Award for Kindness

[Mindy Newton]

A fond wish. How does one come to terms with Quantum Reality when the underlying processes and entities are completely out of our perceptual range. The only handle we have on such things is very, very abstract mathematics (for example Calib-Yao manifolds). Quantum Physics simply cannot be visualized or grasped perceptually by human beings - our senses are just too crude. That is why Feynman (and also Bohr) said that no one really grasps the quantum world. Which is true in grasping it at the non-verbal perceptual level. Only the math gives us a hook into it (now there is a visual analogy!)

I never said the visualization process was perfect - far from it, yet it is all we have. Even the most abstract entities we can conceive of we attempt to visualize somehow, however imperfectly. This does not detract from the value of visualization just because it is extremely difficult in some cases. I can visualize the universe as 4-dimensional space-time continuum which has no boundaries yet is finite in size by imagining something similar, like a blanket with a bunch of folds in it. We can travel forever on the "surface" of the manifold and not ever find a "boundary", because if we postulate a boundary then the question immediately arises "what is on the other side of this boundary?" . Visualizing is an art, as is putting one's visualizations into words, and I would not say quantum physics is impossible to visualize, just difficult. Einstein was quite good at visualizing things that other scientists didn't which was the basis of his famous "thought experiments", I think.

When you say that visualization is all we have, I start to wonder if you have one of these brains in which imagery is predominant. And, I wonder if you know that most people do not usually think in imaginal terms?? Here's an example: Someone asks the average person how many cubes with two painted sides do you get if you cut a 3 x 3 x 3 cube into one-inch cubes, after painting the top, bottom, and both sides (but not the front and back?) Most people cannot answer this without picturing the big cube in their head, painting it, then cutting it, and counting the two-sides-painted little cubes. They are using imagery to solve the problem. However, that is an unusual situation for them (most people.)

There is a group of people, I don't know the frequency data, for whom such imagery is the natural, automatic way to think, whether a visually-oriented problem is before them or not. Words are translated into images for them, with the images taking on relations appropriate to the facts, etc. stated.

I, for one, am not a visual person in this sense. I can imagine the cube just fine, but that isn't my normal mode of processing information. For me, and for most people, meaning is immediate. It is "pure idea" you might say. It is no trouble to relate any word or statement to concretes, but "we" don't normally do that.

I'm wondering if you have this unusual--but not deficient, mind you--kind of brain. What do you think?

= Mindy

[Paul Mawdsley]

When you say that visualization is all we have, I start to wonder if you have one of these brains in which imagery is predominant. And, I wonder if you know that most people do not usually think in imaginal terms?? Here's an example: Someone asks the average person how many cubes with two painted sides do you get if you cut a 3 x 3 x 3 cube into one-inch cubes, after painting the top, bottom, and both sides (but not the front and back?) Most people cannot answer this without picturing the big cube in their head, painting it, then cutting it, and counting the two-sides-painted little cubes. They are using imagery to solve the problem. However, that is an unusual situation for them (most people.)

There is a group of people, I don't know the frequency data, for whom such imagery is the natural, automatic way to think, whether a visually-oriented problem is before them or not. Words are translated into images for them, with the images taking on relations appropriate to the facts, etc. stated.

I, for one, am not a visual person in this sense. I can imagine the cube just fine, but that isn't my normal mode of processing information. For me, and for most people, meaning is immediate. It is "pure idea" you might say. It is no trouble to relate any word or statement to concretes, but "we" don't normally do that.

I'm wondering if you have this unusual--but not deficient, mind you--kind of brain. What do you think?

= Mindy

I do.

Paul

[Paul Mawdsley]

Mindy, surely you have something better to do than keep bashing me. Why don't you just move on?

Paul

I'm always up to fight the forces of evil. You must not think I've got it in for you personally. I thought we got off to a nice start. But I'll defend man's mind wherever and whenever the bat-light shines in the sky!

= Mindy

Neither I nor my ideas represent the forces of evil. Your rigid adversarial approach that allows for no creativity in interpretating perspectives different from your own, on the other hand...well, I think that might be one of those forces you're looking for. :super: (Sorry, I couldn't find Batman.)

