Hello Joshs,

I think phenomenologists would agree that our ability to represent or model is not primary. They would say instead that there is no experience of any kind that is not conditioned by prior experience, which anticipatively projects forward into and shapes what we actually experience

Oh, I see. What about initial experience then? Or were you conveying a priori knowledge as opposed to “prior experience”?

This mutual dependence between subjective projection and objective appearance is most fundamentally what the world actually is, and we can never get beyond or beneath this intertwined structure of experience to get to an independently objective world or an inner subjective realm.

This sounds an awful lot like Kantianism.

Hello 180 Proof,

Really? How about ...

We must be using the term ‘proposition’ toto genere differently. By it, I mean a grammatical statement that expresses something that is truth-apt.

How is the claim, for example, “all truths are relative” not a grammatical statement that is truth-apt? Or “Consciousness is fundamental to reality”, or “mathematical structures are real”, … ?

Metaphysics is the attempt at determining ‘what things are’. No?
No. It's more like an "attempt at" deducing concepts and interpretions of "what things are".

That’s the same thing. To determine something is to derive concepts and interpretations of something. How is that different?

My point is that it is a study that thinks it can get at what reality actually is, and what things in that reality are. If not, then it is really just the study of determining models of what we experience, which is fine….

Hello Joshs,

Kant’s metaphysics grounds the condition of possibility of experience in something prior to experience. This turns the subjective categories into in-themselves objects, transcendent to the experience they condition.

Correct. He derives transcendental truths. But the problem (I have with him) is that he derives them with the presumption that things still have a causal relationship to us, while also denying that they necessarily have a causal relationship. He takes our direct experience as justification that we represent, and then uses that to annihilate any knowledge that we actually represent anything.

Your recommendation to start out from pure experience runs the risk of substituting for Kant’s idealist metaphysics an empiricist metaphysics in which we assume the objects of pure experience can be made to appear to us disconnected from the presuppositions and expectations we bring to our apprehension of them.

Sort of (I guess). I would say that my view is more a pragmatism, which is definitely more empiricist than Kant, such that we can only produce models for experience and never say that we have any definitive a priori knowledge nor that there are objects impacting our sensibility that, in turn, produce representations. Instead, a priori knowledge is a part of the model wherein we represent things to ourselves. Within my model, I have no problem saying we represent things, and that we do not directly apprehend them.

Phenomenologists like Merleau-Ponty, who advocated a return to the things themselves, argues that the pure experience of things always comes already conditioned by prior experience. Things appear out of a background interpretive field.

Of course. We experience things with preconstructed abilities to represent; but this isn’t where knowledge starts: that’s a model we came up with to predict our experience. It could be that we don’t represent anything at all, nor do ‘we’ exist in the world as it actual is.

Hello Manuel,

If you have science in mind, then I do think you have a model of reality, as close as we can get to it. Sure, it is the human conception, there being no other we can access, unless we do so indirectly. It seems we disagree on what science describes.

How do you know how accurate the knowledge humans can gain through the prism of their experience to reality? Why can’t reality be, for example, actually acausal, irrational, etc.?

By definition, there is not chair absent us, a planet or an atom is a different thing, something we postulate which belongs in the external world.

My point was that the chair does exist, if it there right now, independently of your observation of it; but that this is just a model of experience, and that is not to say that reality has chairs, atoms, nor planets like we perceive them.

I would say that the ‘world in-itself’ as whatever is strictly beyond our experience is the ‘absolute’ and the ‘world in-itself’ within the model that we represent the world is one which would have to have certain properties (presupposed by the model itself)(such as causality, they “impact” us in some way, etc.). — Bob Ross

I don't follow your argument here.

I think the single biggest problem for Kant is that he starts out with a model and not pure experience. We should always start epistemically with pure experience. We do not know immediately that our conscious experience is a representation, once we do take up that model then Kant’s arguments come into play.

For Kant, the phenomena vs. in-itself is a distinction founded within the paradigm (the model) that represent the world (thusly there’s a representation and whatever is actually there that was represented). But this knowledge, this model, is also only valid, under my view, for possible experience; since a close examination of the forms of one’s experience determines that all evidence of us representing the world is conditioned by them.

So, the phenomena vs. in-itself is an incomplete: the absolute is whatever exists beyond our possible forms of experience, and the in-themselves and phenomena are within the possibility of our experience.

Then this is quite different from the title of the OP, because you say you have in mind metaphysics in the sense of beyond all possible experience

The study of things-in-themselves is not solely (necessarily) metaphysics (in the sense of the study of that which is beyond the possibility of experience). There could be something else posited that isn’t a thing-in-itself.

I would add then, that physics in this sense, is metaphysics, because it postulates things that, though discovered through experience, do not depend on experience for existence.

But the knowledge of them is dependent on our experience, and so we can only say that we should expect them to behave within experience as if they persisted beyond our experience in a similar manner within a noumenal space and time—knowing full well we know nothing about what is actually happening in the world in-itself.

I think I follow, but there is more evidence to consider than what reaches consciousness. What reaches experience is but a small portion of everything there is. We don't experience photons - in the sense in which we are aware of them working in us - nor do we experience electrons or plenty of hues in the electromagnetic spectrum and so on.

This is all fine and good within our model of experience, which includes considering things which exist that we cannot directly perceive, of which we perceive (indirect) evidence of their existence.

