If the certainty of natural law is really not sufficient to explain natural causes and effect.....
— Mww

Natural laws are not sufficient to explain the existence of the universe, — EugeneW

Not yet, but that’s beside the point of whether or not they are certain enough to explain the natural causes and effects in the universe.

Maybe dreaming is meant for divine communication. — EugeneW

Could be, but why only in dreams? And why would gods communicate with us in dreams, then not make it so we can remember what the dreams were about? Seems like a rather pointless enterprise. I guess I should say, if a god communicates with me via my dreamstates, he damn sure outta enable me to remember it.

What if you have seen them in dreams? — EugeneW

There are no sensations in dreams. I’ve dreamt of frying bacon, but never when so engaged, have I experienced the smell it frying.

Just as I like to keep my conscious faculties separated, in order to tell which one to call on for the thing it alone can do, so too I like to keep the conscious activities separated from the sub-conscious activities.

Instinct is an innate fixed pattern of behaviour. — RussellA

instinct, ability and knowledge are all distinct aspects of human intelligence. — RussellA

If instinct is fixed, but ability and knowledge are contingent, thus not fixed, I wouldn’t lump them all under intelligence.

All distinct aspects of the human condition, perhaps?

Every object can be intuited as belonging to it. — EugeneW

No. I’m talking about objects of intuition belonging to conceptions of gods, but you’re talking about objects intuited as belonging to gods as existing, albeit supersensible, objects in themselves. We don’t intuit objects as belonging to objects, but rather, we intuit properties belonging to objects from the sensations by which they are presented to us. Gods are not presented to us as are real objects, they leave no impressions on our sensations, so we don’t intuit anything with respect to them as phenomenon.

Now it is permissible to think objects as belonging to gods, by which our sensations may be impressed by that object, but that is not the same as an impression made by a god itself. From which we say dumb stuff like....only a god could make an object so wonderful.
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Necessity is that for which the negation is impossible”.
— Mww

The gods, that is. — EugeneW

The negation of the necessity of gods is easy. If the effects in the empirical world are sufficiently explained by natural law, then explanations for effects in the natural world have no antecedent necessary explanation by gods. Therefore the negation of the necessity of gods is not impossible.

If the certainty of natural law is really not sufficient to explain natural causes and effect, is a god then merely possible, but still not necessary. Only when no other explanation at all, of any kind whatsoever, whether comprehensible by us or not, for the natural occurrences of cause and effect, may gods be necessary. But then, if gods make causes and effects comprehensible to us, such that we know they are responsible for them, then we are no better off than having the comprehension of natural laws we already had.

How would we tell the difference? Technically, we cannot, as demonstrated by critiquing pure reason to order to exploit it only within its proper limits.

Conception using perception is reasonable. — EugeneW

Yes, but that’s not the only way of conceiving. Conceptions arise from understanding conditioned by sensibility, but they also can arise from understanding without sensibility for their condition. Which allows us to think gods, but prevents us from proving the existence of them, iff they do not admit to the criteria of sensibility, from which all our experiences are given.

There is a big difference between reason and pure reason. — EugeneW

The only differences in reason, is the domain of its use. Reason concerns itself with knowledge represented by phenomena in synthesis with conceptions, pure reason with thought represented by the synthesis of conceptions alone. Reason may or may not be a priori; pure reason is always and only a priori.

Pure reason is abstract and devoid of subject matter. It's a fictional vacuous fairytale. — EugeneW

Pure reason has its own subject matter. Obviously, insofar as that which is derived from pure reason can be represented in language, which would be impossible without a subject. Necessity is a syllogistic subject matter of pure reason. As in, “Necessity is that for which the negation is impossible”. Causality. Existence. Reality. Any conception for which no object can be intuited as belonging to it. Like....you know.....gods and stuff.

I am sure that babies also have certain innate knowledge. — RussellA

I’ll grant innate abilities, which is just a euphemism for instinct.

the innate knowledge of how to learn how to talk — RussellA

Knowledge of how to learn? Again....merely an innate ability, a typical condition of sufficient intelligences.

babies have an innate knowledge of time and space. — RussellA

I’ve three sons. I gave a watch to one, once. He put it in his mouth. Best he could do, is think it something to eat, or at the very least, something to make his jaws feel better. I wouldn’t make any claims about what babies know about time and space, even after having been one. I don’t think it matters what they know about them, if they can’t understand th use of them with respect to empirical knowledge.

One can define any conception to make it fit his own theory.

