question for philosophers

Jakob - as the World’s Leading Authority on Ernst Werklempter, I will tell you that he was a Positionist, first and foremost. But he can also be rightly described as a Non-Negative Nihilistic Noumenist.

Plistz, in his semi-authoritative “Ernst Werklempter: Philosopher, Iconoclast, Chronic Complainer” wrote:

“Werklempter’s view of the thing-in-itself-in-itself is a stunning formulation. It turns Plato on his ear, and Kant on his arse, which is very unattractive”.

Werklempter himself says, in his scintillating but generally upsetting “Why I Am So Scintillating, But Generally Upsetting”:

“The other day I moved all my furniture around. Just for the hell of it. I still hate this apartment.”

Does that answer your question?

Thanks all for the contributions. I googled essentialism and found it’s the closest to date in describing what I’m looking for…thanks, Faust. I am surprised, though, that there isn’t a short definition for this principle.

Loved your post, Omar…when you were describing Susan, I immediately thought ‘stepford wives’…lo and behold, the robot thing appeared. I must be an intuitive! On the other hand, the description “…very nice girl, hot bod, intelligent, like sports, talks to a minimun and never about gossip” has to be a manufactured agent!

As re your comment,

But the changes you note still don’t destroy the sovereignty of individuality, right? I’ve changed in a lot of respects since childhood, we all have, but isn’t what remains in the midst of all these changes still the same individual? Or is this actually the same point you’re making by pointing out that we’re more than the sum of our parts?

BTW, the reason I’m pursuing this is trying to tie philosophy (which I’m finding fascinating, started reading it less than three years ago) and theology together to arrive at an unorthodox but IMO warranted conclusion for a universal Christian salvation. All interpretation is of particulars…the division of particulars to either heaven/hell. I think the application of this principle…which sounds like ‘essentialist’ view at this point…reveals a substructure in the Bible of how every human is saved…destruction and rebirth are directed to essence rather than particulars, which would retain individuality in the same way replacement of material cells leave individual intact.

Thanks again for all the input!

==============
Heraclitus “every thing is becoming”
God’s law-- the law of change
form zygote to adulthood, you changed but you are still you.

Hello dumbernmud:

Like I said, yes, that is the most convincing view, but one which much be first studied by you. Don’t take it on my saying so, cause I can be very wrong. Your beliefs should be carefully picked.
Now, we’re talking logic here. From that point of view, your individuality, your self, is disconnected into snap-shots which pass just like the film in a movie, or animation, giving you the impression that “You” is a whole, a unit designated by the “I”. This is stuff many here still discuss, so just watch long enough and you might catch such a discussion.
But because of the perspective used, that is, logic, one must agree with the premise to an extent. It is enough to demonstrate that you do change to allow the conclusion that the self must therefore be an illusion. I believe that we do change but that our changes are a matter of degree and not in kind. But from the view point of logic there is little middle ground- it is simply established that the self is not one continuous unit, but a group of ideas held together by a principle or law of association.

Let me just say, as a sort of an advice, that you should not take any “goals” into studying philosophy. Personalize it, make it yours, apply it so that it is relevant in your life, yes, yes, but don’t try to fit philosophy into preconceived goals, such as an unorthodox theology. There is plenty of theologians already doing that. If you do, you might put words in it’s mouth, so to speak and you might miss something important it had to say.

Philosophy is not theology because it departs from a doubt, not from a given belief in God and in His account written in the Bible. Philosophy surrenders itself to reason. Theology surrenders itself to it’s faith, over an above reason. Even when they delve into metaphysics, philosophy imagines creatures and realms quite different from the christian theologian.
I am telling you all this because there is no possible “unorthodoxy” in what you’re doing, so long as what is reviewd as pertaining to “Christian salvation”. The philosopher should ask himself first:“Why Christianity, from all the other faiths that roam the Earth?” You might find that in responding to that question and finding reasons why Christianity is for you the true religion (and not just superstition) might also answer the other question concerning a salvation.

Hi Omar,

Good thoughts. Don’t know how realistic it is at this late stage in the game (I’m on the wrong side of 50) to abandon presuppositions and start from scratch. Am operating from the premise that if something is true, it’ll hvae true relations. Philosophy, as fascinating as it is, is at the same time only another flawed system of thought put into play by flawed human beings. Hey, it’s what we do. I suspect a lot of philosophy suffers from the same ailment as any other intellectual methodology…its conclusions suffer from the same kinds of predisposition in interpretive process as theology or science. We’re really all on the same boat after all, and all playing by the same general rules, it seems.

