I'm not surprised. — Banno

And your response to other things from last post (the ones that pertain to the arguments being made in this thread)?

Sure, it's complex. And you? Do you think that there is indeed a tree with leaves? Is there something about your view that opposes it to direct realism, or perhaps even realism? What? — Banno

Before I get to my view, I'd like to defend indirect realism, at least as it opposes direct realism. I think Dennett does have good evidence when discussing this case (not his overall theory of consciousness, however, which denies and ignores the problem at hand- the hard problem).

Some examples he gives:
-Our mind "fills in gaps" with things like patterns (checkerboards, two-faced pictures, etc).
-Optical illusions, like the one that shows two lines of equal length, but one line appears longer than the other because of the arrangement of the arrows on the ends of the lines.
-The variability of sensory perception amongst different people or the same person at a different timeframe.
- Attention shapes how an object is recognized. If we have the intention of finding something, that object becomes more apparent to us than if not.

But, besides these examples, the fact that at the end of the day, the "result" is based on electrical impulses and chemical information transfer, means that there is a "filter" of the various processes themselves that inevitably affect the result, and makes it "not just a copy" of the input. The medium matters, the image is not being psychically passed but rather, computed via neural networking via chemical and electrical integration points.

Again, I'm totally taking the role of an indirect realist here.

It's the tree that either does or does not have leaves, regardless of our perceptions and representations. — Banno

No one is saying it doesn't on the indirect realism side.
Direct vs. indirect realism becomes about whatever the caller wants apparently. Direct realism thinks there is basically an immediate access to the tree without any interpretation.
Being that it is realism debating realism, it is about how veridical this "window" into the tree is.

It inevitably heads in the direction of a homunculus argument, which fails. It tries to account for phenomena in terms of the very phenomenon that it is supposed to explain. — NOS4A2

I literally wrote about this several times before regarding the hard problem.
https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/comment/102760

https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/comment/417503

https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/comment/194285

https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/comment/305002

https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/comment/416211

https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/comment/106635

https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/comment/470051

So you are a little late to the game, NOS!

The only way out of this, I think, is to say that “interpreting” and “configuring” reality are acts of perceiving, and abandon the idea that these interpretations and configurations of reality are the objects of perception. But then again, that would imply direct realism, making indirect realism redundant.

If direct realism is saying we are perceiving reality as it is, then indirect realism is perceiving reality exactly as it isn’t. But these qualifiers are essentially nonsensical and unnecessary. Though the problem of the external world is related to the problem of perception, I am speaking strictly of the problem of perception. — NOS4A2

This part, I don't get why that conclusion must result. I am missing your explanation here. Cartesian theater, thus indirect idealism false, seems odd to me.

If you’re not using eyes, how are you witness to the end result of this processed and interpreted information? — NOS4A2

So you bring up the Cartesian Theater problem, something I've discussed often. This is simply Hard Problem stuff. Have we moved to this topic?

Before we do, going back here- the question of indirect/direct realism is whether the we are perceiving exactly as reality is externally. That is to say, that there is a 1-to-1 correspondence between what is external and what is perceived. Indirect would say that the brain, due to its processing and evolutionary biology, can only ever interpret and reconfigure what is external.

Although I think Dennett is wrong about his overall theory of consciousness, he does have some neat little examples of how the mind reinterprets and edits the world (though again, these are the easy problems which he thus reifies in a way as the hard problem and thus negates it as a problem which is a move too far in my estimate).

Also, again, moving to idealism (even further from indirect realism), we can even question "what" it means for a quality or property (primary or otherwise) to be instantiated in something without a perceiver.

Another word for a collection of human organs and processes is a human being. This is the perceiver and can be confirmed to perceive. Any thing less, for instance a subset of organs, cannot be said to perceive. Human perceivers also digest, metabolize, breathe, and grow hair. — NOS4A2

Yep, and that was what I was getting at.. one of the colloquial terms, aye. Don't play word games. For once Witty may be right when it comes to this kind of argument. None of this refutes what I said if you read it with charity. You went right for "brain processes" and then said, "Ah, can't be that as there is more to the human than that!". Well, duh, hence my emphasis on "collection of processes" and "colloquial terms" (aka human being). That doesn't negate the fact that indeed those processes are all part of the package of the human being (even if they don't exhaust it. Nor have I ever claimed that.

