[Nesster]

I was not referring to words in a conversation like ours. I was referring to words like those printed at the top of the forum or in the menus. For example, if a dialog box pops up and says "do you want to update?", it is not a question from an intelligent being - it's just programming.

But you are assuming that a programmed pop up is of the same order as an intelligent being?

Von Neumann's sequence of registering devices - ie, a simple box to measure the state of the one below, with a quantum event at the bottom - demonstrates that you can move the level of quantum uncertanity arbitrarily upwards in the chain, up to human scale say, and still the Copenhagen Model will need that one more layer of conscious choice. As Henry Stapp tells it, the implication is that the mental part is pushed outside the physical world entirely - as all physcial can be described in quantum terms. "What von Neumann showed was that within the quantum mechanical conception of nature, the mind can't be the body, because the psychological elements of the theory remain the psychological elements of the theory regardless of where you draw the cut. Quantum theory still requires this interplay between the two realms."

So, no matter how much we seek to automate software generation, ultimately there is some intelligent being doing the deciding...

(And there is a plausible possibility that the quantum waveform can collapse on its own, and does so in order to create the universe, independently of conscious observation. Or alternately, that consciousness and matter both arise as quanta from the sub-material (and sub-conscious?) soup of quantum roil. In this latter case, life evolves to concentrate the consciousness floating around, microtubules and all, as it provides further complexity and, in humans, a competetive advantage over life forms less able to concentrate this...)

No, but we can argue that ideas are. Language is just a code for expressing them. Same as the protocols used by machines to communicate, except it's more ambiguous, hence the confusions that can arise in conversations. It is tedious for humans to be precise, so they usually are not.



Maybe I am biased because I am a software engineer. But I only see a difference in scale of complexity between humans and computers. As I said, I may be wrong, but I don't see anything yet to indicate that.

Language is a code for expressing ideas... but it is also the mechanism by which ideas generate and evolve, at least in our state of development. As we touched on in the discussion about Bible translations, the language used has a lot to do with the sorts of ideas that can be expressed, or the flavorings and associations generated in the thinker, and will be different when using a different language. What is a non-verbal idea?

A loose analogy to computer code is that certain languages are better suited to certain algorithms or coding styles. Some things are easier to do in one language than another. What's missing in today's systems is the free-associative collection of meaning from otherwise non-correlative data points. (Hmmm, could that be a defintion of consciousness?)

---------- Post added 03-18-2010 at 01:00 PM ----------

Well, matter and material are concepts in themselves, same as spirit and spiritual. Materialistic is just a label that some philosophers who thought they see a great division have thrown at others that didn't think the same. At the end of the day everything being material may be the same as saying that everything is spiritual, because we really don't know what either word means. So you can simply call matter spirit if that makes you feel better, but in the end we still all want to figure out what *it* is and how *it* works.

A fine and excellent point, that. If one follows materialism rigorously to the end, I believe one ends up in a place very much similar to a nondualist mystic's. These dualities are labels and made up, not 'really' there except in our thinking and conditioned view of the universe.

[Laurentiu Cristofor]

That's interesting. To me Occam's Razor has always had an element of an argument from ignorance to it. You are assuming that since you aren't aware of the reason for a more complicated explanation, the reasons don't exist. It is a practical tool for directing a search, but does not result in logical certainty any more than the reciprocal argument from ignorance.

The main difference is that Occam's Razor is a principle, while an argument from ignorance is, well - an argument. Occam's Razor does not guarantee that the simplest solution is the right one - it just suggests to start with the simplest solution that seems to answer the problem and then only "upgrade" to a different one if that simple solution actually gets contradicted by what you'll find along the way in your search. Occam's Razor is not an argument for the validity of a simple theory, it's just an argument for not adding complexity to a theory without reason.

Ignorance does not prove or disprove.

That's exactly why arguments based on it are irrelevant.

Arguments from ignorance are a false implication rule. They usually take this form:

X is true.
I cannot imaging how X could be true if Y would not be true.
Hence Y must be true"

Then this is packaged in short proposition and sold as "X implies Y". It's a logical fallacy.

---------- Post added 03-18-2010 at 10:15 AM ----------

the actual scientist doing good science around bioluminescence went from rising star to pariah due to this direction he took

There's always the case that some guy has a great idea (a local example is Bretz) and can't get it past people thinking in a certain mindset, but eventually his ideas gain acceptance. It works for science as a body, even if it doesn't work that nicely for the scientists and their personal lives.

