DeepSight:


I havent said that the surface is nonexistent. You are strawmmaning me, perhaps deliberately.

Gosh, seems your amnesia is acting up again. You categorically said shadow doesn't exist so how am I strawmanning you? How can shadow not exist but still be the surface? This is what you have failed to explain. You may have nothing further to say but let it be on record that you contradicted yourself by claiming that shadow doesn't exist but is also the surface on which it appears.

What an absurdity.

LordReed:


Gosh, seems your amnesia is acting up again. You categorically said shadow doesn't exist so how am I strawmanning you? How can shadow not exist but still be the surface? This is what you have failed to explain. You may have nothing further to say but let it be on record that you contradicted yourself by claiming that shadow doesn't exist but is also the surface on which it appears.

What an absurdity.

The absurdities are all yours brother. I will list them before we are done.

For the avoidance of doubt I said what you are seeing is a surface. And that is a fact.

If you have a cassette tape and some part of it has no recording and the rest has a recording you cannot then say that the part without a recording is a separate Inmaterial thing. Likewise if you have a wall and some part is blocked off from light that doesn't make it a separate immaterial thing. That is what is absurd. As usual you have ignored my several explanations and examples. Even on Morse code which you brought up.

I am content with what I have explained. It will be there for posterity. Maybe one day in the future you might even read it with better understanding.

DeepSight:


The absurdities are all yours brother. I will list them before we are done.

For the avoidance of doubt I said what you are seeing is a surface. And that is a fact.

If you have a cassette tape and some part of it has no recording and the rest has a recording you cannot then say that the part without a recording is a separate Inmaterial thing. Likewise if you have a wall and some part is blocked off from light that doesn't make it a separate immaterial thing. That is what is absurd. As usual you have ignored my several explanations and examples. Even on Morse code which you brought up.

I am content with what I have explained. It will be there for posterity. Maybe one day in the future you might even read it with better understanding.

Nope, all yours since you kept making inferences that were not my position then insisting they were. Even budaatum got confused thinking you had accurately stated my position not knowing you created a bunch of strawmen for your own pummelling pleasure then started to insisting you had me dead to rights and even now you claim shadow doesn't exist and simultaneously claim it is the surface on which appears. It's a pattern with you and I think it raises from your overthinking of simple concepts and the need to make them more perplexing than they are. But let's see how you do with your spirit definition, hopefully it's not another stark contradiction.

DeepSight:


The absurdities are all yours brother. I will list them before we are done.

For the avoidance of doubt I said what you are seeing is a surface. And that is a fact.

If you have a cassette tape and some part of it has no recording and the rest has a recording you cannot then say that the part without a recording is a separate Inmaterial thing. Likewise if you have a wall and some part is blocked off from light that doesn't make it a separate immaterial thing. That is what is absurd. As usual you have ignored my several explanations and examples. Even on Morse code which you brought up.

I am content with what I have explained. It will be there for posterity. Maybe one day in the future you might even read it with better understanding.

What you don't even grasp is that you shot yourself in the foot with this argument when you apply it to images on a screen especially projection screens. If a shadow is non-existent and is merely a surface then what is image on a screen if not the shadows with colour gradients? So how can you then claim the image is made up materials but say a shadow is non-existent? LoLz, you should really reevaluate your position since it has no real world consistency.

LordReed:


What you don't even grasp is that you shot yourself in the foot with this argument when you apply it to images on a screen especially projection screens. If a shadow is non-existent and is merely a surface then what is image on a screen if not the shadows with colour gradients? So how can you then claim the image is made up materials but say a shadow is non-existent? LoLz, you should really reevaluate your position since it has no real world consistency.

This is a mischaracterization of what I have said. I didnt say the image you see on a screen is non-existent, I said it is not immaterial. Regrettably I feel there is no point repeating myself ad infinitum ad nauseum. I am content with my explanations and happy to leave them as they are for posterity. I addressed every example or analogy you brought up, but there are several I brought up you simply walked past without a word on. I have nothing more to add on this point.

