Yes to all of those. I think I'm saying that mechanical regularity and random chance are extreme cases with a lot of possibilities in between including 'deterministic chaos'.
I think you mean that random chance is complete unpredictability. But I'm not sure what the other terms mean.
You mentioned before that you generally agreed that the behaviors of particular types of material objects were regular features. Humans were raised as a possible exception, but I wondered if we couldn't consider the fact that humans act for reasons as being a regular feature of human behavior. If that is so, then there are a couple of things I think we can say about material objects in general.
First is that if something is completely unpredictability, we cannot know much of anything about it. No use discussing human behavior if it is unpredictable.
Secondly, if there is regularity, there is predictability and we can know something about what it is up to from the fact that we know what type of thing it is. Certain behaviors are directed toward certain ends.
So it would seem unreasonable to think that all objects behave the same way wouldn't it? They may behave similarly in some aspects, but certainly not all aspects, right?
One person might seem to be behaving irregularly. They might explain that their reasons for acting have changed. Maybe outside circumstances have changed, so they are still being regular in so far as they respond in a way that makes sense to them and to us. But maybe their reasons change, or their ranking of possible responses changes, or maybe something else. So the question might be, Why is this?
Anyway, I'm curious as to where you are going, so do continue.
I am testing for common ground for basic mutual understandings.
It seems we started from a point of disagreement and perhaps tried to work backwards. Maybe if we started from the bottom floor and found out where we agreed and disagreed we would have better idea where the gap is and how big it is.
My working definition of what a materialist is committed to has changed as a result of this discussion.
So the question might be, Why is this?
So why? Specific instances may vary, but is there something general that answers the why question?
207 comments:
«Oldest ‹Older 201 – 207 of 207Yes to all of those. I think I'm saying that mechanical regularity and random chance are extreme cases with a lot of possibilities in between including 'deterministic chaos'.
I think you mean that random chance is complete unpredictability. But I'm not sure what the other terms mean.
You mentioned before that you generally agreed that the behaviors of particular types of material objects were regular features. Humans were raised as a possible exception, but I wondered if we couldn't consider the fact that humans act for reasons as being a regular feature of human behavior. If that is so, then there are a couple of things I think we can say about material objects in general.
First is that if something is completely unpredictability, we cannot know much of anything about it. No use discussing human behavior if it is unpredictable.
Secondly, if there is regularity, there is predictability and we can know something about what it is up to from the fact that we know what type of thing it is. Certain behaviors are directed toward certain ends.
Does this sound reasonable to you?
Certainly.
So it would seem unreasonable to think that all objects behave the same way wouldn't it? They may behave similarly in some aspects, but certainly not all aspects, right?
I'm getting at reductionism not being the case.
One person might seem to be behaving irregularly. They might explain that their reasons for acting have changed. Maybe outside circumstances have changed, so they are still being regular in so far as they respond in a way that makes sense to them and to us. But maybe their reasons change, or their ranking of possible responses changes, or maybe something else. So the question might be, Why is this?
Anyway, I'm curious as to where you are going, so do continue.
I am testing for common ground for basic mutual understandings.
It seems we started from a point of disagreement and perhaps tried to work backwards. Maybe if we started from the bottom floor and found out where we agreed and disagreed we would have better idea where the gap is and how big it is.
My working definition of what a materialist is committed to has changed as a result of this discussion.
So the question might be, Why is this?
So why? Specific instances may vary, but is there something general that answers the why question?
Post a Comment