Of Reason

[shkrobius]

...What can be more sillily arrogant and misbecoming, than for a man to think that he has a mind and understanding in him, but yet in all the universe beside there is no such thing? Or that those things, which with the utmost stretch of his reason he can scarce comprehend, should be moved and managed without any reason at all?Read more... )

Comments

[nedosionist]

You're asking two different questions, shifting the meaning of "rational" in a non-trivial way: about human rationality and about rationality of the universe. Laws of nature provide the link between the two, and while on one hand known laws of nature are indeed our own generalizations (human rationality), I'd say that in another sense realist view is appropriate, and law of nature do exist, as as-yet-unknown regularities (rationality of nature): similar objects in similar circumstances act in similar ways. But your answer to the puzzle why laws exist is begging the question: we can say that fundamental constants are product of chance in multiverse, which is similar to your argument here, assuming axiomatically existence or at least possibility of some laws. If we argue, as you do, that existence of laws of nature themselves (rationality of nature) is a product of chance, you merely shift the burden and axiomatize chance. Then: Why chance exists? It is not clear that existence of chance is any more fundamental than existence of laws of

[shkrobius]

I am only suggesting that we are rational because the world is rational. There are no two meanings of the word, only one. Had the world been irrational, it would be useless to ask questions at all. Any questions. Assuming that a question WHY has an answer already presupposes that the world is either rational or quasirational.

[nedosionist]

Granted; but in your comment you are shifting from ontology to epistemology. Your post itself suggests a lot stronger reading. In truly irrational world, that is, the world without laws of nature at all, there is at best utter chaos (even that, if we can assume preexistence of chance). There are no organisms, no evolution, no cells, no molecules, no atoms. So by a version of anthropic principle, if life exists (or anything at all for that matter), then the world is already necessarily rational.

[shkrobius]

But this IS a world without laws, if you follow a materialist viewpoint. Laws are regular patterns suggested by human mind. They connect concepts rather than material objects. It may be as well that these are purely imaginary patterns or the ones that are cast by our own minds so there is always an agreemnt with observtion. It is less an epistemiological problem than that of the ontological status of the laws. In any case, it is insufficient to have laws to be rational. You also need the ability to follow these laws. The chaos that you mention is not, actually, chaos at all, just each particle of that world follows its own laws. So you would have an astronomical number of laws, but an infinitely caable rational mind would certainly be able to follow it all. So there is no reason to believe that there is no life in chaos.

[michaellogin]

***I am only suggesting that we are rational because the world is rational.*** Так это и есть один из догматов диамата: мышление - неотъемлемое свойство материи, отражающее её сущностные аспекты и подчиняющееся, так же, как и мир в целом, законам диалектической (гегелевской) логики. Так что собственно материализм здесь ни при чём - проблема "мир-разум" существует в любой философии, озаботившейся саморефлексией

[shkrobius]

Да я знаю, что это один из догматов. Вот именно он и делает из него посмешище: понятийный аппарат, предложенный для саморазвития Абсолюта ни к селу ни к городу приложен к материи. Такой выход сродни mysterians (почему бы так должно быть не поясняется) а потому и говорить не о чем.

А Ваше рассуждение о возможных мирах - лишь немного другая форма антропного аргумента, что я привел в посту. Других попыток ответа мне не попадалось, кроме одной, но о ней стоит говорить отдельно. От Вашего подхода она далека; утверждается, что определенные виды матлогики выбираются эволюцией независимо от отбора. Теория эта темная, и как я не пытался ее понять, как она именно работает я разобраться не смог. По-моему , там какое-то движение руками в середине; предпосылки ясны, выводы тоже, но как одно следует из другого понять невозможно. WS Cooper : The evolution of reason.

[michaellogin]

Купер стартует уже с биологического уровня, "жизнь-память", а до него ещё надо добраться, если мы хотим "доказать" тезис о рациональности мира

[shkrobius]

(3) in its logically consistent form is panpsychism. My very first paragraph directly stated that I will not consider it.

Так рационален мир или нет? -- Just like Locke says in his chapter (which I rehashed in the post): it is no more possible that the world that is devoid of rationality produces it than matter that lacks extention produces space. Actually, he also says that panpsychism cannot be correct. If each corpuscule is rational but has its own rules than you can have harmony only if there are rational principls that are still higher than their rational principles that they need to obey, whether by universal agreement or imposition. That principle, that point of agreement can be called G-d without any loss of generality.

[pr_eugene]

...What can be more sillily arrogant and misbecoming, than for a man to think that he has a mind and understanding in him, but yet in all the universe beside there is no such thing? Or that those things, which with the utmost stretch of his reason he can scarce comprehend, should be moved and managed without any reason at all? (Locke)
[...]
There is a thing about materialism proper (as opposed to, say, panpsychism) that I've never been able to understand: how does it explain rationality.
[...]
People usually take the easy way out of it. Yes, there are no laws, it is all irrational, but there are certain regularities in nature, and the laws are ad hoc rationalizations of such regularities. Recognizing such regularities helps us to survive, because one can predict what is likely to happen.

Did they ever watch the perfect beauty of a rainbow ?
I am happy to stay put and watch in awe.

[cousin_it]

Sure, I can imagine a world where every quantity of interest comes from an independent random event, not predictable by rationality. But in most worlds I can imagine, at least some quantities of interest will be aggregations of many random events, and thus predictable with near certainty. That IMO is why rationality works, and the extent to which it works.