So it's alright for you to do but not anyone else. I get it.

I stand corrected, and thanks for pointing that out. I have never observed that so it never entered my mind. But I would agree that it is worse.

If you want to start getting personal, I'm done.

So if someone saw a picture of an ostrich with a flowing poking out of it's butt and exclaimed "brilliant!" wouldn't it start to become clear that aesthetics are kind of meaningless in this context? If we automatically just look at the range of what we see and label the high end of that range "profoundly aesthetic" won't aesthetic really only mean that people are present?And that they are perceiving and evaluating their perceptions according to what they deem to be aesthetic, yes.

That’s easy enough. I’ll just put it back the was it was before you altered it…

“unlimited supply of raw materials for individuals to shape new forms and plots to serve their own personal, functional and esthetic needs and desires”

I don’t know. But I do know that people have changed the output of Random Number Generators. So how would you classify that?

I just have one question. Can you conceive of anyone every having a sandbox related goal, which would fit within the context of our discussion?

My point here is that it would be much more direct to study the causative process itself, to understand how it works, rather than trying to infer how it works by only studying the effects of the causative process.

Once we understand how that creative process works, then we’ve got the whole universe by the tail, so to speak.

The most fundamental aspects of a game are “winning” and “losing”. Which are defined as succeeding or failing to overcome obstacles. And all games have degrees of difficulty – i.e. “How hard is it to overcome the obstacles.” And the difficulty of the obstacles are different throughout the game.

So “unimaginable cruelty” is nothing more than a personal assessment of the relationship between an obstacle and a player’s abilities – just like any other game.

Well yes, that wold be true, since aesthetics are wholly subjective. But then, I was simply stating my own subjective assessment of the game properties in the first place.


I’m talking about a game here, not a bridge. The purposes are completely different and thus the design criteria must be completely different. Form follows function.

I’m talking about the universe and eternity here, not just the fragile lifeforms on one tiny planet at the edge of a mediocre galaxy in the middle of who knows where. That’s only 1*10^-(very big number)% of the entire game.

Well ok, so that’s your view of how reincarnation fits in with the entire game. But that’s why I said “belief”. Not all beliefs in reincarnation are the same.

Yes it’s true that “the universe game” is not exactly like other games. But then no game is exactly like any other game.

Yeah, that’s a workable analogy – to a point.

Tell that to a five-year-old.

Seriously though, I don’t agree with your assessment of what makes games fun. As I see it, what makes games (or anything else) “fun” is the personal satisfaction of overcoming barriers in the pursuit of a goal. So of course if your only goal is “to understand the rules”, then once that goal is achived, there is no more fun. But “understanding the rules” is not the only goal anyone could ever have. But if one’s goal is to, for example, win duels with other players, then the “rules” include the unpredictable actions of those other players. Or if the game has some sort of “random” events, then a complete understanding of all ther rules is not possible because “randomity” is part of the rules.

And not only that, but one can set a goal, achive it, and then set the same goal again and achieve it - repeatedly. So in that sense, ever a simple “sand box game” can be fun over and over.

I don’t play any games that use the term, so I don’t really know what it means. But if I did, I’m sure I’d probably agree.

You seem to be “consistently contradictory”. (Just kidding – mostly. )

Seriously though, ask a quantum physicist how non-locality and general relativity can be consistent, and then use that answer.

(Hint: We don’t know how they can be consisten. We just assume that they are in some unknown fashion. And we work at finding the missing link in our understanding of them – or not.)

I don’t. I think it’s the other way around. I think it is the fact that the overall viewpoints align, which allows me to better understand the description of those specific pats of the viewpoints. Think of it in the sense of “cultural similarities”. If you grew up in the same culture as someone else, it is easier to understand their expression of ideas that are common to that culture.

That’s intersting perspective. I was thinking more along the lines of using it to help myself and others. But to each his own.

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Sometimes I see things in other’s opinions that cause me to more closely examine my own world view. Sometimes that results in a change my own world view and sometimes it results in a reinforcement of my own world view. So yes, other’s opinions that I disagree with can be useful in shaping my own world view. That is one of the beauties of this forum.

