Since appeals to Hume and Kant and academic skepticism will take us too far from the topic of this thread I won't pursue it here, but I would be interested to read what you have to say if you start a thread on Hume and Kant and their connection to Academic Skepticism, and more specifically your claim that:

... when you are not perceiving it, there is no more the ground, warrant or reason to believe it. — Corvus

But to do so, it would seem, would be to involve you in a performative contradiction when you go on to council us unperceived beings:

I would say stopping believing in something when there is no ground, warrant and reason to believe it would be definitely more rational ... — Corvus

It strikes me as being unreasonably reasonable.

I mean we have no ground, warrant or reason to believe in the world, when we are not perceiving it. — Corvus

And yet both you are Hume write for an unperceived public.

How long must the lights stay out before this form of skepticism takes over? Do you doubt the existence of the world each time you blink?

...learning about philosophy — dani

I make a distinction between learning about philosophy and doing philosophy. The former is a view from outside, being given someone's views on what philosophers have thought and said. The latter develops your own thinking through engagement with the writings of philosophers, working to understand them rather than relying on how someone else understands them. In my opinion, the major philosophers do not simply tell us what they think but teach us how to think, that is, a way of thinking.

Some of Plato's shorter dialogues is a good place to start. Socrates is responsive to what his interlocutors say. He calls himself a "midwife", helping others to birth their ideas, beliefs, and opinions. By imagining what we would say in response to him Plato helps us to develop and give birth to our own ideas. And in the process allow us to alter or abandon those that we no longer wish to call our own.

This last point can be both the greatest strength and the greatest weakness of philosophy.

Enjoy the journey.

The duped see a barn. — Banno

Then we are in agreement.

We are also in agreement that they failed to correctly identify the building.

But we don't see a barn, we see a church that looks like a barn. — Banno

If by "we" you mean those who are not duped, then yes. But it may be that we would be among the duped, in which case we would see a barn.

That depends on whether one is aware that it has been camouflaged, of course. — Banno

Right. What would be the point of camouflaging it if not to fool those who do not know that it is a church?

I'm not seeing(!) a point here, either in favour or against the arguments we are considering. — Banno

The point is about what it is that we see. What is the basis for the distinction between what something looks like and what we see? It seems as though Austin is basing the distinction on a questionable assumption about objectivity, as if we don't see a barn because it is a church.

And if pressed, I'd have to agree with Austin, that what we see is a church, albeit one that looks like a barn. — Banno

If "a church were cunningly camouflaged so that it looked like a barn" why would you think that what you see is not a barn but a church? How would you respond when you saw it? Would you approach it with the intention of praying?

A brief comment on the Butterfly Dream. The last two lines are important:

Between Zhuang Zhou and a butterfly there must be some distinction! This is called the transformation of things

.

Distinctions are made between Zhuang Zhou and the butterfly and being awake and dreaming, but beyond the distinctions is the transformation of things. Throughout the Zhuangzi one thing becomes another. Often it is not simply a distinction between things, but from one thing to its opposite. Understanding comes through this transformation from the limited perspective of one thing to that of another. The story is told in Chapter Two: On Equalizing Things.

all I see is patches and blobs from which I infer(?) the existence of a cup. — frank

I think the indirect realist gets it backwards. She sees the cup and based on a theory of perception infers that she sees patches and blobs.

Put her in a room that contains only patches and blobs my guess is she would see patches and blobs. But if some of those patches and blobs were arranged in a certain way, in dim light, and at enough of a distance she might see a cup or pen or chair. That is to say, there is, I think, a constructive element of seeing.

That admission seems to be how he denies any sort of comprehensive indirect realism. — frank

Terms such as 'realism' in all its variety of flavors confuse me. I try to avoid them. The fault may be entirely my own, but I have not been able to find any consistent usage that makes me confident that those who talk about such things have the same concerns and are arguing for or against the same things.

I am also trying to understand that, because unless I do understand that, I don't understand what "indirect" means. — Ludwig V

To say eyes are one of the mediums of visual perception is to point out that perceptions are indirect. — Corvus

The distinction between direct and indirect is stated on page 2:

The general doctrine, generally stated, goes like this: we never see or otherwise perceive (or 'sense'), or anyhow we never directly perceive or sense, material objects (or material things), but only sense-data (or our own ideas, impressions, sensa, sense-perceptions, percepts, &c.).

Well, sometimes what we see is what there is... — Banno

In the case of the camouflaged church what we see is not, as Austin claims, "a church that now looks like a barn". (30) What we see is a barn. If we didn't what would be the point of camouflaging it?

He continues:

We do not see an immaterial barn, an immaterial church, or an immaterial anything else.

