Re: Creativity

On 2 Dec 2003 04:38:19 GMT, Neil W Rickert <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> in
comp.ai.philosophy wrote:

>[EMAIL PROTECTED] (Lester Zick) writes:
>>On 1 Dec 2003 01:46:23 GMT, Neil W Rickert <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> in
>>comp.ai.philosophy wrote:
>>>[EMAIL PROTECTED] (Lester Zick) writes:
>>>>On 30 Nov 2003 17:37:30 GMT, Neil W Rickert <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> in
>>>>comp.ai.philosophy wrote:
>>>>>[EMAIL PROTECTED] (Lester Zick) writes:
>
>>>>>>What I will point out for general edification is that everything that
>>>>>>is a property whether seen, thought about, or considered in any way
>>>>>>whatsoever is seen, thought about, and considered within the envelope
>>>>>>of the brain. In other words there is no specifically objective
>>>>>>reality outside the brain/mind complex. And everything we know and can
>>>>>>know of reality inside or outside the brain/mind complex takes place
>>>>>>right in the brain/mind complex.
>
>>>>>This sounds like the solipsist's manifesto.
>
>>>>Why do I get the distinct impression you feel more comfortable
>>>>discussing things in personally abusive terms?
>
>>>I'm sorry that you see it as "personally abusive".  It was not
>>>intended that way.
>
>>>If you don't believe that you are implying solipsism, then you need
>>>to clarify your assertion.
>
>>>>                                               Where do you think
>>>>perception, cognition, and the results of those processes occur? In
>>>>outer space just because you're looking at the moon?
>
>>>The reflecting of sunlight off the moon is an important part of the
>>>processes, and it surely does not occur solely within the brain.
>
>>> ----------
>
>>Let me see if I can clarify what I was describing in mechanical terms.
>
>>Let's say we see the moon and each of us sees it in almost exactly the
>>same way in practical terms.
>
>>Now the moon itself is what I would call a material body. But that
>>materiality is not the same as what we see or what we know in
>>objective terms.
>
>If it is not the same, how could we possibly know that?

Here I'm just framing the problem for analytical purposes. Granted
that I haven't and don't prove the materiality of the moon, I think it
can reasonably be inferred from the consideration of alternatives.
>
>>                 The actual lunar materiality as it exists in space
>>represents a continuum amalgm of undifferentiated material properties
>>which I would call aggregated sensation.
>
>Who or what is having these sensations?  Or is that just a poor
>choice of terminology?

Once again I am not proving the assertion in analytical terms. I am
describing the implications of differential cognition if the doctrine
is correct. The who or what is whatever lies within the differential
envelope defined by the operation of taking differences.
>
>>                                         And that amalgm reacts to
>>other material amalgms in continuum terms according to the differences
>>between and/or among them, things like sunlight, gravitation, etc.
>
>>In looking at the moon what we see however is not its materiality as a
>>whole but certain objective properties selected by our optical,
>>perceptual, and cognitive faculties for a variety of evolutionary and
>>volitional reasons. I say objective in this context but only because
>>those properties have properties to begin with and not because the
>>properties we see are material or because they are external or
>>anything like that. These kinds of considerations we can only know
>>after the fact.
>
>>But the actual perception lies wholly within the brain/mind complex.
>
>Just to be clear, I disagree with that.
>
>>And the same is true for everything we know of or can know of. This
>>doesn't mean that material aggregates like the moon as it exists in
>>outer space lie in the brain/mind complex.
>
>It seems contradictory.  If everything we know lies wholly within the
>brain/mind complex, then whatever of the moon is outside that complex
>would be something that we could not know.

Not something we could not know just something we do not know. We
could presumably always examine those things excluded from present
consideration. Having said which however let me also note that there
may be things we cannot know about the materiality as a whole if these
things do not differ in any regard from anything in our materiality
such that it would produce a difference.
>
>>                                           But it does mean that every
>>property known of the moon and everything else lies in the brain/mind
>>complex because that is where perception and cognition occur in terms
>>of differences and differences are the reason perception and cognition
>>occur inside the brain/mind complex and not anywhere outside.
>
>You wrote of a materiality of the moon.  That's a property.  If
>every property has to lie in the brain/mind complex, then the
>materiality of the moon would have to lie in the brain/mind
>complex.  Now where does that leave the moon itself?

This is a good point. It's true that the materiality of the moon is a
property. It's what I consider an inferred or deduced property in the
sense that it follows from the ability to consider properties of the
moon or anything else different from what we know of such objects in
any particular context.

The skin for example is a much better receptor for a broad array of
materiality aspects than the eye because it is much less decriminating
and what we perceive through the skin is a much grosser representation
of any object and yet is more representative of its materiality than
vision.

