“Revolution in Thought: A new look at determinism and free will"

[Rhea]

His ideas about an infant's vision development are also full of holes. An infant doesn't need other senses to develop vision. Moving around and moving its head will enable it to improve depth perception.

Oh, I forgot about that additional observation. I’ll update my list to include it so we can discuss it accurately.

 

[Rhea]

My synopsis We can build this as we discuss


CLAIM:

• Hurt (and hence wars and other suffering) occurs when people are made to feel inferior through insults.
• If they knew eyes were not a sense organ, and that the brain inherently knows the truth about what exists, they would not believe the insults and peace would reign

Observations (Lessans or propsed)	Synopsis	Test results	Supported, Inconclusive or Refuted
[Lessans post 8414] Dogs demonstrate that vision is not a sense organ	Dogs eyes are not sense organs, and furthermore, unlike humans, their brains are not equipped like humans to know inherent truth, demonstrated by them being unable to identify their humans by sight alone (through pictures)	Multiple tests show dogs recognizing their humans from pictures	Refuted, post 8415
[Lessans post 8419] Babies demonstrate that vision is not a sense organ	Babies need the input of other senses in order for vision to develop, and it develops later than other senses, demonstrating that vision is not a sense organ
[Proposed] Blind people would have a different outlook than sighted people	If sight causes an interruption to an otherwise pure instant vision, then sightless people would have a universally and profoundly more positive sense of self worth than sighted people

 

[peacegirl]

This gives me pause because I'm not willing to defend something that is automatically shut down. This is not science; it's prejudice.

Yet here you are, defending this crap for 420 pages and counting.

[removed].

Nothing has automatically been shut down. It has been considered. And found to be false.

It HAS been considered, but the consideration is based on a limited understanding, which isn't much.

Also, you wouldn’t know science if it tap danced on your head, farted in your face and screamed in 6.000 different languages, “I’m science!”

And you know more about science because of your belief that one day you may be able to start over as a baby in your four-dimensional spacetime block universe? Your imagination is way past overtime!

If you knew a single thing about science you’d be ashamed to the point of crumbling into a tiny heap at how badly you have embarrassed yourself in this thread, and in all the threads across a quarter-century in all the forums in which you have insulted everyone’s intelligence.

I haven't insulted anyone's intelligence, Pood. That's just your anger talking because you don't like where the discussion is going.

 

[Michael S. Pearl]

His condition demonstrated very clearly how much he needed extrinsic images to function.

An excellent example. A perfect example sufficient to establish that there is afference with regards to vision.

If sight causes an interruption to an otherwise pure instant vision, then sightless people would have a universally and profoundly more positive sense of self worth than sighted people

I think that a proponent of the Lessans position would object saying that it is not afferent vision which interferes with pure and true vision. After all, so far as I can tell, the Lessans position denies that there is light-afference which contributes to vision. Instead, the Lessans proponent would say that it is other afferent information - such as from hearing - that conditions an exclusively efferent product or result. For example, a blind person could be conditioned to think (rather than see) that a particular sort of voice is ugly - not just ugly but really, not merely subjectively ugly.

Of course, if vision is only afferent, and if a person is conditioned to think that a particular countenance is ugly - not just ugly but really, not merely subjectively ugly, then the Lessans proponent has need to explain how essentially the same effected thought of there being real and not merely subjective ugliness is produced in both cases where there is no efferent vision.

 

[peacegirl]

I have gone over umpteen times that light does not travel inward to affect vision

So, "Light indeed has to travel inward" but the light which travels inwardly does not "affect vision". That would appear to mean that light does not participate in or contribute to the biological process which effects vision. The biological process which effects vision occurs entirely within the bodies of individual persons. Since, according to Lessans and you, light has no role in that corporeal biological process, it is impossible for light to "reveal" anything biologically, and that means light is not necessary for the biological vision process to occur. Of course, you insist that light is indeed necessary, but that is a charade - "an empty or deceptive act or pretense".

That light is indeed necessary for sight is because light IS a necessary condition. Your logic is so convoluted, it's hard to make sense out of it. Light does not travel inward, which only means that the pattern or wavelength does not travel to our eyes through spacetime and get transduced into an image, per the afferent account. That is all it means. Light is necessary and plays an important role in sight, which he never denied, because without light, we would be in the dark.

He didn't say light was not afferent.

If his not saying "light was not afferent" means that light is afferent,

He did not say light was not afferent. He said the eyes were not afferent.

but if it is also the case that light does not participate in or contribute to the biological process which effects vision, then light afference, according to Lessans and you, is inert with regards to the biological process which results in vision,

It IS inert in that it doesn't play an active role, but is a vital link that connects our inner world to the outer world.

and that means light is not necessary for the biological vision process to occur. Of course, you insist that light is indeed necessary, but that is a charade - "an empty or deceptive act or pretense".

To the degree that light is our visual connection, it is 100% necessary for the biological vision process to occur because it allows the object and its reflection to be at our photoreceptors in real time, which the brain then uses to think, categorize, and integrate into a form that can be used to understand the world around us.

what we see is utilized by the brain to form concepts.