The issue I have is that, given the title of the OP, you are saying or insinuating that metaphysics is an illegitimate source of knowledge, I disagree with that, because I think it covers much more than whatever is "beyond all possible experience."

But my OP is using the definition of metaphysics which is the study of that which is beyond all possible experience, so within that terminology I am saying it is an illegitimate source of knowledge (which you seem to agree with, but disagree with the semantics).

If there is such a thing as "moral facts", then there is nothing to discuss, no room for philosophy, only for pedagogy, dogma, and proselytizing.

For most moral realists, of course there is a need to discuss the moral facts so that we can discover them.

Further, moral realism in its crudest form is the principle "might makes right". This means that what is right depends on whoever happens to have the upper hand, at any given time

It absolutely does not. Moral realism is the position that (1) moral judgements are cognitive and (2) there are objectively true moral judgments.

What you described is an anti-thesis to moral realism.

Another example of the metaphysical concepts, that you seem to accept as the reality is Time and Space.

I do not claim that reality in-itself has time nor space: only that our forms of experience are time and space.

Hello Corvus,

In that case, your models are not much different from imaginations either

They are impurely imaginative, like science, which is fine so long as the claims are constrained to the forms by which they are attained.

Because you are rejecting metaphysics under the ground of the imperfect knowledge which is beyond your experiences,

No, I am rejecting metaphysics on the grounds that it makes claims about that which is beyond the forms of the evidence supporting it; which means it is devoid completely of empirical content itself, irregardless if one uses it as empirical evidence of it, and this is why there are so many coherent and consistent metaphysical theories out there (of which are incompatible with each other): the world in-itself could be literally anything or nothing at all.

Your body is made of cells? I am not sure if it is a scientific knowledge

It is scientifically proven, via biology, that we have cells and that they compose our organs, skin, etc.

Just because you have empirically verified knowledge doesn't mean it is scientific knowledge.

True.

But it seems clear that your limiting the scope of knowledge to what you can only observe and verify, and it narrows and limits the depth and amount of knowledge you could ge

I would say that I am limiting my knowledge to what is possible within the forms (the overarching constraints) of my experience—and not letting myself jump into the abyss of pure imagination.

Because you would reject any more complicated and deeper knowledge under the excuse of not observable, non verifiable metaphysical knowledge

Perhaps it would be beneficial if you gave an example of such ‘metaphysical knowledge’? Then we could dive into that. As I don’t mind claiming knowledge about something which is within the possibility of experience but hasn’t been directly observed yet.

I never said they are pure imaginations. They are conjectures and imagination in nature.

But that is what I am talking about: claiming that the world really exists as something physical or mental, for example, is purely imaginative.

I will not go into the definition of Metaphysics because you can find them on the internet.

I would like to know your specific definition, so I know what to address.

Metaphysics is about Ontology just like Fine said in his writing. It is conceptualised ontology. For instance, I can ask, discuss or investigate anything about any object as a metaphysical object without having to be concerned with the ins and outs of Biology or Physics or Ethics or a person .... because they are all Beings. In other words, they are Things. (Read Heidegger, What is a Thing?") When an object is viewed as a Being or a Thing, I can ask anything - the meanings, functions, origins, types... and why and how without having to use laboratory instruments

But all of these ‘things’ are only valid as a possible experience—so would you agree that your ‘metaphysical’ inspection or derivation of them is invalid for whatever may exist beyond the forms of your experience?

Your comments on Logic seem to be limited to the classic and symbolic logic. The formulas in different types of logic are replaced with the variables and contents for them to be the main operating logic in the microprocessor of devices or political movements.

My comments pertain to all valid forms of logic. The contents of variables is not a part of the logic itself: it is what gets analyzed through the logic. For example, I could write:

if (x == y){ }

The logical aspect of the above code is purely the form: a conditional which checks if two variables equal each other. The contents of x and y are not a part of the logic, just like how in formal logic x <> y pertains solely to the form and not the content of x or y.

Again, I feel you are limiting and restricting on what metaphysics do in terms of going beyond the reality. The vast area of Philosophy of Mind, Language, Logic, Ethics are metaphysical in nature. It is the nature of questions they ask, and the methods it uses which is different from the other subjects, and it deals with all things existing in the universe.

I can only evaluate this once I understand what definition of metaphysics you are rolling with.

For you using the term, and accepting the fact that you have your own "mental life" proves you are using a Metaphysical concept. Because your mental life is an entity that is beyond possibility of experience by another person, from the rest of the population in the universe points of view it is a Metaphysical entity

Firstly, me knowing I have a mental life is not beyond the possibility of my experience—thusly not metaphysical.

For other people, if they were to derive that I have a mental life from pure imagination, then, yes, that would be metaphysical. However, I think one can ground other people having mental lives from empirical evidence and thusly it is not purely imaginative—but the arguments are only valid as possible experience. I would never say we have justification that my nor your mental life exists in the world as it is in-itself.

Hello 180 Proof,

Philosophical statements are not propositions about the world

Yes they absolutely are. Give an example of a ‘philosophical statement’ which is not a proposition which references the world in any manner.

You unwarrantedly assume that such an inquiry attempts to determine 'how things are' and then criticize it for failing to do so

Metaphysics is the attempt at determining ‘what things are’. No?

