This has nothing to do with the question I wanted you to answer.
It is about the why question: why is there affectance? How does affectance come into the universe? That is the question.
I give in my own words the definition of “affectance” given by James S. Saint:
“Affectance = ultra-tiny influences or changes in affect potential. … - Affectance: - Physics: Ultra-tiny, mostly randomized electromagnetic pulses, where “positive” is electrically positive potential and “negative” is electrically negative potential.” The other definition is the one you quoted last:
"Existence == that which has affect or potential to affect."In fact, if you rearrange this sentence a little bit, it tells us:
“Affect or potential to affect is existence”.
So James was an existential philosopher. And I too would like the topic of my thread to be understood in terms of existential philosophy. Please do not say now “I would not say that James was an existential philosopher”. That is irrelevant. But my question remains: Why is there such a thing? So I am not asking now about affect, affectance, potential to affect, but about the “is”!
Has James given an answer to this? (I have, as I said, not read the whole Mithus book).
An existential philosopher asks about the “is” (the “==” in your definition quote). And in doing so, he touches on a subject I have pointed out many times here. It boils down to God, or questions like this: “Why is something at all and not rather nothing?” (Leibniz).
“Explain to me once, Meno or Obsvr, why the universe exists, if it exists”
The universe exits, if it does, because if it didnt, then we would or could be here talking about it. This simplicity may offend some, but really calls to bring down to real means more then trying to prove that Methus’ book was read or not.
The fact is, and a priveable existential fact that esse est percipii is now considered a Proven mandate until otherwise rebutted.
This is a long held meta-phisic, where the length of even one day has stretched even up to almost the limit, while the perceived length of one 24 period has developed a calculus of many variables, actually shortening the same temporal evolution.
The universe’s existance, even without defining the terms, could not have bought the romulus and Remus co-construction of evolution without a temporal overpass of this coupling.
Therefore, I can stretche it to a coexistently evolved calculus, that center on a middle that is it’s vanishing point.
There is no existence without perception if this essential enomaly
Apparently you didn’t understand my response (there was a lot to it) -
Then followed by -
Now would you like for me to post his maths on the subject to display his reasoning as to WHY it is logically impossible to have non-existence? It is a bit heady.
So you are saying that the universe exists because our perception exists.
A critic would now say that this is wrong. And he would ask you for proofs of your assertion which you cannot give clearly and speak instead only of a “mandate” which “applies as long as it applies” (until the counter-mandate namely).
Note: I am playing the “critic’s lawyer” here. My opinion on this is another matter.
I know that argument. And I already read the text you quoted three or four months ago.
Now my questions:
Do you agree that there is death?
Do you know what death means?
Do you agree if someone says that nothingness is not the only alternative to existence?
Are the alternatives, if they exist, all irrational?
And if they are irrational, then your answer should actually be that there is no rational alternative to existence. We talk or should talk about the relation between the irrational and the rational. There are under circumstances innumerable alternatives, but all of them are irrational.
What I am saying is that it is very difficult to fight the irrational because it is so powerful.
“Credo quia absurdum est” (“I believe because it is absurd”, means that "I believe because it is contrary to reason (i.e. because it exceeds the capacity of reason).
But you should continue like this, because you can actually come the irrational only with rational arguments.
I don’t think you understood the premise that for anything to exist it must affect something.
Are you claiming to believe that something that has absolutely no affect on anything at all exists? Can you name that something? (one of James’ arguments).
Yes, I am aware that some of the definitions you provided are not the ones you came up with yourself (such as the Wikipedia one.) It might also be the case that there are definitions among the ones you provided for which I mistakenly believe to be your own discovery. And yes, I am aware that not every word you wrote was meant to convey a definition of some sort. That’s the reason I said that you “provided a number of definitions and hints”.
None of this, however, seems to be relevant. My point is merely that you are not painting a clear picture of your ideas. In other words, your posts are difficult to understand – they are incomprehensible – which is why I think they need to be revised. Do you want to be understood rather than not understood (or even worse, misunderstood)?
I don’t always write (or talk) about definitions but in certain cases it is necessary to do so. If I don’t understand a word (or rather, what someone means by that word) I need to ask for a definition. Similarly, when other people don’t understand what I mean by some word, I have to define it for them. Seems like a rational thing to do.
And here’s yet another sentence I don’t understand.
