The Spacetime Of Galilean Relativity Viewed Through Systemic Functional Linguistics

Penrose (2004: 386-7):

What Galileo teaches us is that the dynamical laws are precisely the same when referred to any uniformly moving frame. … There is nothing to distinguish the physics of the state of rest from that of uniform motion. In terms of what has been said above, what this tells us is that there is no dynamical meaning to saying that a particular point in space is, or is not, the same point as some chosen point in space at a later time. In other words, our cinema-screen analogy is inappropriate! There is no background space — a ‘screen’ — which remains fixed as time evolves. 

We cannot meaningfully say that a particular point p in space (say, the point of the exclamation mark on the keyboard of my laptop) is, or is not, the same point in space as it was a minute ago. To address this issue more forcefully, consider the rotation of the Earth. According to this motion, a point fixed to the Earth’s surface (at the latitude of Oxford, say) will have moved by some 10 miles in the minute under consideration. Accordingly, the point p that I had just selected will now be situated somewhere in the vicinity of the neighbouring town of Witney, or beyond. But wait! I have not taken the Earth’s motion about the sun into consideration. If I do that, then I find that p will now be about one hundred times farther off, but in the opposite direction (because it is a little after mid-day, and the Earth’s surface, here, now moves oppositely to its motion about the Sun), and the Earth will have moved away from p to such an extent that p is now beyond the reach of the Earth’s atmosphere! But should I not have taken into account the sun’s motion about the centre of our Milky Way galaxy? Or what about the ‘proper motion’ of the galaxy itself within the local group? Or the motion of the local group about the centre of the Virgo cluster of which it is a tiny part, or of the Virgo cluster in relation to the vast Coma supercluster, or perhaps the Coma cluster towards ‘the Great Attractor’? 

Clearly we should take Galileo seriously. There is no meaning to be attached to the notion that any particular point in space a minute from now is to be judged as the same point in space as the one that I have chosen.

Blogger Comments:

From the perspective of Systemic Functional Linguistic Theory, the general confusion here is of 'location' with 'thing'. First, a second-order location (space realised in a projected image) is confused with a first-order thing onto which the image is projected (a cinema screen). Then, a location ('point in space') is confused with a thing ('the point of an exclamation mark'), which naturally leads to the confused notion that a location changes its location ('is not the same point in space') as processes unfold.

If 'location' and 'thing' are not confused, then it is things that change their locations — relative to other things — as processes unfold.

Aristotelian Simultaneity Viewed Through Systemic Functional Linguistics

Penrose (2004: 384-5):

In Aristotelian physics — and, indeed, in the later dynamical scheme(s) of Galileo and Newton — there is an absolute notion of temporal simultaneity. Thus, it has absolute meaning to say, according to such dynamical schemes, that the time here, at this very moment, as I sit typing this in my office at home in Oxford, is ‘the same time’ as some event taking place on the Andromeda galaxy (say the explosion of some supernova star). 

To return to our analogy of the cinema screen, we can ask whether two projected images, occurring at two widely separated places on the screen, are taking place simultaneously or not. The answer here is clear. The events are to be taken as simultaneous if and only if they occur in the same projected frame. Thus, not only do we have a clear notion of whether or not two (temporally separated) events occur at the same spatial location on the screen, but we also have a clear notion of whether or not two (spatially separated) events occur at the same time. 

Moreover, if the spatial locations of the two events are different, we have a clear notion of the distance between them, whether or not they occur at the same time (i.e. the distance measured along the screen); also, if the times of the two events are different, we have a clear notion of the time interval between them, whether or not they occur at the same place.

Blogger Comments:

From the perspective of Systemic Functional Linguistic Theory, the notion of 'simultaneity' is concerned with the ordering of processes in time. Importantly, in the case of the visual representation of processes projected onto a cinema screen, the temporal ordering of such processes is relative to — and construed by — the unfolding of the mental processes of viewers.

'Objectively Real' vs 'Psychological Invention' Viewed Through Systemic Functional Linguistic Theory

Davies & Gribbin (1992: 129-30):

Philosophers have long debated the thorny issue of whether the present moment is objectively real, or just a psychological invention. Those, such as Hans Riechenbach and G. J. Whitrow, who have argued for the reality of the present are known as 'A-theorists', while their opponents, among whom are some distinguished figures such as A. J. Ayer, J. J. C. Smart are called 'B-theorists'.