And your 'antirealist' (mis)conception of science is inadequate as well insofar as natural sciences consist in models of phenomena, which are not remotely what you keep calling "models of experience" (e.g. Neo-kantian "symbolic forms")

The only difference between ‘phenomena’ (in the neo-kantian sense) and my term ‘experience’ is that the latter isn’t necessary a representation.

Thank you: I will look into it and get back to you.

Hello 180 Proof,

To "define ... that which is beyond" seems patent nonsense to me.

But this is clearly a straw man. I didn’t try to define that which is beyond the possibility of experience: I defined a term as whatever is beyond the possibility of experience. Surely, those are two completely separate actions.

Also, "the possibility of experience" amounts to an anthropic / subjectivity-bias (contra Copernicus' mediocity principle & Peirce's fallibilism). Typical idealism.

You cannot go beyond your experience, so I think its actually a humble epistemic position: I am not advocated for ontological idealism on these grounds, that would also be completely unattainable here.

IME, metaphysics has always been the reflective study of the most general prerequisites (i.e. ontology) for rationally making sense – interpreting the paradigm changes, research programs & provisional results – of physics (i.e. the counter-intuitive, defeasible study of nature (i.e. ontics)).

Perhaps we are merely semantically disagreeing; as I have no problem with trying to interpret physics for the sake of having a model of experience. It’s when one thinks they are actually gaining knowledge of the world in-itself (or what I call the absolute) that is completely unwarranted.

In other words, metaphysics describes what also must be the case and not be the case in order for 'whatever we think can or cannot be the case'

Let me ask you this: do you think reality in-itself could be existing in a state that we would all, limited by our human cognition, think is impossible? Because I do, and thusly find it useful to think of ‘metaphysics’ (ignoring our semantical differences for a second) in the way you mentioned, but it wouldn’t get at traditional ontology (in the sense of understanding the world in-itself).

Study nature; then reflect on 'what makes it possible to study nature' (not merely to have 'subjective experiences') – Aristotle surpasses his teacher Plato here – this is metaphysics, or where ("first") philosophizing begins ("in wonder").

Again, does this reflection give you knowledge of the world in-itself, or some sort of indirect window into it? I certainly don’t think so. We are stuck in the cave, science is the study of those shadows, and metaphysics the study of, at best, whatever we think is required for those shadows to behave that way and, at worst, the study of plato’s real world outside of the cave.

You say "modeling," I say "ontology."

That's fair. I distinguish the two to separate two mindsets: the former being just one who wants to be able to predict experience, and the other thinks they are actually getting at knowledge of the world in-itself.

Hello Pantagruel,

The nature of experience is that it expands with knowledge. Compare the experience of the human, versus that of the single-celled creatures from which we sprang. Consider the experience of a symphony by a trained musician versus someone with no musical knowledge. Thomas Nagel stresses the point that our tools for comprehending reality are limited, but those limits are constantly evolving.

I agree...but, I would say that this claim is also conditioned by one’s experience; and whatever is beyond your experience could be completely different than what you actually experienced. How do we ‘know’ that biological organisms evolve (or even that there are such organisms)? From experiencing them. What about when you take away those possible forms by which you experienced them? What’s left? Nothing intelligible.

This just sounds like a tautology built off of the definition of 'wrong'.

Hello Corvus,

Can you trust all your empirical perception and observation? Are the data you gathered via your senses 100% error free?

No I cannot. The model which I have of experience is that I represent the world, and those representations are imperfect.

I doubt so called valid scientific knowledge in that nature would be much use.

I think all scientific knowledge, absent metaphysical claims, are perfectly compatible with my view. For example, I should expect that my body is made of cells (as this has been empirically verified plenty enough), but takeaway my possible forms of experience, and the possible forms of other people’s experience (which is similar to my own), and it is not clear at all that we have any reason to believe there are cells at all, let alone bodies, let alone space and time, etc.

The knowledge derived from the visual experience via telescope from millions of miles away from the astral objects without any kind of direct contact is nothing more than imaginary conjectures and inferences

I don’t think they just use pure imagination to determine stars, they use empirical evidence and hypothesized predictions.

Metaphysics can deal with any objects and methodology if they are related to their topics, and also as part of their investigations.

Could you please define what you mean by “metaphysics”?

The whole Marxist movement and running of the countries has been based on the Dialectic Logic. And All those logic listed above are used in many different sciences and technologies for applications to real life situations and device designs.

I didn’t follow the relevance of this part: could you please elaborate? My point was that logic pertains to the form of an argument (of reasoning): not the content. There is no such thing as a valid theory of logic that provides its own content as well as the form of that content.

Many of the concepts such as Time, Space, Substance are also studied by Physics, Chemistry and QM too. You are not just discarding metaphysics, but totally discarding also the general Science as well.

Scientifically studying time and space (and what not) is fine: but it is only valid for possible experience. Without that possible experience, we are over-extending the bounds of the empirical evidence we used to justify our belief in it in the first place.

How do you know something is beyond possibility of experience, if you had not experienced it at all?

Just because I have not experienced it it does not follow that it is beyond the possibility of all experience (for the most part). However, if it is a claim which transcends my forms of experience then I know for sure that it is beyond the possibility of any being which has the same forms of experience as me, and if a being doesn’t have those forms, well...I can’t comprehend their existence anyways.

If something is truly beyond possibility of experience, then you wouldn't even be able to mention it, because you have never experienced it, and your stance is that whatever beyond possibility of your experience is unknowable?

