Mythopoetics

  Modern computers are based on the Von Neuman architecture, which consists in a central processor that executes sequentially one operation at a time over a given data according to some predefined instructions stored in a memory. Such machines can be reduced to a universal Turing machine, furthermore, the Church-Turing thesis postulates that any computation can be described as a program of the so called universal Turing machine. The thesis can be equivalently formulated as: any computation is a sequence, and such sequence can be composed further into more complex sequences by a concatenation rule common to the smaller sequences. Does human computation follow the Church-Turing thesis? The parallel wiring of human brain seems to deny it,  in fact, the computer metaphor for the brain is inaccurate and crude, as many authors (Edelman) have carefully discussed. Sackur and Dehaene’s interpretation of the experimental data from some basic arithmetic computation suggests that th...

According to the widely accepted  commentary-key paradigm  for the definition of the concept of consciousness proposed by Lawrence Weiskrantz [1997], subjective reports are the primary criterion for deciding whether a percept is conscious or not. The proposal is akin to the  accurate report  concept of  Seth, Baars and Edelman [2005]. The reports do not have to be verbal, in fact, many neuroimaging experiments are based on manual reports of conscious perception [Dehaene, 2006]. In any case, the paradigm assumes attention as a key property of consciousness, for it would not make any sense a non-attentional report. However, the proposition “there is consciousness  iff  there is attention” is not subscribed by some neuroscientist, for subjects can become conscious of an isolated object or the gist of a scene despite the near absence of top-down attention, and, conversely, subjects can attend to perceptually invisible objects [Koch and Tsuchiya, 2006]. ...

We can conceive something necessary within a particular scenario, like when we define cause as a necessary relation between events which determines a temporal sequence of those events within a particular conceptual frame, but can we conceive consistently a necessary being in absolute terms? Necessary relations in relative terms are introduced by definition as exomorphic conditions of the system, and they work as definiens for other relations and objects. Such is the Lebenswelt intuition of cause, which simply expresses a composition of representations (o better, mappings in a neural space) according to a sequence. However, as an absolute determination, the old bronze chain of Ananke reappears as a transcendental object that grounds a full set of old hypostasis of the universal law. Kant’s arguments for the fourth antinomy are equivalent to these: A. There is something absolutely necessary in the world, both [1] as a part of it and as its cause . 1. Our experience of the world...

While the previous two antinomies of reason examined the contradictions in the use of concepts of our basic space-time intuition, such as the idea of a beginning or of basic quanta, Kant’s third antinomy mixes the basic intuition of causality with the moral concept of freedom, two notions of different conceptual order. The result is a rather confusing argument, though the reductio ad absurdum works beautifully simple by the appeal to the epistemological principle of conceivability: an object can only be conceived through a defined and finite sequence of mental processes. Let us understand by cause a necessary relation between events (objects, relations) which defines a temporal sequence of those events within a particular conceptual frame. A. Causality according to laws of nature is not the only way to derive the relations and objects of a given scenario: we must include also causality according to freedom . 1. Assume that there is only causality according to the laws of nature...

By atom I mean the literal denotation of the word: something which has no parts, as conceived by Democritus and Leucipus. Today atoms are strings, or branes, or whatever object that we may fancy as being the end of the line in the decomposition of things into smaller parts. Kant’s second conflict of the transcendental ideas is formulated in relation to the notion of simple substance, in the sense of a basic form of atom or monad. Let us formulate the antinomy without his Aristotelian semantic operator of substance/accident . I will use two principles which I consider evident: Principle alpha : A composite object is constituted either by simple or by composite elements. Principle beta : An object, whether simple or composite, can only be conceived through a defined and finite sequence of mental processes. A. Every composite object in the world is constituted by simple elements, and nothing can be conceived anywhere but the simple or what is constituted by simple elements . ...

    Antinomies are the guardians of a threshold. It seems rather reasonable to suppose that the universe had to begin sometime. Our traditional myths confirm it, they even ascribe authorship to the action, and even modern mythology tells us of an instant cero, (or is it a one?)  anyway, a Big Bang explosion started everything. If we ignore the idea of an instant cero, which presupposes an observer beyond what we are saying that happens, i.e. the universe is the universe plus something else unrelated to it (remnants of older mythologies) it all seems commonplace and obvious. Then philosophy steps in (didn’t it step already?)and asks: is that a metaphor or do you really mean it? Is it not necessary for an explosion to happen that the exploding thing expands in something which is already there, say, space? Then space and time were already there, are they objects? Certainly, if they were there, they cannot be relations among objects for there were not any yet. However, if y...

       There is a wonderful passage in Lucretius in which Nature speaks to the old dying man who wails aloud, over-complaining about his own death: What troubles you so much, oh mortal? The passage is part of a long funerary advice for those who do not practice the dreams of an afterlife, a consolation before death that follows the principles of the human law.    If you lived well, what is all this groan and moan about? Why don’t you, like a banqueter fed full of life retire, and rest in peace forever, you greedy?    But if you lived a miserable life, if all you once had is now spilt and lost, why do you lament the end of your pains, why would you like to add more, you fool?    The one who lived gathering blessings develops greed, a condition of the dopaminic emotional system in which the neurotransmitters responsible for the movement and search functions of the organism cannot be turned off. It is curious how such a lack of b...