Philosophy Of Technology - Science topic

In spite of such effects, the majority of humanity, especially the scientific community – does not learn to bring about a radical re-definition of the pragmatically defined concept of attainable truth. This is the proof of the relevance of a re-formulation of the same by the science of philosophy and by scientific philosophy in the realization and growth of science, technology, etc.

Just within the pragmatic attitude lives and functions a big majority of the humanity. Specifically, the scientific community acts consciously by inhibiting wholesome ideas, actions, and changes in the usually pragmatic functioning of (1) every possible realm of knowledge, including the human project of thinking, feeling, curing, facilitating, etc. or (2) any other realms of life in any given environment and society.

The only given justification has been the urgency (1) to experience “the realizably” theoretical and practical effects of all ideas, actions, and changes as early as possible, (2) to have the awaited “long-term effects” at the earliest, (3) to have it in abundance “in the here-and-now”, etc.

Pragmatism has been the backbone of almost all, most basic and less basic, definitions, practical procedures, etc. in logic, mathematics, physical sciences, biological sciences, human sciences, etc. Pragmatism acquires constantly new definitions in history of science and philosophy.

By ‘pragmatism’ is meant not exactly and not only the philosophical school under this name. Of course, this philosophical school extols the effects-only and use-only theory beyond the emphasis it assigns to theoretical breadths and depths. In general, such emphasis plays an exaggerated role in determining the forms of access to what humanity needs in terms of life and truth. It is mainly the sciences that effectively inhibit any efforts beyond pragmatism.

The suggested new paradigm beyond pragmatism would be: The more the certainty and generality of the theoretical breadths and depths assured by the axiomatic foundations – the greater the truth of the specific, the individual, and the delineated results of such a founded philosophy and science within life and knowing.

I shall explain in other words the pragmatic state of the sciences. After all theoretical and experimental search, truth is being concluded to – albeit for a short time and with some or much assurance of probabilistic tenability – in a manner that is FULLY representative of the state of affairs sought to be represented.

The representation of an objectual process in a truth statement is taken to directly correspond or correspond enough to reality, when the theoretically antecedent instruments are universal enough to produce the knowledge about anything specific. But the antecedents are never universal enough, if the theoretical foundations are not broader than the theoretical grounding available in the positive sciences or formal sciences.

This sort of truth-representation is what knows, feels, cures, and facilitates life today, purportedly “in all respects”. Hence, pragmatism is merely be about the method of approaching truths and activities. But it has not been sufficiently about concluding something from a swarm of structures of theoretical generality and superiority, which should have worked in terms of theoretical and practical applicability in all possible specific cases available in any theory that is trans-pragmatic.

One example where the attitude of more general theoretical justification is missing is in the diverse theoretical constructs in physics. Anyone can characterise one of the many reasons as the blind and pragmatic acceptance, by many physicists, of the velocity of light as sacrosanct everywhere in the cosmos. In fact, we have been able to prove the velocity of light only with respect to our part of the universe, and have accepted it as the highest for all parts of the cosmos solely because we have not been able to detect one of higher value.

This is due to the overemphasis on pragmatism in science. Using such a limit velocity in science for technological success is a necessity, but insisting on it even in the broadest possible theoretical situations is cheap adherence. In this respect, the matter that none can accept is the way in which Einstein’s postulation of c as the reference velocity to measure and calculate other but lower velocities becomes accepted as the final proof of the very postulation!

What else is it but the consequence of strict pragmatism in the method and procedure of inquiry without enough antecedent theoretical broadening in the foundations, method, and procedure? This has debilitated science and philosophy of science for almost a century and a quarter. How to dispense with such pragmatism in science and philosophy?

Additionally, the declaration that the observed source-independence of luminal velocity is somehow a basis for accepting a background ether for luminal velocity to hinge upon, is again another instance of overmuch pragmatism in the method and procedure of theorization without restricting strict pragmatism to drawing conclusions.

A second example of strict pragmatism is the way in which some absolutely spherical geometries and their topologies were and are even now being used to geometrize the universe. They tend even to conclude from such a presupposition that the universe is spatially and temporally isotropic, and then tend to dispense with the effects of the locally causal temporal dimension on the universe.

Yet another example is the blind acceptance of the pragmatically probabilistic interpretation of quantum physics as the essence of all physics and of all physically existent reality, whereby most physicists attempt to accept a merely epistemic sort of causality in physical reality and call it “probabilistic causality”, and then start using it as if it were physical-ontological causality.