Paul

Edited October 8, 2008 by Paul Mawdsley

[Paul Mawdsley]

Paul, this is a wonderful statement -- especially "Maintain the intellectual invisibility of your opponent and you win the battle through attrition." You've named a major stumbling block in the path of communication. I think we all should examine our past posts with a view to seeing where and to what extent we've fallen over this stumbling block and onto our faces.

Thank you Barbara. I'm thankful I can count on you to find some value in my idiosyncratic language.

There is another impediment to communication I call "How to instantly infuriate your opponents." It consists of beginning one's post with something like: "Muslims lie when they deny they seek world domination!" -- or "George Bush is the most incompetent president in American history!" -- or "Israeli leaders sanction murder!" -- or.... fill in the blanks.... Such statements emanate from the poster's red-hot fury, and are guaranteed to invoke the same feeling in readers, thus guaranteeing also that mutual understanding will be impossible.

Such statements also attract readers who already tend to red-hot fury. We are attracted by interpersonal contexts (subjective contexts shared between people) that give us the freedom to express our intellectual and emotional identity. The idea of visibility applies again. What people respond to when one expresses one's ideas or emotions generates a sense of visibility. This visibility creates a context of freedom in which one can express such ideas and emotions further. The contexts that are created shape the ways in which communication does or doesn't unfold. A context of creative interpretation generates a very different dynamic from a context of rigid interpretive norms. It creates very different freedoms in the direction of dialogue.

It would be an interesting and probably valuable exercise for OL posters to identify other ways in which intellectual opponents often inadvertently build barricades to understanding others and to being understood.

Sometimes just operating under the assumption of "intellectual opponents" is enough for barricades to form. Intellectual explorers would have a different dynamic.

Paul

[tjohnson]

I'm wondering if you have this unusual--but not deficient, mind you--kind of brain. What do you think?

= Mindy

I have no doubt that my brain is unusual and most likely deficient as well.

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

I, for one, am not a visual person in this sense. I can imagine the cube just fine, but that isn't my normal mode of processing information. For me, and for most people, meaning is immediate. It is "pure idea" you might say. It is no trouble to relate any word or statement to concretes, but "we" don't normally do that.

Mindy,

At another time in my life, I started investigating Gestalt psychology for understanding how the mind processes information on perceptual level. I remember reading a fascinating book called Gestalt Psychology by Wolfgang Köhler, which opened my mind to ideas like pattern recognition and boundaries in formulating concepts. But that was years ago.

I intend to resume this line of study one day because I found many parallels between the Gestalt theory of integration with the Objectivist theory of concepts.

But I remember the issue being two-sided, not one-sided. Not only does the mind organize things according to how they exist, it also has its own inner forms that it imposes on sensory data.

Here is an example I remember from some studies in music. Notice that in most all popular music, the drum beat is in twos or threes. (Most classical music follows a two and three rhythmic organization, also, but it is more obvious in popular music because of the drums.) There is a mental reason for this.

Experiments have been conducted on people listening to a metronome over a period of time. They always end up organizing the beats in groups of twos or threes even though the sensory data coming from the metronome is identical.

The way the mind bounces back and forth in visual images such as the following are also an indication of an independent form-making mental imposition on sensory data.

In other words, the mind recognizes forms, but also creates them.

I believe this is true on a conceptual level, also.

Michael

[Mindy Newton]

I, for one, am not a visual person in this sense. I can imagine the cube just fine, but that isn't my normal mode of processing information. For me, and for most people, meaning is immediate. It is "pure idea" you might say. It is no trouble to relate any word or statement to concretes, but "we" don't normally do that.

Mindy,

At another time in my life, I started investigating Gestalt psychology for understanding how the mind processes information on perceptual level. I remember reading a fascinating book called Gestalt Psychology by Wolfgang Köhler, which opened my mind to ideas like pattern recognition and boundaries in formulating concepts. But that was years ago.

I intend to resume this line of study one day because I found many parallels between the Gestalt theory of integration with the Objectivist theory of concepts.

But I remember the issue being two-sided, not one-sided. Not only does the mind organize things according to how they exist, it also has its own inner forms that it imposes on sensory data.

Here is an example I remember from some studies in music. Notice that in most all popular music, the drum beat is in twos or threes. (Most classical music follows a two and three rhythmic organization, also, but it is more obvious in popular music because of the drums.) There is a mental reason for this.

