cladking

...As Kuhn said; "paradigms change".

I'm certainly not suggesting any theory be tossed out or tweaked because of one anomalous result that isn't or might not be understood.

I agree, except it is apparent that the primary problem is in the extrapolation of experimental results that Kuhn called a "paradigm". We reduce reality to experiment using definitions and axioms in the context of existing understanding and then tend to forget that ultimately experimental results are defined by these and the specific design. Obviously I agree except that I believe that in the long run most of our current understandings will fall by the wayside.

Yes. It is for this reason that experiment is critical in establishing theory. I believe humans by nature reason in circles and always come back to our assumptions unless experiment intercedes. Bias introduced through hypothesis formation is not direct but most people most of the time will come up with hypotheses that support prevailing paradigms. I don't think it is possible for our species to be objective because we preferentially see our models and beliefs to reality. We don't see a "basketball" we see Michael Jordan. Objects we see often turn out to be something else entirely either on further inspection or a simple change of models or beliefs. It's possible thoughts can be discerned some day with sufficiently sensitive instruments. A more interesting question might be what leads us on some specific train of thought. In the human thirst for knowledge, understanding, and creation nothing will get in our way whether it's the status quo, beliefs, or existing methodology. Everything in the way will eventually be bulldozed aside so long as one of us survives. Yes, I believe there will be limitations on science and I further believe we've been at a major obstacle for a century now. But we shall overcome.

Yes, I agree that the principle problem with objectivity is in paradigms but there is also some problem with experiment itself because we still see what we expect and experiment is only relevant within the definitions and axioms underlying it and proper interpretation in light of its parameters. There is incidentally some bias introduced by the formation of testable hypotheses. We can't test what we don't first hypothesize. Science, reality, is sought to be understood to better control our lives and make better predictions. If science is lacking in any way whatsoever it behooves us all to identify and correct it. Anything else is anti-science and anti-life. If science can be improved in any way it must be improved.

There have been a couple new developments very highly supportive of my hypotheses; First is that Egyptology now recognizes something I've known for years; All of the so called "Valley Temples" which each great pyramid has lines up along the edge of an ancient arm of the Nile River. https://researchers.mq.edu.au/en/publications/the-discovery-of-the-ahramat-nile-branch-a-hidden-ancient-waterwa This is of critical importance since it describes the routes of casing stones and supplies up a long "ramp" straight to the very bottom of the pyramid. Since it is the bottom it strongly suggests there were no ramps to take stones up the side of the structure. Instead the "valley temple" is in actuality a "port" and the "Mortuary Temple" is actually a mason's shop that the builders called "The Great Saw Palace" because it made some half a million cuts through Tura Limestone using pendulum saws powered by water. There was no "Holy Walkway" down to the port but just a sloped surface they called "The Ladder of Set" and we call "The Causeway" and was used as a funicular run. Second and perhaps more importantly is that a team of interdisciplinary scientists have found extensive evidence for the use of hydraulics to build Djoser's Pyramid. Remarkably they even agree with me that the excavations around the enclosure was full of water and that a river flowed through what Egyptologists call the "Hypostyle Hall" on it's southern side! https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0306690 Furthermore they go on to suggest that water was removed in the same way from the catchment as I propose and is evident at the Great Pyramid: "The excavations performed on the eastern wall of the Gisr el-Mudir highlighted a lower structural quality [45]. Its shape is similar to that of the western wall, with a distinctive parabolic profile (Fig 6, line C-D). Furthermore, it discloses two topographical singularities: first, its overall altitude is a few meters lower than the western wall (Fig 7A). Then, in the southern part of the eastern wall, a geophysics anomaly (G2 in Figs 4B and Fig 6) was found to be a series of massive, roughly cut, ‘L’-shaped megaliths [45, 66]. Before our study, these megaliths were thought to possibly be the remains of a monumental gateway–due to their similarities with the Djoser’s complex enclosure’s entrance–but their purpose was not specified [66]. According to our analysis, these megaliths could be the side elements of the water outlets, possibly slit openings [76] that were likely closed off by wood beams but could be opened to drain the basin. They are consistently found near a trench that is 2.2 m deep [45], which we believe is possibly the canal that guided outflowing water. In a nutshell, the eastern wall likely acted as a second check dam to the Abusir flows."