The point is: the truth will come out eventually. Sometimes it comes right away, sometimes it takes time to get accepted. Bretz was unlucky because for him it was hard to provide a proof and he was dealing with something completely new.

But, I agree with you that a dogmatic approach to science is bad. And science getting dogmatic is a threat worth keeping in mind and checking against.

I would say it is also true in general that in any area, people can go bad if they drift into complacence.

In the end, the only thing we can replace science with is still better science. And better science is done by better people. So, we always end with self-improvement and ethics, regardless of whether we can get all answers.

Without that materialist bias, you might have asked a different question: how does a mental state cause or correlate with chemical or electrical activity in the brain (or body)?

What makes you think such questions are not asked and papers are not published on this? Correlations based on significant statistical samples should be easy to publish. I don't think these examples are very good examples of what kind of science is being done today.

---------- Post added 03-18-2010 at 10:54 AM ----------

But you are assuming that a programmed pop up is of the same order as an intelligent being?

No, that would make a strawman argument out of what I am saying. I am just saying that what we call an intelligent being may just be a machine. I also am not saying that this is a full answer to everything.

Von Neumann's sequence of registering devices - ie, a simple box to measure the state of the one below, with a quantum event at the bottom - demonstrates that you can move the level of quantum uncertanity arbitrarily upwards in the chain, up to human scale say, and still the Copenhagen Model will need that one more layer of conscious choice. As Henry Stapp tells it, the implication is that the mental part is pushed outside the physical world entirely - as all physcial can be described in quantum terms. "What von Neumann showed was that within the quantum mechanical conception of nature, the mind can't be the body, because the psychological elements of the theory remain the psychological elements of the theory regardless of where you draw the cut. Quantum theory still requires this interplay between the two realms."

I can't follow this argument and I am not sure what von Neumann was saying or trying to convey. Can you give me a reference that discusses these ideas?

So, no matter how much we seek to automate software generation, ultimately there is some intelligent being doing the deciding...

That is just an antropomorphic explanation. We see each other doing things, so everything must be done by someone. Clouds are manufactured by some guy at the horizon and pushed towards us, etc. It's easy to understand why we think this way, but that doesn't mean such thinking is correct.

(And there is a plausible possibility that the quantum waveform can collapse on its own, and does so in order to create the universe, independently of conscious observation. Or alternately, that consciousness and matter both arise as quanta from the sub-material (and sub-conscious?) soup of quantum roil. In this latter case, life evolves to concentrate the consciousness floating around, microtubules and all, as it provides further complexity and, in humans, a competetive advantage over life forms less able to concentrate this...)

Sorry, I'm not following these comments.

Language is a code for expressing ideas... but it is also the mechanism by which ideas generate and evolve, at least in our state of development. As we touched on in the discussion about Bible translations, the language used has a lot to do with the sorts of ideas that can be expressed, or the flavorings and associations generated in the thinker, and will be different when using a different language. What is a non-verbal idea?

I think the way it works is that as we grasp new concepts, we get new words for them, and thus language develops. I agree that language limits the kinds of discussions one can have - that is an excellent point. A non-verbal idea might represent a new concept we reach for, which we did not had a corresponding language representation before. It's never so clearly cut as I make it though - I'm simplifying and I apologize, but the actual processes are probably impossible to summarize in one post as they work in smaller increments - ideas form over a length of time from the accumulation and combination of experience.

For example, I didn't had in my head when I started writing this post, the thoughts I am writing now - I am "milking" my knowledge and experience trying to answer your questions (and my thoughts "materialize", so to speak ) - and I am answering not only to you, but to me as well. In a way, this kind of crude mechanism I just suggested may indicate why confirmation bias is such a problem in conversations based on strong beliefs. We work to convince ourselves first, to put our experience and knowledge in order - I think it is a traumatizing event for someone to discover conflicts in their beliefs - this is why people (everyone, including myself) get defensive and delusional during argumentation - our brain doesn't stand conflict - it's built a certain way. This is just some theory I've been developing over the past months

A loose analogy to computer code is that certain languages are better suited to certain algorithms or coding styles. Some things are easier to do in one language than another. What's missing in today's systems is the free-associative collection of meaning from otherwise non-correlative data points. (Hmmm, could that be a defintion of consciousness?)

We're missing lots of things, but I don't think language is the problem. Science has solved that pretty well by developing its formal language - there are limitations to that formal language as well, but I don't think they are the main limitation to what we can find out today.