Correct. Whatever exists beyond the possibility of experience is a giant question mark, with no possibility of knowing it ever.

Therefore it couldn't possibly be your criteria for declaring it is metaphysics

Well, so we can imagine things which have never been experienced and never will be experienced. I can use my faculty of reason, for example, to totally make up conceptions of things; such as, for example, the existence of a square circle in the world in-itself; or a aspatiotemporal being beyond the possibility of experience. I can certainly say it, but that doesn’t mean that I’ve ever experienced it nor that anyone ever will. Reason and our imagination can overstep the bounds of empirical reality.

So metaphysics is the long history of people thinking about such things which go beyond empirical reality; and so I can easily define it that way without knowing anything (in truth) about that which is beyond experience.

I am not sure what you mean by experience too.  Does it mean visible and audible and touchable objects only?  Things that we talk about, fantasize, and even imagine, should they not also be mental experience in nature?

I would say ‘experience’ is that first-person immediate knowledge that one has, which includes their mental life, such as things which only are immediately apprehended in time (as opposed to space).

From the perspective of moral realism, the very discussion of morality (and philosophy in its entirety) is useless. By its nature, moral realism is opposed to a reflexive, meta-view of morality.

I didn't follow why this would be true: can you please elaborate?

Hello Manuel,

Yes, models of reality - not models of models

I would say it is a model of experience--not necessarily reality. It is empirically ungrounded, I would say, to claim that our experience gives us any sort of accuracy into reality (unless by ‘reality’ you just mean the human conception of it).

if on the right track, tell us something about the way the world works absent us. Yes, experience tells us this, yes models are not reality, but they refer to it, not to a model.

On what grounds can your models of reality (or, more accurately, of experience) be said to tell us about something beyond that experience (i.e., ‘absent of you’)? I cannot know that the world has the chair of which I am sitting on right now nor that it persists in that world when no one is experiencing it—but I can say that one should expect, all else being equal, to experience it in the same manner next time.

Correct. But I ask you, is there any other way to get any knowledge at all about anything, that's not through a particular experience, related to the relevant creature? Knowledge is relational.

I would say that our knowledge is ‘relational’ (in the sense you described), but I have no clue what kind of creatures may exists in the world in-itself, nor all the actually possible ways by which knowledge can be acquired. I agree that, from our human perspective, it is hard to imagine that any creature would ever not be stuck in the paradigm I have provided—but that is no justification to say that is true of the world in-itself, as neither of us know if the world in-itself has to abide by what we find conceivable.

But you are limiting the historical scope of metaphysics only to things-in-themselves, not even Kant did this. He spoke about morals and religion as aspects of metaphysics.

I mean that’s pretty fair. I would say that morals and religion are also conditioned by our forms of experience and thusly say nothing of the world as it is in-itself.

And even Kant had things to say about things-in-themselves, that they are non-relational, and that they ground the objects of experience.

That is (sort of) true, and I have a hard time semantically distinguishing the subtle differences in my views vs. his. I would say that the ‘world in-itself’ as whatever is strictly beyond our experience is the ‘absolute’ and the ‘world in-itself’ within the model that we represent the world is one which would have to have certain properties (presupposed by the model itself)(such as causality, they “impact” us in some way, etc.).

But remove the forms of one’s experience, and it isn’t even clear that one is representing anything.

Finally, we should recognize, that appearances are part of empirical reality.

True; and, I would say, it is all we have access to in terms of empirical reality.

I do not know why you insist on using this as the benchmark for metaphysics.

I am not intending to say that metaphysics is solely the study of things-in-themselves: I am merely noting that it is impossible to know them (other than what is presupposed by the model that we represent them) and that we know nothing of the absolute.

The way you are defining external world precludes evidence which shows that there are things absent us. Like planets or the stars...Unless you say that because all we have is a model, this model doesn't get to things in themselves, ergo planets and stars are not external to us.

I would say that we can say there are stars and planets sans us as a valid statement for the possibility of experience: that is, we should treat them like they exist independently of us, because every time we experience them they behave as such. However, we have no clue if there are stars and planets, let alone our own bodies, let alone space and time, beyond what is conditioned by our experience. You know what I mean?

I agree we possibly can't have knowledge of things in themselves, but I don't restrict metaphysics or reality to these terms - I don't see a good reason for doing so.

Correct me if I am wrong, but it seems like modeling our experience is a part of metaphysics for you; which just means we are semantically disagreeing (which is fine).

I mean, are we going to ask a model for it to predict something which is beyond all possible experience? That's incoherent.

Exactly. So why think that when it does predict something within experience that it would ever verify something that is beyond it? Which I think you anticipated my response here with:

But then, why is there any reason to believe that a more predictive model will tell us about things beyond all possible experience? We are still stuck in the same cage you set up.

With all due respect, I am not going to come up with a definition for you. Either you have one or you don't: it should not be that hard to explicate if you do...

For example, I define it as "the study of that which is beyond the possibility of experience".

Hello Corvus,

In those cases, science uses hypotheses which are imagination in nature.

I have no problem with the imagination being used to try to sort of something empirical—it is when we going beyond the empirical that gets sketchy to me.

If you are only relying on the observable and verifiable objects only, you would have very little to work with.