For these reasons it cannot be said that brains perceive. And since our eyes point outwards, it cannot be said we view are perceiving brain phenomena, whether we call them processes, configurations, qualia. — NOS4A2

Eyes point outward is also word games. The information is still thus processed and interpreted thus. A dead person's eyeballs are also pointed outward, so?

the brain is viewing a configured tree — NOS4A2

Correct, according to the current scientific account- the perceiver is the culmination of various brain and body processes. This collection when discussing the question, "What is it that is perceiving X", is the proper locus for what can be called "the perceiver". In general human parlance, this is often called "perception" or other cognitive psychological placeholder term.

What is configured is the qualia, and conceptual associations that go along with said brain processes. I mean, if we want to venture into the mind-body problem, be my guest. I've done it on this forum many times, and I'm often the one contrary to the typical materialists, so make my day. But, before you jump to the "hard problem", I would like to at least recognize that there are indeed "easy problems", which you seem to be dismissing.

Not getting what you are saying other than (unintentionally) vague allusions to Idealist arguments (the tree is just and idea and not external, etc.).

Everything standing in the way of our direct perception disappears. There is nothing between perceiver and perceived. — NOS4A2

How is that related conclusion occurring by adding more biological components (or any at all)? You are simply restating a claim and then not refuting the counterargument (the components of the body are configuring the tree for the person seeing it).

Although there may be particular instantiations of the property squund in the world, an instantiation of a property is not a property. — RussellA

Can you elaborate on this, defining instantiation here, and property and why one instantiation of property is not property? I may agree, but just want to see if I understand your thought here first.

What is an event without an perceiver?
— schopenhauer1

Unperceived. — RussellA

That really doesn't help though. That is simply rephrasing the problem, "What is an event that is unperceived" then?

There's nothing else apart from space-time that could be a placeholder. — RussellA

But I guess, what does that even mean for space and time to be a placeholder for an event sans perceiver?

But there are more organs and more biology involved in perceiving. — NOS4A2

Yep, sure are. And by me adding this to the equation, what exactly would that be adding to the problem? We already have X brain and sensory components I mentioned, add more, and what changes? We already have various filters I have mentioned.

I agree that in one sense the Direct Realist is looking at a tree in the world , not at the sense data in the mind. They are "looking through" the sense data to the tree on the other side of it, as one looks through a window to the world outside.

However, if someone somehow removed the sense data from the brain of the Direct Realist, they wouldn't be able to see the tree.

In another sense, the Direct Realist is directly looking at something that is at the same time both sense data and a tree. This could be part of the argument against Direct Realism, in that the Direct Realist is perceiving something which is in fact sense data although they think it is a tree, ie, a psychological illusion. — RussellA

:up: Yeah this sounds like a good synthesis of the landscape.

I think the bigger picture is not the epistemology but the metaphysics. What are "physical properties" really? How do physical properties obtain without a perceiver? What is an event without an perceiver? Is it space-time that becomes the placeholder for the event to obtain? Here comes idealism creeping in slowly...

Good

But, is this direct or indirect realism really? Direct realism I would say is about knowledge of the world, not mechanism of the knowledge. The mechanism is agnostic (sense data, or Y or Z). All that a statement needs to fall under the class “direct realism”, is that the mind is perceiving an exact replica of what the tree is externally, “in the world”.

An indirect realist might also use the sense data mechanism, but as long as that sense data is in some way changing the tree into its own schema of that tree, it is indirect.

Of course sense data alone is too basic in both cases but it’s just an example of how that can remain constant and the argument doesn’t change for either.

Is the brain perceiving the process, then? — NOS4A2

The brain is a conglomeration of processes which, working together is the perceiving.

Yes indeed, much different conception from Mr. Schop and one I like to delve into but so far in this discussion keeping it mild by just starting with indirect realism

There's only 1 tree of course, but the point is the representation of the tree, the image on the retina, is, well, true (direct realism) or embellished (indirect realism). — Agent Smith

And that’s my point. What “true” here mean? See my reply to @Banno.