A fine and excellent point, that. If one follows materialism rigorously to the end, I believe one ends up in a place very much similar to a nondualist mystic's. These dualities are labels and made up, not 'really' there except in our thinking and conditioned view of the universe.

I wish I had studied psychology because they are making some interesting progress in this area. I can only recommend that book again - The Science of Fear, just for some "taste" of what biases we can find within our "programming".

[GeneV]

The main difference is that Occam's Razor is a principle, while an argument from ignorance is, well - an argument. Occam's Razor does not guarantee that the simplest solution is the right one - it just suggests to start with the simplest solution that seems to answer the problem and then only "upgrade" to a different one if that simple solution actually gets contradicted by what you'll find along the way in your search. Occam's Razor is not an argument for the validity of a simple theory, it's just an argument for not adding complexity to a theory without reason.

That's exactly why arguments based on it are irrelevant.

Arguments from ignorance are a false implication rule. They usually take this form:

X is true.
I cannot imaging how X could be true if Y would not be true.
Hence Y must be true"

Then this is packaged in short proposition and sold as "X implies Y"

I'm just curious, but do you think you are disagreeing with me, or are you just taking this opportunity to explain these concepts for the benefit of all?

[Laurentiu Cristofor]

I'm just curious, but do you think you are disagreeing with me, or are you just taking this opportunity to explain these concepts for the benefit of all?

Both actually. I wanted to say that I disagree with your observation that the incredulity argument may be seen as part of Occam's principle. And I usually try to write in ways that may be useful to more than just my interlocutor, so the last paragraph was just for those that may need a short version of what is an argument from ignorance - I didn't assume that you don't know that, if that's what you are asking.

[Nesster]

Gene may have a subtle point there though - the argument from ignorance embedded in the usage of Occam goes like this: I can't imagine another causality or agent apart from the material, therefore I will choose the material as the simplest.

A fun example of this is heliocentricity - this being so unimaginable at the earth centric time, that all those epicycles and things had to be imported to shore up the universe revolving around the Earth in circles.



For a summary of the von Neumann stuff-
http://www.informationphilosopher.com/solutions/scientists/neumann/
is a pretty good start on information physics and process 1...

Originally Posted by Nesster

So, no matter how much we seek to automate software generation, ultimately there is some intelligent being doing the deciding...

That is just an antropomorphic explanation. We see each other doing things, so everything must be done by someone. Clouds are manufactured by some guy at the horizon and pushed towards us, etc. It's easy to understand why we think this way, but that doesn't mean such thinking is correct.

Ok, but you are changing the context each time around. I started with human thought, you with programmed pop ups. When I propose that no matter how many levels of abstraction and code generators, at some point along the chain a human will have made a few selections from alternative paths for that pop up. Then you take it to the clouds! Clouds by themselves are not 'thoughts' and are not a product of a conscious operation. Though, the meanings associated with those clouds are - including that guy at the horizon...

However, yeah, leaving that aside. Language can be seen as a virus - and taking language as shorthand for 'culture', which isn't too big a stretch - because nearly all of what each of us considers our unique self is actually cultural borrowing and conditioning, and the rest is common bioware There's something of a symbiosis between human wetware and consciousness or thoughts - humans do create these, but any successful creation must be made of cultural memes in order to 'sell'. So I'm willing to pursue the idea that consciousness and thought is not anthropomorphic.

What if there was a thought, and nobody was around to understand?

[Rupert]

Still an interesting thread....I have a few questions that I want addressed, but it is late...tomorrow will work. I'm not sure that the lines here are well divided between science and philosophy...or that the two are even unrelated, but the questions I have are not complex, so it should be easy to get some opinions.
Best Regards!

[Laurentiu Cristofor]

Gene may have a subtle point there though - the argument from ignorance embedded in the usage of Occam goes like this: I can't imagine another causality or agent apart from the material, therefore I will choose the material as the simplest.

For me the main difference is that Occam's Razor precludes the introduction of foreign concepts in the absence of a motive while the argument from ignorance is introducing them based on ignorance. Not sure how to put it - with Occam's Razor, we add concepts when some evidence hints the model is too simple and needs to be enhanced; with the argument from ignorance we add them because we can't figure out another explanation. Also, I think of Occam's Razor as giving some direction when searching in the space of solutions - go from simple to complex.

