As such, I project that the opposite leads to opposing views, which to me hinge on a kind of superstition regarding language and its effects. — NOS4A2

Interesting. I have an unstoppably verbose internal monologue, to a serious fault (insomnia, I am able to induce mental illnesses etc...) and share those concerns.

Most interested parties have moved on to considering the challenges of adaptation. — frank

That has always seemed a more reasonable approach to me, so fair enough lol.

without concepts that allow phenomena to cohere in the understanding, we wouldn’t actually cognize anything at all, as made clear here: — Mww

Ok, nice. That feels like a slightly more adequate key to the lock im trying to pick, compared with my question. Thanks! Feeling a little less lost now.

in which the major is (1.)the understanding of the manifold of conceptions related to an object, the minor is (2.)the judgement regarding the compatibility of the synthesis of those conceptions to each other, and reason (3.)concludes the validity of that synthesis with respect to those already given — Mww

Something i've wanted, for some time, is a plain-language expression of the passages that express this in the CPR. So, if you wouldn't mind commenting on, or correcting hte below, I would sincerely appreciate that(these numbers being the three parts I've inserted into your description above):

1. In which your mind retrieves a priori concepts under which the sensation can be brought in order to cognise the object;
2. In which your mind determines which concepts are 'correct' to apply to the object, with regard to their inter-conceptual coherence (i.e avoiding contradiction); and
3. In which your mind determines whether that coherent set of concepts, in fact, applies to the sensations you're 'judging'.

is that, or how far is that, a reasonable unadornment ?

Then you really don't know what you're talking about, and I suggest taking literally 10 minutes, type in "climate change" in Google, pick one result -- whether from NASA or NOAA or the Royal Academy or MIT or anything you like -- and read about it. Because you're making an utter buffoon of yourself. — Mikie

Not at all, no. I'm fully accepting of anthropocentric climate change (though, i certainly have quibbles around what exactly the implications are - and I don't think its reasonable to suggest that is settled) and yet do not feel any real moral reason to take massive, global action. I'm open to reasons and discussions, but i have no intuition that we need to, or should, do much about it. I'm not going to accept a 'well, you're a monster' then type response as meaningful.

I would also suggest perhaps not positing someone is a 'buffoon' for not sharing your moral intuitions :) Particular as I would also note it appears old mate is being fairly glib. The air conditioning comment can't really be taken seriously and I don't read it as intended to be more than a poke of the bear.

currently illegal jobs like prostitution, selling organs, dealing drugs. — neomac

Given these are, either in restricted senses, or in other jurisdictions, completely legal, we have to accept that this is the case. People as means-to-ends seems imbedded in human interactions.
It seems 'morality' consists in the preventing ourselves from taking an advantage over those means as opposed to some form of co-operation.

Correct. — Patterner

On some accounts... I don't really understand how Bob is getting his 'must's. I'm also awaiting that draft of why we should assent.

I recently discovered that others can think in words. Some have even admitted to hearing an inner monologue, not so much as an audio hallucination, but as a fundamental component of their thinking. Having been unable to find these words or hear these voices myself I naturally began to envy their powers and the company they keep. — NOS4A2

This has been a bit of a phenomenon recently.

Apparently, about 60% of people have no internal monologue https://irisreading.com/is-it-normal-to-not-have-an-internal-monologue/ (good explainer).

I've found the inverse of your position baffling. I can't work out how to interact with the world if there is no internal symbolic representation of the most common and apparently effective communication mode. Perhaps this accounts for a differential in critical, systematic thinking between the two groups.

With regard the OP question; I think that inhabit minds and cause more than their form implies, but aren't that themselves.

mathematics — Patterner

I suppose it depends how you're defining it. If you mean the anthropocentric system of allocating symbols to facts about the world and abstracting them to come to proofs, then yes. That's true.

But if you take mathematics as merely a naming of those aspects of the world that necessarily are attending by the former description, i'm unsure this can be said.

you hear the sound, but don’t know whether it’s a firecracker or the tailgate on a dump truck. — Mww

On this account, are you illustrating the 'concept' of that (I guess, specific..) sound, without needing to invoke an object to understand the sensation? If so, yes, that's helpful. My response to Russell will be illustrative of why It's only helpful to understand the intent there, rather than my understanding of why that's the case..

