My point is that we mostly make up knowledge, then build it up, rather than discovering it. — bogdan9310

You're forgetting about observation. How does any human form knowledge without observation? Observation is an aspect of science. All in all, philosophy is a science. The conclusions reached in one domain of knowledge should not contradict the conclusions in another. All knowledge must be integrated.

They are not aware that their judgements of culture are culturally conditioned, or to the extent that they are, they are fanatics convinced that they have the one true culture - colonialists. — unenlightened

Wrong. Natural selection designed us to be territorial. So it is naturally conditioned.

Let me put it this way, supposing my culture is dominant, and powerful, supposing my culture involves knowing this, then its expression would not be defensive, as if we are liable to be overwhelmed unless we build a wall. It would not need to suppress or eliminate other cultures. And so it is, that the more xenophobic cultures are those in decline, those that are weak or dying. — unenlightened

This is nonsense. A culture in decline wouldn't have millions of people risking their lives to immigrate to it. Millions of people risking their lives to immigrate to your country is evidence that your culture isn't in decline and millions of people leaving your culture is evidence that your culture is in decline. It is the reason why you have to build a wall or else you become overwhelmed by the costs to accommodate these people into your culture. In other words, it will bring your culture into a decline. We see what is happening in Europe as well with the Arab immigrants. Accepting other groups that don't want to adopt your culture but bring their own is what causes a culture to decline.

I have no idea.

First, don't we need to question the claim of some people over some land? Or are we simply defending our groups resources? Claiming land is one thing, defending that claim is something else. Who has a right to claim land in the first place when every group's ancestors had to migrate from somewhere else in the past. History provides a more objective context.

So we are supporters of oppressed minorities, of black folks, the disabled, women, etc etc. And thus supporters of the Sentinelese, in so far as we interpret their murderous treatment of immigrants as a legitimate demand for privacy.

And there is the beginning of the problem. Because we do not, elsewhere, at the Israeli-Palestinian border, or the US -Mexican border, or the European-African border, take the same respectful understanding view of those cultures that want to maintain their own privacy/purity/security/cultural integrity. — unenlightened

But when the US wants to maintain its cultural integrity by building a wall to keep people that we don't know out, then that is more barbaric than the Sentinelese treatment if their immigrants. Go figure.

What if the Sentinelese were polluting their environment or chopping down rain forests where its impact can affect other cultures?

"Transcendent" means beyond nature, or more than the sum of its parts.

I have no idea what "beyond nature" means. Everything has a causal connection. It is all natural. All things are a sum of their causal relationships and nothing more. From where would that "something more" come from and how is it not affected by or affects our natural world? Transcendent in this sense IS meaningless.

If what happens here affects what happens somewhere else (like in heaven or hell), then they are all part of the same causal domain. There is no distinction of "natural" vs. "supernatural". There is no domain that is beyond nature. Nature includes all causal relationships. God would therefore be natural, and would be a natural cause of the universe, or better yet, "God" is the universe, or multiverse.

Why must something have a reference for it to be understandable? All that requires for something to be understandable is for it to have meaning. — Purple Pond

Why are you answering a question with a question? What do you mean by "understand" and "meaning"?

Understanding is knowing. Knowing is having a set of rules for interpreting sensory data. Words, either spoken or written, are in the form of sensory data (sounds and scribbles). To understand words is to have a set of rules for converting those sounds and scribbles into what they refer to in the world. This is how you learned what words mean. You were shown pictures or people would point and name the object pictured or referenced. What words mean is what they refer to. Words that refer have meaning and are understandable. "Words" that don't refer are just sounds with no reference. Your not really using language if you aren't referring to anything. You're just making sounds, or writing scribbles, that don't mean anything. Exclamations refer to the speaker's emotional state and their intent to express it.

The weather or "the states of affairs", is the rain. It cannot perform the raining. — Purple Pond

The rain is a type of weather.

"It" could also refer to the conditions, or what is the case. It is the case that it is raining. When people use this sentence, they are informing another of a state of affairs, or the conditions somewhere.

The information is redundant because I already know that it is raining, not the sentence. The sentence is fine. — Purple Pond

What is the information? You keep using these words without the slightest idea about what they mean and how they all relate together. I think you need to define, "understand", "know", "meaning", and "information" and see where we stand once you do that.

