Right, the idea that we are constituted by our experiences makes sense to me. And I agree that our sensations are located in the world, because I tend to think the world is also a part of the experience-based model, as are our bodies themselves.

I think the source of much confusion lies in this, that experience cannot be inside the brain/ body we know, because it is just a model, a part of our experience, a part of the world-model. It's very hard to talk about this without becoming confused.

And you say I must be right if I am conscious, which I take as not just conscious in the sense that I am awake, but “conscious of”, in that I am aware of the pain, which is a kind of knowing. But we can be suffering and not know it (be unaware), such as when we are in denial, but it is clear to our friends, or when I am cold but I focus on something else. — Antony Nickles

If you were cold and focusing on something else to the point of being unaware at all of being cold, then it would not seem appropriate to say that you were suffering being cold, unless the cold was great enough to be physically detrimental. But even then, that would be a different notion of suffering than the kind of suffering that in order to be counted as suffering entails being consciously aware of it.

People tie themselves in knots with theories about the science of sensation and the brain, but, here, for Descartes, the actual mechanics and logic of sensation do not matter because it does not meet his requirement for certainty. I can either be incorrect that I sense something (“You’re not shot this time!” Or “It’s just a mirage!”) or mistaken in my judgment of what I sense (“You’re not angry, you’re jealous.” or “Whew, that felt like a spider!”), but, ultimately, I can deceive myself, be mistaken, or uncertain, and that will not do for Descartes as a foundation for our opinions. — Antony Nickles

You can be incorrect that you sense something, but you cannot be incorrect that you seem to sense something; that was the only point I was making. This is really what Descartes means when he says that we can doubt, but that we cannot doubt that we are doubting (or think or feel, but not doubt that we are thinking or feeling). Pain and other sensations such as pleasure are unique in this context. If I feel pain or pleasure, it makes no sense to say that I doubt that I am feeling pain or pleasure; what could it even mean to say I doubt that I am feeling some sensation that I am feeling?

Though some will continue to try to find a way in which our sensations or bodies are certain (@Janus), that could not avail us anyway, as there is no connection between how our senses (or any of science) could be the basis for true or certain customs and opinions anyway, which is the point of the Meditations. — Antony Nickles

This is where you miss the point. I am not really saying that our sensations are certain; since they are not propositional, they are neither certain nor uncertain, they are merely sensations, although what we infer on the basis of them can be certain or uncertain. (That said, it would seem to be absurd to say that I doubt that I feel any sensations, so it seems that I can be certain that I feel sensations).

You might argue that it is not certain that we are embodied, but there can be no doubt that we seem to be embodied. Embodiment is not the same kind of case as feeling sensation; we certainly feel sensation, but it does not necessarily follow that we are embodied.

Where I had misunderstood it was to mean that, if all events are of finite duration, and the Universe is infinitely old, then everything that could occur would have already occurred, because no number of finite events could ever occupy an infinite expanse of time. — Wayfarer

Even if all events were of finite duration, and the Universe were infinitely old, that all events that could occur would already have occurred would rely on the Universe being of finite extent; that is the salient point.

I don't know exactly what you are thinking is entailed by "no number of finite events could ever occupy and infinite expanse of time" in this context. That sounds like the standard argument against the possibility of an actual infinite duration.

You could have said, which would have been clearer I think, "no finite number of events could ever occupy an infinite expanse of time", and that, if true, would show that either the Universe has not been of infinite duration or that, if it were, then an infinite number of events would have occurred, with recurrence if the extent of the Universe were finite, but not necessarily if not. That events are finite is a given.

So you come up with a plausible hypothesis (the BB cannot 'come up with' anything) about the nature of your universe and if the hypothesis predicts that you're more likely to be a BB than not, then there cannot be justification for that hypothesis.

I think that's the summary of the argument. — noAxioms

Yes, that's pretty much what I was thinking. Sure, we might be Boltzmann in any case, but if we were then we would have no rational justification for thinking that we are or even might be.

Doesn't it stand to reason that, if the Universe was of infinite duration, and all events in the Universe are of finite duration, then all events would already have occurred? Isn't that deductively valid? (It also seems to map against the idea of the heat death of the universe, which is a hypothesis that the universe will evolve to a state of no thermodynamic free energy, and will therefore be unable to sustain processes that increase entropy.) — Wayfarer

That would only seem to hold if the Universe was of finite extent, that is contained a finite number of microphysical constituents. If we consider Nietzsche's 'eternal return' to be more than just a thought-experiment to test for life-affirmation, then this is the physical basis of his idea.