I equally feel you have not grasped anything on this point, and have serially contradicted yourself, have put forward amazing absurdities, but there is nothing more to be said because we have said it all.

DeepSight:


This is a mischaracterization of what I have said. I didnt say the image you see on a screen is non-existent, I said it is not immaterial. Regrettably I feel there is no point repeating myself ad infinitum ad nauseum. I am content with my explanations and happy to leave them as they are for posterity. I addressed every example or analogy you brought up, but there are several I brought up you simply walked past without a word on. I have nothing more to add on this point.

I equally feel you have not grasped anything on this point, have serially contradicted yourself, have put forward amazing absurdities, but there is nothing more to be said because we have said it all.

Did you even read what I wrote?

LordReed:


What you don't even grasp is that you shot yourself in the foot with this argument when you apply it to images on a screen especially projection screens. If a shadow is non-existent and is merely a surface then what is image on a screen if not the shadows with colour gradients? So how can you then claim the image is made up materials but say a shadow is non-existent? LoLz, you should really reevaluate your position since it has no real world consistency.

LordReed:


Did you even read what I wrote?

Yes I did sir, and I have nothing more to add. It appears to me you have not read anything I have written. It can rest there.

DeepSight:


Yes I did sir, and I have nothing more to add. It appears to me you have not read anything I have written. It can rest there.

I don't think you did or you won't have written I said you said image on a screen doesn't exist since that is exactly the opposite of what I actually wrote.

LordReed:


I don't think you did or you won't have written I said you said image on a screen doesn't exist since that is exactly the opposite of what I actually wrote.

This misunderstanding cant be helped. Its better left where it is.

DeepSight:


This misunderstanding cant be helped. Its better left where it is.

What you and I wrote is not erased. You can go back and point out where I made a mistake.

Ok give me small time.

LordReed:

Is computer software material? It is not yet it is generated by a computer a material thing. The image on a screen is not material yet it is generated by a material thing. You should acknowledge you have a problem with how you view these things, the conundrum is not mine.

Yes, my Lord, computer software is physical "material", as are these physical words physical me is generating with my physical hands and mind using a physical computer, and which you will read after I am done generating them. The message that the physical words convey itself is not physical however, but more of a non-physical message.

When you read these physical words, they are transformed back from their mere physical nature by your mind into the non-physical message that I am using the physical words to convey.

I am reluctant at this moment to give a name to the "non-physical message". And I've quoted Deepsight below because he is pretty close.

DeepSight:

Perhaps before proceeding to define/ describe spirit I should make a small detour/ stop-over here again. The computer software you refer to is a form of informative code which makes it possible to transmit information. So to use an analogy, if you want to copy a song from your computer to your phone, or to an external drive, what is actually moved or copied? What is copied is merely the specific code which represents the song and thus transmits it in a decipherable form. This code could vary from technology to technology and even from language to language. The code remains a method of transmission of the information which represents the song. It is not the song itself which is an immaterial thing.

Thus, the computer, in this analogy, did not generate the song. The mind did.

I hope this is clearly conveyed to you: and I had to stop over to make this absolutely clear, lest we suffer from it further down the road.
I now proceed to describe spirit.

LordReed:


The image you are seeing on the screen is not material, the light conveying that image is what is material not the image itself. These are 2 distinct things.

Hair splitting, my Lord.

If the image on the screen is not material how the heck are you seeing it? With you spirit eyes, perhaps?

DeepSight:

The song remains completely immaterial - even when it is sung by a person, what you hear are actually informative codes which float along sound waves and reach your ears to be transmitted to your brain

No, the song doesn't remain completely immaterial. Deepsight. The singing of the "informative codes" of the song transforms them into physical material that my ears perceive.

I'd even argue that the "informative codes" of the song are material in their own right. You'd note that physical codes need storing in a physical container for starts, and "informative codes" are very song specific.

