dream_weaver

So, you are contesting what Leonard Peikoff wrote in OPAR, that "[t]here is no basis for the suggestion that consciousness is separable from matter, let alone opposed to it, no hint of immortality, no kinship to any alleged transcendent realm."

Eyal Mozez identifies Dennett as a mechanist/reductionist. Perhaps this is why you have been able to avoid the 'problem of Free Will' for some time now. Please feel free to direct your focus toward anything out there you so choose.

Nicely laid out.

Our abstractions vary in the degree relative to the perceptual level. In that sense, a first level abstraction (lowest order, if you will) is validated by the percept, or perceptual level data. As second level abstraction, in the case of animal, is brought about by integrating dog, cat, man, as against tree. To further move another level of abstraction more removed, would be to take animals and plants as against rocks to integrate and abstract the concept living-organism. Rocks can be subdivided into quarts, mineral, etc, as a second level abstraction Minerals can be further more precisely differentiated into a third level abstraction by subdividing diamonds, quartz, and mica. Protons, neutrons and electrons are no more metaphysically significant than the universe. We may grant atoms epistemological significance relative to the universe as a whole, or grant existence as epistemologically significant when identifying its primacy to consciousness.

Concepts also subdivide and subcategorize the perceptual level concepts such as bird, into eagle, hummingbird, etc.; trees, into oaks, elms, maples, ect.

Nihilism filling a void? Interesting observational integration otherwise.

Jacob86, I would be interested in the answer to Plasmatic's inquiry. Can you cite where Rand supports you on your assertion here? You appear to suggest that the essence of her statement was captured in the preceding paragraph.

If you think it is important or vital to understanding what rationalism is, reviewing the material might be benificial toward that end.

Interesting. For one who can quip from and think they can critique OPAR efficaciously, not to have gleaned from the same section the above questions, is itself an enigma. Did you pull this from someone else's analysis, or just skip over the sections that outlined intrinsicism, rationalism, axiomatic validation and primacy of existence vs. primacy of consciousness?

I need to make an apology regarding my 'verbal judo match' to any practitioners of this worthy endeavor. The analogy I was trying to make is not captured in the reference. A practitioner of Judo spends hours learning, refining and understanding under the guidance of an instructor to learn the proper execution of his techniques to automate them should a situation call for them. Unlike many of the martial arts which hold there are no 'superior' martial arts, only superior martial artists, in philosophy knowledge is judged to be correct or incorrect, and the criteria by which to judge it, must itself be judged. I don't really have a substitute at them moment, save for perhaps a 'verbal barroom brawl', but I would like to withdraw the 'verbal judo match' from this bad selection of an analogy.

We now return you to your regularly scheduled 'verbal judo match', where definitions are approximated via floating abstractions, and rationalization can make use of them without the need to define the terms via their logical hierarchy back to the perceptual observations that gave rise to them.

LEM would in essence be as Parmenides stated it: "What is, is. What is not, is not.", if that states it simply enough. Which I do agree with. (italics edited)

After recently listening to Dr. Corvini's 'The Crisis of Principles in Greek Mathematics', it would appear that Euclidean Geometry kept the deductive formulation for the arena it was intended, mainly planar geometry, for which it is valid, and much of the inductive development was lost historically, as most of the writings prior to Euclid have not survived, a possible testament to the efficacy of this particular work (Euclid's Elements).

I do not know Logic well enough to comment intellegently on LEM. As to Plasmatic's response, I believe this is divirging from the direction that it appeared to be going (epistemologically, I believe) prior to parsing these issues.

Because 'logic', like 'animal' or 'furniture' is an abstraction from abstractions. Logic is derived from the Law of Identity in conjunction with aspects of mathematics. Both the Law of Identity and Mathematics are induced from the perceptual as well. Knowing how to use a concept by without knowing it's perceptual underpinnings leads one into 'rationalism' or 'deducing theorems to your heart's content' without developing the proof (logical hierarchy) and validating the various concepts to their perceptual level.

And while Objectivism views Metaphyisics as the foundational, it is essentially relies on Objectivists Epistimology to integrate them together. Keep in mind, this a broad overview and simplification which relies on contextual usage of many of the concepts used to explain it here. Why start with perception? In short, we open our eyes, we listen with our ears, etc., sensations automatically integrated into percepts (entities) are what we first encounter and concretize. Conceptual consciousness differentiates and integrates the material provided by the senses. Primarily, consciousness is a difference detector if you will. When we observe specific entities to be similar, induction allows us to integrate those instances under the concept we are taught by our parents as 'dog', 'cat', 'table', 'chair'. Later, as we expand our range of knowledge, we further integrate 'dog' & 'cat' under the concept 'animal'; 'table' & 'chair' under the concept of 'furniture'. Note that there are no existents 'animal' or 'furniture'. Animal subsumes 'cat', 'dog', 'horse', 'bird' - which we can point to ostensively and state 'by dog', I mean (pointing at Fido) Fido here. This permits us to 'validate' concepts like 'dog' & 'cat'. This permits us to 'prove' a concept as 'furniture' by identifying the existent/entities it refers to and wrap up the proof with the validation of 'table', 'chair', 'bed', etc. Objectivist epistemology can be touched upon in a forum setting. To be fully grasped, it is best to grapple with it via it's source, "Introduction to Objectivist Epistemology" or in conjunction with "Objectivism: The Philosophy of Ayn Rand".