The naive/direct realist believes the perceiver is perceiving the tree exactly as it is,
— schopenhauer1

Nuh. Direct realism is where what we talk about is the tree, not the image of the tree or some other philosophical supposition. — Banno

Same thing bro.


Also,

In philosophy of perception and philosophy of mind, naïve realism (also known as direct realism, perceptual realism, or common sense realism) is the idea that the senses provide us with direct awareness of objects as they really are. — Wiki

Direct realism’ (also known as ‘common sense realism’ or ‘naïve realism’) is the idea that our senses provide us with direct awareness of objects as they really are. The ‘directness’ part of the claim captures well our common sense intuitions of direct perceptual access to the world. However, as the term suggests, ‘direct realism’ also makes the ‘realism’ claim, which is that the existence of the world of objects is not dependent upon it being perceived. — https://philosophynow.org/issues/146/Against_Direct_Realism

Right, that’s how naive realism would say it. How would an indirect realist say it? — NOS4A2

You are playing around with definitions. A naive realist would say that what the person is perceiving is "really" the tree as it is, without any interpretation... But I just gave you the fact that the brain is doing stuff (that is the interpretation), so it is indirectly accessing the tree, as it filters through that process.. which by the way, if I haven't stated it, is a human process.

I know how the biology works. The question can be answered in the form X perceives Y. — NOS4A2

You are a human. Humans are comprised of various sensory organs that are wired to a central processing called the brain. This brain processes the data coming in from the sensory organs called stimuli. That is your detailed version of X perceives Y. In colloquial terms, we say a "person perceives a tree".

I want to know the answer to the question “Who perceives what? For the indirect realist. I want to see if we can examine these objects and their natures. — NOS4A2

It seems like you are simply getting at the hard problem of consciousness, which is probably where @bert1 is coming at it, if I remember, as he (if memory recalls) is a kind of panpsychist. So the idea from a panpsychist would be that there is an internal aspect to the physical.

But getting back to your question, what do you mean by "Who perceives what"? As others explained, it is basically inputs integrating information and various neural networks doing what it is they do, when they come across these inputs through sensory apparatuses. Light shines on the retina, fires the optical nerve, causing a whole bunch of neurons to go through a series of networks moving up cortical layers and subcortical layers, etc.

Again, I think an empirical question. We know for example, that the brain has various ways of integrating information from sensory information. Humans develop over time from fetuses, and all that pretty standard stuff.

Ha, perhaps so!

Ok, I thought I was crazy. I looked back at the previous conversations, and it seems like he is asking a basically empirical question: "How is it that what I think is immediately correct about the world is but just a representational component of mind?". Well, that's like saying, "The computer screen is displaying everything without any computation occurring to make it so". That seems wrong, even on the face of it. Besides the fact that, I don't think that idea is really "direct realism" so much as naive computationalism, or something of that sort.

Right, so what is @NOS4A2 getting at? Can you see how I am confused as to what he is saying?

He doesn't like terms like "actually out there". He only cares what we perceive, but it is exactly the fact that direct realism posits that what we perceive is "actually out there" that is the question at hand. But then he keeps not wanting that to be the case!

I still don’t know why we’d add the qualifier “exactly as it is”. Do you believe we are viewing the trees exactly as they are not? — NOS4A2

That is why I have to bring in metaphysics, I am sorry. Humans bring an interpretive point of view. Do you believe there was a time without humans, or a possibility of a no human universe? If you are not a solipsist or brand of idealist, I am sure you will answer, "yes, of course". There is a tree that exists without human interpretation. What direct realism seems to indicate is, humans have direct access to that view, as if humans are like the "eyes and ears" of the universe itself. But I am sure you don't believe that either, that the tree can have qualities, and properties that are not how it is perceived by humans. But humans have their own schema, that creates for us what we usually think of as how a tree is perceived.