How can the Processist use words to refer to things, like "tree" or "grandmother", if those things are constantly changing? Using language takes time and by the time the message is relayed the thing has changed and is longer what the Processist would be referring to. Also, what is it that changes?

I think the ideas of relativity and feedback loops come to mind when it comes to thinking about how we perceive the world with its both stable and changing features.

Why not? I already gave an example of and understandable sentence where no reference is completed. "it's raining". What does the "it" refer to? Nothing. — Purple Pond

How can something be understandable without reference? What does it mean to "understand" in your book?

"It" refers to the state of affairs - the conditions outside - the weather. What else would it be referring to? What do you mean when you say, "It is raining"? What information are you trying to relay? If I were to look out the window and see that it is raining and you tell me that it is raining - wouldn't that be redundant since I already see that it is raining? How can the statement, "it is raining" be redundant if the statement doesn't refer to anything?

Also, when translating languages, what is it that you are translating? What the words refer to.

If I go outside, or look out the window, I will see rain. — Purple Pond

Exactly. Why would you look out the window, or go outside, instead of look in the refrigerator or pour a glass of water? Because the state of affairs that the sentence refers to is outside and not in the kitchen.

If words don't refer then you aren't using language, you're just making noise.

If language does not necessarily refer, then how is that you can use language to refer to the fact that language doesn't refer? You end of contradicting yourself with this type of argument. Even when you say what isnt the case you are stating what is the case. Is it the case that words don't refer, or not?

It sounds like all that you are saying is that everything changes. In other words, change is infinite.

Do fetuses feel pain? Do they experience stress when being aborted? I would say that anything with a nervous system feels pain and stress. Late term abortions should be illigal except in extreme circumstances.

I'll come out and say what others are thinking: this is nonsense. — Banno

Speak for yourself. It isn't difficult. Nothing is like unicorns in that they only exist as concepts that don't refer to anything like other concepts do. It is the distinction between what is imaginary and what is real. Nothing is a contradicory term in that nothing is actually something and exists - as a concept.

I don't even agree with dropping free speech but why would you say something so clearly false as a means to support free speech? Nazis came to power using street violence, inciting fear and unrest, and taking advantage of a more fragile state of the public mind after the first War and a terrible economy. Not because muh free speech was limited. — MindForged

Go back and read what I wrote. I never claimed that Nazis came to power ONLY by limiting free speech. They used violence against anyone who spoke negatively about the party. THAT is limiting free speech. My response was to the narrow scope of the OP where limiting hate speech - like fascism - actually works against the freedom of speech. Many political parties have used violence, incite unrest and take advantage of people's fears, not just Nazis. Many political parties want to restrict personal freedoms, not just Nazis. Many politicians refer to their opponents as hostiles, which is inciting violence and unrest here in the US.

The OP was asking whether or not limiting free speech was permissible in certain circumstances. I was saying it isn't permissible in any circumstance. Let all ideas be expressed, and then let those ideas be open for criticism and falsification. My point was that it wasn't by allowing free speech that Nazis came to power. It was by limiting it, but not just limiting free speech - but that would be beyond the scope of this thread - get it?

And Jews aren't part of the society? Further, how is the Nazi destruction of civil liberties and personal property not harmful? Like come on, everything you're saying is making hyper-idealized scenarios the reason why one ought to maintain free speech — MindForged

Again, go back and read the post. That isn't what I was saying. I said the best way to combat Nazism is by letting them express their ideas and then expose their ideas to criticism. Not only that, but it's always nice to be able to know what your neighbors think and where they stand.

Freedom of speech is important in that censorship can be abused by powerful institutions as a tool to disenfranchise certain people, making them less influential. If liberals and their ideas such as freedom, democracy, human rights are censored, their messages will not reach everyone. However, on the same coin, if fascist, Nazi, racist, and other hateful speech are censored, their toxic can be contained. — Purple Pond

Nazism came to power because of limited free speech not because of free speech. When your party controls the airwaves, controls the conversation, and what is allowed to be talked about, you become the very thing you claim you want to prevent.

Some speech harms society, some speech hurts society, most speech does neither. The question is who should stem the flood of harmful speech? Well, it depends on the domain. In the public domain, the government can do something about harmful speech. But here's the key question, can we trust them? Governments have been known not to act in the interest of the people. As for the private domain (such as here in the philosophy forum), it's really the owners pejorative prerogative. Your house, your rules. For example, I see nothing wrong with YouTube banning Alex Jones form their website.

