2 ms·

Can you explain in simple terms? I see physical reality as almost redundant and consciousness seems to be able to do everything.

timschmidt 2y ago
From the first paragraph of the linked article: "Mistaking the map for the territory is a logical fallacy that occurs when someone confuses the semantics of a term with what it represents. Polish-American scientist and philosopher Alfred Korzybski remarked that "the map is not the territory" and that "the word is not the thing", encapsulating his view that an abstraction derived from something, or a reaction to it, is not the thing itself. Korzybski held that many people do confuse maps with territories, that is, confuse conceptual models of reality with reality itself."
- hshshshshsh 2y ago
  Okay. I can see that in day to day life. People confusing sentences with actual knowing. Like labeling something a tree and thinking you know what a tree is because you know it's a "tree". But how did anyone verify there is an underlying reality outside consciousness? It's just an assumption right?
  - timschmidt 2y ago
    > But how did anyone verify there is an underlying reality outside consciousness? It's the stuff which continues existing when we stop believing in it.
  - dekhn 2y ago
    Yes, it's taken on faith by scientists that we live in an objective universe with cold hard reality outside our consciousness. It seems like a reasonable assumption, consistent with all our observations. It seems not unreasonable to assume that in the early universe there was nothing living, then at some point, through random chance, the first living things became alive (possibly from some non-alive replicators), and then later, the first living things with consciousness came to be. Again, all of this is consistent with our observations, but effectively taken on faith/treated as an assumption.

2 ms·

Can you explain in simple terms? I see physical reality as almost redundant and consciousness seems to be able to do everything.

by hshshshshsh 2y ago

timschmidt 2y ago
From the first paragraph of the linked article: "Mistaking the map for the territory is a logical fallacy that occurs when someone confuses the semantics of a term with what it represents. Polish-American scientist and philosopher Alfred Korzybski remarked that "the map is not the territory" and that "the word is not the thing", encapsulating his view that an abstraction derived from something, or a reaction to it, is not the thing itself. Korzybski held that many people do confuse maps with territories, that is, confuse conceptual models of reality with reality itself."
- hshshshshsh 2y ago
  Okay. I can see that in day to day life. People confusing sentences with actual knowing. Like labeling something a tree and thinking you know what a tree is because you know it's a "tree". But how did anyone verify there is an underlying reality outside consciousness? It's just an assumption right?
  - timschmidt 2y ago
    > But how did anyone verify there is an underlying reality outside consciousness? It's the stuff which continues existing when we stop believing in it.
  - dekhn 2y ago
    Yes, it's taken on faith by scientists that we live in an objective universe with cold hard reality outside our consciousness. It seems like a reasonable assumption, consistent with all our observations. It seems not unreasonable to assume that in the early universe there was nothing living, then at some point, through random chance, the first living things became alive (possibly from some non-alive replicators), and then later, the first living things with consciousness came to be. Again, all of this is consistent with our observations, but effectively taken on faith/treated as an assumption.