If light does not participate in or contribute to the biological process which effects our seeing, and if what we see contributes to concepts formation, then light does not contribute to concepts formation by means of our seeing.

Light DOES participate, but does not cause. It plays a a passive role. It is inert in the sense that it doesn't actively convert its wavelength/frequency to the object's wavelength/frequency upon striking the object. It keeps its own intrinsic wavelength/frequency before and after striking an object.

If light does not contribute to the biological process of seeing but light does contribute to concepts formation, then, since light is afferent and not inert, an issue which needs to be addressed is identification of that pathway by which light gets conveyed inwardly into the body for use by the brain. You have already said that "light doesn't go through the optic nerve." Does the light utilized not at all in the biology of seeing but supposedly in the biology of concepts formation enter through the pores in the skin? Does it enter via the nostrils? Or maybe the ears? Maybe the tongue plays a role.

Preposterous?!?!?! Of course!

The data doesn't get chemically transduced through the optic nerve. That doesn't mean the optic nerve doesn't play an important part in vision. Please stop the sarcasm, thanking you in advance.

But this brings up a related issue: What is a concept? It is a thought, certainly. It can be a thought abstracted from particular instances or experiences. For sure. But, with regards to what we see, if what we see is only the efferent projection of concepts, then why do we fail to see when there is not sufficient light?

What are you talking about, Michael? Your logic is getting more and more confusing because your premises are invalid. The brain uses what it sees, through the eyes, in real time (if he is right), the same way the brain would use what is reconstructed in delayed time. The exact mechanism is not as important (at this point) as whether the model itself is a workable alternative to the present model, which it is.

If vision is only efferent, if vision is only a matter of concepts being projected,

What do you mean by "if vision is only a matter of concepts being projected?" You need to carefully reread what he wrote regarding the brain and its attributes to fully understand why he said that the brain acts like a movie projector.

then we should be able to see without need of light.

Where did you get the idea that we should be able to see without the need for light in the efferent account of vision?

We need light to see; therefore, vision is not exclusively efferent - contrary to Lessans and you. But if we need light so see, then vision is not to be identified as only the projection of concepts, and this further indicates that light must participate in the biological process which effects vision, even if the optic nerve does not in fact have any role in the afferent biology.

Vision is exclusively efferent. Your reasoning is not accurate, period. We need light to see, and light exists in this model of vision.

You're going to have to let go temporarily of your apparent belief that efferent vision is impossible

That is illogical. On several fronts - only one (okay, maybe two) of which will be addressed here: To hold that inwardly traveling light participates in or contributes to the biological process which effects vision is not the same thing as holding that "efferent vision is impossible".

True. Only holding that efferent vision is valid and sound can it be said that it is not the same thing as inwardly traveling light participating and contributing to the biological process of vision because they are opposites, which would be a contradiction.

It is Lessans and you who insist that efferent vision is necessarily incompatible with afferent vision. Your insistence is not evidentially or observationally supported, and your insistence is not even supported logically for which you would have to exclude the conceptual possibility of vision having both afferent and efferent aspects.

It is very much supported that these two models of sight --- afferent and efferent --- are defined in a way that makes them incompatible when it comes to rational thinking.

Since you hold that light does not biologically contribute to vision,

I am not letting you get away with this. Light contributes to vision. We cannot see anything without light, so you're providing a strawman.

it is you who provides the reason and basis for thinking that efferent vision is biologically impossible, because there is no purely conceptual basis for denying that vision has both afferent and efferent aspects - even if there are observational bases for doubting that vision is efferent.

Please provide reason for thinking that it is impossible for vision to have both afferent and efferent aspects.

This claim is only in reference to how the brain and eyes work in unison. In regard to his claim, it can't be both afferent and efferent. It has to be one or the other. We see in delayed time, or we don't.

 

[bilby]

Why does a mirror reverse left and right, but not up and down?

A mirror doesn't reverse left and right. It reverses front to back. Mirrors are interesting, but I don't see anything here that disproves his claim.
-------------------------------------------

A mirror does not actually reverse left and right in the way many people think. Instead, it reverses front-to-back — the direction toward and away from the mirror Science ABC+1.

What a mirror really does​

When light hits a mirror, it reflects back at the same angle (law of reflection). The mirror doesn’t rotate or flip your image sideways; it simply shows you what you would see if you were on the other side of the mirror sciencebehindlife.com+1. This is a front–back reversal, not a left–right or top–bottom flip.

Why it looks like left–right reversal​

Because your body is roughly left–right symmetric, the brain interprets the front–back flip as a left–right swap. For example, if you lift your right hand, the mirror image lifts its left hand — but this is just the mirror showing you from the opposite depth perspective Science ABC+1.

Why top–bottom stays the same​

Top and bottom don’t reverse because you don’t turn upside down when facing a mirror. Your head stays at the top, your feet at the bottom. The mirror keeps your orientation in the vertical axis the same sciencebehindlife.com.

A simple analogy​

Imagine writing “HELLO” on a transparent sheet. If you look at it from the other side, the letters appear backward, but the top is still the top and the bottom is still the bottom. A mirror works the same way — it reverses depth, not vertical orientation sciencebehindlife.com.