Every valid aspect of science is a prediction about something which could be possibly experienced. Metaphysics is about that which, in principle, can never be.

For instance most of the astronomical objects are unreachable from earth. They are only viewable by telescope from a far distance.

Viewing it from a telescope is a form of experiencing it. How do you ‘view’ whether the world is actually made of a physical or mental substance? Or that there actually are Universals, or just particulars?

In this case, their studies and investigations are metaphysical rather than scientific

Positing hypotheses to try to predict objects within possible experience is not metaphysics.

Where empirically verified content is devoid, Logic uses inference for coming to their conclusions which is one of the main empirical scientific methods.

Logic is the form of an argument (i.e., the form of reasoning), and does not pertain to the content of arguments. As I read your other post (to another person), I feel I need to clarify this as well (just to anticipate your response):

Could you please clarify which logic you mean here? There are vast many different types of Logic.

Deductive Logic
Inductive Logic
Predicate Logic
Philosophical Logic
Modal Logic
Non-Classical Logic
Dialectic Logic

All of these (except maybe ‘dialectic logic’, depending on what you mean there) share that pertain to the form of argumentation and not the content.

Of course, it attempts to answer questions we humans want to answer, but there is a reason we can’t legitimately: there is no way to ground it in reality, since all we have of reality is our experience of it and the questions metaphysics tries to answer (as a matter of ontology) is beyond that experience. — Bob Ross

I don't understand this point here. Could you please elaborate in detail with some examples please? Thanks.

Of course! Metaphysics, in the sense that I defined it in the OP, is about ontological things; that is, about that which is beyond the possibility of experience (e.g., Universals vs. particulars, nature of time, nature of space, substances, etc.). Now, all we can ever know empirically is from our experience, so the best we can ever do in terms of explaining the ‘nature’ of things is what is conditioned, right off the bat, by our possible forms of experience (and, not to mention, our means of cognizing the world) (namely space and time) and thusly are only valid constrained to them. Take away your forms of experience, and everyone else’s, and what is intelligible left (with any metaphysical claim you can think of)? Absolutely nothing.

None of your links are of you giving a definition.

But the point is that it doesn't tell the whole story. Rather, it raises a whole host of questions about the relationships between "properties" and events, and why some configurations are "preferred" by the universe versus others

Nothing we empirically study is nature herself, it is our model of nature derived from experience. Nature does not have to be anything remotely like what we experience, nor that we could comprehend.

Science is one colour on the palette. Metaphysics is about the palette, and the picture, and the painter, and the model.

I like this analogy, but, for me, the pallette, picture, and painter become the model of our experience, and science is the relationships of the colors, shapes, etc. on the painting.

Awe! I see now that we are in complete agreement! I think you are the first, and perhaps the only one who will, agree with me (:

Hello Pantagruel,

If you start trying to wrap your head around the emergence of physical properties as the manifestation of pointer states in the process of the decoherence of quantum superposition from the web of entanglement it is hard not to think that you're thinking in metaphysical terms.

For me, it is really easy to see how it wouldn’t be: I would just say quantum physics is a model that we use to navigate reality; and is not legitimate beyond the possibility of experience.

Hello Corvus,

I am not sure if the OP's definition on Metaphysics is formally accepted by the public and academics. Metaphysics doesn't use imagination and conjectures all the time as its investigative methods.

My definition of metaphysics is that is the study of that which is beyond the possibility of experience, and not that it is a process of using the imagination. For most metaphysicians, they use principles like parsimony, explanatory power, internal/external coherence, (logical) consistency, intuitions, etc. to determine metaphysical theories.

For instance, Kant's Metaphysics arrives at its conclusions via rigorous logical arguments.

Logic devoid of empirically verified content is indistinguishable from the imagination. I can make a logically consistent argument for the world being comprised of one giant cookie monster.

and it asks and investigates the topics these subjects cannot deal with or ask, such as the "why" questions.

Of course, it attempts to answer questions we humans want to answer, but there is a reason we can’t legitimately: there is no way to ground it in reality, since all we have of reality is our experience of it and the questions metaphysics tries to answer (as a matter of ontology) is beyond that experience.

Hello T Clark,

He says similar things about time. Is it your position that space and time are illegitimate concepts?

Kant, as can be seen in your quote of CPR, was making most of his arguments from the model that we represent the world; which, from that perspective, I find his arguments convincing.

However, my argument is more fundamental than that: it doesn’t grant, initially, that we are representing anything. Instead, it just notes that we ‘experience’ with two possible forms: space and time. Whether, in our model of reality, we attribute those forms to our representative faculties is irrelevant. Just by determining our forms of experience we thereby determine the ultimate limitations of our knowledge.

But, to answer your question, if I were to engage in metaphysics, in the sense of trying to get at ontology as opposed to mere modelling [of reality], then I would go for a more Kantian view that space and time do not pertain to the world as it is in-itself: there’s no noumenal space and time. Although, I should note that Kant didn’t quite go that far, he only wanted to prove that the space and time we directly apprehend is not something in the world in-itself, which is fine.

Hello 180 Proof,

Inferences with "beyond" premises (e.g. magic, myths, ideals), whether or not they are valid, cannot be sound. Metaphysics is rational, at best, and itself is never theoretical (i.e. explanatory of nature)

Can you please define what you mean by ‘metaphysics’? Because, to me, metaphysics is ‘“beyond” premises’.