This said, I love philosophy because it’s nature seems to make it harder to hide one’s dispositions in the folds of her fabric…though it appears to good old subjective me that the generally sharper class of people in her hallowed halls rise to the occassion, as they do in any other intellectual endeavor. It’s those philosophic connections in the processes involved which leads to the universal bias in interpretation that I find most fascinating, and this just ain’t found in matter, as Hume taught. Metaphysics seems about the only lady still searching this area, and she’s just a fading old girl today…though there may some life in her limbs yet.

Again, thanks for your guidance. It’s appreciated.

I will turn to contextualism to address this.

While this may not appeal to your “goal”, it is (as far as this debate goes) a novel way of discussing identity.

What you are trying to define is identity. Identity is abstract - the fact that I am “Emorgasm” isn’t because I am objectively “Emorgasm,” it’s because I am identified as such by beings with the capacity to identify me as such (including myself.) Without that conscious identification, identity would not exist. Identity is contextual - this means that something can only be identified relative to something else. For example, attempt to define something without refering to a different object. In describing an apple, I must first describe that it grows on a tree, and follow with any number of more accurate descriptions (each one of which will neccessarily be relative.)

Following this logic, something’s identity can be described in many ways, each one of them accurate. Identity is contextual - it depends on the perspective taken and the comparisons used to define an object. Dumbernmud, if we’re speaking cellularly, has changed a great deal since his birth. If we’re speaking in terms of particle physics, chances are that his identity has completely changed (because of the number of interactions that particles undergo on a submicroscopic level.) If we’re speaking in terms of his role in society, he may have been very much the same person for the last 40 years. If we’re speaking in terms of his role in a narrative, his identity may be very concrete.

None of these are contradictory. They are, however, from different vantage points - this is what makes the ship whose boards have all been replaced seem like a paradox. It is not - the ship has multiple, completely reconciliable identities depending on the context that its identity is defined in; in terms of it’s label in the navy’s roster, it is very much the same, while in terms of it’s particulate components, it is very much a new ship. Both of these are correct.

It’s great to be back.

Thanks for your input, Emorgasm. You make some good points.

Am I thinking wrong here, or would contextualism have a correlation to relativism?

Dumbernmud,

What you describe in the original post is actually a concept that also exists in Complex systems theory. It is considered one key trait that differentiates life forms as a subset of complex systems. In other words, not all complex systems are ‘life’ but all life are complex systems.

The term for the ability of a complex system to replace all of its components and still maintain the same pattern is called: Autopoiesis

Here’s a link:
prototista.org/E-Zine/Autopoiesis.htm

Thanks for the link, DT Strain. I’ve saved it to favorites after a quick glance and will delve into it later.

still researching…

obw, could you explain what you mean when you say essentialism is not a non-nominalistic view of the brain? Curious to know what you mean by this. In exploring the subject the last couple days, it would seem essentialism and nominalism are opposed.

DTStrain,

Aside from the obvious immediate difference between essentialism and autopoiesis–that the former seems to be more generic as referring to all complex entities while autopoiesis is focussed on living organisms–would it be wrong to say that autopoiesis is an essentialist view in a general sense?

I’m also wondering how Emorgasm’s contextualism fits into this picture. Would it be correct to say that because context depends on a particular conscious view, contextualism would necessarily render the view of ‘uniqueness retained in the midst of change’ as subjective and relative?

Thanks to all for his/her contribution.

Nice link, DT Strain.

This is a good point that brings about another question; is “knowing that you know” a product of language use or is it a fundamental structure to the cogito that precedes language.

What is the experience of self-awareness like without thinking-with-words?

Is it possible? Probably not, but we should also consider the nature of language without our describing it with language; the “meaning” of a word-sound cannot be an entity that is carried without its form as tonal data, except when reading text and not hearing it. The mind understands meaning, then, not through context but through matching tonal data to imagery or real tacit experience. However, the neurological understanding, which is the actual act of processing the data and is an executive function, cannot be experienced and must be assumed. I am saying that “sense is made” by your mind, but you are after-that and through this lapse a “self” is experienced as the pre-reflective cogito, which is what the assertion above points to.

Our dilemma here is not if consciousness happens, but what is the bare minimal neccesary object that must exist for consciousness to exist as a consciousness-of-something.

I can be nonintentionally focused on driving my car. How much of that is habit and how much of that requires me to “pay attention,” which amounts to intentional consciousness; having “myself-driving-this-car” as direct knowledge and in the form of language as I think to myself while driving.

