peacegirl wrote: ↑Sun Sep 28, 2025 8:34 amYou did not answer the questions, that is how you view it. If this book is to be accepted you are assuming others will see it the way you do....they will not.Eodnhoj7 wrote: ↑Sun Sep 28, 2025 4:39 amI answered every one of your questions. This is just a repeat.peacegirl wrote: ↑Sun Sep 28, 2025 12:30 am
1. So the pursuit of satisfaction is never ending...and yet it is not a futile pursuit....by what reasoning?
2. Determinism is an interpretation, accurate by what standard?
3. You are assuming this book will be accepted by the masses...by what reasoning?
4. Real simple...punishment is a means of interpretation and as such you cannot assumed people will share the same interpretation of it. What is punishment to some is not to others. The book will negate negate the act of punishment occuring by people percieving it is occuring.
5. You asked what I meant by the "natural act of distinction making". So I clarified it.
6. So definitions mean nothing unless they reflect reality and yet reality not only changes but the very act of defining is a part of reality. You cannot prove or disprove determinism outside of definition.
You fail to see that for the book to mean anything it has to have a antithetical viewpoint to it that others will accept.
New Discovery
Re: New Discovery
Re: New Discovery
The New Discovery ignores religion and says because ...
*
Does the following have anything to do with The New Discovery?
Everyone does what they must to support and affirm their self-concept, including the garbage man, therefore the greatest satisfaction is to affirm the self-concept, even if it makes one miserable on a day-to-day basis ... which btw, is why everything that everyone does is what had to be done ... Determinism. (Do those 51 words explain The New Discovery?)
Last edited by Walker on Mon Sep 29, 2025 9:08 am, edited 1 time in total.
- FlashDangerpants
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Re: New Discovery
Common sense folk-psychology has it that beliefs, desires and so on are our sources of motivation and that our will follows our motivations. Lessan's version is the same, he just uses the term "greatest satisfaction" in place of BDM. But whether we call it satisfaction or desire, it is the thing that is motivating the will. In a fully causal universe, it is the proximate cause of will. In a choice based universe, it is the thing that in all possible worlds still explains the choice. It's only under a non folk-psychology paradigm that this stuff isn't all the same when it is about thinking rational agents like us. Peacegirl would have to read stuff not written by her dad to know about that sort of thing though.Atla wrote: ↑Mon Sep 29, 2025 3:36 am Will and satisfaction are two different things. Satisfaction is felt, will typically isn't felt.
The author says (imo) that we can't will to go against what we think is our best satisfaction. Not that we can't will to go against our will, willing to go against our will would just be a self-contradiction, so it would make no sense to try to show that we can't do it. (Unless I missed it and he did argue that, which would be hilarious.)
His point of departure would be the whole movement = life part, and the application of the "greatest satisfaction" to everything that moves and is therefore alive. Satisfaction for germs and millipedes doesn't involve beliefs and desires. But peacegirl says that the whole talk of movement being life and so on is strictly about humans only. Which to me seems to be in conflict with the book she is slinging. But she is the special one, the only person who can comprehend it, so who are we to dispute such things?
Re: New Discovery
I don't think you're talking about the will itself here but about actions, chosen actions. Imo folk psychology also acknowledges the will in itself. The will itself isn't caused by BDM/satisfaction/desire, it's a pre-existing faculty.FlashDangerpants wrote: ↑Mon Sep 29, 2025 9:06 am Common sense folk-psychology has it that beliefs, desires and so on are our sources of motivation and that our will follows our motivations. Lessan's version is the same, he just uses the term "greatest satisfaction" in place of BDM. But whether we call it satisfaction or desire, it is the thing that is motivating the will. In a fully causal universe, it is the proximate cause of will. In a choice based universe, it is the thing that in all possible worlds still explains the choice. It's only under a non folk-psychology paradigm that this stuff isn't all the same when it is about thinking rational agents like us. Peacegirl would have to read stuff not written by her dad to know about that sort of thing though.