We can conceive by perception. — EugeneW

Probably better not to confuse the abilities of one faculty with the abilities of another. Pretty soon we’ll have steering wheels that dig holes in the ground. Or.....apples doing calculus.
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Reason is no fairytale. Pure reason (das reinen Vernünft) is. — EugeneW

It matters not. It is still only reason that says pure reason is a fairytale. And only reason can say how pure reason actually is a fairytale of sorts, when it operates beyond its limits. Like convincing ourselves of the reality of a thing, then making that thing impossible to experience in the same way other things are experienced.

Perhaps they do
— Mww

For certain they do (have the power to create the universe). — EugeneW

Ok, but are we just as certain they did?
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If so, then human understanding is capable of perceiving — EugeneW

No. Understanding conceives; the senses perceive.
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Pure reason is a fairytale. — EugeneW

And yet pure reason is the only possible source of both affirmative and negative determinations with respect to gods, as far as humans are concerned. Whether they exist or not, reason is how we can talk about what they may or may not be. It is, after all, only reason that says reason is a fairytale.

today we can explain Kant's "a priori" knowledge as innate knowledge, — RussellA

Does the theory of evolution distinguish between innate knowledge and mere instinct?
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I watched a NOVA show on ”slime molds”, in which a planaria was cut in half, and one piece regenerated the missing front part, and the other piece regenerated the missing tail part. The guy called it “knowledge” possessed by the organism. But under dissociative experimental conditions, the organism generates either two heads or two tails. So, dunno if that’s really knowledge to begin with or merely compliance with natural law.

I mistakenly wrote in my post Critique of the Power of Judgement... — RussellA

Yeah, I noticed, that and including his lifespan, made it look like some C & P but without credit for it. Not important, really....just wondering.

I think it only wise to also refer to secondary sources (...) Don't you agree ? — RussellA

Yes, for comparative understanding of a personal interest. No, when referencing him in support of an argument. There’s an unnecessary trust involved, in sayin SEP....or Guyer, or Palmquist, or Quinne.....says Kant says, as opposed to saying Kant himself says.

gods have power of creation. — EugeneW

Perhaps they do. On the other hand, human understanding is obviously capable of conceiving an unconditioned possibility, and pure reason has the authority to establish an idea of its object. But mere a priori conceptions and transcendental ideas are very far from manifest reality, and the manufactured illusory appearances of unchecked dogmatism for the sake of those ideas, treated forthwith as phenomena, do more harm to the certainty of experience than reason should allow itself to afford.

If for any reason that affirms an idea, there is an equally valid reason that negates it.....there’s something about the idea that remains inconclusive. And any thesis or proposition for which a definitive, non-contradictory judgement regarding the reality of its object is lacking, or ill-gotten, properly belongs to imagination, which has the power to logically present or deny to itself objects of mere ideas without phenomenal representation, yet cannot at all belong to that of which such representation is absolutely necessary, as in experience.
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That we can think gods and their supposed powers as logically possible, does nothing to grant knowledge of them as empirically given. The fact that humans cannot think the impossible, but can think gods, thereby denying their impossibility, is surely the weakest of positive arguments, and indeed.....

“....Now it may be taken as a safe and useful warning, that general logic, considered as an organon, must always be a logic of illusion, that is, be dialectical, for, as it teaches us nothing whatever respecting the content of our cognitions, but merely the formal conditions of their accordance with the understanding, which do not relate to and are quite indifferent in respect of objects, any attempt to employ it as an instrument in order to extend and enlarge the range of our knowledge must end in mere prating; any one being able to maintain or oppose, with some appearance of truth, any single assertion whatever. Such instruction is quite unbecoming the dignity of philosophy...”

People can read about cosmology or theology. — EugeneW

Sure they can. So if people know a local piece of the natural world, and the natural world is a copy of heaven, then they know a piece of heaven? If so, then heaven is as full of disturbing occurrences as the natural world, so why would I prefer one over the other? Why would there be copies anyway?

That’s fine. If you think the existence of the universe is sufficient proof of gods.....who am I to argue.

But then...if to know the universe is to know the gods, and the average run-of-the-mill human being can never know the universe as such, how will he ever know the gods?

the gods lay at the foundation of all there is. — EugeneW

All this does is presuppose the reality of gods, for which proven empirical justification is lacking.

Why don’t we just say a better knowledge of the universe is provided by better knowledge of the phenomena in it?

