What's the most interesting philosophical thing you've ever heard?

[Jaded Sage]

I think I was unclear about frequency. There should be a colon after it.

Second quote: you are asking a second question before answering the first. You might not be the man for the job here.

Well, strictly speaking, I was asking a question about a proposition, which seems reasonable enough. The point being that deciding good/bad by reference to frequency is different to doing so with reference to any objective standard. It is simply deciding good and bad by vote.

Third quote: well, for instance, should it be always, usually or not never? Also, later, for who.

That's exactly the question I put to you that makes you think I'm not up to the job.

Forth: it is very tough. For instance, can you come up with at least one way in which peace is bad?

I'm sure that once Hitler had eliminated everyone that he didn't like, the world would have been very peaceful. Sometimes you have to fight.

I see what you're saying. The metaphor threw me. The frequency thing is just something I came up with off the top of my head as an example. I personally am not very impressed with it either. But it technically could be considered a type of measurement, so I'm definitely open to it. Do you think my other one (something is good if it can be described as 'that which is good in at least one way and bad in no more than zero ways') is democratic as well? If you have any other suggestions, then I am all ears.

[Obvious Leo]

JS. You don't seem to have made very clear what you actually understand by the terms "good" and "bad". Are you seriously suggesting that an objective standard exists by which such terms can be evaluated?

[Jaded Sage]

JS. You don't seem to have made very clear what you actually understand by the terms "good" and "bad".

Yeah, but I have made clear why: we are intentionally working with intuitive notions.

Are you seriously suggesting that an objective standard exists by which such terms can be evaluated?

I'm not sure, but I doubt it. That's why I asked a new question about Absoluteness, Objectiveness & Noumena.

[Obvious Leo]

Surely if there is such a thing as an objective reality it is formless and purely informational in its nature. As even Heisenberg said, nothing can be known about the physical world which has not first been filtered through the prism of our consciousness. Heisenberg is not widely renowned as a metaphysical giant but surely he gets a tick for getting this bit right. We can certainly accept the notion in an abstract sense that there is such a thing as an objective reality but the fact that we can only interpret such a reality subjectively is inescapable. A dog is only a dog because that's what we've mutually agreed to call it, just as a quark is only a quark because that's the way we've mutually agreed to codify a particular class of observations in our interrogation of the subatomic world. If you're looking for an Absolute Truth then I fear your quest will be in vain.

[Jaded Sage]

Surely if there is such a thing as an objective reality it is formless and purely informational in its nature. As even Heisenberg said, nothing can be known about the physical world which has not first been filtered through the prism of our consciousness. Heisenberg is not widely renowned as a metaphysical giant but surely he gets a tick for getting this bit right. We can certainly accept the notion in an abstract sense that there is such a thing as an objective reality but the fact that we can only interpret such a reality subjectively is inescapable. A dog is only a dog because that's what we've mutually agreed to call it, just as a quark is only a quark because that's the way we've mutually agreed to codify a particular class of observations in our interrogation of the subatomic world. If you're looking for an Absolute Truth then I fear your quest will be in vain.

Formless and purely informational. Now we are getting something new. What makes you describe it this way?

[Obvious Leo]

Formless and purely informational. Now we are getting something new. What makes you describe it this way?

The idea originally comes from Leibniz, who was arguably the world first true information theorist. However it's probably best understood in terms of Kant's Noumena and Phenomena and then enfolded within the modern science of cognitive neuroscience. When we make an observation of the world around us we imagine that we are observing reality but this assumption is false. All our senses are able to perceive is raw data from events which exist no longer and it is then our consciousness which constructs into a meaningful narrative of reality this raw data which has been projected through time onto our senses. In cognitive neuroscience this construction is known as a cognitive MAP and each of us creates one which is completely unique to ourselves. Instead of observing reality we MAP reality and the way in which we do this is entirely arbitrary. It simply makes no sense to say that there is a right way or a wrong way to map our own version of reality when all we're really doing is mapping it in such a way that it is meaningful to us. We delude ourselves when we imagine that it is reality which is specifying for our cognition of it because it is the reverse that is in fact the case. Reality just is what is, the elusive ding an sich, and the way we elect to codify it is entirely our own affair.

Unfortunately this message doesn't seem to have penetrated the thinking of physicists, to whom ontology and epistemology appear to be synonymous constructs.

[Walker]

If you're looking for an Absolute Truth then I fear your quest will be in vain.

“I am is true, all else is inference.”
- Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj