dwyer@vixie.UUCP (Bill Dwyer) (10/14/86)
Concerning my rejoinder to Brad Templeton on Objectivism,
Alan Wexelblat replies to my statement: "Consciousness requires a brain
and sense organs. It also requires something (an external world) to be
conscious of."
He states:
I disagree with both these points. Although we have not seen any
examples of consciousness absent from brains, there does not seem
to be a logical necessity. I can make this argument in a separate
article, if ncessary. The second sentence is also problematic. Surely
we can conceive of a self-aware consciousness? Why is an outside
world required?
I have already answered the second question in my previous reply to Mr.
Wexeblat. But I'll state it again: Awareness is always OF SOMETHING. If
one is not aware of anything, one is not aware. Thus, there has to be an
awareness of something BEFORE there can be an awareness to be aware of.
In which case, in order to be aware of one's awareness, one must first be
aware of something OTHER THAN one's awareness. Comprende?
As to the first question, consciousness is always consciousness in some
particular form and by some particular means. One is aware in the form of
color, sound, smell, etc. by means of vision, audition, olfaction, etc.
Specific forms of awareness require specific sensory receptors without
which the attendant form of awareness would not exist. Non-sensory
perception is logically impossible, because it would be awareness without
any specific form of awareness and without any specific means of being
aware. Just as communication is impossible without a form of
communication (e.g., language), or locomotion impossible without a form
of locomotion (e.g., walking) -- so awareness is impossible without a form
of awareness (e.g., vision). And vision without eyes is as impossible as
walking without legs. If Mr. Wexelblat wishes to write a separate article
on this subject, let him write one on why "Although we have not seen any
examples of [walking] absent from [legs], there does not seem to be a
logical necessity."
Wexelblat quotes me: ". . . the "primacy of existence" . . . is the view that
consciousness is metaphysically dependent on, and its content determined
by, existence. In other words, according to Objectivism, existence can get
along without consciousness, but consciousness cannot get along without
existence. In this sense, existence not consciousness is metaphysically
primary."
He comments:
(Note: How is "metaphysically primary" different from "primary"?)
I've already covered this in my reply to Templeton, but again, I will repeat
myself. Consciousness is an irreducible primary epistemologically, since
all knowledge presupposes it, but it is not an irreducible primary
metaphysically because existence does not presuppose it. Wexelblat
continues:
Again, two points. I have in my consciousness an image of a chimera.
How is that bit of content "determined by existence"? Second, "get
along with" is a very loose phrase. It seems certain that in some
ways the very presence of consciousness affects existence (I am
thinking here of quantum-mechanical effects).
The first point is simple: The raw material for a chimera must come from
one's awareness of existence, just as the raw material for a dream must
come from waking life. Such raw material cannot come from awareness
divorced from any object of awareness, since (as I stated) without an
object of awareness, there would be no awareness.
By saying that consciousness cannot "get along without" existence, I mean
that there has to be something to be conscious of in order for
consciousness to exist. By saying that existence "can get along without"
consciousness, I mean that there does not have to be consciousness in
order for something to exist.
As for Wexelblat's statement that "the very presence of consciousness
affects existence (I am thinking here of quantum-mechanical effects)," I
suppose he is referring to the fact that the process of measurement
affects the object measured. Although this is true, it does not
demonstrate that a mere act of awareness can affect existence; it
demonstrates only that the the physical means of measurement can.
In response to my point that it is neither necessary nor possible to prove
consciousness, Templeton asks:
What does it mean to "prove consciousness"? Do you mean "prove that
consciousness exists"? [Answer: YES] Do you mean "prove that I have
consciousness. [YES; I cover this in my previous reply to Wexelblat]
Or "prove that you and I both have consciousness and that they are not
connected or identical"? [No, not exactly, but solipsism can be
refuted as per my previous reply to him.]
Wexelblat takes issue with Objectivism's definition of time as "the
measurement of motion" which definition, he states,
shows a lack of understanding of relativity. If I take a trip at some
significant fraction of the speed of light (say >75%), then even an
instrument as coarse as a wall-clock will show the differences. You
here on earth will think my trip took significantly longer than I
thought it did.
If we want to use quite precise instruments (say, atomic clocks) we
can show that "eight hours" does not have the exact same meaning on
the ground as it does at the top of the World Trade Center. What
motion is involved here?
