Tentatively Christian; looking for a reasonable discussion

[IATIA]

And there is NOT an infinite amount of matter, as we know by the First Law of Thermodynamics.

That is an assumption. If there is a star 100 billion light years away, we will not know for a while. No matter how many stars or galaxies we find, it cannot be proven that there is not one more. The theory of the 'Big Bang' suggests implicitly that matter may be infinite.

[Whateverist]

In general it has always been a mistake to assume less where the cosmos is concerned. If bangs turn out to be a dime a dozen, then time may very well be infinite. At best the answer is probably not answerable without making assumption we can't support.

[Neo-Scholastic]

...when we suspend belief in physcialism about the mind, the problem still stands. For example, mental states are anything but unchanging. One minute there is this thought and this experience, then the next minute there is another thought and experience, then two hours later there are different thoughts and experiences that are not identical(not to be confused with analogous) to ones from before...Another problem is that we can't find "I" in our thoughts and experiences. When "I" analysis the experience of sitting down and typing on a keyboard, into smaller parts "I" don't find an "I." Now, I common criticism to this is that the I is external to the thoughts and experiences. Okay, but this comes at a price; that is, the concept of Self would become a very sterile concept.

They are basically the same problem. Anyone, but Heraclitus, can see that from cradle to grave, Joe is still Joe. And anyone, except Parmenides, can see that Joe has changed in material composition, size shape, and capacities. I wish there was a philosophical tradition that could somehow resolve this dilemma. Hmmmmm....

Seriously though the experience of the higher Self is the profound experience of moving beyond the ego awareness of “I” and merging with the Divine. What to the ego appears to be a sterile concept turns out to feel very expansive and liberating.

[JuliaL]

They are basically the same problem. Anyone, but Heraclitus, can see that from cradle to grave, Joe is still Joe. And anyone, except Parmenides, can see that Joe has changed in material composition, size shape, and capacities. I wish there was a philosophical tradition that could somehow resolve this dilemma. Hmmmmm....

Seriously though the experience of the higher Self is the profound experience of moving beyond the ego awareness of “I” and merging with the Divine. What to the ego appears to be a sterile concept turns out to feel very expansive and liberating.

Sure, him and Theseus, and everyone who notices that while Joe is asleep, Joe isn't Joe (at least the mind part, not the body which changes in a more chemically straightforward fashion.)
Or the split brain folks where Joe either can or can't find the word for chicken when shown a chicken depending on which eye it is shown to.
Or the people with dissociative identity disorder where Joe comes and goes and gets replaced by Ralph or Fred.

No, to the outside world, the thing that corresponds to Joe is the set of organized brain states which, by social convention, is recognized as 'Joe' when it is seen and recognized as 'Joe.' You might make an argument that from Joe's perspective, Joe always exists and it is reality that keeps coming and going. It's simpler and more consistent with observation for the rest of us to posit a continuous reality and an intermittent Joe. From outside Joe, all we can see is the brain states and try to understand how they interact to give Joe the sensation of being Joe.

Self aware neural networks are pretty easy to make: all that needs be done is to train one to recognize itself. This can be observed in the brain as input from the body is integrated and resolved into somatic markers which provide substrate on which to base decision making which is eventually reported to the conscious circuitry. The mystery of what is 'I' is being unpeeled for anyone who will see and accept that not being able to be someone else does not preclude understanding how that someone else can be constructed. Koch defined a set of rules by which contagious diseases could be attributed to specific causes: Koch's postulates. Application of these rules does not prove that the flu virus causes flu but it does give a framework on which to base decisions and actions as if it did. I expect there will, and probably soon, be a parallel but more complicated set of rules pertaining to observations of brain states which can similarly be used to define when a 'self' is there or not and whether that 'self' can be expected to return. At that point, philosophers discussing qualia, like those learned physicians who advocated the 'miasma theory' for the cause of cholera will have to shut up and die off.

[Neo-Scholastic]

...while Joe is asleep, Joe isn't Joe …the split…where Joe either can or can't find the word for chicken when shown a chicken depending on which eye it is shown to….[or] with dissociative identity disorder where Joe comes and goes and gets replaced by Ralph or Fred.

