Is motion like the following?

[Exian]

Yeah, I don't know man. I can't think of a third option that doesn't involve either infinite regress or something from nothing that doesn't sound silly as hell.

[bennyboy]

This works whether reality is idealistic, or the reality is that we are brains isolated from our percepts.

Btw, self-movement may be constrained by geometry, and thus not random.

That reminds me of one thing that I forgot: that if time is not a dimension, and there is only 1 time in existence-- the present-- then in any world view, saying things "move" would be a philosophically false statement, since anything with a single state can't really be moving. I do not know the current scientific view on the nature of time, so I don't want to look ignorant by conjecturing further (though I probably will pretty soon)

[Mudhammam]

This is unreadable. Edit it.

Sorry, I was a little stoned, and had just finished reading Thomas Aquinas' Contra Summa Gentiles, which is all I had been reading for the prior month, and that incredibly dull and boring work does something to petrify the mind in a not so good way. What I wanted to say was this: A moved object (A) requires a mover (B), otherwise it must be self-moved (AB). Furthermore, self-motion can only be random, for anything else (i.e. not random but moved at a particular instant to this or that end) will be determined by object B, the mover. This appears to me to be the only possibilities with respect to motion, granted it actually exists.

[Exian]

Every time I'm presented with the idea that the brain shapes the world in various ways, I can't help but think that we have fossil evidence prior to the development of the brain. Which means it developed in response to its environment. When a tree falls in the woods and no one is around to hear it, it does make a sound. Otherwise, the ear drum wouldn't have developed in response to sound waves. I know there's an argument that throws that into a spin, but I never remember it exactly. Because of this, I have an uncomfortable time accepting that motion or time is illusory, but it's fun to entertain.

[Mudhammam]

I confess I'm not understanding the choices.  Is this a contrast between viewing the movement of objects as entirely the result of earlier, determinative motions -vs- objects as subjects with intentions whose motion are reflection of those intentions (wherever those may have come from).  So the motion of inanimate objects is to be understood by looking backward toward earlier impacts while the motion of (at least some) animate objects is to be understood by looking forward toward the ends which are the goal of intentions.  Am I close?

Yes, that is close to what I'm saying, though I would include intentions/ends under that of a mover moved by a determinate motion, whereas self-motion is movement of self by self, and hence, can only be random motion. Why do I insist on this? Because if of itself and by itself something can determine to move in such a way that is truly free of necessity, it can have no predilection for one outcome over another, or to move at this time and at none other. Such a bent would preclude a prior motion which necessitated that particular state of affairs, otherwise, it occurred spontaneously.

To put it another way: All change by definition follows upon a preceding state of affairs which is ever so slightly different in one of two respects, temporal succession or spatial location. That change must either result as a necessary consequence of the preceding state (the car in Benny's dream was imagined to be here, passing by, but now that it has changed its position, it's there, up the imaginary road), in which motion is acted upon by something prior (whatever put the car in motion, on that particular road, in that instant of thought, etc.), or it acts from something of an internal impulse, but one that can truly be said to free in the sense that it is indeterminate - the only other option involving some causes and/or ends.

[Mudhammam]

I'd argue that the motion is itself only an idea, and that in fact the car is not moving, but rather that the mind is applying the idea of motion to the idea of the car.

But even the mind applying the idea is a change to and/or from some other, alternate mental activity, no? And change is... motion.

[Mudhammam]

Every time I'm presented with the idea that the brain shapes the world in various ways, I can't help but think that we have fossil evidence prior to the development of the brain. Which means it developed in response to its environment. When a tree falls in the woods and no one is around to hear it, it does make a sound. Otherwise, the ear drum wouldn't have developed in response to sound waves. I know there's an argument that throws that into a spin, but I never remember it exactly. Because of this, I have an uncomfortable time accepting that motion or time is illusory, but it's fun to entertain.

Well, some, like Locke, have differentiated between primary qualities, which are objective and actually "out there" - size, location, motion, etc. - and secondary qualities, which exist only in the mind of the person, such as texture, color, smell, sound, etc. So, the underlying substance, this mysterious something that you experience as this particular fossil, wouldn't entirely cease to possess all of the properties you detect in it absent of your mind. The problem is how does one define a substance and how do these secondary qualities, which exist in the knower, relate to the object that is known?

[Alex K]

I should comment here but no time right now... later!

[bennyboy]

I'd argue that the motion is itself only an idea, and that in fact the car is not moving, but rather that the mind is applying the idea of motion to the idea of the car.

But even the mind applying the idea is a change to and/or from some other, alternate mental activity, no? And change is... motion.

Motion is specifically a change in space.  If space is an idea, then you have at best the idea of motion.

[Whateverist]

Yes, that is close to what I'm saying, though I would include intentions/ends under that of a mover moved by a determinate motion, whereas self-motion is movement of self by self, and hence, can only be random motion. Why do I insist on this? Because if of itself and by itself something can determine to move in such a way that is truly free of necessity, it can have no predilection for one outcome over another, or to move at this time and at none other. Such a bent would preclude a prior motion which necessitated that particular state of affairs, otherwise, it occurred spontaneously.

To put it another way: All change by definition follows upon a preceding state of affairs which is ever so slightly different in one of two respects, temporal succession or spatial location. That change must either result as a necessary consequence of the preceding state (the car in Benny's dream was imagined to be here, passing by, but now that it has changed its position, it's there, up the imaginary road), in which motion is acted upon by something prior (whatever put the car in motion, on that particular road, in that instant of thought, etc.), or it acts from something of an internal impulse, but one that can truly be said to free in the sense that it is indeterminate - the only other option involving some causes and/or ends.

Again we bump up against the free will debate, agreed? I see some room between random and determined motion. From the point of view of an external witness, the movement of a self-mover can seem random. But from the point of view of the self-mover, movements can be elective and coherent with values and dispositions which are more or less settled. But some of our actions can seem more spontaneous/random than others, and some of us would always want to make room for them. But I don't think any self-mover -assuming we're talking about human beings here- would ever agree that every one of their actions is random.