 

Blogger Comments:

On the one hand, the opposition between 'objectively real' and 'just a psychological invention' derives from the Galilean distinction between primary qualities (e.g. the position and motion of bodies) and secondary qualities (e.g. odours and sounds), with primary qualities being the only valid domain of scientific study. See, for example, the earlier posts:

The Thoughts Of Galileo Vs Systemic Functional Linguistics

Edelman On Galileo Through Systemic Functional Linguistics

On the other hand, the notion of 'objectively real' takes a 'transcendent' view of meaning, such that meaning transcends semiotic systems like language. In this view, experience is pre-categorised, independent of semiotic systems, and the task of science is to identify those categories and their relations.

However, this 'transcendent' view of meaning is invalidated by the experiments of quantum physics, which demonstrate that, in the words of John Wheeler, 'no phenomenon is a real phenomenon until it is an observed phenomenon'; that is, that 'reality' is the meaning that we (intersubjectively) construe of experience. This is the 'immanent' view of meaning: that meaning is created as semiotic systems. In this view, the task of science is to make meanings of meanings, primarily of the meanings of language construed of the meanings of perceptual systems.

The Kuhnian Notion Of A Scientific Paradigm

Davies & Gribbin (1992: 17):

The philosopher Thomas Kuhn believes that scientists adopt certain distinct paradigms that are tenaciously retained, and are abandoned only in the face of glaring absurdities. These paradigms help to shape scientific theories, and exercise a powerful influence over the methodology of science and the conclusions drawn from experiments.

Blogger Comments:

This notion of a scientific paradigm can be understood as an ontology that is construed on the basis of specific epistemological assumptions. A paradigm shift can thus be just an ontological shift or an entire epistemological shift.  

For example, the shift from the absolute space and time of Newton to the relative space-time of Einstein was an ontological shift within the epistemological assumptions of Galilean science. 

Quantum physics, on the other hand, is inconsistent with such assumptions, and requires an epistemological shift that accommodates its finding that, as John Wheeler puts it, 'no phenomenon is a real phenomenon until it is an observed phenomenon'. This includes the epistemological shift from 'meaning as transcendent' to 'meaning as immanent'.

Science As "Extensional" Through Systemic Functional Linguistics

Edelman (1992: 233):

The subsequent development of the computer…reinforced the ideas of efficiency and rigour and the deductive flavour that had already characterised much of physical science. The "neat" deductive formal background of computers, the link with mathematical physics, and the success of the hard sciences looked endlessly extensible. There was a natural tendency to stop a philosophical analysis of scientific exploration at the surface of the human body (the skin and its receptors). Behaviour could be analysed, but not phenomenal experience. In this way, science could remain "extensional," as W. V. Quine put it, and one could declare with him that "to be is to be a value of a variable."

Blogger Comments:

As previously noted, science is concerned with what Galileo distinguished as 'primary qualities' (as opposed to 'secondary qualities'), and what Descartes termed 'res extensa' (as opposed to 'res cogitans').  It is in this Cartesian sense that science 'could remain' "extensional".

From the perspective of Systemic Functional Linguistic Theory, this means that science is concerned with construals of experience of the non-semiotic domain as material-relational meaning (as opposed to mental-verbal meaning).  It is the mental-verbal domain of meaning that constitutes 'phenomenal experience' in this context.

The Place Of Conscious Observers In Scientific Descriptions Through Systemic Functional Linguistics

Edelman (1992: 209):

The solution to the problem of how we know, feel, and are aware is not contained in a philosophical sentence, however profound. It must emerge from an understanding of how biological systems and relationships evolved in the physical world. 

When that evolution resulted in language, the imaginable world became infinite. There is great beauty and much hope in the realisation of this open-endedness of imagination. But we must continually return from that world to the world of matter if we are to see how as conscious observers we are actually placed within our own descriptions. Analysing that placement will be one of the major goals of the science of the future.

Blogger Comments:

From the perspective of Systemic Functional Linguistic Theory, the world of matter is the world of the material-relational domain of first-order meaning (phenomena), whereas the world of imagination is the world of second-order meaning (metaphenomena): the projected ideas and locutions of the symbolic processing of the mental-verbal domain.

The place of the conscious observer in scientific descriptions is as the mental-verbal medium through which the meaning of language, construed of experience, is reconstrued as the meaning of the language of science.

Because the mental-verbal domain ('secondary qualities') is not the concern of Galilean science, it is limited to understanding the place of conscious observers in its descriptions only in material-relational terms.