Detrop, you always manage to articulate with a strong degree of clarity, it is great and always helps with my thinking, with getting a grip on certain ideas and understanding them.

Thank You

Unfortunately, I’m not educated well enough on the points you’re asking to give a very satisfactory answer, I’m afraid. But these are fascinating questions. I would point out one thing, refering to the section I’ve bolded in the above quote: autopoiesis is not focused on living organisms per se. It’s just that all living organisms we know of have this as a feature. But there are other systems which undergo autopoiesis which we would not consider to be single living organisms. For example, a flowing river, an ecosystem, or a hurricane. All of these patterns continually replace the makeup of their components while maintaining their pattern. So, living biological organisms are only a subset of all complex systems which undergo autopoiesis. It makes one wonder how arbitrary our definition of ‘life’ really is.

Is Dumbernmud refering to Essentialism as Obw has described it there, and could you, Obw, expand a bit on that?

I personally see no reason to posit an essence to anything. Why can’t there be infinite particulars? I suppose it was the use of mathematical systems, symbols, for representing things and quantities, that led the first thinkers to propose a “universal” or “essential” idea of something, in this case, the symbol and number. Since they used single variants several times over, the numbers became a priori to the quantities and things they represented.

I am reminded of Nietzsche saying that causal entities, that is subjects, are invented so the world can be calculated. I add-- these developments were not intentional or purposeful by man. The a prior structures of the world and experience, if there are any, must be a synthesis of stimulus and stimulation-- there need not be a medium, a “thing to be stimulated.” This process is honed through the act of sensibility. It is at its origins sensory…it isn’t “experience.”

Man did not invent mathematics-- but what he refers to as “mathematics” is the act of these a priori systems working.

If there is anything essential to these states of autopoiesis it would be in the dynamic created between a stimulus and a response. If this response is simply a kind of feedback, then there is no “essential” type of system save the concept of the cogito created in experience or in “having a perspective.”

A chair’s “being” is feeding back…it is as causally real as I am. Here the dilemma is this; where is consciousness happening in this organic system. If it isn’t anywhere, then it cannot effect anything…it would hover above the world without touching it. If it is somewhere…then its possible the chair is conscious like myself, since the beginning of my body and the beginning of the chair’s body is only a matter of space. But space, like consciousness, is nothing.

Anyway I say that the idea of “essence” is incompatible with the act of existing, since all events that have being are particular contingencies in the universe. They have no history or design, they are not teleological, and do not have being until they have been.

Recall Sartre’s analogy of the artisan and papercutter-- the finished shape of the paper would be the intention of the cutter, but would be independent of the cutter once it was created…it would be that shape with or without the cutter present. Man can be compared to the paper shape, yet since there is no God, no artisan to have an intention, a design in mind, the being of the paper shape would be determined by its surging into the future and would never become something determined. For to say one quality of man is determined is like saying one specific law of the universe is determined…which would in turn require another law to substantiate it, so on and so forth until to reach an intial cause, of which there cannot be.

Therefore nothing in the mind of man has or is capable of describing an “essence,” but his experience has an essential characteristic which can be considered a priori to his synthesis, his formualtion and signification of the event. The mathematics are happening because there is sensibility, but the symbols and entites which are represented are always particular events and things. Their genus is only due to their recurrance. The habitus, as Dunamis once called it I think.

Yes, contextualism is very closely related to relativism.

More specifically, contextualism is the result of the linguistic application of relativism - it does generally insist, though, that philosophy (and in fact, all thought) is linguistic in nature, something that many self-declared “relativists” disagree with.

The neutrality of viewpoints is borrowed directly from physical relativism, though, as developed by Einstein (or at least, that’s where I pull it from.)

As far as contextualism fitting into the overall framing of the question at hand:

Contextualism provides a framework within which the problems of identity that seem to be caused by autopoiesis dissapear. It is not contradictory within the framework of contextualism for today’s dumbernmud to be both the same and radically different compared to the dumbernmud of ten years ago; it depends entirely on the viewpoint taken, and each viewpoint is valid in a fitting context.

Relativism is nearly impossible to honestly apply to a religious concept without deconstructing the religion, though.

Haven’t had much time to post last few days, but want to thank all who’ve contributed, I love the diversity of thought.

I find you last post fascinating, detrop. Will try to formulate a few questions in next couple days as it speaks to something I’ve been working on about what seem to me similarities in the nature of the mind’s formulation of substance and essence.

