Home | Community | Message Board


This site includes paid links. Please support our sponsors.


Welcome to the Shroomery Message Board! You are experiencing a small sample of what the site has to offer. Please login or register to post messages and view our exclusive members-only content. You'll gain access to additional forums, file attachments, board customizations, encrypted private messages, and much more!

Shop: Kraken Kratom Red Vein Kratom   North Spore North Spore Mushroom Grow Kits & Cultivation Supplies   PhytoExtractum Buy Bali Kratom Powder   Left Coast Kratom Buy Kratom Extract   Unfolding Nature Unfolding Nature: Being in the Implicate Order   Mushroom-Hut Mono Tub Substrate

Jump to first unread post Pages: 1 | 2 | Next >  [ show all ]
InvisibleTrueBrode
Stranger

Registered: 11/03/03
Posts: 287
The ability to conceptualize
    #2240352 - 01/13/04 08:43 PM (20 years, 2 months ago)

Isn't it amazing? We can take parts of external stimuli and arrange them in a new way to create a concept? I wonder if there is any information/knowledge/stimuli beyond our ability to conceptualize? What could be beyond our conceptualization... only experiences outside of our world... if they exist?

Extras: Filter Print Post Top
Anonymous

Re: The ability to conceptualize [Re: TrueBrode]
    #2241079 - 01/14/04 08:04 AM (20 years, 2 months ago)

- Post History Deleted Upon User's Request -

Extras: Filter Print Post Top
Invisiblejpod
Stranger

Registered: 10/14/03
Posts: 107
Loc: DeeSee
Re: The ability to conceptualize [Re: ]
    #2241103 - 01/14/04 08:29 AM (20 years, 2 months ago)

Exactly, how can we attempt to envision something outside of our conceptual ability? It would then enter the realm of the conceptual.

The role of language in relative conceptualization is interesting though. According to Bohm we are self-limited by our language. Can you think of concepts which cannot be descibed by language? Even abstract concepts can be attempted to be explained by language. Bohm has an interesting theory of a new type of language called the Rheomode which could potentially expand upon what is presently able to be conceptualized by the current state of language. Ultimately though, conceptualization is still self-containing.

Extras: Filter Print Post Top
OfflinePhluck
Carpal Tunnel
 User Gallery

Registered: 04/10/99
Posts: 11,394
Loc: Canada
Last seen: 5 months, 3 days
Re: The ability to conceptualize [Re: jpod]
    #2241105 - 01/14/04 08:31 AM (20 years, 2 months ago)

"Exactly, how can we attempt to conceptualize something outside of our conceptual ability? It would then enter the realm of the conceptual."

Not quite... take a 4-dimensional object. We can work it out on paper, and understand the math behind it, even create a computer model of sorts... but I doubt most people could actually conceptualize it.


--------------------
"I have no valid complaint against hustlers. No rational bitch. But the act of selling is repulsive to me. I harbor a secret urge to whack a salesman in the face, crack his teeth and put red bumps around his eyes." -Hunter S Thompson
http://phluck.is-after.us

Extras: Filter Print Post Top
Invisiblejpod
Stranger

Registered: 10/14/03
Posts: 107
Loc: DeeSee
Re: The ability to conceptualize [Re: Phluck]
    #2241110 - 01/14/04 08:38 AM (20 years, 2 months ago)

If one has the ability to work such an idea out on paper and understand the math behind it, is that not a concept in and of itself? The genesis of notion would already have occurred.

Extras: Filter Print Post Top
OfflinePhluck
Carpal Tunnel
 User Gallery

Registered: 04/10/99
Posts: 11,394
Loc: Canada
Last seen: 5 months, 3 days
Re: The ability to conceptualize [Re: jpod]
    #2241114 - 01/14/04 08:40 AM (20 years, 2 months ago)

...but to be able to actually visualize how a 4-dimension cube is shaped is near impossible.


--------------------
"I have no valid complaint against hustlers. No rational bitch. But the act of selling is repulsive to me. I harbor a secret urge to whack a salesman in the face, crack his teeth and put red bumps around his eyes." -Hunter S Thompson
http://phluck.is-after.us

Extras: Filter Print Post Top
Invisiblejpod
Stranger

Registered: 10/14/03
Posts: 107
Loc: DeeSee
Re: The ability to conceptualize [Re: Phluck]
    #2241119 - 01/14/04 08:45 AM (20 years, 2 months ago)

Agreed, but need something be visualized to be a valid concept? Can you visualize an abstract concept such as right and wrong, or truth? And yet they are still concepts. The 4-dimensional cube is a concept because of its very ability to be mathematically conceived and expressed.

