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tribesman
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Is non-spatial actually a thing ?
#23628692 - 09/09/16 10:59 AM (7 years, 4 months ago) |
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" According to Descartes, the physical world (res extensa) is essentially extended, whereas mental substances (res cogitans) are nonspatial entities; i.e., they are indivisible and have no shape, size, texture, and cannot be located in space. Colin McGinn agrees with Descartes that the mind is nonspatial, but McGinn’s perspective on the mind-body problem is a kind of property dualism, not substance dualism, entailing that conscious states are unexplainable and nonspatial properties of brains."
~ Ståle Gundersen, Is Consciousness a Nonspatial Phenomenon?
The only things I myself can imagine as non-spatial are time, as it acts as a flux in space, and consciousness, which is obviously a non-spatial phenomenon but which is apparently structured in time.
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laughingdog
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Re: Is non-spatial actually a thing ? [Re: tribesman]
#23629245 - 09/09/16 02:31 PM (7 years, 4 months ago) |
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Quote:
tribesman said: ...
The only things I myself can imagine as non-spatial are time, as it acts as a flux in space, and consciousness, which is obviously a non-spatial phenomenon but which is apparently structured in time.
indeed language is problematical and hypnotic I suggest web searching 'reification' and 'Nominalization'.
It is surprising that many understand some level of math, but are completely blind as to abstraction and parts of speech, as they affect our thinking.
for example consider that time has no duration, as it cannot step outside itself to measure itself. likewise: for example consider that space has no size, as it cannot step outside itself to measure itself. this is simple logic and amazing and totally ignored
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DividedQuantum
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Re: Is non-spatial actually a thing ? [Re: tribesman]
#23629495 - 09/09/16 03:49 PM (7 years, 4 months ago) |
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If you believe there could be dimensions beyond spacetime, then yes. String theory posits that there are ten.
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redgreenvines
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mind which is associative is pretty much non-spatial, i.e. each and all ideas and memories and sensations of all sizes fit into it as if no space at all were necessary. big scenes or small scenes or both simultaneously take no space. the speed of thought is also curious since it takes no time to make a linkage.
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DividedQuantum
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Re: Is non-spatial actually a thing ? [Re: redgreenvines]
#23629560 - 09/09/16 04:07 PM (7 years, 4 months ago) |
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Yes, rgv, excellent points. As OP mentioned as well, consciousness is non-spatial and I would add non-temporal, as you say. It is either non-dimensional or higher-dimensional.
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laughingdog
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Re: Is non-spatial actually a thing ? [Re: tribesman]
#23633330 - 09/10/16 05:57 PM (7 years, 4 months ago) |
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generally some think of psychedlics as mind expanding and mind as free from being localized in space
however consider all the salvia reports
of people who become trapped in couches, walls, chairs and carpets...
hmmm ...
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beforethedawn
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Re: Is non-spatial actually a thing ? [Re: laughingdog] 1
#23633653 - 09/10/16 07:48 PM (7 years, 4 months ago) |
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"The physical world" is a strange notion, and also wrong. Thanks Descartes, for trying, but we're confused now . . .
-------------------- Hostile humankind Can't you see you're fucking blind?
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redgreenvines
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Re: Is non-spatial actually a thing ? [Re: laughingdog]
#23633668 - 09/10/16 07:54 PM (7 years, 4 months ago) |
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they are only trapped because they forgot how to distinguish their left pillow from their right. given enough shroom or lsd they would still be stuck and for a longer time too.
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laughingdog
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Re: Is non-spatial actually a thing ? [Re: redgreenvines]
#23634421 - 09/10/16 11:53 PM (7 years, 4 months ago) |
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Quote:
redgreenvines said: ... distinguish their left pillow from their right. ...
????
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falcon



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Re: Is non-spatial actually a thing ? [Re: laughingdog]
#23634458 - 09/11/16 12:16 AM (7 years, 4 months ago) |
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Timnmen, sissors and clothes pins?
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redgreenvines
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Re: Is non-spatial actually a thing ? [Re: laughingdog]
#23634830 - 09/11/16 07:01 AM (7 years, 4 months ago) |
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Quote:
laughingdog said:
Quote:
redgreenvines said: ... distinguish their left pillow from their right. ...
