Thinking is part of reality

Our educational system and our culture lie to us. We are taught by our educational system and by our culture that there is thinking and there is reality and that thinking’s job is to discover reality; never informing us that reality and thinking go together, one is not separated from the other. Reflexivity is a concept that informs us that thinking is part of reality.

In the natural sciences truth is of the utmost importance because knowledge of reality is a precondition for success. In human affairs there are shortcuts to success—one can lie, manipulate, spin, and use force to gain success. Thus in human affairs truth often takes a back seat.

In his book “Open Society” George Soros speaks of many things; one important concept is ‘reflexivity’. “I started thinking in terms of reflexivity nearly fifty years ago. It may be interesting to recall how I arrived at the idea. It was through the footnotes of Karl Popper’s “Open Society and its Enemies”…I started to apply the concept of reflexivity to the understanding of social affairs, and particularly of financial markets, in the early 1960s before evolutionary systems theory was born…”

The first chapter of this book, wherein he explains this concept, can be found at The Crisis of Global Capitalism.

Hogwash!

Serendipity has brought about as many scientific advancements (and/or identifications of truth*) as any structured and planned procedure of carefully controled experiments by knowledgable experts preconditioned for success by thier knowledge of reality.

Indeed, how about Ben Franklin and his faulty knowledge of the reality of lightning leading to his discovery of electricity? Damn near killed himself in the process.

*Note: I use the term in its euphemistic and/or relative sense here. Epistemologically speaking, I maintain that there is no such thing as 'truth'.

Except that Franklin didn't discover electricity, and the flying a kite in a thunderstorm thing probably never happened.

Who Discovered Electricity?


I think what he's trying to say is that better your understanding of reality, the better chance you have of forming a viable theory to explain unexpected phenomena.

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“ The subjects of every state ought to contribute towards the support of the government, as nearly as possible, in proportion to their respective abilities; that is, in proportion to the revenue which they respectively enjoy under the protection of the state.”

Adam Smith , The Wealth of Nations 1776

"We have always known that heedless self-interest was bad morals; we know now that it is bad economics"
FDR's second Inaugural Address

Actually, I don't recall being taught in school or anywhere else that "thinking" and "reality" are inherently seperate.

The fact of the matter IS, is that they CAN be separate though. This can certainly easily be shown. They can be seperate, due to the nature of thinkings biochemical processes leading certain individuals to incorrect conclusions or assumptions or beleifs or even actions.

A person that has "issues" may beleive that he can fly one day and leap off a cliff or a tall building.

Yes, those thoughts that arose from the chemical processes in his/her brain were part of reality, but the idea that led him to conclude that he should jump off the cliff to FLY obviously was not.

So, I guess it's the conclusions and beleifs that COME from the chemical reactions that are our thoughts are what can be said to actually be seperated from reality at times.

So it does.

Any similarities to this writing ?:

Governments and ruling classes generally find little advantage in a populace that is self controlled, healthy and truly happy. Who would need such a profusion of problem solvers if there were no problems to be solved ? A majority of political leaders, doctors, lawyers, ministers, generals and locksmiths, as well as others I'm sure you could name, would be dead set against the idea of not being needed. People whose egos aspire to glory and greatness need to be needed. The entire idea of promoting needs and answering to those needs becomes a source of life to the leader; it makes him feel like God. But victims must be sacrificed to satisfy the growing need to be needed; people must be debilitated, crippled, reduced to the status of whimpering animals for the glory of the leader.

Consider the principle: if your ego is dependant on being needed, then it must surely follow that your beloved has to be weakened in order to provide the security that you require. Once it begins, this entire system of answering to needs is self-perpetuating and self-promoting. While he is pretending to promote the good of the people, the power and glory of the leader is built at the expense of the people.

Whenever a relationship with external authority replaces the proper bond between a human being and the indwelling self, then all answers and all actions, humanly speaking, are always wrong, even if they are technically, technologically or morally correct. So long as man remains separated from his true identity, corruption will take its toll, causing the mass mind to cry out for a champion. Recognizing this need, the aspring leader sees that simply by keeping people from the truth he can become that champion of what appears to be the public good. And so the leech who profits and revels in the glory of leading is going to do his damndest to keep light from coming into the world, whereas the true leader leads all men back to themselves.
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pgs. 3-4 "How to conquer negative emotions", Roy Masters - Foundation of Human Understanding - Home Page
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In OTHER words, the true leader tells us to "take pride in ourselves, get our shit together and manage our lives with common sense and decency. Don't behave as wild animals in need of "shephards"."