Experiments have been conducted on people listening to a metronome over a period of time. They always end up organizing the beats in groups of twos or threes even though the sensory data coming from the metronome is identical.

The way the mind bounces back and forth in visual images such as the following are also an indication of an independent form-making mental imposition on sensory data.

In other words, the mind recognizes forms, but also creates them.

I believe this is true on a conceptual level, also.

Michael

Cognitive psychology was my field of study. I know the Gestalt theory and related perceptual phenomena. They are indisputably real. Whether or not they mean the mind imposes form is a philosophical question. That Gestalt phenomena mean the mind imposes order on simple percepts or sensory data is not certain. I don't believe it is the correct interpretation. This is a good topic to discuss, but I'm short on time at the moment. I'm posting now because your statement that the mind has "its own inner forms that it imposes on sensory data," is a Kantian premise, and conceding that simple statement actually yields to Rationalists everything they need to reject an Objective point of view.

= Mindy

[Mindy Newton]

I'm wondering if you have this unusual--but not deficient, mind you--kind of brain. What do you think?

= Mindy

I have no doubt that my brain is unusual and most likely deficient as well.

A quick comment: If it is true of you two, Paul and GS, it sheds a new light on why you argue and describe as you do.

= Mindy

[Brant Gaede]

Cognitive psychology was my field of study. I know the Gestalt theory and related perceptual phenomena. They are indisputably real. Whether or not they mean the mind imposes form is a philosophical question. That Gestalt phenomena mean the mind imposes order on simple percepts or sensory data is not certain. I don't believe it is the correct interpretation. This is a good topic to discuss, but I'm short on time at the moment. I'm posting now because your statement that the mind has "its own inner forms that it imposes on sensory data," is a Kantian premise, and conceding that simple statement actually yields to Rationalists everything they need to reject an Objective point of view.

I don't see how his statement can be more than a hypothesis. How can one build a falsifiable theory?

I'd bet that a discussion about this will merely reduce itself to a version of the nature/nuture debate. Habits do make deep tracks in one's mind.

--Brant

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

Mindy,

Not Kantian and not either-or.

Forms exist in reality. The mind also exists to perceive them. The mind is set up to run on autopilot for a small part of it, but not all. This makes it sometimes open file folders (percepts) that are not 100% correct if correlated to reality (like the 2nd and 3rd beat stresses assigned to identical metronome stimuli).

I believe ignoring this fact is the equivalent to making a philosophical lobotomy. In this instance, we thus have a mind that has an imaginary or projected nature based on what it should be according to some suppositions, not what it is based on through measured and tested observation.

I go with what is observed, not what is supposed.

Kant has nothing to do with this except for the fact that he made the same error from the other end.

Michael

[Dragonfly]

I'm posting now because your statement that the mind has "its own inner forms that it imposes on sensory data," is a Kantian premise, and conceding that simple statement actually yields to Rationalists everything they need to reject an Objective point of view.

I don't see what is Kantian or rationalist about that. Perception is not a passive process. We cannot recognize an object in an image if we don't already have templates of possible objects in our mind. We are wired to detect patterns in the data from our senses and we project our templates even on more or less random patterns, so we for example perceive faces where none exist (a face on Mars, a grinning devil in the smoke clouds of the WTC, Jesus or Mary in food stuff, etc.). Our brain is continually looking for correlations between general form templates in memory and sensory data.

[Mindy Newton]

I'm posting now because your statement that the mind has "its own inner forms that it imposes on sensory data," is a Kantian premise, and conceding that simple statement actually yields to Rationalists everything they need to reject an Objective point of view.

I don't see what is Kantian or rationalist about that. Perception is not a passive process. We cannot recognize an object in an image if we don't already have templates of possible objects in our mind. We are wired to detect patterns in the data from our senses and we project our templates even on more or less random patterns, so we for example perceive faces where none exist (a face on Mars, a grinning devil in the smoke clouds of the WTC, Jesus or Mary in food stuff, etc.). Our brain is continually looking for correlations between general form templates in memory and sensory data.