In short: Mirrors reverse front-to-back, which, due to your body’s symmetry, makes it look like left–right reversal, but top–bottom stays unchanged.

I was hoping you might think about the question, rather than just typing it into Bing.

 

[DBT]

If light is a necessary element for generating vision, which has been acknowledged, there must be a travel time, therefore a delay between the object and the eyes and vision being generated by the brain. There is no way around it.

There IS a way around it if the brain does what Lessans claimed it does. Do you remember what he wrote?

I don't recall reading anything that remotely accounts for the contradiction. If light is necessary, which has been acknowledged, information travel time negates instant vision. Images are not transmitted, information is. Information the brain uses to generate sight.

There is no contradiction between light being necessary and seeing in real time. Information comes from what we see. Travel time is not a prerequisite. Call it images or information, it still means the same thing, for all intents and purposes of this debate. It does not mean that information gleaned by what we see has to travel through space/time like a radio frequency that takes time.

Of course there is a contradiction. You acknowledged that light is necessary, that light conveys information, and that light has travel time, which means that there is no way we can see an object instantly. To be instant, it would have to be faster than light. If that was possible, light is not necessary, you already see the object before the light arrives.

The claim is absurd in any way you look at it.

No, the way YOU look at it is absurd.

Basic physics.

Light is a source of information.

The eyes evolved to detect light and transmit information to the brain.

The brain generates sight.

Light has travel time.

No. This is where we part ways. Everything remains the same except for what is occurring regarding light and its role in sight.

We see things as they were when light was emitted or reflected from the objects that we now see.

DBT, I hope you don't give up. It would be sad because you know that man's will is not free. and yet everyone wants to dispute his claim regarding the eyes. You are literally stuck, like everyone else, woth the belief that he was wrong because science got it right, and as a result, everything he wrote is being shunned. Do you see what's going on, or are you part of the problem?

It can be shown that the claim is wrong. It has been shown to be wrong. Multiple posters have given any number of excellent explanations for why it is in fact wrong.

There is no possibility of the claim being right. The sensible thing to do would be to drop the claim and edit the book. There is no shame in being wrong.

That would be a terrible disservice to not only him, but to our world. I would never do that.

To maintain and defend an obvious error may do a greater disservice to the author than to acknowledge the error and correct it......and it is, without a doubt, an error.

I brought this exact issue up earlier. If you have already decided that he was wrong before you ever truly understand where his claim came from and why his observations and reasoning demand a robust and unbiased analysis, you will continue to insist that his claim must be wrong because of your belief that scientists got it right. That is not the way to determine whether a claim is true or not.

There is no decision to make, no alternate options such as instant vision to ponder. The role and function of the eye is well enough understood. The authors claim is wrong based on what is understood about the mechanisms of sight and the physics of light. He was wrong. There is no doubt of that.

 

[Michael S. Pearl]

He did not say light was not afferent. He said the eyes were not afferent. ... To the degree that light is our visual connection, it is 100% necessary for the biological vision process to occur because it allows the object and its reflection to be at our photo-receptors in real time, which the brain then uses to think, categorize, and integrate into a form that can be used to understand the world around us.

He needn't have bothered saying the eyes are not afferent, because the eyes are not inwardly traveling. That means the eyes are as afferent as are the ears. The issue with afferent vision regards the light and whether it travels inwardly to contribute to the process which results in vision. You admit that the light travels inwardly to contribute to the process which results in vision; you admit that the light is afferent, and you admit that it is necessary for light to be afferent in order for vision to occur. Therefore, you admit that vision is not (only) efferent.

Your "in real time" addendum contributes nothing to the understanding about how vision occurs - as will now be discussed.

The fact that light energy travels inwardly, the fact that light energy travels into the body, means that the identical light energy is not at the photo-receptors and at the brain for processing at the same time - if there is any distinction at all between the photo-receptors and the brain. Even if you regard the photo-receptors as part of the brain, it is not the photo-receptors which do the processing which produces thinking, categorizing, etc. The photo-receptor processing is prior to the processing which occurs deeper within the brain to produce the related thinking. This "prior to" fact means that there is some amount of delay associated with light afference. No reason has been provided for thinking that the delay necessarily associated with light traveling inside the body is absent with regards to light outside the body. Indeed, if light travels without delay, then it is in no way sensible to say that light travels at all. And we're right back to the presentism according to which nothing travels since there are no delays because time is necessary for there to be a delay and there supposedly is no time, there is only the present timeless-space.

All that being said, we have progressed with your admission that light traveling afferently is absolutely necessary for vision to occur.

Now the issue switches to the matter of there being a delay, what would be described as a time lapse, during the process which effects, among other products, vision. As is the case with all processes, that vision-producing process occurs non-instantly, but how can that be if there is no time? If light travels non-instantly within the body, what reason is there for thinking that light does not travel non-instantly to the body?

The brain uses what it sees, through the eyes, in real time ... the same way the brain would use what is reconstructed in delayed time.