While this is true, and is the reason why he cites this example, the distinction between what we see and what it looks like cannot be made unless we can see that what it is, a camouflaged church, is something other than what it looks like. If the camouflage is removed we might say that what we see is a church that now looks like a church, but if the camouflage was not there in the first place we would not say that what we see is a church that now looks like a church.

How do you think this impacts on Austin or Ayer's arguments? — Banno

From an earlier post:

In the case of a table, and perhaps more clearly in the case of a pen or cigarette, what we see in not simply an object in passive perception, but something culturally and conceptually determined. In a culture without tables or pens or cigarettes what is seen is not a table or pen or cigarette. But neither is what is seen "sense data".

If, to take a rather different case, a church were cunningly camouflaged so that it looked like a barn, how could any serious question be raised about what we see when we look at it ? We see, of course, a church that now looks like a barn.
(40) [correction: page 30 of text/40 electronic]

I agree with Austin that what we see is not something immaterial, but I do not think it a matter of course that what we see is a church that looks like a barn. It is only when the camouflage is removed that what we see is a church. What it is and what we see are not the same. What we see is what it looks like to us. — Fooloso4

The sense data (indirect)/material object (direct) dichotomy, taking either one or the other or both together fails to encompass the problem of seeing.

To quote Wittgenstein:

PPI 251. We find certain things about seeing puzzling, because we do not find the whole business of seeing puzzling enough.

Is that consistent with me using a cup to trap a spider? — wonderer1

I think so.

People surely have the ability to see ways of using things, in ways no one has before. So surely what we 'see' is more than just previously recognized linguistic and usage associations? — wonderer1

I agree.

That's what RussellA said. It's linguistic idealism. — frank

I think it is more a matter of what we do than what we say, of what cups are made and used for. The role or function that cups or, to use two examples Austin does, cigarettes and pens play in our lives.

What I am getting at is that there is more to perception than passive reception. What we see when we see the cup is not something separate from or independent from what we call it and what we use it for.

But they might say that when you look at a cup, what you are seeing is the cup — Banno

Suppose there is a tribe that does not have cups. What do they see when shown or given a cup?

You need more than just identifying a table as a table in visual perception. — Corvus

I think this is a good point. In the case of a table, and perhaps more clearly in the case of a pen or cigarette, what we see in not simply an object in passive perception, but something culturally and conceptually determined. In a culture without tables or pens or cigarettes what is seen is not a table or pen or cigarette. But neither is what is seen "sense data".

If, to take a rather different case, a church were cunningly camouflaged so that it looked like a barn, how could any serious question be raised about what we see when we look at it ? We see, of course, a church that now looks like a barn.

(40)

I agree with Austin that what we see is not something immaterial, but I do not think it a matter of course that what we see is a church that looks like a barn. It is only when the camouflage is removed that what we see is a church. What it is and what we see are not the same. What we see is what it looks like to us.

Actually if you read the OP you will see that Epicurus had a strong notion of unnatural human desires. — Leontiskos

Actually I have read the OP and more. Why would you think I haven't? What did I say that runs contrary to this?

The Greeks used the term phusis ('nature') to distinguish it from what is by convention or law or custom (nomos). When applied to ethics, what is by nature is universal, true for all human beings by virtue of human nature.

In Judaism, however, no appeal was made to nature but to God. Rather than a nature man has "ways". Some ways are straight, others crooked. Some God approves, others he does not. Some men are on the path, others stray.

Christianity inherits both opposing views. On the one hand God's Law, and on the other, through Paul, man is born in sin and powerlessness against it. Augustine goes further with the belief in original sin. What is most natural becomes the source of sin.

I’m saying that those aspects of Wittgenstein’s philosophy are not propositional but still conceptual. — Luke

Sorry, I did not catch that you were shifting gears. The passages you cited are helpful in making the case for conceptual seeing. It cuts across the neat division between seeing and saying in the Tractatus.

Yes, the sun. One type of thing. — Antony Nickles

There are several issues raised including what a law of nature establishes, the problem of induction, contingency and necessity.

It is unclear what your "this" is referring to. — Antony Nickles

Contingency, certainty, science, nature ...

My guess is that you are imagining every example leads to a conclusion about our approach to everything (that there is only one form of skepticism: the problem of a foundation for a particular criteria for knowledge). — Antony Nickles

You should be skeptical of imagining what I am imagining. What you are imagining that I am imagining is wrong.

I take you to be framing it that he only has one "picture of knowledge", and, for that matter, that there is only one sense of "certainty". — Antony Nickles

Again, you are wrong. It is counterproductive to make conjectures and argue against them rather than addressing what I have actually said.

The problem of skepticism can be framed in terms of the question of what can be known, which leads to the question of knowledge. If you are interested in what I have said, the thread An Analysis of "On Certainty" would be a good place to start.