What we can understand (probabilistically, epistemically) need not be the same as how nature is out there! What in fact is the probabilistic causality that acts in physical processes with some parts of it being causal and other parts not causal or even acausal? Is not such a concept of causality a silly idea of causation based on epistemic determinism getting converted into ontological determinism, which then is converted into the actual nature of existent processes? The unnecessarily pragmatic ways of fixing scientific practices is the main reason behind it.

In preparing a short introduction to the following critical presentation of the aftermaths of pragmatism, let me put in gist the new paradigm that is necessitated here: (1) Truth is not merely a subject-object act. (2) Truth is not merely an act of tending towards. (3) Truth is much more an act of epochal finalizing of constant insertion of foundational breadths and depths in the state of affair / process being inquired into, based on the most universal of all conceptual foundations and driving them down onto the particular, but based fully and always on the foundations of the total in a mutually related context.

That is, strict pragmatism should be exercised only at the instance of concluding to the final, strictly contextual, statement and action, and that too under the provision of further constant inquiry and enhancement of the descriptions, conclusions, etc.

My contention concerning strict methodological pragmatism is that, although the pragmatic attitude has its rights over thought and practice, it (1) inevitably foregoes many fundamental (most broadly based on the totality of all existents) aspects of reality, environment, and life and, (2) in consequence, unbridles back onto the same reality, environment, and life the epistemically guided ontological aftermaths of the negligence of the said fundamental theoretical aspects and necessities of reality and of knowledge – and consequently of course onto life and the human ideal of comprehension of reality and life.

Hence, it is high time that philosophy and science eliminate as much as possible the defective, strictly pragmatic attitude from their foundations while safeguarding some of the necessary aspects of pragmatism merely when they create advantages via accessing conclusions and actions, without causing philosophical, scientific, and human-life tragedies.

As there are countless disadvantageous aftermaths of pragmatism in knowledge and life, some of them may be cited in the following:

(1) International, national, and local politics purposefully manipulating natural resources, economies, societies, religions, and nations for power and wealth, even to the extent of impoverishing the majority of a continent or nation.

(2) National and international poverty alleviation programs and techniques which increase the rich-to-poor differences by perpetuating pragmatically charitable corruption in industrial, educational, health, and governmental ventures.

(3) Educational systems and methods becoming partially aimed at creating a vast majority of cheap labourers for the industry especially in poor nations, by fast-paced and obscurantist information-encrypting of sciences, humanities, and languages in educational institutions, without reference to the history of future-oriented achievements in discoveries, ideas, theories, events, programs, etc.

(4) Most media entities creating sensational partial truths as the short-time highest truths at the behest of politicians, industry, research & development, or at least against them, meant finally for easy financial gains and thereafter for practising political and scientific amnesia at the same truths.

(5) The pharma and health industry adopting and justifying as sacrosanct the mechanist-causalist manners of producing medicaments and treating patients – encouraged mainly by the successes of naturally necessitated urgency in such interventions – and producing chemical medicines so non-holistically (i.e., in ways that do not involve material interactions more minute and life-based than in chemical interactions) that the methods of production and treatment necessarily have more than intended side-effects creating ever more patients.

(6) Industries, technological companies, media entities, media producers, and a few nations specializing in hyperbolically creating and satisfying unhealthy and unessential psychological and physical needs and increasing easy production of commodities for quick-growth in economy, resulting in universal pollution of genes and life-forms.

(7) Constitutions of nations and justice-dispensation systems formulated in ways that normally foster or at least merely facilitate the exigencies of the powerful and rich and possibly get favoured in return.

(8) Governmental law-enforcement arms which work on old-fashioned and corruption-facilitating machinery and, from time to time, can milk the rich and powerful by way of protection of their pragmatic socio-economic attitudes.

(9) The more than two centuries of spread of chemical fertilizing methods of agriculture by blocking the spread of great natural cultivation methods and researches into them, callously titling the latter “unscientific”, and thereby chemically cluttering the whole cultivable and life-worthy earth.

(10) The millennia-old mammoth culinary science and eating culture that encourage tasty junk consumption at home and outside, successfully encouraging and perpetuating the enjoyment of quick pleasure from the one end of the tongue to the other.