That would indicate that seeing "in real time" and seeing non-instantly are indistinguishable - except for the fact that seeing non-instantly is far more explicable. This means that with regards to seeing, the "real time" version of seeing neither presents nor solves previously unrecognized problems with the non-instant understanding, nor is the "real time" version more complete than is the non-instant version. Consequently, the "real time" version does not present a reason for why the non-instant understanding should be either abandoned or modified to incorporate insight from the "real time" notion. Without providing such reason, the "real time" contention fails to be presented as possibly true. Such reason need not be proved to be actual in order to be considered possible, but, absent any such reason, the "real time" notion has not yet achieved the status of being possible. To be possible, it is not sufficient that a notion be a concept or a contention.

It is very much supported that these two models of sight --- afferent and efferent --- are defined in a way that makes them incompatible when it comes to rational thinking. ... In regard to his claim, it can't be both afferent and efferent. It has to be one or the other. We see in delayed time, or we don't.

If afferent and efferent are necessarily incompatible, even if only as a result of some asserted definition(s), then, when you agreed that afference is necessary for vision to occur, you concurrently denied that vision is a matter of efference. Since you also rightly associate vision as a matter of afference with delayed time, and since you hold that vision can be only afferent (delayed) or only efferent (non-delayed), you necessarily believe that a delay is associated with vision.

 

[peacegirl]

You are acting on the assumption that I've never shared his clam. I have many times, and it was rejected just as many, but that still does not make his proof wrong. As I stated earlier, the leading authority of his time, Nageli, rejected Gregor Mendel's proof of the laws of inheritance, but he was wrong, as history recorded, and now he is considered the father of modern genetics, and Nageli is a footnote. I'm not saying this happens all the time, but it does go to show that dismissing a claim that appears to be wrong CAN BE WRONG.

The part that I crossed off is your retreat. It doesn’t illuminate the claim in any way. It does not add information or clarify. It’s a tangent.
You could have posted a link to where you made the claim. You could have repeated the claim. But you instead spent time on this post to… tread water.

His discovery regarding the eyes is not directly related to his discovery of how we can achieve world peace.

Summary: Many theories as to how world peace could be achieved have been proposed, yet war has once again taken its deadly toll in the 21st century. The dream of peace has remained an unattainable goal — until now. The following pages reveal a scientific discovery regarding a psychological law of man’s nature never before understood. This finding was hidden so successfully behind layers of dogma and misunderstanding that no one knew a deeper truth existed. Once this natural law becomes a permanent condition of the environment, it will allow mankind, for the very first time, to veer in a different direction — preventing the never-ending cycle of hurt and retaliation in human relations. Although this discovery originated from philosophical thought, it is factual, not theoretical, in nature.

This is all I have so far about his claims.
And it says nothing. It hints, it teases, but it does not illuminate. It never actually states his claim, unless his claim is, “Think of me as a genius!!”

It isn't meant to say anything other than an introduction. It was on the copyright page!

What is the claim? What is the discovery? What is the psychological law? How does it effect peace?

You're asking me questions as if I can explain a 600-page book in one sentence. These discoveries take time to understand. They can't be explained in a few sentences, or the book will lose its meaning. That is what happened at freethought-forum.

This is like a clickbait title, “do this one weird thing every night to live forever”
Okay, what is the one weird thing?

What is the newly discovered psychological law of man’s nature????

It is a law that lies behind the door of determinism.

(Also, if he’s going to call it a scientific discovery but then claim that he can’t possibly use the scientific method, then, he should not call it a scientific discovery, yah?)

That is why he said this: For purposes of clarification, please note that the words “scientific” and “mathematical” only mean “undeniable” and are interchanged throughout the text. The reasoning in this work is not a form of logic, nor is it my opinion of the answer; it is mathematical, scientific, and undeniable, and it is not necessary to deal in what has been termed the “exact sciences” to be exact and scientific. Consequently, it is imperative to know that this demonstration will be like a game of chess in which every one of your moves will be forced and checkmate inevitable, but only if you don’t make up your own rules as to what is true and false, which will only delay the very life you want for yourself.

That is not what he did. He did not say we see in real time without giving his reasons for it. I am just tired, and I don't know if it's worth starting over again. People already have their preconceived ideas ready to fight Lessans tooth and nail. I know what their responses are, unless they have a sudden epiphany and change of heart. You came in late, which is why you think I didn't give it my all. Not true.

Again you spent time writing this and it advances nothing. Clears up nothing. No one is going to have an epiphany without some kind of input.

I know I'm stalling because I'm not sure I want to continue. Normally, books are read and then discussed. No one here has read the book, so a discussion would not have any meat to it.

My reply to this is, “Sorry you feel so frustrated. Science is hard. I’ve spent a whole career doing science and it can be very frustrating when the results are unclear. You have to roll up your sleeves and design a new experiment. I know this can be exhausting. And so frustrating when people poke holes in your conclusions. But rest assured, this is the biggest benefit of science—people trying to test your theory, finding the areas that need better explanation. It’s the only way we advance.”

But that is all I can say, because I’m replying to a post that says nothing but how hard science is.

No matter how late I came in, you could either

• point me to where you successfully described it already

Or

• understand that the tooth and nail fight is important information for the theory.

Actually, you could read the book. That would go a long way to having a purposeful discussion.