Maybe it makes sense to think of it the other way - if we start with a complex model - how are we going to simplify it - what are we going to throw out?

A fun example of this is heliocentricity - this being so unimaginable at the earth centric time, that all those epicycles and things had to be imported to shore up the universe revolving around the Earth in circles.

I am wondering - did they know about Occam's Razor at the time? It could be argued they should have figured out they were on the wrong track once the model became too complex.

For a summary of the von Neumann stuff-
John von Neumann
is a pretty good start on information physics and process 1...

Thanks. From the looks of it, it will take me some time to digest it.

Ok, but you are changing the context each time around.

I started with human thought, you with programmed pop ups. When I propose that no matter how many levels of abstraction and code generators, at some point along the chain a human will have made a few selections from alternative paths for that pop up. Then you take it to the clouds!

Clouds by themselves are not 'thoughts' and are not a product of a conscious operation. Though, the meanings associated with those clouds are - including that guy at the horizon...

Sorry, I was not clear enough.

I brought up computers because they're the closest thing we have to a different form of intelligence than ours. We can make computers do things that a few decades ago seemed the exclusive province of human minds. So, we can approach the human thought as an example of machine programming in an attempt to understand how the brain works.

However, just because our computers are programmed by us doesn't mean that we are programmed by something else. This is why I brought the antropomorphic explanation of the clouds - I just meant to say that we shouldn't jump from the fact that computers have a programmer that did something to them to imbue them with apparent intelligence, to the fact that maybe there is a Great Programmer in the Sky that programmed us.

So I'm willing to pursue the idea that consciousness and thought is not anthropomorphic.

I would use the word emergent. I'd wish to know more about this, but here I reach the boundary of my knowledge.

I can just tell you that I am impressed with what I notice in sports videogames - the situations that happen there are not preprogrammed in the sense that if you play the game long enough you will start seeing the same scenarios again. Even the game programmers would not be able to predict all that will go on in a game once it gets started. And videogames are nothing compared to the complexity of our brains.

What if there was a thought, and nobody was around to understand?

We probably have those too

[GeneV]

For me the main difference is that Occam's Razor precludes the introduction of foreign concepts in the absence of a motive while the argument from ignorance is introducing them based on ignorance. Not sure how to put it - with Occam's Razor, we add concepts when some evidence hints the model is too simple and needs to be enhanced; with the argument from ignorance we add them because we can't figure out another explanation. Also, I think of Occam's Razor as giving some direction when searching in the space of solutions - go from simple to complex.

Maybe it makes sense to think of it the other way - if we start with a complex model - how are we going to simplify it - what are we going to throw out?



I am wondering - did they know about Occam's Razor at the time? It could be argued they should have figured out they were on the wrong track once the model became too complex.

As we discussed, and I THINK we agreed, Occam's Razor actually proves nothing. It is not a rule of rigorous logic but a tool to keep an investigation on the best or most efficient track (my words). I may be wrong, but it seems that you attribute more meaning to the results of applying this tool than it merits. Assuming away "foreign concepts" is as devoid of logical rigor as assuming them to exist. A syllogism involving only propositions A, B and C, compels no conclusion about the existence of D, E or F, even though it may be simplest to deal only with the knowns of A, B and C.

Occam's Razor was conceived by a monk and it has been employed by numerous theologians from various faiths. On one level, a god is a the simplest explanation for everything with science being the more complicated. William of Ockham enunciated the principle in the 14th century (it may have predated him), so yes, they could have been aware of it at the time the calculations to support and refute a heliocentric system were debated.

[Ratmagiclady]

What if there was a thought, and nobody was around to understand?

Would be Zen?

[Rupert]

So my first question, and it is not an argumentative response, it is simply to ask for the views here of those that apparently do some deeper thinking than most.....and I will just listen to your answer/answers, without comment (I may have questions) to show that I am not baiting for an argument....

It appears that the idea of a God (or Gods) is universal, and singular, as far as we can know to humans......what is your idea of the basis of this universal belief? Is it purely a function of brain size and intelligence, or is it founded in some other source, and what might that source be?
Regards!

[Laurentiu Cristofor]

As we discussed, and I THINK we agreed, Occam's Razor actually proves nothing. It is not a rule of rigorous logic but a tool to keep an investigation on the best or most efficient track (my words)

I never said it proves anything. I'm just saying it is the correct approach to work towards developing a correct theory (it is the correct guiding principle).

