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From: william21 Dec 2007 21:47
To: Drew (X3N0PH0N)
7 of 18
I don't think we can imagine a world without causation. We can imagine one where certain individual aspects appear to happen in a non-causal manner. We can even redefine the understanding of a world down to a point where only these types of event are incorporated. But then, I think, these turn out to be simply artefacts constructed from parts of our own world. Nevertheless, I'm not particularly precious about this. It was a scene-setter - not an argument in its own right. I wanted to get across the idea that causation is a pervasive way of understanding the world, even more so than the understanding that comes with logic or mathematics.
I didn't spell out what I meant very clearly. I disagree that the similarity between the necessity of causation and the force of valid logic are the same, because we are, maybe, using varieties of logical language. Neither am I saying that there is a feeling of truth, or a fit based on some match with experience. That latter point was the empiricist view in a nutshell; Hume coming up with the idea that the constant perception of events we call "causes" prior to the events we call "effects", leads to the impression of a supposed relationship which we imbue with necessity.
What I am saying, is that causation is a principal of our comprehension of the world. I'm with Kant here: it isn't something we derive from experience, it's something a priori which makes our experience possible at all. This is what is in common with logic and mathematics. I think it's necessary to bear in mind that the world is a rather rich and complex place with many aspects that we may only come to experience at different points in our lives. The objection might be raised that it is perfectly possible to go through life with no mathematical concepts at all and yet have a full and useful experience of the world. This may be true, but it's also true that it is when you have understood the rules of mathematics that the mathematical world is available to you. Mathematics makes our experience of the mathematical world possible. Logic makes our experience of the logical world possible. To follow up on your Wittgenstein type of question about artistic/musical etc. propositions: yes, there is a similarity.
I didn't spell out what I meant very clearly. I disagree that the similarity between the necessity of causation and the force of valid logic are the same, because we are, maybe, using varieties of logical language. Neither am I saying that there is a feeling of truth, or a fit based on some match with experience. That latter point was the empiricist view in a nutshell; Hume coming up with the idea that the constant perception of events we call "causes" prior to the events we call "effects", leads to the impression of a supposed relationship which we imbue with necessity.
What I am saying, is that causation is a principal of our comprehension of the world. I'm with Kant here: it isn't something we derive from experience, it's something a priori which makes our experience possible at all. This is what is in common with logic and mathematics. I think it's necessary to bear in mind that the world is a rather rich and complex place with many aspects that we may only come to experience at different points in our lives. The objection might be raised that it is perfectly possible to go through life with no mathematical concepts at all and yet have a full and useful experience of the world. This may be true, but it's also true that it is when you have understood the rules of mathematics that the mathematical world is available to you. Mathematics makes our experience of the mathematical world possible. Logic makes our experience of the logical world possible. To follow up on your Wittgenstein type of question about artistic/musical etc. propositions: yes, there is a similarity.
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From: Manthorp21 Dec 2007 22:08
To: william
8 of 18
I agree. I'm watching a vintage ghost story at the moment, so can't respond in the detail that you did; but identifying and making connections seems to me to be a fundemental component of human intelligence. Causality is temporal connectivity.
The apparently non-causal disturbs us hugely, and immediately demands interrogation and the establishing (or invention: ref: God) of cause.
The apparently non-causal disturbs us hugely, and immediately demands interrogation and the establishing (or invention: ref: God) of cause.
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From: Drew (X3N0PH0N)21 Dec 2007 22:21
To: william
9 of 18
I'm kinda lost now, I've forgotten what if anything was in dispute or I didn't understand.
I agree with what you've said (except for being able to imagine a non-causal world) but/and none of that goes towards suggesting that causation is not/is other to (only) conventional, right?
hmm, not sure. Are you saying that even were I to arrive at a non-causal understanding of the world I could only get there through having a causal understanding in the first place?
