James wrote...



It's impossible. One is only kidding themself if they actually think that it is even possible to think like that.

I have some small completely clear crystal rocks and my tarot cards. But I just admire them, I have not projected anything into them. I would like a larger crystal ball though.

I just want to say that there is a HUGE difference existing between the memory, say.... of piece of aluminum foil, and a consciously accessible memory which is composed entirely of some form of representational understanding through experience alone...

Human understanding/language/thought/belief/knowledge...



Ooops...

I let it all slip out at once.



Have fun, I have more reading and writing to do!

I still have yet to see any reliable definitions separating these words meanings.

Instinct.
Conscious.
Thought.

I keep seeing shifting mirages of definitions.

Bacteria acknowledge glucose in there environment, and move toward it. They will do the opposite when near recognized poisons. Bacteria can also communicate these findings to other parts of the colony. They can also learn about new poisons from the death reactions of other parts of the colony.

Representational understanding and communication.

Its no wonder these words are hard to define and yet keep humans on our marvelous pedestal way up in the consciousness clouds.

Acknowledge, as in recognize the existence of - without having cognitive physiological constructs?


Communicate?


Learn?


Perhaps it is a matter of instinct.

Michael,

I believe that it is precisely these kind of totally unwarranted opinionated assertions you make that people find objectionable. Who are you to tell someone else how they must think? How can you possibly know what kind of thinking is possible for others?

You seem to be just assuming that everyone must think within the confines of your limited views and beliefs. But why should that be?

You're also basically saying that Richard Feynman is just kidding himself.

And you're not?

Isn't that a bit presumptuous?

Everyone isn't hung-up with an obsession to know certainty. Your obsession with certainty could almost be viewed as a mental disorder simply because it appears to have totally absorbed your full attention and has become the driving force behind your mental life.

Look at Smiless! He's not obsessed with certainty! He's quite happy confessing to himself, and anyone who will listen, that he has no clue what's going on, and that's just fine with him. It doesn't seem to cause him any problems whatsoever.

Jess Lee is always trying to drive home the power of "Just Being". Whatever will be will be. Que Sara Sara. Change the things you can and accept the things you can't. Uncertainty is abound, and it is acceptable. To refuse to accept it will only cause you grief because knowing anything with certainty is what is truly impossible.

Not-knowing is fundamental to quantum physics. This is a core principle of the whole discipline. The principle of complementarity states that some things are just not knowable. Period. In a very real sense we can even say that uncertainty is certain in this universe!

This is what quantum mechanics is saying. It is saying that uncertainty is certain! And that's not a contradiction in terms, because what it is truly saying is that some things can indeed be known with certainty, but other things cannot be known with certainty. So we can be certain that uncertainty exists in this universe without any conflict or contradiction in what we are saying.

Richard Feynman understood this completely. After all his Nobel Prize was won for his achievements in the study of Quantum Physics.

I don't see how you can claim that an acceptance that everything is not knowable would be impossible or that it would be impossible to think like that. All you are truly doing is displaying your own limitation of thought and attempting to push your limitations onto everyone else.

If you can't handle the fact that knowledge of this universe will always be uncertain, then you'll end up either in a mental institution alongside the ghost of Georg Cantor, or you'll just cause yourself endless stress and frustration because of your inability to accept the one thing that is certain, and that is that you can not know everything with certainty. It's the one thing we can truly know. Yet you say that it's impossible to think like this?

Well it's not impossible for me. I've accepted Richard Feynman's view of life long before I ever ran across his quote. I was drawn to his quote because he expresses quite eloquently my very thoughts. Thoughts that you claim are impossible to accept.

Perhaps for you they are impossible to accept. But for me it's a quite natural way of thinking.

So I'm afraid I'll have to reject your assertion in this matter. Your assertion is nothing more than a display of your own limited thinking. You have absolutely no justification for demanding that your limitations of thought must be pushed onto me by claiming that I have to be kidding myself.

From my point of view, you're the one who's kidding himself to think that you could actually know everything with certainty. Good luck with that. From what I've seen in this thread you might want to start by studying the behavior of bees, it doesn't appear to me that you understand them very well at all. Let alone Human Behavior. Yet here you are asserting that its impossible for humans to think a certain way?

