Does a seperate "self" exist independent of it's space & time?

[El_Machinae]

Telling how many hydrogens are in your concept of justice would probably require a biopsy that you're unwilling to give. But if justice isn't physical, then why can you push for it? I need to use my hands to get justice, don't you?

Additionally, colour is a percept of certain electromagnetic radiations, caused by a comparison between your red & green cones, and then 'flavoured' with your blue cones.

 

[aelf]

Telling how many hydrogens are in your concept of justice would probably require a biopsy that you're unwilling to give. But if justice isn't physical, then why can you push for it? I need to use my hands to get justice, don't you?

Then you'd be talking about the practical applications of justice, wouldn't you? I don't see why there is a problem with the notion that ideas have abstract and practical guises.

Additionally, colour is a percept of certain electromagnetic radiations, caused by a comparison between your red & green cones, and then 'flavoured' with your blue cones.

I'm not very familiar with colours. I think they do receive somewhat different treatment from what we're usually referring to when we talk about ideas.

 

[El_Machinae]

I don't disagree that ideas are abstract. I'd also say that there is an infinite amount of 'idea'. Realising an idea, though, requires a mind. And a mind requires physical components. Any realisation of an idea is a physical thing.

 

[aelf]

I don't disagree that ideas are abstract. I'd also say that there is an infinite amount of 'idea'. Realising an idea, though, requires a mind. And a mind requires physical components. Any realisation of an idea is a physical thing.

And that's not something I dispute.

 

[Agent327]

When asked for comment on this thread Plotinus responded:

What a strange thread. Looks to me like it could do with a healthy injection of scholastic philosophy, most notably the distinction between the formal properties of an idea and its objective properties, but I'm not going to do that.

and after a further question by aelf:

Well, to be honest I don't understand what the OP is even asking. Is he asking if a "self" could exist in a different context? Obviously it could - I could have become a road sweeper, in which case my self would exist in a context other than the one it actually does exist in. Is he asking if a "self" could exist in no context at all? That doesn't sound to me like a meaningful question. And the actual discussion in the thread just seems to meander vaguely between arguments about souls and bickering about Nietzsche. My comment about the formal/objective distinction was in reference to the post that JEELEN linked to, and the argument about whether ideas can exist outside space and time. That desperately needs a definition of "idea" since it's obvious that everyone is talking at immense cross-purposes. (Hint: someone look up the type/token distinction.) It reminds me of late seventeenth-century philosophy, which also consisted mainly of people arguing vehemently about "ideas" without ever agreeing on what they were talking about (look up the debates between Malebranche and Arnauld, and Desgabets and Foucher, for example). So in short I don't think there's much value in commenting on a thread where nothing has been defined and no-one seems to agree on what they're talking about. Sorting that out is the OP's job.

 

[Angst]

By that reasoning, commodities only have exchange value. But we know that they have use values too. A chair is not simply $50, or however much it costs in the market. A chair is a chair. Ergo, just because something is measured by some unit doesn't mean that the thing consists of that unit.

I didn't say my value is equal to 176 cm, my height. It is one of my values, of course, but that's why I can't say what the chemicals are made of, I wouldn't know the accurate measures of all the numbers stored in your brains, your personal dna, your tissue setup, your mental malfunctions or functions (That is, how your brain correlates with the stored information), because it's way beyond the human knowledge as we know of, I'm just thinking logically.

Okay, I looked up and down the thread. I do not see where I said the essence of ideas are eternal.

But your comprehension of ideas does imply that, which you seem not to get. Or do you think ideas change over time in the world you believe exist? From your standing point, do you think that ideas are differating from person to person, as in, judgement and moral is different?

There are a number of problems with your reasoning. You say that ideas do not belong in another realm than ours (Therefore, they belong in space/time), but consists of neither. You say that you don't believe they belong in any spiritual realm or the like, ideas actually belong in our world. You say that ideas belong in our heads, but they have no physical bounds. So, how do ideas exist when they don't? You're having a positive view of the human mind since you seem to think that the human mind can connect with something not of this world.

But really, if that's your reasoning, I'm good to go for it, you can believe it.

