What does physicalist science tell us about reality?

[Jim Cross]

Experiencing itself is exactly a relationship between a subject and object experienced and both subject and object are further reducible.

That's already a metaphysics, an unprovable interpretation. You chose to believe in the relational interpretation (of both QM and of the world in general), and it's a good one, but it is still an unprovable interpretation.

Look at what is given in your direct 1-st person conscious experience: a flow of phenomena (sensations, feelings, acts of will, thoughts with their meanings, images etc) each of them consciously experienced ("there is something it is like to heave those experiences"). There is no "subject" or "object" in this direct experience, only the intimate experiencing of phenomena. All phenomena are inter-related, but the experience of them is always continuously unchangingly present here an now regardless of what is experienced. This is all what is given. Anything else is our interpretation added to this direct experience, but the funny thing is, any interpretation itself, being a set of meanings of thoughts, is also inseparable part of this conscious experience. And the "subject" and "object" are also nothing but the meanings of thoughts that are also inseparable part of this conscious experience.

Unfortunately that is all a post facto interpretation.

[Eugene I]

Unfortunately that is all a post facto interpretation.

So a new born child looks at the sky and directly experiences the blueness, there is something it is like to experience the blueness, but s/he has no interpretation of it yet, it's just a bare fact of bare experience. No?

Look yourself at the sky, you will have an experience of blueness. What does it have to do with any interpretation? It is a pure fact of experiencing blueness without naming it or interpreting it in any way.

If not, then what is the pure facto without any interpretation in your opinion?

[Jim Cross]

Unfortunately that is all a post facto interpretation.

So a new born child looks at the sky and directly experiences the blueness, there is something it is like to experience the blueness, but s/he has no interpretation of it yet, it's just a bare fact of bare experience. No?

Look yourself at the sky, you will have an experience of blueness. What does it have to do with any interpretation? It is a pure fact of experiencing blueness without naming it or interpreting it in any way.

If not, then what is the pure facto without any interpretation in your opinion?

I can explain with neurons firing too. That also would be interpretation.

My point is that as soon as you start to label it or describe it, it becomes something else. Your description of "directly experiencing the blueness", although different from a description of neurons firing, in its own way as just as abstract and interpretative.

Even in your interpretation, there is still relations involved in the experience - there is "me" when I look at the sky ("look yourself") and there is the sky. I don't see the blue of the sky without the sky unless I am recalling a memory and, in that case, there is a memory of a seeing a sky.

[Eugene I]

Unfortunately that is all a post facto interpretation.

So a new born child looks at the sky and directly experiences the blueness, there is something it is like to experience the blueness, but s/he has no interpretation of it yet, it's just a bare fact of bare experience. No?

Look yourself at the sky, you will have an experience of blueness. What does it have to do with any interpretation? It is a pure fact of experiencing blueness without naming it or interpreting it in any way.

If not, then what is the pure facto without any interpretation in your opinion?

I can explain with neurons firing too. That also would be interpretation.

My point is that as soon as you start to label it or describe it, it becomes something else. Your description of "directly experiencing the blueness", although different from a description of neurons firing, in its own way as just as abstract and interpretative.

Even in your interpretation, there is still relations involved in the experience - there is "me" when I look at the sky ("look yourself") and there is the sky. I don't see the blue of the sky without the sky unless I am recalling a memory and, in that case, there is a memory of a seeing a sky.

I needed to use the language with linguistic labels to communicate with you (and yes, the labels unavoidably involve interpretations), but my purpose to use the labels was to point to the most basic experiential facts (observables) that exist and would exist in our direct experience before we even invoke or develop those labels.

Regarding the "me": the new born child would have no concept of "me" but would still have the experience of the blueness. Also you might notice, when you look at the sky, that the pure experience of blueness is there, but there is also though/idea that there is a "me" who experiences the blueness, and that idea is definitely an interpretation habitually overlaid on "top" of the pure experience of blueness. But you can still trace it, become aware of it, and even train your mind to drop it, this is what practicing Buddhists do when they realize the "emptiness" of their sense/idea of "me". And if you remove the idea of "me", the experience of blueness will still be there. I'm not saying that we should get rid of our sense of self, no, it is very useful evolutionary developed mechanism needed for our survival. I'm only saying that it is still useful to recognize it as an interpretation and to decipher it from the pure observables of our pre-interpretational direct experience.