Yes, we find patterns. We can find different patterns, too, just like seeing a cloud as one thing, or another. Each pattern we recognize in the cloud is valid. And each is objective. MSK was saying that we find some, and we impose others. That is the conclusion I disagree with. Perception is abstract, and abstractions are partial. Different abstractions don't contradict one another, there is not one that is objective and others that are "imposed."

Secondly, Kant's whole program is built on our supposed inability to perceive fundamental formal characteristics such as space and time. Since we can't perceive them, since we are already "using" them in our earliest perceptions, they have to be organizations imposed by the mind. Bye-bye reality.

Now, as to how we originally acquire these patterns, nothing has directly been said. My theory is that we derive them from sensory data through a process of extracting invariances that are objectively present in that data. Gibson's theory of perception talks about "picking up" invariances--he doesn't go into how we actually internalize them, but he worked at length to show that the constancies that our perceptions show over variations due to such as distance, rotation, etc., are present as invariances in the ambient sensory energies. Cherry (ask if you want a ref.) has shown how nerves can extract invariances.

(I know I've posted about this before, but I can't recall if it was here. If I'm repeating myself, my apologies.)

Anyway, this gives us a series of steps by which we can acquire and utilize patterns in the manner in which you described, Dragonfly.

Current theories of perception tend to assume that the patterns are at least partially innate. That point of view, taken in its philosophical implications, takes us back Kant. (I'm not saying reject it because it takes us to Kant, I'm highlighting the connections between the idea of imposed form and a Kantian point of view.)

= Mindy

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

MSK was saying that we find some, and we impose others.

Mindy,

Actually the correspondence between mental operations and reality for primary integration is mostly as it should be. Only a small part is innately imposed, as I mentioned with the metronome experiment. I believe this is due to the nature of the integrating mechanism itself. That's the way it works. The mind comes already predisposed to hone in on specific sensory input and integrate it into small groups of units and forms (in terms the mind can use), and to ignore the vast amount of sensory input. I'm not just stating an opinion, either. There is a lot of empirical evidence to back this up.

I am in agreement with the fundaments of Objectivism, but not when there is common and repeatable evidence on record that proves the contrary. This is why I believe part of the problem of Objectivism is scope, not accuracy. Just because something is 100% true in "X context" does not mean it is true in 100% of ALL contexts.

Something like what we are discussing is true and verifiable for the most part (and it is), but I too often see an either-or mentality inappropriately applied to where it does not belong. Thus "X is true except in cases Y and Z" is not on the table for this kind of thinking, even when the exceptions are observed and measured and repeated at will. It becomes "if part of X is false, then all of X is false." With the rider, "And the idea that part of X can be false is a Kantian fallacy." Then the logical pretzels start in order to justify a claim that the eye contradicts.

In metaphorical terms, black and white exist, but so does gray. And even more, so does an entire spectrum of colors. There is no such thing as an exclusively black and white universe, just as there is no such thing as a universe without black and white in it. The either-or mentality claims gray and colors do not exist in the universe and the fuzzy mind claims that nothing is black or white.

I claim both of these poles are wrong in scope, but right in the part they get right. Thus black and white exist (as claimed by the either-or person), and so do gray and colors (as claimed by fuzzy minded non-absolutist).

Oodles of recorded evidence overwhelmingly support the fact that the mind has an organizing nature of its own. This is even called the law of identity in Objectivist jargon. If you like, I will try to dig some of the recorded experiments up. It has been years since I have messed with this, but I am sure our friend Google will be useful in finding something.

Anyway, I am an artist. I use my imagination and "selectively recreate" reality all the time, thus my mind actually imposes itself on reality. (I call this top down causality.) I literally make forms that never existed before. I integrate something in my mind, and solely in my mind, then I make it happen in reality. I am the cause of such things. The buck stops with my volition. And these forms come from a place inside me that is not caused by what has existed before that moment, other than my volition taking my memories, my mental organizing faculty and my surroundings as raw materials to be used to create something new in a form caused by my volition itself.

It is true that a sculptor can't make paper or water out of a slab of marble, thus marble has its own nature that cannot be violated. But the breathtaking sculpture he carves does not exist merely because he integrated the form of the marble slab. He imposed the sculpture's form on the marble and that form came to exist solely in his mind before he started to carve the stone. If the sculptor does not integrate and imagine the form in his mind first, it will never come into being in reality.