You just make totally unwarranted assertions that clearly have nothing to do with any certain knowledge of anything. You're just demanding assertions that you wish were true.

How can you assert that certain ideas are impossible to accept?

Just because you personally can't accept them?

That can only be an assertion about you and your potential for thinking. You have absolutely no right to assert that this must be true for anyone else.

Why should we accept your absolute assertions over Richard Feynman's personal sharing of how he prefers to think?

Well my gripe is not with whether we label bacteria conscious or not, but I think words like instinct are poorly defined.

We do not have rigid borders around words like conscious, instinct, and thought. And until we do these words are not useful in determining what does and what does not qualify. Its like an equation where you have no clue what defines each term . . . useless to manipulate such an equation. You need at least a few known terms to gain any insight into such an equation.

That was my point.

It seems we point to humans, and say conscious. Thats easy.
Then we point to things that do not have all of the cognitive qualities of human and say not conscious. Thats easy.

Then we try to list each of these qualities of consciousness and find them in various degrees throughout nature and even in inanimate objects. Hmm, that makes me pause.

Well if you say that ONLY ALL of the qualities make consciousness, then you have indeed just simple said that consciousness only exists within humans becuase there are not other creatures with all of the qualities of cognition that humans posses under normal conditions. Seems a bit arbitrary to me . . .

A = A

The set of A is {1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,]
Where each number represents a facet of consciousness.

If this definition is arbitrary then its a no brainier, literally. It means that only A is conscious because we say so.

What we need to deal with is whether we really want an arbitrary definition or not. I dont. It erodes the meaning when we analyze from such diverse perspectives as we have in this thread.

If not arbitrary then we need to build the definition up from the ground up. So instead of top down, we need a bottom up approach.

In that case we need to separate out each of these facets, and try to understand the physiology behind each one. Sadly something we will not be able tot tackle in this thread.

The top down definition does nothing but create exclusivity, it tells us nothing of how something works.

James...

Great emotional investment James. I see what you mean, but you do not see what I mean.

If one knows anything, then they know something.

What is attached to your left wrist and has fingernails at the tip of five separate digits?



You tend to carry things much farther in thought than what must follow my words.

Jeremy,

I am in agrrement with you, but 'physiological' - the term itself - places boundaries(albeit, I think necessary) on the entire construct which those who do not view it as you(and I, I believe), would agree to.

I do not believe that an inductive style would serve a purpose different from the one which you are seemingly opposed to.

I'll just accept that we think so differently that it's highly unlikely that we can ever truly communicate.

We can just leave it at that.

Yes! Thank you Bushido!

Also, in my experience, "instinct" is a word often used when people mistake 'labeling' something as 'understanding' it. We don't need to ask how human responses are similar to non-human animal responses - we can just label the non-human animal response 'instinct' and our questioning is done.


Creative wrote:



I have truly have no idea. My ignorance does not prevent me from 'fixing a bicycle', which you might say I did 'using my hand'. And I've learned to adopt the pretense of knowledge (including, knowledge about 'my hand') to relate to other people. But I can take a good honest look at my so-called experience and realize that the only true answer to your question is: "I don't really know". (Or better: "What do you really mean by 'left wrist' ???)

I suspect its impossible for you to believe me, but that might be a natural consequence of your worldview

Abra - I thing your manner of responding is more sensible than my own.

Well, I'm at a loss to know how to respond when someone asserts that it's impossible to think they way I do and that anyone who thinks this way is just kidding themselves.

It just seems to me that there isn't much room left for an exchange of ideas after such an assertion.

There's no emotion involved on my part. I don't become emotionally distraught if someone doesn't understand my way of thinking. But at the same time there seems to be no sense in continuing to converse with a person who suggests that my way of thinking is impossible and that I'm only kidding myself.

What would I need to do to accept such an assertion other than to just shut up and listen to the all-knowing mind?

I think I'd rather go play with Jeanniebean in the Wicca Thread and see what's going on with her new crystal ball.

If bees have a conscience thought then do bees in Africa have a different sense of conscience thought then those here in America?