(11) The way in which human beings, for millennia, exhaust and emaciate themselves in pursuit of quick joys, vastly unaware of the merely brain-based connotative nature of quick joys.

(12) The methods of finance acquisition and offspring-maintenance in families, societies, nations, and religions, oriented at self-perpetuation and attaining – for that same reason – nothing of it.

(13) Eco-compatibility efforts all over the nations by governments themselves, that help further industrialize under cover of grand holistic statements and schemes.

(14) Economic, educational, cultural, health, and other diverse forms of solution of problems of humanity, in which policy makers never go for the deepest roots of maladies: e.g., the real reason why people build houses on and cultivate (e.g., occupying and cultivating steep hill-sides, thus inundating the high ranges), is not merely craving, but the high rate of population growth, and yet no government acts in this direction ethically and democratically via education.

(15) The manner in which the very oppressed groups become much like the oppressor groups and indulge in pragmatic tactics against their own status, and consume the effects of such self-poisoning.

(16) The universal ignominy to what the experiences and the universal phenomenon of rational reflections of the old and dying are – including those of former scientists, technocrats, and scholars.

(17) The wide-spread technocratic and allopathic health-scientific methods of nipping all nature-infused living methods by blanket-terming them as unscientific.

(18) Religions’ millennia-old and continuing promise of a quick and miraculous transfer to a body-less state similar to that of a supposedly vacuous Absolute, instead of the more possible and reasonable “continued growth” of love-bodies as fully well caused by the same kind of growth during the lifetime of individuals and societies in imitation of an infinitely active love-bodied Source.

(19) A section of scientists and philosophers wilfully presupposing that anthropomorphized expressions and theologies based on them are the meaning of religion and spirituality, and basing their science, technology, medicine, and philosophy, etc. on notions that counteract these vicious concepts that should not have been the meaning of religion and spirituality.

(20) Some or many of those involved pragmatically in the above thought patterns and sciences trade their guns against supposed realities that do not exist in the sciences and in the world out there, thus beating in the air to kill some form of ideas that do not exist where they think them to exist.

The most suitable examples today in theoretical sciences are Russell, Wittgenstein, and many others in the early half of the 20thcentury, and Stephen Hawking, Richard Dawkins, Lawrence Krauss, and a host of others in the latter half of the 20th century and thereafter. The ways in which the likes of these experts have unquestioningly been using the already existing pragmatism in physics, cosmology, and philosophy is symbolic and emblematic of pragmatism as a cut-throat methodology in effect.

Technological examples are the ways in which Newton’s physics and mechanistic chemistry, biology, economics, etc. are being used today to facilitate money-flow into the industry by disregarding their health-related and environmental aftermaths.

Bibliography

(1) Gravitational Coalescence Paradox and Cosmogenetic Causality in Quantum Astrophysical Cosmology, 647 pp., Berlin, 2018.

(2) Physics without Metaphysics? Categories of Second Generation Scientific Ontology, 386 pp., Frankfurt, 2015.

(3) Causal Ubiquity in Quantum Physics: A Superluminal and Local-Causal Physical Ontology, 361 pp., Frankfurt, 2014.

(4) Essential Cosmology and Philosophy for All: Gravitational Coalescence Cosmology, 92 pp., KDP Amazon, 2022, 2nd Edition.

(5) Essenzielle Kosmologie und Philosophie für alle: Gravitational-Koaleszenz-Kosmologie, 104 pp., KDP Amazon, 2022, 1st Edition.

We academics love our coffee and our computers, but we are also supposed to think critically. With this is in mind, should coffee shops ban laptops?

Some folks are saying they should:

The question is which arguments emerge as most compelling, so what are your thoughts?

Here I give a short description of a forthcoming book, titled: Cosmic Causality Code and Artificial Intelligence: Analytic Philosophy of Physics, Mind, and Virtual Worlds.

§1. Our Search: What Is the Mysterious Stuff of Information?: The most direct interpretations of the concept of information in both informatics and in the philosophy of informatics are, generally, either (1) that “information is nothing more than matter and energy themselves”, or (2) that “information is something mysterious, undefinable, and unidentifiable, but surprisingly it is different from matter and energy themselves”.

But if rightly not matter and energy, and if it is not anything mysteriously vacuous (and hence not existent like matter-energy, or pure matter, or pure energy), then how to explain ‘information’ in an all-inclusive and satisfying manner? Including only the humanly reached information does not suffice for this purpose. Nor can we limit ourselves to information outside of our brain-and-language context. Both the types need necessarily to be included in the definition and explanation.