Michael

[Paul Mawdsley]

In metaphorical terms, black and white exist, but so does gray. And even more, so does an entire spectrum of colors.

Michael,

The first time I saw you write this, some time ago, I struggled to wrap my head around it in my own images but could only get a faint glimpse of what you meant. Recent discussions and experiences have truly brought this home to me. I get it vividly now. I enjoyed the context created by this post. It fits my understanding.

I especially liked:

Anyway, I am an artist. I use my imagination and "selectively recreate" reality all the time, thus my mind actually imposes itself on reality. (I call this top down causality.) I literally make forms that never existed before. I integrate something in my mind, and solely in my mind, then I make it happen in reality. I am the cause of such things. The buck stops with my volition. And these forms come from a place inside me that is not caused by what has existed before that moment, other than my volition taking my memories, my mental organizing faculty and my surroundings as raw materials to be used to create something new in a form caused by my volition itself.

Paul

[Mindy Newton]

MSK was saying that we find some, and we impose others.

Mindy,

Actually the correspondence between mental operations and reality for primary integration is mostly as it should be. Only a small part is innately imposed, as I mentioned with the metronome experiment. I believe this is due to the nature of the integrating mechanism itself. That's the way it works. The mind comes already predisposed to hone in on specific sensory input and integrate it into small groups of units and forms (in terms the mind can use), and to ignore the vast amount of sensory input. I'm not just stating an opinion, either. There is a lot of empirical evidence to back this up.

I am in agreement with the fundaments of Objectivism, but not when there is common and repeatable evidence on record that proves the contrary. This is why I believe part of the problem of Objectivism is scope, not accuracy. Just because something is 100% true in "X context" does not mean it is true in 100% of ALL contexts.

Something like what we are discussing is true and verifiable for the most part (and it is), but I too often see an either-or mentality inappropriately applied to where it does not belong. Thus "X is true except in cases Y and Z" is not on the table for this kind of thinking, even when the exceptions are observed and measured and repeated at will. It becomes "if part of X is false, then all of X is false." With the rider, "And the idea that part of X can be false is a Kantian fallacy." Then the logical pretzels start in order to justify a claim that the eye contradicts.

In metaphorical terms, black and white exist, but so does gray. And even more, so does an entire spectrum of colors. There is no such thing as an exclusively black and white universe, just as there is no such thing as a universe without black and white in it. The either-or mentality claims gray and colors do not exist in the universe and the fuzzy mind claims that nothing is black or white.

I claim both of these poles are wrong in scope, but right in the part they get right. Thus black and white exist (as claimed by the either-or person), and so do gray and colors (as claimed by fuzzy minded non-absolutist).

Oodles of recorded evidence overwhelmingly support the fact that the mind has an organizing nature of its own. This is even called the law of identity in Objectivist jargon. If you like, I will try to dig some of the recorded experiments up. It has been years since I have messed with this, but I am sure our friend Google will be useful in finding something.

Anyway, I am an artist. I use my imagination and "selectively recreate" reality all the time, thus my mind actually imposes itself on reality. (I call this top down causality.) I literally make forms that never existed before. I integrate something in my mind, and solely in my mind, then I make it happen in reality. I am the cause of such things. The buck stops with my volition. And these forms come from a place inside me that is not caused by what has existed before that moment, other than my volition taking my memories, my mental organizing faculty and my surroundings as raw materials to be used to create something new in a form caused by my volition itself.

It is true that a sculptor can't make paper or water out of a slab of marble, thus marble has its own nature that cannot be violated. But the breathtaking sculpture he carves does not exist merely because he integrated the form of the marble slab. He imposed the sculpture's form on the marble and that form came to exist solely in his mind before he started to carve the stone. If the sculptor does not integrate and imagine the form in his mind first, it will never come into being in reality.

Michael

I believe, Michael, that I know of the top-down findings you refer to. Perceptual set, etc. I am not disagreeing with these sorts of perceptual findings. I don't disagree with top-down cognitive processes. However, I do disagree that the patterns or templates we use when we get to top-down processing are innate or arbitrary. That means that top-down cognitive processing has to be a secondary perceptual process. Underlying the ability to process stimuli that way is another level of perception. This basic level of perception derives structure, patterns, templates, etc., directly from sensory data.