The astrophysicists at the time postulated that if the Universe was of infinite duration and extent, then the night sky should be ablaze with light, given that there would be an infinite number of stars and an infinite amount of time for the light to reach us, and the conclusion was that the Universe must be of finite extent, and it was unclear whether it had been of infinite duration.

We can only be completely agnostic on the question of if we are a Boltzmann Brain? — Down The Rabbit Hole

Either that, or the idea is groundless and/ or incoherent. I don't know what to think about it.

The Boltzmann brain paradox effectively says, in an infinite duration, we are more likely to be a disembodied brain with false memories than existing as persons within the complexities of our universe. — Down The Rabbit Hole

This seems self-refuting: if we were disembodied brains with false memories there would seem to be no rational justification for believing that we could be such, since the hypothesis that we are more likely to be Boltzmann brains relies on accepted mathematical and physical understandings which are reliant on the assumption that our memories are accurate (enough).

I may be wrong, but I believe that even illusionists like Keith Frankish do not claim "that we don't really experience anything at all". I believe they make the more modest claim that qualia do not have the properties of privacy, ineffability, etc. that Dennett mentions in Quining Qualia, or that we should not be misled into the misconception that phenonenal consciousness implies the homunculus view of an "inner show" or Cartesian theatre. — Luke

You may well be right, but I, in my limited reading of Dennett, had got the impression that he thinks that experiencing something is kind of like a mirage or an afterimage that is not real, whatever that could be taken to mean.

I never understood why there would need to be an homunculus in order for there to be an "inner show". Phenomenologically speaking there certainly seems to be an inner show when I close my eyes, and neuroscience seems to tell us that the "outer show" we see with open eyes is really an inner show.

For example, I remember reading about experiments that showed that if someone is upside down for long enough the image of the environment will be inverted to be "the right way up", and that for a while if subjects subsequently stand up they will see things upside down.

The article linked in the OP proposes an answer to that question. — Luke

Right, I only scanned it: I will try to find the time to read it more closely.

That is, we cannot tell the difference in behavior between and intellectual response to sensation, and a reflexive one...

Descartes assumed, more often than not (again, some inconsistency here) that animals were kind of like machines. But that claim would no longer be supported by most these days... — Manuel

I think we can see that some animals have preferences, and so display intentional behavior. This might not be obvious in simple 'one-off' acts, but extended observation and testing I think would show the difference.

The idea that animals are machines and hence, for example, feel no pain seems absurd to me, and is abhorrent.

we imagine we can’t be wrong about them. We think: If I am in pain, I must know it, and know it without a doubt. But we can repress it, and even to where it doesn’t register. — Antony Nickles

We cannot be wrong about consciously feeling pain. We cannot be wrong about how things seem: say, for example I look at the far hill and I see an animal moving across it that looks like a sheep: I cannot be wrong about seeing something moving that looks to me like a sheep, but of course it may not be a sheep.

Wayfarer would put transcendence in the prime position. The trouble there is saying anything truthful. Such arguments are in danger of becoming either mere ritual again, or nonsense. — Banno

I see transcendence as central to religion,, and ritual, although prominent in many religious contexts, is not so in all, as I said earlier in this thread. As I also said earlier there is some ritual in nearly all aspects of human life. I think hope goes hand in hand with the notion of transcendence when it comes to religion.

Who make this claim? — Luke

I think Dennett claims something along these lines; that experience and consciousness are either epiphenoma or a kind of illusion.

This addresses the question of why some bodily states are not conscious, but it does not address the question of why some bodily states are conscious. — Luke

Good point. I guess there would have to be some advantage to having some bodily states be conscious. We may not be able to answer that question, though.

The senses are the spark. But it's a bit obscure to me to argue that senses think, they (seem to me) to just act in accordance to relevant stimuli. — Manuel

I tend to think with Kant that the senses without concepts would be "blind", but I don't think that entails that without language there are no concepts. After all 'higher' animals seem to navigate the world very effectively without language, a fact which convinces me that they see things as things (although perhaps not self-reflectively if that entails language), just as we do.

So, I think that the simplest organisms (and machines) operate with just stimulus and response, then the next step up is perception (which entails conception) and then on top of that there is self-reflection.

That part is more like Kant arguing against superstition than Hume musing about causes between billiard games. — Paine

:up:

Is anything found there that does not come, ultimately, from the senses?

We decide that it’s a star, tomorrow we find out it was actually a plane. In the process of *judgment* do the senses play a part or not? It’s hard to say. Maybe we can’t seperate them as much as we think. Maybe we can. — Manuel

In regard to the question whether the senses play a part; how do we later find out it was a plane?