§2. Our Search: What, in Fact, Can Exist?: First of all, what exist physically are matter and energy (I mean carrier wavicles of energy) themselves. In that case, information is not observable or quasi-observable like the things we see or like some of the “unobservables” which get proved later as quasi-observable. This is clearly because there are no separate energy wavicles that may be termed information particles / wavicles, say, “informatons”. I am subjectively sure that the time is not distant for a new mystery-monger theory of informatons will appear.

§3. Our Search: A Tentative General Definition: Secondly, since the above is the case with humanity at various apparently mysterious theoretical occasions, it is important to de-mystify information and find out what information is. ‘Information’ is a term to represent a causal group-effect of some matter-energy conglomerations or pure energy conglomerations, all of which (of each unit of information or units of information in each case) are in some way under relatively closely conglomerated motion, and together work out for a causal effect or effects on other matter-energy conglomerations or energy conglomerations.

§4. Our Search: In What Sense is Information Causal?: Thirdly, the causal effect being transferred is what we name a unit or units of information. Hence, in this roundabout sense, information too is causal. There may have been and may appear many claiming that information is something mysteriously different from matter-energy. Some of them have the intention of mystify consciousness in terms of information, or create a sort of soul out of immaterial and mysterious information conglomerations, and then create also an information-soul-ology. I believe that they will eventually fail.

§5. Our Search: Examples for Mystification: According to some theologians (whose namies avoid mentioning in order to avoid embarrassment) and New Age informaticians, God is the almighty totality of information, and human, animal, and vegetative souls are finite totalities of the same. Information for them is able to transmit itself without the medium of existent matter, energy, or matter-energy. Thus, their purpose would be served well! But such theories seem to have disappeared after the retirement of some of these theologians because there are not many takers for their theological stance. If they had not theologized on it, some in the scientific community would have lapped up such theories.

Hence, be sure that new, more sophisticated, and more radical ones will appear, because there will be more and more of others who do not want to directly put forth a theological agenda, and instead, would want to use the “mystery”-aspect of information as an instrument to create a cosmology or quantum cosmology in which the primary stuff of the cosmos is information and all matter and energy are just its expressions. Some concrete examples are the theories that (1) gravitation is not any effect carried by some wavicles (call them gravitons), but instead just a “vacuum effect”, (2) gravitation is another effect of electromagnetism that is different from its normal effects, etc.

§6. Why Such a Trend?: In my opinion, one reason for this trend is the false interpretation of causality by quantum physics and its manner of mystifying non-causality and statistical causality by use of spatialization and reification of mathematical concepts and effects as physical without any attempt to delimitation. There can be other reasons too.

§7. Our Attempt: All-Inclusive Definition of Information: Finally, my attempt above has been to take up a more general meaning of the notion ‘information’. For example, many speak of “units of information in informatics”, “information of types like in AI, internet, etc., that are stored in the internet in various repositories like the Cloud”, “information as the background ether of the universe (strangely and miraculously!)”, “loss of all information in the black hole”, “the quantum-cosmological re-cycling of information in the many worlds that get created (like mushrooms!) without any cause and without any matter-energy supply from anywhere, but merely by a (miraculously quantum-cosmological vacuum effect (!?)”, etc. We have been able to delve beyond the merely apparent in these notions.

Add to this list now also the humanly bound meanings of the notion of ‘information’ that we always know of. The human aspect of it is the conglomeration of various sorts of brain-level and language-level concatenations of universal notions (in the form of notions in the brain and nouns, verbs, etc. in language) with various other language-level and brain-level aspects which too have their origin in the brain.

In other words, these concatenations are the brain-level and language-level concatenative reflections of conglomerations of universals (which I call “ways of being of processes”) of existent physical processes (outside of us and inside us), which have their mental reflections as conceptual concatenations in brains and conceptual concatenations in language (which is always symbolic). Thus, by including this human brain-level and language-level aspect, we have a more general spectrum of the concept of information.