????
When I was a couch I could feel the skin on the pillows and the puffy feeling with little relief.
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sudly
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Re: Is non-spatial actually a thing ? [Re: tribesman]
#23637116 - 09/11/16 08:41 PM (7 years, 4 months ago) |
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Quote:
tribesman said: " According to Descartes, the physical world (res extensa) is essentially extended, whereas mental substances (res cogitans) are nonspatial entities; i.e., they are indivisible and have no shape, size, texture, and cannot be located in space. Colin McGinn agrees with Descartes that the mind is nonspatial, but McGinn’s perspective on the mind-body problem is a kind of property dualism, not substance dualism, entailing that conscious states are unexplainable and nonspatial properties of brains."
~ Ståle Gundersen, Is Consciousness a Nonspatial Phenomenon?
The only things I myself can imagine as non-spatial are time, as it acts as a flux in space, and consciousness, which is obviously a non-spatial phenomenon but which is apparently structured in time.
I think a simpler way of describing Descartes idea is with implicit concepts(res cogitans) and explicit concepts(res extensa).
I would say human sentience is a mixture of explicit sensations and implicit perceptions. In my view consciousness alone is only explicit sensations. However, consciousness can become sentience through the development of a conscience and the ability to perceive implicit perceptions.
Time and space are inherently linked as Einstein showed with E=MC^2 so I don't think it's correct to say that time is non-spatial.
-------------------- I am whatever Darwin needs me to be.
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tribesman
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Re: Is non-spatial actually a thing ? [Re: sudly]
#23637680 - 09/12/16 05:04 AM (7 years, 4 months ago) |
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E=MC2 is relevant to matter and energy and not spacetime I thought. I'm not clear on the relevant spacetime equation. Isn't it also correct that the relativity of space and time is demonstrable through the introduction of velocity ?
The ambiguity for me is in the congruence of space and time; space being an extension and capacity for reification, and time being the reifying flux.
I think tis is actually written by Ulrich Libbrecht.
" It became clear that yu-chou is not identical with heaven and earth (as later philosophers sometimes pretend), but that yu-chou originates from to basic data: (1)The void, which has extension, and produces the yu; (2)The tao which creates a dynamism in this void by turning around: thus realizing cyclic temporality, chou. Only both these conditions produce an energy, which as a field of force, fills the whole universe. For Chinese thinking space is not a pure extension, not a mathematical space, but a 'space-time'."
~ from Time and Temporality in Intercultural Perspective edited by Douwe Tiemersma, Henk Oosterling.
Something else I'm stuck with is this:
What is time's equivalent to the geometry of space? I heard of spacetime geometry, but what is time's metric?
Clocks I notice in allowing us to 'keep track of time', what they are actually doing is spatialising time.
Edited by tribesman (09/12/16 05:08 AM)
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DividedQuantum
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Re: Is non-spatial actually a thing ? [Re: tribesman]
#23638051 - 09/12/16 09:35 AM (7 years, 4 months ago) |
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E=mc² is intimately tied up with the concept of spacetime. This equation comes out of the math for the Special Theory of Relativity, which describes spacetime and the need to posit the interdependence of space and time. Space, time, mass, and energy are all sides of a four-sided coin. And one can measure time as space and space as time. For example, one could measure a year in distance -- the distance a photon will travel in one year. One could measure a mile as time -- the amount of time it takes for a photon to traverse the distance.
One cannot have space without time, or time without space. And one cannot have mass without spacetime, energy without spacetime, or energy without mass and vice versa.
Light (energy) defines spacetime. A given distance that light travels will have a corresponding passage of time for an observer (unless they are traveling at the speed of light, which we think is impossible for massive objects), and a given amount of time that light travels will require a given distance to be able to do so.
Spacetime.
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tribesman
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So the constant C is the spacetime element of the equation ?
Still this is only a theory of the relationship between those four elements and not a conclusive explanation of the nature of spacetime.