Indeed. Your examples all present interesting problems. Approaching these sorts of problems from a nominalist position, like you do, produces many paradoxes. I think one would first have to distinguish to what kind of universal does the particular instance, Joe, belong. It would seem to me Joe remains in essence human, and the personal ego identity, Joe, comes from accidental features.

… the thing that corresponds to Joe is the set of organized brain states which, by social convention, is recognized as 'Joe' when it is seen and recognized as 'Joe.

I guess that position kinda undermines the idea that Joe’s, or anyone else’s’, life can have meaning since Joe is nothing more than an arbitrary boundary between one socially determined* collection of material permutations and the rest of the material world.

…Self-aware neural networks are pretty easy to make…at that point, philosophers discussing qualia, like those learned physicians who advocated the 'miasma theory' for the cause of cholera will have to shut up and die off.

I think you bite off more than you can chew. The problems of qualia and intentionality would still remain unresolved. Besides, neo-Scholasticism doesn’t have the same kind of mind-body problem as modern analytic or continental philosophy.

*Which begs the question since the notion of a distinct social group is also an arbitrary boundary.

[Mudhammam]

I guess that position kinda undermines the idea that Joe’s, or anyone else’s’, life can have meaning since Joe is nothing more than an arbitrary boundary between one socially determined* collection of material permutations and the rest of the material world.

Turns out "nothing more" is a sum of pretty incredible experiences to which the material permutations arbitrarily identified as the individual Joe assigns great value. Why do you assume more is required?

[JuliaL]

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...while Joe is asleep, Joe isn't Joe …the split…where Joe either can or can't find the word for chicken when shown a chicken depending on which eye it is shown to….[or] with dissociative identity disorder where Joe comes and goes and gets replaced by Ralph or Fred.

Indeed. Your examples all present interesting problems. Approaching these sorts of problems from a nominalist position, like you do, produces many paradoxes. I think one would first have to distinguish to what kind of universal does the particular instance, Joe, belong. It would seem to me Joe remains in essence human, and the personal ego identity, Joe, comes from accidental features.

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… the thing that corresponds to Joe is the set of organized brain states which, by social convention, is recognized as 'Joe' when it is seen and recognized as 'Joe.

I guess that position kinda undermines the idea that Joe’s, or anyone else’s’, life can have meaning since Joe is nothing more than an arbitrary boundary between one socially determined* collection of material permutations and the rest of the material world.

And your problem with this is?
Is meaning supposed to be some absolute gas hanging out in the nothing that can't exist?
Why not be satisfied with the local meanings we as individuals apply to states of affairs?
Personally, I envision a hierarchical network of conditions that offer levels of meaning to each. Each level is contextual to the individual asking the question. The microbe is interested in its local chemical environment, the multi-cellular animal is interested in finding food and the society at large is interested in keeping from being overrun by the society next door. Meaning for each will differ, but is still meaning.

…Self-aware neural networks are pretty easy to make…at that point, philosophers discussing qualia, like those learned physicians who advocated the 'miasma theory' for the cause of cholera will have to shut up and die off.

I think you bite off more than you can chew. The problems of qualia and intentionality would still remain unresolved. Besides, neo-Scholasticism doesn’t have the same kind of mind-body problem as modern analytic or continental philosophy.

*Which begs the question since the notion of a distinct social group is also an arbitrary boundary.

I only indulge in philosophy to the extent necessary to keep philosophers at bay.
My basic belief is that, no matter how much we learn, we are physically & mentally limited and there will be things to not know. This state can, if allowed, provide a 'philosopher of the gaps' niche where authoritative speculation provides both motivation and reward to its members. If you can give the size of synchrotron needed for energy levels high enough to image 'the underpinnings of being itself' I can help you get it funded. Until that time, speculative bullshit remains speculative bullshit and like the poor, will always be with us. The problems of qualia, solipsism, & inference have had no closed solutions despite continuous discussion by better minds than mine for thousands of years. I don't expect an answer and am quite comfortable in that. The parallel with Koch's postulates offered is a solution which, in its pragmatism, pushes the philosophical purists a little farther into irrelevancy where they belong. Like Clinton, you can argue all day on what the meaning of 'is' is. But the physical theorists and experimentalists are the ones who have provided us with terrabyte drives. I'm on their side.