I am here as the living person to promote his claims, not MY claims. Further, as a steward of HIS claims, I have to make sure I am doing it the right way, or I would not be a good steward. I'm not jeopardizing this sensitive subject just because you want to see if I understand his claims. I'm not on trial. I will continue to answer questions if I reconsider posting the chapter, as you politely asked me to.

Wait. Serious question. Are you just here to post someone else’s work and hope for epiphanies?
That’s preaching, and it is not allowed on this site..

Yes, I'm sharing a discovery. I know I'm not in the right venue, but it's too late. If it's against the rules to share his work, let them tell me and I'll go.

If you are not here to actually debate, to hear the objections, weigh them, discuss their merits and possibly amend your initial view, then you may have massively misunderstood what a “debate forum” is.

I did. I didn't realize that sharing this knowledge was supposed to be debated before it was ever read or understood. It's backwards.

Listen bilby, you are going about this backwards, and it's not fair to him. He did not study light. He studied human behavior and how the eyes function. That is what needs to be examined. If he is right about his claim, then scientists can come up with an alternative explanation for the moons of Jupiter that doesn't involve the speed of light.

And what we’re doing here is discussing whether he is right about his claim.
Assuming we can agree upon what his actual claim actually is in the first place.

Because honestly, so far this feels like,

• Bring me a rock
  • Here’s a rock.
• No, not that rock, bring me another rock.
  • How about this one?
• No, not that rock.
  • What kind of rock are you looking for? Is this one too big? Or too red? What kind of rock do you want?
• Not that one.

That's not what I'm doing. Why don't you read the first three chapters to get an idea of what his first discovery is? I provided the link. At least we will have something substantive to talk about.

I just don't think he was [wrong,] based on the observations that led him to his claim.

WHAT OBSERVATIONS??????
WHAT CLAIM?????

It would be so handy in this whole discussion for you to be able to — for us ALL to be able to — quote at the top of our posts something like,

For the context of this discussion,
The Claim is:

• The brain knows the detailed nature of an image and did not get that information from photons, which is why the speed of light does not delay knowledge of the image no matter how distant.

We see in real time because light doesn't carry or bring the pattern or reflected light to the eyes through spacetime.

The Observations that lead to this claim are:

• Babies can’t focus
• ???

Babies can't focus their eyes at birth because they need stimulation from the other senses to awaken the brain to see what is being experienced by the other senses. I don't like the way you're doing this because you can't reduce a concept to such an extent that the meaning is lost.

For the context of this discussion,
The Claim is:

• The psychological law of efferent sight leads to universal understanding and hence instant peace

You are mixing up his discovery on the senses with the discovery that lies behind determinism. No wonder it doesn't make sense to you.

The Observations that lead to this claim are:

• The brain knows what’s really there
  
  • Babies can’t focus
  • ???

Or whatever the claim is. Surely, surely somewhere in Lessans’ book he clearly states his claim and the evidence for it. SURELY he does this, knowing that the psychological law of humankind requires clarity in order to communicate effectively! Surely you can just copy and paste that part of his book?

I gave the first three chapters to everyone. The link is on the bottom of all my posts. I changed some of the wording but I haven't updated it yet. The core concepts remain untouched.

 

[pood]

This gives me pause because I'm not willing to defend something that is automatically shut down. This is not science; it's prejudice.

Yet here you are, defending this crap for 420 pages and counting.

You always get snarky when the truth is getting too close for comfort.

[removed by moderator]

Nothing has automatically been shut down. It has been considered. And found to be false.

It HAS been considered, but the consideration is based on a limited understanding, which isn't much.

We have full understanding. His claims are false.

Also, you wouldn’t know science if it tap danced on your head, farted in your face and screamed in 6.000 different languages, “I’m science!”

And you know more about science because of your belief that one day you may be able to start over as a baby in your four-dimensional spacetime block universe? Your imagination is way past overtime!

[removed] Nietzsche’s eternal recurrence and the block world of Einstein/Minkowski is totally beyond your understanding.

If you knew a single thing about science you’d be ashamed to the point of crumbling into a tiny heap at how badly you have embarrassed yourself in this thread, and in all the threads across a quarter-century in all the forums in which you have insulted everyone’s intelligence.

I haven't insulted anyone's intelligence, Pood. That's just your anger talking because you don't like where the discussion is going.

This is yet again an ad hominem attack. The ad hom is the idea that my arguments are wrong because I am angry. My arguments are not wrong and I am not angry in any case, except insofar as being incensed by [removed] posts [removed]

[removed]

 

[bilby]

You're asking me questions as if I can explain a 600-page book in one sentence. These claims are not easy to explain.

Max Born's 1961 book Einstein's Theory of Relativity, which sets out the eponymous theory in layman's terms, is 400 pages long.

However, the central idea can be summarised in one sentence:

Neither time nor space can be mapped in such a way that all observers will agree that the sequence of places and/or events are correct; Rather, each observer has an understanding of time and space that shares only one commonality - that they all observe the speed of light to be the same.

Ideas that are true are amenable to summary. There's a lot of detail missing, but the central idea is there.