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DividedQuantum
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Re: Is non-spatial actually a thing ? [Re: tribesman]
#23638284 - 09/12/16 11:38 AM (7 years, 4 months ago) |
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Yes, c is the maximum velocity for anything traveling in spacetime. Given that, light defines the dynamics. Time cannot exist apart from space, and space cannot exist apart from time.
That's essentially Special Relativity, in very general terms. There are a lot of physical consequences, like E=mc².
There is no conclusive explanation of the nature of spacetime other than that, unless you include General Relativity, which brings in gravitational acceleration. Also, we still don't even know whether spacetime is quantized or continuous.
I mean it's like asking why is a raven like a writing desk. Well, there's no good way to answer that. We know what we know and not more.
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tribesman
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...abd so Einstein's theory is true enough.
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DividedQuantum
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Re: Is non-spatial actually a thing ? [Re: tribesman]
#23638322 - 09/12/16 11:57 AM (7 years, 4 months ago) |
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Yeah, it's been verified in dozens of ways. The GPS in your phone, for example, wouldn't work without the equations of relativity. Examples are numerous.
It has the added benefit of making sense, where quantum mechanics, for example, might be a little lacking in that department. Of course it has been verified even more precisely than relativity.
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tribesman
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OK so how do we move forward with regards the nature of spacetime? For example a geometry of spacetime, it seems counter intuitive to use the word geometry for a Nonspatial phenomena even if time is a tangent to space. What mathematical model can be used to explore and define temporal forms or structures ?
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DividedQuantum
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Re: Is non-spatial actually a thing ? [Re: tribesman]
#23638395 - 09/12/16 12:29 PM (7 years, 4 months ago) |
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Quote:
OK so how do we move forward with regards the nature of spacetime? For example a geometry of spacetime, it seems counter intuitive to use the word geometry for a Nonspatial phenomena even if time is a tangent to space. What mathematical model can be used to explore and define temporal forms or structures ?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minkowski_space
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_relativity
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tribesman
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Anything a little more radical ?
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DividedQuantum
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Re: Is non-spatial actually a thing ? [Re: tribesman]
#23638471 - 09/12/16 01:11 PM (7 years, 4 months ago) |
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If you want it...
http://peswiki.com/powerpedia:teslas-dynamic-theory-of-gravity
http://www.netowne.com/technology/important/
http://www.plasmacosmology.net/tesla.html
https://www.quora.com/What-was-Teslas-opinion-on-Einsteins-theory-of-relativity-and-quantum-mechanics
Tesla on relativity: "...magnificent mathematical garb which fascinates, dazzles and makes people blind to the underlying errors. The theory is like a beggar clothed in purple whom ignorant people take for a king ... its exponents are brilliant men but they are metaphysicists, not scientists..." New York Times, July 11, 1935, p23, c8
Nikola Tesla was not a scientist, he was an engineer, and frankly some of his declarations about physics, and even many of his inventions, were nothing besides harebrained. I personally have a problem with the fact that none of that stuff can be reproduced, but you asked for radical.
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tribesman
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Thanks DQ,
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DividedQuantum
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Re: Is non-spatial actually a thing ? [Re: tribesman]
#23638663 - 09/12/16 02:40 PM (7 years, 4 months ago) |
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Halayudha
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Awesome post and thread, tribesman. . I've been interested in physics a lot lately, it's a good way to go. . .
You definitely brought up one of the most interesting questions - at some places in the continuum it very much seems like space and time can be transcended - and other times it seems like we are in a 4-dimensional universe. . .
So - for me, it has been very interesting to explore, and so forth -- another is the point that many make that time illusory. . . I suppose there are even more clues and what not that inspire me to learn more, but this one is a fascinating one. . . If time is illusion, what all does this mean? And is it so?
Not to answer, but to simply continue to ask and ponder. . .
'The Future of Spacetime' is a wonderful book I highly recommend; it's not math-heavy. . . One thing for instance - to sum up - it would seem that nature has automatic safe-guards against paradoxes... The timeline is secure, in other words. They were able to come to this by working out simple objects, yet it would seem to hold true for more complex ones as well (in talking about time-travel and paradoxes).
Anyway I look forward to seeing where it goes.