For practical experience, true enough. Phenomena always antecede the conception, but they certainly do inform the concept. — Mww

Ah, this is clarifying, in terms of what i intuited(in the colloquial sense) was inarguable in the hypothesis. Thank you.

pure logic, antecedes the phenomenon. — Mww

Is the suggestion here that without the concepts that allow phenomena to cohere in the understanding, we wouldn't actually intuit (in the Kantian sense) anything of any comprehendable nature?

Would you accept that even in that case, the objects exist, we just have no access to even their indication? (i realise this might be pedestrian to you and somewhat obvious - I'm new to this work).

Hi Russell - thank you very much for your reply. It is helpful in someways, and not in others.

As a pre-empt; shortly after making my comment, I was watching Lecture 2 in a series by Robert Paul Wolf on the CPR... Nearer the end another prof. from his department (Dr. Alan Nelson) asks a question which is somewhat answered there, and then further answered in the opening of Lecture 3.
The question he has is somewhat similar to mine, but posed in an infinitely more reasonable and i think clearer way: his question is Kant's use of hte word 'experience' with regard to delineating between 'understanding' and 'intuition'. He is asking why Kant thought he could get away with the premise that het two are necessarily distinct and why, with regard to Humean/Leibnizian alternatives, he thought it could not be argued against. Wolf's answer was basically that he thought he had already established the delineation in his inaugural dissertation (i've not read) and so didn't bother elucidating in the way Dr. Nelson was looking for. Ultimately, he concludes that it's not all that convincing (as best I can tell). I suppose that's where i am now.

I would suggest that concepts such as rough and smooth are innate and pre-exist any phenomena subsequently experienced. — RussellA

I guess this is what I have trouble with (noting for anyone else reading; I haven't attended the other replies to my recent comment re: concepts. Am working backward through notifications).

"apple" doesn't appear to me to be the same as "rough" - which, from what i understand of the world, is heuristic rather than a definite descriptor (but as usual, I could very well just be wrong). Apple can collapse into many other categories and concepts, but 'rough' is a sensation regardless of that which it inheres. I understand 'apple' to still be a concept - I'm not skirting that - But, 'apple' describes an arrangement of things in the world via their impression on the sum total of our sensible "inputs" ideally. 'roughness' only applies to one, in the context you've outlined and so appears far more apt to the distinction, where I can't get over into putting 'apple' there too. The 'concept' of apple is surely derived from an amalgamation of the totality of instances of 'apple' one has experienced brought under another concept - say, 'hand fruit', which itself has the same collapse pending into lesser-distinct concepts (food, flesh, juice etc..). But those sensations one could ascribe to an apple (colour, texture, smell, taste etc...) can be thought of in that a priori sense. One can cross-reference those aspects of an experience with other, disparate experiences, to form a working system of sensational categories.

Good lord I hope that's not just intensely confused muck :snicker:

Why not, pigs? — hypericin

I worked as a debt collector for a time in finance and I no kidding once had to put through an application for hardship for a fellow who had been suspended from his rural job for kicking the pigs out of frustration at the COVID lockdowns .. yikes.

Denied. Naturally.

"One ought not kick puppies" is both sensible and true. — creativesoul

It's not true. Thank you for your time :)

No apple, as such, ever existed independently of that by which it is conceived, and, thereby, is represented by that name. The object represented by the concept, however, does. — Mww

This has struck me, in CPR, as absolutely nonsensical (which may just be me, hence questions).

How could the concept of an apple indicate it's actual existence? You couldn't possibly have the concept without the phenomena, and the phenomena informing the concept is tautological. I haven't grasped this in the sense that, on multiple readings of several sections (I would need to pull out my copy to cite, so forgive.. tis a general comment anyway), it appears that I understand, and entirely reject the coherence of his position. Lil help? LOL.