In the sense of Aristotle’s original definition, saying it is the study of what ‘comes after’ the physics is really, to me, the same thing as saying ‘to study that which we cannot possibly experience, but would like to explain’.

Hello Manuel,

Astronomical and physics based evidence suggests otherwise, if you take these sciences seriously, you have to seriously consider that the external world exists.

I never said the external world doesn’t exist; and astronomy and physics produce models of reality based off of predicting our experience (i.e., empirical evidence) and thusly are only valid insofar as they reference experience, which is conditioned by our forms thereof.

Not to mention archeological evidence

All of archeological discoveries are conditioned, epistemically, by our possible forms of knowledge (namely space and time): if not, then please provide me with any empirical evidence you have of any archeology whatsoever which is not derived nor contingent at all on human (or animal) experience.

Yes, all these sciences are constrained by our modes of cognition, but when our cognition coincides with aspects of the external world, we get a science.

I disagree. When our cognition can be predicted, we have science. Whether or not one wants to imagine that that predictability suggests a correspondence to reality (beyond our cognition) is another matter.

If that's not enough, or if you think this is not firm enough foundation, then, the only sense which I think cannot be "thought away", is solidity or impenetrability. Everything else is could be modified.

Solidity and impenetrability are grounded, like all other qualities, in our experience. Try to think of anything solid which has empirical evidence for its existence that is sans our experience. This is why, for example, idealists can come up with perfectly coherent metaphysical theories that posit tangibility as a synthetic a priori property (of human cognition).

So either we assert, full stop, that we cannot know anything about the external world, or we say that some aspects we can tease out, most of them we cannot.

In the sense of the external world that transcends us, I would say we can’t know full stop.

But we have to be somewhat realistic, we cannot attain the kind of certainty you are looking for, that is, one that defeats skepticism about these topics.

I am not a hard skeptic. My proposal to you is simple (I think at least). To distinguish something from [human] imagination, it must have empirical content (i.e., empirical evidence for it). Our forms of experience are just that: ours and not the external world’s itself (irregardless of whether one wants to posit another noumenal space and time). All of our knowledge which has any empirical content is derived from experience, and thusly are conditioned by our forms of experience. Any claim about that which lies beyond our experience cannot be grounded in anything empirically accessible to us, since we can only know things from our experience, and thusly it is indistinguishable from the imagination because it has no empirical content [for us]. If you think I am wrong, then I would challenge you to either (1) provide a means of providing empirical evidence for a claim which pertains to that which is beyond our experience or (2) provide justification for how we can know that our experience is accurate to the external world (of which is not appealing to models of reality which are determined by predicting our experience: which, naturally, are conditioned by our experience).

I have no problem with gaining knowledge that is useful for experience from experience, even if it doesn’t provide absolute certainty. For predicting what one could experience is very useful and is an empirically verified way of gaining more knowledge about the world that we experience; but not the world as it is.

But then by definition, we cannot say what metaphysics is, because it is beyond all possible experience.

We can say what it is, but not engage it as a practice. There is nothing stopping me from defining it, for example, as I can know that it is the study of that which is beyond the possibility of experience without trying to derive anything true of that which is <…>.

My point was simple, we have a model, which we use to navigate the world as is given to us. If there was no world, we wouldn't need a model.

But a model doesn’t really make claims about things beyond possible experience: it just says, hey, look, we can predict stuff in experience if we treat stuff like they are this, so, until we come up with a more predictive model, let’s use that to navigate experience. It doesn’t say: this is actually how the world in-itself is.

I'm not a Kant scholar, but I've read "Critique of Pure Reason." I don't remember it saying anything like "metaphysics is, in fact, indistinguishable from human imagination." I doubt that it did and I doubt that Kant thought it. I can't speak to Leibnitz, but I would be surprised if he felt that way.

You are confusing my definition with what I claimed about the practice itself: I never said that 'metaphysics' is defined as "the study of that which is indistinguishable from human imagination". I said it is "the study of that which is beyond the possibility of experience". In terms of Kant, this can be found in his work (as a presupposition) and explicitly (as well). For example:

First, concerning the sources of metaphysical cognition, it already lies in the concept of metaphysics that they cannot be empirical. The principlesb of such cognition (which include not only its fundamental propositionsc or basic principles, but also its fundamental concepts) must therefore never be taken from experience; for the cognition is supposed to be not physical but metaphysical, i.e., lying beyond experience. Therefore it will be based upon neither outer experience, which constitutes the source of physics proper, nor inner, which provides the foundation of empirical psychology

– (Prolegomena, p. 60, Section 1).

Hello Philosophim,

I've noted before I generally do not use philosophical terms such as 'metaphysics' in discussions, because as you can see from the many replies, no one can agree what they actually mean.

Apparently so! I didn’t expect the semantics behind ‘metaphysics’ to be such a pinnacle aspect of the conversation.

I mainly agree with your response, but let me highlight some of the subtle disagreements:

We can only know of the world in-itself through logical limitations and consequences. Namely, some "thing" must be there

This is my fault, as I have been using the “world in-itself” terminology to refer to whatever exists beyond one’s experience, but I actually distinguish the “world in-itself” from “the absolute”: the former is actually a product of the model wherein organisms are thought to represent the world, and the latter is whatever exists completely sans anything we gain from our experience. The subtle difference, and contention I would have with your above quote, is that we cannot know, independently of evidence gathered from our experience (which is constrained by our possible forms of experience), that we represent objects in a space and time that transcends us: takeaway the forms of our experience (namely space and time that doesn’t transcend us) and it equally unintelligible that there is some “thing” out there. In other words, some “thing” being out there is a part of a model itself as well.