Realism And Materialism Through Systemic Functional Linguistics

Edelman (1992: 161):

By taking the position of biologically based epistemology, we are in some sense realists and also sophisticated materialists. … And by assuming that the brain is a somatic selective system, we rule out the idea of the little man or homunculus in the head. He is no more necessary to the sciences of somatic recognition than special creation or the argument from design is to evolution. If he is res cogitans, he is exorcised.

Blogger Comments:

To be clear, both realism and materialism assume that meaning is transcendent of semiotic systems.  Realism assumes that reality exists independent of the mind; materialism assumes that materiality is the basis of reality.

From the perspective of Systemic Functional Linguistic Theory, meaning is a property of semiotic systems, and on this basis, reality and existence are construals of experience as meaning.  By the same token, materiality is the construal of experience as the material-relational domain of meaning.

Galilean science is concerned with a realist interpretation of the material-relation domain ('primary qualities') at the expense of the mental-verbal domain ('secondary qualities').  Cartesian philosophy justifies the material-relational domain (res extensa) by the certainty of the mental-verbal domain (res cogitans).

Exorcising the res cogitans is consistent with Galilean science, but it leaves the mental-verbal domain only accounted for in terms of the material-relational domain.

Assumptions Of A Scientific View Of The Mind Through Systemic Functional Linguistics

Edelman (1992: 159):

We should first state the assumptions of a scientific view [of the mind]:

There is a real world — one described by the laws of physics, which apply everywhere. (This is the physics assumption.) 

We are embedded in that world, follow its laws, and have evolved from an ancient origin. The mind arose on the basis of new evolutionary morphology. (This is the evolutionary assumption.) 

It is possible to put the mind back into nature. A science of mind based on biology is feasible. The way to avoid vicious circles and dead ends is to construct a brain theory based on selectionist principles. (This is the central argument of this book.)

Blogger Comments:

From the perspective of Systemic Functional Linguistic Theory, the real world described by the laws of physics is a construal of experience as the material-relational domain of meaning.  The laws of physics are reconstruals of such meanings as the meanings of theory.

The laws of physics, as reconstruals of meaning, are not obeyed by the construals of experience that they describe, any more than a map is obeyed by the terrain it reconstrues.

The 'we' that is embedded in the material-relational domain of meaning construed of experience is the construal of experience as the mental-verbal domain of meaning.

Putting the mind back into nature would entail not only identifying the processes of its material-relational domain, an embodied brain, but also identifying the processes of the mental-verbal domain.  This distinction of domains largely corresponds to the Galilean distinction between primary and secondary qualities, and the Cartesian distinction between res extensa and res cogitans.

A Scientific Connection Between The Mental And Physical Viewed Through Systemic Functional Linguistics

Edelman (1992: 153-4):

In Modes of Thought, Whitehead pointed out that philosophy is the attempt to make manifest the fundamental evidence as to the nature of things. In the same work, he remarked that scientific reasoning is completely dominated by the presupposition that mental functionings are not properly part of nature. He deplored this and hoped that a proper connection between the mental and physical could be forged within science itself.

Blogger Comments:

From the perspective of Systemic Functional Linguistic Theory, science since Galileo has been concerned with the outer material-relational domain of meaning (Galileo's 'primary qualities'), whereas mental functionings are those of the inner mental-verbal domain of meaning (Galileo's 'secondary qualities').  Consistent with Galilean science, Edelman's Theory of Neuronal Group Selection provides a model of the inner domain in terms of the outer domain that makes the emergence of the inner domain possible.

A 'Scientific' Theory Of Consciousness Through Systemic Functional Linguistics

Edelman (1992: 82):

To be scientific, the theory must be based on the assumption that all cognition and all conscious experience rest solely on processes and orderings occurring in the physical world.

Blogger Comments:

To be clear, this criterion for 'scientific' derives from Galileo's primary qualities and Descartes' res extensa, as previously discussed on this blog.  Note that, on this model, Chomsky's Formal linguistics is not scientific, since it is concerned instead with Descartes' res cogitans.

From the perspective of Systemic Functional Linguistics, this approach to 'cognition and all conscious experience' reconstrues the 'inner domain' of mental (and verbal) processes in terms of the 'outer domain' of material and relational processes.  That is, it provides the material basis for consciousness, but stops short of modelling consciousness itself.