Re: New Discovery
Atla and FlashDP make the same error of presuming 'will' is a thing, an anatomical thing like some specialised sort of neuron ; or a physiological event like digesting a meal in the stomach and duodenum.FlashDangerpants wrote: ↑Mon Sep 29, 2025 9:06 amCommon sense folk-psychology has it that beliefs, desires and so on are our sources of motivation and that our will follows our motivations. Lessan's version is the same, he just uses the term "greatest satisfaction" in place of BDM. But whether we call it satisfaction or desire, it is the thing that is motivating the will. In a fully causal universe, it is the proximate cause of will. In a choice based universe, it is the thing that in all possible worlds still explains the choice. It's only under a non folk-psychology paradigm that this stuff isn't all the same when it is about thinking rational agents like us. Peacegirl would have to read stuff not written by her dad to know about that sort of thing though.Atla wrote: ↑Mon Sep 29, 2025 3:36 am Will and satisfaction are two different things. Satisfaction is felt, will typically isn't felt.
The author says (imo) that we can't will to go against what we think is our best satisfaction. Not that we can't will to go against our will, willing to go against our will would just be a self-contradiction, so it would make no sense to try to show that we can't do it. (Unless I missed it and he did argue that, which would be hilarious.)
His point of departure would be the whole movement = life part, and the application of the "greatest satisfaction" to everything that moves and is therefore alive. Satisfaction for germs and millipedes doesn't involve beliefs and desires. But peacegirl says that the whole talk of movement being life and so on is strictly about humans only. Which to me seems to be in conflict with the book she is slinging. But she is the special one, the only person who can comprehend it, so who are we to dispute such things?
I am sorry to read that you two ,who are among the better informed contributors, don't understand you are deceiving yourselves by reifying.I trust neither of you need me to quote you directly however if you do I will do so.
True, the meaning of a word is its use, but some popular usages determine stultifying thought processes. Reifying 'will' leads directly to nonsense like absolute free will.
Reification of will has a history.
Last edited by Belinda on Mon Sep 29, 2025 10:40 am, edited 1 time in total.
- FlashDangerpants
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- Joined: Mon Jan 04, 2016 11:54 pm
Re: New Discovery
No we don't. Both of us know that will is just a term for a mental faculty. Don't be silly.Belinda wrote: ↑Mon Sep 29, 2025 10:29 amAtla and FlashDP make the same error of presuming 'will' is a thing, an anatomical thing like some specialised sort of neuron ; or a physiological event like digesting a meal in the stomach and duodenum.FlashDangerpants wrote: ↑Mon Sep 29, 2025 9:06 amCommon sense folk-psychology has it that beliefs, desires and so on are our sources of motivation and that our will follows our motivations. Lessan's version is the same, he just uses the term "greatest satisfaction" in place of BDM. But whether we call it satisfaction or desire, it is the thing that is motivating the will. In a fully causal universe, it is the proximate cause of will. In a choice based universe, it is the thing that in all possible worlds still explains the choice. It's only under a non folk-psychology paradigm that this stuff isn't all the same when it is about thinking rational agents like us. Peacegirl would have to read stuff not written by her dad to know about that sort of thing though.Atla wrote: ↑Mon Sep 29, 2025 3:36 am Will and satisfaction are two different things. Satisfaction is felt, will typically isn't felt.
The author says (imo) that we can't will to go against what we think is our best satisfaction. Not that we can't will to go against our will, willing to go against our will would just be a self-contradiction, so it would make no sense to try to show that we can't do it. (Unless I missed it and he did argue that, which would be hilarious.)
His point of departure would be the whole movement = life part, and the application of the "greatest satisfaction" to everything that moves and is therefore alive. Satisfaction for germs and millipedes doesn't involve beliefs and desires. But peacegirl says that the whole talk of movement being life and so on is strictly about humans only. Which to me seems to be in conflict with the book she is slinging. But she is the special one, the only person who can comprehend it, so who are we to dispute such things?
I am sorry to read that you two ,who are among the better informed contributors, don't understand you are deceiving yourselves by reifying.I trust neither of you need me to quote you directly however if you do I will do so.
True, the meaning of a word is its use, but some popular usages determine stultifying thought processes. Reifying 'will' leads directly to nonsense like absolute free will.