Know the gods and you know the universe. — EugeneW

How would one know the gods, and even if one did, how would he know the gods would give knowledge of the universe? Why wouldn’t a god just say...hey, figure it out for yourself, you think you’re so smart, with your fancy inventions and all. I mean, c’mon, man. You’ve FUBAR’ed that beautiful planet I gave you, now you want me to give you free knowledge?

I got better intelligences to work with than you puny-assed humans.

Phenomenoa lay at the base of knowledge. — EugeneW

Theology is a firmer base of knowledge — EugeneW

So...phenomena lay at the base, but theology lays a firmer base.

How many degrees of firm are there? What’s the firmest possible base of knowledge? How is the firmness of a base determined?

Paint, meet corner.

Your accounting, or sourced from secondary literature?

Perception is the sense awareness of the environment that starts within the mind and then pushes outward. — chiknsld

Sense awareness....to be aware by means of the senses? If to be aware means use of the senses, how can awareness begin in the mind, which has nothing to do with the physical senses?

If the senses cause us to be aware of that which is already out there in the environment, why would the mind push out what just came in?

What is it that the mind is pushing out? Action? What’s going on between that which comes in by means of the senses, and that which gets pushed out by means of the mind?

I'm so glad you came to save the day. — Constance

Ehhhh.....the man’s life’s work was at stake. I was duty-bound, doncha know.

You are ignoring the qualifier..... — RussellA

And this is why I absolutely detest the ghastly stupidity of language games. DETEST, I tell ya!!

“As much as he wanted....” Exactly how much is that, anyway? WFT kinda qualifier would “as much as” be, without a quantitative measure to accompany it? Without a how much to go with the “as much”, who the hell cares about as much as he wanted? He wanted, however much it was. Which he didn’t in the first place. So of course “as much as” can be dismissed as a qualitative categorical condition and the falsity of the proposition stands unassailed.

There’s no mountain to be made from this molehill.

is not "catastrophically false". — RussellA

Ohfercrisakes.....that he wanted to deny it is every bit as false as he did deny it. He equally never did either.

Butting in......

Space doesn't bend; things bend IN space. — Constance

Agreed, re: gravitational lensing. There are no mathematical expressions with space qua infinite containment, as a variable, which there must be if space moves, which it must if it bends.
(“Well, gosh, Mr. Bill. Where did the space go that was above the rock before I put the bucket there?”)
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Causality as an intuition is taken AS causality in play, in context. — Constance

Maybe....taken as causation in play.
—————

the moment you try to talk about it, you place it in the dubious hands language and analysis. — Constance

At first, maybe just language; to talk about indicates an analysis has already been done from which follows the dubious transcription into language. Subsequently, dubious analysis would then be of the initial language.
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Kant wanted to deny metaphysics — Constance

This is catastrophically false, but none of your co-respondents noticed nor cared, even though every single one of them is fully immersed in it, so.....you got off scot-free. Almost.

Butting out.....

Any idea what OM means? — Agent Smith

This garden universe vibrates complete.
Some we get a sound so sweet.
Vibrations reach on up to become light,
And then thru gamma, out of sight.
Between the eyes and ears there lay,
The sounds of colour and the light of a sigh.
And to hear the sun, what a thing to believe.
But it's all around if we could but perceive.
To know ultra-violet, infra-red and X-rays,
Beauty to find in so many ways.
Two notes of the chord, that's our fluoroscope.
But to reach the chord is our lifes hope.
And to name the chord is important to some.
So they give a word, and the word is OM.
(Edge, Pinder, 1968)

Doesn’t answer the question, but cool as hell anyway.

Agreed; there is a body between. I was objecting to “we’re a body”, which I take to be a misconception. A categorical error of equating the mere representation of a metaphysical object of pure reason, with a concrete spacetime reality.
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where we think there should be a divisor. — Metaphysician Undercover

The explanatory gap?

The mental resides in matter. Like charge in an electron. — EugeneW

It would seem that way, yes, as an analogy. Or some quantification of the same sort. But if charge per se, because all matter contains electrons, you must also say the mental is a property of matter generally, as charge is a property of electrons generally, which gets you into all kindsa philosophical trouble.

I’d agree there’s an inside and an outside, but not that “we’re a body between” them. Problem is, as always, that the physical must be responsible for the mental.....somehow. Or maybe it’s just the more parsimonious to suppose it is, otherwise, what we take for knowledge is even more suspect than it already is.

I think you have actually laid consciousness on the table. — EugeneW

Rock and a hard place: you won’t find consciousness, insofar as to so claim is reification of an abstract conception, but to say that of which the body is conscious is not to still be contained in the body, is a logical contradiction.