In view of this general sense of the term ‘information’, we need to broaden the definition of the source/s of information as something beyond the human use of the term that qualifies it as a symbolic instrument in language, and extend its source/s always to some causal conglomeration-effect that is already being carried out out-there in the physical world, in a manner that is not a mere construct of human minds without any amount of correspondence with the reality outside - here, considering also the stuff of the consciousness as something physically existent. That is, the causal source-aspect of anything happening as mental constructs (CUs and DUs) is a matter to be considered always as real beyond the CUs, DUs, and their concatenations. These out-there aspect consists of the Extension-Change-wise effects in existent physical processes, involving always and in each case OUs and their conglomerations.

§8. (1) Final Definitions: ‘Information’ in artificial intelligence is the “denotative” (see “denotative universals” below) name for any causally conglomerative effect in machine-coded matter-energy as the transfer agent of the said effects, and such effect is transferred in the manner of Extension-Change-wise (see below: always in finitely extended existence, always every part of the existent causing finite impacts inwards and outwards) existence and process by energy wavicles and/or matter-energy via machine-coded energy paths. The denotative name is formulated by means of connotation and denotation by minds and by machines together.

Information in biological mindsis the denotative name for any causally conglomerative effect in brain-type matter-energy and is transferred in the Extension-Change manner by brain-type matter-energy and/or energy wavicles. The denotative name here is formulated by means of connotation and denotation (see below) by minds and by symbolic-linguistic activities together.

Mind, in biologically coded information-based processes, is not the biological information alone or separately, but it is the very process in the brain and in the related body parts.

§9. (2) Summary: I summarize the present work now, beginning with a two-part thesis statement:

(a) Universal Causalityis the relation within every physically existent process and every part of it, by reason of which each of it has an Existence in which every non-vacuously extended (in Extension) part of each of it exerts a finite impact (in Change) on a finite number of other existents that are external and/or internal to the exerting part. (b) Machine coding and biological consciousness are non-interconvertible, because the space-time virtual information in both is non-interconvertible due to the non-interconvertibility of their information supports / carriers that are Categorially in Extension-Change-wise existence, i.e., in Universal Causality.

Do artificial and biological intelligences (AI, BI) converge and attain the same nature? Roger Penrose held so initially; Ray Kurzweil criticized it. Aeons of biological causation are not codified or codifiable by computer. Nor are virtual quantum worlds and modal worlds without physical properties to be taken as existent out there. According to the demands of existence, existents must be Extended and in Change. Hence, I develop a causal metaphysics, grounding AI and BI: Extension-Change-wise active-stable existence, equivalent to Universal Causality (Parts 2, 3).

Mathematical objects (numbers, points, … structures), other pure and natural characteristics, etc. yielding natural-coding information are ontological universals (OU) (generalities of natural kinds: qualities may be used as quantities) pertaining to processes. They do not exist like physical things. Connotative universals (CU) are vague conceptual reflections of OU, and exist as forms in minds. Words and terms are their formulations in discourse / language – called denotative universals (DU), based on CU and OU.

The mathematical objects of informatic coding (binaries, ternaries) are “as-if existent” OUs in symbolic CU and DU representation. Information-carriers exist, are non-vacuous, are extended, have parts, and are in the Category of Extension. Parts of existents move, make impact on others, and are in the Category of Change. Extension-Change-wise existence is Universal Causality, and is measured in CU-DU as space-time. Other qualities of existents are derivatives, pertain to existent processes, and hence, are real, not existents.

Properties are conglomerations of OUs. For example, glass has malleability, which is a property. Properties, as far as they are in consciousness, are as CUs’ concatenations, and in language they are as DUs’ concatenations. AI’s property-attributions are information, which in themselves are virtual constructs. The existent carriers of information are left aside in their concept. Scientists and philosophers misconceive them. AI and BI information networks are virtual, do not exist outside the conglomerations of their carriers, i.e., energy wavicles that exist in connection with matter, with which they are interconvertible.

Matter-energy evolution in AI and BI are of different classes. AI and BI are not in space-time, but in Extension-Change-level energy wavicles in physical and biological processes. Space-time do not exist, are absolute virtuals, and are epistemic and cognitive projections. Physical and biological causations are in Extension-Change, hence not interconvertible.

From the viewpoint of the purpose of creating an adequate theory of experience and information, for me the present work is a starting point to Universal-Causally investigate the primacy of mental and brain acts different from but foundational to thoughts and reasoning.

