmmmmk.

And I try to avoid saying anything at all “in the empirical sense” :)”

{AK} “it’s empirical, [TOO].”

(SM) “Feel no need to argue for Eternity. Personally I try to observe what is, understand what must be. Time is experienced only by mortal beings. It’s certainly not some endless cascade of events – it’s the lack of events, it’s infinite, it’s an endless void you cannot even conceive of.

Some things are beyond human understanding.”

{AK}
“it’s the lack of events” – So nothing happens.
“it’s infinite” – So it doesn’t have limits.
“it’s an endless void you cannot even conceive of” – It appears that you’ve just conceptualised ‘it’.

The concept of an actually eternal universe (one full of actions), “without beginning or end”, is an “endless cascade of events”.
That might not be the formal definition used by NL, but I used it within my comment, & it’s valid in that context, & any other, if used consistently. Was my erroneous interpretation, of NL’s use, significant for the argument? Was it truly an error, even as an interpretation?
No, not really.
See next comments to NL.

“The problem is it isn’t brilliant. It’s the straightforward result of consistently applying a physics mindset to the philosophy of mind and freedom. The result is mainly intuitive.

You get no scholar status points for believing stuff like this. Which is a problem, since it’s true.”

What a theologian means by “man acts by the grace of G-d” is basically the corollary/flip-side of what a physicist (of sorts) means when he says “there is no fact…until the measure-interaction occurs, which then creates the fact”.

It’s been well said that physics is the only real science – all the rest are basically stamp collecting. Likewise, I’d say that theology is the only real philosophy – the rest is just rhetoric.

I’d dare suggest that Maistre himself could find little in Alrenous’ exposition to disagree with:

We are all bound to the throne of the Supreme Being by a flexible chain which restrains without enslaving us. The most wonderful aspect of the universal scheme of things is the action of free beings under divine guidance. Freely slaves, they act at once of their own will and under necessity: they actually do what they wish without being able to disrupt general plans. Each of them stands at the center of a sphere of activity whose diameter varies according to the decision of the eternal geometry, which can extend, restrict, check, or direct the will without altering its nature.

You get no scholar status points for believing stuff like this. Which is a problem, since it’s true.

“A satisfying account of free will must accept dualism, as the will is a fundamentally subjective phenomenon. Any attempt to create a purely physical account is going to feel wrong for the simple reason that it is.

From the perspective of physics, free will is the creation of a fact. There is no fact of the matter whether the electron will collapse into spin up or spin down, until the measurement-interaction occurs, which then creates the fact. However, it is physically impossible to tell the difference between randomness and will. The only definitive way to know if the electron is being random or making a choice is to be that electron. If you are that electron, it’s easy to tell if you have practical (not cosmic) free will – agency. If it seems like you could have chosen otherwise, generally that’s because it’s true.

Though it seems that will and randomness aren’t actually different at the lowest levels of subjectivity, similar to the way the physical forces unify at high energies.”

This is actually brilliant.

““Mortality” is an appellation for the convention of limited identity.”

Could you clarify what you mean by limited identity? What would “unlimited” identity look like? Obviously a man’s “identity” pertains to his social roles – his relationships with others – as the term is typically used.

“You can’t derive anything from it, except anthropic pathos. It isn’t a clarification, or refutation.”

Anthropic pathos could mean a few different things. I’ll reply to one thing you may mean by this: the idea that man’s mortality in some sense demonstrates that the physical domain is compatible with the conscious life that perceives it is absurd. It is a tautology.

I’ll also note that nothing can be derived inductively, least of all an alleged anthropic pathos.

“But all ‘eventuality’ is linked to the metaphysics of identity, & all identities are contingent, ‘dependently originated’, as the Mahayana say.”

Well, sure. My mortality is not a component of my identity – and yet I’m mortal nonetheless!

“Light is outside of time, & it’s empirical, too. So I’m not saying Eternity is unreal, in the empirical sense.”

Light is empirical because it can be observed? Mmmmmk.

And I try to avoid saying anything at all “in the empirical sense”

“If you both push the Platonic essentialisation argument for Eternity, all the carefully crafted insularities of Neoreactive immanence are going to unravel. ‘Outside in – Involvements with Ideality’ lol”

Feel no need to argue for Eternity. Personally I try to observe what is, understand what must be. Time is experienced only by mortal beings. It’s certainly not some endless cascade of events – it’s the lack of events, it’s infinite, it’s an endless void you cannot even conceive of.

Some things are beyond human understanding.

Disagree that it’s weird. Thus I look forward to your treatment of it.

Hard determinism is fully compatible with what we generally observe.

Consider a game of life board or something like it. We know that such rules are turing complete, and thus you could in principle embed an intelligent agent in such a world. We further know that it is utterly deterministic to the point where you can often skip ahead without actually calculating intermediate states (see hashlife).

Still the life-embedded agent can make free choices and can experience the same kind of stuff we do, to the extent that that means anything at all. That we could stop the world and extrapolate what the agent will think and do, run it multiple times forwards and backwards, and so on doesn’t change its experience of having free choice.

I find no tentacles leaking in from Outside here though, so I’m excited to see what you do with it.

“”The notion of ‘eternity’ only indicates an endless series of events.” — This is totally not getting it. Eternity is the Outside of time (or perhaps, time-in-itself — the transcendental edge of time).”

Bingo.

One must be mortal to experience time, after all.”

“Mortality” is an appellation for the convention of limited identity. You can’t derive anything from it, except anthropic pathos. It isn’t a clarification, or refutation.
Time is inextricably linked to eventuality: no events, no time. But all ‘eventuality’ is linked to the metaphysics of identity, & all identities are contingent, ‘dependently originated’, as the Mahayana say.
Light is outside of time, & it’s empirical, too. So I’m not saying Eternity is unreal, in the empirical sense.

If you both push the Platonic essentialisation argument for Eternity, all the carefully crafted insularities of Neoreactive immanence are going to unravel. ‘Outside in – Involvements with Ideality’ lol

There’s another response further down, but I haven’t really argued against the ‘transcendental Eternity’ concept, because I could see the fuller context admin referenced, with the “Background” link. He’s building the ‘history of ideas’ structure first.