Sharing stories
Of times long past
When each of us was younger
Making mistakes we would regret
Now they make us laugh
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Sympathetic eyes Sharing stories Of times long past When each of us was younger Making mistakes we would regret Now they make us laugh |
| date | 2000-11-10:16:53 |
| Metaphysics |
This is a loose preamble to where I'm going next. In the edges paper Carolyn and I introduced the idea that separatedness rather than seperability was what constituted entity-hood. Coming to this conclusion was one of the most rewarding aspects of that collaboration, as I was making tentative moves toward it and while working on those tentative moves Caro realized it much more clearly than I had. This view of entities is closely related to our view that there is no identity without an identifier: that what a thing is, the concepts under which it is subsumed, depend on who is classifying it, and for what purpose. Things are not just intrinsically rocks or trees or fish: they are what they are, but they are classified under those categories by a knowing subject who has reasons for doing so. Thus we escape, in the usual conceptualist fashion, from the ills of realism and nominalism. We say, with the realists, that there are universals, but we agree with the nominalists that they are mind-dependent. Now I find myself talking about aspects of reality that are mind-independent, because they are not even possible objects of awareness. If I have two indistinguishable quanta, they are such that they cannot be objects of awareness. The only way it is possible for them to be indistinguishable is for them to be unknowable. This seems to contradict all of the forgoing about identity being dependent on the identifier. This seems to get at the "how things really are" that lies underneath our identifications. It may indeed do that, but then the issue of how we classify things versus how things are independently of us rears it's ugly head, and if I'm not careful I'm going to be talking in a minute about mind-independent views of reality. And yet we know from Bell's work that we can say things about mind-independent reality (it is nonlocal.) So there are some interesting distinctions to be made here. One difficulty is language: "indistinguishable", as Caro points out, is a bad word, because it immediately begs the question of "indistinguishable by whom?" Hmmm... I think I need to talk about logical versus physical possibilism, and ask the question, "To what in reality does POSSIBLE refer?" |
| Creatures |
There's been a sudden exfluorescence of squirrelly-bears today. It's been raining, so they're all puffed up and bear-like as they dart around, looking for whatever it is squirrels look for this late in the year. Bird-seed, mostly, I think, which is what they seem to live on. Squirrels and birds occupy remarkably similar niches. Around here, the squirrels live in trees in nests of leaves and twiggs, just like many birds do. Squirrel nests become visible at this time of year, now that the trees are bare: big messy congolmerations of leaves in the crooks of trees. I've never gotten close enough to one to get any idea of the fine structure--I don't know if they're just a big bundle of leaves, or if they've got more structure than that. As well as nesting in trees, squirrels eat the same seeds and nuts that many birds to. Anyone with a bird-feeder knows how badly misnamed they are. We have two bird-feeders, one of which is for finches only, that dispenses tiny seeds through even smaller holes. The other one is a generic feeder with a couple of troughs that are fed from a hopper containing an eclectic mix of grains that I'm sure is more nutritious than what many people eat. The generic feeder is constantly beset by squirrels, and the only defense against them seems to be a squirrel-gaurd made from a pipe that hangs over the post the feeder is mounted on. When squirrels run up the pole, they run inside the pipe, which is blocked at the upper end. The pipe it too large in diameter for them to climb up the outside of it. Unfortunately, also like birds, squirrels fly. We have flying squirrels around here, but that's not what I'm taking about. I'm talking about ordinary grey squirrels, who if they can't actually fly (being a bit lacking in the aerodynamics department) can leap tall bird-feeders in a single bound. So unless the bird-feeder is mounted on a really tall post, the squirrel-guard doesn't work, and if there's anything near the feeder, within two or three meters, it doesn't work either. Based on classification by ecological niche, I think it follows from all this that squirrels are birds. This makes perfect sense because it's also clear on morphological grounds that they are descended from dinosaurs, just like other birds. Take a careful look at a squirrel in profile. Big back legs. Long tail. Tiny front legs. The resemblance to T. Rex is uncanny and compelling. |
| Poem | Had lunch with a friend today who managed to convince me that she'd done dumber things in her youth than I did in mine. Laughter is a great solvent of tragedy. |
| Reading |
Homer continues to annoy me. I've found the best way to read the roll-call of ships and troops is randomly. There are very few human problems that can't be solved by a sufficiently interesting distribution of random numbers. Flipping pages back and forth and dipping in when something interesting catches your eye allows you to get a fair sampling of the language and some idea of who is what, without producing the stullifying sense of being trapped in the narrative that trying to get through it linearly does. It may be that the whole book is designed with some careful progression in mind that this method of reading ignores, but anyone trying to read it linearly will fail to see the progression as well, being mired in feelings of helplessness and boredom. Reading it randomly, if you get bored, you can always skip off to something else, so you feel in control. |