Do greenhouses have windows?

[HeyYou]

Well then, that was certainly convoluted.......

[Daedthr]

Yet rather enjoyable. :)

[kvnchrist]

Define a window. Some say the eyes are the windows to the soul. Are they transparent or do they let out what the owner wishes to be seen?

[Daedthr]

Well if I had to give a philosophical definition it would be "something that can be used to allow one to see further than the window itself." But if we get into that then we also have to define what sight is, and you'll likely end with an infinite regress of terms.

 

So I will stick with "A window is a structural part of a building that allows light to transverse between the interior of the building and the exterior world, and vice versa" as it seems to me a reasonable definition and provides a good foundation for my proof.

[kvnchrist]

 

 

 

 

3.

 

The premise for this next stage of the argument is that colour is a visual description of substance, that is, whenever you see colour you are seeing substance too.

 

Now the substance that a glass building is made of is glass, and if this building is equally green then it stands to reason that this glass must also be green.

 

 

 

Color is a description of what wave length of light is refracted off and object. It is not a define that object . A green plant is vastly different to a green colored fog.

4. However glass is transparent, which means we either accept that transparency = green, of that glass is not really transparent. Either way, the a posteriori evidence that our senses are giving us does not seem to match with what can logically be.

 

Now by definition logic must be true, but the empirical may not necessarily be so (think how a hallucinogenic effects our senses, it causes us to see things that are not true, therefore our senses can be fooled).

 

 

 

But if our sense are being fooled perpetually to the extent that transparency = green, then what use are they? Surely it is the purpose of the senses to provide us with reliable information about the world around us, but if our senses do not, then they fail to fulfil their purpose, and thus there is no purpose to them. If there is no purpose to something, then logically it should not exist, as it would never have had any reason to come into existence.

 

Yet, these fooled senses exist, which indicates they must have a non-intrinsic purpose, that is a purpose given to them by something else. Thus, their purpose demonstrates the existence of something else.

 

 

This is complete nonsense.

 

5. But what can give them this purpose?

 

It cannot be Evolution, as for one evolution cannot give purpose to anything, and also because it does not make sense in the context of Evolution that our species could have evolved to have senses that not only fail to be of any use (because the information they provide cannot be relied upon), but are also detrimental to our survival because unreliable information would be likely to jeopardise our survival.

 

 

 

Evolution gives more of a purpose in life than life itself, because without us evolving, which we do on a daily basis, we would continue being the organism we first appeared as. The purpose of life is to exist and compound on that idea to become better than we began.

 

The only other explanation for our acquisition of such complex yet poor senses must therefore be that they were given to us by an omnipotent being, who also gives these bad senses their purpose - to demonstrate the existence of the being itself.

 

Therefore as we have these senses, an omnipotent being exists, and as nothing else we know of is omnipotent (that is capable of accomplishing anything that is not logically impossible), this being is also supreme.

 

 

Hence there exists a Supreme Being.

It also could be that we are loosing senses that we no longer need, because our habitat no longer requires their use.

 

 

 

[Deleted1205226User]

A word definition is nothing like mathematical Axiom. It's always a simplification of a complex reality when Axioms are rules.

 

"The source of our word window is a vivid metaphor. Window comes to us from the Scandinavian invaders and settlers of England in the early Middle Ages. Although we have no record of the exact word they gave us, it was related to Old Norse vindauga, "window," a compound made up of vindr, "wind," and auga, "eye," reflecting the fact that at one time windows contained no glass." from http://www.thefreedictionary.com/window

 

Language is an analog world, Logic a digital one (true/not true)

 

Your first demonstration is then null and void.

[Daedthr]

 

 

 

3.

 

The premise for this next stage of the argument is that colour is a visual description of substance, that is, whenever you see colour you are seeing substance too.

 

Now the substance that a glass building is made of is glass, and if this building is equally green then it stands to reason that this glass must also be green.

 

 

 

Color is a description of what wave length of light is refracted off and object. It is not a define that object . A green plant is vastly different to a green colored fog.

 

You've literally just agreed with what you've quoted, your definition of colour "Color is a description of what wave length of light is refracted off *an object." uses an object in it! Thus your own definition of colour can be considered a description of a substance or object, a description by length of wave length reflected.

 

For clarity's sake I will change my definition too:

 

 

 

 

 

3.

 

The premise for this next stage of the argument is that colour describes the wave length of light reflected by a substance, that is, whenever you see colour you are seeing substance too.

 

 

 

But this has absolutely no influence on the point, as what wave length of light a substance reflects describes the substance, and is a visual description at that because the differences in wave length are distinguished by our eyes.

 

You say that light is not the definition of an object, well I agree, but I never said it was, I said it was a description, which according to your very own definition it is.

 

Rather than describing reflections and refractions of light every time I mention colour however, it is far easier for me to simply say green, rather than the wave length of life reflected from a substance that we have called green. It further makes no difference to the argument as there are clearly many glass buildings that interact with light in such a way as not to appear green, when in fact he logic of the argument holds that all glass should interact with light waves in such a way that what we see is what we have come to know as green.

