Case Against Reality: “I have touted the virtue of precision in a theory of consciousness. …” (Chapter ten, ¶39)
Citizenschallenge: Precisely modeling one’s idea is one thing, accurately reflecting Earth, evolution, human nature, is another.
Hoffman’s Case Against Reality is a philosophical/religious thesis, removed from actual nature and physical reality. Hoffmanian Conscious Agents offer nothing to observe, and nothing that can ever be tested, beyond computer games.
The book was a disappointment with little to enhance current neurological, physical, or psychological understanding. It is marketable intellectual entertainment for the sci-fi, woo loving crowd.
To me, it’s a splendid example of the sort of fame and fortune seeking hubristic follies that helped create today’s willfully ignorant populous, which in turn enabled the current political degeneration, along with all its horrendous cascading consequences of late.
I’m trying hard to enunciate my thoughts in as coherent and concise a manner as I can. This is because I want to be one of the many many ‘Children Of The Intellectual Enlightenment' who are needed to stand up for rational sober science; people willing to advocate for respect of the reality of our three dimensions and time; for the fact that matter is substantial and can be measured with astounding accuracy and repeatedly, etc., etc. That serious good-faith science deserves to be respected and trusted.
I’m just an attentive life long spectator, self-schooled and nearing my end, knowing a fraction of what serious students know. Where are you?? This is my workbook and you are welcome to use any of it, respecting original sources. I'm hoping some might find a little inspiration.
Engage to do something to confront the creeping disconnect from Physical Reality and contempt for science that’s infecting so many people out there.
Show ‘em you have Soul, the kind that emerges out of grasping deep time and Earth’s Evolution through the lens of science.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
“Conscious realism is a non-physicalist monism.”
Lets unpack that:
In ontology and the philosophy of mind, a non-physical entity is a spirit or being that exists outside physical reality. Their existence divides the philosophical school of physicalism from the schools of idealism and dualism; with the latter schools holding that they can exist and the former holding that they cannot. If one posits that non-physical entities can exist, there exist further debates as to their inherent natures and their position relative to physical entities. [WIKI] It get's over complicated, see here.
In other words, by his own definitions Hoffman’s “Case Against Reality” is a non-physical “reality”. Namely, an abstract meta-physical idea and beyond the reach of empirical science.
Hoffman claims his mathematical rigor makes it science. But, he forgets that serious science (as opposed to science fiction) also requires observation, measurement, evidence and facts.
Rigorous mathematics without such physical touchstones, amounts to a self-indulgent head-game, one that has more in common with religious desires, than natural sciences.
A review of Donald Hoffman’s, Case Against Reality,
chapter 10b, Community: The Network of Conscious Agents