GENIUS FORUMS

"LOL" is your answer?

Okay, fair enough. There's nothing wrong with "lol." It doesn't bother me, just in case you hoped it would.

Dan Rowden wrote:

Dave Toast wrote:

Dan Rowden wrote:Exactly, Dave. "Acausality" in a temporal, empirical sense has always and must always have application - it's inevitable because there's always a limit to what is observable and explicable; that limit may be contingent, it may be final, we'll never be truly sure about that. But this application of the concept of "acausality" is, of course, restricted to empirical considerations because the definition of "cause" being employed is limited to empirical relevance and context.

The inconsequentiality of definitions eh Dan.

In this case it is a final limit btw, that much we do know. But I guess you were refering to the contextual limits of any given current theory.

On what basis do you say we know it's final? I'm not sure I'm convinced of that.

It's just the way it is when it comes to measuring conjugate variables Dan. It's kind of like Incompleteness. We cannot go beyond the level of the Planck scale in this endeavour. Not because of the system of measurement but because it is a fundamental limit, like the speed of light (or more accurately the speed limit of spacetime).

[edit] It's why String theory will never be verifiable.

Unidian wrote:"LOL" is your answer?

Okay, fair enough. There's nothing wrong with "lol." It doesn't bother me, just in case you hoped it would.

That's not what I meant. I thought it was a joke. The lol was because, scientifically, you know exactly what my answer would be.

Of course, philosophically, my answer might differ.

Of course, philosophically, my answer might differ.

What, if anything, is the philosophical value of proclaiming causality as an absolute truth?

Thinking about it can provide the thinker the means to eventually realise the emptiness of absolutes. Kind of like the koans and banging your head against the wall you spoke about the other day.

Oh, in that case, we have no disagreement. Kewl potatoes.

I wish you 4 guys would have a genuine no holds barred debate on the subject of QM and determinism because I'm just about at my wits end with eastern philosphy :D

I've tried to look at this problem from every angle but everyone seems so damn slipperry on the issue.

DQ/KS :"Causality is like a 'theory of everything' because space goat dependent arising is absolutlely true and thus must be defended at all costs.When pressed on this-'well it's only a stepping stone' "

Larkin : "Nargajuna says you're wrong David/Kevin"

Davetoast:"QM shows non-determinsim but this just points to there being no absolute truths"

Unidan:"I'm a determinist but i believe 'shit can just happen' but it's only such a small scale we shouldn't be too concerned about it.Dialectics can show us the way.

Victor :"Shit CAN just happen!"

I'm sure I've misrepresented all of your positions to some extent and for that I apologise.But thats how it comes accross to me.


Me:"Hell is other people."

I'm not sure why David's "Wisdom of the Infinite" isn't a sufficient explanation of causality - both in a linear empirical sense and in a purely logical one. What part of that troubles you (assuming you've read it)?

Ataraxia wrote:Davetoast:"QM shows non-determinsim but this just points to there being no absolute truths"

I'm sure I've misrepresented all of your positions to some extent and for that I apologise.But thats how it comes accross to me.

Yep, you got me almost as wrong as possible. It doesn't prove non-deterministim in the quantum system and it has nothing to do with absolute truths.

Dan Rowden wrote:I'm not sure why David's "Wisdom of the Infinite" isn't a sufficient explanation of causality - both in a linear empirical sense and in a purely logical one. What part of that troubles you (assuming you've read it)?

The 'space goat' troubles me.

"everything depends on everything else" is used as proof that causality is absolutely true in all possible worlds at all times,including the quantum world.Ergo non-determinism and acausality can't exist.

It's neat, but is it correct logic.Is 'dependent arising' really what is happening 'out there' always?

Narganjuna says no, not always(as far as I can tell), and unless I'm reading Unidian and Victor wrongly they have a problem with this claim too.

I'm not accually taken sides on this btw Dan,I don't friggen know.

Dave Toast wrote:

Ataraxia wrote:Davetoast:"QM shows non-determinsim but this just points to there being no absolute truths"

I'm sure I've misrepresented all of your positions to some extent and for that I apologise.But thats how it comes accross to me.

Yep, you got me almost as wrong as possible. It doesn't prove non-deterministim.

Yeah,sorry about that Dave,I did get you wrong on that.

Ataraxia wrote:DQ/KS :"Causality is like a 'theory of everything' because space goat dependent arising is absolutlely true and thus must be defended at all costs.When pressed on this-'well it's only a stepping stone' "

Larkin : "Nargajuna says you're wrong David/Kevin"

I'm not so sure about that. Nagarjuna placed billiard ball causation in the realm of the empirical. He did not do the same with conditionality, or co-dependent origination - logical causality. As such, empirical evidence can never constitute an absolute and so scientific causality or acausality cannot be absolute.

