[Daoist]

I've been trying for a long time to put into words exactly what attracts me to my namesake philosophy. A investment book I'm now reading is helping me do that.

"The Black Swan," which argues against the use of the Gaussian bell curve in statistical analysis, is almost more of a book on philosophy than investment. One chapter that caught my attention mentions aesthetics. Mandelbrot - creator of some of the most beautiful images in the world - did pioneering research on non-Gaussian distributions. Taleb doesn't really believe that the world revolves around Mandelbrot's distributions either - it's too complicated for that. But after seeing the passion which which he rejected the bell curve, it struck me that these sorts of questions - looking for patterns among ordinary, disparate real-world events - might actually be more important than the sorts of logical pretzels philosophers are often known for getting themselves into.

Aesthetics is the process of simplifying information. One of the points Taleb makes is that it is impossible for us as humans to look at events without imposing any interpretation on them (which takes place subconsciously primarily in the left hemisphere of the brain.) We look at the sky, and we don't see a bunch of clouds, we see an elephant, and in the process, we store memories more efficiently. Aesthetics is subjective because there are multiple possible ways to encode information, yet perception could not exist without it.

My beef with Western philosophy is that it treats logical processes as a black box: input -> output. Simplification is seen as a lower-order task that doesn't pose any fundamental hurdles. But if you are going to actually implement any of the ideas you come up with using this process, you are going to have to do some sort of statistical analysis. In fact, in physics, statistics is needed to explain the very concept of temperature, and even time itself (since the 2lot is a statistical law.) So statistical methodology seems just as fundamental as logic. Yet it is subjective: the only way to do statistics is come up with some sort of expectation of what numbers should look like. There are all sorts of ways to make that process look objective, but there's no way of getting around the fact that statistics are more useful for explaining the past than predicting the future. Aesthetics lets you create your idea of what the future should look like, based on universal symbols (like the yin-yang.)

I've included a poll with the question to force people to take a side, and to see how much of a minority I am.

[PlatoHagel]

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Paul Dirac When one is doing mathematical work, there are essentially two different ways of thinking about the subject: the algebraic way, and the geometric way. With the algebraic way, one is all the time writing down equations and following rules of deduction, and interpreting these equations to get more equations. With the geometric way, one is thinking in terms of pictures; pictures which one imagines in space in some way, and one just tries to get a feeling for the relationships between the quantities occurring in those pictures. Now, a good mathematician has to be a master of both ways of those ways of thinking, but even so, he will have a preference for one or the other; I don't think he can avoid it. In my own case, my own preference is especially for the geometrical way.

Both the theorists and the experimentalists looked only at the pile of tokens that landed in a particular slot at the bottom of the To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts. . While the experimentalists had a set of guidelines about how the tokens should have gotten there and excluded any tokens that didn’t follow the rules, the theorists didn’t care as much about that. They were primarily concerned with the mass of the initial particles, the mass of the final particles and the ratio between them. When the initial massive particles decay into lighter ones, the total energy must be conserved. Sometimes this energy goes missing; if the missing energy adds up to a certain amount, it could mean that a supersymmetric particle carried it away without being detected.See: To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.

The science of "extra dimensions" had to be followed geometrically?

[sommers71]

When I think about these things next to each other I think about them as both classifiable as members of Deterministic perspectives of the world. I think the difference between the two is determined by what deductive methodology someone employs to analyze information. Aesthetics deduces principles from consequence, while Epistemology deduces consequence from principles. I think they are kind of twisted together somehow.

This made me remember Synchronicity, which contrasts similar to Causality. It also reminded me of the concept of Emergence, which does kind of as well.

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I thought about this a bit in a free will thread a while back, but reading it now I'm not sure I agree with myself from then. There is also alot of other interesting things in that thread.

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(post #65)

[AlfredSchnittke]

	Originally Posted by Daoist To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.
	Aesthetics is the process of simplifying information.

So defined, Aesthetics is surely of more pragmatic use than epistemology.

	My beef with Western philosophy is that it treats logical processes as a black box: input -> output. Simplification is seen as a lower-order task that doesn't pose any fundamental hurdles.

What Western philosophy are you speaking about? Certainly not contemporary...? You mean, like Plato and Aristotle?

[Daoist]

	Originally Posted by AlfredSchnittke To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.
	So defined, Aesthetics is surely of more pragmatic use than epistemology.

I don't mean to rig the question. Aesthetics isn't the only way to simplify information, and statistics normally revolves around the mathematical formal of axiom-consequence.

The problem is, many of these concepts make aesthetic judgments without realizing it. For instance, I was shocked to learn that even the simple concept of a sample average can be problematic. A sample should in theory generalize to any size population. But if the population size is infinity, then it would be reasonable to assume that at least one of the members could have a value of infinity (a sort of aesthetic question, which might depend on the subject area). If one out of infinity of the members has a value of infinity, the population average should be in infinity. Any finite sample would (incorrectly) show a finite average, so you cannot sample.