- FlashDangerpants
- Posts: 8815
- Joined: Mon Jan 04, 2016 11:54 pm
Re: New Discovery
Folk-psychology attaches noun and verb words to mental faculties and events. The Will, the Mind and so on being the nouns. Beliveing, choosing, wanting, thinking and so on being the verbs. The Will is a noun when it is being invoked as an object, and to will is a verb when it is invoked as an act of willing. The faculty cannot be split into an actual seperate noun and verb unless I must take back what I just wrote to Belinda about neither of us reifying will.Atla wrote: ↑Mon Sep 29, 2025 10:03 amI don't think you're talking about the will itself here but about actions, chosen actions. Imo folk psychology also acknowledges the will in itself. The will itself isn't caused by BDM/satisfaction/desire, it's a pre-existing faculty.FlashDangerpants wrote: ↑Mon Sep 29, 2025 9:06 am Common sense folk-psychology has it that beliefs, desires and so on are our sources of motivation and that our will follows our motivations. Lessan's version is the same, he just uses the term "greatest satisfaction" in place of BDM. But whether we call it satisfaction or desire, it is the thing that is motivating the will. In a fully causal universe, it is the proximate cause of will. In a choice based universe, it is the thing that in all possible worlds still explains the choice. It's only under a non folk-psychology paradigm that this stuff isn't all the same when it is about thinking rational agents like us. Peacegirl would have to read stuff not written by her dad to know about that sort of thing though.
Folk psychology has no real issue with recalcitrance though, and neither does BDM as an explanation for motivation. It is obvious to all of us that a person can know cognitively that the spider is more afraid of us than we are of it, but also to feel paralysed with fear when seeing spiders. The emotion that arises to confound our intelligence, desires and beliefs is recalcitrant - it does not conform and does not need any specific reason not to.
Similarly you can cognitively know that lending money to somebody is a bad idea based on prior experience, and that it will be regretable, and on top of that know that you don't want to, but still some recalcitrant urge of some sort that runs counter to your motivations. There's room to argue about whether it also evades your will, as the phobia surely does.
None of this can rescue Lessans. The comon sense view of our minds is robust and flexible, his thing is a cut down homespun version that is brittle to survive.
Last edited by FlashDangerpants on Mon Sep 29, 2025 10:52 am, edited 1 time in total.
Re: New Discovery
In that case please take more care in the language you use to express your ideas. Sensible people like you two influence others , more so than some self-published unsaleable book.FlashDangerpants wrote: ↑Mon Sep 29, 2025 10:34 amNo we don't. Both of us know that will is just a term for a mental faculty. Don't be silly.Belinda wrote: ↑Mon Sep 29, 2025 10:29 amAtla and FlashDP make the same error of presuming 'will' is a thing, an anatomical thing like some specialised sort of neuron ; or a physiological event like digesting a meal in the stomach and duodenum.FlashDangerpants wrote: ↑Mon Sep 29, 2025 9:06 am
Common sense folk-psychology has it that beliefs, desires and so on are our sources of motivation and that our will follows our motivations. Lessan's version is the same, he just uses the term "greatest satisfaction" in place of BDM. But whether we call it satisfaction or desire, it is the thing that is motivating the will. In a fully causal universe, it is the proximate cause of will. In a choice based universe, it is the thing that in all possible worlds still explains the choice. It's only under a non folk-psychology paradigm that this stuff isn't all the same when it is about thinking rational agents like us. Peacegirl would have to read stuff not written by her dad to know about that sort of thing though.
His point of departure would be the whole movement = life part, and the application of the "greatest satisfaction" to everything that moves and is therefore alive. Satisfaction for germs and millipedes doesn't involve beliefs and desires. But peacegirl says that the whole talk of movement being life and so on is strictly about humans only. Which to me seems to be in conflict with the book she is slinging. But she is the special one, the only person who can comprehend it, so who are we to dispute such things?
I am sorry to read that you two ,who are among the better informed contributors, don't understand you are deceiving yourselves by reifying.I trust neither of you need me to quote you directly however if you do I will do so.
True, the meaning of a word is its use, but some popular usages determine stultifying thought processes. Reifying 'will' leads directly to nonsense like absolute free will.
"A mental faculty" is still too Cartesian for safety, as "a mental faculty " is too much like a permanent state of mind.