But that isn't the case for conditionality. And conditionality is none other than the causality David and Kevin espouse.

Absolute truths are logical entities. Scientific truths are empirical entities.

None of this matters anyway. Causality is one of the most important tools in the box when it comes to deconstructing yourself. The necessity of absolutes follow in its wake. That's all that matters.

Dave Toast wrote:

Ataraxia wrote:DQ/KS :"Causality is like a 'theory of everything' because space goat dependent arising is absolutlely true and thus must be defended at all costs.When pressed on this-'well it's only a stepping stone' "

Larkin : "Nargajuna says you're wrong David/Kevin"

I'm not so sure about that. Nagarjuna placed billiard ball causation in the realm of the empirical. He did not do the same with conditionality, or co-dependent origination - logical causality. As such, empirical evidence can never constitute an absolute and so scientific causality or acausality cannot be absolute.

But that isn't the case for conditionality. And conditionality is none other than the causality David and Kevin espouse.

Absolute truths are logical entities. ...

Mr. Toast,

You neglected your cites. Where did Nagarjuna allow that this 'conditionality' was absolute truth, and did Nagarjuna assert that 'absolute truths are logical entities'? Of the former, I've been looking through XX Examination of Combination and I don't see any problem. Of the latter, you won't find such a thing in Nagarjuna but knock yourself out. If that's Toast, in Nagarjuna's view it would be toast I think. If the point is to deny thought anything to which it can cling, isn't it a contradiction to suggest there are still some truths to which thought can cling? What liberation is there in clinging?

Dave Toast wrote: As such, empirical evidence can never constitute an absolute and so scientific causality or acausality cannot be absolute.

Ok.

It's also fair to say the mathematics support the acausality hypothesise.But again that could just be be human,all too human.

But that isn't the case for conditionality. And conditionality is none other than the causality David and Kevin espouse.

But isn't this the heart of the matter? QSR conflate conditionality and billiard ball causality as if they where same.And then argue accordingly."acausality can never be absolutely true because of..... conditionality"

So "shut up and calculate" ,you'll see I'm right eventually.

It's all so simple.Why haven't these theoretical physicists grasped this?Why if i pick up any book off the shelf on the subject of QM will there will be some sort of claim that "particles just pop into existence"?

None of this matters anyway. Causality is one of the most important tools in the box when it comes to deconstructing yourself. The necessity of absolutes follow in its wake. That's all that matters.

Fine,but enquiring minds want to know.Isn't that what philosophy is? Trying to put all the pieces together.

I may just as well say neutral monism is true and take it on faith it so.Tuck a copy of the Tao te Ching under my wing and move to my nearest cave.

I'm not trying to be a smart arse here,I'm all at sea over this problem and the 'problem of consciousness'.So much so I've decided to do an undergraduate in philosphy,starting next week.(unfortunately looking at the subjects offered in the first couple of years I'm going to have to wade through a shedload of PoMo first) :(

Nat: What, if anything, is the philosophical value of proclaiming causality as an absolute truth?

Dave: Thinking about it can provide the thinker the means to eventually realise the emptiness of absolutes. Kind of like the koans and banging your head against the wall you spoke about the other day.

Nat: Oh, in that case, we have no disagreement. Kewl potatoes.

Further more, it may not necessarily be that one proclaims “causality” (finger) itself as AN Absolute Truth, rather the ‘realization’ (Moon) itself, as an absolute means to ‘realizations’, and one eventually realizes that there are more than ONE absolute truths, that are however contingent on each other, reduced to two fundamental yin and yang so to speak.

Only the ‘understanding’, ‘realization’ itself could be absolute in any sense, but that too depends on what ‘realization’ isn’t, so the clinging to ‘realizations’ itself falls away.

But I see no emptiness there, but fullness in all its splendour.
But that’s me…. what can I say…. Sue me! :)

I may just as well say neutral monism is true and take it on faith it so.Tuck a copy of the Tao te Ching under my wing and move to my nearest cave.

Why would that be the result of saying neutral monism is true?

I'm not trying to be a smart arse here,I'm all at sea over this problem and the 'problem of consciousness'.So much so I've decided to do an undergraduate in philosphy,starting next week.

College classes are going to help? How do you figure that? Based on what little I've seen of your writing, it's a good statistical bet that your intellect is sharper than that of the professor, most or all of the class, and most of the people who write the textbooks. How is that going to help?

Unidian wrote: Why would that be the result of saying neutral monism is true?

It wouldn't,I'm being flippant.

