Talking to oneself and retrieving knowledge {thinking, epistemology} can lead to further thoughts.
thinker
Thought processes seem to imply thinking things, selves, or persons.
process
Thoughts use previous-moment thoughts. Thoughts can arise spontaneously. Thought processes can use categories and meta-qualities. Thought includes self-model.
stages
First thinking stage is to perceive. Second stage is to process perceptions using logic, concepts, and propositions, to form new perceptions, judge existing patterns, and find causes and effects.
First thought stage describes objects and events. Next thought stage describes how objects and events work. Next thought stage explains why objects and events work that way or are that way. Next thought stage relates objects and events to nearby things. Next thought stage relates objects and events to distant things in space, time, or abstract spaces. Next thought stage predicts what objects and events will be or do. Next thought stage demonstrates how objects and events fit theory or principles. Next thought stage is theory construction.
thought
Thought includes all mentation and cognition, conscious and unconscious. Thoughts are mental states and events with content, which people use to know how to perceive and act. They are always changing, are continuous, and are about objects. Thoughts can think other thoughts, so thinkers are thought-systems. Only thoughts have intrinsic value. Human biology makes thought, perception, and relations to world similar, allowing understanding and communication.
thought: mental content
Content is objects, properties, and relations. Mental states and cognitive systems have symbols and representations about something else. Experienced features are intrinsic, non-intentional features that cause phenomena. People can introspect such features. Such features can be different even if representation or intentional content does not change. Such mental features relate to physical-object properties. Beliefs or desires change will, which causes actions.
thought: non-conceptual content
Content {non-conceptual content} can be about abilities and experiences.
thought: infinities
Infinity is uncountable and has parts that have as many terms as whole. People can conceive of all space. People can conceive of being outside space. People can conceive of all time. People can conceive of being outside time, with no past, present, or future.
thought: motions
Animals can know motion directions, speeds, and endpoints. Animals can distinguish living-thing and non-living-thing motions, to protect against predators. Some animals can tell if animals are looking and in what directions.
thought: number
Number is plurality of plurality of pluralities. It is for counting individual objects. It applies to nouns and verbs as countable things vs. continuous amounts {mass noun, number}. Primates have object and number concepts, which allow numerical reasoning.
thought: object functions
Animals have interest in object and event functions, with which they interact. Animals can know other-animal and inanimate-object behavior frequencies. Animals can know other-animal and inanimate-object reactions to actions.
thought: idea relations
Relations conjoin two predicates or are one proposition with two variables. Relations can be about things inside {internal relation} or things outside {external relation}. *Relations are pairs: origin-destination, action-actor, difference-cause, recipient-method, motive-obstacle, trajectory-instrument, object-vehicle, and time-place.
Objects and object parts are connected/disconnected, inside/outside, left/right, vertical/diagonal/horizontal, large/medium/small, and above/below, as well as related by relative distance.
thought: space and cause
Spatial reasoning is causal reasoning, because to explain cause requires space.
thought: communication
Animals use communication to get others into same mental state.
thought: expression
People do not express thoughts with no reports or intentions to report.
People have outward thoughts, what is said in public, and innermost thoughts, what is thought in private {doi takeo}. Their knowledge concepts differ.
Neural events can cause mental events {psychophysical law}.
People can think using hypotheses, evidence, and logic {theory formation theory} {theory theory, epistemology}. This thinking determines what third person says. Only humans imagine that others have mental states or intentions. First person is active, is agent, has goals, makes decisions, has intentions, and deliberates, whereas third person is passive and has only functional modules.
People can mentally model how world works {simulation theory, epistemology}.
People can think about situation facts from different viewpoints {situation theory}.
Syntactical processes simulate semantic relations {proof theory, semantics}.
Beliefs and desires are theoretical {thought-theory}.
People can use as few concepts as necessary to explain ideas {Ockham's razor} {Ockham razor} {Occam's razor}. The simplest theory that is valid is the preferred theory. The simplest theory requires the least information. Inductive reasoning can find a simple program to use, but it is impossible to prove that the program is minimal.
Nothing happens without adequate reasons or causes {sufficient reason principle}| {principle of sufficient reason}, though people cannot usually know reasons.