So it comes down to two questions:

In the public domain, can we trust the government to censor "harmful" speech?

In the private domain, do you agree that what can be said is the owner's pejorative prerogative? — Purple Pond

The question is, What do you mean by "harmful"? Nazi Germany had a robust economy before Hitler started WW2. The society wasn't harmed by fascism. Jews were, and any other group that wasn't pure German.

Declaring speech "harmful" is a way if limiting speech that you don't agree with. You have to explain why it is harmful. You have to use your own words to combat hate (illogical) speech. It is illogical because to ask to treat anyone different than yourself - to declare yourself as having special rights that others don't have - is hypocritical and therefore illogical. It is quite easy to counter hate speech with logic. All that is necessary is that the hate speech can't limit other's freedom to speak and counter other speech.

The answer isn't to limit free speech. The answer is MORE free speech. Allow everyone a say. Use your own words to argue against illogical speech. Let everyone listen to what is said. Let them hear hate speech AND the counter to it. Let people the freedom to not only speak, but to listen to every and any idea and the counter to those ideas. That is how we will evolve, or progress, in our thinking as a society.

I don't know, you mentioned everything is information, not matter or mind- which causes dualism, or something like that. I thought you were saying that mind is an illusion, like the illusion of the bent straw, but maybe you weren't. — schopenhauer1

Exactly. You didn't really read what I wrote and went about making an argument against something that I never said. This is a very common occurrence on these forums.

My point with the illusion thing was that some people (maybe not you), like to say that mind is an "illusion", just like X illusion (a mirage perhaps), and thus, wipe their hands and think they are done. The ground of understanding anything in the first place though, would be this "illusion" that is the very thing to be explained. By the fact that it grounds everything else that we know, makes the idea that it is an illusion silly. Illusions happen within the general framework of cognition, the very thing that is first necessary to say it is an illusion. Illusion needs the general backdrop of cognition to understand that this particular phenomena is an illusion. What is the general backdrop of cognition but itself?

Now, more sophisticated versions of this "illusion" (non-answer) is the idea of information. Language bootstraps matter into a logic that has many feedback loops that become "experience" or "consciousness". There are so many holes in this, it doesn't hold water. Language may be a big part of the equation as to how cognition functions (if you are inclined to believe computationalist models of sorts), but how it bootstraps matter into awareness, is not explained without assuming the very thing it is explaining. — schopenhauer1

Well, what is an illusion? When we experience an "illusion" for the first time, we don't call it an "illusion". We believe that what we experience is real, or has a cause external to the mind. It doesn't occur to us that we are experiencing an "illusion".

When we know that it is an "illusion" and aren't fooled by it any longer, is it still an "illusion", or is it something for which we simply have a the correct rule for interpreting sensory data (this is bent light, not a bent straw)? It is no longer an "illusion" when we understand that we see light, not objects. Seeing bent straws is exactly what we're suppose to see.

I don't see how you can say, or question, how language "bootstraps" matter into awareness when you don't even know what matter is and how it differs from awareness, or mind for that matter. The only way you know of matter is through awareness. What I've been saying is that matter and mind aren't illusions, rather they are types of information.

But these illusions are happening in the bigger "illusion". Everything that takes place, is a priori taking place in the illusion (of representation, of consciousness, of experience, etc.). That is to say, it grounds all other things we might analogize to it, and thus eludes the analogy in a big way. — schopenhauer1

I don't know what this means. I don't think you know what it means either as you put "illusion" in quotes.

I explained that an illusion is a misinterpretation of sensory data. It's actually a miscategorization of sensory data. The straw isn't bent. The light is. Seeing a bent straw is exactly what you would expect for animals that use light as a source of information about its environment. There is no illusion once you categorize your sensory data properly.

You seem to be saying that the sensory data itself is an illusion. What does that even mean? Effects are not their causes. To imply that the mind is the world, and not an effect of the world, is the illusion - that category mistake I spoke about.

That's fair. I should have been saying 'substance monism' or 'substance monist' not 'monism' and 'monist' — csalisbury

I don't see how that helps. What is a "substance"?

How does, let's say, "my desire for food" (desire interaction?), or "the ability to use a computer" (technology interaction), answer the question of how matter and mind are connected other that indeed the mind can think of technological thoughts and have desires. — schopenhauer1

They are connected causally.