The motion of the clocks used as standards for measuring other forms of
motion against the rotation of the earth. It is true that the internal
workings of an atomic clock atop the World Trade Center are a fraction
slower than they would be if the clock were on the ground, because the
earth rotates faster up there (coming a fraction closer to the speed of
light) than it does on the ground. If one were to measure motion against a
normal clock whose 24 hour passage reflected a single rotation of the
earth, one could not do it while the clock was atop the World Trade Center
without adjusting the clock to run a fraction faster. But the fact that the
measuring device has to be adjusted for accuracy in different contexts is
irrelevant to the nature of time. The fact that motion is relative simply
means that its measurement must also be relative, i.e., context-dependent.
That time is relative to a given context of motion does not discredit the
definition of time as "the measurement of motion." True, if I accelerate to
>than 75% the speed of light, then from my frame of reference the trip
will take less time than it will from your frame of reference here on
earth. But you and I can still measure motion relative to the standards of
motion (the clocks) that we have available. It's just that your motion will
be faster than mine relative to my standard, and my motion slower than
yours relative to your standard. Wexelblat continues:
On another front, behaviorists have shown that there is a definite
correlation between intelligence and "time sense." Animals which we
agree (do we?) are conscious, such as dogs, do not have such a sense.
For example, you can train a dog to do something when he hears a bell,
You cannot train him to wait 2 seconds and then do something.
To the extent that humans possess a time sense, there is nothing
particularly mysterious about it. Nor does it contradict my definition of
time. We have plenty of experience measuring our activities against the
clock from which experience we have developed an ability to accurately
estimate (without certain limits) how long it takes to do something. In
other words, we have developed the ability to estimate the relationship
between our activities and the motion of the clock. Animals are not able
to do this, because animals do not engage in measurement or, for that
matter, in any process of conceptual identification.
Wexelblat quotes my statement: "Of course, the universe (meaning
existence) has not existed for a finite period of time, because
existence had no beginning. To have a beginning, it would have had to
come into existence out of nothing, and from nothing comes nothing.
He then states:
"I wonder how you know this. Were you there? What is it about the
universe that makes you say it has always existed? And what do you
mean by 'from nothing comes nothing'?"
He then quotes my statement ". . .since the universe is literally everything,
it can have no relationship to anything else -- neither a temporal one nor a
spatial one", and says:
Once again, you are using a word differently. I have heard
astronomers and astrophysicists use the term "other universe " (when
talking about black holes). What do you mean by "universe" such that
there can be nothing else? Do you include these other universes?
Possible universes?
By "universe" I mean existence as such. Existence always existed (in some
particular form); it had no beginning.
In response to my statement that the universe had no beginning, he says, "I
wonder how you know this? Were you there?"
Was I where? At the beginning of the universe? But it is my position that
the universe HAD no beginning. How do I know it had no beginning? What
could possibly be the cause or creator of existence as such? Certainly not
existence itself. Non-existence then? But non-existence is nothing. And
nothing can create nothing. A beginning or a creator presupposes
existence; existence does not presuppose a beginning or a creator. Just as
unconsciousness cannot prove consciousness, so non-existence cannot
create existence. Just as consciousness is an irreducible primary
epistemologically, so existence is an irreducible primary metaphysically.
What makes me say that the universe always existed? Well if the universe
did not always exist -- did not exist for all of time -- then it would have
come into being at some point in time, in which case, time would antecede
the universe, antecede existence. But time is the measurement of motion,
and motion presupposes bodies that move. Therefore time requires an
already existing universe of moving bodies, without which it would be
impossible. "Time is 'in' the universe; the universe is not 'in' time."
[Nathaniel Branden, THE OBJECTIVIST NEWSLETTER, May 1962, p. 20.
I stated:
In order for faster than light communication to be possible, it must
be consistent with the law of causality. . . . And no valid scientific
inferences are possible that repudiate the law of universal causation
-- a principle on which all scientific induction depends.
Wexelblat replies:
Two points: I think Bill Dwyer doesn't quite understand what FTL
communication may mean. FTL travel (whether of information or
whatever) implies time-travel. Thus we could have effects occurring
"before" their "causes"! I also don't understand what he means by "the
law of universal causation" and what it has to do with the Objectivist
identity axiom.
If FTL communication is possible, it cannot violate the law of causality.
Effects cannot precede causes by the very nature of
ause and effect. Nor
is time travel metaphysically possible. To say that FTLC is possible,
therefore, means that our present conception of what it implies about
effects preceding causes must be wrong. FTLC is considered scientifically
impossible for very specific reasons. As one approaches the speed of
light, mass becomes infinite, etc. To entertain the possibility of FTLC is
therefore simultaneously to entertain the possibility that the scientific
reasons against it contain loopholes. It is not to entertain the possibility
that the scientific reasons against it continue to hold, but that the
philosophical (i.e., metaphysical) reasons against it (i.e., the law of
causality, the law of identity) themselves contain loopholes and are to be
abandoned.