DeepSight:

This is the same thing with physical sound. It is sound waves in the air which are vibrating, so those vibrations are actually what causes the phenomenon of sound. This does not make the song physical, what I hear are vibrations of physical things, but even if you smash those vibrations you have not destroyed the song, have you? The song is not material, it is not even located anywhere specific in matter, it belongs to the realm of the intangible.

-------
And yet, you are able to play a song in your head. Does that not tell you something?
Do you use your physical ears to listen to a song you play in your head? You are able to speak to yourself silently in your mind. Does your physical ear hear such words? Anyhow this last bit is part of that which I will use in demonstrating an intangible being. So let us let it be for now.

Interesting. But vibrations are actually not what causes the phenomenon of sound (of music).

The maker of the specific music arranged vibrations in a specific way so that that specific song is what you hear when you hear the vibrations arranged in the specific order of that specific song.

And the order of the specific vibrations of a specific song are material, even when you are singing it inside your head.

LordReed:


Which is why it is necessary to settle definitions early. Your definitions don't seem to follow what I know or you seem to conflate so many things I don't understand how you make simple things into complex conundrums.

I blame you, my Lord. You've been here long enough to know definitions are very important since words mean whatever the user understands them to mean which may not be what you understand them to mean.

DeepSight:


Jesus No! certainly not!
Look I really dont know how something so simple has become a problem for you, but a shadow is not a thing, not even an immaterial thing. You cannot simply block light from a surface and then call it a thing, declare it a separate immaterial thing. It is not. Your mind simply discerns a shape from a part of a surface in lesser light as opposed to a part of the surface bathed in greater light. At all times, what you are looking at is that same surface, simple.

I truly must attend to other things, I will be back after hours.
Cheers.

Sorry Deep, but shadows are a thing. And you can simply block light from a surface and then call it a thing.

When I build a house I block off a part to form a shadow so I can sit in comfort in the evening. And when I plant things around my house I ensure the things I want to grow are in or not in shadow according to their need for light.

The argument could be whether it is material or not, but a definition of material would first be needed in order to determine.

budaatum:


Hair splitting, my Lord.

If the image on the screen is not material how the heck are you seeing it? With you spirit eyes, perhaps?

The image you are seeing is a shadow if you will because it is produced by selectively inhibiting light so you not looking at an actual material that has taken the shape of an image. Lemme attempt to contrast this with a physical book . With a physical book you are looking at actual ink on actual paper which you see because light is reflecting off the physical paper into your eyes, with a screen you are looking at a shadow projected through a substrate, the image you are seeing is a virtual image not the reflection of light off of a physical image. In both cases you are seeing because of light but in one case you are seeing a physical image while in the other you are seeing a virtual image. I don't know how anyone can argue that a virtual image is made of material, that would be bizarre to say the least.

budaatum:


Sorry Deep, but shadows are a thing. And you can simply block light from a surface and then call it a thing.

When I build a house I block off a part to form a shadow so I can sit in comfort in the evening. And when I plant things around my house I ensure the things I want to grow are in or not in shadow according to their need for light.

You cannot call an absence a thing.
That is analogous to calling the absence of either light or sound a thing.
If you do so, once you go into your room at night, if you switch off the lights, then the ensuing darkness is a thing.
It is an absence of light - which is a thing. Light is a thing. The absence of light is not a thing.

But I have said enough on this matter. I am tired of it for now.
Maybe I will have the inspiration to revisit it some other time.

You simply cannot describe an absence of something as a separate thing in itself.
An absence is not a thing.

budaatum:


Yes, my Lord, computer software is physical "material", as are these physical words physical me is generating with my physical hands and mind using a physical computer, and which you will read after I am done generating them. The message that the physical words convey itself is not physical however, but more of a non-physical message.

When you read these physical words, they are transformed back from their mere physical nature by your mind into the non-physical message that I am using the physical words to convey.