The primary process is bottom-up, and the secondary ones work both ways. Philosophically, it is crucial to make this distinction.

= Mindy

[Paul Mawdsley]

Underlying the ability to process stimuli that way is another level of perception. This basic level of perception derives structure, patterns, templates, etc., directly from sensory data.

I don't think so. It is a process of creation. It goes beyond just copying reality.

Paul

Edit: I would agree that these processes include what Mindy describes.

Edited October 10, 2008 by Paul Mawdsley

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

However, I do disagree that the patterns or templates we use when we get to top-down processing are innate or arbitrary.

Mindy,

I want to unpack this a bit. Innate does not mean arbitrary, but I am not sure from your statement if you agree with this or are using the two terms as synonymous or interconnected.

I realize that innate is a dirty word in Objectivism when the word "mind" is near, but the very way the mind integrates concepts is innate. The emotional reactions of infants are innate. Feeling hunger and thirst when the body needs fuel is innate.

There's oodles of innate stuff in the mind. See if an infant can refuse to learn a language. The development of language is innate with his growth, just like getting bigger is.

The second thing I want to unpack is "the patterns or templates," which I interpret you to mean "ALL patterns or templates." Here is the scope thing again. From my observations, SOME patterns are innate in the mind, just like the sensation-percept-concept chain is, but not ALL. I see nothing wrong in accepting the fact that the mind has an identifiable nature, which is innate by the fact of being identifiable. And I see nothing wrong with identifying a predisposition to function in a certain manner. That's one of the places where math comes from (although not exclusively, since reality is involved also).

If there can be optical illusions based on incorrectly processed patterns (indicating that there is something innate around), I see no reason to conclude that there cannot be a cognitive illusion. Once again, there is the metronome thing. Patters of two and three are clearly perceived, but they do not exist in the physical metronome beats and there is no distorting lens like there is with an optical illusion.

How do you explain that if you reject innate mental patterns?

And the third thing to unpack is that if a person so desires, a pattern or template can be arbitrary. He can make one up at whim and repeat it until he learns it. That's one of the reasons I imagine there are so many languages in the world, but all of them express the same concepts (at least on a primary level). Someone chose a template for whatever reason and others followed, but elsewhere others chose other templates for whatever reason.

Michael

[Mindy Newton]

However, I do disagree that the patterns or templates we use when we get to top-down processing are innate or arbitrary.

Mindy,

I want to unpack this a bit. Innate does not mean arbitrary, but I am not sure from your statement if you agree with this or are using the two terms as synonymous or interconnected.

I realize that innate is a dirty word in Objectivism when the word "mind" is near, but the very way the mind integrates concepts is innate. The emotional reactions of infants are innate. Feeling hunger and thirst when the body needs fuel is innate.

There's oodles of innate stuff in the mind. See if an infant can refuse to learn a language. The development of language is innate with his growth, just like getting bigger is.

The second thing I want to unpack is "the patterns or templates," which I interpret you to mean "ALL patterns or templates." Here is the scope thing again. From my observations, SOME patterns are innate in the mind, just like the sensation-percept-concept chain is, but not ALL. I see nothing wrong in accepting the fact that the mind has an identifiable nature, which is innate by the fact of being identifiable. And I see nothing wrong with identifying a predisposition to function in a certain manner. That's one of the places where math comes from (although not exclusively, since reality is involved also).

If there can be optical illusions based on incorrectly processed patterns (indicating that there is something innate around), I see no reason to conclude that there cannot be a cognitive illusion. Once again, there is the metronome thing. Patters of two and three are clearly perceived, but they do not exist in the physical metronome beats and there is no distorting lens like there is with an optical illusion.

How do you explain that if you reject innate mental patterns?

And the third thing to unpack is that if a person so desires, a pattern or template can be arbitrary. He can make one up at whim and repeat it until he learns it. That's one of the reasons I imagine there are so many languages in the world, but all of them express the same concepts (at least on a primary level). Someone chose a template for whatever reason and others followed, but elsewhere others chose other templates for whatever reason.

Michael

That helps, Michael.

First, "innate" and "arbitrary." I meant either/or. The key point is that it is not objective.

