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ORIGINAL: vincentML

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We also know that a human being is more than the sum of its physical parts. What this ‘something extra’ might be is not known. It has resisted all attempts at specification and/or identification (to date), and also resisted all attempts at symbolic representation except via vague allusions.

I recall you writing this quite awhile ago. Your meaning eludes me. A human is a complex dynamic non-linear emergent biological system. Every primate is. It should be self-evident that they are more than the sum of their physical parts by the very nature of their organization and functions. I am troubled that your 'something extra' skirts the edges of some mystical essence that others have called 'soul.' I don't see how you can avoid falling into the soul pool, although I know it is not your intention to even dip your toes in those waters. How would you distinguish between 'something that resists representation' and something called 'soul?'

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So the notion that there may be something there, something that defies physical explanation is not at all far fetched. It appears to be an essential part of each and every one of us. As things stand, it also appears to be beyond the explanatory limits of a purely materialist model.

Is this any more than an appeal to Cartesian dualism?

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ORIGINAL: tweakabelle
There is no need to infer a soul or anything of the sort from the above.

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ORIGINAL: tweakabelle
There is no need to infer a soul or anything of the sort from the above. Both post-modernist approaches and Chaos Theory posit that all systems are subject to random interventions. One application of these perspectives would posit humans as a system subject to random events/influences/forces.

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Chaos theory is a field of study in mathematics, with applications in several disciplines including meteorology, physics, engineering, economics and biology. Chaos theory studies the behavior of dynamical systems that are highly sensitive to initial conditions, an effect which is popularly referred to as the butterfly effect. Small differences in initial conditions (such as those due to rounding errors in numerical computation) yield widely diverging outcomes for such dynamical systems, rendering long-term prediction impossible in general.[1] This happens even though these systems are deterministic, meaning that their future behavior is fully determined by their initial conditions, with no random elements involved

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PeonforHer
If they can't understand it, poetically tell them to fuck off.

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Chaos theory does not posit that all system are subject to random interventions, whatever the fuck and intervention is. Chaos theory says that some systems have too many variables to take them all into account when modeling those systems, this is why weather forecasting cannot be a precise activity. A corollary is the so called butterfly effect where some seemingly minor variable has an outsized effect on the future state of the system. Chaos theory is never about randomness but is entirely about deterministic systems.

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ORIGINAL: tweakabelle
sadly, poetry would be wasted on such insecure, crippled minds.

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ORIGINAL: vincentML

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Chaos theory does not posit that all system are subject to random interventions, whatever the fuck and intervention is. Chaos theory says that some systems have too many variables to take them all into account when modeling those systems, this is why weather forecasting cannot be a precise activity. A corollary is the so called butterfly effect where some seemingly minor variable has an outsized effect on the future state of the system. Chaos theory is never about randomness but is entirely about deterministic systems.

Tweak isn't saying that the systems are random, but the intervening events are random and unpredictable. That systems can be effected, as she says, is a deterministic statement.

Chaos theory is not so much about too many variables as it is about overlooking seemingly minor variations in the early data. The application to humans is that we are dynamic biological systems that emerge out of obscured prenatal environments whose starting conditions are not easily measured. Are there random intervening events? Oh yeah! A brain tumour would fit that description.

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I strongly urge people who don't understand higher math to not use math theories they don't understand as they inevitably mangle them, as tweaks has now done both to Gödel's Incompleteness Theorems and to Chaos Theory.

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ORIGINAL: vincentML

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I strongly urge people who don't understand higher math to not use math theories they don't understand as they inevitably mangle them, as tweaks has now done both to Gödel's Incompleteness Theorems and to Chaos Theory.

Clearly, you misread or misrepresented what Tweak wrote. Randomness of intervening events NOT randomness in chaos systems. Deliberately or not, you went on to scold her without basis and now you do not even have the civility to acknowledge your error and extend an apology. WTF? Man up!

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ORIGINAL: tweakabelle
There is no need to infer a soul or anything of the sort from the above. Both post-modernist approaches and Chaos Theory posit that all systems are subject to random interventions. One application of these perspectives would posit humans as a system subject to random events/influences/forces.

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ORIGINAL: Kirata

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ORIGINAL: DomKen

Take the weather, for instance...

Or take determinism, for instance. Determinism is a philosophical position that suffers from a lack of agreement over whether or not it is true, and even over whether or not it can be known to be true.

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ORIGINAL: DomKen

I strongly urge people who don't understand higher math to not use math theories they don't understand as they inevitably mangle them

I strongly urge people who don't understand what they're talking about not to make truth claims about things that are in fact not known to be true, and about which it may not even be possible to know.

K.

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ORIGINAL: DomKen

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ORIGINAL: vincentML

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I strongly urge people who don't understand higher math to not use math theories they don't understand as they inevitably mangle them, as tweaks has now done both to Gödel's Incompleteness Theorems and to Chaos Theory.

Clearly, you misread or misrepresented what Tweak wrote. Randomness of intervening events NOT randomness in chaos systems. Deliberately or not, you went on to scold her without basis and now you do not even have the civility to acknowledge your error and extend an apology. WTF? Man up!

Bullshit. Here is exactly what she wrote

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ORIGINAL: tweakabelle
There is no need to infer a soul or anything of the sort from the above. Both post-modernist approaches and Chaos Theory posit that all systems are subject to random interventions. One application of these perspectives would posit humans as a system subject to random events/influences/forces.

Chaos theory never posits that a system involves randomness. Chaos theory is very specifically about deterministic systems.

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ORIGINAL: vincentML
Damn! Are you having trouble reading? Nowhere does she say the systems involve randomness. Use your own example. Climate is a chaos system. Within the system causes and effects are assumed. But suppose Yellowstone explodes. A random event outside the climate system. That sure as hell would effect the climate.

You just can't admit you misread Tweak.

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Both post-modernist approaches and Chaos Theory posit that all systems are subject to random interventions.

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ORIGINAL: DomKen
If Yellowstone explodes it does not cause a random effect on the climate. It has a deterministic effect on climate. A chaotic system but still a system with a result that occurs exactly as the initial conditions dictate.

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ORIGINAL: GotSteel

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ORIGINAL: DomKen
If Yellowstone explodes it does not cause a random effect on the climate. It has a deterministic effect on climate. A chaotic system but still a system with a result that occurs exactly as the initial conditions dictate.

It looks to me as though VincentML's reading of tweak's claim is that the "Yellowstone explodes" is the "random intervening event". This is also not literally correct as it's not at all random. However, applying the principle of charity she could be using it in a figurative sense like how people will refer to dice as random.

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ORIGINAL: Kirata

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ORIGINAL: DomKen

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ORIGINAL: Kirata

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ORIGINAL: DomKen

Take the weather, for instance...

Or take determinism, for instance. Determinism is a philosophical position that suffers from a lack of agreement over whether or not it is true, and even over whether or not it can be known to be true.

Making up shit as always.
Chaos theory is always about deterministic systems.

Since I didn't say it wasn't, it would appear that you're the one making shit up. The subject of my post was determinism, not chaos theory. Determinism predicates a clockwork universe, inherently predictable in every detail, except that "we just cannot accurately model it because of all the small variables" (your words). But theories and models are not reality. Determinism is an assumption. To proclaim as a fact that real systems like the weather are deterministic amounts to nothing more or less than a recitation from your catechism.

K.