That is to say that I don't find where this is relevant to the matter at hand. — Antony Nickles

Based on the title of the workshop:

‘Disappointment with criteria – Cavell, Rush Rhees, and skepticism’. — Antony Nickles

I don't see why you would think that what I quoted from Wittgenstein is not relevant.

And it is satisfied in the case of the sun (as with believing it is raining outside), because we can know whether we are right or not when the sun comes out (or checking on the rain). — Antony Nickles

We can know that the sun rose today, but can we know that the sun will rise tomorrow? It seems clear that he did not think we could.

a picture of knowledge. — Antony Nickles

I think his picture of knowledge takes this into consideration. Perhaps his best expression of this is the river of knowledge from On Certainty.

Did Wittgenstein change his mind on this:

T 6.36311 That the sun will rise to-morrow, is an hypothesis; and that means that we do not know
whether it will rise.

T 6.37 A necessity for one thing to happen because another has happened does not exist. There is only logical necessity.

T 6.375 As there is only a logical necessity, so there is only a logical impossibility.[/quote]

255. The philosopher's treatment of a question is like the treatment of an illness.
— ibid. 255

Not what you want to hear riding the gurney. — Paine

Compare this to 133:

The real discovery is the one that enables me to break off philosophizing when I want to. a The one that gives philosophy peace, so that it is no longer tormented by questions which bring itself in question. - Instead, a method is now demonstrated by examples, and the series
of examples can be broken off. —– Problems are solved (difficulties eliminated), not a single problem.

Physician heel thyself.

Not propositional, but still conceptual. — Luke

Does Hacker discuss Wittgenstein on what might be called conceptual seeing - seeing as, seeing aspects, seeing connections?

PPI 251. We find certain things about seeing puzzling, because we do not find the whole business of seeing puzzling enough.

PPI 257. The question now arises: Could there be human beings lacking the ability to see something as something a and what would that be like? What sort of consequences would it have? ... We will
call it “aspect-blindness” - and will now consider what might be meant by this. (A conceptual investigation.)

PPI 261. The importance of this concept lies in the connection between the concepts of seeing an aspect and of experiencing the meaning of a word.

Since the primitive people interpret what they hear, the difference is that one uses language and the other does not. There is, however, a difference in their form of life. More specifically, the way of life of philosophers (savages) and that of ordinary language users. The gap would be closed by philosophers not imbuing language with metaphysical meaning.

Does the project to dissolve as many problems as possible actually do that? — Paine

I don't think so. The assumption is that philosophical problems are grammatical problems. In some cases they are, but by treating language as the key it would seem that Wittgenstein is among the savages.

The reaction might be, at least in part, biological. There are several animals that play dead and other animals that will not eat or in other ways come in contact with dead animals. In some cases it might be a fear of the dead. Disease is a common cause of death. Perhaps there is something in the DNA of some animals, including humans, an impulse to avoid dead things.

I read through that thread, including your response.

With regard to it:

It should not matter whether one is a philosopher as long as one is reasonable. But even if restricted to philosophers worthy of the name we do not find agreement with regard to the question of reason itself let alone agreement on the existence of God.

Culture and history should not make a difference unless reason is historically determined and God is not transcultural.

I'm anxious about relying on the concept of nature. — Moliere

As well you should be. Concepts of nature can be a reflection of perverse desire that things be a certain way in accord with one's opinion of how they should be. We can see this clearly when nature is appealed to as authoritative in moral disputes. For example, the claim that homosexuality is unnatural. Of course when we look at what occurs in the natural world what we find is that the facts do not support the claim.

What distinguished what is natural from what is unnatural? As the example above shows, it cannot be an appeal to what we find in the non-human world.

This might be a good place to start. What quickly becomes evident is that his interpretation of Wittgenstein is grounded on the problems and analysis of propositions, as can be seen in such claims as:

It [philosophy] is concerned with plotting the bounds of sense.

(43)

What philosophy describes are the logical relations of implication, exclusion, compatibility, presupposition, point and purpose, role and function among propositions in which a
given problematic expression occurs. Philosophy describes the uses of expressions in our language for the purpose of resolving or dissolving conceptual entanglements.

(45)

There are other aspects of Wittgenstein's philosophy, such as seeing aspects, that are not propositional. It is here that we can see continuity between the Tractatus and his later work. It is also here that the limits of Hacker's interpretation of Wittgenstein can be seen.

But some do.

There are no examples of reason completing itself. Although Thomists might believe it does in some limited way, because they believe that through it we can know that God exists, a great many highly capable and reasonable people do not agree.

Why the lack of agreement? If it were simply a matter of reason there would be no such disagreement.

I do not know what to make of ‘from quantity to quality’... — Banno

It is not simply a matter of motion but of responsiveness.