Next, "innate" aspects of the mind. The dirt on the concept "innate" comes when it refers to ideas. Sure, the mind has a nature, and set abilities, and certain sensitivities, innate responses like a baby's sucking, holding the breath when submerged, etc. But these are not ideas. They don't count. Development of language isn't an innate idea, and physical growth isn't an innate idea. The issue is contents of the mind, perceptions, etc.

Next: Illusions: illusions are not incorrectly processed anything. They are unusual perceptual abstractions. A spoked wheel that seems to be turning backwards is incorrectly identified as "turning backwards" because the exact rate of displacement of the spokes forward coincides with the displacement they would have if turning backwards, at a slower rate. Notice that these illusions always involve jumps in rate of apparent movement of the spokes.

Illusions do not prove errors in sense-perception, though they represent errors in identification of what we are seeing, etc. I believe that's also the Objectivist line. It is important to keep in mind that perceptions are abstractions, and the same thing can be abstracted in multiple ways. All are valid, and they do not imply any contradiction. We must learn from coordinated experience what the bare look of a thing means insofar as making an identification of it. The reports of people who recover eyesight as adults are instructive here. A given percept may mean a curb of 4 inches at six feet distance, or a curb of 6 inches at ten feet distance, etc. (Just watched a program on this.) Despite his seeing what there is to see, and even knowing what the possibilities are, the newly-seeing person can't identify what is before him.

You and I don't even notice that those two things look alike.

Next: All sorts of patterns exist in the metronome's beat. We can assimilate it to the Mission Impossible theme (5 beats to a measure,) or anything else. We can do this because we already possess different rhythmic patterns. Abstraction does not require an exact match--just think of animals in clouds. Patterns/templates/forms (all the same for these purposes) are everywhere, and we work with them constantly.

Finally: Lots of things in the world can be arbitrary. That isn't the point. What I'm claiming doesn't rule out imagination or wildly creative constructions. The issue here, and it is crucial to the efficacy of man's mind, is the objectivity of sense-perception.

= Mindy

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

Mindy,

I am going to have to look up the metronome thing. It was not about what we can do. It was about what people actually did in a laboratory setting, and this was measured, recorded and published. Then repeated many times.

Metaphysically speaking, it is inaccurate to say there are all kinds of patterns in the metronome's beat. There are not any patterns at all other than a recurring beat of equal volume, envelope, stress, duration, timbre and all other measurable characteristics. The patterns were exclusively in the minds of the subjects and they always came back to 2 and 3. Never 1 (which, existentially from the metronome's end, was the only true pattern).

btw - A 5 beat is rarely integrated as 5 independent. It is usually divided into 2 units of smaller ones: 2+3 or 3+2.

I also argue for the objectivity of the mind. That means fully understanding its strengths, limitations and anything else involving its nature. I am committed body, mind and soul to the magnificence of the human mind.

Michael

[Mindy Newton]

Mindy,

I am going to have to look up the metronome thing. It was not about what we can do. It was about what people actually did in a laboratory setting, and this was measured, recorded and published. Then repeated many times.

Metaphysically speaking, it is inaccurate to say there are all kinds of patterns in the metronome's beat. There are not any patterns at all other than a recurring beat of equal volume, envelope, stress, duration, timbre and all other measurable characteristics. The patterns were exclusively in the minds of the subjects and they always came back to 2 and 3. Never 1 (which, existentially from the metronome's end, was the only true pattern).

btw - A 5 beat is rarely integrated as 5 independent. It is usually divided into 2 units of smaller ones: 2+3 or 3+2.

I also argue for the objectivity of the mind. That means fully understanding its strengths, limitations and anything else involving its nature. I am committed body, mind and soul to the magnificence of the human mind.

Michael

You don't need to look up the metronome research. As an aside, I actually did a psy. experiment with metronomes, and had to read the major metronome-related research at that time. We don't disagree about the facts. We disagree about their interpretation.

= Mindy

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

We don't disagree about the facts. We disagree about their interpretation.

Mindy,

So you believe that patterns exist innately where they don't exist by instrument measurement?

Or that it is merely an arbitrary coincidence that everybody does 2 and 3?

If neither, where do the universal patterns of 2 and 3 come from in your conception?

I'm confused.