The law of causality (sometimes referred to as the law of universal
causation), is the law of identity applied to action and is a presupposition
of scientific induction. Without the law of causality, no scientific
inferences could be drawn from any empirical observation, for on what
basis would one draw them? On the basis that like effects imply like
causes? Not if the laws of identity and causality are thrown out with the
bathwater. Nothing could be inferred from anything, because nothing
would imply anything. Those experiments that Templeton cites which
allegedly violate "Bell's famous inequality," would imply nothing let alone
one of the four possibilities that Templeton cites in his article.
To claim as a valid scientific inference that the law of identity is
meaningless or spurious disqualifies any basis that one has for making
such an inference. For on what basis is the inference to be made and
according to what logical principles? To say that A implies B is to say
that there is a logical connection between A and B, but if the law of
identity is meaningless, no logical connections can legitimately be
inferred.
Wexelblat quotes my statement,
To say that "A is approximately A" would be meaningless itself, if A
were not A. For if A were not A, if it had no identity, how could one
identify it as being approximately anything?
He replies:
Dwyer's problem here is that he doesn't understand what Templeton
means by "approximately". Templeton means "to the first
approximation"; that is, what we call A may not actually turn out to
be the case if we look too closely at it. Thus, the statement "that is
A" is NOT a statement about how things really are, but rather is a
statement of human convenience.
The law of identity, expressed by the formula "A is A", is simply an
expression of the metaphysical truth that a thing is what it is. It has
nothing to with what we "CALL" things. Nor does it have anything to do
with cases of mistaken identification. It simply refers to the fact that
whatever a thing is, it is what it is. In that sense, it IS a statement about
how things really are -- and NOT a statement of human convenience --
because things REALLY ARE WHAT THEY ARE. It certainly is a non-sequitur
to say that if we look too closely at things, they may turn out to be what
they are not. They may turn out to be what we THOUGHT they are not, but
they cannot turn out to be what IN FACT they are not.
The statement "A is A" is not "A is x". For instance, we may say, "The man
is guilty." (A is x) If we investigate further, we may find him innocent, but
whatever he is, innocent or guilty (x or y), he is what he is. The law of
Identity is not simply a statement of human convenience. It is a
statement about the nature of existence. As Rand has so elegantly put it,
"Existence IS identity".
Furthermore how, according to Templeton or Wexelblat, does one
characterize the statement that the law of identity is simply a statement
of human convenience? Is that "a statement about how things really are"
or simply "a statement of human convenience"? If it is simply a statement
of human convenience, as it must be according to him, then it is not a
statement about what the law of identity really is -- in which case, he
cannot MAINTAIN that the law of identity is simply a statement of human
convenience. His argument is self-refuting.
Wexelblat quotes my statement:
If a thing is not itself but only approximately itself, then if it is
approximately A", does that mean then that it is approximately
"approximately A"? And if so, does that in turn mean that it is
approximately "approximately 'approximately A'"? Evidently. We
are thus let to an infinite regress, in other words, to a contradiction.
Wexelblat says:
"No. . . . To say that "A is approximately A" DOES NOT say that it is
approximately "approximately A". No regress is involved (which, by
the way, is not the same as a contradiction!)
If by "approximately A" one means NOT that a thing may turn out to be only
approximately what we THOUGHT it is, but that it may turn out to be only
approximately what it IS, then an infinite (i.e., vicious) regress IS
involved. For if what a thing IS is only approximately what it is, then the
"what it is" as only "approximately what it is" is, in turn, only
approximately what it is, in which case, you get an infinite series of
approximatelies qualifying approximatelies. An infinite (i.e., vicious
regress) is a contradiction in the sense that the regress is generated by a
contradiction. In this particular case, the contradiction is obvious: One is
saying that a thing is not what it is (but only approximately what it is).
Wexelblat continues. He quotes my statement:
The statement "A has a high probability of being A" is no better. Is it
TRUE that "A has a high probability of being A" or is it merely highly
probable?
He replies:
Once again, you're not seeing Brad's viewpoint. To say "A has a high
probability of being A" is to say that making identifications in the
real world is not a certain business. it says nothing about English
sentences, which have no trouble remaining true or false. Thus, the
sentence I quoted is true if the Copenhagan interpretation is correct,
false otherwise. No probability is involved here.
If this is indeed Brad's viewpoint -- and I would like to hear from Brad
himself on this -- then he has failed to identify properly the law of
identity. Again, the law of identity simply says that a thing is what it is,
irrespective of whether we can identify what it is or not. So if the
Copenhagen interpretation is simply that we cannot be certain of making
correct identifications in the real world, then that interpretation does not
contradict the law of identity as such.