And nobody is limiting you to one sentence.

 

[bilby]

What is the newly discovered psychological law of man’s nature????

It is a law that lies behind the door of determinism.

You really need to work on your attention to detail. The question was "What is..?", not "Where is..?".

 

[Rhea]

You're asking me questions as if I can explain a 600-page book in one sentence. These discoveries take time to understand. They can't be explained in a few sentences, or the book will lose its meaning. That is what happened at the other forum.

Yes, I totally expect you to be able to do this. I never said one sentence, that’s you. I said clear and succint
It can be done for every major scientific and philosophical discussion.

For example here’s how to do it for Darwin’s theory of evolution:

Summary of Darwin's Theory of Evolution

• A species is a population of organisms that interbreeds and has fertile offspring.

• Living organisms have descended with modifications from species that lived before them.

• Natural selection explains how this evolution has happened:
— More organisms are produced than can survive because of limited resources.
— Organisms struggle for the necessities of life; there is competition for resources.
— Individuals within a population vary in their traits; some of these traits are heritable -- passed on to offspring.
— Some variants are better adapted to survive and reproduce under local conditions than others.
— Better-adapted individuals (the "fit enough") are more likely to survive and reproduce, thereby passing on copies of their genes to the next generation.
—Species whose individuals are best adapted survive; others become extinct.

Here’s what it looks like for string theory:

In physics, string theory is a theoretical framework in which the point-like particles of particle physicsare replaced by one-dimensionalobjects called strings. String theory describes how these strings move through space and interact with each other by vibrations. On distance scales larger than the string scale, a string acts like a particle, with its mass, charge, and other properties determined by the vibrational state of the string. In string theory, one of the many vibrational states of the string corresponds to the graviton, a quantum mechanical particle that carries the gravitational force. Thus, string theory is a theory of quantum gravity.

Here’s what it looks like for relativity:

KEY CONCEPTS OF SPECIAL RELATIVITY​

Why can't anything travel faster than light?​

As objects approach the speed of light (approximately 186,282 miles per second or 300,000 km/s), their mass effectively becomes infinite, requiring infinite energy to move. This creates a universal speed limit — nothing with mass can travel faster than light.

What does E = mc² mean?​

Einstein’s equation, E = mc², means that energy (E) and mass (m) are interchangeable. The speed of light (c) squared is an enormous multiplier, so even a tiny bit of mass contains an enormous amount of energy.

For example, converting the atoms in a paper clip into pure energy would release the equivalent of 18 kilotons of TNT.

BEFORE EINSTEIN: NEWTON AND THE LUMINIFEROUS ETHER​

Before Einstein, Isaac Newton’s three laws of motion formed the bedrock of classical physics. But they couldn't explain everything, especially the behavior of light.


To fit light into Newtonian physics, scientists proposed the luminiferous ether, a hypothetical medium for light waves. However, the 1887 Michelson-Morley experiment showed that light’s speed is constant, regardless of Earth's motion, suggesting the ether didn't exist.

So yes, I absolutely do expect you to be able to distill the contents of a 600 page book to a less than one page summary.
every other major discovery in the history of many can be distulled down to a thesis.

 

[Rhea]

This debate forum is not a book club. So most of us are not here to read 600 page books. We discuss concepts brought to the group and explained and summarized in conversation. You will see that nearly all threads on this site proceed this way.

I was curious, and put your book into ChatGPT and asked for a summary, the main thesis and the evidence used to support the thesis. This is what I got:

Including, you’ll see at the bottom, a one sentence summary.



========chatgpt results=========

I reviewed the text available at Decline and Fall of All Evil on PhilArchive. The work presents itself not as a conventional philosophical essay but as a claimed scientific discovery about human nature that, according to the author, would eliminate war, crime, punishment, and other forms of human conflict if widely understood.

Central Claim​

The author's main thesis is that humanity has misunderstood a fundamental psychological law of human nature. Once this law is correctly understood, society will recognize that many common ideas about moral blame, free will, punishment, and evil are mistaken, leading to the eventual disappearance of war, crime, and other harmful behaviors.

In the book's own framing, this is presented as a discovery comparable in importance to major scientific discoveries in physics or genetics.

Main Claims​

1. Human behavior is governed by an undiscovered natural law​

The author argues that there is a lawful structure to human behavior analogous to the laws governing the solar system. Human conflict persists because this law has remained hidden behind mistaken assumptions and dogma.

Supporting evidence used:

• Analogies to scientific discoveries such as astronomy, electricity, and genetics.
• The claim that long-standing beliefs can conceal deeper truths.
• Historical examples of initially rejected discoveries that were later accepted.

2. Belief in free will is the key error​

A recurring argument is that free will cannot be proven and that belief in free will prevents recognition of the true causes of human behavior. The author treats determinism as the more scientifically defensible position. (PhilArchive)

Supporting evidence used:

• Logical arguments about the inability to prove free will.
• Claims that if actions are determined by prior causes, blame becomes conceptually mistaken.
• Dialogue-based reasoning intended to show contradictions in common beliefs about freedom and responsibility. (PhilArchive)

3. Blame and punishment are based on a misunderstanding of human nature​

The author argues that people do not ultimately choose their motivations or character. Therefore, moral condemnation and punitive systems are built on a false assumption about personal responsibility.