If you recall the idea of "discrete experience", we part and parcel reality as we wish within our own minds. I can view a field of grass, a blade of grass, or a piece of grass. I do not even need to call it "grass". It is the applications of these identities in practice which determine their usefulness in representing how a thing in-itself impacts the world in a way that is not-contradicted by its existence.

To build off of this, I would say that our “discrete experience” of the objects, such as blades of grass, says nothing about what may exist in the world which transcends our possible forms: not even that there is a blade of grass—irregardless of what we label it.

Just wanted to chime in at how I thought this was a really great post!

As always, I appreciate your responses!

Hello T Clark,

For me, metaphysics it's the most important part of philosophy. My objection to your OP is that you attempt to discredit metaphysics using a definition that I, and most philosophers, don't believe is correct.

If you have a different definition, then let’s hear it: I am more than happy to entertain other definitions. On my end, I am using the definition used in the Kantian tradition, as well as Leibniz and many before him.

Hello Corvus,

I have nothing to define, but would you not agree that the OP's claim sounds like Metaphysical itself?

I don’t agree, because I am not making claims about that which is beyond the possibility of experience. However, since the term is somewhat muddied these days, I will grant that many people consider the negation of metaphysics to be metaphysics, which doesn’t make sense to me. For example:

"X is unknowable." is also a Metaphysical comment.

The claim of agnosticism about that which is beyond the possibility of experience is not itself a claim about that which is beyond the possibility of experience, just as the claim of agnosticism about God’s existence is not the denial of God’s existence.

Because if it were Science, they will make up some hypothesis on the object they want to find out.

I wouldn’t say that something is either scientific or metaphysical: I think that’s a false dilemma.

Hello Manuel,

Constrained in relation to what?

Constrained by our possible forms of experience: space and time. Just because I experience the outer world in space and time, it does not follow that they exist in the outer world itself; nor that anything I derive from my experience, which is conditioned by them, pertains to anything beyond it. Instead, it only holds valid insofar as it references a possible experience from a being which has a similar ‘type’ of experience as myself.

Also, experience of what?

The world in the sense of whatever transcends experience, if anything, of which I call ‘the absolute’. It is the ‘whole’, the totality of existence, etc.

Absolutely sense-data or sensations or however you want to call it, is fundamental to any metaphysics.

That you sense, is something one empirically discovers; which is thusly conditioned by the forms of space and time of which one (or another person that one trusts) used to experience that empirical evidence.

In other words, I only know I have sensations which get interpreted into perception, according to the standard model of human biology, by collective empirical studies of organisms; all of which are conditioned by the possible forms of human experience. Take away those forms, and there is nothing intelligible left to speak of.

I think the minimum requirement of agreement should be, that metaphysics is about the world.

I agree, if by ‘about the world’ you take it to mean that one is deriving what the world fundamentally is in-itself: knowledge of the absolute, the whole, the totality of existence, that which transcends you, ontology, etc.

Someone who calls themselves a materialist or an idealist use evidence all the time, they'll say that, for example, the collapse of wave function counts as evidence for idealism, or they'll say that the progress of neuroscientific evidence proves materialism is correct.

That is fair, and I agree that they do try to ground their metaphysical commitments in empirical data; however, upon closer inspection, are they successful? No: these empirical claims are still conditioned by our pure forms of experience (namely space and time): without them, the claim becomes unintelligible. Thusly, the claim that “idealism/physicalism is true” is not universally valid, if granted as true on the empirical grounds, but rather constrained to the possibility of experience. So, in other words, the ontological claims get stripped out, and what is left is the claim that we have reasons to consider the world that we experience as idealistic or physicalist (or what not) and not that the world in-itself actually is any of those.

So, you'd have to specify a bit, what you mean by not having an ounce of empirical data. As I see it, experience must count as empirical content, otherwise we are using the word "empirical" to mean, "publicly observable", these are not the same thing.

Hopefully my above comments help clarify a bit. If not, then please let me know. Likewise, I agree that experience is empirical content.

Sounds as if some kind of model-centric version would count as part of metaphysics for you. Because saying "model of possible experience" without specifying what this relates to, doesn't amount to much, so far as I can see.

I guess I am not entirely following: the model relates to possible experience. Metaphysics, as the study of what which is beyond the possibility of experience, is ontological in nature. For me, a model is not an ontology: the former is a map for navigation, which may or may not be accurate to the territory, and the latter is a theory of what the territory is.

Hello 180 Proof,

No, definitely not. By analogy, for instance, the rules – generalizations abstracted from design (logical) space – for valid moves in chess (e.g. metaphysics) are not "over-arching means of determining" winning strategies for playing chess (e.g. physical theories).

Would you say, then, that metaphysics is informed by physics, and never vice-versa?

Irregardless, if metaphysics is the “abstracted design” of experience, then it should never make any ontological claims but, rather, merely provide models of that experience; for how could an abstraction from experience necessarily pertain to that which is beyond it?

