> Where were we?... Yes, what do you think of the three axioms?
Well, lets see...
Existence exists. Sure, I'll give ya' that. There is
/something/, period. It may be the most complicated waveform imaginable,
the mushroom addled dreams of a heavy bearded god, or discrete concrete
objects interacting, the details are pretty sketchy if you ask me. But
/something/ is going on.
Identity. Hmmm... Things are what they are? No, I can't give
you that one. Things ARE different things in different situations. If
you need a repeatable experiment to prove this we can go back to Quantum
Physics. In different situations (different measuring devices) a photon is
different things (wave or particle). Another equally telling experiment
we've all done, is to take the lover that you know ever so well, back home
to meet your parents, and see who all of them they turn into. Different
situations, different identity. And since complexity is growing (or more
accurately, localizing around us), I don't see that it is possible to say
that /something/ is "the set of things that it /can/ become in changing
situations". I don't think these are closed sets in a complexifying
environment.
Consciousness. Well it certainly is not redundant. Unless you want
to say that "without an observer there is no observed". If that's part of
how you understand Identity or Existence, then sure. Identity implys that
there is a consciousness doing the identifying. I might go so far as to
say that the nature of Consciousness implys the phenomenon of Identity (or
even Existence). Making, at least, axiom #2 non-axiomatic. But, yes, you
can have this one too. Consciousness is, period. Again, the details are
mighty sketchy and up for debate.
And that's the fun part.
Prof. Tim