A similar argument would be to point out to a two-dimensional creature living on a two-dimensional plane that there is a three-dimensional world that the two-dimensional creature is unaware of, references different aspects of reality which are quite demonstatable to us as three-dimensional creatures. To use that to suggest that there is a fourth-dimension that we as three-dimensional creatures are not aware of, could be referred to as 'digging Plato's cave'. The third-dimesional world can be demonstrated: relative to a demonstratable two-dimensional world: is not the demonstration of a four-dimensional world: relative to a demonstratable three-dimensional world.

That which exists, can be demonstrated to exist, incontrovertibly.

Concepts and knowledge are both hierarchial and contextual - grasping them requires establishing both the hierarchy and the context, without which can demonstrably lead to the confusion we have just experienced, and subsequently establishing the hierarchy and context, clarify. Using 'experience' in this context suggests that it could be an axiomatic concept. Circumscribe a sphere inside your tetrahedron. Is it's volume less than or greater than the tetrahedron? Circumscribe a tetrahedron inside the aforementioned sphere. It's volume is less than the sphere. Mathematically, this can be carried out repeatedly, beyond the resolution imposed by our physical abilities to discern the volume of the inscribed from the circumscribed. This may be benificial as a metephor, as experience is ultimately packaged in units of concepts. Mathematics is the science of measurement.

Experience is a concept abstracted from dropping of the specific measurements involved. Experience drops the measurement of time. Some time must have passed, but any amount may have. Experience drops the measurements of objects/entitites, consciousness, in that some thing(s) was observed by somebody(ies) but could be any thing(s) observed by anybody(ies). Experience is an abstraction from abstractions, as concept is an abstraction from abstractions. Concept abstracts from the units of language integrating them into a single unit of language identified as a concept. Experience is a concept integrated from time/entities/consciousness. Concepts are integrated by a process which involves experience. It occurs to me here that you may be speaking of experience existentially. In that context, an infant experiences prior to conceptualization, but will not conceptualize 'experience' until much further along in it's develpment.

Entity is the pre-requisite to concept. Experience is the product of consciousness which is the active process, and existence, being necessary for consciousness to differentiate and integrate from. Entities are percepts automatically integrated from sensations, and later categorized into concepts by a conceptual consciousness. Experience is derived from the relationship of consciousness to existence via time. Consciousness experiences existence, it is not experience that 'permits' consciousness awareness of existence. Experience is an abstraction that relies on the fundementals of existence and consciousness, and the abstraction of time which is derived from consciousness observing the changing of entities spatial relationship to one another.

It was metaphorical. Most of the argument presented here posited against the objectivist identification of metaphysics, rest on floating abstractions or outright invalid concepts. Refusal to define and integrate one's concepts does not bolster their argument. Defining and integrating one's concepts is a volitional activity, open to error and in the face of error, subsequent correction. Several errors have been pointed out on the side of those positing the argument for the existence of God. At that point, an individuals intellectual integrety is made available for evaluation and subsequent judgement. Brian0918 is viewed as 'the strongest opponent' (which inspired my 'vebal judo' metaphor) because he is relying on the previous efforts his mind has made to rigorously define and integrate the concepts he is using, with the generous use of his time to assist those assumed to be in honest pursuit of clarifying their own mental chaos. What his opponents do with the errors that are highlighted and identified will reveal if this is just a 'vebal judo match' or an honest attempt to grasp and comprehend and develop a epistemology to deal with the universe which we all find ourselves a part of. I hope this clarifies what I was talking about.

Well, if the goal is verbal judo, cheering for the team that most aligns with your entrenched viewpoints would be the natural thing to do. If on the otherhand, discovering the proper methods of aligning the concepts in your mind with the observations of the world around you, and the universe which you find yourself a part of, perhaps the percieved winner of a verbal judo contest is not the ultimate standard upon which to base your own personal epistemology.

Rand established the context in which she used the concept. You dropped the context by selecting a different sense that sacrifice could be used as with your opening definition, and tried to equivocate her usage, substituting the definition you selected in its place.