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From: Drew (X3N0PH0N)21 Dec 2007 22:28
To: Manthorp
10 of 18
But none of that speaks to whether it's 'true' or 'real' or anything, just that it's useful, as it undeniably is (as is our perception of time as linear, which is a pretty closely related thing).
Something being useful doesn't debar something contrary to it also being useful (or from existing). We think of the world as flat and lots of our activities rely on us thinking it is so but that doesn't mean that it's not sometimes useful to think of the world as round or that thinking of the world as round prevents those flat-world activities and none of that has a bearing on which if either are true.
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From: william22 Dec 2007 07:33
To: Drew (X3N0PH0N)
11 of 18
The truth is that there never was any real dispute.
You raised a question in a totally different context, and I siezed on it, wholly unecessarily, to set out a view of causation. I am doing this kind of thing rather a lot at the moment, because I am struggling with some issues at work that are stopping me from sleeping, and I am attempting to keep my mind occupied.
Am I saying "that even were I to arrive at a non-causal understanding of the world I could only get there through having a causal understanding in the first place?"
Not really, since I'm not sure what a non-causal understanding of the world would be like. It's a bit like asking whether in order to understand what a disk would be like without an edge, we first have to understand edges (a bit like). It sounds like a plausible question, but it's really just a string of words in the form of a question - like something one of your owls would come up with. That could sound rather rude, but I don't mean it to be.
I wonder where the impulse to pick at an issue like this comes from? Personally I think it's down to a sort of feeling that we are entitled to answers for all questions and that an answer should be possible if only we could find the place to be, in relation to the issues, where we could truly see what the issues are. It's like the common belief that all will become clear when we die; i.e. move outside the context of our lives. I'm sure that it's the same impulse that led people like Bertrand Russell to come up with meta-languages which, supposedly, stand outside everyday language in order to explain what is inexplicable from inside it.
The problem is, he could never become a native speaker of meta-language, any more than I can learn Owlish.
You raised a question in a totally different context, and I siezed on it, wholly unecessarily, to set out a view of causation. I am doing this kind of thing rather a lot at the moment, because I am struggling with some issues at work that are stopping me from sleeping, and I am attempting to keep my mind occupied.
Am I saying "that even were I to arrive at a non-causal understanding of the world I could only get there through having a causal understanding in the first place?"
Not really, since I'm not sure what a non-causal understanding of the world would be like. It's a bit like asking whether in order to understand what a disk would be like without an edge, we first have to understand edges (a bit like). It sounds like a plausible question, but it's really just a string of words in the form of a question - like something one of your owls would come up with. That could sound rather rude, but I don't mean it to be.
I wonder where the impulse to pick at an issue like this comes from? Personally I think it's down to a sort of feeling that we are entitled to answers for all questions and that an answer should be possible if only we could find the place to be, in relation to the issues, where we could truly see what the issues are. It's like the common belief that all will become clear when we die; i.e. move outside the context of our lives. I'm sure that it's the same impulse that led people like Bertrand Russell to come up with meta-languages which, supposedly, stand outside everyday language in order to explain what is inexplicable from inside it.
The problem is, he could never become a native speaker of meta-language, any more than I can learn Owlish.
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From: koswix22 Dec 2007 15:44
To: william
12 of 18
That's all well and good, but it doesn't answer the /real/ question: just who /is/ Cobra2?
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From: Drew (X3N0PH0N)22 Dec 2007 16:04
To: william
13 of 18
I'm not glad you're struggling with things at work and I'm not glad that you have to do things to keep your mind busy because I know that feeling much too well but I am glad it results in this.
(giggle)
I see the Madhyamaka school's understanding of dependent origination as a non-causal understanding of the world. Do you see it as not non-causal or just as invalid? (It's the reason I asked the Owlish question, I think it might be fair to say that only a being able to think causally could come up with it).
quote:
like something one of your owls would come up with
(giggle)
I see the Madhyamaka school's understanding of dependent origination as a non-causal understanding of the world. Do you see it as not non-causal or just as invalid? (It's the reason I asked the Owlish question, I think it might be fair to say that only a being able to think causally could come up with it).