Hello simplyG,

Another question one could ask is whether metaphysics is necessary at all and if so why ? I would answer in the positive for the reasons that it’s the father of the scientific method not only in its rationality and application of reason to the real world but hypothetical scenarios which if it’s able to contemplate with rigour, robustness and clarity than it’s results could not be wrong from a hypothetical standpoint. The upshot of this is just like math can correspond to reality so can metaphysics without having to invoke experience.

I agree with most of this, if I were to not be specifically meaning ‘the study of that which is beyond the possibility of experience’. I have no problem with creating theories and models ‘of reality’ in the sense of what to expect within the possibility of experience.

The only thing I didn’t agree with was the last sentence: math does not a priori necessarily pertain to the things-in-themselves, our representations of them, nor the absolute. Math, as a practice of predicting relations within experience is absolutely empirically grounded.

If the results of experience or observation match the results of metaphysical speculation can we not say that metaphysics has succeeded in this regard?

In this case, it has succeeded in predicting objects within experience; but take away the possible forms of your experience, and what is left of that observation that matches your metaphysical speculation? Absolutely nothing.

In modern science especially quantum physics the lines between metaphysics and physics have become blurrier and blurrier so it’s fair to ask who will get us out of this muddle, physics proper with its application of empiricism which finds it is limited when explaining physical phenomena at the quantum level or metaphysics? Or perhaps a combination of both?

I am perfectly fine with retaining most of metaphysics as not metaphysics; that is, as the pragmatic study of models for that which is within the possibility of experience—but to extend the claim beyond that is unwarranted to me (which is traditional metaphysics in a nutshell).

Hello Corvus,

Isn't this a metaphysical question? The Metaphysicians have been asking and investigating on the nature of Metaphysics and its legitimacy of the claims. One of the point of CPR by Kant was to find out, "How Metaphysics is possible as a Science."

Depending on how you define it, yes. In the sense I defined it in the OP, no.

Hello Wayfarer,

This sounds very Kantian.

It is very motivated by Kant.

Over all, I agree with your depiction of the origins of ‘metaphysics’.

'Philosophy', Etienne Gilson remarked 'generally buries its undertakers'. Also applies to metaphysics.

I don’t quite agree: I think we can refurbish our philosophical talk into pragmatic modellings of experience, and not actual claims about what may exists beyond that. I don’t see the self-undermining aspect of this argument (like in the case of arguing that philosophy is illegitimate).

I am negating the idea of actually thinking anyone is getting at anything justifiably true with:

In it the nature of 'the knowledge of what is' that is the major subject. The nature of what truly is, which is not subject to change and decay, the imperishable.

This is impossible to obtain.

Hello elephant,

There is no other task that makes us think in a way that does not involve memorization of equation, procedure, or statistics than metaphysics. Philosophical discussions is natural to humans.

I am not saying that philosophy is an illegitimate practice.

Hello Manuel,

Either we hold onto some kind of metaphysics or we do not. If we deny that metaphysics is legitimate, then we are left with the view that all there is, is sense data, for us.

Not at all: it just means all of our knowledge is contrained by the possible forms of experience. Saying we have sense-data is a part of the contemporary model that is useful for navigating experience.

All the traditional topics of metaphysics, materialism, the self, dualism, free will, things-in-themselves, the nature of objects and so on, would be impossible to formulate absent imagination.

Science is also impossible without the imagination, and I was not intending to argue that it is illegitimate for that. Instead, I am arguing it is illegitimate because it is purely imaginative: there is not an ounce of empirical content tied to it.

We shouldn't have a metaphysics that says modern physics is wrong

I wouldn’t say that modern physics is wrong, I would say that the metaphysical claims, which is separate but usually conjoined with the science, should be interpreted as models for the possibility of experience and not actual claims about the world in-itself.

Hello T Clark,

I'll just provide a conventional definition:
Metaphysics is the branch of philosophy that studies the fundamental nature of reality. This includes the first principles of: being or existence, identity, change, space and time, cause and effect, necessity, actuality, and possibility. — Wikipedia - Metphysics

That is not at all the same as:
metaphysics is, in fact, indistinguishable from human imagination

True, but this is not a conventional definition in philosophy: it is an adequate colloquial rundown. That is why, if you re-read it, they are more examples as opposed to an actual definition. Again, I am working with the Kantian (and previous to him) philosophers usages of the term. Either way, I grant you it is different than the basic definitions from a google search.

Hello LuckyR,

I completely agree with you.

:up:

Hello Mww,

If the watershed for the traditional sense of metaphysics is Kant and Enlightenment philosophy in general, and metaphysics in such traditional sense has only to do with conceptions, it follows that to combine metaphysics with, juxtaposition it to, or ground it in, imagination, is very far from the traditional sense.

Kant claims metaphysics is the study of that which is beyond the possibility of experience; but I am not claiming he thought it was a product of the imagination. I think, for him, pure reason is quite different from imagination. For me, not so much.

See:

First, concerning the sources of metaphysical cognition, it already lies in the concept of metaphysics that they cannot be empirical. The principlesb of such cognition (which include not only its fundamental propositionsc or basic principles, but also its fundamental concepts) must therefore never be taken from experience; for the cognition is supposed to be not physical but metaphysical, i.e., lying beyond experience. Therefore it will be based upon neither outer experience, which constitutes the source of physics proper, nor inner, which provides the foundation of empirical psychology

– (Prolegomena, p. 60, Section 1).