On the disparity between intrinsically discrete thought and intrinsically continuous sensory experience and the resulting misrepresentation of physical space
I haven’t read the previous post yet but no, Andy does have an “idea” of differentiated physical space from the moment he has an “idea” of the one and the many. In this case this might refer simply to the concept of real numbers. What he does not, and cannot have an idea of, is of time; that time which is understood as the process of becoming, the flow of time if you will. The only idea he would have of time (assuming he is some sort of automata-friend) is that of “spacialized time”, which is the only account of time and measurement that physics cares about. Your paragraph is entirely correct when applied to time, but not to space. An intrinsic experience that is discrete is already called space, that is what space is, it is an “always already”. Andy is always already. That is why machines act so well (in space) compared to humans, but they will never act in any conceivable way (in time) compared to humans. This is the time of Augustine, which exists only in the present (both, past and future exist only in the present). Note that the space of time that Augustine refers to bears no extension, “ciò che non ha spazio non si misura”, it exists in an absolute present without expand: “da ciò che non è ancora, attraverso ciò che non ha spazio, in ciò che non esiste più.” (Confessioni, 11, XXI).
This was made very clear by Bergson, and there has never been an answer to that, or to be more precise, there cannot be an answer to that within the dogmatic subjectivism of a Kantian epistemology. Which is what underpins our entire commitment to “modern science”. The categories of understanding can be called into question from the moment they are a product of the environment and its material evolution, not the pre-conditions for its own existence. See for example Bergson’s generative intuition (HB “Key Writings”, Bloomsbury), or James’s idea of an active mind which I mentioned earlier. Not to mention ANW of course. The creative nature of time is entirely missed by science. It treats time as if it did not exist, and obviously, Nature does not exist either, other than as a physical aggregate. We have been stuck in this damaging misconception for three hundred years.
That quotation from Sri Aurobindo is extraordinary, it could have been said by Bergson in one his most brilliant intuitions. It puts all Kant antinomies to rest.
You really should read about Andy in my post on Intentionality. Andy, I wrote there, “is good at math, so he understands you perfectly if you tell him that space is (or is like) the set of all triplets of real numbers. But if you believe that this gives him a sense of the expanse we call space, you are deluding yourself.” Andy certainly has an “idea” of differentiated physical space but this idea is of “a Many that allows itself to be thought as a One.” There is another kind of unity associated with space, described by Sri Aurobindo in the quoted passage as “an infinity which seems to us the same all-containing all-pervading point without magnitude.” This is the intrinsic unity of space implied by QM, which does not cease to exist when a multiplicity of spatial relations comes into being, along with an apparent multiplicity of relata (“apparent” because the relata are numerically identical). This intrinsic unity features in phenomenal consciousness as the extensional quality of space, of which Andy has no idea, just as he has no idea of the “flow” of time.
Unfortunately you are right when you say that an experience that is discrete is already called space (though it would be a thought rather than a sensory experience) since to most physicists space is adequately represented by a transfinite set. “Unfortunately” because it ignores the limits that QM imposes on the objectivation of multiplicity, which is always *in* space and never *of* space. Machines act well is space, but as the word “act” already implies, they act just as well in time. Fortunately for them, they do not have to worry (as we do) about the *ontology* of space and time.
This reminds me of an anecdote about my father. Wounded during WWII, delirious in some field hospital, he was overheard muttering to himself: “There are only two problems: space and time,” which prompted a doctor or nurse to ask: “Who is this philosopher?” Must be in the family genes.
Well, we had a go at space, that’s where it all started: astronomy. We have gone as far as possible to find those things that are not “there”. And along the way we discovered that “there” is not a thing either. And we saw that place is a far richer concept than space. Fair play, we must consider ourselves fortunate. Now let’s move on to the absolute near side, as Nishitani would have put it. Everything that happens, everything that “takes place”, takes place in that realm. General Relativity will cease to exist the moment you close your eyes. That is true time.
“..if time, as the reflective consciousness represents it, is a medium in which our conscious states form a discrete series so as to admit of being counted, and if on the other hand our conception of number ends in spreading out in space everything which can be directly counted, it is to be presumed that time, understood in the sense of a medium in which we make distinctions and count, is nothing but space.”