Last edited by Belinda on Mon Sep 29, 2025 10:51 am, edited 1 time in total.
Re: New Discovery
You're too confused as always. To some degree we must reify everything that exists, otherwise that would mean that our thoughts and emotions wouldn't exist at all. But we do have thoughts and emotions and in theat sense we also have a will.Belinda wrote: ↑Mon Sep 29, 2025 10:29 amAtla and FlashDP make the same error of presuming 'will' is a thing, an anatomical thing like some specialised sort of neuron ; or a physiological event like digesting a meal in the stomach and duodenum.FlashDangerpants wrote: ↑Mon Sep 29, 2025 9:06 amCommon sense folk-psychology has it that beliefs, desires and so on are our sources of motivation and that our will follows our motivations. Lessan's version is the same, he just uses the term "greatest satisfaction" in place of BDM. But whether we call it satisfaction or desire, it is the thing that is motivating the will. In a fully causal universe, it is the proximate cause of will. In a choice based universe, it is the thing that in all possible worlds still explains the choice. It's only under a non folk-psychology paradigm that this stuff isn't all the same when it is about thinking rational agents like us. Peacegirl would have to read stuff not written by her dad to know about that sort of thing though.Atla wrote: ↑Mon Sep 29, 2025 3:36 am Will and satisfaction are two different things. Satisfaction is felt, will typically isn't felt.
The author says (imo) that we can't will to go against what we think is our best satisfaction. Not that we can't will to go against our will, willing to go against our will would just be a self-contradiction, so it would make no sense to try to show that we can't do it. (Unless I missed it and he did argue that, which would be hilarious.)
His point of departure would be the whole movement = life part, and the application of the "greatest satisfaction" to everything that moves and is therefore alive. Satisfaction for germs and millipedes doesn't involve beliefs and desires. But peacegirl says that the whole talk of movement being life and so on is strictly about humans only. Which to me seems to be in conflict with the book she is slinging. But she is the special one, the only person who can comprehend it, so who are we to dispute such things?
I am sorry to read that you two ,who are among the better informed contributors, don't understand you are deceiving yourselves by reifying.I trust neither of you need me to quote you directly however if you do I will do so.
True, the meaning of a word is its use, but some popular usages determine stultifying thought processes. Reifying 'will' leads directly to nonsense like absolute free will.
Reification of will has a history.
Re: New Discovery
But it's unintelligent to go through life making category errors. What you wrote above could have come directly from Descartes.Atla wrote: ↑Mon Sep 29, 2025 10:50 amYou're too confused as always. To some degree we must reify everything that exists, otherwise that would mean that our thoughts and emotions wouldn't exist at all. But we do have thoughts and emotions and in theat sense we also have a will.Belinda wrote: ↑Mon Sep 29, 2025 10:29 amAtla and FlashDP make the same error of presuming 'will' is a thing, an anatomical thing like some specialised sort of neuron ; or a physiological event like digesting a meal in the stomach and duodenum.FlashDangerpants wrote: ↑Mon Sep 29, 2025 9:06 am
Common sense folk-psychology has it that beliefs, desires and so on are our sources of motivation and that our will follows our motivations. Lessan's version is the same, he just uses the term "greatest satisfaction" in place of BDM. But whether we call it satisfaction or desire, it is the thing that is motivating the will. In a fully causal universe, it is the proximate cause of will. In a choice based universe, it is the thing that in all possible worlds still explains the choice. It's only under a non folk-psychology paradigm that this stuff isn't all the same when it is about thinking rational agents like us. Peacegirl would have to read stuff not written by her dad to know about that sort of thing though.
His point of departure would be the whole movement = life part, and the application of the "greatest satisfaction" to everything that moves and is therefore alive. Satisfaction for germs and millipedes doesn't involve beliefs and desires. But peacegirl says that the whole talk of movement being life and so on is strictly about humans only. Which to me seems to be in conflict with the book she is slinging. But she is the special one, the only person who can comprehend it, so who are we to dispute such things?
I am sorry to read that you two ,who are among the better informed contributors, don't understand you are deceiving yourselves by reifying.I trust neither of you need me to quote you directly however if you do I will do so.