Behaviourist Psychology Through Systemic Functional Linguistics

Edelman (1992: 67):

One reaction to this state of affairs was to declare the subject off limits and insist that science should concern itself only with behaviour that was observable in ways defined by the forms of successful scientific inquiry concerned with nonintentional objects. In an attempt to salvage the "scientific" posture without denying intentionality, and in contrast to this behaviourism, a different position was later taken by cognitive science.

Blogger Comments:

To be clear, the behaviourist approach to psychology is an attempt to model behaviour broadly within the mechanistic epistemological framework established by Galileo, focusing on measurable primary qualities, rather than secondary 'subjective' qualities. In Cartesian terms, this is modelling behaviour in terms of res extensa rather than res cogitans.

From the perspective of Systemic Functional Linguistic theory, behaviourism is concerned with the behavioural manifestations of consciousness rather than consciousness itself: mental and verbal processes, and their projections, ideas (meanings) and locutions (wordings).

Descartes' Res Extensa And Res Cogitans Through Systemic Functional Linguistics

Edelman (1992: 11):

It is here that the second great figure of the scientific revolution of the seventeenth century, Descartes, comes to the fore. In his search for a method of thought, he was led to declare for "substance dualism." As I mentioned earlier, according to this view the world consisted of res extensa (extended things) and res cogitans (thinking things). Galilean manipulations work on res extensa, the set of extended things. But res cogitans, the set of thinking things, does not exist properly in time and space; lacking location, not being an extended thing, it cannot fall into the purview of an external observer. Worse still is the problem of interactionism: the mind and the body must communicate. With an uncharacteristic lack of clarity, Descartes declared that the pineal gland was the place where interactions between res cogitans and res extensa occurred.

Blogger Comments:

From the perspective of Systemic Functional Linguistic theory, 'substance dualism' arises from construing experience as things, rather than as processes involving participants.

A thinking thing (res cogitans) is a metaphorical reconstrual of a 'thing thinking', that is, of a senser mediating a cognitive mental process, through which ideas are projected into semiotic existence.

An extended thing (res extensa) is a construal of experience as a phenomenon of a perceptive mental process mediated by a senser.

Descartes' distinction is thus between the medium of a cognitive process (res cogitans) and the range (or agent) of a perceptive process (res extensa), this being a contrast along two dimensions: process type and degree of involvement in the process.

However, contrā Descartes, a thinking thing (res cogitans) is construable as located in time and space, as demonstrated by any clause in which a cognitive mental process is located in time and space, such as Einstein thought so in Bern in 1905.  Spatio-temporal location is thus not limited to the phenomena of perceptive mental processes.

On the other hand, although cognitive mental processes are not perceivable phenomena, the behavioural processes that manifest them are, as demonstrated by construals such as they saw him meditating.

they	saw	him meditating
Senser	Process: mental: perceptive	Phenomenon him meditating Behaver Process: behavioural

Physiological Models Of The Brain Through Systemic Functional Linguistics

Edelman (1992: 11):

But as Whitehead duly noted, the mind was put back into nature with the rise of physiology and physiological psychology in the latter part of the nineteenth century. We have had an embarrassing time knowing what to do with it ever since. just as there is something special about relativity and quantum mechanics, there is something special about the problems raised by these physiological developments. Are observers themselves "things," like the rest of the objects in their world? How do we account for the curious ability of observers (indeed, their compelled need) to carve up their world into categories of things — to refer to things of the world when things themselves can never so refer? When we ourselves observe observers, this property of intentionality is unavoidable.

Blogger Comments:

To be clear, the rise of physiology and physiological psychology did not put the mind into nature; it merely began the study of the brain from within the confines of Galilean epistemology.

From the perspective of Systemic Functional Linguistic theory, physiological models of the brain are concerned only with the outer domains of experience, doing and being; they are not concerned with the 'conscious-semiotic centre of the ideational universe' (Halliday & Matthiessen 1999: 131): the symbolic processing of sensing and saying that creates content — meaning and wording — through projection.

From this perspective, observers are 'conscious things', and it is this that distinguishes them from non-observers.  Human observers "carve up their world", not by "referring to things in the world", but by construing their experience as meanings, such as 'observer', 'object' and so on.

The Inconsistency Between Galilean Epistemology And Quantum Physics Though Systemic Functional Linguistics

Edelman (1992: 9-10):

Even today after the Einsteinian revolution and the emergence of quantum mechanics, the Galilean procedure has not been swept aside. Albert Einstein's theory of relativity showed how the position and the velocity of the observer altered the measurement of space and time, and by taking acceleration into account it altered the very meaning of the word matter. Quantum mechanics showed that the operation of measurement in the domain of the very small ineluctably involves the actions of the observer who has to choose, within the uncertainty dictated by Planck's constant, the level of precision with which he or she wishes to know either the position or the momentum of a subatomic particle. This reflects what physicists call the Heisenberg uncertainty principle.