What makes you think that I don’t? I already provided three different definitions. But that tells me little to nothing about how you define the word. And it is your definition that matters because it is your posts that I am reading. You are a writer, I am a reader. Everything you write will be read by someone and it will affect them somehow (positively or negatively.) Do you really want to confuse other people? Is that your goal? Or is it a price that you think should be paid in order to reach those who will understand you with little to no effort? And even then, why should a community care? Why should a community allow their writers to disrespect their readers?
Then we’re in disagreement. Anyone else here who disagrees with the above?
Shall we make it a test? And note that it’s important that other people truly understand you and not merely think they understand you. The Emperor’s New Clothes comes to mind.
The quotation marks are set differently. I claim with the quotation marks at the word “argument” that the irrational can present arguments only under certain conditions, because arguments are a matter of the rational. You claim with the quotation marks at the word “irrational” that the irrational is the not-really-to-be-taken-seriously and nevertheless assign complete justification to the argument in your term. This shows that we are arguing from two different sides. And since I play the role of the critic’s advocate here (with the criticism against the rational), I have to defend the irrational, because I am of the opinion that one can only get a grip on the irrational via the way of experience with the irrational. Because: the fact that the irrational is in the world, and unfortunately with more power than the rational - you don’t deny that either.
As I said: I am playing the critic’s lawyer.
And we can affirm the following question:
Nice.
I don’t claim or necessarily believe that something that has absolutely no influence on anything exists; however, I do claim (on behalf of my clients) that this belief has always been, is, and will always be an option for people. My clients say that no one knows the final answers (not even the fabled James S. Saint) - except God, if He exists, and if so, then this is a matter more of belief, thus more of irrationality than of rationality.
If it exists, then it could be God. But if so, then we could not say “God is …”, because “is” is a matter of being, of existence.
According to Aristotle, God is “unmoved” but has “moved” something. Therefore, it is not him.
James S. Saint spoke not only of God but also of a “real God”, but this one can’t be meant here either, because according to him the affectance is at home in the real. I do not James S. Saint’s “RM:AO” well enough in this context. But I hope you will tell me right away what James S. Saint meant by that “something”…
[tab]By the way:
Why did James S. Saint not get a Nobel Prize?
Because of the fact that irrationalists rule. Right?[/tab]
What it means is only that we were using the quotes for different purposes. You used them to express - to quote you - “not-really-to-be-taken-seriously”. And I used them only - to quote you.
There is a whole lot I could say about that - but I don’t know how much of James’ ontology you have read. Did you watch that video I posted above? In that he speaks of an “exclusion barrier”. And in other posts he explains that without that barrier annihilation occurs. Yes, irrationality is powerful - for destruction. If it is not kept separate from the construction/rationality effort - the rationality is dispersed and without the rational the irrational can no longer exist so is dispersed as well - mutual annihilation.
And if you mean by “experience the irrational” that you live around it - you already have that all around - but if you mean “experience of being it” - I think that you don’t merely experience being it - you become it (from which there may be no return) - to be excluded so that the positive AND you can survive (the exclusion barrier).
Does that mean that it is the kind of example you were referring to?
That would be an example of an irrational belief. But you avoided an answer (“I don’t claim or necessarily believe” - doesn’t answer the question). I think keeping the doubt in your mind prevents you from fully understanding it - some things are unavoidably and necessarily true and you have to find the confidence to know when you see one. In this case - and as he argued - “it is pointless to accept otherwise”.
Again - an example of irrational belief (having no rationale behind it).
I have to guess at what you mean by the way you used your words.
The first time I saw James use that idea (that if something exists - it must have affect on something) was years before he came here - debating with atheists over the existence of God on a “We hate Christians” type board (forgot the name). They all agreed and the debate continued from there - where he proved that by all of the available definitions of “God” - God had affect on people - therefore God exists.
Again having to guess your meaning - James’ “must have affect upon something” meant (and he explained this) that to affect something is to change it and since the “it” must exist to be changed - the “it” is merely another affecting existence - “Affectance and the universe is nothing but affect-upon-affect.” - one of his cool videos.
He should have added the sound track from The Matrix to that.
Or maybe from the introduction to the Star Trek series.
And now I realize why that last video was so fuzzy - it had been reduced.
[tab]By the way:
Why did James S. Saint not get a Nobel Prize?
Because of the fact that irrationalists rule. Right?
James’ words - “You have to be a member of the church to be favorably recognized by it”
Nothing to do with irrationality - merely a different “church”/ontology[/tab]
I am of the opinion that there are many useful mathematical expressions that are oxymorons.
In general, I think that just because an expression contains a contradiction does not mean it is a useless one.
An example would be (1.90). This expression stands for a number that you get when you calculate the result of (1 + 9 \div 10). But can you calculate the result of that expression? What’s the result of (9 \div 10)? How can you come up with a set of (10) groups such that 1) each group contains the same number of items, and 2) the total number of items is equal to (9)? You can’t. With that in mind, I think it’s safe to conclude that the expression must be a contradictory one. But if you take that expression and further process it by say multiplying it by (10), you get an expression that is not an oxymoron – you get (190). Another way to process it is to add “m” to it to get “1.90m” which means “1.90 meters”. And if meters can be divided into 10 equal parts, then we’re freed from contradiction.
At other times, we can approximate. If we get a result such as (\sqrt{2}), we can substitute that with an expression such as (1.42). This can be justified on the ground that the model we are using is not an accurate representation of reality.
I don’t think there is anything wrong/irrational/illogical with the numbers. It is what you are trying to do with them. Your efforts are irrational - not the numbers. They call certain kinds of numbers “irrational” only because of what they can’t do with them - they can’t ration those numbers the way they want to.
Perhaps, but there are also other, more philosophical, spiritual, practical ways to approach Pi:
Max [voiceover]: Something’s going on. It has to do with that number. There’s an answer in that number.
…
Max [voiceover]: Restate my assumptions: 1] Mathematics is the language of nature. 2] Everything around us can be represented and understood through numbers. 3] If you graph the numbers of any system, patterns emerge. Therefore, there are patterns everywhere in nature. Evidence: The cycling of disease epidemics; the wax and wane of caribou populations; sun spot cycles; the rise and fall of the Nile. So, what about the stock market? The universe of numbers that represents the global economy. Millions of hands at work, billions of minds. A vast network, screaming with life. An organism. A natural organism. My hypothesis: Within the stock market, there is a pattern as well… Right in front of me…hiding behind the numbers. Always has been.
…
Sol: But life isn’t just mathematics, Max. I spent 40 years searching for patterns in Pi. I found nothing.
Max: You found things.
Sol: I found things…but not a pattern. Not a pattern.
…
Max [voiceover]: Sol died a little when he stopped research on Pi. It wasn’t just the stroke. He stopped caring. How could he stop, when he was so close to seeing Pi for what it really is? How could you stop believing that there is a pattern, an ordered shape behind those numbers, when you were so close? We see the simplicity of the circle, we see the maddening complexity of the endless numbers 3.14 off into infinity.
…
Lenny: Hebrew is all math. It’s all numbers. You know that? Look. Ancient Jews used Hebrew as their numerical system. Each letter’s a number. The Hebrew A, Aleph, is 1. B, Bet, is 2. Understand? But look, the numbers are interrelated. Take the Hebrew for father, ab. Aleph, Bet. 1 plus 2 equals 3. The word for mother, haim. Aleph, Mem. 140 equals the sum of 3 and 41. 44. Now, the Hebrew word for child - mother, father, child. Yelev. That’s 10, 30 and 4. 44. Torah is just a long string of numbers. Some say that it’s a code, sent to us from God.
…
Max [voiceover]: Failed treatments to date: Beta blockers, calcium channel blockers, adrenalin injections, high dose ibuprofen, steroids, Trager Mentastics, violent exercise, cafergot suppositories, caffeine, acupuncture, marijuana, Percodan, Midrine, Tenormin, Sansert, homeopathics. No results. No results. No results.
…
Sol: What…What’s happened?
Max: First, I get these crazy low picks, then it spit out this string of numbers. I never saw anything like it. And then it fries. It crashed.
Sol: You have a print out? Of the picks, the number?
Max: I threw it out.
Sol: What number did it spit out?
Max: I don’t know, a string of digits.
Sol: How many?
Max: I don’t know.
Sol: What is it …a 100, a 1000, 216? How many?
Max: Probably around 200. Why?
Sol: I dealt with some bugs back in my Pi days. I wondered if it was like one I ran into.
…
Sol: You remember Archimedes of Syracuse, eh? The king asks Archimedes to determine if a present he’s received is actually solid gold. Unsolved problem at the time. It tortures the great Greek mathematician for weeks - insomnia haunts him and he twists and turns in his bed for nights on end. Finally, his equally exhausted wife - she’s forced to share a bed with this genius - convinces him to take a bath to relax. While he’s entering the tub, Archimedes notices the bath water rise. Displacement, a way to determine volume, and that’s a way to determine density - weight over volume. And thus, Archimedes solves the problem. He screams “Eureka” and he is so overwhelmed he runs dripping naked through the streets to the king’s palace to report his discovery.
[pause]
Sol: Now, what is the moral of the story?
Max: That a breakthrough will come.
Sol: Wrong! The point of the story is the wife. You listen to your wife, she will give you perspective, meaning. You need a break, you have to take a bath or you will get nowhere!
…
Lenny: We’re searching for a pattern in the Torah.
Max: What kind?
Lenny: We’re not sure. All we know is it’s 216 digits long.
…
Max: You asked me if I’d seen a 216 digit number.
Sol: Oh, yeah. You mean the bug. I ran into it working on Pi.
Max: What do you mean ran into it?
Sol: Max, what’s this about?
Max: There are these religious Jews I’ve been talking to. Hasids, the guys with beards. I know one from a coffee shop. He’s a number theorist. The Torah is his data set. He says they’re after a 216-digit number in the Torah.
Sol: Come on, it’s just coincidence.
Max: There’s something else, though. You remember those weird stock picks? They were correct. I got two picks on the nose. Smack on the nose, Sol. Something’s going on. It has to do with that number. There’s an answer in it.
…
Sol: The Ancient Japanese considered the Go board to be a microcosm of the universe. Although when it is empty it appears to be simple and ordered, in fact, the possibilities of gameplay are endless. They say that no two Go games have ever been alike. Just like snowflakes. So, the Go board actually represents an extremely complex and chaotic universe. So, the Go board actually represents an extremely complex and chaotic universe. And that’s the truth of our world, Max. It can’t be easily summed up with math. There is no simple pattern.
Max: But as the game progresses, the possibilities become smaller. The board takes on order. Soon, every move’s predictable. So maybe, even though we’re not aware of it, there is a pattern, an order underlying every Go game. Maybe it’s like the pattern in the stock market? The Torah? This 216 number?
Sol: This is insanity, Max!.
Max: Or maybe it’s genius.
Sol: Listen to yourself. You’re connecting my computer bug with one you might’ve had and some religious hogwash! You want to find the number 216 in the world, you will be able to find it everywhere. 216 steps from a mere street corner to your front door. 216 seconds you spend riding on the elevator. When your mind becomes obsessed with anything, you will filter everything else out and find that thing everywhere.
…
Marcy: Mr Cohen…
Max: God damn it! I’m sick of you following me. I’m not interested in money. I want to understand our world. I don’t deal with petty materialists like you.
…
Max [voiceover]: More evidence. Remember da Vinci. Artist, inventor, sculptor, naturalist. ltaly, 15th century. Rediscovered the perfection of the golden rectangle and pencilled it into his masterpieces. Connecting a curve through the concentric golden rectangles, you generate the mythical golden spiral. Pythagoras loved this shape, for he found it in nature - a nautilus shell, rams’ horns, whirlpools, tornadoes, our fingerprints, our DNA and even our Milky Way.
…
Max: You lied to me.
Sol: You have it? OK, sit down. I gave up before I pinpointed it, but my guess is that certain problems cause computers to get stuck in a loop. The loop leads to meltdown, but just before they crash they become aware of their own structure. The computer has a sense of its own silicon nature and it prints out its ingredients.
Max: The computer becomes conscious?
Sol: In…In some ways…I guess. Studying the pattern made Euclid conscious of itself. It died spitting out the number.
Max: Consciousness is the number?
Sol: No, Max. It’s only a nasty bug.
Max: It’s more than that.
Sol: No. It’s a dead end! There’s nothing there!
Max: It’s a door, Sol. A door.
Sol: A door to a cliff, you’re driving yourself over the edge. You need to stop.
Max: You were afraid. - That’s why you quit.
Sol: I got burnt. It caused my stroke!
