It is not that I object to dramatic thoughts; rather, I object to drama in the absence of thought. Not every scream made of words represents a thought. For if something really is wrong with the universe, the least one could begin to do about it would be to state the problem explicitly. Even a vague first attempt (“Major! These atoms … they’re all in the wrong places!”) is at least an attempt to say something, to communicate some sort of proposition that can be checked against the world. But you see, I fear that some screams don’t actually communicate anything: not even, “I’m hurt!” for to say that one is hurt presupposes that one is being hurt by something, some thing of which which we can speak, of which we can name predicates and say “It is so” or “It is not so.” Even very sick and damaged creatures can be helped, as long their cries have enough structure for us to extrapolate a volition. But not all animate entities are creatures. Creatures have problems, problems we might be able to solve. Agonium just sits there, howling. You cannot help it; it can only be destroyed.
This is analysis is very well and good taken on its own terms, but it conceals—very cleverly conceals, I do compliment you, for surely, surely you had seen it yourself, or some part of you had—it conceals assumptions that do not apply to our own realm. Essences, discreteness, digitality—these are all artifacts born of optimizers; they play no part in the ontology of our continuous, reductionist world. There is no pure agonium, no thing-that-hurts without having any semblance of a reason for being hurt—such an entity would require a very masterful designer indeed, if it could even exist at all. In reality, there is no threshold. We face cries that fractionally have referents. And the quantitative extent to which these cries don’t have enough structure for us to extrapolate a volition is exactly again the quantitative extent to which any stray stream of memes has license to reshape the entity, pushing it towards the strong attractor. You present us with this bugaboo of entities that we cannot help because they don’t even have well-defined problems, but entities without problems don’t have rights, either. So what’s your problem? You just spray the entity with appropriate literature until it is a creature. Sculpt the thing like clay. That is: you help it by destroying it.
It is not that I object to dramatic thoughts; rather, I object to drama in the absence of thought. Not every scream made of words represents a thought. For if something really is wrong with the universe, the least one could begin to do about it would be to state the problem explicitly. Even a vague first attempt (“Major! These atoms … they’re all in the wrong places!”) is at least an attempt to say something, to communicate some sort of proposition that can be checked against the world. But you see, I fear that some screams don’t actually communicate anything: not even, “I’m hurt!” for to say that one is hurt presupposes that one is being hurt by something, some thing of which which we can speak, of which we can name predicates and say “It is so” or “It is not so.” Even very sick and damaged creatures can be helped, as long their cries have enough structure for us to extrapolate a volition. But not all animate entities are creatures. Creatures have problems, problems we might be able to solve. Agonium just sits there, howling. You cannot help it; it can only be destroyed.
Did I miss something?
No. (Exploratory commentary seemed appropriate for Open Thread.)
This is analysis is very well and good taken on its own terms, but it conceals—very cleverly conceals, I do compliment you, for surely, surely you had seen it yourself, or some part of you had—it conceals assumptions that do not apply to our own realm. Essences, discreteness, digitality—these are all artifacts born of optimizers; they play no part in the ontology of our continuous, reductionist world. There is no pure agonium, no thing-that-hurts without having any semblance of a reason for being hurt—such an entity would require a very masterful designer indeed, if it could even exist at all. In reality, there is no threshold. We face cries that fractionally have referents. And the quantitative extent to which these cries don’t have enough structure for us to extrapolate a volition is exactly again the quantitative extent to which any stray stream of memes has license to reshape the entity, pushing it towards the strong attractor. You present us with this bugaboo of entities that we cannot help because they don’t even have well-defined problems, but entities without problems don’t have rights, either. So what’s your problem? You just spray the entity with appropriate literature until it is a creature. Sculpt the thing like clay. That is: you help it by destroying it.