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Sciborg_S_Patel
Nice post Chuck.
I think the validity of mechanistic closure (everything about reality can be given a complete mathematical description that fits into the whole) is what divides what we can loosely group as "materialists" from those we'd group as "immaterialists".
You see this with questions of time, qualia, creative ability, and so on. [Though as you say all this still remains at the level of forms.]
But the claim, AFAICTell, is not that the sensation of becoming expresses the truth about time, but rather that this illusion of becoming is becoming within the context of subjective awareness:
"Take the supposed illusion of change. This must mean that something, X, appears to change when in fact it does not change at all. That may be true about X; but how could the illusion occur unless there were change somewhere? If there is no change in X, there must be a change in the deluded mind that contemplates X. The illusion of change is actually a changing illusion. Thus the illusion of change implies the reality of some change. Change, therefore, is invincible in its stubbornness; for no one can deny the appearance of change."
-Laird
It's a case where seeming is being. As such, regardless of whether the illusion is accurate to exceedingly small units of time (if division of time is even acceptable) is irrelevant. It's the illusion which changes, so something does change.
I think the validity of mechanistic closure (everything about reality can be given a complete mathematical description that fits into the whole) is what divides what we can loosely group as "materialists" from those we'd group as "immaterialists".
You see this with questions of time, qualia, creative ability, and so on. [Though as you say all this still remains at the level of forms.]
I think the problem with those critiques is that they try to take the illusion and somehow extrapolate it to the ontology. Like saying that because you had the sensation time is going backwards, that means time indeed, trully goes backwards. While I agree that time and consciousness are puzzling and currently their relation is unknown, I think it begs the question to ask that the illusion must be taken as ontologicaly significant without any sort of justification other than "it just feels like it".
But the claim, AFAICTell, is not that the sensation of becoming expresses the truth about time, but rather that this illusion of becoming is becoming within the context of subjective awareness:
"Take the supposed illusion of change. This must mean that something, X, appears to change when in fact it does not change at all. That may be true about X; but how could the illusion occur unless there were change somewhere? If there is no change in X, there must be a change in the deluded mind that contemplates X. The illusion of change is actually a changing illusion. Thus the illusion of change implies the reality of some change. Change, therefore, is invincible in its stubbornness; for no one can deny the appearance of change."
-Laird
It's a case where seeming is being. As such, regardless of whether the illusion is accurate to exceedingly small units of time (if division of time is even acceptable) is irrelevant. It's the illusion which changes, so something does change.
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