Oh, and ideas are eternal due to your logic since, again, something not bound to space/time kinda doesn't have a starting point in a timeline, nor an ending point, is eternal or never happened (As with the concept of 0). When saying ideas are independent of space/time, they're independent of time, they don't have a duration, and there, they're either nonexistant or omnipresent. Or heck, are you simply arguing for ideas not to exist at all? Or nonphysical ideas not to exist at all?

There are two possibilities. Either ideas aren't eternal, but are bound to space/time, and therefore a part of it, chemicals. Or you can say they are independent of space/time, but then they are eternal, since they don't have a duration.

Could you just stop this? I'm tempted to conclude some things about your level of intelligence simply because this is getting so stupid and yet you persist.

You wouldn't. The reason why it got stupid was that your arguments got directed at me instead of my points.

You answered that you don't know. Can I just conclude, therefore, that you're fantasizing?

If you knew anything, at least a few examples would be forthcoming, instead of you merely retreating into the weak "This question is unanswerable!" reply.

Well, I'm just thinking logically. I'm considering your "justice" point from a purely reasonable view. Every human emotion is stored as a chemical. Nothing else. Everything you think about is, in the end, some kind of a file, like stored in a computer. The reason why humans think differently from a computer is simply that our minds are so much more complex, taking more factors into account.

Yeah, look who's getting personal now

You got personal when unecessary, then you got a personal reply.

How do you know I don't say stuff like that in real life? I guarantee you that I do, because I'm just very sarcastic.

Well, then I'm happy I don't debate with you in real life. I know plenty of reasonable people that don't need to mock in order to prove their point.

But during a discussion like this, people in RL also don't tend to try very hard at pretending that they're more sophisticated, outrightly lie about when what the person they're talking to just said and ironically accuse him of doing something that they are doing more than anyone, so it doesn't happen very often. Or perhaps I just don't tend to get into a discussion with people like that and don't even hang around them.

What? Are you saying you just don't like me, or the other way around? I accuse you of getting personal (Which is getting personal) when you get personal, I know it's hypocrisy, but at least I'm the reactive one. And no, I never said I was smart.

I'm sorry if you perpetually think that I'm not brilliant enough for you

Really, now, will you cut the crap. I just said I didn't think you were stupid. All I'm asking for is you to stop the dirt throwing.

So you're arguing with me but you don't know what we're arguing about? No wonder I'm lost

Well, what I said was kinda "I lost track of where we derived from since you began grumbling at me instead of my arguments". You were probably lost because my arguments were presented wrong and confused you, then you got personal at me because you thought I snapped at you I guess.

 

[Greizer85]

I don't really think pure ideas exist on some higher plane or other. I just think that ideas are not physical because they are not subject to the laws of nature, and the neurons and the chemical in our brains are not synonymous with the ideas they carry, maybe like how salt water is not salt. I think these are plain as day.

If ideas are based on our physical properties, and said properties are based on the laws of nature, then ideas could be said to be based on laws of nature by proxy. How meaningful that is I guess depends on your narzness or aelfness.

@lord_joakim: I presume you mean that infinity cannot be fully comprehended without 'Enlightenment' of some sort, or that it cannot be comprehended at all? That still doesn't change the fact that it is an idea. It is then simply an uncomprehendable one. I'm sure that it isn't greatly bothered by its uncomprehendableness.

I am with El Mac in that I think there are an infinite amount of ideas and that it depends on your 'machinery' which ones you can access. Existence on the plane of ideas is not the same as physical existence; ideas are eternal and unalterable. This may reek of backwards thinking, sophistry, what have you; but it avoids most of the problems of the last few pages of this horribly derailed 'ooooh-sooooo-deeeeep' thread.

Although now that I think of it, idea(s) of the self still survive without space and time, so maybe that answers the op's question in some bizarre and useless way.

 

[aelf]

If ideas are based on our physical properties, and said properties are based on the laws of nature, then ideas could be said to be based on laws of nature by proxy.

If someone is thinking of the perfect circle, smash his brain and the idea of the perfect circle doesn't change.