People can produce, and think about, new thoughts {productivity, language} {language productivity}.
People can misrepresent {disjunction problem} {problem of misrepresentation} {misrepresentation problem}.
States {doxastic state}| can be about beliefs and similar things. Mental-information states can be non-conscious {subdoxastic state, non-conscious} or have non-mental information {non-doxastic state}.
Physical things can use basic-science languages {linguistic physicalism}.
Semantic ideas, such as references, can be explainable by non-semantic ideas, such as correlation, causation, resemblance, structure, or teleology {naturalized semantics}.
People can refer to non-existent things and events {Plato's beard} {Plato beard}.
Words are in larger expressions or link expressions to make larger expressions {scope, expression} {expression scope}. Scopes can be noun phrases, complex sentences, or predicates. If sentences rearrange or make inferences, words often have ambiguous scope or change scope, causing fallacy {scope fallacy, philosophy}. Statement, subject, or predicate negation changes scope. Reference change changes scope.
Questioning others {Socratic method}| {elenchus method} {refutation method} {method of elenchus} {method of refutation} can obtain agreement on facts and definitions; find contradictions, fallacies, and incomplete ideas; end false beliefs; obtain understanding; and reach agreed conclusions.
Descriptions can use logical particles, connectives, and other logical constants {syncategorematum}.
People can imagine experiments {thought experiment}| to test physical theories. Thought experiments are complex, because mind has hidden variables and results are not directly verifiable. Computers and/or people can perform mental experiments, to see actual results, note pitfalls, and propose better experiments. Experiments can also have control groups, with which to compare results, to verify that no other variables affected experiment except intended variable.
Analysis {topic-neutral analysis} can state something is similar to something else, but state nothing about objects, events, states, or properties.
Thinking {verbal thinking} can be in words without talking to oneself.
Mental states can be about something else {representation, symbolic} {symbolic representation}. Representation is neither reflexive nor symmetric.
types
Representations are beliefs, hopes, fears, or ideas.
forms
Representations can be linguistic, non-linguistic, or other mental states. Representations can use gestures, sounds, marks, or natural phenomena.
interpretation
The same representation can be about several different objects or events, depending on interpretation. Different interpretations can make different representations. Representations do not necessarily resemble the represented. Representations are not necessarily about real external objects or concepts but about perceptions, experiences, history, or actions relative to external objects. Representations can represent concepts, as well as things.
Similarity representation does not imply representation similarity. Representation absence is not the same as absence representation. Representation presence is not the same as presence representation.
process
Representations are not just labeling and not just associations between arbitrary symbols and the represented. Outside rules or other agents do not assign representations. Representations use agent structure or configuration, with functions. Representations have meaning to agents, because structures or functions associate with agent history, memory, structures, and functions. Agents can use representations, such as goals or reasons.
process: information
Representations include only parts and relations necessary to act for survival and omit most information about objects and events. Principles include how objects construct. Representations build through multiple eye fixations and so involve memory. Representations have hierarchies, in which larger patterns inhibit smaller ones.
images
Representations store general shapes at low resolution and parts at higher resolution. Representations include features and feature probabilities. Surfaces can be ellipsoidal segments, so objects and events can be like generalized ellipsoids, whose equation is a*x^2 + b*x + c*y^2 + d*y + e*z^2 + f*z + g = 0. Networks need 10 to 100 units to represent all possible three-dimensional-object views. Representations can include viewer-centered and object-centered properties.
People can introspect about representation {higher-order thought theory, meta-representation} (HOT theory) and so make consciousness {meta-representation} (Rosenthal). However, why should consciousness require thinking about mental states? Is culture necessary to have higher-order thoughts?
Cognitive representations have intrinsic connections {systematicity argument}. Reasoning is systematic.
Representations have both causal factors and conceptual-role factors {two-factor theories}. However, why do the factors match?
True statements {fact} about reality are possible. Facts can be true or false, based on perceptions and explanations.
Names {name, epistemology} are singular, like proper nouns, or general, like common nouns.
Statements {synthetic statement}| can state empirical facts.