Supporting evidence used:

• Deterministic reasoning: actions result from causes beyond an individual's control.
• The idea that understanding causes is more effective than assigning blame.
• The claim that removing blame would reduce cycles of retaliation and conflict.

4. Eliminating blame would transform society​

The book predicts that once society adopts this understanding of human nature, major social evils—including war, crime, hatred, discrimination, and revenge—would progressively disappear.

Supporting evidence used:

• Theoretical arguments about how retaliation perpetuates conflict.
• Predictions that understanding causation will encourage prevention rather than punishment.
• Analogies to technological revolutions produced by scientific discoveries.

Type of Evidence Used​

Most of the support is:

• Philosophical reasoning.
• Logical arguments.
• Thought experiments and dialogues.
• Historical analogies to scientific discoveries.

The work does not primarily rely on:

• Controlled experiments.
• Statistical studies.
• Neuroscience data.
• Empirical social-science evidence.

Its evidence is therefore largely conceptual rather than experimental.

Assessment of the Argument​

Strengths​

• Ambitious attempt to connect free will, responsibility, punishment, and social conflict into a single explanatory framework.
• Raises genuine philosophical questions about blame and determinism.
• Emphasizes examining underlying causes of harmful behavior rather than focusing only on punishment.

Weaknesses​

• The book repeatedly describes its conclusions as "scientific," "mathematical," and "undeniable," but the evidence presented is primarily philosophical argumentation rather than empirical demonstration.
• Large predictive claims (e.g., ending war and crime) are not supported by rigorous social-scientific evidence.
• Historical analogies to figures such as Mendel, Edison, and Einstein do not themselves establish the truth of the discovery.
• The argument depends heavily on accepting the author's treatment of determinism and moral responsibility. (PhilArchive)

One-Sentence Summary​

The essay argues that a deterministic understanding of human nature reveals moral blame to be fundamentally mistaken, and that recognizing this hidden psychological law would eventually eliminate war, crime, and other forms of human conflict; its support comes mainly from philosophical reasoning and logical argument rather than empirical scientific evidence.

 

[Rhea]

That is why he said this: For purposes of clarification, please note that the words “scientific” and “mathematical” only mean “undeniable” and are interchanged throughout the text.

He doesn’t get to change the meanings of words “for the purpose of this text.”
Scientific MEANS tested, repeated, demonstrated.
Mathematical MEANS demonstrable by equations that are not ambiguous.

Lessans is not entitled to pretend it means “I’m so really sure, you should just believe me!”
You are not entitled to get away with pretending it means something it doesn’t without pushback from all of us.

You will need to get used to this pushback because his definitions, and your use of them, is not interchangeable.

You can make up definitions, and he can, too, but you can’t walk around and demand to not be challenged on your error of logic.

The reasoning in this work is not a form of logic, nor is it my opinion of the answer; it is mathematical, scientific, and undeniable, and it is not necessary to deal in what has been termed the “exact sciences” to be exact and scientific.

On the contrary, it absolutely is.
If you want the authority of calling something “scientific,” you have to BE scientific.
You don’t get to try to wear the mantle of science without performing science.

Same with math. You don’t get a free pass to re-name it and re-define it without the whole community saying, hold up. Get your own words that mean something.

We WILL challenge you on misusing these words in an attempt to gain legitimacy of an idea with no supprting evidence.

Consequently, it is imperative to know that this demonstration will be like a game of chess in which every one of your moves will be forced and checkmate inevitable, but only if you don’t make up your own rules as to what is true and false, which will only delay the very life you want for yourself.

You are making up rules. You just quoted Lessans making up definitions. Heal thyself.

He wants legitimacy without earning it. He wants to call his work science without doing any science.
It’s philosophy (at best, even that is sketchy,) not science.

 

[DBT]

Not sure if it could even be classified as philosophy....

 

[Rhea]

It’s interesting because there are portions of his concepts with which I agree wholeheartedly.

For example, his assertion that punishment for crimes is misdirected.

I agree. I feel that crimes should be met with rehabilitation and protection, and never punishment. Rehabilitate when possible, and protect society from the unrehabilitatable. But if you have to jail someone for life, don’t punish, just contain humanely.

Punishment harms society in so many ways. I agree with Lessan on that.
If people could embrace this, could understand the implications of it, I believe so much crime would disappear.

But it doesn’t require “secret laws” and “instant sight” and “chess games”. It doesn’t even require an adherence to determinsim or free will arguments.

It takes, in my opinion, clear and pragmatic studying of human behavior. That a society enacting punishment creates crime by creating permission to treat people badly when one feels wronged.

It will require demonstrating in some area that is willing to try. It would require starting small so that a willing population could embrace it. It can be done by examining existing data because there are pockets of this and programs that try to enact it.

There would be a lot of pushback, because there are a lot of people who LIKE punishment. In my opinion, they are a sad byproduct of previous punishment.