They do a superb job of providing an overview of almost everything. But they do a poor job of being consistently factually correct and differentiating fact and opinion. I think of wiki as the ideal place to go for experts who don't know much about a subject outside their own field.

Actually the Great Pyramid is just the tip of an obelisk.

You might be forgetting that there are many similarities between reality and our perception of it and we aren't mere points but rather live and operate in the real world. This isn't about what's "better" but what exists. Human knowledge is simply too extensive and complex to model holistically. We must model it in bits and pieces.

Are you suggesting it's relevant but doesn't support my position? Logic isn't in words. It's in nature. It consists of bites like "Iff A then B" where A and B are defined in terms that apply to all things. These are the discrete bits of reality that might be mistaken for "laws". It is the way reality unfolds and makes reductionistic science appear to generate universal laws. Our science is experimental and the experiments in aggregate show this logic. Most of this logic probably has initial conditions or time as a component. I can't define logic since it would require centuries of study and involve omniscience. I'm merely trying to put "the nature of our existence" into words anyone can understand. That I might be wrong is irrelevant since everyone who has ever lived might be wrong and it's a rather all encompassing question. Perhaps rather than say everything is an issue of science I should have said "I believe that given sufficient time it might be seen the everything is within the purview of science". Numerous things are outside the scope of science now. Mountains and rivers certainly share many characteristics with living things and are intimately connected but they don't reproduce and are not conscious. You missed my point. I meant that the nature of our existence is for animals to have a four dimensional world derived from four dimensional thought (which they don't experience) and humans to have a one dimensional reality composed of their own beliefs and thoughts (which we do experience). Animals don't have a chain of thought but rather their entire brain operates within and as a part of reality. Due to their highly limited capacity resulting chiefly from the lack of generational learning they see very very little of reality and know it. We believe we see all of reality and we "know" this.

I would maintain that everything is an issue of science.

A bee's waggle dance is quite complex and reflects existing reality. A bee must know the position of the sun and the distance to a food source. It must be able to attract the attention of the other bees and each bee must attend to the nuances of the dance. It is entirely within the realm of reason to suggest other information about water sources and predators might be relayed as well. Then the bees must cooperate to gather the food and use it. The waggle dance is quite possibly just a tiny little part of what it means to be a bee and to do what they do. Whether this can all be hard wired as instinct or not is more a philosophical question than it is one that supports or denies my theory. It is philosophical largely because I am not maintaining that they "think" like we do. I suggest their brains, consciousness, and behavior are all one single thing based on the logic of reality itself. They do not experience "thought" but obviously they must have something in its place and this is consciousness. This consciousness allows them to react properly to the existence of threats and opportunities. It gives them a chance to survive and procreate. I am suggesting that the bee's waggle dance is digital, metaphysical, and representational and as such constitutes natural language which every species uses (most very limitedly) to thrive. Humans are different because our brains are wired for a different kind of language. We experience thought. This is largely perspective. If we had no math "science" would have little practical meaning and would still be in its infancy. Yes. Obviously there is generational learning in crows and most complex species. A cat teaches her kittens to hunt. But this knowledge being transferred is relatively simple and simple language can be used to transfer it. Much more complex knowledge is handed down generationally in humans and this knowledge includes not only the efforts of the giants of the past but also the means by which knowledge is gained. A cat or a crow has highly limited knowledge of any means to gain new knowledge beyond its ability to recognize patterns in nature. It isn't intelligence or the ability to think quickly and clearly that has created the modern world. It is complex language which we use to pass knowledge to each new generation that individuals might claw their way up onto the shoulders of giants. This IS the nature of our existence. There are literally thousands of experiments that have shown we see what we believe. I haven't read this so can't swear it's completely relevant; https://neuroscience.stanford.edu/news/reality-constructed-your-brain-here-s-what-means-and-why-it-matters It's not only experiments in the soft sciences that support my theory but all experiment to my knowledge. There isn't even a proper scientific definition of "consciousness", "reality", "logic", or most of the terms I'm attempting to define here. You can't experiment on what can't be defined so no theories apply to such things except the prevailing belief that the "laws of nature" define reality. Even if this belief proves someday to be correct, at this point in time we simply don't know all the laws of nature. I can't ask others to support their beliefs which is why the thread is on the philosophy forum. Right or wrong my theory is based on fact and experiment, thousands of them.

