Random thoughts - 1

When we study any topic, ideas constantly appear in our minds. These ideas aare special, they will never appear again. It is not possible to evaluate all ideas at the same time but it is important to document them.

Here are some random ideas (part 1):

* I was thinking about Jung’s synchronicity and coin tossing (Synchronicity: An Acausal Connecting Principle (Vol. 8)).

In coin tossing, each toss is an independent event. There is no apparent reason for the current toss to be affected by the previous tosses. But still each toss does not seem to be random, as 50/50 ratio has to be maintained in the long term. It could be said that there is no causal relation between the current toss and the previous tosses, and at the same time it is not a mere coincidence that we have a ratio of almost 50/50 in the end, but there is some kind of synchronicity between all the tosses.


* Coincidence Problem

The statue is made up of clay and not Gandhi. Gandhi is the name attached to its shape. If I make a statue of Hitler, again, Hitler refers to the shape of statue. If I make a statue of Hitler using iron, again, Hitler refers to shape and not the material.

Thus, if I break the statue, its form is destroyed and it is no longer Gandhi but it is still clay, as the material is not destroyed. Another thing could happen, if a statue of Hitler made of iron gets rusted, then we will say that it is still Hitler but not iron.

So I don’t see body-body problem. Every body has many different properties like – shape, material, height, weight etc. and each of these properties can be given a different name.


* Another problem I faced was the division of experience into subjective and objective by Kant (Kant: Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals).

Objective is something which is real independent of mind. Subjective is characteristic of or belonging to reality as perceived rather than as independent of mind. In case of objective experience, can something be experienced independent of mind, because, as soon as I observe something it becomes subjective and without observing I cannot experience.

I think this is a case of Gilbert Ryle’s category errors, if objective experience cannot be experienced it should be called something else.

* I liked the concept of black body Black-Body Theory and the Quantum Discontinuity, 1894-1912.

“We cannot say ‘blackbody’ is just a classical object of mass m, since the radiation that characterizes it as blackbody is NOT dependent on the matter of which it is made; nor can we then say, "blackbody" is then a totally a concept WE hold in our heads because this observed behavior "blackbody" is modeled by the quantum postulate and the equation works!”

I carry on the argument on ‘coincidence problem’. Take an example; if I call all objects which have a mass of 10 kg by ‘tanaka’, then we can say that ‘tanaka’ is neither fully an object nor just a concept. It refers to a property of object i.e. its mass is 10 kg.

Similarly, black body refers to a property of object, which is shared by all materials.