 

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4. However glass is transparent, which means we either accept that transparency = green, of that glass is not really transparent. Either way, the a posteriori evidence that our senses are giving us does not seem to match with what can logically be.

 

Now by definition logic must be true, but the empirical may not necessarily be so (think how a hallucinogenic effects our senses, it causes us to see things that are not true, therefore our senses can be fooled).

 

 

 

But if our sense are being fooled perpetually to the extent that transparency = green, then what use are they? Surely it is the purpose of the senses to provide us with reliable information about the world around us, but if our senses do not, then they fail to fulfil their purpose, and thus there is no purpose to them. If there is no purpose to something, then logically it should not exist, as it would never have had any reason to come into existence.

 

Yet, these fooled senses exist, which indicates they must have a non-intrinsic purpose, that is a purpose given to them by something else. Thus, their purpose demonstrates the existence of something else.

 

 

This is complete nonsense.

 

Well first off you've committed the fallacy of personal incredulity, and second calling something nonsense leaves no room for refutation unless you also quantify why, which you have not done.

 

However I agree, the whole argument is nonsense, but at least state your reasons why to create some potential for debate. Straight dismissing an argument without saying why seems to me rather poor practice, as it's not reasoned argument, it's unreasoned argument.

 

So, if you would, please provide reasons that I can try and argue against (I don't expect to win as I'm in agreement with you, but it still makes for a debate to an extent). I also frankly don't see anything non-nonsensical about the truth of logic and the principle of causality, both of which are subjects that still create debate among professional philosophers and physicists today.

 

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5. But what can give them this purpose?

 

It cannot be Evolution, as for one evolution cannot give purpose to anything, and also because it does not make sense in the context of Evolution that our species could have evolved to have senses that not only fail to be of any use (because the information they provide cannot be relied upon), but are also detrimental to our survival because unreliable information would be likely to jeopardise our survival.

 

 

 

Evolution gives more of a purpose in life than life itself, because without us evolving, which we do on a daily basis, we would continue being the organism we first appeared as. The purpose of life is to exist and compound on that idea to become better than we began.

 

 

I have two issues with this:

 

1. The first comes from your claim that "the purpose of life is to exist". The purpose of something (it's Final Cause) is it's reason to exist. Let me use an example in context of Aristotle's four causes too demonstrate:

 

Take a desk, this desk can be adequately described using four causes:

 

Material Cause - The substance of which something is made, which in the case of this desk will be wood.

 

Formal Cause - The characteristics or attributes of something that define it apart from it's substance, which in the case of this desk might be four legs supporting a flat surface and some draws.

 

Efficient Cause - Whatever caused the material of which the object is made to acquire it's characteristics (formal cause), in the case of the desk this will be the carpenter, as it is the carpenter that fashioned the wood into the shape that defines the desk.

 

Final Cause - The purpose of something, whatever caused the efficient cause. In the case of the desk it might be the need for a work space that caused the carpenter (efficient cause) to fashion the desk.

 

Something needs a final cause because otherwise it would have no reason to exist, which logically means it shouldn't as there would be no reason for it ever to come from non-existence into existence.

 

These causes explain the existence of something, but according to you it is the Final Cause of life to exist, which is of course not possible, because existence cannot cause itself - if it could, why are things not simply causing themselves to come into existence all the time, why has a cow not caused itself to come into existence right next to me if it's existence can cause itself?

 

2. You suggest that Evolution can give purpose, but Evolution cannot give purpose to anything, it is the efficient cause of life, it explains how life came to form, it does not explain why it came to form.

 

You also seem to think that the "change" of life brought through Evolution is a purpose for it to exist, but it cannot be, because for change or improvement to occur their first has to be something to change or improve, which means that for your purpose for the existence of life to hold true, life must already exist. You seem to be arguing that the purpose of life is to change, but the purpose of something is it's reason to exist, and something cannot change or improve unless it already exists, and therefore your purpose for life's existence is reliant on life already existing, so it is not the purpose for life's existence, your logic is circular.

 

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The only other explanation for our acquisition of such complex yet poor senses must therefore be that they were given to us by an omnipotent being, who also gives these bad senses their purpose - to demonstrate the existence of the being itself.

 

Therefore as we have these senses, an omnipotent being exists, and as nothing else we know of is omnipotent (that is capable of accomplishing anything that is not logically impossible), this being is also supreme.

 

 

Hence there exists a Supreme Being.

It also could be that we are loosing senses that we no longer need, because our habitat no longer requires their use.

 

 

In Evolutionary terms it does not make sense for us to have acquired poor senses because we are losing senses that we no longer need. Whether or not we are losing senses that we no longer need is surely irrelevant of why our senses might be poor, because it should not matter if we are losing senses that we don't need because if we didn't need them we wouldn't be using them anyway. Losing that which we don't need and therefore don't use should not make the senses that we do use any poorer and doesn't explain why evolution should have given us poor senses.