Most all of what I'm saying here is merely reinterpretation of existing knowledge and experiment. I am aware of no "extraordinary claims" that I've made in THIS thread. Every experiment shows people see what they believe and I am extrapolating from this. If bees don't think then how can they communicate? I would remind everyone that we don't know what 'thinking even is but rather use its existence as proof of our own; "I think therefore I am". From this perspective it is impossible to think about thought and learn anything. I have arrived at different very ordinary conclusions from a different perspective. People don't accept the means I used to achieve this different perspective and find it rather extraordinary which isn't too far wrong. But just as the type of lab equipment that is used is normally irrelevant to experiment the means I used to get to my perspective is irrelevant to a conversation about the nature of life and its meaning. People don't want to hear about epistemology and metaphysics and they most assuredly don't want to hear about metaphysics that is based on the exact same perspective used by bees. But these too constitute "experiment" and are within the scope of human knowledge.

What I meant was that for the main part every thought derives from the previous or new input. Additionally we tend to often be subject oriented. This varies individual to individual however. I defined "consciousness" several posts back. And before that I defined "thought". I am still using those definitions. Consciousness is life and thought is the comparison of input to beliefs. This works. Yes, but when I refer to abstractions I'm talking about the means we use to communicate and think. Abstractions aren't real but we treat them as if they were. They are symbols of complex ideas. The nature of our existence is to build models of what we believe and to communicate about these models in abstractions. Historically these models have always proven to be wrong or woefully incomplete. We have no means to know whether anyone's beliefs are any better today other than science and we know science changes one funeral at a time. We have no means of knowing what future scientists will think of our current models but it is "certain" they will have better ones. The various parts of our brain/ bodies are wired similarly to many other life forms. "Consciousness" is the means by which life survives. It tells a rabbit to avoid foxes and the bast means to escape. A key aspect is learning to make predictions which is derived logically from pattern recognition. If a rabbit sees a fox by the creek every day at sunrise it avoids being by the creek at sunrise. Consciousness seeks patterns to make useful prediction. This is not the nature of consciousness. This is the nature of thought. Other species apply all of their knowledge to all of their interactions with reality all the time they are awake. But our existence is largely a chain of thought. Animals succeed so well on so little knowledge because they exist in four dimensions where we essentially are in only one. We succeed because we can pass learning from generation to generation through language and gain knowledge through induction, deduction, and experiment. The nature of our existence is unlike things that are not alive and unlike all other living things. We are unique! And where each rabbit is essentially the same except for experience we are each different as defined by our beliefs.

We have both thought and consciousness but experience only thought. Other life has no thought but do have an individual consciousness which they do not really experience. In our terms you might say they think but aren't aware of it. Our abstractions are a great way to communicate complex ideas and use for inductive logic but they do not exist in reality. Obviously there is more going on in the human brain/ body than just chemical processes and thought and we are aware on some level of many of these. We still live and exist in our thoughts. We see the world from the perspective of our thoughts. We are still animals and still hooked up like other animals but unlike other life we have a "one track mind". All consciousness, even human consciousness, seeks patterns. Even without thinking a dog is still trying to understand its master. Where we model beliefs dogs model reality itself to the degree their limited knowledge and capacity allows. The brain/ body/ life of other consciousness resonates with reality. In reality humans experience thought so even a dog can pick up on this and possibly imitate it in small degree.