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Will these dashed lines work for you?

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No, I don't think brains/neuraons are a good place to look. At least not when investigating the subjective - simply because that would be investigating how the objective affects the the objective.

But investigating how the subjective effects neurons would be going in the right direction.

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Check out the PEAR research into man/machine interaction and remote viewing: http://www.princeton.edu/~pear

Interesting idea. And actually, it doesn’t seem fundamentally different from the exact situation we are in today from a materialist perspective - the universe started and eventually we came along, noticed it was there, stepped in and started intervening. Now if I didn’t have more faith in something akin (but not identical) to Bohm’s Holographic Universe model, I’d probably be likely to adopt something like that as a philosophical world view.

From my perspective, this universe looks like a good design by almost any standard I can think of – especially if one looks at it like a game.

It is infinitely varied, yet the elegance of its most fundamental operation is almost absurd in its simplicity.

It exhibits a heart-stopping esthetic at all levels.

It is constantly changing at all levels, yet provides enough consistancy to allow players to amass great fortunes of whatever they deem valuable.

It allows for virtually infinite possibilities of game<=>player and player<=>player interaction.

It provides an unlimited supply of raw materials for individuals to shape new forms and plots to serve their own personal, functional and esthetic needs and desires – whatever they may be and however they may change.

It provides a virtually limitless supply of built-in, hidden, and progressively difficult mysteries to solve.

Even the characters themselves have built-in mysteries to solve and abilities to be gained. If you believe in the concept of “reincarnation” it affords an unlimited supply of “lives”. Not only that, but (according to some beliefs) reincarnation itself is a personal mystery to be solved and when one does finally solve it, all the experiences of, and abilities gained in, past lives are unlocked and available in future lives.

And it even allows one to change the very rules of the game itself.

I dunno about you but that’s about as close to the perfect game design as I can possibly imagine.

But that’s just my own personal assessment. I guess anyone can see it as good or bad according to their own assesment criteria.

I agree that it often takes a lot of work and insight to gain an understanding of some peoples perspectives – simply because they can be so different.

But I consider that every perspective/viewpoint/belief system has inherent consistency. Whether or not I consider that consistency to be “logical” is irrelevant. It simply is what it is. And what matters most to me is how closely another system aligns with my own.

So personally, I find that from what I understand of Abra’s and Jeannie’s belief systems, they are the ones (in this forum) that most closely align with my own belief system. Thus, I tend to understand them better than other’s who hold to a more conflicting belief system.

I understand what your saying, but I think you’re a little off the mark regarding “meaning”.

I my view, meanings are fundamentally compartive associations. A single thing by itself (i.e. an object, action or a property), has no intrinsic meaning. It must be compared/associated with something else for there to be meaning.

Properties, on the other hand, are just as you say. The exist regardless of whether they are observed, though about, or compared/associated with anything else.

Your smile and a cat’s tail straight up are not meanings, nor do they “have” intrinsic meanings. Neither does the state of “happiness” have any intrinsic meaning. It is only when the smile/cat’s tail is compared/associated with the state of “happiness” that meaning comes into being.

An good example is a word such as “better”. Its meaning is explicitly dependent on a comparison. Without a comparison of at least three things (two objects and a “rule” of some sort) , the word “better” cannot have any definite meaning.

And since the only thing that can do the comparing/associating is an observer, “meaning” is entirely dependent on an observer performing that action. Thus, we do “give meaning” by comparing/associating.

Anyway, that’s how I see it.

Yes, lots. But that doesn’t mean they’re completely useless. Understanding other’s opinions is can be very useful in predicting how they will act in a given situation.

Self as “a living thing” (human or not) would be the most accurate. However, self as “individual humans” is close enough for general purposes and easiest to work with since we have language which can express the ideas of subjective versus objective.