 

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A word definition is nothing like mathematical Axiom. It's always a simplification of a complex reality when Axioms are rules.

 

"The source of our word window is a vivid metaphor. Window comes to us from the Scandinavian invaders and settlers of England in the early Middle Ages. Although we have no record of the exact word they gave us, it was related to Old Norse vindauga, "window," a compound made up of vindr, "wind," and auga, "eye," reflecting the fact that at one time windows contained no glass." from http://www.thefreedictionary.com/window

 

Language is an analog world, Logic a digital one (true/not true)

 

Your first demonstration is then null and void.

 

Ultimately, I agree that the relationship between words is a flaw in the argument, but I will still attempt to refute your points.

 

You say mathematical axioms are different from words because they are rules and words are simplifications of reality, but surely mathematics is also a simplification or at least description of reality in exactly the same way as words are. Both are human concepts used to simplify and describe the universe, when we define a word as something then there is no reason that the word cannot equal what we define it as much as a = a. The fact that we make language analogue does not mean that it is, there is no reason why a definition of a word can not be true/untrue just as numbers are, or that they should have their own absolute and logical rules.

 

Indeed, words can be represented in numbers and mathematics just as easily as letters, what you're reading right now is a computers interpretation of binary (true or false) numbers and representing them as letters and words. If words and letters can simply be considered a representation of numbers as you are seeing right now, then there is also no reason that they cannot obey the same rules that the numbers themselves do. I mean just go and look at something like Hamming Code, a cryptography process in binary numbers that uses mathematical rules. These binary numbers could represent letters, and thus letters and words are as subject to these mathematical laws as numbers are.

 

Words have as much logical power as mathematics does, they are just two different ways of representing logic, and as computers prove, are interchangeable. If I can make "a" = to say "5", there is no reason I could not also make "a" = "walls".

 

Indeed "walls" as a hexadecimal number would be 77-61-6C-6C-73, where the hyphens separate the letters. In Denary it would be 119-97-108-108-115. The word "walls" is the sum of those letters, thus the numerical value of walls might be 547. You would have no issue with me equating 547 to "a" (I should certainly hope), so there is really no reason for you to take issue with me attributing words to algebraic values to which the laws of logic can then be more easily applied.

 

Numbers and mathematics obey logic no more than words.

Edited May 18, 2015 by Daedthr

[Deleted1205226User]

:smile:

Well tried. Following your idea:

wall = 547

Window = 532

547 = 532 Oops, we have a problem.

Indeed, words can be represented in numbers and mathematics just as easily as letters,...

Even if you go the Gematria path, I doubt you'll manage to have your demonstration working.

..., but surely mathematics is also a simplification or at least description of reality in exactly the same way as words are.

I couldn't disagree more. Mathematics has nothing to do with the description of reality. It's pure abstraction in a fixed conditioned set of rules.
Numbers have values. Fixed values.
Words can attempt a description of reality, realities and non realities at the same time through a twelve words poem that sound illogic.
Words have meanings. Different contextual meanings.

Edited May 18, 2015 by Guest

[Inkatet666]

Glass is known to be a unknown property element, check it out on Google or wiki

[Daedthr]

:smile:

 

Well tried. Following your idea:

 

wall = 547

 

Window = 532

 

547 = 532 Oops, we have a problem.

 

Indeed, words can be represented in numbers and mathematics just as easily as letters,...

Even if you go the Gematria path, I doubt you'll manage to have your demonstration working.

..., but surely mathematics is also a simplification or at least description of reality in exactly the same way as words are.

I couldn't disagree more. Mathematics has nothing to do with the description of reality. It's pure abstraction in a fixed conditioned set of rules.

Numbers have values. Fixed values.

Words can attempt a description of reality, realities and non realities at the same time through a twelve words poem that sound illogic.

Words have meanings. Different contextual meanings.

 

 

Aha well you have me on the first part, for sure. :) I think one of the many problems with the "Proof by Greenhouse" was the issue of ontology and trying to wrangle words around to make it work, so I'll definitely give you that.

 

To an extent though, I do believe that words have as much logical power as mathematics, because if we think about where mathematics first came from, it was using to describe empirical relationships that we could observe, for instance the Egyptians using rope in what came to be known as Pythagoras' Rule. Both came about as a way to describe our world, but numbers and mathematics unlike letters are universal, as you pointed out we have turned words contextual through different languages. Had we one world language, then there is no real reason why something is not what we call it, any less than a quantity is we number it.

 

Unfortunately words didn't turn out as numbers have, because they were also used to express things that cannot be as easily described by numbers, such as concepts like beauty or justice. I would still argue they have logical power, as words do mean something and they can make use of logical laws, to think that mathematics holds a monopoly on logic would be short-sighted indeed, though I understand that is not what you are actually saying.

 

Ultimately though, while logical conclusions can follow as much from words as mathematics, the same rules that mathematics uses cannot really be applied to words, so I'd certainly agree with your criticism of the first demonstration, so for that reason the proof fails.

 

There should be plenty more problems though, so ignoring that one I wonder what other issues can be discovered.