I haven’t read the previous post yet but no, Andy does have an “idea” of differentiated physical space from the moment he has an “idea” of the one and the many. In this case this might refer simply to the concept of real numbers. What he does not, and cannot have an idea of, is of time; that time which is understood as the process of becoming, the flow of time if you will. The only idea he would have of time (assuming he is some sort of automata-friend) is that of “spacialized time”, which is the only account of time and measurement that physics cares about. Your paragraph is entirely correct when applied to time, but not to space. An intrinsic experience that is discrete is already called space, that is what space is, it is an “always already”. Andy is always already. That is why machines act so well (in space) compared to humans, but they will never act in any conceivable way (in time) compared to humans. This is the time of Augustine, which exists only in the present (both, past and future exist only in the present). Note that the space of time that Augustine refers to bears no extension, “ciò che non ha spazio non si misura”, it exists in an absolute present without expand: “da ciò che non è ancora, attraverso ciò che non ha spazio, in ciò che non esiste più.” (Confessioni, 11, XXI).
This was made very clear by Bergson, and there has never been an answer to that, or to be more precise, there cannot be an answer to that within the dogmatic subjectivism of a Kantian epistemology. Which is what underpins our entire commitment to “modern science”. The categories of understanding can be called into question from the moment they are a product of the environment and its material evolution, not the pre-conditions for its own existence. See for example Bergson’s generative intuition (HB “Key Writings”, Bloomsbury), or James’s idea of an active mind which I mentioned earlier. Not to mention ANW of course. The creative nature of time is entirely missed by science. It treats time as if it did not exist, and obviously, Nature does not exist either, other than as a physical aggregate. We have been stuck in this damaging misconception for three hundred years.
That quotation from Sri Aurobindo is extraordinary, it could have been said by Bergson in one his most brilliant intuitions. It puts all Kant antinomies to rest.
You really should read about Andy in my post on Intentionality. Andy, I wrote there, “is good at math, so he understands you perfectly if you tell him that space is (or is like) the set of all triplets of real numbers. But if you believe that this gives him a sense of the expanse we call space, you are deluding yourself.” Andy certainly has an “idea” of differentiated physical space but this idea is of “a Many that allows itself to be thought as a One.” There is another kind of unity associated with space, described by Sri Aurobindo in the quoted passage as “an infinity which seems to us the same all-containing all-pervading point without magnitude.” This is the intrinsic unity of space implied by QM, which does not cease to exist when a multiplicity of spatial relations comes into being, along with an apparent multiplicity of relata (“apparent” because the relata are numerically identical). This intrinsic unity features in phenomenal consciousness as the extensional quality of space, of which Andy has no idea, just as he has no idea of the “flow” of time.
Unfortunately you are right when you say that an experience that is discrete is already called space (though it would be a thought rather than a sensory experience) since to most physicists space is adequately represented by a transfinite set. “Unfortunately” because it ignores the limits that QM imposes on the objectivation of multiplicity, which is always *in* space and never *of* space. Machines act well is space, but as the word “act” already implies, they act just as well in time. Fortunately for them, they do not have to worry (as we do) about the *ontology* of space and time.
This reminds me of an anecdote about my father. Wounded during WWII, delirious in some field hospital, he was overheard muttering to himself: “There are only two problems: space and time,” which prompted a doctor or nurse to ask: “Who is this philosopher?” Must be in the family genes.
Well, we had a go at space, that’s where it all started: astronomy. We have gone as far as possible to find those things that are not “there”. And along the way we discovered that “there” is not a thing either. And we saw that place is a far richer concept than space. Fair play, we must consider ourselves fortunate. Now let’s move on to the absolute near side, as Nishitani would have put it. Everything that happens, everything that “takes place”, takes place in that realm. General Relativity will cease to exist the moment you close your eyes. That is true time.
“..if time, as the reflective consciousness represents it, is a medium in which our conscious states form a discrete series so as to admit of being counted, and if on the other hand our conception of number ends in spreading out in space everything which can be directly counted, it is to be presumed that time, understood in the sense of a medium in which we make distinctions and count, is nothing but space.”
(HB, The Idea of Duration)