I may be wrong, but it seems that you attribute more meaning to the results of applying this tool than it merits.

I'm just saying it's the best principle to follow. Because if your initial solution is too simple, you'll eventually find that you're missing variables in it to account for a complex problem - so you just add them when it is obvious you need them. It's much easier to add to a simple solution than to devise a very complex one (which may still lack crucial elements) and then work your way down. It's about a bottom-up versus a top-down search. Since there isn't any limit on the complexity a theory can have, a top-down search raises obvious problems - where do you start (how complex) and how do you shrink down to the right model. A bottom-up approach is simpler - you add when you need - this way it's constructive rather than inventive.

Newtonian mechanics is still good enough today. When we found phenomena we couldn't explain, we got Einstein to expand the theory. Could Einstein have developed the same theory if he lived in Newton's time? No, because he would have lacked all the knowledge accumulated in between their time and all the problems detected with Newtonian mechanics. Our model of reality gets improved incrementally - Occam's Razor is being applied all the time.

On one level, a god is a the simplest explanation for everything with science being the more complicated.

Well, a god is not an explanation for anything - it is just an answer that for some people represents the end of their search. But a god raises questions that are even more complex than whatever problem it might solve - who made that god (a meta-god?), what is its nature, what is its purpose, what is its environment, etc. You don't solve a complex problem by introducing an even more complex factor that you don't understand.

If you want to apply Occam's Razor to religion, it will lead you from polytheism to monotheism to philosophy (for example, Confucianism).

---------- Post added 03-19-2010 at 08:43 PM ----------

For a summary of the von Neumann stuff-
John von Neumann
is a pretty good start on information physics and process 1...

I looked at it and it's not going to be easy to digest. And with all the books I'm reading, it's going to take time. If I'll ever be able to understand quantum mechanics to the point I'll be able to carry a meaningful discussion about it, I'll attempt to do that

BTW, to not make this a useless post, another book I am reading now is "Influence; The Psychology of Persuasion". I have just got through the first chapter, but it's very interesting. If you're looking for insights into how our mind works, you'll like this.

[Nesster]

It appears that the idea of a God (or Gods) is universal, and singular, as far as we can know to humans......what is your idea of the basis of this universal belief? Is it purely a function of brain size and intelligence, or is it founded in some other source, and what might that source be?
Regards!

Different people will have slightly different answers depending on where they are coming from.

Personally, I have a feeling this has to do with the universe being self-aware through human awareness - partial self awareness, from the universe's pov for sure, and fragmented, but self awareness nonetheless. I think we have a hunch, a glimpse, of something beyond our own body and body-based senses, we sense a continuity across individuals and across birth and death. This 'leakage' of dim awareness beyond the individual self perhaps is a root driver of various mythologies and religious thought.

Another way I think about this - the first proto-humans whose brains were large enough started to glimpse themselves - glimpses of self-awareness - and differentiate psychologically from the world. Here's the origin of culture and of the separation we feel from the rest of creation. These early humans weren't dummies - their survival depended on precise observation and memory. There was power in the sense of self, but also fear, as we were able to realize that I too will die... or my companions might die. Pattern is collectively recalled as ritual - as a group, we can remember when the beasts migrate where the best time and place to hunt will be. There may be a sense of the world birthing us in our awareness, and the world's a nourishing as well as dangerous and unpredictable place.

Later as we become planters, the cycle of death and rebirth becomes important - the descent under ground, the re-emergence into light, the cycle of seasons reflected in the cycle of stars.

So far, what I describe is fairly standard, Joe Campbell stuff, and can be explained as the human intelligence and collective memory seeking evolutionary advantage through better prediction of the environment.

But I think there's something else going on as well. Many shamans say that plants 'talk' to them, show them how the plant may be useful. Plants show how, though they are poisonous taken straight, if you first boil and then dry and then smoke, you get this medicine... The usual evolutionary explanations are a bit thin, I think, as how much random experimentation does it take, how many poisoned individuals, to develop a sequence where the first 2 steps still produce a poison rather than the hoped for medicine?