EDITED: 22 Dec 2007 16:05 by X3N0PH0N
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From: william22 Dec 2007 17:10
To: koswix
14 of 18
The cobra 2 is a criminal organisation...Oh Bugger! No, that's the 39 steps. I dunno.
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From: william22 Dec 2007 17:41
To: Drew (X3N0PH0N)
15 of 18
I'd probably borrow Ludwig W's remark about the solipsist and twist it slightly: what they want to say is correct, only it cannot be said. I might not though. It's ever so slightly arrogant to make glib summations of an entire philosophy, when you don't really know much about it. Bad taste at the very least.
It isn't the approach to understanding causation I would take. They are clearly correct in that all the possible causes and sets of circumstances in creation cannot be determined and hence, this sort of investigation cannot lead to an ultimate truth. But then, I wonder whether the emphasis on the lack of independent reality of phenomena and the emphasis on "dependent origination" is actually a way of setting a frame of mind; like the ladder that you have to climb to get somewhere, but which you then dispose of.
I'm not sure that it's a non-causal view. I think it might be putting causation into a proper place or perspective, by emphasising that it can have no ultimate (as in enlightening) explanatory power. There's a tendency in western thought to assume that science can explain everything. This is very much like, if not completely synonymous with the thought that if only we knew all the causes, then we would know all the answers. So in this sense, relegating cause to it's proper place, is a useful exercise.
I don't think I know Madhyamaka writing well enough to say much more without making crass mistakes. It's years since I read any Bhuddist stuff anyway. I don't really know whether they're getting at a Zeno-like notion that all existence, time, movement etc. are illusions, or whether they're saying something more like a sort of Platonic view of forms. Or something different altogether.
What do you think?
It isn't the approach to understanding causation I would take. They are clearly correct in that all the possible causes and sets of circumstances in creation cannot be determined and hence, this sort of investigation cannot lead to an ultimate truth. But then, I wonder whether the emphasis on the lack of independent reality of phenomena and the emphasis on "dependent origination" is actually a way of setting a frame of mind; like the ladder that you have to climb to get somewhere, but which you then dispose of.
I'm not sure that it's a non-causal view. I think it might be putting causation into a proper place or perspective, by emphasising that it can have no ultimate (as in enlightening) explanatory power. There's a tendency in western thought to assume that science can explain everything. This is very much like, if not completely synonymous with the thought that if only we knew all the causes, then we would know all the answers. So in this sense, relegating cause to it's proper place, is a useful exercise.
I don't think I know Madhyamaka writing well enough to say much more without making crass mistakes. It's years since I read any Bhuddist stuff anyway. I don't really know whether they're getting at a Zeno-like notion that all existence, time, movement etc. are illusions, or whether they're saying something more like a sort of Platonic view of forms. Or something different altogether.
What do you think?
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From: Drew (X3N0PH0N)22 Dec 2007 18:09
To: william
16 of 18
I think I agree with you mostly.
I agree that it's mainly about setting a frame of mind. But then I think the causal way of thinking is, too, for other purposes.
I absolutely agree with what you said about the view of science in western culture. I think that's a big problem.
I think Madhyamaka are definitely saying all that shiz is an illusion but I don't think they're saying it in a Zen way. It smacks more of Taoism (to which, along with Ludy W. I am very sympathetic) to me.
I'm sorry, I haven't really said much. Nothing useful is coming to mind right now.
I agree that it's mainly about setting a frame of mind. But then I think the causal way of thinking is, too, for other purposes.
I absolutely agree with what you said about the view of science in western culture. I think that's a big problem.
I think Madhyamaka are definitely saying all that shiz is an illusion but I don't think they're saying it in a Zen way. It smacks more of Taoism (to which, along with Ludy W. I am very sympathetic) to me.
I'm sorry, I haven't really said much. Nothing useful is coming to mind right now.
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