Physics and metaphysics share an Uber. One sits in the front, one sits in the back, they don’t talk, and they pay their own way. All they have in common is the ride.

Ehhh....not to worry, until it becomes as bad as....

“....How should the minds that in the freshness of youth have been strained and ruined by the nonsense of Hegelism, be still capable of following (...) profound investigations? They are early accustomed to take the hollowest jingle of words for philosophical thoughts, the most miserable sophisms for acuteness, and silly conceits for dialectic, and their minds are disorganised through the admission of mad combinations of words to which the mind torments and exhausts itself in vain to attach some thought....”
(W.W.R., I, Pref.2, 1844)

....Arthur’s verbal castration of poor ol’ G. Dubyah F., or at least his followers, which is the same thing.

Anyway, I’m merely a pacifist spectator, maybe with a clandestine affirmative nod here and there.

I don’t have the era-specific expertise required for direct support herein, but the expertise.....or maybe just the favoritisms......I do have, being taken from the same general arguments as yours, offers support indirectly. What I mean is, for a great deal of what you’ve said so far, I can find references from subsequent metaphysics that supports it.

For whatever that’s worth.....

Metaphysics chooses worn-out words, such as the absolute, infinite, nonexistence, which do not display a trace of original coinage. — lll

“....To coin new words is a pretension to legislation in language which is seldom successful; for this reason, when it happens that there exists only a single word to express a certain conception, and this word, in its usual acceptation, is thoroughly adequate to the conception, the accurate distinction of which from related conceptions is of great importance, we ought not to employ the expression improvidently, or, for the sake of variety and elegance of style, use it as a synonym for other cognate words. It is our duty, on the contrary, carefully to preserve its peculiar signification, as otherwise it easily happens that when the attention of the reader is no longer particularly attracted to the expression, and it is lost amid the multitude of other words of very different import, the thought which it conveyed, and which it alone conveyed, is lost with it....”

Reification. Or, misplaced concreteness. Knowledge is not an existence.

Ok. Thanks, it was fun. For awhile.

“....The mathematician, the natural philosopher, and the logician—how far soever the first may have advanced in rational, and the two latter in philosophical knowledge—are merely artists, engaged in the arrangement and formation of conceptions; they cannot be termed philosophers. Above them all, there is the ideal teacher, who employs them as instruments for the advancement of the essential aims of human reason. Him alone can we call philosopher; but he nowhere exists. But the idea of his legislative power resides in the mind of every man, and it alone teaches us what kind of systematic unity philosophy demands in view of the ultimate aims of reason. This idea is, therefore, a cosmical conception, by which I mean one in which all men necessarily take an interest. (...) Even at the present day, we call a man who appears to have the power of self-government, even although his knowledge may be very limited, by the name of philosopher....”

Gotta be a lesson in there someplace.

A system predicated on prediction and trial and error....
— Mww

Reason doesn’t always have a choice in the matter. — Possibility

Irrelevant, insofar as ‘predicated on’ as a general methodological necessity is not the same as ‘recognition of’ a particular exception. In the case of QM, reason merely conveys that for which a certainty is impossible, under the strictest of conditions reason itself provided, in accordance with observation. Humans, as such, don’t function in the quantum domain, and I’m a big fan of staying in my own lane, so.....
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Pain is a basic biological signal that our predicted distribution of effort and attention (affect) in a particular situation is currently insufficient in some area. — Possibility

Yeah....no. Here’s me, walkin’ down a public road, mindin’ my own damn business, hummin’ Jimmy’s solo bridge in Stairway to Heaven.......punk-assed banga jumps out of the bushes, whacks me in the noggin, relieves me of my Rolex. So the pain of embarrassment I felt in the loss of my watch is the signal that I paid too little attention to making it and my wrist inseparable? Or maybe the pain of the lump on my head signals that I made too little effort in formulating an escape from a situation for which there was no antecedent reason, insofar as the situation itself was a complete surprise?

This is what I meant by guessing games. If such-and-such is true in one case, but not in another, there must be something logically underpinning them both.

Pain, or pleasure, is a basic signaling parameter. Period. All they in their various degrees do, is inform of a relative exception to a given rule, and it’s up to reason to figure out the particulars related to it. Anything else is mere anthropology or (gaspsputterchoke) empirical or clinical psychology. Of which the proper speculative metaphysician treats as the proverbial red-headed stepchild, while the “vulgar class”, as Berkeley would say, or the “vulgar understanding” as Hume would call it, think them as some major importance in the governance of the fundamental human condition.
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Understanding awareness in non-conscious entities is how we improve the accuracy of relationships and interaction with our environment and the universe. — Possibility

Surely you didn’t mean to say I can improve my relationship with a swimming pool if I only understand my diving into it doesn’t cause it any pain. Or, on the other hand, my relationship with the pool improves if I understand it appreciates me diving into it because that is one way the pool was meant to be treated. Your assertion can certainly be interpreted like that.