(But yes, we are a curious species, sooner or later someone will try every thing, over and over, and over time every variation of lifestyle and thought will be tried... or at any point in time, all available political and religious thought, as well as environment, will be occupied by someone. This is just another way of looking at evolution, from a species perspective - a given species as a whole must constantly occupy its niches, and press at the boundaries, in order to hold onto the territory. Evolution in this sense means that a species gradually stops occupying a niche, and begins to occupy another, along the edges... and another species steps in where this one is becoming sparse, and finishes the job by pushing the first species out... in terms of human cultural evolution, there may be a problem, in that what stops us from cannibalism, say? Mad cow disease? Who else steps in to push the remaining cultures out of cannibalism? or take any other cultural behavior or belief, same thing. We add new stuff on one end, but when do we as a species truly cease those older things?)

Getting back to that shaman to whom plants talk. This I believe was a common specialization in the stone age, people who developed their consciousness, intentionally, to 'read' the universe - as consciousness is a property of the universe, since we are a part of the universe. I think this is still going on, though at a greater remove, and we have been dealing with culture and each other as the main components of our environment for a long while now. Science also conditions us to a separation of consciousness (observer) and subject, the mind-body split, the living bit vs the soul.

So, this morning I'm ending up with God as a mnemonic and as that unknown which we must appease and please, to avoid disasters and to ensure well being. We are all children of God in the sense that we are all children of the universe, the same as any other thing, except that we have enough consciousness to be self-aware. Science and religion are symbolic analogues of the universe's 'wanting' to increase awareness... though they are and always have been, a means of social memory, regulation, and control.

Each era and each society will create an image of divinity that helps the society regulate itself and predict its means of livelihood. A nation of hunters will have a god for the hunt, herders will have their Shepherd, farmers their corn god and his cyclical death and resurrection. A nation of scientists will have its Einstein

[Rupert]

Very interesting view, and in keeping with my word, I won't criticize. I would like to hear more from others if they care to add/subtract to your post.
Thanks
Rupert

Second question.....I am not well schooled in this, I have only heard a few brief thoughts on it and so if it is not described accurately, that is why. I have heard that some scientists, physicists, or whatever toy with the idea of a "mirror universe", perhaps separated from us by only a razor thin barrier, and impenetrable. How this would be proved seems impossible to me, but it is interesting in that if so, could there be more to the human mind than we can account for....perhaps a soul, after all?

Of course, I already believe there is a soul, but not all do. This is not about believe/don't believe, it is just a question of what science might or might not discover at some future date. There are valid scientific discoveries all the time....I would never deny that. There are also religious discoveries......Adam and Eve discovered knowledge.....and along with that they discovered sin and death.
Regards!

[Laurentiu Cristofor]

If we're moving from science and philosophy to religion through personal belief, I feel I should recommend this book: "The Sacred and the Profane" - one thing that becomes clear from it is that everyone is religious, but not necessarily in the sense generally accepted.

There is some philosophy in each religion and some religions are just philosophies.

Religion works as a psychological balm at some level, allowing people to cope with the tough world around them - the problem with it is when we become addicted to one balm and fail to see there are others, or when we don't even realize we're using a balm.

Science starts from philosophy too, but it is more pragmatic - it doesn't cater to needs. That is why people who are mainly concerned with what they need in life reject it.

Philosophy had a great potential once - I guess around the time of the Greeks: Socrates, Plato, Aristotle. It still went strong for a while, but often got mixed with religion. Today, my feeling is that philosophy has sadly become irrelevant, in the sense that no one goes to philosophers to find meaning for their lives. Will philosophy survive or will it just blend into a sum of science and personal belief?

[Rupert]

If we're moving from science and philosophy to religion through personal belief, I feel I should recommend this book: "The Sacred and the Profane" - one thing that becomes clear from it is that everyone is religious, but not necessarily in the sense generally accepted.

There is some philosophy in each religion and some religions are just philosophies.

Religion works as a psychological balm at some level, allowing people to cope with the tough world around them - the problem with it is when we become addicted to one balm and fail to see there are others, or when we don't even realize we're using a balm.

Science starts from philosophy too, but it is more pragmatic - it doesn't cater to needs. That is why people who are mainly concerned with what they need in life reject it.

Philosophy had a great potential once - I guess around the time of the Greeks: Socrates, Plato, Aristotle. It still went strong for a while, but often got mixed with religion. Today, my feeling is that philosophy has sadly become irrelevant, in the sense that no one goes to philosophers to find meaning for their lives. Will philosophy survive or will it just blend into a sum of science and personal belief?

I would hope that philosophy survives....the answers it renders are not as important as the questions, and I think there will always be questions.

Which brings me back to my Second Question, which is more scientific than philosophical or religious.....and I would still like some answers......
Best Regards!