I mean if evolution were true, we would have had wings and fly around to the work instead commuting stuck in the traffic jam polluting and burning the toxic gasoline paying out fortune just for one example. — Corvus

What? That's not at all a reasonable comment on evolution to my mind. I hope i've missed something.

New Zealand - but i also looked about a bit in the UK, as i'm also a citizen there (and Ireland.. lol).

Fair enough. Luckily, that was (roughly) the approach i took anyway.

However, I've seen a pretty clear distinction - some schools only teach what is generally understood to be 'continental' philosophy to the exclusion of anything similar to the majority of what i understand to be analytic philosophy. I saw one department that only offered courses from Kant forward to the Frankfurt school and no further (i.e, still some modern philosophers but only included the likes of Zizek and the Ljubljana school, basically, under their BA structure.

Maybe i just 'got lucky' in that sense - But in any case, i am far more toward choosing courses and tutors based on the questions i want to address in the next forty-some years.

In some cases this is true. When I went to grad school I found out who was teaching at the schools I was considering and what their approach and interests were. More often than not, they favored American analytic philosophy. I did not find evidence of "moral training" but moral philosophy was often represented. — Fooloso4

Interesting. Starting out my academic journey sort of at the moment - seeking advice from many quarters, the one cohesion between the bits of advice i've gotten is to ensure the faculty doesn't favour continental philosophy - and that this is widespread, and a slippery slope to actually not doing philosophy lol.

obviously, i can't speak one way or the other, but interesting that you've a different conception of that. Gives me pause.

AmadeusD
— AmadeusD

Yes and colleges have been favoring German philosophers over the classical ones and boy are we in a mess! — Athena

Hi Athena! Sorry for not yet replying to your earlier comment. I don't necessarily think I am the best-placed member to give a good account of that school of thought.

However, did i miss something that the post i've quoted above relates to? I'm unsure it was intended for me :)

Certainly. — Alkis Piskas

Hi Alkis :) Thanks for your thorough response.
I\ve started with the above as i believe it, in some senses, makes some of your other responses redundant or contradictory.. though i do not think this is on purpose, a result of stupidity or anything.

Maybe the other way around ... In order to be aware of something you must first perceive it, don't you? — Alkis Piskas

Consciousness entails perception. Sentience entails feeling about perception. It seems counter to both the definitions used by philosophers, and the basic notion of these two concepts, that Sentience could precede consciousness. That seems exactly backwards to me and i can't grasp how you're seeing it another way.
To my understanding, consciousness is more basic than sentience. Sentience is in addition to consciousness. This someone goes to my first response above - you seem to be not really using the correct distinction that philosophers use when discussing this - but that is based on my understanding just there, so i may be wrong. But it doesn't seem in any way a philosophical problem in the sense of 'debate'. One of us is using hte wrong term.

Does this mean that you just don't believe or trust what a person says or you can't debate what that person says or you don't trust your own reasoning, knowledge and jugment? — Alkis Piskas

No. It means i expect someone presenting sources for their arguments to actually have verified sources, rather internet articles for which there are no references, no credible citation and no clear author or institutional source. And to note, I did, in fact, critique it via my own 'judgement' anyway.

How can you judge that if you can't judge what the person says in the first place? Or are you going to believe that authority unquestionably because it is a famous personality? Or are you going to start doubting or arguing about what that authority says or even about the authority iself? Wouldn't that end up in a vicious cycle?
It all loses its meaning, doesn't it? — Alkis Piskas

Give both aspects of what i've said about, i think this entire passage is misconceived and potentially a way of trying to deflect from a lack of support for the initial assertion. I don't know that to be true, but its a huge protest that doesn't make any sense given i addressed the article and the lack of credibility. I would also note that being directed to Google for sources supporting your own argument is bizarre, and Twitter-level interlocution to my mind. I left Twitter to avoid that type of "Do you own research" kind of thing. To be a little more direct, If i can't find a good reason to take your assertion on board, or consider it seriously due to it failing at xyz hurdle, your sources are the way to convince someone you have something. Your sources are used to ensure you're not making stuff up - in this case, as your source fell well short of being credible, thorough or even clear in its origin and thesis, i can't understand why you're being dismissive of wanting sources. Seems counter to what we do here.

the final acceptance or rejection of a proposition will always depend on your own jugment. — Alkis Piskas

That's true. But unless you're suggesting we jettison understanding, reason, veracity and debate - i can't see how this is relevant.

I know that. And this is exactly what I objected to! :smile: — Alkis Piskas

If this was your intention, it was not clear and doesn't seem to be relevant to what we're actually talking about.
If we both agree sentience isn't required for the above, we are left with consciousness (which was my assertion all along). That means you've somewhat shot your objection in it's own foot.

I explained that "sentience" and "perception" are very close. I alo talked about what I often like to say: Consciousness is a characteristic of life; of sentient beings. — Alkis Piskas

This, again, doesn't seem relevant. They aren't particularly close in the context we're discussing, but further, even if they are 'close' its their distinction that matters to us here - not their similarity. And in any case, we seem to both have established (albeit, you've done it by accident) that sentience is further up the chain from consciousness, as consciousness is not required for thought (mental images) where sentience is. This ...almost... feels like you're pulling my leg.

I see that we go in circles. You just reject the definitions, descriptions and examples I'm bringing up. — Alkis Piskas

No. That is not the case, at all. I have pointed out to you that the definitions you are using are both non-philosophical, and fail us in making a distinction (which clearly exists).
The fact that your utterances aren't taken as wrote is not any indication of some kind of resistance or dishonesty on the part of your interlocutor. As i've found out, it's difficult but extremely helpful to accept where you are wrong, or where your thinking isn't clear. More below...

Why don't you look up for yourself and clear the meaning of all these words/terms in a dictionary? Do you hate dictionaries as a lot of people in here do? — Alkis Piskas

If you are not apt to use philosophical definitions and usages of words, this may not be the best place to discuss these things. I also note three instances of ad hominem in this response ( most recently, in the quote immediately above this section of my comment.

Just rhetorical questions. I'm not interested in talking more about this subject. It's totally useless. — Alkis Piskas

Are you suggesting you have no further interest in establishing communal philosophical usages of words, that you have no further interest in discussing consciousness, or that you have no further interest in philosophy?

IN all three cases, i return to my earlier suggestion - this may not be the place for you to discuss these issues. Given that you've been here three years and amassed more than 2000 posts, this strikes as quite odd. Has this been a long time coming, or have you long-had a distaste for the nitty-gritty as it were?.

It's a direct supporting context for while British and American law is not alike.

If it isn't relevant to your point, your point was either extremely orthogonal or nigh impossible to grasp.

'tis no matter in any case.

Yep - often do. I just happened to be getting off a train at the time LOL. Have edited now.

amount of the world. In that scenario, are we qualified even to say we have been perceiving the world at all? This is just one scenario. — Corvus

The underlined would suggest: Yes! But we must be humble about it to a very high degree! Not that this is news lol

**an unwillingness + **illustrate (that) the appearance of him, as i've described it, isn't a wild thing to hear someone say, despite it being inaccurate.

o, if he challenges you, then just keep taking on his challenge, if you think you can. — universeness

My point was that as I’ve seen it, he doesn’t. He just dismisses. I’ve also been clear I’m not actually knocking the guy. I appreciate an unwillingness to go over the same arguments hundreds of times. I merely meant to illustrate that the appearance of him as I’ve described isn’t a wild thing to hear someone say.

How do you think we could send atheists to Hell if they don't know right from wrong? — Leontiskos

lol.

I was under the impression went sent ourselves to Hell...

Do you have logical explanations for your belief? — Corvus

The only thing I have ever known myself to exist on/in, is the world. It would be far more unlikely that at times i'm not perceiving it (unconscious ,whatever..) it has disappeared, than it would be that I am simply not perceiving it because my senses are not trained it.

I suppose the other thing is, in what scenario are we not sensible of the world in one way or another? A deprivation tank still provides a temperature etc... It's just aligned so closely with homeostasis its hard to tell. It hasn't actually removed stimuli entirely.

Bear in mind that some of the greatest scientific discoveries were from random, accidental and leisurely observations too. — Corvus

Or drugs.

Not actually, given that Anscombe's thesis is contrary to Catholic tradition — Leontiskos

Also, very interesting. I have a good number of Catholics friends who are practicing, and as best i can tell, they practice virtue ethics. I should probably say, if their calculations conflict with a piece of scripture they can bring to mind at the time, then that raises obstacles; but, in general, they seem to have learned from their church-going that you can't stringently rule what is right and wrong and so improving one's character, holistically (though, this is billed as 'enhancing/improving/deepening a relationship with God' so there are implications of serious limits there)is how one reaches more, and more moral viz. virtuous, positions (intellectual/emotional positions). This may be why it felt her position was 'protecting the roost'.

But, in hindsight, that seems more superficially humanist or unitarian.

Granted, that doesn't say much about Catholic tradition, but I found that an interesting little incongruence.

We saw a micro-cosm of the US election here in New Zealand recently. We moved, overwhelmingly, to a liberal government in 2017 (we have three-year terms) because people got bored. 2020 - same party got an overwhelming result giving them full governmental control, essentially.

They have shit the bed, entirely, since then, basically ignoring their jobs.

This year, the right-of-center(ROC) party won, but needed a coalition to govern. So we have a very mildly ROC main party, and two coalition partners who respectively go further and then even further right in their politics.

And for all the utterly ridiculous preening and alarmism from other quarters, the right-of-center government really was the only reasonable choice. Most of the suggestions people are having an issue with amount to either socio-political discussions or outright alarmism (bear in mind, the types making those claims are the types who thought hte Hamas attack was (in the same breath as denouncing it??) understandable, and that Israel should've just taken it on the chin and given Palestine some more land or whatever. They aren't serious people.

I can't really see the US election going different, excepting some major occurance or revelation between now and voting time. And hten the cycle starts again... I can see Biden being the first Dem 1-Termer since Carter.

Edit after Wayfarer's post below: I am always struck but just how intensely partisan people get with politics. I've never found it to be worth the time - it's all a bit of a farce.

her historical thesis is flawed — Leontiskos

Interesting. Working through this post and it's references (only insofar as they are directly relevant and retrievable) I got the feeling that I agree with Schopenhauer on the nature of obligations, but didn't think it required any kind of relegation to theology to support.

Having not read Anscombe, but knowing she was a Catholic, that seems more like protecting the roost than it does actual historicity (which i guess Richter points on half of). But, the idea that obligations arise from artificial moral systems predicated on results seems pretty clear to me.

You are well ahead of me. I have gone back to the very beginning and starting over from the Preface. — Corvus

Don't assume i understand more than 10% :P

seems to be asking for evidence to support a series of claims that keep getting repeated without significant justification. — Tom Storm

In terms of why i'm saying this, across about five threads i've seen the opposite. Again, if it's unwillingness i have respect for that. It seemed as if he just had nothing to say in those threads. I'm only lending support to the idea that he can appear that way - and it makes it unfortunately unappealing to engage him.

Rupert does seem to get more of a hearing amongst respected scientists than most on the fringe. — universeness

Interestingly, just listened to a podcast which was a debate between Michael Shermer and Sheldrake.

I thought Sheldrake won the debate, despite basically feeling the same as yourself about his work. Think he and Chalmers could probably figure a more respectable version of his assertions if they cracked heads together.

if you are suggesting that 180 Proof, is an example of the persona you are trying to describe in the sentence — universeness

Just an observation - It may be the case that the remainder of your defence of 180Proof is correct - but he comes across condescending, affected and incapable (im gathering, unwilling is the truth of it) to engage with many arguments he doesn't like. His prerogative, but i got hte exact same feeling FrancisRay has.

I agree with Banno that glancing attacks on moral realism are occurring. — Leontiskos

I apologise :P

At least i now have some understanding, and grasp what i'm denying :sweat:

Ken Gergen puts it this way — Joshs

(for brevity - assume it includes the Gergen quote too)

Huh, i see. So I suppose thsi is a framework that supposes some universal 'oughts', but this based on a statistical analysis of functioning societies? Or would it just differ between societies? Seems to sort of put a definitive spin on relativism.