§10.(3) The Context of the Present Work: The reason why I wrote this little book deserves mention. Decades ago, Norbert Wiener said (See Chapter 1, Part 1) that information is nether matter nor energy but something else. What would have been his motive while positing information as such a mysterious mode of existence? I was surprised at this claim, because it would give rise to all kinds of sciences and philosophies of non-existent virtual stuff considered to arise from existent stuff or from nowhere!

In fact, such are what we experience in the various theories of quantum, quantum-cosmological, counterfactually possible, informatic, and other sorts of multiverses other than the probably existent multiverse that the infinite-content cosmos could be.

I searched for books and articles that deal with the stuff of information. I found hundreds of books and thousands of articles in the philosophical, ethical, informatically manipulation-oriented, mathematical, and on other aspects of the problem, but none on the question of information, as to whether information exists, etc. This surprised me further and this seemed to be a sign of scientocracy and technocracy.

I wanted to write a book that is a bit ferocious about the lack of works on the problem, given the fact that informatics is today much more wanted by all than physics, mathematics, biology, philosophy, etc., and of course the social sciences and human sciences.

For example, take the series to which belong the first two of the three books: (1) Harry Halpin e Alexandre Monnin, eds. [2014], Philosophical Engineering: Towards a Philosophy of the Web; (2) Patrick Allo, ed., Putting Information First: Luciano Floridi and the Philosophy of Information –both from Chichester: Wiley Blackwell; and (3) John von Neumann [1966], Theory of Self-Reproducing Automata, Urbana: University of Illinois Press.

These works do not treat of the fundamental question we have dealt with, and none of the other works that I have examined deals with it fundamentally – even the works by the best of informatics philosophers like Luciano Floridi. My intention in this work has not been making a good summary of the best works in the field and submitting some new connections or improvements, rather than offering something new.

Hence, I decided to develop a metaphysics of information and virtual worlds, which would be a fitting reply to Norbert Wiener, Saul Kripke, David Lewis, Jaakko Hintikka, and a few hundred other famous philosophers (let alone specialists in informatics, physics, cosmology, etc.), without turning the book into a thick volume full of quotes and evaluations related to the many authors on the topic.

Moreover, I have had experience of teaching and research in the philosophy of physics, analytic philosophy, phenomenology, process metaphysics, and in attempts to solve philosophical problems related to unobservables, possible worlds, multiverse, and cosmic vacuum energy that allegedly adds up to zero value and is still capable of creating an infinite number of worlds. Hence, I extended the metaphysics behind these realities that I have constructed (a new metaphysics) and developed it into the question of physically artificial and biological information, intelligence, etc.

The present work is a short metaphysical theory inherent in existents and non-existents, which will be useful not only for experts, but also for students, and well-educated and interested laypersons. What I have created in the present work is a new metaphysics of existent and non-existent objects.

WHAT IS INFORMATION? WHAT IS ITS CAUSAL (OR NON-CAUSAL?) CORE? A Discussion. Raphael Neelamkavil, Ph.D. (Quantum Causality), Dr. phil. (Gravitational Coalescence Cosmology)

Questions Addressed: What is information? Is it the same as the energy or matter-energy that is basic to it? Is it merely what is being communicated via energy and different from the energy? If it is different, is it causally or non-causally different or a-causally? Is it something purely physical, if it is based on and/or identifiable to energy? What is the symbolic nature of information? How does information get symbolized? Does it have a causal basis and core? If yes, how to systematize it? Can the symbolic aspect of information be systematized? Is information merely the symbolic core being transmitted via energy? If so, how to connect systematically and systemically the causal core and the symbolic core of languages? If language is a symbolizing production based on consciousness and life – both human and other – and if the symbolic aspect may be termed the a-causal but formatively causal core or even periphery of it, can language possess a non-causal aspect-core or merely a causal and an a-causal aspect-cores? If any of these is the case, what are the founding aspects of language and information within consciousness and life? These are the direct questions involved in the present work. I shall address these and the following more general but directly related questions together in the proposed work.

From a general viewpoint, the causal question engenders a multitude of other associated paradoxical questions at the theoretical foundations of the sciences. What are the foundations of all sciences and philosophy together, upon which the concepts of information, language, consciousness which is the origin of language, and the very existent matter-energy processes are based? Are there commonalities between information, language, consciousness, and existent matter-energy processes? Could a grounding of information, language, etc. be helped if their common conceptual base on To Be can be unearthed, and their consciousness-and-life-related and matter-energy-related aspects may be discovered? How to connect them to the causal (or non-causal?) core of all matter-energy? These are questions more foundational than the former set.