It’s not a matter of how the scientists should study so much as what they should study. They already know an incredible amount about how the objective affects the objective (i.e. the interactions between matter/energy and spacetime), and a little about how the objective affects the subjective (i.e. external events can actually alter one’s though processes). I’d just like to see more focus on how the subjective affects the objective. (With “how the subjective affects the subjective” a little farther down the line.)

The point being that we understand a lot about how “other” works, but virtually nothing about how “self” works, largely because mainstream science has defined self in terms of other, which I think is a grossly erroneous definition.

Internal/external is pretty close but lacks the concept of source/cause/creation. I think “self-originated/other-originated” may be the closest in terms of common word meanings. But you see my quandary.

Well personally, I was considering the “eternal” idea more seriously than the “unintended creation” idea. It’s just that it was not being discussed very much and I didn’t want to “muddy the waters”. But I actually consider the “eternal” explanation to be much more satisfactory than the “unintended creation”, since it does not exclude the possibility of “ongoing design”.

He makes up the rules and then plays by the rule she made up. Just like anyone who plays a game they made up.

Well then one or both of us misunderstood some context somewhere. I was depending on the context of Abra’s posts back somewhere around page 40 or so, from which I concluded that he meant “happenstance” in the sense of “unintended” as opposed to “random”. And as I think about it, he seemed to me to have used “happenstance” and “random” synonymously to refer to “unintended intention”. SO that’s the context I was operating on.

Well I can only reply by saying that I think you are confusing what I am saying (a thing in and of itself) with things in your mind.

I freely accept that I have not made it clear enough for you to see. I have known from the beginning that that would be the likely outcome of my attempts, and I place no blame on you for that.

Creative,

I screwed up the quote tags in one of my above replies to you. Sorry.

Well I will admit that I obviously lost you

I disagree. I find other peoples opinions are often quite useful to me.

Math and logic are both fabrications. See below for reference to subjective.

You’re quite right that I have been using the word subjective with an intended meaning that does not exactly match any of those definitions. Unfortunately, I know of no other common word that does match exactly. And I often find it impossible to convey the idea of what I mean, even in lengthy and involved face-to-face discussions. (We’ve all had exierience with people who “just don’t get it”. )

But over the course of this thread I think I may have come up with a way of explaining it…

If everything is divided into two categories of “self” and “other”, then subjective is caused/created by self and objective is caused/created by other.

Which could also be stated as: self is the source of the subjective and other is the source of the objective.

Now in that sense, “objective” is pretty close to definition #2 and “subjective is pretty close to both #1 and #3. The main difference is in the assignment of cause/creation/source.

So yes, I know that is somewhat different from the dictionary definition, but if anyone knows of two comparative words that mean what I just described, please let me know.

Shoku said:WOW!
I don’t know where you got that from, but it is so totally not related to any meaning I ever intended that it’s no wonder your questions and replies have baffled me.

Tell that to Creative.

I agree. That is profoundly true. But it doesn’t answer the question.

(Although, changing the subject like you did is an actual demonstration of what you do. So in that sense, I guess you did answer the question indirectly.)

By definition.

No more so than saying an eternal universe got there by chance. An eternal universe didn’t “get there”, it was always there. Just as a creator didn’t “get there”, it was always there.

I’m not saying the design is not all round mew. I’m saying the design is all around me.

(However, I think I may be misunderstanding the referent for “it” in you question.)

Yes, that’s what we’re talking about – the creator of the rules.

Then there can be no meaning to a creator.

But that’s not what I’m saying. I’m only saying that anything without intention behind it is happenstance, by definition.

Interesting. That may be the very reason we so often disagree.

So we have to know logic and facts in order to use logic. I agree with that.

The kicker is that the “logical conclusion” is dependent on logic. And logic is completely man-made.

So value logical conclusion is dependent on a complete fabrication.

Any way you cut it, it eventually comes down to a dependence on the subjective (with the next step up from that being “agreement”).

There is no other starting point.

Which is my point. The “reliability and repeatability” is directly related to the amount of invesigation and research. And there is has been virtually zero investigation and research into the subjective. So it’s no wonder the subjective is considered unrelaible.