[The Reality Salesman01]

@Nestor
I happened to be reading Meno today, one the Great Dialogues of Plato, and couldn't help but think that this applied to what we are talking about. I thought I'd change only a couple of the words in the actual text to illustrate the parallel this has with our discussion.
In the actual dialogue, Socrates is examining Menon's proclaimed knowledge of Virtue. He is not asking about examples of things that correlate to virtue, rather, he wants to understand the essence of things that makes them virtuous. Our conversation has been about numbers and whether or not they have some intrinsic value on their own that transcends all things that correlate with them. Socrates offers the example of shapes to illustrate the sort of question he is asking, here's part of the exchange:

---

S: It seems so, but I really want to try to make progress here, for you do understand that
it's going to be like this with everything. If someone asked you about what we were just
talking about: 'what is shape, Meno?' and you told him that it was roundness, and then
he asked you what I just asked - namely, 'is roundness shape or a shape?' - you would
surely tell him it is a shape?
M: I certainly would.
S: That would be because there are other shapes?
M: Yes.
S: And if he went on to ask what they were, you would tell him?
M: I would.
S: The same would go for numbers, if he asked you what they are, and you said it is 1, and
he interrupted by asking, 'is 1 numbers or a number?' You would say it is a number, because
there are other numbers?
M: I would.
S: So what is this one thing to which the term number generally applies? Try to tell me.
For think what it would be like if you responded, like so, to the man who asked you all
these questions about color and number: 'I don't understand what you want, or what you
mean.' He would probably find this incredible and reply: 'you don't understand that I
want to know what these cases have in common?' Even hearing that, is it true you would
still have nothing to say, Meno, if someone asked: 'what is the one thing that applies to
roundness and straightness and all the other things you call shapes, and which is the
same in all of them?'
M: No! Socrates, you answer for me.
S: Now then, let me try to tell you what shape is. See whether you will accept the
following account: shape, let's say, is the one thing that invariably accompanies color.
Does this satisfy you, or do you want to go about defining the term in some other way?
For myself, I would be satisfied if you defined virtue in some such way as this.

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I started thinking that maybe numbers is the one thing that invariably accompanies truth, and it is truth that is the essence of numbers. The more interesting question seems to be-What is truth? Since numbers alone are not truth, as they can be arranged incorrectly to produce what is both intuitively and demonstrably nonsense, there must be something by which truth is measured. Numbers arranged properly can offer sound conclusions of clarity, but what is it that makes the truth apparent in the numbers? If 1+1 =/=3, why? I believe it is in the nature of existence to be what it is, and lack what it is not. The moment we refer to a "1" that exists, we are acknowledging something about the nature of existence. Whatever this "1" is, it is not anything else, or it could be "2" or "3". It is the nature of existence to be bound by the properties of our existence. Truth is the accurate arrangement of that which exists in reality. 1+1=2 because that is an accurate reflection of the nature of 1 and 2 and how they can be arranged in reality, and we call this arrangement -" truth". Can we say that numbers could produce truth if there were no consistency within the nature of existence? Or is it more accurately said that numbers can only reflect that which is consistent with the nature of existence? And since the nature of our existence is bound within the reality we observe it in, can we say that numbers or truth can exist in any reality in which things exist and there is no consistency? I'm having a hard time investing any likelihood in that being a possibility.

[Esquilax]

They are basically the same problem. Anyone, but Heraclitus, can see that from cradle to grave, Joe is still Joe. And anyone, except Parmenides, can see that Joe has changed in material composition, size shape, and capacities. I wish there was a philosophical tradition that could somehow resolve this dilemma. Hmmmmm....

There's also a realistic tradition that resolves this dilemma, by revealing that the dilemma is merely an equivocation offered by people wishing to resort to the philosophical tradition; Joe may have changed in material composition, but he has not done so entirely, all at once. Joe changes gradually over time, and since "Joe," as an identity,exists as a process going on within Joe's brain, that process can persist regardless of how many physical things change. Sort of like how I can replace the fan on my PC, yet the hard drive doesn't require magic to retain all its programs just because a physical component changes.

[Pizza]

Maybe we should be Software-Hardware dualists?