True, the meaning of a word is its use, but some popular usages determine stultifying thought processes. Reifying 'will' leads directly to nonsense like absolute free will.
Reification of will has a history.
Re: New Discovery
What category error? Descartes was a dualist I'm not.Belinda wrote: ↑Mon Sep 29, 2025 10:56 amBut it's unintelligent to go through life making category errors. What you wrote above could have come directly from Descartes.Atla wrote: ↑Mon Sep 29, 2025 10:50 amYou're too confused as always. To some degree we must reify everything that exists, otherwise that would mean that our thoughts and emotions wouldn't exist at all. But we do have thoughts and emotions and in theat sense we also have a will.Belinda wrote: ↑Mon Sep 29, 2025 10:29 am
Atla and FlashDP make the same error of presuming 'will' is a thing, an anatomical thing like some specialised sort of neuron ; or a physiological event like digesting a meal in the stomach and duodenum.
I am sorry to read that you two ,who are among the better informed contributors, don't understand you are deceiving yourselves by reifying.I trust neither of you need me to quote you directly however if you do I will do so.
True, the meaning of a word is its use, but some popular usages determine stultifying thought processes. Reifying 'will' leads directly to nonsense like absolute free will.
Reification of will has a history.
- FlashDangerpants
- Posts: 8815
- Joined: Mon Jan 04, 2016 11:54 pm
Re: New Discovery
Well if we are avoiding the word faculty because having the ability to reason, percieve and imagine is too much like a permanent state of mind for your liking... please do recommend a proper word to use.Belinda wrote: ↑Mon Sep 29, 2025 10:45 amIn that case please take more care in the language you use to express your ideas. Sensible people like you two influence others , more so than some self-published unsaleable book.FlashDangerpants wrote: ↑Mon Sep 29, 2025 10:34 amNo we don't. Both of us know that will is just a term for a mental faculty. Don't be silly.Belinda wrote: ↑Mon Sep 29, 2025 10:29 am
Atla and FlashDP make the same error of presuming 'will' is a thing, an anatomical thing like some specialised sort of neuron ; or a physiological event like digesting a meal in the stomach and duodenum.
I am sorry to read that you two ,who are among the better informed contributors, don't understand you are deceiving yourselves by reifying.I trust neither of you need me to quote you directly however if you do I will do so.
True, the meaning of a word is its use, but some popular usages determine stultifying thought processes. Reifying 'will' leads directly to nonsense like absolute free will.
"A mental faculty" is still too Cartesian for safety, as "a mental faculty " is too much like a permanent state of mind.
Re: New Discovery
I reify will to some degree, just like folk philosophy does. Not reifying it would mean that it doesn't exist at all..FlashDangerpants wrote: ↑Mon Sep 29, 2025 10:42 amFolk-psychology attaches noun and verb words to mental faculties and events. The Will, the Mind and so on being the nouns. Beliveing, choosing, wanting, thinking and so on being the verbs. The Will is a noun when it is being invoked as an object, and to will is a verb when it is invoked as an act of willing. The faculty cannot be split into an actual seperate noun and verb unless I must take back what I just wrote to Belinda about neither of us reifying will.Atla wrote: ↑Mon Sep 29, 2025 10:03 amI don't think you're talking about the will itself here but about actions, chosen actions. Imo folk psychology also acknowledges the will in itself. The will itself isn't caused by BDM/satisfaction/desire, it's a pre-existing faculty.FlashDangerpants wrote: ↑Mon Sep 29, 2025 9:06 am Common sense folk-psychology has it that beliefs, desires and so on are our sources of motivation and that our will follows our motivations. Lessan's version is the same, he just uses the term "greatest satisfaction" in place of BDM. But whether we call it satisfaction or desire, it is the thing that is motivating the will. In a fully causal universe, it is the proximate cause of will. In a choice based universe, it is the thing that in all possible worlds still explains the choice. It's only under a non folk-psychology paradigm that this stuff isn't all the same when it is about thinking rational agents like us. Peacegirl would have to read stuff not written by her dad to know about that sort of thing though.