Max: That’s bullshit! It’s mathematics, numbers, ideas. Mathematicians should go to the edge. You taught me that.
Sol: It’s death!
Max: You can’t tell me what it is. You’ve retreated to your Go and books and goldfish.
Sol: Max, go home.
…
Marcy [to Max]: You don’t understand it, do you? I don’t give a shit about you! I only care about what’s in your fucking head! If you won’t help us, help yourself. We are forced to comply to the laws of nature. Survival of the fittest Max, and we’ve got the fucking gun!
…
Lenny: Where’s the number?
Max: It’s not on me. It’s in my head.
Lenny: Did you give it to those Wall Street bastards.
…
Rabbi Cohen: The High Priest had one ritual to perform there. He had to intone a single word. That word was the true name of God.
Max: So?
Rabbi Cohen: The true name, which only the Cohanim knew, was 216 letters long.
Max: Are you telling me that…that the number in my head is the true name of God?
Rabbi: Yes! It’s the key to the Messianic age. It will take us closer to the Garden of Eden. As the temple burnt, the Talmud tells us the High Priest walked into the flames. He took the key to the top of the building, the heavens opened and received the key from the priest’s outstretched hand. We have been looking for that key ever since. And you may have found it.
Max: I saw God.
Rabbi Cohen: No. You are not pure. You cannot see God unless you are pure.
Max: No…I saw everything.
Rabbi Cohen: You saw nothing, only a glimpse. There’s so much more. We can unlock the door and show God we’re pure again.
Max: You’re not pure. How are you pure? I found it!
Rabbi Cohen: Who do you think you are? You are only a vessel from God. You’re carrying a delivery meant for us!
Max: It was given to me. It’s inside of me. It’s changing me.
Rabbi Cohen: It’s killing you! Because you are not ready to receive it.
Max: It’s just a number. I’m sure you’ve written down every 216-digit number. You’ve translated all of them. You’ve intoned them all. Haven’t you? What’s it gotten you? The number is nothing. It’s the meaning. The syntax. It’s what’s between the numbers. You haven’t understood it. It’s because it’s not for you. I’ve got it. I’ve got it! I understand it. And I’m gonna see it. Rabbi, I was chosen.
Can you have (10) groups each one containing (0.9) numbers?
If (0.9) is a valid number, then we should be able to use it to quantify anything i.e. there should be no problem saying something like “Set (A) contains (0.9) numbers”.
One possible interpretation of (0.9) is “nine tenths”. Would you say “nine tenths” is a number? How about merely “tenth”? Or “half”? Is that a number? To me, it looks more like a function – similar to that if square root. A tenth of some number (x) is some number (y) such that (10 \times y = x). But it seems that (9 \div 10) stands for the result of the operation of dividing (9) by (10) rather than a function such as (f(x) = \frac{9}{10} \times x).
In order to turn (9 \div 10) into a valid number, you have to combine it with a valid number. An example would be (100 \times 9 \div 10). That’s a valid number: (90).
It’s similar to how in order to turn a statement such as “Donald Trump’s hair is” into a valid one, you have to combine it with an appropriate word such as “blonde”.
Does anyone know if James was asked this question about pi?
It seems to me that when anyone strongly believes that something should work one way yet persistently can never get it to work that way - they just might get a little crazy. They are clinging onto an irrational belief - so they become irrational themselves.
That isn’t what you asked to accomplish.
I must be missing what you are trying to say. But a decimal is an amount or quantity - not a function - which is a process description.
I think this whole pi issue is related to Cantor’s thesis on the fact that there are more finite numbers than can fit on an infinite line. The reason he said that was that he counted every ratio as a “finite number” (James disagreed that all ratios are “numbers” - similar to his “0.999…” is NOT a number/quantity but merely an endless set of digits).
There are more ratios of numbers than there are numbers. That is simple logic. So of course Cantor was right. Why they couldn’t see that way back then - I don’t know but I suspect it was because they thought of every ratio as a number (again a “get your words straight” issue - leading to all paradoxes and irrational thinking).
And when you try to calculate pi - you are actually trying to place a finite number on a transfinite value. It is similar to saying - “what number less than 10 represents 5+6?” You can estimate it forever and you will never get there.
It is an irrational thing to attempt so of course the number is going to be said to be “irrational” (mathematicians never blame themselves - “it’s the number’s fault”).