Okay - specifically, about time being illusion - my main question or inquiry is then into time-travel ... this has been a main one of science-fiction for many decades and further back; for natural reasons,... it's very intriguing! I found it interesting to see Hawking write a couple of times about 'imaginary time,' and so forth. . . just a bit of the puzzle!
I do recommend and love that book - it's just a few articles by some good names in the field.. Hawking, Thorne, Novikov, etc. . . very enjoyable!
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DividedQuantum
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Re: Is non-spatial actually a thing ? [Re: Halayudha]
#23644369 - 09/14/16 11:13 AM (7 years, 4 months ago) |
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Yeah, that is a good book. Richard Price, who wrote the introduction to it, was one of my physics professors in college. Small world.
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tribesman
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Re: Is non-spatial actually a thing ? [Re: Halayudha]
#23648043 - 09/15/16 04:33 PM (7 years, 4 months ago) |
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Quote:
Halayudha said: Awesome post and thread, tribesman. . I've been interested in physics a lot lately, it's a good way to go. . .
You definitely brought up one of the most interesting questions - at some places in the continuum it very much seems like space and time can be transcended - and other times it seems like we are in a 4-dimensional universe. . .
So - for me, it has been very interesting to explore, and so forth -- another is the point that many make that time illusory. . . I suppose there are even more clues and what not that inspire me to learn more, but this one is a fascinating one. . . If time is illusion, what all does this mean? And is it so?
Not to answer, but to simply continue to ask and ponder. . .
'The Future of Spacetime' is a wonderful book I highly recommend; it's not math-heavy. . . One thing for instance - to sum up - it would seem that nature has automatic safe-guards against paradoxes... The timeline is secure, in other words. They were able to come to this by working out simple objects, yet it would seem to hold true for more complex ones as well (in talking about time-travel and paradoxes).
Anyway I look forward to seeing where it goes.
Okay - specifically, about time being illusion - my main question or inquiry is then into time-travel ... this has been a main one of science-fiction for many decades and further back; for natural reasons,... it's very intriguing! I found it interesting to see Hawking write a couple of times about 'imaginary time,' and so forth. . . just a bit of the puzzle!
I do recommend and love that book - it's just a few articles by some good names in the field.. Hawking, Thorne, Novikov, etc. . . very enjoyable!
Thanks for opening the discussion up a bit, and DV but I know the consensus perspective, and I know the pseudo side.
What I'm interested in is something like minkowski space but with a geometry where the singularities of both cones are sunken down to the base of the opposition cone,and with space representing one cone with a expansive/contracting dynamic (big bang/big crush) and with the other representative of time, with a singularity at the narrow end (now) and possibly a state of temporal unfloldment and stasis with no time's arrow (never) at the open end. I think this is similar to the theories on black holes; that beyond the event horizon time stops, this represents a localised temporal expansion and spatial collapse. Now to go out on a limb I speculate further that the primary mechanism of the brain is to generate a low order temporal singularity. This then becomes the temporal-metric within which consciousness grows.
Edited by tribesman (09/15/16 05:05 PM)
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BrendanFlock
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Re: Is non-spatial actually a thing ? [Re: tribesman]
#23648101 - 09/15/16 05:02 PM (7 years, 4 months ago) |
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Well thoughts have a locus to them, and that is good enough to say thoughts are defined..and if they are indeed defined..than you have a substance so to speak..a form..
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tribesman
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Re: Is non-spatial actually a thing ? [Re: BrendanFlock]
#23648133 - 09/15/16 05:12 PM (7 years, 4 months ago) |
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It's about temporal metrics, an architectonic of time. Now it's not a substance, and it has no form as such that we are obviously aware other than the procession off entropy. This fits with the expansion from a singularity theory.
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tribesman
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Re: Is non-spatial actually a thing ? [Re: tribesman]
#23648159 - 09/15/16 05:19 PM (7 years, 4 months ago) |
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The vision I have is of a reversal of the consensus view of reality in which space is an expanding extension and and time is an animating flux ( sort of reminiscent for me of quantum mechanical theories way over my head), to a state where time is fully unfolded and space is present as a flux; how can that be modelled mathematically?
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