Not at all sure where this is going. — Banno

Me neither. I think it clear we do not know what happens when we die. All the rest is story telling.

You are committing the fallacy of affirming the consequent, claiming that because reason is ordered to truth therefore (all) truth must be derivable from unaided reason. — Leontiskos

Nope. What I am saying is that if, as you assert, there is a telos of reason, then it has to date failed to complete or realize itself.

Aquinas and I are in agreement that reason has a limit. Where Aquinas and I differ is with regard to where to draw that limit. Although I cannot say where to draw that limit I can say that he allows for it to extent much further than I do. Where he claims that the truth of God is known to reason, I deny it.

You stitched four clauses together and added a double serving of non sequitur for taste? This is why I don't often respond to your posts. — Leontiskos

No need to stitch together what for Aquinas belongs together.

So Fooloso's assumption that anything that comes from Aquinas must be revelation-based is not only faulty reasoning, it is also almost exactly backwards. — Leontiskos

I have made no such assumption.

You seem to have lost the thread of the argument. You claim that reason is teleological. By teleology you say you mean how the term is understood within the Aristotelian tradition. You go on to say, that it is Aquinas who says that the human being is intrinsically ordered to truth.

Teleology is the movement toward something's completion. The completion of reason accordingly would be the truth. Aquinas, however, says that God reveals things that transcend human reason. In other words, the completion of reason does not yield the whole truth. For this revelation is needed.

All this is very far from what you accuse me of. I suspect your defensiveness is getting in the way.

The ubiquitous account is that something has left the body, implying a dualism. My point was that it is of equal validity to say that the body no longer does what it once did, avoiding the dualism. — Banno

I agree. At the risk of continuing to go in the direction you would rather the discussion not go, I will point out that this is not a modern or contemporary development. It can be found in the ancients as well, and in both roots of the Western tradition.

the simple fact that a dead body is different to a live one. — Banno

I was wondering about the visceral reaction.

Quite often it is ordered [...] to what can be made to seem to be true...
— Fooloso4

Yes, as often as Sophists operate. — Leontiskos

It is often overlooked how close the sophist and philosopher are.

More generally, the problem is our inability to make the distinction between what seems to us to be true and what might be true.

Who said anything about revelation? — Leontiskos

I put these pieces together:

the Aristotelian tradition. — Leontiskos

But as a Christian — Leontiskos

The intuitive opinion follows Aquinas in claiming that the human being is intrinsically ordered to truth — Leontiskos

Summa Theologiae, — Leontiskos

For the Thomist the Aristotelian tradition is typically the Thomist tradition. Even without reference to Aquinas, I recognized the claim as Aquinas' rather than Aristotle's. It occurs often in the argument of Thomists.

You're engaged in axe-grinding. — Leontiskos

Nope. Just following where that ordering leads.

You can attempt to give an argument for such a conclusion if you like. — Leontiskos

You miss the point. That reason does not lead to the truth of God cuts both ways.

I'll take your word for it, although I recall reading a similar account elsewhere, with Plato writing differing accounts for various audiences. — Banno

I have said this several times. For example:

here

Just as Socrates spoke differently and said different things to different people, Plato manages to say different things with the same words.

here

Socrates spoke differently to different people.

here

The two depictions of the soul in the Republic and the Phaedrus do not match up. Different stories for different occasions. Socrates says the he speaks differently to different men depending on their needs.

here

Socrates spoke differently to different people depending on their needs.

I don't recall the source I relied on though. Perhaps @Paine knows.

What's curious is the way in which talk of division or of a spirit leaving the body comes so easily. — Banno

The Greek word translated as soul is ψυχή (psykhē, Latin psyche). The Hebrew is רוח (ruach). Spirit comes from the Latin spiritus. In each case the terms mean breath. At death breath leaves the body. It is from this natural observation that these terms go on to develop mythologies, metaphysical meaning,

I want to draw attention to what is a visceral difference between how one sees a living and a dead body. — Banno

This raises an interesting question. Hunters do not react this way when they kill. They may even have the body preserved and displayed. This may have something to do with the body not being a human. Or it may be that the visceral reaction has been suppressed. How do warriors react when the kill is human? Friend or foe might make a difference. The reaction might also change with frequency.

We brace ourselves against this with ritual, seeking some sort of continuity or normality. But our grief recognises the loss. — Banno

Clergy might tell us that the deceased has gone to a better place, and some may believe this, and yet they grieve.

The other side of this is the loss of one's own life.

I figure that saying: "When we do philosophy" includes all the efforts Wittgenstein is making as much as it includes views he is resisting. — Paine

I agree.

Criticizing from the inside is different from criticizing as an outsider.

It seems like the wide variance of interpretations are a function of how that gets answered. — Paine

Cryptic. Can you elaborate?