If no one exists to apprehend ideas, then perhaps ideas don't exist. That means they exist only in our minds, but I don't think that means they are entirely dependent on the composition of our brains. And ideas are derived from the material universe, but I don't think that means a change in the material universe would be able to change an idea.

I think it's really too difficult to say that ideas are based on our or the universe's physical properties. Maybe built on and existing alongside, yes.

 

[Greizer85]

If someone is thinking of the perfect circle, smash his brain and the idea of the perfect circle doesn't change.

Change the laws of nature and it will. (...This is a problem even to my previous statement, that ideas are eternal and unchangable. If they require even the context of a particular universe and its natural laws, then they are already dependent on something else and cannot be *pure*. The real question then becomes 'where do natural laws come from?'. I don't think we can ever answer that satisfactorily since we cannot go outside our universe.)

If no one exists to apprehend ideas, then perhaps ideas don't exist. That means they exist only in our minds, but I don't think that means they are *entirely dependent on the composition of our brains. And ideas are derived from the material universe, but I don't think that means a change in the material universe would be able to change an idea.

So ideas are derived from material things, but afterwards become independent (save for the destruction of all observers)? Interesting idea (pun intended). See below for the *.

I think it's really too difficult to say that ideas are based on our or the universe's physical properties. Maybe built on and existing alongside, yes.

This has some of the same difficulties as the mind-body problem. How do physical and non-physical things relate to each other? If ideas cannot be reduced to physical components, and ultimately derived from laws of nature, where does that *'extra non-physical fuzziness' come from?

 

[aelf]

Change the laws of nature and it will. (...This is a problem even to my previous statement, that ideas are eternal and unchangable. If they require even the context of a particular universe and its natural laws, then they are already dependent on something else and cannot be *pure*. The real question then becomes 'where do natural laws come from?'. I don't think we can ever answer that satisfactorily since we cannot go outside our universe.)

So ideas are derived from material things, but afterwards become independent (save for the destruction of all observers)? Interesting idea (pun intended). See below for the *.

This has some of the same difficulties as the mind-body problem. How do physical and non-physical things relate to each other? If ideas cannot be reduced to physical components, and ultimately derived from laws of nature, where does that *'extra non-physical fuzziness' come from?

I don't think we have to think about the mind-body problem or substance dualism/monism to have a clear notion that ideas are not physical or material.

 

[Greizer85]

I don't think we have to think about the mind-body problem or substance dualism/monism to have a clear notion that ideas are not physical or material.

I agree that ideas are not physical. But how do they relate to the physical world? How many atoms are there in someone's concept of justice, as you put it? Put more aptly, how many atoms (and what kind, etc) are needed for someone to come up with his concept of justice? Why is that so? I suppose we can't really answer those questions since we're not neurologists, and even if we were we'd still be far from that level of knowledge. I kind of hope that it will never be reached: imagine if some guy in a white lab-coat could tell you your next thought before you even thought it up yourself.

(And ofc neurologists can't answer the 'why?' question.)

...I've begun to ramble and it seems my comments are as fruitless as in that infamous morality thread. I'll leave you gents to it; I'll be watching though.

 

[aelf]

I agree that ideas are not physical. But how do they relate to the physical world? How many atoms are there in someone's concept of justice, as you put it? Put more aptly, how many atoms (and what kind, etc) are needed for someone to come up with his concept of justice? Why is that so? I suppose we can't really answer those questions since we're not neurologists, and even if we were we'd still be far from that level of knowledge. I kind of hope that it will never be reached: imagine if some guy in a white lab-coat could tell you your next thought before you even thought it up yourself.

(And ofc neurologists can't answer the 'why?' question.)

...I've begun to ramble and it seems my comments are as fruitless as in that infamous morality thread. I'll leave you gents to it; I'll be watching though.

I don't think you're rambling. But my view is this - how exactly ideas relate to the physical world may be a question we can never satisfactorily answer, and yet we can say that ideas are not physical. Just as someone might not know how a liquid relates to its solid form, but he can still tell that it's liquid.

There's no need at all to bring in issues about eternal essence or whatever that sound more like superstition than the obvious things a few of the posters here are saying.