It’s almost as if science has decided to take the easy way out and ignore the “hard questions”.

Yes, and that is exactly the whole point of my whole post. The subjective has never been investigated, so how could we possibly know how much and in what way the subjective might actually affect the objective?

We know for a fact that it does in some cases.

And we know for a fact that the effects are “unreliable” in some cases.

But what we don’t know is if and/or how much it effects any of those oh-so-carefully-designed-to-be-completely-subjective “scientific experiments”.

The 'subjective' is only the source of these things because they are man-made concepts/terms which are in place to describe things which are not necessarily man-made...I don’t see any point in the first phrase there. “Man-made concepts/terms” are by definition subjective. So that’s just an identity – “subjective is the source because subjective is the source” or “man-made things are man-made things because they are man-made things”.

So the very concept of “not man-made” is itself subjective. Which means that the concept of something not being subjectively created (i.e. man-made) is subjective. And thus we end up with a subjective concept being created to describe a subjective concept.

In other words, it’s quite literally “all in your head”

I don’t agree with the way that is stated. The way I would state the relationship between subjective and understanding would be more like: “Understanding is subjective”. It may very well influence itself, but that only says “subjective influences subjective”, which I would agree with wholeheartedly.

Oh gosh, there’s that nasty word again.

I’d like to see a definition of, or means of determining, actuality that is not fundamental based on something subjective. (Hint: It can’t be done.)

Well of course they don’t – because that is how they are subjectively defined.

I think this is the perfect place to make my point.

That is a statement of a relationship between two subjective concepts “sky” and “blue”.

What makes it “objective” is the assignment of the relationship. But “assignment” itself is a subjective process. So where’s the “objectivity”?

As best I can tell, objectivity is based on “agreement”. That is, agreement is what determines objectivity.

True.

But it is dependent on your subjective concepts of both “chocolate” and “cacao”.

“…as we have come to know it…” refers strictly to agreement. ”Held up” refers to either agreement, or assertion. Assertion is strictly one-sided, thus subjective. Agreement is dependent on a subjective decision.

Quite the contrary. Those psych pseudo-sciences are the very epitome of the very paradox we ran into with this thread’s OP – assessing first-person qualities from the third person viewpoint. It can’t be done.

This entire post is very misleading and frames subjectivity in such a way as to add value where it does not belong.

I'm not sure that "winning out over adversity" should be considered a necessary process to prove "rightness".

If that is so, then "might makes right" should be considered an accurate statement.

Which would pretty much mean the "bullying" could result in being right.

This one…
http://www.princeton.edu/~pear/pdfs/Change_The_Rules.pdf
http://www.princeton.edu/~pear/pdfs/sos.pdf

First off, you must understand that I am not arguing for a single creator. Most of the arguments for “creator” seem to be oriented in that direction, so when evaluating what I say, be sure to consider that factor.

With that in mind…

What you’re calling the biggest hurdle is not even a hurdle. As far as I’m concerned, it is a scientifically proven fact that we do create reality and the only “causative agent” in that creation is intention. (ref: PEAR man/machine interface research.)

With that as a starting point, I see the follow-up as being a matter of determining limits.

In other words, the “quailty” has been firmly established. Now it’s just a matter of determining "quanitity".

I think you misunderstand Abra’s intent. (And often mine in the same context.) It is not an attempt to redefine the word for purposes of deception or diversion. It is an attempt to use a word whose general meaning most closely aligns with the properties of the thing being referred to.

The only other option is to go through an extremely laborious task of creating a new word, assigning a new meaning to it, and conveying that new meaning to everyone.

What you're labelling as "redefining" is nothing more than a shortcut for the sake of practicality. And it often fails, as does any type of communication where the meanings of the symbols are not agreed upon. But I don't think there is any deceptive or diversionary intent.

So what is/are the other part/s?

(C'mon Creative, work with me here. This type of "pot shot" doesn't help anything. )