I'm really enjoying reading the Hegoland, the relational and QBit interpretations of QM are my favorite ones.

[Papanca]

Unfortunately that is all a post facto interpretation.

So a new born child looks at the sky and directly experiences the blueness, there is something it is like to experience the blueness, but s/he has no interpretation of it yet, it's just a bare fact of bare experience. No?

Look yourself at the sky, you will have an experience of blueness. What does it have to do with any interpretation? It is a pure fact of experiencing blueness without naming it or interpreting it in any way.

If not, then what is the pure facto without any interpretation in your opinion?

I can explain with neurons firing too. That also would be interpretation.

My point is that as soon as you start to label it or describe it, it becomes something else. Your description of "directly experiencing the blueness", although different from a description of neurons firing, in its own way as just as abstract and interpretative.

Sorry if this question seems stupid, but doesn't this also apply to Rovelli model ? Isn't it also abstract and interpretative ?

[Eugene I]

Sorry if this question seems stupid, but doesn't this also apply to Rovelli model ? Isn't it also abstract and interpretative ?

Absolutely

Math models of physics are all abstract by definition, but they may be non-interpretative. For example, we can just apply Schrodinger equation to approximate or extrapolate (predict into the future) the observable patterns of phenomena without any interpretation whatsoever. But all the QM interpretations, (Rovelli's included) are speculations (added to the math models) to hypothetically explain how the reality is actually structured "behind" the scenes of the observable phenomena (even though such interpretation may not pose any ontological claims).

[Papanca]

Sorry if this question seems stupid, but doesn't this also apply to Rovelli model ? Isn't it also abstract and interpretative ?

Absolutely

Math models of physics are all abstract by definition, but they may be non-interpretative. For example, we can just apply Schrodinger equation to approximate or extrapolate (predict into the future) the observable patterns of phenomena without any interpretation whatsoever. But all the QM interpretations, (Rovelli's included) are speculations (added to the math models) to hypothetically explain how the reality is actually structured "behind" the scenes of the observable phenomena (even though such interpretation may not pose any ontological claims).

If i understand this right, anything other than "shut up and calculate" would be an additional interpretation.

[Eugene I]

If i understand this right, anything other than "shut up and calculate" would be an additional interpretation.

Pretty much

[Eugene I]

"I believe that one of the greatest mistakes made by human beings is to want certainties when trying to understand something"
Rovelli

[Jim Cross]

I needed to use the language with linguistic labels to communicate with you (and yes, the labels unavoidably involve interpretations), but my purpose to use the labels was to point to the most basic experiential facts (observables) that exist and would exist in our direct experience before we even invoke or develop those labels.

Regarding the "me": the new born child would have no concept of "me" but would still have the experience of the blueness. Also you might notice, when you look at the sky, that the pure experience of blueness is there, but there is also though/idea that there is a "me" who experiences the blueness, and that idea is definitely an interpretation habitually overlaid on "top" of the pure experience of blueness. But you can still trace it, become aware of it, and even train your mind to drop it, this is what practicing Buddhists do when they realize the "emptiness" of their sense/idea of "me". And if you remove the idea of "me", the experience of blueness will still be there. I'm not saying that we should get rid of our sense of self, no, it is very useful evolutionary developed mechanism needed for our survival. I'm only saying that it is still useful to recognize it as an interpretation and to decipher it from the pure observables of our pre-interpretational direct experience.

I'm really enjoying reading the Hegoland, the relational and QBit interpretations of QM are my favorite ones.

I don't think you can really hide behind "language" issues. Language reflects abstract categories.

How do you know what the new born child is "experiencing"? However, even if the child has no sense of self, there is still a relationship involved. There is something that is experiencing and something being experienced. The child is not the sky. And the sky isn't the child. The blue is an attribute of sky-experiencer relationship.

The notion of "direct experience" is an illusion.