College classes are going to help? How do you figure that? Based on what little I've seen of your writing, it's a good statistical bet that your intellect is sharper than that of the professor, most or all of the class, and most of the people who write the textbooks. How is that going to help?

Yes,quite a few people with philosophy degrees have said that to me also-it's a waste of time.

The main reason I'm doing it is to really get to the bottom of all the arguments from the Greeks to Kant through Wittgenstein to Heidegger.I've read quite a number of them but have not fully understood.And I need the discipline to stick at it.At the moment I'm all over the place.

Like most people here, i imagine, I want to build my philosophy from the ground up.If at the end it's still the buddha-way, then so be it.

Dave Toast wrote:Absolute truths are logical entities. Scientific truths are empirical entities.

None of this matters anyway. Causality is one of the most important tools in the box when it comes to deconstructing yourself. The necessity of absolutes follow in its wake. That's all that matters.

The point is not to deconstruct, but redefine. Logic alone cannot do this; only experience and the trusting of experience will work. You can deconstruct until you are mentally hamstrung, but all you will have floating around your mind are symbols. The absolute cannot be found in any arrangement of symbols. Eventually, you have to trust what you know.

RobertGreenSky wrote:

Dave Toast wrote:

Ataraxia wrote:DQ/KS :"Causality is like a 'theory of everything' because space goat dependent arising is absolutlely true and thus must be defended at all costs.When pressed on this-'well it's only a stepping stone' "

Larkin : "Nargajuna says you're wrong David/Kevin"

I'm not so sure about that. Nagarjuna placed billiard ball causation in the realm of the empirical. He did not do the same with conditionality, or co-dependent origination - logical causality. As such, empirical evidence can never constitute an absolute and so scientific causality or acausality cannot be absolute.

But that isn't the case for conditionality. And conditionality is none other than the causality David and Kevin espouse.

Absolute truths are logical entities. ...

Mr. Toast,

You neglected your cites. Where did Nagarjuna allow that this 'conditionality' was absolute truth, and did Nagarjuna assert that 'absolute truths are logical entities'? Of the former, I've been looking through XX Examination of Combination and I don't see any problem. Of the latter, you won't find such a thing in Nagarjuna but knock yourself out.

I didn't say that he did allow conditionality as absolute truth, I said the causality he specifically consigned to the mundane is the billiard ball kind.

And of course you're right in that, when speaking explicitly about absolutes and truths, Nagarjuna always affirmed their ultimate emptiness. There is a context here though.

Nagarjuna's was an advanced teaching, spoken from the top of the mountain. You have to be so high up the mountain to hear that teaching clearly. In order to get up to the appropriate height to hear it clearly, one needs a clear and practiced understanding of the nature of truth and absolutes in order to expose and understand and practice emptiness in the first place.

If that's Toast, in Nagarjuna's view it would be toast I think. If the point is to deny thought anything to which it can cling, isn't it a contradiction to suggest there are still some truths to which thought can cling? What liberation is there in clinging?

In order to best get on with the business of not clinging, thought needs to first understand the reasons why it shouldn't cling and it does that via truths. At this stage, affirming the emptiness of absolutes is of no use whatsoever to this mind. Once it understands why it shouldn't cling, it can get on with trying to practice non-attachment. In order to do so, it must have faith in and therefore cling to, at the very least, the truths that underpin the pursuit of the intended 'goal'. Eventually that mind can become so practiced in non-attachment that it can even stop clinging to those last truths and the emptiness of all, even absolutes, is realised.


Just as you use your above truth "If the point is to deny thought anything to which it can cling, isn't it a contradiction to suggest there are still some truths to which thought can cling? What liberation is there in clinging?" as a tool, so too Nagarjuna used truths and absolutes as tools, out of the glare of the spotlight, whilst always affirming the emptiness of absolutes when the light was explicitly upon that matter, because that is the ultimate position. He was a skilled teacher after all.

Here's a similar one to yours from the Twelve Gate Treatise:

"How can nirvana exist as both an existent and a non-existent thing?
There is no existence of both at one and the same place, as in the case of both darkness and light."

Also from the Twelve Gate Treatise:

"Without worldly truth, ultimate truth cannot be obtained. Without obtaining ultimate truth, nirvana cannot be obtained.

The teaching by the Buddhas of the dharma has recourse to two truths:
The world-ensconced truth and the truth which is the highest sense

Those who do not know the distribution of the two kinds of truth
Do not know the profound "point" in the teaching of the Buddha.

The highest sense [of the truth] is not taught apart from practical behavior,
And without having understood the highest sense one cannot understand nirvana."

Ataraxia wrote:

Dave Toast wrote: As such, empirical evidence can never constitute an absolute and so scientific causality or acausality cannot be absolute.