Which tree do we perceive? And who is perceiving that tree? — NOS4A2

Yes, this another way of saying what I am asking, which is why I'm perplexed at your objection. The naive/direct realist believes the perceiver is perceiving the tree exactly as it is, without any "indirectness" (mediation/interpretation), and I am refuting thus. I am saying that, unless you think that the tree is exactly as we perceive it in "reality", then direct realism is false. The tree can only be thus interpreted by the human subject. It is a tree "for us".

I see no other way of looking at it, because if you ask, "No what I am asking is if we 'distort' the tree in any way", this STILL automatically implies that the question is, "Are we seeing the tree for how it is in reality, or not". Otherwise, you get circular arguments such as, "Are we seeing what we really see?". That makes no sense. Rather, it is, "Are what we seeing, what is corresponding to what is there (in "reality"/externally)?"

Yes, we’re not viewing a representation of the tree. We need not include the “thing in itself”, which considers the tree independent of any perception of it. I refer you back to my previous posts. — NOS4A2

I'm not introducing the "thing itself" in the "noumena" way. Rather, I am using it in the sense that we are perceiving the tree exactly as it is in reality. What do you think it is that is "directly" perceived? If you say the "tree", then that is the very thing being disputed. Is the tree in reality how we perceive it? Otherwise, this debate makes no sense to me. What is the content that you are debating? We see a tree is not the issue. Rather, whether epistemologically what we are seeing corresponds to what is the case (what is external). Otherwise, it would be an argument of circular nonsense or just one without any impetus (we see a tree).

Direct realism is simply that we are seeing a tree. — NOS4A2

Who is arguing against this? So a tree exists, and we are seeing a tree. But that is not really the direct realism argument. Rather, it is positing whether we are seeing the tree in some non-representational way, that is to say, "as it is in its reality". I refer you back again to my previous posts.

The perceiver is required in order to formulate any theory of perception. If I leave it out there is no perception. I only which to understand from indirect realism the point at which the perceiver ends and the perceived begins, and whether something lies between them. — NOS4A2

Well, that's why you need to understand that question. Direct realism seems to me, to posit that we "objectively" see the thing "as it is in itself". What is something "in itself" though? A tree is the tree you see as a perceiver when there is no perceiver? Mind you, I'm not saying the tree doesn't exist without a perceiver. If you answer, "Well, no the tree isn't what an average human 'sees' when observing a tree", you have your answer- and it doesn't indicate direct realism. Sense data, goes through other layers of the brain, and creates something we have called a tree. Even if you (oddly) posited just "sense data" and no other layers involved (whatever that might mean), then there is still something there as a barrier to what is the tree in itself. It is its own "indirect".

Why would I leave ourselves out of the picture? — NOS4A2

Because I think this will better elucidate your idea about direct realism.

I agree with you. Can we even talk about this subject without being hopelessly enmeshed in strictures of experience and our conceptual schemas?

Even language is a kind of sense that does not make actual contact with the things it is describing. Language's connection to reality seems as tenuous as that of visual perception. — Tom Storm

It's philosophy, and inherently messy subjects, so I say go for it. If you want to remain silent on any speculative thing, than do so, but I see us missing out without some speculative hypothesizing. I had a whole thread on this.

https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/13996/have-we-modern-culture-lost-the-art-of-speculation/p1

I avoid strong metaphysical commitments by claiming a form of pragmatism. I don't need to know what or why just how. No matter what we belief about the nature of reality and being, as soon as we walk out the door we behave as naïve realists. At some level the games we can play with conceptual framing and language don't matter all that much. — Tom Storm

Sure, fair enough. But the question being asked here requires metaphysical positing, maybe not commitments, so that is what I am doing. Obviously, if you asked me about baking an apple pie, observing a tree sway in the wind, and the like, that would be different questions I would be asking :smile:.

It means that anyone can observe the same properties if they were so inclined. These things would be the objects and systems we measure. Properties describe these things. — NOS4A2

Again, these are all category errors in the context I described:

What is a universe without any point of view? People insert themselves into the picture.. Often when we think of "a universe devoid of a point of view" we think of empty space, or images of planets with nothing else, or something like that. But that's not it either. "Events happening" with no epistemological element, is something we cannot compute. — schopenhauer1

You are doing what I was saying we tend to do- inserting ourselves in the picture. You are coming at it from a post-facto manner.