Extras: Filter Print Post Top
OfflinePhluck
Carpal Tunnel
 User Gallery

Registered: 04/10/99
Posts: 11,394
Loc: Canada
Last seen: 5 months, 3 days
Re: The ability to conceptualize [Re: jpod]
    #2241156 - 01/14/04 09:17 AM (20 years, 2 months ago)

"Can you visualize an abstract concept such as right and wrong, or truth?"

No, but they aren't something physical, a four dimensional cube is. The thread was about the limits of the mind... and while we can conceptualize the properties of a 4d cube, it's difficult to conceptualize the cube itself.


--------------------
"I have no valid complaint against hustlers. No rational bitch. But the act of selling is repulsive to me. I harbor a secret urge to whack a salesman in the face, crack his teeth and put red bumps around his eyes." -Hunter S Thompson
http://phluck.is-after.us

Extras: Filter Print Post Top
OfflineVirtBlu
Flouronaught

Registered: 01/06/04
Posts: 23
Last seen: 18 years, 9 months
Re: The ability to conceptualize [Re: TrueBrode]
    #2241257 - 01/14/04 10:16 AM (20 years, 2 months ago)

when a dog looks at a rainbow what does he see? one band of what he perseves as light? and what do we see a mix of every possible shade. even though the dog cannot conseptualize the colors in the rainbow does not mean that they are not there.


--------------------

Extras: Filter Print Post Top
InvisibleTrueBrode
Stranger

Registered: 11/03/03
Posts: 287
Re: The ability to conceptualize [Re: Phluck]
    #2241291 - 01/14/04 10:24 AM (20 years, 2 months ago)

While we may not be able to visualize the 4d cube, I must agree with jpod that we can conceptualize it through the methods he mentioned. It may be important to make a distinction between visualization and conceptualization here, because I do not think they are the same.

I always considered conceptualization to be the ability to use what we know from our current world, and apply that to create an idea of what, why or how something is or could be. For example, take a primitive hunter-gatherer, who let's say, for one reason or another, often pulls bark off a tree. One day he conceptualizes a tool that would allow him to do this more efficiently. He does not think (visualize) a shiny knife with a plastic handle, nor a modern steel head hammer (the most efficient tool for the job), but he takes his external stimuli around him and comes up with fastening a rock to a stick to create his tool. His mind, through experience, reworked his external stimuli to create a concept, the concept of a hammer, knife or chisel like object.

Extras: Filter Print Post Top
InvisibleTrueBrode
Stranger

Registered: 11/03/03
Posts: 287
Re: The ability to conceptualize [Re: VirtBlu]
    #2241337 - 01/14/04 10:35 AM (20 years, 2 months ago)

when a dog looks at a rainbow what does he see? one band of what he perseves as light? and what do we see a mix of every possible shade. even though the dog cannot conseptualize the colors in the rainbow does not mean that they are not there.

The trees do not know we are here, and animals have no idea of who we are or what the world really is, BUT they really can't understand these things, or rather, we cannot explain these concepts to them because they have no language and no ability to conceptualize. That is the major difference between animals and us.

Although we can't see infrared, we can understand it, and we know it is there. It is not any great mystery to us, even though we cannot see it. I think this ability puts us above the inability to understand anything, unless of course there are things so beyond us, they are beyond any type of conceptualization, but then we will probably never encounter them anyway...

Extras: Filter Print Post Top
Invisiblejpod
Stranger

Registered: 10/14/03
Posts: 107
Loc: DeeSee
Re: The ability to conceptualize [Re: TrueBrode]
    #2241377 - 01/14/04 10:52 AM (20 years, 2 months ago)

Right, a concept need not be limited to sensorial impressions. There are of course such things as mathematical, philosophical, ethical, etc. concepts as well. The first post did not specify any one type and is therefore what I was referring to. My apologies for not clarifying myself further. I don't know anything about in specific about 4-dimensional cubes, but if as you say, it is able to be revealed through mathematical proofs, it would then be a mathematical concept.

Extras: Filter Print Post Top
Anonymous

Re: The ability to conceptualize [Re: jpod]
    #2241507 - 01/14/04 12:11 PM (20 years, 2 months ago)

- Post History Deleted Upon User's Request -

Extras: Filter Print Post Top
Anonymous

Re: The ability to conceptualize [Re: jpod]
    #2241509 - 01/14/04 12:13 PM (20 years, 2 months ago)

- Post History Deleted Upon User's Request -

Extras: Filter Print Post Top
Invisiblesilversoul7
Chill the FuckOut!
 User Gallery

Registered: 10/10/02
Posts: 27,301
Loc: mndfreeze's puppet army
Re: The ability to conceptualize [Re: Phluck]
    #2241513 - 01/14/04 12:14 PM (20 years, 2 months ago)

Quote:

Phluck said:
"Exactly, how can we attempt to conceptualize something outside of our conceptual ability? It would then enter the realm of the conceptual."