I do my fair share of computer programming and it is often desiriable within computer programming as it is in algebra to “abstract out” as many pieces as you possibly can. The idea is typically the more general the form, the more versatile in a given situation. In the process of abstraction, specificity is compromised, but the power of being able to generally specify offsets this lack of specificity…the details will be filled in as they are needed.

Then we get to “essence”. Essence, in my opinion, is not much different than what the programmer attempts to do. The goal is to “abstract out” what can be extracted out hoping to get at some “pure” piece of the puzzle. The “isness” of the thing. The problem is, one can abstract ad infinitum. Maybe I get bored with my C++ description and decide I’d rather have the statement generalized such that it is conducive for use also in Ruby. That’s one more step. Have I moved it closer to its “true being”? I’m not so sure about that.

Chaos theory might be a helpful analogue here. Essentially, the fractal nature of the theory allows us to keep drilling down or up as we please seeing bigger and smaller pieces as we so desire. At any particular level I’m not sure we can say, "Ah HA! HERE is the essence of “treeness”, and if we do it is surely arbitrary because what we are doing is potentially recursively infinite.

Supposing that those pieces renew themselves in exactly the same configuration to me, presents no dilemma. For all I know, each day the entire world is built anew. Maybe every second the world is built anew. It doesn’t matter because the configuration in which it is built does not seem to vary and all indications point to it being old. Reassembling things exactly as they are even with new pieces if one is not aware of it doesn’t particularly make that much difference to the thing in question. It’s only at the point that those pieces are reassembled DIFFERENTLY that things become weird…and this is the case for human beings. We don’t have a “new pancreas” exactly. We have a pancreas with a few more “faults” than it had before. We call this aging, and for all the things that are the “same” about us as we age, there are at least as many things that are different.

I’m not understanding your point. Are you suggesting essence requires mathematics as its qualifier, or am I missing what you’re saying?

I think of existence as data. Everything is data and data is everything. Data has no meaning to cognition till it’s formulated into information and meaning (that and what). This same structure applies with equal force (to my thinking) both material objects and essense. Triangularity possesses a specific whatness in comparison to circularity, and in this context all those particulars triangularity applies to become its meaning or whatness. Of course, triangularity is most often thought of as a meaning associated with specific things that have three sides.

My question is, how can something that’s ‘not real’ be found to have the same cognitive structure as something that’s ‘real’?

DTStrain,

in the matter of autopeiesis, the article you provided states, “Although the major force involved in life is the electromagnetic force (the chemical bonds between the atoms in organic molecules of life are electromagnetic forces), the electromagnetic force itself is NOT life.
Furthermore, there is no credible scientific evidence supporting the existence of a “fifth force” or “vital force” as vitalists and new age writers contend…
Instead, from the view of complexity, life is not a force but a process. In complexity ,life is as an emergent property of a system. That is, life is not a property of a system’s parts but emerges as a result of the (nonlinear) interaction of its parts. The pattern & process of interaction are called autopoiesis & cognition.
Thus, autopoiesis is the pattern by which life emerges in dissipative systems; cognition is the very process of life itself.”
This is puzzling to me. On the one hand, to first dismiss the existence of a vital force apart from scientific evidence…then to posit life as a ‘pattern’ which emerges from processes involved in a complex system fails to make any real distinction to me between ‘life force’ and ‘pattern’ beyond an exercise in semantics.

On the other hand, I’ve been toying with an ‘oar in the water’ example as a way of thinking about existence which I realized yesterday also has some interesting parallels with the notion of autopoiesis. Briefly, it seems to me that the interaction of dissimilar modes of matter (oar (solid) applied to water (liquid) creates a non-material force (propulsion). Supposing that all the features of existence operate in [and are a process of] essence emerging from complex material interactions as subsets of this same simple process, it seems to bear some similarities to autopoeisis as it’s explained in the article. Consciousness as an emergent dynamic from the myriad subsets at cellular level of the ‘oar in the water’ formula sure seems similar.

Tracing the process backwards appears to lead to a necessary first or uncaused cause, which poses no problem to me but would to others, I’m sure.

dumbernmud,
We all shed our skins, sloughing off what is no longer necessary or essential, that is, if we hope to survive. Shedding dead or decaying ideas is the best a philosopher can hope for. Nothing necessary can be shed without compromising what is necessary for existence. Luckily for us nature abhors a vaccuum and uses all discards for construction material for new creatures. Hopefully, dead or decaying ideas can become fertilizer for newer, more relevant takes on our experience of existence.

It didn’t exist when this question was asked, but value ontology addresses it efficiently.
beforethelight.forumotion.com/t1 … e-ontology