Michael

[Mindy Newton]

We don't disagree about the facts. We disagree about their interpretation.

Mindy,

So you believe that patterns exist innately where they don't exist by instrument measurement?

Or that it is merely an arbitrary coincidence that everybody does 2 and 3?

If neither, where do the universal patterns of 2 and 3 come from in your conception?

I'm confused.

Michael

I emphatically do not believe that patterns exist innately. We possess familiar patterns of beats, 2/4 or 4/4, 3/4, or 6/8 mostly. As you know, the 2/4 and 4/4 are equivalent for a simple rhythm, as are the 3/4 and the 6/8. So the dominance of 2 or 3-beat perception is not surprising. It encompasses most of musical rhythm. Rhymes and songs are the source of those patterns. Having such patterns already in our minds when we go into the experimental lab, we hear a metronome's beat as fitting one or another of them--2 or 3 beat units.

There are several factors I can think of right away that are relevant to this sort of stimulus, that is, a monotonous one. There is the fact that nerves adapt under steady-state stimulation. There is the Gestalt need to establish a figure and ground. There is neurological integration, which has its own time-frame, and such neurological tendencies as the flicker-fusion threshhold. If you speed up or slow down the metronome by a large measure, you get different perceptual responses from subjects, also.

I do not claim that anyone has sorted out these factors. But they don't need to be sorted out for present purposes. I will grant, for the sake of this argument, that this is a case of top-down perception. However, the patterns used are not innate, but rather abstracted from earlier experience.

= Mindy

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

Mindy,

The wave (a 2 or 3 event) is one of the natural motions in the universe. This is the form of many different types of matter and structures, going from the subatomic level on up to larger structures like ocean waves and even further.

It is my opinion that our perceptual mechanism reflects this from the get-go and is innately predisposed to group in this fashion, just as it is innately predisposed to integrate units into groups. Experience reinforces it and works hand-in-hand with it.

Michael

[Mindy Newton]

Mindy,

The wave (a 2 or 3 event) is one of the natural motions in the universe. This is the form of many different types of matter and structures, going from the subatomic level on up to larger structures like ocean waves and even further.

It is my opinion that our perceptual mechanism reflects this from the get-go and is innately predisposed to group in this fashion, just as it is innately predisposed to integrate units into groups. Experience reinforces it and works hand-in-hand with it.

Michael

The only innate thing that counts, for this issue, is innate content. Can you explain "The wave (a 2 or 3 event)?"

Our perceptual mechanism is a specific, limited capability. Perception integrates, yes. Experience is perceptual, yes. None of that means we have innate forms which we impose on sensory data. That is the issue.

Perception is highly sensitive to symmetry. Symmetry is very common in nature. That doesn't mean we have an innate structure which we impose on sensory data.

At the lowest level, we extract from sensory energy forms, patterns, or templates. We store these and use them in perceiving more things, as they are relevant. Before long, we are using patterns for nearly all our perceptions. When we can't get a stimulus to fit any pattern, we are taken aback, we look again, we say, "I can't make that out..." As we go, we extract new patterns, but mostly we use our liberal store of already-acquired ones.

All of your top-down processes are simply our using stored patterns. If nothing else, parsimony forbids assuming some patterns are innate.

=Mindy

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

Perception integrates, yes. Experience is perceptual, yes. None of that means we have innate forms which we impose on sensory data. That is the issue.

Mindy,

Isn't the very act of integration, which is an innate capability, such an imposition on sensory data?

So what is your criteria to say that one is innate and another is not, when evidence of both is repeatedly observed and measured?

I see you making declarations, but that is not a good criterion, at least a simple declaration does not meet my own standard of knowledge.

Rand did this a lot, i.e., "man's needs are..." or "sensations, as such, are not retained in man's memory..." etc., and this habit is one of the weakest parts of her arguments. She basically says something is so because she says it is so. (Often she was right, but that is not what I am discussing, which is her method of discourse.) These kinds of declarations are premises I used to accept—on faith, in fact, since I used to believe there was something I was missing that would be explained later in the literature. But it isn't. Now I check any and all premises when I perceive a clunker.

It's my mind for me, now, not anyone else's. Nowadays I need more than simple statements to become convinced by anything.

Michael