Not quite... take a 4-dimensional object. We can work it out on paper, and understand the math behind it, even create a computer model of sorts... but I doubt most people could actually conceptualize it.



Well, at least not without a liberal dose of psilocybin.


--------------------


"It is dangerous to be right when the government is wrong."--Voltaire

Extras: Filter Print Post Top
Invisiblejpod
Stranger

Registered: 10/14/03
Posts: 107
Loc: DeeSee
Re: The ability to conceptualize [Re: ]
    #2243544 - 01/15/04 08:32 AM (20 years, 2 months ago)

Quote:

Mr_Mushrooms said:
I am only slightly familiar with Bohm.  What do you think of Chomsky's view of language?




Well, Chomsky has so many theories on language.  Unfortunately linguistics can be hard to get into because a core debate of the science is its very definition.  You have the functionalistic view, which at a basic level says linguistics is a product of necessity for the full functioning of the mind and processing of logical thought.  The view of formal linguistics tends to focus on the actual forms of language and its syntax.  Personally I think this is a trivial difference and the two are not necessarily exclusive.  An approach of wholeness would probably lead to greater advances in the field.  Plus, formal linguistics is really fucking boring. :wink:

As you can probably tell from my above post I agree mostly with his functionalist view of language in its ties to psychology and philosophy.  What occurs when one goes through the process of reasoning?  At some point during the processing from abstraction to reason, a relation to language will take place in those who have learned a language, whether it be native or foreign.  Eventually this will become so tied in with our mind that it will be nearly impossible to form a conscious thought without using language.  Language becomes closely defined to ourselves and thinking processes that they will become nearly indistinguishable from one another.  This is observable in certain people classified with diminished mental capacities, where their usage of language appears directly related to their own rational abilities.

So what then of infants and non-human animals in regards to language recognition?  Chomsky holds that language acquisition is an innate function of infants, which come with a certain pre-specified ability for language called universal grammar and phonetics, versus being a completely learned function.  Basically, infants would come 'pre-wired' with certain phonetics, and through learning would refine this into language.  More recent studies show that neither is totally accurate.  There is a innate ability in both infants and non-human animals to discriminate between phonetic differences, explainable through certain auditory mechanisms and acoustical differences.  Whatever the case may be, it is also clear that adults do not show the same level of ability for phonetic differentiation.

Bohm's contribution to language lies in what he called the 'Rheomode'.  He believes that the overly specific nature of modern language leads and concretization of modern thought.  Since the universe is shown to be in a constant state of motion, he argues, language should be changed in such a way as to reflect this.  In other words, only verbs can be accurate, and nouns are ultimately nothing more than 'slow-verbs'.  For a far more complete account of this, I highly recommend Bohm's Wholeness and the Implicate Order.

Extras: Filter Print Post Top
Anonymous

Re: The ability to conceptualize [Re: jpod]
    #2244856 - 01/15/04 08:07 PM (20 years, 2 months ago)

- Post History Deleted Upon User's Request -

Extras: Filter Print Post Top
Invisiblejpod
Stranger

Registered: 10/14/03
Posts: 107
Loc: DeeSee
Re: The ability to conceptualize [Re: ]
    #2245693 - 01/16/04 07:46 AM (20 years, 2 months ago)

Quote:

A philosophy of language that involved prior philosophical commitments would necessarily beg questions of truth and falsity that are not its function to decide.  Such prior commitments may inevitably lead to espousing views that ordinary language does not serve the purpose of stating the truth about reality and that, for the said purpose, a special language needs to be constructed.




I think that usage and interpretation of ordinary language commonly reveals a certain discrepancy in realistic views by placing the assumption of objectivity upon both objective and subjective.  This is highly visible in our daily personal language communication, and becomes even more blatently obvious in a forum such as this, in written medium without external cues.  Certainly it could be improved upon by a form of language which was more self-acknowledging in its own subjectivity without needing to go far out of the way to state such.


Quote:

Are you referring to Broca's motor center for speech which is uniquely found in humans or is there more to it?