Would you have eaten ice cream if you had not the desire to do so prior to eating it? Does eating the ice cream cause satisfaction to occur? I should point out that imagining eating ice cream doesn't satisfy the desire to eat ice cream as much as actually eating ice cream does. How can a desire cause a physical action that then causes another mental state (satisfaction) if they all weren't the same kind of thing?

The same thing goes for how minds communicate. It takes time to communicate. It takes the intent to project an idea to another mind to cause words to get typed onto a screen and submitted for other minds to read at their leisure. Those scribbles can then invoke a version of the original idea in the mind of the reader. The only way minds can communicate is by using matter as the medium for sharing ideas. If we had telepathy then minds could communicate directly, but we don't so we have to use matter to communicate. And to get at the meaning of the scribbles is to get at the intent of the author (the cause). This is the case for all material things and what science attempts to explain - the cause behind the effect - which then allow us to make more accurate predictions - including how people will feel in the future if a certain event were to occur. When you get down to asking what people mean by "matter" and "mind" you find that they are so much alike that they can't be considered different things.

They may say, "The mental is an illusion".
Then you will say, "What then is this illusion you speak of"?

And then ensues their inability to tidily account for the illusion in anything other than a duality. — schopenhauer1

Indirect realism solves the dualistic problem. The world isn't as it appears. This is why we experience illusions.

A mirage still looks the same (like a pool of water). The only difference is that I don't believe that it's a pool of water. The straw still appears bent even though I know it's not. So an illusion is only an illusion when you misinterpret what you are seeing. You are seeing light, not objects. You see objects indirectly through the behavior of light. Matter is the result of how your visual system interprets and categorizes the information it receives from the light entering the eye. Everything is information, not matter and/or mind. It is the use of those terms ("matter" and "mind") that cause one to think dualism is the only way out.

If you say that everything is matter

Someone can ask: As opposed to what?

You have to answer this question, because if you don't, then the only thing you're saying is: 'everything is what everything is'

But once you do answer - 'Matter as opposed to [the other thing]'

Then the question is: how do we understand what [the other thing] is? — csalisbury

You've already assumed dualism is the case in the response to the claim that "everything is matter, or mind". By asking, "as opposed to what?" you've already taken the position that dualism is the case.

As a monist, the correct response to the claim that "everything is mind, or matter" is "So what?" Why do we have to name the "everything" anything at all? What difference would it make unless we knew how "matter" behaved as opposed to something else (which would be imaginary)? There is the way that things are, and there are (a plurality of) ideas about how the way things are. There is only one way to get it right and an uncountable number of ways to get it wrong. Even when you get it right it's still just an idea, but an idea that is in sync with the way things are.

I don't like to use the terms "matter" or "mind", as they seem to imply dualism. I think "information", "relationships" or "process" are good terms to use.

We still need to figure out how matter understands matter though. And since "understanding" is not matter, that seems quite a tricky problem in itself. — Inis

Now you have to explain how matter produces an understanding of something other than matter. — csalisbury

No they don't. The claim was "everything is "matter/mind" ". That means that understanding is "matter/mind".

I don't see any reason to make that kind of distinction. List one example when it would be a good reason to use those terms where you couldn't use more specific, and therefore more accurate, terms.

Like I said, you can use "mental" to make the distinction between mental and non-mental, just like you use "loudspeaker" to distinguish between loudspeaker and nonloudspeaker.

All you are doing is attributing something special to mental phenomena where they deserve this special category where all other phenomena don't.

Right, so just use "mental" to refer to mental phenomena and "loudspeaker" to refer to loudspeaker phenomena, "stellar" to refer to stellar phenomena, etc. Using a term to distinguish between one phenomena and all others implies that there is something special about that particular phenomena when all phenomena are different, or distinguishable, in some way.

Right, so you're saying that mental phenomena are special where they deserve a special term while all other phenomena fall into the other category. What I've been saying is that there is nothing special about mental phenomenon that would require me to use a special term for it.

I think it's a handy term for referring to mind-dependent or mind-oriented rather than mind-independent or extramental etc. — Terrapin Station

If your saying that subjectivity is a feature of minds, then how is that any different than talking about the features of some other process or thing in reality? Everything has distinctive features that make them different from other things. Subjectivity would be no more special than some other feature of reality, and would be a subset of reality (the objective).

