Roger Penrose - 3 Worlds and 3 Mysteries

 

This post is a continuation of the previous post on the topic suggested by marian.

On Roger Penrose

Please see Wikipedia page on Roger Penrose - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roger_Penrose

The 3 Worlds and 3 Mysteries

Symposium: the Road to Reality (22.01.2019), part II - Sir Roger Penrose
UvA Institute for Advanced Study

The 3 Worlds

According to Roger Penrose, the three worlds in his "Three Worlds and Three Mysteries" framework are as follows¹²³:

1. **The Physical World**: This world encompasses objects that exist physically, such as rocks, tables, and humans. It represents the realm of our everyday experiences¹.

2. **The Mental World**: The mental world extends beyond the physical and includes entities that are not physically present. Emotions like anger, which do not manifest themselves in a physical form, are examples of elements found in this world¹.

3. **The Platonic Mathematical World**: The Platonic mathematical world is the most contentious of the three worlds. It refers to mathematical entities that exist outside space and time, being eternal and unchanging.  For instance, a perfect square resides in this world¹.

These three worlds raise intriguing questions about how we perceive and understand reality¹. Penrose suggests that they are interconnected, forming a single unified world, but our understanding of this world remains limited³.

Please note that these descriptions are based on Penrose's framework and may require further exploration for a comprehensive understanding.

Source: Conversation with Bing, 28/09/2023

(1) Three worlds, three mysteries | Rationalising The Universe. https://rationalisingtheuniverse.org/2018/03/27/three-worlds-three-mysteries/.

(2) Penrose's Three Mysteries - Peaceful Science. https://discourse.peacefulscience.org/t/penroses-three-mysteries/8557.

(3) The theory of the three worlds (Penrose) | Hans Rudolf Straub. https://hrstraub.ch/en/the-theory-of-the-three-worlds-penrose/.

The 3 Mysteries

According to Roger Penrose, a renowned physicist and mathematician, there are three mysteries that arise from the interaction of three different worlds: the physical, the mental, and the Platonic mathematical³. The three mysteries are:

• How can the Platonic mathematical world, which consists of abstract and eternal entities, influence the physical world, which is made of concrete and temporal objects? For example, how can the laws of physics be described by precise mathematical equations?
• How can the physical world, which is governed by deterministic and objective laws, give rise to the mental world, which is characterised by subjective and free experiences? For example, how can the brain, which is composed of neurons and molecules, produce consciousness and thoughts?
• How can the mental world, which is dependent on individual perceptions and opinions, access the Platonic mathematical world, which is independent of any human mind? For example, how can humans discover and invent mathematical truths that are universal and unchanging?

Source: Conversation with Bing, 28/09/2023

(1) Penrose's Three Mysteries - Peaceful Science. https://bing.com/search?q=roger+penrose+3+worlds+and+3+mysteries.

(2) Three worlds, three mysteries | Rationalising The Universe. https://rationalisingtheuniverse.org/2018/03/27/three-worlds-three-mysteries/.

(3) The theory of the three worlds (Penrose) | Hans Rudolf Straub. https://hrstraub.ch/en/the-theory-of-the-three-worlds-penrose/.

(4) Penrose's Three Mysteries - Peaceful Science. https://discourse.peacefulscience.org/t/penroses-three-mysteries/8557.

Some alternative frameworks 

Roger Penrose’s “Three Worlds and Three Mysteries” framework is one way to conceptualise reality. However, there are other concepts and theories that attempt to explain reality from different perspectives. Here are a few alternatives:

• Idealism: Idealism is the belief that reality is a mental construct, and everything we perceive is a product of our minds. (For more information, see Wikipedia.) 
• Platonic Idealism: The Platonic ideal is the perfect, absolute, and eternal Forms. Everything in the natural world is derived from the Forms but only as an imitation or impression of those Forms. Everything is born from the Realm of the Forms and returns back there after death. (see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theory_of_forms)
• Materialism is a philosophical view that asserts that all facts are causally dependent upon physical processes or even reducible to them. It suggests that the world consists entirely of material objects. (For more information, see https://www.britannica.com/topic/materialism-philosophy)
• Physicalism is closely related to materialism and has evolved from it with advancements in the physical sciences. It explains observed phenomena using concepts from the physical sciences. The terms "physicalism" and "materialism" are often used interchangeably, but they can be distinguished based on their philosophical implications. (For more information, see: Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy
• Dualism most commonly refers to: Mind–body dualism, a philosophical view which holds that mental phenomena are, at least in certain respects, not physical phenomena, or that the mind and the body are distinct and separable from one another. (see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mind%E2%80%93body_dualism)
• Daodejing ch.25 has some discussions that may be relevant.  https://philosophyphorphun.blogspot.com/2023/05/daodejing-chapter-twenty-five.html

ANU's document on the Indigenous Voice

Contribution from Linda

The following link to the Australian National University's website on the Indigenous Voice was sent in by Linda.  