The interpretation does, however, suffer from other problems. It
presupposes a certain (i.e., knowledgeable) identification of the facts on
the basis of which the interpretation is made. If one cannot make certain
identifications in the real world, then on what basis does one presume to
identify correctly the results of the experiments that are alleged to
violate "Bell's famous inequality?" Or did these experiments take place in
an unreal world where certain identifications are possible?
Templeton has stated:
All particles that were ever related are forever related. By the
Big Bang theory, that's the whole universe. No entity has an
independent existence. A is A now only applies to the whole universe,
and as such it's not very meaningful. "The universe is the universe"
-- That I'll agree with.
Wexelblat explains:
What Brad is saying is this: By some theory we are all part of the
same "stuff". If you look at things from a certain viewpoint, all that
we call "things" are part of one thing. This is another way of making
the same point that was first made: what we call "A" has less to do
with reality than it does with human convenience. The same thing can
be said of relationships - they are just human notational
conveniences, not reflections of "what's really out there." This is
important because Objectivism claims to be making metaphysical
statements (ie., statements about the way things really are). Gary is
showing how that might be a false claim.
Gary? I thought we were talking about Brad's statements. I'm afraid
Wexelblat has his Templetons mixed up. Gary Templeton is a baseball
player with the San Diego Padres. Brad Templeton is the guy making the
statements. But then if we look a little closer we might find that Brad
Templeton is really Gary, after all. Right, Mr. Wexelblat? Besides,
"[whom] we call ["Brad']" may, on Templeton's theory, "have less to do with
reality than it does with human convenience."
Seriously, if "what we call A has less to do with reality than it does with
human convenience", then what Templeton calls "particles", "the Big Bang"
"the whole universe", etc. have less to do with reality than with human
convenience. But if these words do not refer to reality, then how are we
to consider the theory they express as a genuine metaphysical possibility?
Yet Mr. Templeton's interpretation presumes to be metaphysical --
presumes to be one interpretation of "the way things really are."
Certainly, his statement, "No entity has an independent existence. A is A
now only applies to the whole universe . . . ." is metaphysical -- is a
statement about "what's really out there" on this interpretation.
In fact, concepts must refer to "what's really out there", otherwise they
wouldn't mean anything. What, for example, does "human, notational
convenience" mean? Is there REALLY a human notational convenience that
the term designates -- in other words, does the term refer to reality -- or
does the term itself function simply as a human, notational convenience.
If the latter, then we have no way to know what "human, notational
convenience" means, and cannot therefore meaningfully ASSERT that its
function is one of human, notational convenience.
Gene Ward Smith addresses himself to issues that parallel those Alan
Wexelblat raises. He asks:
What in the name of Ayn Rand is "the universal law of causality?"
Would you care to define what it is, and show why it is PRESUPPOSED
by induction?
I have already discussed this above, but I will elaborate somewhat here:
The law of universal causality is really just another name for the law of
causality itself. I use the term "universal" in order to emphasis the fact
that it applies universally, just as does the law of identity. The law of
causality is the law of identity applied to action:
"A thing, to be at all, must be something, and can only be what it is.
To assert a causal connexion between A and X implies that A acts as
it does because of what it is; because, in fact, it is A. So long
therefore as it is A, it must act thus; and to assert that it may act
otherwise on a subsequent occasion is to assert that what is A is
something else than the A which it is declared to be. . . . [which]
is to deny the possibility of reasoning altogether. If we cannot truly
make the same assertion about a number of things, then, as Aristotle
observes, there will be no universal, and so no middle term, and no
demonstration. . . . What holds for the relation of subject and
attribute holds in the respect eo ipso for that of cause and effect. To
suppose that the same cause -- other things being equal -- can have
different effects on two occasions is as much as to suppose that two
things can be the same, and yet so far their attributes different.
[H.W.B. Joseph, "Presuppositions of Induction", AN INTRODUCTION TO
LOGIC (Oxford University Press, London, 1961), pp. 408-409]
Mr. Smith asserts:
Without wishing to assert physics is in some unique way the science
of reality, I would like to claim that anyone who today wishes to do
serious metaphysics ought to understand some physics, notably
relativity and quantum mechanics.
While it is true that discussing metaphysics with knowledgeable
scientists in the fields that he mentions may require a common frame of
reference, it is not necessary to know relativity and quantum mechanics to
DO metaphysics. On the contrary, an understanding of the law of identity
and its corollary, the law of causality is required for proper scientific
investigation and inference.
Smith states:
I see you are now claiming that the "law of causality" follows from
the "law of identity" and that physics depends on both. Care to
explain your meaning.
A careful reading of the quoted passage by Joseph should make my meaning clear.