Blogger Comments:

While it is true that 'the Galilean procedure has not been swept aside' after the emergence of the theories of relativity and quantum mechanics, these theories differ significantly from 'the Galilean procedure' in as much as both involve the observer in the theory.

From the perspective of Systemic Functional Linguistic theory, by including the observer, the theories of relativity and quantum mechanics construe experience as meanings that are the cognitive projections of conscious processing — senser and mental process — whereas the original Galilean procedure construes experience as meanings in the absence of the conscious processing that projects them.

As shown in previous posts on Quantum theory, it is this (unrecognised) inconsistency between the two epistemologies that confuses physicists with regard to the "intrusion" of consciousness into the Galilean domain of primary qualities: the position and motion of bodies.

Edelman On Galileo Through Systemic Functional Linguistics

Edelman (1992: 9):

In Science and the Modern World, Alfred North Whitehead observed that in inventing mathematical physics, Galileo removed the mind from nature.  By this figure of speech, I suppose he meant that Galileo insisted that the observer must be objective, that he must avoid the vexing disputes of Aristotelian philosophers over matters of causation. A scientist should instead make measurements according to a model with no human projection or intention built into it and then search for correlative uniformities or laws that either support or disconfirm his or her claims. 

This procedure has worked magnificently for physics and its companion sciences.  Isaac Newton stands as the triumphant figure of its first full flowering.

Blogger Comments:

To be clear, as Kœstler (1979: 476-7) observed — see previous post here — Galileo removed the mind from nature through his distinction between primary qualities (e.g. the position and motion of bodies) and secondary qualities (e.g. odours and sounds), identifying only the former as the domain of scientific description, as expressed in the following excerpt from his Il Saggiatore:

To excite in us tastes, odours, and sounds I believe that nothing is required in external bodies except shapes, numbers, and slow or rapid movements. I think that if ears, tongues, and noses were removed, shapes and numbers and motions would remain, but not odours or tastes or sounds. The latter, I believe, are nothing more than names when separated from living beings.

From the perspective of Systemic Functional Linguistic theory, this is the distinction between quantifiable semiotic construals of visual experience and all other semiotic construals of experience.

This is distinct from Edelman's distinction between 'objective' and 'projective' which, from the perspective of Systemic Functional Linguistic theory, is the distinction between the projected ideas of cognitive and desiderative mental processes, that is: the distinction between thoughts and desires.

Quantum Reality Through Systemic Functional Linguistics

Gribbin (1989: 324):

If only our minds were equipped to handle the same concepts in a more abstract form, in keeping with the quantum equations, so that we could properly understand the nature of quantum reality, where nothing is real unless it is observed, and there is no way of telling what "particles" are doing except at the moments when they interact with one another, then supersymmetry would seem much more natural.  The flaw lies in our imagination rather than in the theory.

Blogger Comments:

The "flaw" here lies in the interpretation of the theory, which results from not questioning the epistemological assumptions of Galileo and Descartes on which classical physics is based, and which quantum physics disconfirms.

From the perspective of Systemic Functional Linguistic theory, it is not that "nothing is real unless it is observed" but that 'real' is a construal of experience as meaning, and without observation, there is neither experience nor its construal as meaning.

The Thoughts Of Bohr vs Einstein Through Systemic Functional Linguistics

Gribbin (1990: 183):

Bohr and his colleagues could live with a reality in which the position and momentum of the second particle had no objective meaning until they were measured, regardless of what you did to the first particle.  A choice had to be made between a world of objective reality and the quantum world, of that there was no doubt.  But Einstein remained in a very small minority in deciding that of the two options open he would cling to objective reality and reject the Copenhagen interpretation.

Blogger Comment:

From the perspective of Systemic Functional Linguistic theory, the position and momentum of any particle are not construed as meaning until they are measured.  "Objective reality" and the quantum world are both construals of experience as meaning.  The findings of quantum theory expose the epistemological error in the notion of an objective reality secundum Galileo.