I suspect an “objective property” is one that is public, available for anyone to measure. With this one needn’t eliminate an observer. — NOS4A2

What does "available" even mean in that context? "What" are these "things" availing themselves?

I think these debates ultimately come down to "what" physical properties are without an observer. What does it mean that charge, mass, energy is "objective"? What is a universe without any point of view? People insert themselves into the picture.. Often when we think of "a universe devoid of a point of view" we think of empty space, or images of planets with nothing else, or something like that. But that's not it either. "Events happening" with no epistemological element, is something we cannot compute.

I'll pose it to the forum, what are "objective properties"? What does that even mean in any coherent way without measurement, interpreters? Whence is the platform for these events? Are we saying space and time are the interpreters, epistemological frame of the events "objectively"?

@Joshs @RussellA @Tom Storm

There's suffering but there's also a lot of joy. A lot of people consider the suffering to be worth it due to the joy. — Xanatos

From at least two perspectives, this is not a good moral justification. One reason it’s not is that not being born means no person experienced the collateral damage of “no joy”. No one is sitting in nothingness regretting no joy. However, collateral damage is created the other way. When someone is born there is always at least some regrettable harms that will befall people- sometimes (and not infrequently) quite burdensome for that person.

It is also simply a violation and an insensitivity to the dignity and worth of the person you are procreating to assume on behalf of another person, that they need to live the X number of years of limited choices that this game of life offers and that they need to experience known and unknown harms. It assumes this game (the limited survival game of this life) is what another person must experience and play. This stance is “aggressively paternalistic” in that it assumes one can and should create unnecessary harms and assumes choices for other people. Rather, prior to the potential child’s birth, is one time when one can perfectly follow the non-harm principle, and not have to mitigate greater violations of harm for lesser ones. One can perfectly follow the duty to not unnecessarily cause harm to others.

One would be using the other person and violating their dignity by indeed causing unnecessary harm, and for x cause (even to see the possibility of a happy child). The overlooking of the harm caused, for X result is indeed violation of someone’s dignity in this situation where no one needed to be caused harm in the first place and where no one needed to assume for another what set of choices is appropriately “good” for others to have. With this last point I might elaborate that perhaps this life’s set of choices is not one they would have chosen. Perhaps this games limited ways of surviving of being in the world would have been less optimal than their preference. The assumption that other self-reflective beings would agree that the parameters of this world are what they would have chosen is aggressively paternalistic. Indeed even if someone experiences joy (whether frequently/deeply or not) might still regret many aspects of this particular setup. They may have preferred a world where survival through work/labor (or otherwise destitution, free-riding, hacking it in wilderness, and death) are not the de facto parameters.

Frankly, anti-natalism for high-IQ people has struck me as being rather stupid since this would only contribute to dysgenics for future generations. If future generations will, on average, become duller, than this would be worse for humanity as a whole. Even the people who want to curb their fertility for the sake of the planet are being stupid IMHO because this would simply mean that there would be fewer people in future generations who will intensely care about this topic because such people will simply be weeding themselves and their own political views out of the future gene pool. — Xanatos

Totally missing the point of most antinatalists' stance against creating suffering for future generations. Also, a lot of ANs aren't even consequentialists. There is something about being aggressively paternalistic and creating suffering and choices on behalf of others for X cause that violates deontological principles.

I hope you weren't in the middle of something important. I'd hate to be a nuisance monsieur! — Agent Smith

We can regard our life as a uselessly disturbing episode in the blissful repose of nothingness.
-Schopenhauer

Our non-grandchildren will not sing of our brave exploits! :lol: — Agent Smith

This is true. Aggressive paternalism assumes life is good and necessary for someone else. It disregards suffering of another so that X goals are achieved. Indeed it is ends justifying means mentality and a deontological miscalculation.

I’m rambling perhaps as I have no context for which I was called but the thread is about ends justifying the means so I’m going with that.

You rang?

Before I answer, I guess I’m getting confused are you debating my interpretation or Schopenhauer himself?