No, I am not aware if Chomsky theorized on a specific physical location for this function.  I believe Broca's area has been only shown to be responsible for motor functions.  According to my understanding, his theory should also be applicable to a mute who may learn to understand his native language while still lacking the ability for vocal expression of it.  Universal grammar is more in reference to a capability of 'inner-language', based on the theory that all languages of earth are at root the same, with differences lying in structure and phonetics.  The possibility for all languages is contained within these in-born rules, and infants will then deduce rules from environmental cues to acquire the native language.


Quote:

I was referring to Chomsky as in his review of Skinner, not his books like Syntactic Structures or Aspects of the Theory of Syntax.




It has been a long time since I have read that and is not exactly fresh in my head.  Perhaps when I get some free time I'll review it.


Quote:

Here's a short list of authors that I disagree with in reference to language theory:

Wittgenstein
Russell
Hobbes
Hume
Berkeley
Ayer
Quine

Here are a few I agree with:

Locke
Chomsky
Aristotle
Maritain
Popper




Wow!  I wish I could claim to be that well read but I am still a young pup and haven't had enough time yet.  I will make it a point to check all of these out, as well as your links.
:smile:

Extras: Filter Print Post Top
Invisiblejpod
Stranger

Registered: 10/14/03
Posts: 107
Loc: DeeSee
Re: The ability to conceptualize [Re: ]
    #2247091 - 01/16/04 08:18 PM (20 years, 2 months ago)

I almost forgot to say, thank you for your gracious words. I promise to attempt to learn here and to contribute where possible.

Extras: Filter Print Post Top
OfflinePHARMAKOS
addict
Registered: 09/13/02
Posts: 573
Last seen: 19 years, 8 months
Re: The ability to conceptualize [Re: jpod]
    #2247121 - 01/16/04 08:30 PM (20 years, 2 months ago)

mr mushrooms just a thought 'when you see something and it goes no further then you are percieving' now technically (and here we come again into the issue of language) you are not in fact percieving but SENSING. there is an important differance between sensation and perception. It is in fact the mind interpreting the sensation (in lieu of past experiences, preconieved bias etc) that transforms sensations into perceptions. that is why a newborn infant (we can only assume) first experiences sensation (bright and dark, tactile sensations pain etc) but for the first part of their lives they have no real understanding of these things. Only after a great deal of experimentation and experience do those sensations begin to take on the qualities of perceptions. It is this differance that explains why a person may see (sense) a white person robbing a bank but actually Percieve that it was a black person (just an example) it is in this regard that our mind (with all its failings) can distort sensations, and is this that explains why two people can experience the exact same sensations and yet come up with diffrent perceptions of what is happening.

Extras: Filter Print Post Top
Jump to top Pages: 1 | 2 | Next >  [ show all ]

Shop: Kraken Kratom Red Vein Kratom   North Spore North Spore Mushroom Grow Kits & Cultivation Supplies   PhytoExtractum Buy Bali Kratom Powder   Left Coast Kratom Buy Kratom Extract   Unfolding Nature Unfolding Nature: Being in the Implicate Order   Mushroom-Hut Mono Tub Substrate


Similar ThreadsPosterViewsRepliesLast post
* The Fallacy of an Egocentric View of Reality, Interdependence. michael_lifshitz 2,216 8 02/13/07 12:10 PM
by michael_lifshitz
* Following AI: Consciousness as an interpretive process for data! (aren't I fancy!)
( 1 2 3 all )
PsilocinSam 6,831 58 03/18/05 11:45 AM
by gettinjiggywithit
* Young Children as ego centric...true? g00ru 939 15 12/03/09 09:27 AM
by g00ru
* Conceptual thinking. *DELETED* dorkus 1,325 1 05/01/06 12:43 PM
by TheQueen
* Diploid's Sincere Request Of MarkostheGnostic
( 1 2 3 4 all )
DiploidM 6,369 79 12/20/15 06:47 AM
by LunarEclipse
* an interpretation of the thousand petalled lotus
( 1 2 all )
redgreenvines 2,119 28 06/23/05 02:05 PM
by Sinbad
* human centric belief systems.
( 1 2 all )
truekimbo2 2,306 22 05/03/04 07:31 PM
by ParabolaChair
* Conceptual Evolution And Physical Evolution fireworks_godS 3,322 15 04/19/05 06:33 PM
by entiformatie

Extra information
You cannot start new topics / You cannot reply to topics
HTML is disabled / BBCode is enabled
Moderator: Middleman, DividedQuantum
4,053 topic views. 2 members, 6 guests and 22 web crawlers are browsing this forum.
[ Show Images Only | Sort by Score | Print Topic ]
Search this thread:

Copyright 1997-2024 Mind Media. Some rights reserved.

Generated in 0.027 seconds spending 0.007 seconds on 16 queries.