I am reluctant at this moment to give a name to the "non-physical message". And I've quoted Deepsight below because he is pretty close.

I think you are conflating your physical acts with the words on your device screen. The words on your device screen are virtual they are not made of material. They are a projection. Will you call the image in a cinema hall screen a physical image? It's not. If you think it is, what is it made of? Similar question to what is a shadow made of.

DeepSight:

Numbers - Numbers are representational of quantity, volume, size, length and the like. They are an immaterial construct, and do not exist in and of themselves as a thing. The number 7 is not a thing. It is neither a material thing nor an immaterial thing. It doesn't have any independent existence save with reference to representation of quantities, volumes, sizes, etc.

I'd say a specific shadow is a number "with reference to representation of quantities, volumes, sizes, etc". While shadow in general is like number 7.

One can qualify and quantify a specific shadow, which does make it a thing.

LordReed:


The image you are seeing is a shadow if you will because it is produced by selectively inhibiting light so you not looking at an actual material that has taken the shape of an image. Lemme attempt to contrast this with a physical book . With a physical book you are looking at actual ink on actual paper which you see because light is reflecting off the physical paper into your eyes, with a screen you are looking at a shadow projected through a substrate, the image you are seeing is a virtual image not the reflection of light off of a physical image. In both cases you are seeing because of light but in one case you are seeing a physical image while in the other you are seeing a virtual image. I don't know how anyone can argue that a virtual image is made of material, that would be bizarre to say the least.

There is no difference between a "physical image" and a "virtual image" in the specific case of books. I can post you a piece of paper with ink for words, but it will just take a bit longer. Or would you argue that what you just read is not material that I physically created in the comfort of my home and virtually transmitted to you to read?

As for shadow, I know its physically there when it protects me from the sun and my sweating reduces. We can of course argue that the heat is blocked by the building forming the shadow, but that simply would mean the building formed a physical thing which I am benefiting from.

budaatum:


There is no difference between a "physical image" and a "virtual image" in the specific case of books. I can post you a piece of paper with ink for words, but it will just take a bit longer. Or would you argue that what you just read is not material that I physically created in the comfort of my home and virtually transmitted to you to read?

As for shadow, I know its physically there when it protects me from the sun and my sweating reduces. We can of course argue that the heat is blocked by the building forming the shadow, but that simply would mean the building formed a physical thing which I am benefiting from.

The difference is in what they are made of. The virtual book or words are immaterial, they aren't made of substance unlike the book which is made of paper. Similarly, a shadow is not made of substance.

DeepSight:


You cannot call an absence a thing. That is analogous to calling the absence of either light or sound a thing.
If you do so, once you go into your room at night, if you switch off the lights, then the ensuing darkness is a thing.
It is an absence of light - which is a thing. Light is a thing. The absence of light is not a thing.

But I have said enough on this matter. I am tired of it for now.
Maybe I will have the inspiration to revisit it some other time.

You simply cannot describe an absence of something as a separate thing in itself.
An absence is not a thing.

Yes I can call an absence, a thing. An absence of a thing can be a thing in many cases, and in fact, the specific word called not-thing has been formed so I can.

I can claim that the removal of a thing called light has left a thing (or a not-thing) called darkness. Also, an absence of money could be a thing called poverty, and a lack of food to eat can cause a thing called hunger, etc.

Its all in use of language.

LordReed:


I think you are conflating you physical acts with the words on your device screen. The words on your device screen are virtual they are not made of material. They are projection. Will you call the image in a cinema hall screen a physical image? It's not. If you think it is, what is it made of? Similar question to what is a shadow made of.

You are conflating physical things with whatever might be its opposite.

The words you are reading are physical things made by me ordering the letters in a specific order to convey a very specific message, which I will have converted into a virtual image so you can receive and read it. The virtual part is just to overcome the distance between us. If I called you and read it out to you instead you will not claim the voice of buda reading to you is virtual.