So the materiality of the moon or anything else perceived is a
property not seen but deduced or inferred and associated with
perceptual objects.

>
>We do send up unmanned rockets to measure properties of the moon
>and of other things.  How could that possibly work if properties
>lie in the brain/mind complex?

Considered from this perspective it's amazing that any of this does
work. Yet the fact that a rocket seen only in our brain/mind complex
does go to a moon object seen only in our brain/mind complex is a
testament to the extraordinary cognitive development of the brain/mind
complex and the huge effort devoted to the inferential and deductive
mental analysis of those kinds of circumstances over the past several
thousand years.
>
>>The typical solipsist views material aggregates as lying within the
>>brain/mind complex and when he uses the terms objective or subjective
>>what he is referring to are whether those things subject to his will
>>or not. And most opponents of solipsism contend that subjective things
>>lie inside the brain/mind complex and objective things lie outside.
>>However this is an entirely fallacious distinction and badly misjudges
>>the whole meanings of the terms subjective and objective.
>
>When you say it is a fallacious distinction, are you implying that no
>distinction exists between solipsism and its alternatives?  Or are
>you saying that the distinction exists but is different from the
>above?

I'm saying that there is a viable basis for dismissing solipsism but
that the meanings of objective and subjective are misjudged in this
context and thus used inappropriately for rejecting solipsism. The
correct basis for rejecting solipsism is that materiality aggregates
do not and cannot lie within the brain/mind complex because
inferential and deductive logic considerations indicate they lie
outside the skin, skull, etc. If someone chooses to ignore these kinds
of inferential considerations that's his priviledge. But if he chooses
to do so I think he's going to have a pretty hard time even seeing the
moon much less figuring out where it is.
>
>>The only reason I wrote the previously cited thread on solipsism to
>>begin with was that I was immensely frustrated by the conventional
>>approaches to the problem. It's an old and very stupid philosophical
>>doctrine that should have been dealt with centuries ago in definitive
>>terms.
>
>>The term objective simply refers to things having definable, known, or
>>knowable properties. In point of fact there are no definable "things"
>>in the brain/mind complex except properties and properties of other
>>properties and those properties are the result of differences between
>>material circumstances whether originating inside or outside the
>>brain/mind complex.
>
>If properties are the results of differences, then how exactly do we
>determine these differences?  Are you saying that there is some sort
>of "difference operation" that can be performed on material
>circumstances?  And if the material circumstances exist outside the
>brain, and the differences (otherwise known as properties) exist only
>inside the brain, then is there some magic going on that creates
>these differences only inside?

This is pretty much the idea except that it isn't magic. If we look at
material aspects of some materiality, what can we say about them? One
important thing that I could suggest is that they have more or less
indefinite bounds in physical spatial terms perhaps extending out as
far as the optical horizon in space around 15 billion light years.
It's true that the significance of those properties diminishes greatly
just a few centimeters or meters away from what we call the surface of
an object but I can't see any basis or reason to deny that those
properties permeate space more or less indefinitely in all directions.

And the same would be true of any aspect of the materiality of our
brains as well. However the difference between two aspects of those
materialities would not. It would only correspond to the difference
between them and would be finite and limited. I assume that whatever
difference operation is involved leaves the difference in the brain.
Or perhaps we might define the brain in terms of differences left in
the brain by that operation on the assumption that the brain can only
work on differences and needs the results of differences as the
mechanical basis for information and whatever it can know.
>
>>This is why the doctrine of differential cognition is crucial to the
>>comprehension of what goes on in the brain/mind complex and why there
>>is a mind in literal mechanical terms and why the brain is not just an
>>especially complex piece of neural machinery. But it turns out that
>>solipsism is also a critical limiting link in analyzing the problem.
>>Not so much because it represents a credible possibility but because
>>it highlights the issues involved, issues the importance of which I
>>didn't begin to appreciate until I started considering the problem in
>>critical terms.
>
>For the present, I remain skeptical of your "differential cognition",
>because there seem to be far too many loose ends.

You know if the idea of differential cognition is actually correct,
I'm faced with the very difficult problem of trying to communicate it
in the most efficacious way. I could have started at the top and
worked down. But I chose to start somewhere in the middle because you
guys seem interested and capable of disciplined thought on the subject
of cognition and the mechanics involved.

If I had started at the top I think I would have lost the audience
immediately because it really begins with a very brief outline of
metaphysics as the science of reality. (And no I'm not tripping out
and going religious. When I say metaphysics as science I mean
analytical considerations and conclusions as hard as any found in
geometry or any other kind of analytical science.)

So the problem I'm faced with is either saying too much or too little.
In the preceeding post I obviously said too little. I'm hoping that in
the present post I'm saying exactly the right amount for general
descriptive purposes. Subject to clarifications and explanations.