I have written about that at length in discussions here. And I have no problem at all being scientific about that; determining, “how would I prove it” and “how would I test it.” And hearing from people on this site why certain proposals “would never work,” and examining that discussion to see if that’s true. Honestly.

 

[steve_bank]

The idea that society creates the conditions that creates crime and then punishes for it is not new.

Circa 15th century. There is probably ancient Greek commentary.

AI Overview
You are quoting the famous social critique from Sir Thomas More’s 1516 book, Utopia. He wrote, "For if you suffer your people to be ill-educated... and then punish them for those crimes... what else is to be concluded from this, but that you first make thieves and then punish them."

The last 5 or 6 years in Seattle and Washington state has been a large scale experiment in decriminalizing most behavior ad reducing police authority and power.

Defunding the police. Treatment and diversion instead of jail. It was common in my neighborhood to see people shooting up in pubic with no fear of police. On ouir door steps.

A state law seriously limited police high speed chase. Criminals took advantage. When police tried to pull somebody over they just accelerated away.

Seattle police was destroyed, large scale officer resignations. It got to the point where police would respond only to the most serious 911 calls.

As it began affecting people views changed and people complained about lack of policing.


I do not think you can get rid of policing and punishment. Our human imagination makes any kind of social conformity on the scale of the USA possible, while maintaining the wide latitude in free speech and behavior.

China maintains a rigid political and social conformity. Anything contrary is harshly suppressed.

Any system can not ignore ‘the laws of human nature’. Greed, conflict, violence, power.

That is the problem with our Washington state progressives. They are overwhelmed and blinded by well intention ed empathy. They are unable to see people as they are.

It is not a matter of free will vs determinism. It is about how our brains work. That leads to the nature vs nurture debate.

 

[peacegirl]

My synopsis:
CLAIM:

• Hurt (and hence wars and other suffering) occurs when people are made to feel inferior through insults.
• If they knew eyes were not a sense organ, and that the brain inherently knows the truth about what exists, they would not believe the insults and peace would reign

Observations (that Lessans used to test)

• Dogs eyes are not sense organs, and furthermore, unlike humans, their brains are not equipped like humans to know inherent truth, demonstrated by them being unable to identify their humans by sight alone (through pictures)

This is really another claim, not an observation. So let’s examine what observations we can make about the “dogs vision” claim that Lessans gives to support his human eye claim:

Okay, how would we test that?
Get some dogs and see if they can identify their humans via photograph


Let’s test that.

Can Dogs Recognize Their Owners in Pictures? - Wag!

Join the debate, discover the science behind, and learn the signs of your dog's potential capabilites. Can dogs recognize their owners in pictures? Find out now.

wagwalking.com

Scientific studies always help to understand the logic behind an action and the Journal of Vision conducted some experiments to show that dogs could have facial recognition skills. A group of twelve Beagles were put into a training program with a handler for each dog. They spent two hours a day together for six months.

At the end of that time, they were given visual recognition tests. The dogs proved beyond a doubt that they did recognize their handlers and were not interested in pictures of strangers. These experiments were taken using dogs and new handlers over a six-month period and the results were positive, so imagine how much more positive the results are with you and your dog when you have been interacting for a long time.

Current conclusion:
Lessans’ claim that dogs cannot identify their humans through pictures is disputed by dogs actually recognizing their owners through pictures.

UPDATE NEEDED:
He needs to withdraw this claim, or eliminate this “observation” that dogs cannot identify their humans, as soon as he sees actual dogs actually identifying their humans through pictures.

Important question:
do you agree with the update needed based on these new observations?

Your entire conclusion that the experiment with beagles proves that they actually recognize their human is utter bullocks. Training a dog to recognize visual patterns is not the same thing as true recognition. You will have to think again before telling me that he needs to eliminate the observation that dogs can identify their humans. Show me a dog that has not seen his human for months and gets excited (by a wag of a tail or a happy whimper or something of that nature) when you stick a picture of his human in front of his face, close up. Show me where a dog recognizes his human from a computer screen when no other cues are present, such as movement or sound. When you do, please post it so everyone can see this for themselves.

 

[DBT]

Dogs have eyes. They are not only able to recognise people, but understand body language and read moods.

Abstract
Emotions are critical for humans, not only feeling and expressing them, but also reading the emotional expressions of others. For a long time, this ability was thought to be exclusive to people; however, there is now evidence that other animals also rely on emotion perception to guide their behaviour and to adjust their actions in such way as to guarantee success in their social groups. This is the case for domestic dogs, who have tremendously complex abilities to perceive the emotional expressions not only of their conspecifics but also of human beings. In this paper we discuss dogs’ capacities to read human emotions. More than perception, though, are dogs able to use this emotional information in a functional way? Does reading emotional expressions allow them to live functional social lives? Dogs can respond functionally to emotional expressions and can use the emotional information they obtain from others during problem-solving, that is, acquiring information from faces and body postures allows them to make decisions. Here, we tackle questions related to the abilities of responding to and using emotional information from human expressions in a functional way and discuss how far dogs can go when reading our emotions.

Dogs functionally respond to and use emotional information from human expressions - PMC

Keywords: Canis familiaris, dog–human relationship, emotion perception, emotion regulation, social cognition

pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov