I'd just say that swimmers in water look different than swimmers out of water.
(At least we do have some understanding of what's going on with refraction, reflection and such.) — jorndoe

Re optical illusions like that, that's really what something partially submerged in water looks like from a particular reference point. You're getting accurate information from a "system" that consists of everything in the environment between the point of reference and the object(s) in question.

Okay. So now my question would be, if anything anyone experiences is reality from a particular reference point, how do you ever get to a distinction between reality and hallucination? — leo

So first, hallucinations and illusions are real hallucinations and illusions. (Where we're not using "real" in the traditional manner to refer to something objective or that exists extramentally.) But we can know that there are no real pink elephants in someone's apartment when they're hallucinating a pink elephant in their apartment, because other people can see that there are no pink elephants, we can tell this via instruments, as well, and we know a lot about how matter behaves and can behave, what's required for there to be an elephant in an apartment, and we also know a lot about how brains work, including how they work on LSD (if that should be the case in this instance), etc.

We know, however, that hallucinating a pink elephant is really what the world is like when someone's brain is in a particular state, perhaps when it's triggered by certain other visual phenomena, etc.

If you're positing that stuff exists that's separate from your mind, and that isn't just others' minds, you're a realist.

I’m trying to figure out how you justify your belief that reality is directly apprehended. — Noah Te Stroete

The simple answer is that in order to have the belief that reality can NOT be directly perceived (insofar as its perceived, re what's perceived, etc.--in other words, no one is saying that you're "perceiving everything about everything"), you'd need evidence that x is not really like F, whereas your initial perception was that x was like F. But to have evidence of that that counts against the initial evidence, we'd have to be able to accurately perceive the way something really is, contra our mistake, which means that we can at least sometimes directly, correctly perceive things.

This also includes the notion that we can directly, correctly perceive things like eyes and ears and brains and machines that we hook up to them, so that we'd have some accurate info about how they work.

No, I do not construct concepts in experiencing and abstracting. I find them latent in my sensory representation. So, I actualize prior intelligibility, converting a potential concept into an actual concept. I do this by focusing on a particular aspect of what is presented. If I constructed concepts as you suggest, there would be no basis for applying the concept to its next instance. — Dfpolis

So we don't agree on what concepts are or how they work.

Also, I haven't the faintest what "find them latent in my sensory representation" or "actualize prior intelligibility" would refer to. To me that just sounds like words randomly strung together.

Re "no basis for applying the concept in a consequent instance"--you construct the concept, and you have a memory.

Now, you might say that I partially construct the concept, but then how do I come to the other part? — Dfpolis

"The other part"? I have no idea what that's referring to.

And, on what basis do I apply the construct to a new instance in which (on your view) it is not latent? — Dfpolis

We could start at the beginning, with how infants do this, and we could start in a scenario where there either are or are not other people (using language) in the environment, but doing any of that would be pretty laborious in this setting, and it's not really necessary. Let's say that you already have a lot of concepts on hand--like beetles and wings and eyes and so on, because you're an adult, and let's say that you're an entomologist working in the Amazon. You discover an odd individual insect. It has only one wing but can fly, and it squirts some sort of gunk out of its eyes, and so on. So you wonder if you've discovered a new species. You provisionally call it coleoptera monocornu goopojo (a silly name that doesn't follow scientific conventions well, but that's what you initially come up with)--we'll call it cmg for short. You look for other single-winged, eye-goop-shooting beetles in the area, and you find some that aren't exactly alike--some have one large but one very stunted wing, some shoot green eye goop instead of blue, etc., but per your concept, you decide to call any beetle with more or less one wing, that flies, and that shoots colored goop out of its eyes a cmg.

Later, you might decide that there's an important difference between the green and blue goop shooters, or between the beetles that have no trace of a second wing and those that have stunted second wings. And then you'd revise your concept--either adding subgroups to cmg's, or only considering some cmg's while others would have a new concept-name applied, to accomodate what you consider to be important differences (while ignoring the differences that you don't consider to be important). That's how you apply a concept in further instances.

This is already too long, so I'm going to leave it there for now. We could continue with the rest of the post I'm responding to later.

So, how does one know that insects perceive UV light? From what reference point is that given? How do we know the structure of atoms? Has anyone ever seen a single atom? — Noah Te Stroete

Do you think that I'm denying theoretical knowledge for some reason?

Again, my view is that perception gives you things in themselves at particular reference points and everything is always relative to some reference point or other, with there being no preferred reference point.

You didn't think that I was saying that perception gives you "everything about existents from every possible reference point," did you? (As if that even really refers to something that's not nonsensical)

Yes, that was one example. — Noah Te Stroete

Sure. So first, I'm confirming that you're saying that a chair doesn't really look like a chair from a frame of reference that's however many inches or feet away from it and that includes the whole of the chair or a big section of it. Is that correct?

I asked you "How would you know that you've perceived something other than it is? Could you give an example?" And then I wondered if the chair was your example.

Do you see atoms when you look at a chair? — Noah Te Stroete

Was that your example? So a chair doesn't really look like a chair from a frame of reference that's however many inches or feet away from it and that includes the whole of the chair or a big section of it?

Then what is the point of theorizing or the scientific method? Theory and science are needed exactly because perceiving doesn’t give us the things in themselves. — Noah Te Stroete

How would you know that you've perceived something other than it is? Could you give an example?

The rifle used in the Garlic Festival shooting was legally purchased in Nevada — S

I didn't hear about the garlic festival shooting. Was the perp a vampire?

Yes, I know all of this. This just strengthens my argument and weakens yours. — Noah Te Stroete

Nice move basically doing this:

I understand all of these things. I’m pointing out that perception doesn’t give you the things in themselves. — Noah Te Stroete

It gives you the things in themselves at particular reference points and everything is always relative to some reference point or other, with there being no preferred reference point.

but not all electromagnetic radiation is visible light, — Noah Te Stroete

To us, no. Again, it just depends on how faculties evolved for the creatures in question. That usually has a lot to do with what's survivally advantageous for the creatures in question. There are creatures that can see different ranges of electromagnetic radiation than humans see. Those ranges are visible light for them. It's very similar to sound waves. Different creatures can hear different frequency ranges of sound waves. Well, different creatures can see different frequency ranges of electromagnetic radiation, too.

You seem to think that the perception of reality gives you reality. — Noah Te Stroete

Yes. And I can easily show the flaws in empirical-based arguments that claim otherwise.

Do you know how perception works? I don’t think you do. — Noah Te Stroete

Patronizing much? And after not understanding electromagnetic radiation, doppler shifts, etc.

Can a point of reference be “considered” without conceptualization or perception? — Noah Te Stroete

Can it be considered without that? No. Because of what it refers to to consider something.

Depends on the activity, on the occasion.

Visible light is a type of electromagnetic radiation. We can detect doppler-shifted electromagnetic radiation at relatively slow speeds.

We were talking about points of reference, not the flux of reality. — Noah Te Stroete

Yes, spatio-temporal locations. You can't consider anything absent a spatio-temporal location, and all property changes occur relative to spatio-temporal location differences--necessarily so, since time is simply motion or change.

You asked how fast they'd need to be moving in order to detect doppler-shifted light. The answer is not very fast. We can detect doppler-shifted electromagnetic radiation at relatively slow speeds.

Category error, I think. — Noah Te Stroete

?

You're it aware that visible light is part of the electromagnetic spectrum? Microwaves would be visible light to creatures that evolved sensitivities to be able to perceive them. It's all the same stuff, just different frequencies.

Exactly. If the properties of the orange change, then how can we keep calling it an orange? — Harry Hindu

How would you think that the properties of an orange (or anything else) don't change? You wouldn't be able to have orange trees flowering, some of the flowers turning into fruit, the fruit developing, eventually ripening, falling, decomposing, etc.

Not very fast. Radar guns work via doppler effect measurement, for example. Radar guns use microwaves, but it's all just part of the electromagnetic spectrum.

It's not that the orange is emitting light. It's reflecting it. Reflected light is doppler-shifted just as well as emitted light. You could say that it's emitting reflected light if you like. At any rate, just how the light is produced is irrelevant to the doppler effect. The relative motion is what matters.

The relations or the river? — creativesoul

You asked "Put forth a duration."

I explained what time is: The changes/motion that are happening. A duration would a measurement of the changes that are happening from some frame of reference--for example, our phenomenal now.

You asked "what changes"--presumably, what changes was I referring to re "the changes/motion that are happening."

Well, time is the relations of everything that's changing/moving. That includes the river relative to other things, it includes the water and fish and rocks and particles, etc. in the river. Everything.

Presumably, at some point you'll get to why one would "not be able to step in the same river once."

There are properties that vary at different spatial-temporal locations but not all of them. Color and texture of the orange doesn't change as I move around it or if I were to move it relative to me. The location changes, but not the color or texture. — Harry Hindu

I'd agree that maybe not all properties change at different reference points, but I definitely wouldn't say that color and texture are among them. Color will change if the orange is moving at particular velocities, for example--it can be blue or red-shifted, and it will change as the environment changes, including, of course, as we change from day to night.

Texture will easily change with distance and scale. If the reference point is far enough away, the texture will be as smooth as a billiard ball, for example.

The common objection to this is to say something like, "Well, at the surface of the orange, the texture is such and such"--but that's a different reference point. (And this is just my point--the properties will be different at different reference points.)

I guess. The way I interpret Kant is that the spatio-temporal reference points you were talking about as real things of nature only exist in minds. — Noah Te Stroete

Right, it just seems like a very odd thing to think. I was reviewing his motivations for arriving at his view a bit, and they seem like really poor reasoning to me, but it would be a big thing to get into detailed critiques of all of the points.

What exactly then is your position re Kant about what is inherent to the mind as laid out in Critique of Pure Reason? Is space and time at least partially constructed in the mind? Or are space and time inherent to the physical world ONLY? — Noah Te Stroete

I'd say that space and time are inherent in the physical world, which is everything that exists, including your mind.

It's been so long since I read Kant that I can't remember his argument for this (which isn't aided by the fact that it probably didn't make a lot of sense to me when I did read it--Kant's not exactly my idea of a clear writer), but I can't see what the reason would be for one positing that we mentally create and basically "project" space and time onto things.

I'd agree that we'd not be able to make sense out of anything without thinking of things in terms of space/time, but that's because space is simply extension(al relations) and time is simply motion/change. It's incoherent to suppose that there could be existents without spatial extension/extensional relations to other existents, or to suppose that nothing is moving or changing. That's not a reason to suppose that there's no real extension/extensional relations or motion/change.

Relations

Ok, then those properties are what we are talking about, which include the object's location in space and time. Objects have other properties than just spatial-temporal locations. — Harry Hindu

Right, so the point is that properties of objects vary at different spatio-temporal locations, including spatio-temporal locations on/in/etc. the objects themselves. That's because relations are an integral aspect of properties, and relations vary at different spatio-temporal locations. It's a spatio-temporal/relational situatedness, which isn't something that can be "escaped" in any sense. That has nothing to do with persons necessarily. But when persons are present, they experience this spatio-temporal/relational situatedness perceptually.

But you understand that transcendental idealism a la Kant is more than just idealism a la Berkeley or leo? And how do you personally explain how theoretical knowledge is created? — Noah Te Stroete

I don't want to get into the issues re "explanations" again.

Personally, I don't think that Kant explains anything, by the way.

This is the sort of thing that Zappa's cohorts were doing on Lumpy Gravy:

I think Terrapin Station is saying that there is a real way something IS from a particular spatial temporal reference point, and how that thing is from that particular point is knowable — Noah Te Stroete

That's all correct. To finish the above, it's knowable, for one, from perception, which isn't theoretical. But in cases where perception isn't possible, sure, then we have to do something theoretical.

The point I was bringing up re having to introduce theoretical material was contra a notion that seems popular around here: namely, that idealism or at least realism skepticism due to representationalist notions of perception are somehow a default experiential view. Those views aren't default experiential views. You have to invoke theory and make theoretical commitments in addition to your experiences, your perceptions, to arrive at idealism or representationalism.

It is not. Before we encounter a duck, it is a duck and capable of evoking the concept <duck>. That capability is its intelligibility as a duck. When we sense the duck, that intelligibility becomes present in us. When we attend to its sensory representation (become aware of it), we actualize that intelligibility and know the duck as a duck. — Dfpolis

Okay, so first, you're applying a concept that you've constructed. Do you agree with that? It's not as if you're perceiving concepts or anything like that. A concept is something you do, personally, in response to things.

Secondly, you can perceive a duck and not think anything like the name "duck," or think of the concept of a duck, or any sort of mental content per se period, right?

We can become aware of specific properties. "Known" in the sense of "acquainted with" might be a better word. — Dfpolis

I don't see what that would have to do with the word "understand(ing)" or "intelligibility." Those seem like misleading words to use there. (At least relative to their conventional senses.)

No. Intelligibility is what we grasp in knowing. — Dfpolis

I hope you're not thinking that "Knowledge is awareness of present what-we-grasp-in-knowing" is any less gobbledygooky.

Objects can be understood. — Dfpolis

Objects can be "understood" in what sense? Not a semantic sense, obviously. But?

Then you have to pay attention to what I actually say. — Dfpolis

You have to say things in a manner that's intelligible. (Ironically enough.)

Mars and the Eiffel Tower don't have eyes and a brain. — Harry Hindu

Why would spatio-temporal locations imply eyes and a brain to you? It's frustrating that so much interaction here is people not even understanding what the other person is saying.

They don't have subjective experiences. How would they have reference points? — Harry Hindu

You had just written "A reference point is a location [in] space-time." And yes, that's correct. That's what I'm talking about. Spatio-temporal locations. (It's just that I'm stressing that properties are unique at each spatio-temporal location.)

Are you saying that when I look at objects, I'm merely looking at other reference points? — Harry Hindu

When you look at an object, you're seeing the object as it is from that reference point. (That is, from your spatio-temporal and relational situatedness)

Objects are always some set of ways from any arbitrary reference point. Your presence isn't required. No one's presence is. But when you're present, you experience things from a particular reference point.

There's no way for anything to be any way from "no reference point." There's always some reference point, including reference points on, inside, etc. the "object itself." Again, this is talking about saptio-temporal locations, or spatio-temporal (and relational) situatedness.

If a tree is a reference point, then why do I perceive it as an object and not a reference point? — Harry Hindu

So, this is asking "If the tree has a spatio-temporal location, then why do I perceive it as an object and not a spatio-temporal location?" Is that a question you'd be inclined to ask?

The tree is only part of my reference point. — Harry Hindu

The tree isn't part of your spatio-temporal location unless either you've climbed the tree, or you're inside it, or we're considering a reference point as broad as whatever city you're in, or we're simply talking about Earth or the solar system or something.

If there are a combination of reference points, where are they located relative to each other? — Harry Hindu

It depends on the points, obviously. You can't give a single answer that applies to all cases.

For example, Mars and the Eiffel Tower would have very different answers as to where all the possible reference points for each are located relative to each other, because of the different spatial arrangements, etc.

Why am I suppose to assume you exist independent of my reference point, but the tree doesn't? — Harry Hindu

I honestly have no idea what you're asking here. It doesn't sound as if it's stemming from anything I'd say. Let me ask why you're thinking that anyone is saying that you're "supposed to" assume that some things exist independent(ly) from you but other things do not?

You wrote it in the post above - AFTER my post, so how could I have quoted it in my post before yours? — Harry Hindu

You quoted me saying "there's always some reference point," after which you wrote the phrase "Nothing new here."

that both in your theoretical account and his theoretical account everything we experience are experiences of a conscious being, — leo

Sure, but I'm not at all endorsing representationalism, idealism, etc. Those require theoretical moves just like any other stance does. That was the point.

Nothing new here. — Harry Hindu

As it shouldn't be. Now if everyone would just agree with it so I wouldn't have to point it out in contradistinction to other ideas.

Some are talking about how objects are independent of reference points (a view from everywhere). — Harry Hindu

There's no such thing, though. Hence the nothing new of "there's always some reference point." The reference point can be a combo of others, but it's still a reference point.

What is the nature of the tree independent of reference points? — Harry Hindu

I just wrote that there is no such thing, you just quoted it, and you just said "Nothing new here." So why would you even be asking?