Of course, we would need very FEW true leaders. Unlike how overbloated our govt. today is, with so called "leaders". It's "we the peoples" fault people :-) We're doing it to ourselves.

Yes, well, I was using that example metaphorically.

And honestly, I never knew that - though I should have suspected it.

But that is beside the point. I could use a hundred other similar examples. Pure serendipity is a remarkably common source of scientific knowledge.

Yes, that's probably true. But in philosophy, one doesn't state generalities as absolute principles. I'm quibbling the absoluteness of the assertion as I always do when people make absolute statements that are not tenable.

Knowledge of reality is not always a necessary precondition of success. It usually is, but not always. Serendipity (i.e. pure chance) can sometimes often deliver success without any knowledge of reality at all being present.

Captain T

I was educated in engineering but also had some interest in philosophy. My first philosophy course was Descartes' "Meditations on First Philosophy". I suspect this is an introductory course for most students studying philosophy. Descartes has left Western tradition with a gigantic legacy that only now is this legacy being undermined by cognitive science.

Descartes goes through a sequence of analysis in an effort to find an absolute truth upon which to build his philosophy. He settled on "Cogito, ergo sum". "I think therefore I am". The conclusions of this series of analysis by Descartes have set the course, more or less, of Western philosophy. What are the fateful conclusions derived from the work of Descartes?

"I am, I exist, that is certain. But how often? Just when I think; for it might possibly be the case if I ceased entirely to think, that I should likewise cease altogether to exist...But what then am I? A thing that thinks."

The Folk Theory of Essences
Every kind of thing has an essence that makes it the kind of thing it is.
The way each thing naturally behaves is a consequence of its essence.

Descartes knows he exists because he thinks. Because he exists he has an essence. He assumes nothing else causes his thinking but his essence. Conclusion: thinking must be at least a part of the human essence.

"Just because I know certainly that I exist, and that meanwhile I do not remark that any other thing necessarily pertains to my nature or essence, excepting that I am a thinking thing, I rightly conclude that my essence consists solely in the fact that I am a thinking thing."

"It is certain that this I [that is to say, my soul by which I am what I am], is entirely, and absolutely distinct from my body and can exist without it."

To have reached that last conclusion Descartes must assume an additional:

The Folk Theory of Substance and Attributes
A substance is that which exists in itself and does not depend for its existence on any other thing.
Each substance has one and only one primary attribute that defines what its essence is.

The following is what his introspection has made him “see”:

There are two kinds of substance, one bodily and the other mental.
The attribute of bodily substance is extension in space.
The attribute of mental substance is thought.

Captain T

Regarding your last three paragraphs:

Psychology informs me that most of those three paragraphs are not true to human nature.

White Rabbit

With all due respect, you are full of balony.

Hoowa!

WR, your philosophical credentials have been called into question. I believe that the gauntlet of the obvious has been thrown down!

Unless you can, forthwith, spit out a three page 'thesis' on "why thinking is good", I think I'll have to pronounce you the loser.

Oh, and coberst, did freeing yourself from the anchor of anti-intellectualism and becoming an aesthete among Philistines ever instruct you that the preferred spelling (particularly when you're trying to administer a non-judgment, intellectual beat-down) is 'bologna'?

__________________
"Government big enough to supply everything you need is big enough to take everything you have... The course of history shows that as a government grows, liberty decreases."

-Thomas Jefferson

Indeed.

I'll spare you all a three page dissertation, despite drgoodtrips stated requirement for the simple reason that it is likely that my assertion of the non-viability of the concept of absolute truth is the one that has apparently drawn the ire of our esteemed fellow poster.

Kingdaddy games interest me not, despite the potential for ammusing the esteemed drgoodtrips.

Coberst, I've been relatively polite so far. I don't have to be.

Insults from you will only encourage my contempt for you and your words.

I've challenged your words a dozen times previously (at another forum) and you've never been able to defend your position at all. You usually just whinge about it, but I see you have now raised your game to throwing insults in reply.

When you make pretentious philosophical statements and someone challenges the validity of your statements with philosophic arguments in reply, the proper intellectual response is a counter-argument. Anything less is just drivel and betrays the lack of substance beneath your pronouncements.

Preferred by whom?

I agree with some of things you say here.

And there comes a point where overanalysis and narcisisstic self congratulation becomes what can be summed up as "mental masturbation".

Be careful.

W. rabbit is a pro at this "mental masturbation", do not follow his/her path.

"Psychology", or YOUR interpretation OF "Psychology" is incorrect then.


Thats all.