Same with the image on a cinema hall screen. I only see it because the screen, and the specific image, are physically there in front of me in the physical cinema hall.

budaatum:


Yes I can call an absence, a thing. An absence of a thing can be a thing in many cases, and in fact, the specific word called not-thing has been formed so I can.

I can claim that the removal of a thing called light has left a thing (or a not-thing) called darkness. Also, an absence of money could be a thing called poverty, and a lack of food to eat can cause a thing called hunger, etc.

Its all in use of language.

Going by this then nothing is a thing. A perfect self- negating statement. You simply can't describe an absence as a thing otherwise you are surrounded by the absence of all things which exist which are not in your presence.

It's truly absurd, but enjoy.

LordReed:


The difference is in what they are made of. The virtual book or words are immaterial, they aren't made of substance unlike the book which is made of paper. Similarly, a shadow is not made of substance.

My Lord, you can not claim a virtual book is not made up of substance just because its not made up of physical paper and physical ink! Paper and ink has simply been evolved in the case of the virtual book and has become virtual ink and virtual paper.

And a shadow is specifically made of physical substance! That building forming a shadow by blocking the sun is a physical substance! Remove the physical building and it will stop forming that specific shadow.

budaatum:


You are conflating physical things with whatever might be its opposite.

The words you are reading are physical things made by me ordering the letters in a specific order to convey a very specific message, which I will have converted into a virtual image so you can receive and read it. The virtual part is just to overcome the distance between us. If I called you and read it out to you instead you will not claim the voice of buda reading to you is virtual.

Same with the image on a cinema hall screen. I only see it because the screen, and the specific image, are physically there in front of me in the physical cinema hall.

Ok then what is the image made of? Tell me what shadow is made of as well.

budaatum:


My Lord, you can not claim a virtual book is not made up of substance just because its not made up of physical paper and physical ink! Paper and ink has simply been evolved in the case of the virtual book and has become virtual ink and virtual paper.

And a shadow is specifically made of physical substance! That building forming a shadow by blocking the sun is a physical substance! Remove the physical building and it will stop forming that specific shadow.

Viirtual ink and virtual paper are not material. If you think they are then what are they made of?

I didn't ask for what is making the shadow, I asked what the shadow itself is made of.

DeepSight:


Going by this then nothing is a thing. A perfect self- negating statement. You simply can't describe an absence as a thing otherwise you are surrounded by the absence of all things which exist which are not in your presence.

It's truly absurd, but enjoy.

You make it sound like "truly absurd" is a negative thing.

Indeed, one is "surrounded by the absence of all things which exist which are not in your presence". It's actually a state of being to be "surrounded by the absence of all things which exist which are not in your presence", and is the basis of human existence called want, and desire, and so on.

I am surrounded by poverty which is the absence of a thing which exists which is not in my presence, and when I am hungry its because I am surrounded by food that might exist but not in the proximity to my mouth and my belly.

budaatum:


You make it sound like "truly absurd" is a negative thing.

Indeed, one is "surrounded by the absence of all things which exist which are not in your presence". It's actually a state of being to be "surrounded by the absence of all things which exist which are not in your presence", and is the basis of human existence called want, and desire, and so on.

I am surrounded by poverty which is the absence of a thing which exists which is not in my presence, and when I am hungry its because I am surrounded by food that might exist but not in the proximity to my mouth and my belly.

In that case, take good care of my absence, a real thing which is right beside you.
Good night.

LordReed:

Virtual ink and virtual paper are not material. If you think they are then what are they made of?

Electricity, light, sand, silicon, etc, my Lord. Everything required to make the device I type the physical words on and which work together to transmit them to you.

LordReed:

I didn't ask for what is making the shadow, I asked what the shadow itself is made of.

Do they really differ? The building makes the shadow by blocking some light from where the shadow is.

The shadow is made of light, or specifically by the reduction of light in the shadow area.