It takes time to communicate, so time exists independent of minds, therefore transcendental idealism is wrong. If minds are seperate, that implies that space exists independent of minds (what is it that seperates minds?), therefore transcendental idealism is wrong.

Idealism of any form inexorably leads to solipsism (either that or idealism refutes itself by becoming some form of realism). And if solipsism, then the world is exhausted by your experience of it, therefore solipsism (and idealism) is a form of direct realism. I already went over this but it was ignored or missed.

Yes, I think indirect realism doesn't necessarily have to be at odds with transcendental idealism. How, I'm not quite sure. — Wallows

If indirect realism isn't at odds with idealism then there would have to be something other than minds or ideas that separates minds. This would be the medium through which minds communicate - matter.

If we assume that God is not a person and is everything that can be said about the world, then does God posses 'subjecthood'? — Wallows

Yeah, I interpret this as babble. It would be more coherent to ask if God is an object. If God is the world then God is an object.

As I mentioned in the other thread we can dispense with these terms, "subject" and "subjective" and get by just fine. It seems to me that it is the use of those terms that causes the confusion.

It seems to me that this is about awareness of the self. Are you Datalchemist, John, or a God of War?

Oops! No, his head isn't in his mind. — Terrapin Station

Yeah, its not that his head is in his mind. Its the idea of his head that is in his mind.

The only time his head is in his mind is when he looks in the mirror. But then that isnt really his head either. Its a visual sensory impression of a reflection of his head that is in his mind.

If you agree we should not fill the world with (say) active and uncontained nuclear fuel, then you must also agree that we should not release uncontrolled and unconstrained AIs into the world? — Pattern-chaser

Then you would also agree that we control who can release other humans into the world as bad, or a lack of, parenting leads to destructive, anti-social behaviors that are unleashed upon the rest of us.

Duplicate

Knowledge is not obtained by the senses, or by incorporating sensory data. — Inis

This doesn't sound right at all. What form does your knowledge take if not the form of your sensory data? How do you know that you possess knowledge?

Knowledge is pattern recognition. The more optimal the recognition, the more optimal the knowledge. Such is math. Binary language is simple machine recognition. Fight or flight is simple animal recognition. — Theyone

This works well. How would you explain contradictory knowledge that we possess? We must integrate all the information we have into a consistent whole. Until then, do we really possess knowledge?

Under Schopenhauer's understanding, mind as primary subjects, that can perceive themselves as only subjects. This is where the loop between subjectivity and objectivity arises. I'm still reading along here and can say that the chief element that Schopenhauer mentions is the unclearness of the will of the Will. In some sense, it is a noumena or thing in itself. I'll come back later as I progress through the book. — Wallows

We could just as well say that the mind is an object that observes other objects. We can dispense with the terms, "subjective" and "subject" all together. In this sense, it would be a feedback loop (not a mobius strip), like a camera observing its monitor creating a visual feedback loop.

If something only exists when you experience it, then you exhaust what that thing is. This is direct realism, not idealism or anti-realism. In this sense, idealism and anti-realism refute themselves.

I think indirect realism deserves a mention as well. Why do we experience bodies instead of minds? How can we lie to each other where the contents of another mind isnt what we are told by the body?

It seems to me that minds are objects themselves. You are your mind that exists relative to me. You are nothing more than another object that I can interact with both physically and mentally. We can trade punches and ideas.

Any explanation of knowledge has to address how knowledge can be wrong. When we find our knowledge was wrong, did we really possess knowledge? Do we ever possess knowledge? What is knowledge? It seems like knowledge is simply a set of rules for integrating sensory data that can be updated with new sensory data.

Yes, it is. Again, the subject/object divide crops up and is in a constant state of perpetuity when we have an observer observing their own behavior. — Wallows

But other observers exist independent of your experience of them. Where do they exist relative to your mind? If they are seperate minds then that implies some kind of medium where minds exist which would be the shared world. What seperates minds from each other?

Irrespective of the amount of chess knowledge Alpha Zero may have, it doesn't possess the quale of knowledge. — Inis

How do you know this? What is quale? When you look at a person you see matter, not quale, so how do you know that a person has quale but not a computer? Is matter quale?

Then a skeptical theist is really an agnostic.

I'm trying to understand your position. If you're just going to "answer" a question with a question then I'm done here.