Folk psychology has no real issue with recalcitrance though, and neither does BDM as an explanation for motivation. It is obvious to all of us that a person can know cognitively that the spider is more afraid of us than we are of it, but also to feel paralysed with fear when seeing spiders. The emotion that arises to confound our intelligence, desires and beliefs is recalcitrant - it does not conform and does not need any specific reason not to.
Similarly you can cognitively know that lending money to somebody is a bad idea based on prior experience, and that it will be regretable, and on top of that know that you don't want to, but still some recalcitrant urge of some sort that runs counter to your motivations. There's room to argue about whether it also evades your will, as the phobia surely does.
None of this can rescue Lessans. The comon sense view of our minds is robust and flexible, his thing is a cut down homespun version that is brittle to survive.
- FlashDangerpants
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- Joined: Mon Jan 04, 2016 11:54 pm
Re: New Discovery
There's a broad sense in which mind is a thing, it is a thing we can use and talk about. And there's a narrow sense in which is not a thing, it doesn't hover on some external plane of existence as a glowing cloud of thoughts. Reification occurs when we know that an object exists in the loose sense only, but accidentally or otherwise think and reason about it as if it belongs to both.Atla wrote: ↑Mon Sep 29, 2025 11:07 amI reify will to some degree, just like folk philosophy does. Not reifying it would mean that it doesn't exist at all..FlashDangerpants wrote: ↑Mon Sep 29, 2025 10:42 amFolk-psychology attaches noun and verb words to mental faculties and events. The Will, the Mind and so on being the nouns. Beliveing, choosing, wanting, thinking and so on being the verbs. The Will is a noun when it is being invoked as an object, and to will is a verb when it is invoked as an act of willing. The faculty cannot be split into an actual seperate noun and verb unless I must take back what I just wrote to Belinda about neither of us reifying will.
Folk psychology has no real issue with recalcitrance though, and neither does BDM as an explanation for motivation. It is obvious to all of us that a person can know cognitively that the spider is more afraid of us than we are of it, but also to feel paralysed with fear when seeing spiders. The emotion that arises to confound our intelligence, desires and beliefs is recalcitrant - it does not conform and does not need any specific reason not to.
Similarly you can cognitively know that lending money to somebody is a bad idea based on prior experience, and that it will be regretable, and on top of that know that you don't want to, but still some recalcitrant urge of some sort that runs counter to your motivations. There's room to argue about whether it also evades your will, as the phobia surely does.
None of this can rescue Lessans. The comon sense view of our minds is robust and flexible, his thing is a cut down homespun version that is brittle to survive.
I don't think either of us is actually crossing that line, but I also never thought that common sense folk psychology does. Belinda is making a mistake to go down this behaviourist line of reasoning in my view. There's no call for Ryle here.
Re: New Discovery
FlashDangerpants wrote: ↑Mon Sep 29, 2025 12:05 amOMG, what is the deal with you? You wrote "You are basically in agreement with me because you admit that a person cannot go against his own wishes" that is a quote from you, you utter buffoon.peacegirl wrote: ↑Sun Sep 28, 2025 11:42 pmWhere did "admitting it" enter into it?FlashDangerpants wrote: ↑Sun Sep 28, 2025 10:48 pm
It is specifically because you write stuff like this that I call you stupid.
peacegirl wrote:STFU, I"m tired of your name calling FD. Maybe when you learn to have a little respect, I'll finish this post, but right now I'm movin' on.
Erm, I should have felt safe to leave the word impossibly out of it to be honest, it shouldn't need saying, it is obvious beyond words. You make no effort to understand what other people write because you have already hit reply before you get there, just like age does. You are clumsy and lazy and can barely read.
My God you are stupid. I have already explained this thing, you have had an unreasonable number of opportunities, there is no useful question to be answered. I am now going to just mock you and nothing more.peacegirl wrote: ↑Sun Sep 28, 2025 11:42 pm This is correct and shows that, regardless of how you define free will, going against what you find preferable, is impossible. Given a person's environment and genetics only leads them in one direction, not two. Free will states that a person can go in both directions because there is no compulsion either way, which is impossible. I hope you can ruminate on this and see the truth before screaming "foul".
Last edited by peacegirl on Mon Sep 29, 2025 11:30 am, edited 1 time in total.