>
>>I realize that I have drawn several very fine and idiosyncratic
>>terminological distinctions in the course of elaborating differential
>>cognition. The terminology however isn't so important as the
>>properties and mechanics of the brain/mind complex they describe.
>>(By the way, Omega, this is the reason I didn't seem very enthusiastic
>>about your suggestion regarding receptors, etc. These things may exist
>>but the real issue is whether they are part of perception or cognition
>>or just what.)
>
>>So where do we get notions like inside or outside the brain/mind
>>complex in definitive terms? It's all in the logical relations between
>>and among the things we see in perception and in the mind. These are
>>all objective so the fact that we see them has no bearing on the issue
>>of inside or outside We judge whether something is inside or outside
>>the brain/mind complex according to the relations between things.
>
>That paragraph could be a description of George Berkeley's idealism.

I don't doubt that the idea has been presaged by others. What I
consider original however is the differential basis for what I'm
suggesting because it shows the mechanics involved and shows
why and how they have to be exactly what they are. What I don't show
is the material basis for taking of differences within the brain. But
this is something I think I'll have to leave to neuroscientists to
figure out.
>
>>If what we see as the moon is occluded by other things, we know or
>>infer that the moon lies beyond those things and those other things
>>are intervening.
>
>But how could that inference work if what we see is entirely
>within the brain/mind complex?  There seem to be huge gaps
>in your account.

How does inferential spatial perspective work? It doesn't work because
we pace it off. It works because perceptual and cognitive organs take
and create differences and differences among differences until they
reduce differences between or among things perceived or cogitated on
to a minimum as far as I can tell. The end result is what I call
making sense out of a perceptual or cognitive field.
>
>>                 And if those things lie beyond our arms or noses we
>>know that those things also lie outside whatever is defined as lying
>>within arms, noses, the skin, etc. This is exactly what babies do in
>>the course of their cognitive development and why it takes so long.
>>They have to formulate and automate all their cognitive relations in
>>spatial, temporal, and logical terms. In other words they have to
>>learn to judge things in terms of perspective.
>
>But if perception occurs only within the brain/mind complex,
>how can babies learn as you describe?

If you mean the mechanics of how babies actually learn to coordinate
their eyes etc. I don't think I'm the best source. But I do know and
understand that they do it by means of differential inference however
it's done in neurological terms.

I can appreciate your skepticism with respect to differential
mechanics as the mechanical basis for perception and cognition.
What's puzzling here is not so much the reluctance to agree with
differential cognition but rather the locus of perceptions and
cognitions.  It's really more a question of what's the alternative?
Where do you think perceptions and congitions could actually lie?

Clearly our perception of the moon doesn't actually lie in outer space
because we wouldn't be able to cogitate on the perception in our
brains if it did. And similarly reflected light from the moon doesn't
constitute an ipso facto perception of the moon because if it did our
skin would perceive it as well. Not to mention which if reflected
light from the moon constituted a perception in itself we would have
no way to limit perception in physical terms to any proximity for the
purpose of cognition and consideration in terms of other perceptions.

It's apparent to me at least that all these things are in fact
confined to an envelope which constitutes the brain/mind complex and
that this proximity is circumscribed and defined as a result of the
differential mechanics involved.

>
>>This is why we all tend to see things like the moon in very similar
>>ways - because we all see it through exactly the same processes of
>>logical inference applied to perspective.  And this is also why
>>Renaissance painters became famous for their renderings of spatial
>>perspective, because it had unstated and previously unrecognized
>>cognitive implications applicable to every individual.
>
>Your paragraph starts with "This".  I cannot work out what
>that "this" refers to.  On the face of it, everything you see
>about the moon occurs in your brain/mind complex, and everything
>I see about the moon occurs in my brain/mind complex.  It would
>seem that there is no possibility of communication or comparison.

The "This" is a general reference to preceeding comments regarding
geometric, temporal, and logical perspective and why application of
identical considerations in our brains permits communication. What I
should say here is that the communication testifies to a commonality
of the inferential mechanics involved in each of us. We see the same
or similar things because our inferential mechanics are the same or
similar.

I doubt we could say the same of tigers or insects because they
presumably use different inferential mechanics that do not permit
interchange of information on any common methodological foundation.
This represents one reason they can't communicate in abstract terms.
In fact it isn't clear that individuals of a common species can
communicate in abstract terms either but the rationale is probably a
little more involved in such cases.

>
>Again, there appear to be enourmous gaps in your account.
>
>I will stop my comments at this point.  The remainder of
>what you wrote is highly dependent on the things above that
>are quite unclear.
>



Regards - Lester