Any simplification method must employ some sorts of assumptions...so the question is, is it worthwhile to try to impose a veneer of objectivity on that process - with diminishing returns - or not? I could certainly see an argument being made that it is better to try...though I will of course question it.

	What Western philosophy are you speaking about? Certainly not contemporary...? You mean, like Plato and Aristotle?

Put it this way. What Western philosopher would see the Yin-Yang symbol as a valid, and deep, interpretation of the world?

But yes, the ancient roots are the easiest place to see this. (What contemporary philosophers were you thinking of?)

[AlfredSchnittke]

	Originally Posted by Daoist To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.
	Put it this way. What Western philosopher would see the Yin-Yang symbol as a valid, and deep, interpretation of the world? But yes, the ancient roots are the easiest place to see this. (What contemporary philosophers were you thinking of?)

I think Kant, Sartre, Heidegger, perhaps Nietzsche, Deridda, and a whole host of others probably would find it valid.

But I was originally arguing with your earlier point which was much different. Beginning with Frege, Russell, and Moore and extending most prominently through Wittgenstein (who nearly single-handedly defined 20th Century British/American philosophy) Western Philosophy took a prominent turn where they realized that the most important processes were those of analysis (mapping out the most simple, logical elements of concepts).

If anything, the whole analytic tradition in philosophy is founded upon the notion that logic is anything but simple input -> output. Indeed they have probably overextended, and now miss many "higher" phenomena because they are so concerned with the problems of trying to get things to logically work out, which has turned out to be a Herculean task.

Much of the results actually turned many philosophers, logicians mostly, in mathematicians really...

But in either case, your sentiments just struck me as completely wrong concerning the predominant paradigm of Western Philosophy.

Admittedly characters like Derrida, and Sartre, while accepting yin-yang principles, would probably fall prey to your earlier charge because they didn't seem to think working out the low level logic of their views mattered very much at all.

I admire Daoism quite a lot, however I think it is ultimately the same as post-modernism philosophically.

To me, the more interesting ideas are analytic ideas that rigorously try to explore concepts, and make explicit all of the minute logical processes involved.

These other kinds of philosophy seem to operate on larger, more psychological scales...I mean, other than giving you something amusing to contemplate, that may or may not result in changing your behavior in some way, what does recognizing the yin-yang principle really do for you? Furthermore, when an entire enterprise is really just the exploration of a single idea...it seems somehow hollow I guess. It seems more interesting to me to think about lots of different ideas.

Maybe everything needs some grounding, central idea though...I am not sure...the grounding idea of analytic philosophy doesn't seem to be readily available though, which is perhaps as frustrating as it is fascinating.

[Daoist]

	Originally Posted by AlfredSchnittke To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.
	If anything, the whole analytic tradition in philosophy is founded upon the notion that logic is anything but simple input -> output. Indeed they have probably overextended, and now miss many "higher" phenomena because they are so concerned with the problems of trying to get things to logically work out, which has turned out to be a Herculean task.

Which is to say: earlier philosophy ignored certain nuances. Newer philosophy solved these nuances through a strategy of brute force, which came at a cost. But in neither case did philosophers really discuss simplification in a systematic manner.

	I admire Daoism quite a lot, however I think it is ultimately the same as post-modernism philosophically.

I'd agree with this, with the exception that it is better developed than PMism. Instead of having different, non-logical ideas about things like love, ethics, society, etc., they have one single non-logical idea about all of those things.

	To me, the more interesting ideas are analytic ideas that rigorously try to explore concepts, and make explicit all of the minute logical processes involved. These other kinds of philosophy seem to operate on larger, more psychological scales...

In my mind, if you want to understand the way the brain works, you need to understand how to simplify data. (This is why I talk about statistics in a philosophical sense.)

The most important difference between the human brain and a computer is its use of parallel logic, making all sorts of connections between different sorts of events, vs. linear logic that can be easily diagrammed. I don't see how analytic philosophy can get you there, but statistics can.

(The yin-yang symbol, BTW, is relevant simply as the result of this sort of thinking on simplification as the brain does it, nothing more than that.)

[AlfredSchnittke]

"making all sorts of connections between different sorts of events"


That's all the analytic philosophy does...

You should read some of the latest issues of The Philosophical Review, or Philosophical Issues I think. You might find it enlightening, and/or interesting at any rate.


"I'd agree with this, with the exception that it is better developed than PMism. Instead of having different, non-logical ideas about things like love, ethics, society, etc., they have one single non-logical idea about all of those things."

It would seem so. At least Daoism is definable...no one really knows how to define Post-Modernism because of how disparate it is.

[Daoist]

	Originally Posted by AlfredSchnittke To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.
	"making all sorts of connections between different sorts of events" That's all the analytic philosophy does... You should read some of the latest issues of The Philosophical Review, or Philosophical Issues I think. You might find it enlightening, and/or interesting at any rate.