The Thoughts Of Einstein On The Copenhagen Interpretation Through Systemic Functional Linguistics

Gribbin (1990: 182):

The point of the argument was that, according to Einstein and his collaborators, the Copenhagen interpretation had to be considered as incomplete — that there really is some underlying clockwork that keeps the universe running, and that only gives the appearance of uncertainty and unpredictability at the quantum level, through statistical variations.  According to this view, there is an objective reality, a world of particles that have momentum and position, both precisely defined, even when you are not looking at them.

Blogger Comment:

From the perspective of Systemic Functional Linguistic theory, "objective reality" is a construal of experience as meaning.  When we are not looking, there is no experience to be construed as meaning, and so: there are no construals of experience as particles with momentum and position.  The Copenhagen Interpretation is not incomplete; instead it exposes the epistemological error of Galileo and Descartes.

The 'Schrödinger's Cat' Paradox Through Systemic Functional Linguistics [1]

Gribbin (1990: 2-3):

For what quantum mechanics says is that nothing is real and that we cannot say anything about what things are doing when we are not looking at them.  Schrödinger's mythical cat was invoked to make the differences between the quantum world and the everyday world clear.

In the world of quantum mechanics, the laws of physics that are familiar from the everyday world no longer work.  Instead, events are governed by probabilities.  A radioactive atom, for example, might decay, emitting an electron, say; or it might not.  It is possible to set up an experiment in such a way that there is a precise fifty-fifty chance that one of the atoms in a lump of radioactive material will decay in a certain time and that a detector will register the decay if it does happen.  Schrödinger, as upset as Einstein about the implications of quantum theory, tried to show the absurdity of those implications by imagining such an experiment set up in a closed room, or box, which also contains a live cat and a phial of poison, so arranged that if the radioactive decay does occur then the poison container is broken and the cat dies.  In the everyday world, there is a fifty-fifty chance that that the cat will be killed, and without looking inside the box we can say, quite happily, that the cat inside is either dead or alive.  But now we encounter the strangeness of the quantum world.  According to the theory, neither of the two possibilities open to the radioactive material, and therefore to the cat, has any reality unless it is observed.  The atomic decay has neither happened nor not happened, the cat has neither been killed nor not been killed, until we look inside the box to see what happened.  Theorists who accept the pure version of quantum mechanics say that the cat exists in some indeterminate state, neither dead nor alive, until an observer looks into the box to see how things are getting on.  Nothing is real unless it is observed.

Blogger Comment:

From the perspective of Systemic Functional Linguistic theory, the finding from quantum mechanics that 'we cannot say anything about what things are doing when we are not looking at them' is not at all strange, but entirely consistent with the view that 'what things are doing' is meaning construed of experience.  Without the observation, there is no construal of experience as meaning. The meaning 'Schrödinger's cat is alive/dead' cannot be construed of experience until the observation is made.

The confounding notion of 'real' here derives from the Galilean and Cartesian distinction of 'primary' qualities, such as locomotion and position, being 'out there' in the world of matter versus 'secondary' qualities being 'in here' in the world of the mind.

The Thoughts Of Galileo Vs Systemic Functional Linguistics

Kœstler (1979: 476-7, 535, 537):

Above all, Galileo outlines a principle which became of outstanding importance in the history of thought: the distinction between primary qualities in nature such as the position, number, shape and motion of bodies, and secondary qualities such as colours, odours and tastes, which are said to exist only in the observer's consciousness.

To excite in us tastes, odours, and sounds I believe that nothing is required in external bodies except shapes, numbers, and slow or rapid movements.  I think that if ears, tongues, and noses were removed, shapes and numbers and motions would remain, but not odours or tastes or sounds.  The latter, I believe, are nothing more than names when separated from living beings. …

Though anticipated by the Greek atomists, it is for the first time in the modern age that this distinction is made in such concise terms, the first formulation of the mechanistic view of the universe. …

Galileo takes the hyperstatisation of mathematics a decisive step further by reducing all nature to 'size, figure, number, and slow or rapid motion', and by relegating into the limbo of 'subjective' or 'secondary' qualities everything that cannot be reduced to these elements — including, by implication, ethical values, and the phenomena of the mind. … 

Galileo banished the qualities that are the very essence of the sensual world — colour and sound, heat, odour, and taste — from the realm of physics to that of subjective illusion.

Blogger Comment:

From the perspective of Systemic Functional Linguistic theory, all such qualities, primary and secondary, exist "only in the observer's consciousness" — since they are all meanings construed of experience.  It will be seen later in this blog that it is precisely the continued adoption of Galileo's viewpoint by scientists that makes the experimental findings of Quantum physics seem bizarre.