ANU website - responding to concerns about the Indigenous Voice

You can also download a more colourful document from the site.

https://www.anu.edu.au/files/corporate_message/Aboriginal%20and%20Torres%20Strait%20Islander%20Voice-FINAL-PRINT.pdf

The information on this website provides answers to many of the Why questions that I had raised in class. Click Here for the Jamboard of why questions.

The Indigenous Voice - Contribution from marian

Contribution from marian

How much sway should be put on the First People's statement itself - namely the Uluru statement.

Sorry I can't be part of the face to face...

marian

ULURU STATEMENT FROM THE HEART

We, gathered at the 2017 National Constitutional Convention, coming from all points of the southern sky, make this statement from the heart:

Our Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander tribes were the first sovereign Nations of the Australian continent and its adjacent islands, and possessed it under our own laws and customs. This our ancestors did, according to the reckoning of our culture, from the Creation, according to the common law from ‘time immemorial’, and according to science more than 60,000 years ago.

This sovereignty is a spiritual notion: the ancestral tie between the land, or ‘mother nature’, and the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples who were born therefrom, remain attached thereto, and must one day return thither to be united with our ancestors. This link is the basis of the ownership of the soil, or better, of sovereignty. It has never been ceded or extinguished, and co-exists with the sovereignty of the Crown.

How could it be otherwise? That peoples possessed a land for sixty millennia and this sacred link disappears from world history in merely the last two hundred years?

With substantive constitutional change and structural reform, we believe this ancient sovereignty can shine through as a fuller expression of Australia’s nationhood.

Proportionally, we are the most incarcerated people on the planet. We are not an innately criminal people. Our children are aliened from their families at unprecedented rates. This cannot be because we have no love for them. And our youth languish in detention in obscene numbers. They should be our hope for the future.

These dimensions of our crisis tell plainly the structural nature of our problem. This is the torment of our powerlessness.

We seek constitutional reforms to empower our people and take a rightful place in our own country. When we have power over our destiny our children will flourish. They will walk in two worlds and their culture will be a gift to their country.

We call for the establishment of a First Nations Voice enshrined in the Constitution.

Makarrata is the culmination of our agenda: the coming together after a struggle. It captures our aspirations for a fair and truthful relationship with the people of Australia and a better future for our children based on justice and self-determination.

We seek a Makarrata Commission to supervise a process of agreement-making between governments and First Nations and truth-telling about our history.

In 1967 we were counted, in 2017 we seek to be heard. We leave base camp and start our trek across this vast country. We invite you to walk with us in a movement of the Australian people for a better future.

Reference: https://voice.gov.au/about-voice/uluru-statement

The Origins of Human Morality

 

YouTube video: 95% of your behavior is primate behavior | Frans de Waal - from The Well

Article

The following article is an article authored by Professor Michael Tomasello in Scientific America.  Michael Tomasello is a professor of psychology and neuroscience at Duke University and emeritus director of the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Leipzig, Germany.

The Origins of Human Morality

See Also

Book

A Natural History of Human Morality - by Michael Tomasello

 

YouTube Playlist 

YouTube playlist - Philosophy - Origin of Morality - Sam Au

Websites 

https://www.britannica.com/topic/morality

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Morality

Is beauty good?

 

TEDx Talks - Own your face | Robert Hoge | TEDxSouthBank

In the article "Nietzsche - Your conscience is no saint", Nietzsche states that "Earlier societies (he is rather unspecific about which exactly) did not see things this way; for them, it was the successful, beautiful, powerful aristocratic people who were valued as good, while the rest were bad, in the sense of weak, deficient, or just not up to much."

The YouTube video above clearly illustrates that non-beauty does not equate to bad.  Conversely, beauty can be superficial, manipulative and does not equate good.  

However, there seems to be a natural desire in us to love cute and beautiful things, animals and people, and repulse against the opposites.  People want to be liked, accepted and the pursuit of beauty seems natural too.  

How do we reconcile our rational analysis that beauty does not equate to goodness and our natural desire for beautiful things? 

What do philosophers say about beauty?

The following Wikipedia page discusses the topic: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beauty

A pdf file of the Wikipedia article (8/8/23) is here.

See Also

Radio Podcast 

Philosopher Zone - Beauty: aesthetic or moral ideal?   Guest: Heather Widdows, Professor of Philosophy, University of Warwick UK

ABC RN Sunday Extra - 

• 01 | Face Value — Beauty boom in the age of Zoom
• 02 | Face Value — Ethnic ambiguity and the Kardashian effect
• 03 | Face Value — Killer curves and harsh realities
• 04 | Face Value Empowerment or exploitation? 