It does no such thing. I see no evidence of actual observations (the things at the end of the connections) in these publications. How can you hope to understand the mind without some appeal to neuroscience? (Daoism gets a pass on that point because it's thousands of years old, but it is still focused on observation.) I get that there's a lot more inductive reasoning involved than deductive reasoning, so we don't need to spend pages looking at printouts of MRI's, but it seems to me like this sort of philosophy goes out of its way to make itself irrelevant.

Now, if we could make some meta-analysis of analytic philosophy, and the way it makes these connections, perhaps we'd be getting somewhere...but then we'd be making real observations. (Though these are likely not the most interesting human specimens in the world
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)

[AlfredSchnittke]

Originally Posted by Daoist To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.

It does no such thing. I see no evidence of actual observations (the things at the end of the connections) in these publications. How can you hope to understand the mind without some appeal to neuroscience? (Daoism gets a pass on that point because it's thousands of years old, but it is still focused on observation.) I get that there's a lot more inductive reasoning involved than deductive reasoning, so we don't need to spend pages looking at printouts of MRI's, but it seems to me like this sort of philosophy goes out of its way to make itself irrelevant. Now, if we could make some meta-analysis of analytic philosophy, and the way it makes these connections, perhaps we'd be getting somewhere...but then we'd be making real observations. (Though these are likely not the most interesting human specimens in the world To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts. )

I don't think you really did any actual reading...

Analytic philosophers of mind almost obsessively cite modern neuroscience.

Just look up Ned Block's latest award winning article Attention and Mental Paint.

You should at least be honest when you attack something, it doesn't serve anyone to be dishonest about what one is attack, at least not in this obscure realm.

[Daoist]

	Originally Posted by AlfredSchnittke To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.
	Just look up Ned Block's latest award winning article Attention and Mental Paint.

Getting warmer - though I did specify that we're talking about real-life decisionmaking. The issues in this paper act on a somewhat lower level, which isn't really relevant to social interactions, for instance.

This paper follows a very scientific approach, building on what we know to create some interesting conclusions. An alternate approach might be to ask what it is we want to know - for instance, how to increase our social rank (represented by the yin-yang symbol) - to figure out the sorts of knowledge that would be necessary to get there. In perhaps a thousand more years of science, I might expect these aspirations to match up with the available building blocks (Understanding ourselves perfectly is impossible, because it would create infinite recursion, but we could possibly build a machine, which we wouldn't be able to understand, which could perfectly understand us. [Though I'm not sure if we could verify that machine's understanding - a separate issue.]) Until that point, however, both angles remain important.

[PlatoHagel]

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In order to look at the world and to assert one self within a "self evident position" then one has gone through a inductive\deductive mode. Arche in Raphael Painting

Fluidity is the idea that such a moment is of a Daoist tradition of securing all things in form have been extended, while the energy of traversing through, meets resistance, then felt as nothing and is turned back on itself. One asks then, from where did it begin?

You actually have to have "felt this" to understand what is meant.

[AlfredSchnittke]

Originally Posted by Daoist To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.

Getting warmer - though I did specify that we're talking about real-life decisionmaking. The issues in this paper act on a somewhat lower level, which isn't really relevant to social interactions, for instance. This paper follows a very scientific approach, building on what we know to create some interesting conclusions. An alternate approach might be to ask what it is we want to know - for instance, how to increase our social rank (represented by the yin-yang symbol) - to figure out the sorts of knowledge that would be necessary to get there. In perhaps a thousand more years of science, I might expect these aspirations to match up with the available building blocks (Understanding ourselves perfectly is impossible, because it would create infinite recursion, but we could possibly build a machine, which we wouldn't be able to understand, which could perfectly understand us. [Though I'm not sure if we could verify that machine's understanding - a separate issue.]) Until that point, however, both angles remain important.

You did not specify we were talking about "real" life decision-making...

You initially criticized Western philosophy for assuming logic, and the process of reduction was de facto taken care of.

Actually it looks like you ADVOCATE doing just that, and are now criticizing Western philosophy for doing it.

I can't keep your position straight I'm afraid.

[Daoist]

	Originally Posted by PlatoHagel To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.
	To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.

A big fan of Taleb...though I will get to that article later.

	Originally Posted by AlfredSchnittke To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.
	You did not specify we were talking about "real" life decision-making... You initially criticized Western philosophy for assuming logic, and the process of reduction was de facto taken care of. Actually it looks like you ADVOCATE doing just that, and are now criticizing Western philosophy for doing it. I can't keep your position straight I'm afraid.

The point, either way, is that decisions on reduction are the most important in determining what kind of knowledge you produce.

Note that I never said that statistics should or shouldn't be used (statistics being the prototypical method of reduction.) I just said that we should be thinking more clearly about "aesthetic" questions like whether or not a dependent variable has a finite range over an infinite domain. (And this question must be answered in reference to specific variables, so we need to figure out which ones we actually use.)