Or is it the same idea and systematic approach to it all?

As a matter of fact do they have a language?

If one bee went zzzzzz and one z longer then the other who replies with two short zz zz zz then maybe they are communicating a certain language.

Would that language be different for an African bee or would they be able to all communicate regardless on what continent they are on in the same language and sense?

If anything it would be interesting to know what verbal communication they might have?


There is a spider (forgot the name) who uses quick vibration sounds to attract the female. Not only does he have to dance in front of the spider but also make a quick vibration sound to go with that. Talking about work getting a female right!

Well don't mind me. Just some weird questions from a odd person in general

James,


Holy ****!

Are you kidding me? Were you just calling me presumptive? Allow me to hold a mirror up for you. Read back through this thread. We have yet to even get to the meaning behind my understanding, because we are still focusing upon your misunderstanding of mine.

Did you get that? I mean honestly - do you not see that this is the case?

You throw out the dictionary... ok! Complain about meaning, yet refuse to elaborate on that meaning without using the term to define itself... ok! How do you propose to ever be able to contemplate the 'other' side when you are so wrapped up in your own!

I am, and have been listening and truly doing my best to entertain your point of view as if it is my own, which is why I have attempted - on many occasions - to ask relevent questions in order to clarify the meaning behind your words.

So what troubles you, the fact that you have problems with my world view, which necessitates one's knowing *something* beyond a doubt? You claim you cannot be certain of anything, yet - here once again - you have no problems attempting to dismiss my own understanding without even getting to it!

Here was the beginning of this...

James wrote...



I answered...



Abrasive? Perhaps. True? Absolutely!

James, you take things far too personally. I do not know- nor do I need to know - exactly what you believe or why, although I have a fairly good 'handle' on it - if the common meanings of the words you use match your beliefs. Having said that...

'Accepting' that nothing can be certain is to be certain about that. Doubting something requires undoubted grounds. You doubt that what I write is so. You do this for reasons of your own that exist without doubt.

What is the difference between your certainty and mine, other than I recognize the direct correlation between doubt and belief and you do not?









Massage...

All I can do is shake my head!



Why play with words so much, or moreover how is it possible to do such a thing, especially if you do not know what they represent? Meaningless?

Need I say more?

I think James thought Creative was making a claim that it is possible to be certain of everything, and James was making a claim that it is not possible to be certain of anything.

I think as individuals, we can be certain of some things, but not all things.

Is anything truely unknowable?.... No.

Everything is "knowable" by something or someone somewhere, human or nonhuman.

If anything was completely "unknowable" then it would not exist. --and even if it could or did exist, no one would know it.

If no one or nothing (human or non-human) knows (or imagines) that a thing exists then it does not exist!

The proof of this is that to exist it must be acknowledged. (Known, felt, seen, etc.)

What excellent questions! How, indeed, is it possible?



'Say', or 'query'? I can't be sure when you are using rhetorical questions.

It does appear you overestimate the soundness of your reasoning. I suggest: just relax, and enjoy your worldview.

Massage...



Dissect it for me.... Please!

Hey, I could be wrong! I was just sharing an impression. A possible wrong impression. If I choose not to dissect, or if I lack the skills to dissect, would that bear on the relevance of this comment?

As for dissecting individual chains of reasoning - I'd rather apply my energy in ways that make sense to me. I smell something like fundamentalism, and I've learned not to try very hard when I smell that.

For the record, I can say that I would be a bit more motivated to 'dissect' (and similar) if the conversation in this thread didn't have that smell (to me), but those are just comments about my impressions and my preferences, its not an accusation, and no reason anyone else should concern themselves with it.

For all of us, if we really want to learn, it helps to adopt the mentality of a student.

<======= trying to re-learn to be happily wrong about everything

Yeah!

Fundamentalism...



Whatever massage... whatever!

I smell dishonesty... and not the intellectual kind!

Of course, that would be my impression...

WTF???



Does anyone care to comment on why I state that one must believe *something*, because the word games coming from those who cannot even realize that they know the meaning of a word are getting rather transparent in their attempts to cover the fact that some may not even understand what it is that they believe.



Yeah, I am an eh - s - s hole too!