Point/counterpoint. All in good dialectical exercise.....

This wanders too far afield.

A system predicated on prediction and trial and error cannot be as efficient as one predicated on pure logic, given the excruciatingly simple premise that reason doesn’t like a guessing game, or that which can be reduced to it.
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I have no idea how to connect pain with prediction error.

Prediction: let’s try this. Error: Crap!! I’m now aware that didn’t work!! I felt pain. To feel less pain, try this...try this...try this....where does it end? It ends in no pain, of course. Shall we add sheer luck to prediction and trial and error?

OK...so.....why didn’t it work? Was it because of its logical structure, or because of its qualitative aspect? Or even on the other hand... did it work because of one or the other? If both...equally, or more of one than the other? And if it doesn’t matter, why were they there in the first place?

How was logical structure/qualitative aspect determined, anyway? Or were they given, and in which case, by what?

In subsequent circumstance, under sufficiently congruent conditions, to fall back on prediction or trial and error is absurd, insofar as experience makes them obsolete. So why employ them at all, if they only work once? Sometimes we need something that which works infallibly, all the time.
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Prediction and trial and error have their place, just as logical structure and qualitative aspect has theirs. Just not the same place.

I don't see any reason to take for granted traditional ideas of thought, mind, sense, or consciousness. — Xtrix

I don’t either. Take for granted, that is.

But ya gotta admit.....seeing the numbers in your head, or not seeing a reason, is just the same form of conceptual misappropriation as awareness vs consciousness.

So....we are aware of an actual sensation but also conscious that what we are aware of, could be anything, so has a level of potentiality.
— Mww

It COULD be anything - it CAN be narrowed down (...). It’s where conceptual structures - predictions based on the relation of actual sensation/affect to past experience, knowledge, language, values, etc - come into play. — Possibility

Yes. Close enough.

As for numbers, laws, etc - these are conceptual structures that we develop an understanding of through a potential correlation of quantitative knowledge with qualitative experience. — Possibility

Again, true enough.

it’s just more efficient with prior knowledge of logical structure. — Possibility

What if conceptual structure is itself logical? If it is, then the efficiency we have is all we’re ever going to have, and there wouldn’t be any prior knowledge that isn’t already structured logically.

And if conceptual structure isn’t logical, indicating there is more efficiency to be had, what does the logical structure look like, and how would we know it as such?

To be aware is to be informed by relation to ‘other’; to be conscious is to be aware at the level of potential; to sense is to be aware at the level of actuality. — Possibility

This works for objects of perception, for real objects in the world which affect our sensibility. We know this from the fact we sometimes are affected by objects but don’t know what that object is. So....we are aware of an actual sensation but also conscious that what we are aware of, could be anything, so has a level of potentiality.

But that doesn't account for conditions of consciousness without awareness, of which there are two. One is being conscious of that for which there will never be an awareness at the level of actuality, or that of which we will be potentially aware at the level of actuality iff we ourselves cause it to become an object of perception. The former is, of course, our feelings, and the latter is things like numbers, laws, possibilities, and so on.
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To think is one method of processing information from this level of potential. It isn’t the only one. — Possibility

What is another one? That isn’t the least anthropomorphic?

You’re sensing either way. — Xtrix

If you can add any set of random four-digit numbers together in your head, you are thinking without sensing.

I is strange that you talk of thoughts and awareness as if they are objects (nouns). — Harry Hindu

And it is a dialectic non-starter to fail to grasp that talking about a thing is the only way to objectively represent it. Of course I talk about thinking in terms of nouns. How else would I?

As for the rest....(Sigh)

It seems that both awareness and thinking are integral parts of consciousness. — Harry Hindu

As I said: an unabashed, unapologetic dualist’s personal preference regarding an organized cognitive system. I can think a thing without its being present, but I am immediately aware of a thing upon its being present. Being conscious of thoughts is not the same as being aware of objects, hence being aware of thoughts says nothing more than being conscious of them.

Besides....if it doesn’t really make any sense to say I am aware of my consciousness, or conscious of my awareness, then there is sufficient reason to distinguish the roots and derivatives of one from the roots and derivatives of the other.