Ok.

It's also fair to say the mathematics support the acausality hypothesise.But again that could just be be human,all too human.

That's exactly what it is. The seeming acausality is not part of the quantum system, it is a result of the maths that has to deal with our inability to delineate and discern precise causes.

But that isn't the case for conditionality. And conditionality is none other than the causality David and Kevin espouse.

But isn't this the heart of the matter? QSR conflate conditionality and billiard ball causality as if they where same.And then argue accordingly."acausality can never be absolutely true because of..... conditionality"

It's not really a conflation because billiard ball causality is, in effect, a subset of conditionality. Conditionality is infinite in nature whereas billiard ball causality is just a scientific and far more precise delineation of it, an attempt to isolate and discern specific, empirical aspects of it.

Of course, billiard ball causality is always going to be contingent thereby.

So "shut up and calculate" ,you'll see I'm right eventually.

It's all so simple.Why haven't these theoretical physicists grasped this?Why if i pick up any book off the shelf on the subject of QM will there will be some sort of claim that "particles just pop into existence"?

None of this matters anyway. Causality is one of the most important tools in the box when it comes to deconstructing yourself. The necessity of absolutes follow in its wake. That's all that matters.

Fine,but enquiring minds want to know.Isn't that what philosophy is? Trying to put all the pieces together.

I may just as well say neutral monism is true and take it on faith it so.Tuck a copy of the Tao te Ching under my wing and move to my nearest cave.

I'm not trying to be a smart arse here,I'm all at sea over this problem and the 'problem of consciousness'.

I'm not with you on much of this. Could you put it another way?

divine focus wrote:

Dave Toast wrote:Absolute truths are logical entities. Scientific truths are empirical entities.

None of this matters anyway. Causality is one of the most important tools in the box when it comes to deconstructing yourself. The necessity of absolutes follow in its wake. That's all that matters.

The point is not to deconstruct, but redefine.

Ok but the point changes as the journey does. In order to redefine, first one simply must deconstruct.

One does not need to complicate in order to simplify. It is not a deconstruction that is necessary, but a new
"story," as Alex put it--a new understanding of yourself compatible with your held beliefs that allows you to put the methods of growth into practice within your experience. Breaking yourself down serves very little purpose except that of the experience itself. The mind does not need accuracy within concepts, but accuracy from experience. It is an accuracy of self, not an accuracy of the outside world. The outside world only exists within concepts, and its reality independent of you must be believed by the mind to be "real' or absolute. Deconstruction cannot happen without this perception, but the perception is not true.

divine focus wrote:One does not need to complicate in order to simplify. It is not a deconstruction that is necessary, but a new
"story," as Alex put it--a new understanding of yourself compatible with your held beliefs that allows you to put the methods of growth into practice within your experience. Breaking yourself down serves very little purpose except that of the experience itself. The mind does not need accuracy within concepts, but accuracy from experience. It is an accuracy of self, not an accuracy of the outside world. The outside world only exists within concepts, and its reality independent of you must be believed by the mind to be "real' or absolute. Deconstruction cannot happen without this perception, but the perception is not true.

Deconstruct as in examine analytically, not as in break yourself down.

double post.

Dave Toast wrote:

Ataraxia wrote:

Dave Toast wrote: As such, empirical evidence can never constitute an absolute and so scientific causality or acausality cannot be absolute.

Ok.

It's also fair to say the mathematics support the acausality hypothesise.But again that could just be be human,all too human.

That's exactly what it is. The seeming acausality is not part of the quantum system, it is a result of the maths that has to deal with our inability to delineate and discern precise causes.

If I'm reading you aright, you are saying acausality only appears to be true, empirically and mathematically.It's not REALLY true,it's not part of the quantum system even though mathematics and empricism, predict ,and have observed it as such.

"Acausality is ultimately impossible because,well,conditionality."

To wit...

DaveT:It's not really a conflation because billiard ball causality is, in effect, a subset of conditionality. Conditionality is infinite in nature whereas billiard ball causality is just a scientific and far more precise delineation of it, an attempt to isolate and discern specific, empirical aspects of it.

Of course, billiard ball causality is always going to be contingent thereby.

Hmmm, a subset.To be honest,it sounds slippery to me.

So is acausailty a subset of conditionality too?

Is it fair to say your position on QM is something like: "Acausality within QM is kind of interesting to study,but it's not really what is going on.I know because conditionality(an infinite,absolute truth) would prevent a non-determinate event,ultimately.Science just haven't yet discovered it's causes"?

I'm not with you on much of this. Could you put it another way?

For the sake of this argument lets assume we are both physicalists for a moment.Can a particle just pop into existence?