Facts or beliefs have negations {counterfactual}|. Beliefs can be true if negations are false {counterfactual theory}. The statement "If P happens, then Q happens" {causation, conditional} can invert to "If Q does not happen, then P does not happen" {counterfactual conditional}.
For all a and b, "a is true if and only if b" and "b is true if and only if a" are true {equivalence thesis}.
Proving statements false {falsification}| can gain knowledge.
Reasoning can use difficult sentence types, rhetorical argument tricks, or emotional tactics {sophism}|.
Logical inferences {valid inference} can have conclusions that are true in any interpretation in which premises are true. Valid inferences, and logic, depend on word references, not uses.
Two inductions can lead to the same cause, or two testimonies or experiments can state the same fact {consilience}|.
Statements and opposites can combine into higher-level statements {dialectic}|.
Explanations {explanation} describe how parts work, how parts interact, and how interactions combine to give system output from input. Explanations describe units that interact and interaction rules. Rules include goals and representations. Explanations involve reasons and methods to recognize or evaluate reasons. Explanations must leave something out.
use
Knowing how to use something is not the same as knowing how it works.
expression
Understanding requires actually saying or writing explanations.
types
Explanations include function from structure, means to ends, conclusion from premises, effect from causes, and body from support.
Interpreting {interpretation, word} {word interpretation} can assign semantic values to all statement words.
How mind acquires knowledge, and how people judge knowledge {judgment, epistemology}, are two different processes. Beliefs are concepts about whether perceptions are real.
If people know p, people know that they know p {KK-thesis}.
Causal explanations require general concepts {meta-account} about units and laws.
In rules, equivalent-thing substitution should preserve truth {salva veritate}. However, some situations do not substitute this way.
Statements can refer to themselves {self-reference, statement}. Self-reference causes some paradoxes.
Particulars {particular} are class examples or object properties. Experiences are only about particulars.
Mental constructs {universal, epistemology} depend on inductive inference from experiences of particulars.
quantifier
Statements can include "all...", "some...", or "at least one...".
predicates
Universal statements are actually predicates. They mean, "The objects exist, and, if there is such object, then..." Asserting existence requires subject. Asserting essence requires predicate. Only particular nouns can be statement subjects.
particulars
Universals, Ideas, or Forms are actually particulars. For example, beauty is not itself beautiful. Beauty is not pattern for beauty or the beautiful itself. Universals are relative, not absolute. They are object qualities.
Beliefs, desires, and perhaps thoughts are statements that contain propositions, mental ideas, or situations {intentionality}|. They point to something, imaginary or real, inside or outside self. Intentionality logically relates person and objects, events, and statements. People can pay attention to, track, speak about, and know about objects, events, and statements.
Intention relates represented and representer. Agents have beliefs or wants about representations.
language
Reference can happen only in languages. Reference to something else is the foundation for all languages. Different symbolic representations can use different languages.
mental states
Perhaps, all mental states and events are intentions. For example, hopes, fears, ideas, beliefs, desires, thoughts, perceptions, dreams, and hallucinations are about, or of, something else. Sentences, questions, poems, headlines, instructions, pictures, charts, films, symphonic tone poems, and computer programs are intentions.
mental states: non-intentional
Mental phenomena, such as pain and pleasure, can be only about themselves, not intentional. Conscious states can be non-representational. However, pains and itches can be about body locations, orgasms can be about body changes, and emotions and moods can be body states.
consciousness
Representations can be non-conscious. Before uttering or comprehending, sentences seemingly represent. Perhaps, they represent only after conscious understanding. Unconscious beliefs represent. Perhaps, they represent only by association with conscious beliefs. Cognitive processing uses unconscious representation. Controlling machines use representations. Lower animals and plants represent environmental properties.
Consciousness can be about representation type, for example, behavior that controls representations (Tye) (Dretske). Consciousness selects from behavior sets or ranges. However, unconscious processes control most behavior (Libet) (Goodale).
comparison to relations
Because they reference something else, beliefs and hopes differ from ordinary relations like nouns or spatial relations.
Intentional relations {intentional idiom} are referentially opaque relation subsets.
Messages {message, epistemology} explain intentionality using information-theory concepts.
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Date Modified: 2022.0225