Addressing and resolving the foundational question of the apriority of Causality is, in my opinion, the possibly most fundamental solution. Hence, addressing these is the first task. This should be done in such a manner that the rest should follow axiomatically and thus naturally. Hence, the causal question is to be formulated and then the possible ways of reflection of the same in mental concepts that may axiomatically be demonstrated to follow suit. This task appears to be over-ambitious. But I would attempt to demonstrate as rationally as possible that the connections are strongly based on the very implications of To Be. As regards language, I deal only with verbal, nominal, and attributive (adverbs and adjectives) words, because (1) including other parts of speech would go beyond more than double the number of pages and (2) these other parts of speech are much more complicated and hence may be thought through and integrated in the mainline theory here, say, in the course of another decade or more!

If you don't know what ChatGPT is, watch this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0uQqMxXoNVs. Then, watch the (excellent) movie Her by Spike Jonze. Then, watch this lecture (from the 36 minute mark): https://youtu.be/WJP80WppHuY?t=2147

Finally, picture your child bringing a cell phone home as their partner for your family's holiday dinner.

Make no mistake: this WILL happen. So, take time to think and tell me what you would do. I am curious to see people's responses...

I am currently working on some philosophical issues that today's neurotechnology can raise. My main field of research is the philosophy of technology (more specifically, phenomenology and postphenomenology). I will be very grateful for literature recommendations from experts in this field. Many thanks!

Dear colleagues,

While 'innovation' is one of the main characteristics of our time, it is not clear what we actually mean with this concept. Also in the field of philosophy of technology, it is not innovation but technology that is discussed. I have written and published an article in which I philosophically reflect on the concept of innovation in order to lay the ground for a philosophy of innovation. I am curious to discuss the topic with colleagues and hope that we can direct more philosophical attention to this important concept. Please have a look at the article:

and if you want to receive the published version, please send an email to vincent.blok@wur.nl

vincent blok

I tried to learn something about the philosophy of technology from several books and anthologies, but I did not find much relevant content in them. Some of those books dedicate a lot of space to Plato and Aristotle; Marx is often held in high esteem, and Heidegger is considered the supreme master. But Plato and Aristotle did not see much of technology, and Marx's discourse is slightly old. Heidegger did not manage to say anything that seems (1) understandable, (2) correct, (3) relevant) and (4) new at the same time. What about communication, surveillance, and intense manipulation which information technology has facilitated during the last years?

Programs on my new washing machines last 2 hours or notably more (at low temperatures). There is an option "timecare", but it does not change duration notably. I asked in the shop; they say that all washing machines now have very long programs. I sent an email to the manufacturer; they did not answer. Such long washing seems strange and unnecessary to me.

Different aspects of education such as educational psychology, sociology, philosophy, technology... etc plays a key role in teacher training programs for teachers up to the stage of higher secondary (XII) level and are considered compulsory in addition to qualification in their concern subjects.

Is there any such compulsory program in case of higher education?

Thank you

From the look of the demarcation criteria Does the geocentric theory turn out to be non-scientific versus the heliocentric cosmological theory? Is science no longer a vision surpassed by another?

Recently, There was one Cognitive experiment that was performed somewhat that utilized computer mice to look at Martin Heidegger's theory.

Working with the last book of Bruno Latour I've found an interesting interpretation of existence through a multiplicity of its modes. But I can't catch up what directly Latour means using collocation "modes of existence". Frankly speaking the number of this modes is a secret for me as well. Hope for your help.

Typically, modern and new instrumentation implies that it is smaller, faster, more accurate, less power hungry and more suitable for today's applications. Most of the time these 'modern' instruments are full of 'likeable features', which reminds one of model railway engineering. What about the older technologies, some of which were very reliable, dependable, repairable and 'loveable'. As example consider vacuum tube technology, beautiful, reliable, very functional. Is there a place for it today? As example, I add a photo of a collection of Collins Radio HF receivers, transmitters and transceivers (1960's). This was quality of the day, very reliable and are much coveted today by those who know. What is your experience? Is modern and high tech always the way to go in technology? What and why is this incessant drive towards smaller and smaller instruments and equipment with more bells and whistles?

Processes of subjectivation.

Gilles Deleuze; (Karen Barad); Bruno Latour; John Law; Donna Harraway