Websites

 #EverydayLookism - https://www.everydaylookism.com/

Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy - Beauty: https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/beauty/ 

YouTube videos

TED - Looks aren't everything. Believe me, I'm a model. | Cameron Russell

Epicurus and Epictetus

 

By William Sonmans - Public Domain, Wikisource

Engraved frontispiece of Edward Ivie’s Latin translation of Epictetus’ Enchiridon, printed in Oxford in 1715.

Notes on Epicurus and Epictetus

Please find pdf file on Epicurus and Epictetus here. 

Some resources on Epicurus and Epictetus

• Epicurus - Wikipedia
• Epictetus - Wikipedia

Some YouTube videos on Epicurus

PHILOSOPHY - Epicurus – The School of Life

The Philosopher of Pleasure | EPICURUS – Einzelgänger

Epicurus and the Good Life – Academy of Ideas

PHILOSOPHY - History: Epicurus’ Cure for Unhappiness [HD] – Wireless Philosophy

Some YouTube videos on Epictetus 

The Discourses of Epictetus (Animated Book Summary)  – Eudaimonia

 Epictetus - How To Be A Stoic (Stoicism)  – Philosophies for Life

Epictetus and Stoicism: The Wisdom of the Slave Philosopher - Academy of Ideas

Stoicism

The following are some references on Stoicism:

• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stoicism
• https://www.britannica.com/topic/Stoicis

Here are some Stoicism videos on YouTube:

• The philosophy of Stoicism - Massimo Pigliucci - TED Ed
• Introduction to Stoicism - Academy of Ideas
  
• Stoicism: Meditations and the Wisdom of Marcus Aurelius - Academy of Ideas
• What is Stoicism? - Let's Talk Religion

Dance me to the end of love — Leonard Cohen (Sam's contribution)

 

Lyrics

[Instrumental Intro]

 

Dance me to your beauty with a burning violin
Dance me through the panic 'til I'm gathered safely in
Lift me like an olive branch and be my homeward dove
Dance me to the end of love
Dance me to the end of love

 

Oh, let me see your beauty when the witnesses are gone
Let me feel you moving like they do in Babylon
Show me slowly what I only know the limits of
Oh, dance me to the end of love
Dance me to the end of love

Dance me to the wedding now, oh, dance me on and on
Dance me very tenderly and dance me very long
We're both of us beneath our love, we're both of us above
Dance me to the end of love
Dance me to the end of love

Dance me to the children who are asking to be born
Dance me through the curtains that our kisses have outworn
Raise a tent of shelter now, though every thread is torn
Dance me to the end of love

 
[Instrumental]
 

Dance me to your beauty with a burning violin
Dance me through the panic 'til I'm gathered safely in
Touch me with your naked hand, touch me with your glove
Dance me to the end of love
Dance me to the end of love
Dance me to the end of love

 

Background

"Dance Me to the End of Love" is a 1984 song by Leonard Cohen and first recorded by him for his 1984 album Various Positions. [1]

Although structured as a love song, "Dance Me to the End Of Love" was in fact inspired by the Holocaust. In a 1995 radio interview, Cohen said of the song:

It's curious how songs begin because the origin of the song, every song, has a kind of grain or seed that somebody hands you or the world hands you and that's why the process is so mysterious about writing a song. But that came from just hearing or reading or knowing that in the death camps, beside the crematoria, in certain of the death camps, a string quartet was pressed into performance while this horror was going on, those were the people whose fate was this horror also. And they would be playing classical music while their fellow prisoners were being killed and burnt. So, that music, "Dance me to your beauty with a burning violin," meaning the beauty thereof being the consummation of life, the end of this existence and of the passionate element in that consummation. But, it is the same language that we use for surrender to the beloved, so that the song — it’s not important that anybody knows the genesis of it, because if the language comes from that passionate resource, it will be able to embrace all passionate activity.

 

Meaning 

The song may be about the Holocaust, or may be about love between lovers, but I would like to interpret the song to be about love in the broadest sense, or as Cohen puts it, about embracing all passionate activity.

All lives come to an end and many experience great difficulties; but there can be beauty in life even in difficult circumstances, thus "dance me to your beauty with a burning violin" and "dance me through the panic 'til I'm gathered safely in".

In the second verse, "witnesses" may be present in court, at a wedding or a crime scene; we can see the beauty in things without others being present.  "Babylon" refers to a supposed place of evil as depicted in the Bible [2].  "Limits" refers to rules and restrictions.

In the third verse, the "wedding" does not have to be limited to traditional weddings; It may be about friendship, a hobby, a love of life, or love of one's belief.  "Beneath and above our love" refers to the ways people conduct themselves, possibly fraudulently (beneath our love) and possibly idealistically (above our love).

The fourth verse appears to be talking about people in refugee camps.  The "touch me with your glove" in the fifth verse may refer to people in hospital in their final days.

Notes:

1. Wikipedia — Dance me to the end of love  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dance Me to the End of Love
2. Wikipedia — Whore of Babylon.  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whore of Babylon