The organism has goals and purposes which it either meets or fails to meet. Human cognitive-affective functioning, including our moral oughts , are elaborations of the basic normative oughts characterizing living self-organization. — Joshs

Can we have some explication of how that connection obtains?It feels intuitively sensible to me, but I can;'t enumerate any kind of necessity between our function and morals - which may just be my failing, hence asking for a hand :P

Welp, i've just this morning reached the Transcendental Logic, Second Division :Transcendental Dialectic.

What pitfalls must i avoid in reading this section?

I'm working on being kind to fools. It's not easy.
— Banno

Please be kind to yourself. — hypericin

Now, now, boys....

I guess you have a different definition of the term "sentient" than the ones I presented and what is commonly meant by them. — Alkis Piskas

I do not believe this is the case. Remember, in philosophy, words generally have field-specific meaning:

https://philosophy.stackexchange.com/questions/4682/what-are-the-differences-between-sentience-consciousness-and-awareness
https://www.animal-ethics.org/problem-consciousness/#:~:text=The%20difference%20in%20meaning%20between,experiences%20of%20her%20own%20thoughts.
https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/FhjwbQ3RfYeC6ZJWe/sentience-sapience-consciousness-and-self-awareness-defining
https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-3-030-31011-0_2

So, consciousness is actually very well understood to be the basis for sentience, but not the same, and while there are fuzzy edges the major difference between them (value-informed experience) seems universally accepted.

OK, it was a ref that I found handy. You can chose youserf from among 150 million Google results for < perception of plants > (w/o quotes) or the 2.5 million results on < "perception of plants" > (w/ quotes). :smile: — Alkis Piskas

I'll just note that I would expect references which would support the points being made, from the person making them :)

(BTW, my saying "they must feel something" is very general and the wor "feel" in it has the meaning of "perceive" or "sense", not any emotional state.) — Alkis Piskas

In discussions of sentience 'feeling' indicates a subjective, value-informed state of mind, viz. emotional responses to stimuli.

Now, you assert that a plant needs not to be aware of -- i.e. perceive-- anything n order to react to stimuli. — Alkis Piskas

I didn't. I indicated self-awareness is not required for mechanistic reactions to stimuli without analysis. Gnomon sort of went over this too - a VFT doesn't actually know a fly is there in the way a human or dog does. You actually replied to my replacement for that theory - they are able to sense air pressure differentials (possibly). They note some underlying change in their environment and mechanical reactions are triggered. There's no mental image or deliberation. No sentience.

Which means that it can identify them, distinguish one from another. — Alkis Piskas

It does not. Recognition is a matter for sentience.

It cannot "choose" how to react. Choosing involves free will or at least the existence of a mind, which are both absent in a plant. Besides, we have already that it reacts mechanically ... — Alkis Piskas

This runs counter to some of your comments above. If they 'recognize' flies, then they are choosing to snap out at them. But we know that isn't the case.

Because "feeling" as a sense belongs to perception, which is our subject and can certainly not follow cognition. Right? — Alkis Piskas

This seems extremely confused. Cognition is almost correlate of sentience and feeling. It is the ability to recognize and deliberate to gain knowledge and understanding. Feeling is a result of perception, but it's not a 'part' of it.

I only would like to say that my definition of consiousness --esp. in its basic form-- has not been disproved by anyone until now. — Alkis Piskas

No idea where this is coming from? No one has tried to do that - though, i should point out it has be very adequately pointed out that consciousness doesn't entail feeling.

Here's once more my basic definition of consciousness: "The state and ability to perceive". — Alkis Piskas

Again, i think you're having a different conversation then. No one has an issue with that conception of consciousness, i wouldn't think. But sentience requires much more.

a history of divine command theory, linking morality to compliance and hellfire, via a foundational guarantee from a magic man with anger management issues, has probably messed with our thinking. — Tom Storm

:snicker:

Nicomachean Ethics — Leontiskos

Thread put me in mind of this once you mentioned him. Nice. Thank you :)