That's possibly a clue to his motivation: he sees "wokeism" as a civil religion, and since he questions it, he's questioning religion and is therefore a great philosopher. — Jamal

Haha, so only the "great philosophers" question religion (read "all collective social phenomena"?)? Or do the ordinary philosophers also question, but their questions are not great?

I will say that if it's true that philosophers cannot start from a neutral transcendent foundation, that their thinking is conditioned by their time, then it might help to be aware of it. — Jamal

That sounds right...question everything, including oneself and the presuppositions that live beneath the questions; from whence do they come?

Kant, for instance, though self-consciously critical and non-dogmatic, in some ways did not take his attack on metaphysics far enough, and ended up with his own elaborate system, dogmatically rationalist in its own way (not to mention quintessentially Enlightenment and bourgeois). — Jamal

I don't know about this; Kant's categories at least seem to ring true and space and time as the pure forms of intuition too. Are they no longer viable? Aristotle's categories? Goethe said “He who cannot draw on three thousand years is living from hand to mouth.” "The poverty of historicism" says Popper.

Modernity seems to me to predominately reflect a kind of narcissism. Can we see our own reflections in the cesspool?

I doubt that Hegel's notion of thinking one's time entails a view of historical moments as monolithic and pure, since the whole point of his philosophy is to see things in their dynamic, historical, conflictual context, rather than as fixed — Jamal

Right, though in saying "monolithic" I wasn't thinking of the dichotomy between fixed and dynamic, I was thinking more of the 'monistic/ pluralistic' dichotomy: meaning that I don't think historical moments have just one "zeitgeist" but are rather boiling cauldrons in which many geists grapple with one another for supremacy. From where I stand "the state" looks like a kind of monstrous fiction.

Yes, that’s what I did in the OP and have been doing in the discussion since. The video made me think, and the resulting thoughts diverged from anything in the video. — Jamal

Right. I probably haven't read the thread thoroughly enough.

I thought about that too, but in the video Moeller mentions Hegel rather than Deleuze. — Jamal

I've since watched the video, and he does mention Hegel in that connection. I have to say I'm a bit skeptical about Hegel's notion of thinking one's time, as though historical moments are monolithic and pure. In any case it needn't be a self-conscious thinking of the times if it is true that our thinking is inevitably constrained by the historical "moment" we find ourselves in.

Ok, I’ll go along with that. In the video, Moeller actually identifies three things that philosophy is for: questioning religion, coining concepts, and giving jobs to failed poets (continental philosophers) and failed mathematicians (analytic philosophers). — Jamal

Interesting...I'd broaden the 'questioning' part to questioning tradition and established values, including religion. Also, identifying unexamined assumptions driving thought (most of which probably derive from cultural, including religious, indoctrination).

I'm familiar with the 'creating new concepts' idea from Deleuze (see What is Philosophy co-authored with Guattari). I like the snarky reference to the anals and the incontinentals as failed poets and mathematicians respectively. Anyway, I should find the time to watch the video.

Agreed, but I was pointing out that it is not the only role of philosophy, which saying that is what philosophy is for seems to suggest.

I'd say this is a specifically modern conception of philosophy. Ancient philosophy, "philosophy as a way of life" as Pierre Hadot argues, consisted in studying (not critiquing) the words of the founder of the school (Plato's academy, Stoicism, Epicureanism, Pyrrhonism, Neoplatonism, and so on) one was connected to and attempting to put into practice the teaching and associated spiritual exercises.

That makes sense to me. So, the question could become: 'could all human activities, the whole of civilization and its products have been produced 'blind' so to speak'? Shakespeare would have been a p-zombie just like everyone else; he would have written his plays without being aware that he did so, and the actors would have performed them without being aware of doing so, and the audiences would have attended, without knowing they did, and without experiencing anything at all.

Some claim that we are in fact in such a situation, that we don't really experience anything at all but just have the illusion that we do. Assuming that were so, should we attribute the same illusions to the p-zombie human world? But then, if experience is just an illusion, isn't having an illusion of experience having experience after all? This is reminiscent, in a different register, of the Cartesian 'cogito'.

Also, if there were no experience then there would be no sense of time and memory. Time itself may be an illusion, but it seems impossible to think of a sense of time as an illusion, and memories might be confabulated, but it seems impossible to think of the sense of remembering as an illusion. Those elements, time and memory, seem to be indispensable to creativity, to the production of novelty, and so it seems impossible to imagine p-zombies being able to produce civilization and all its products,

If that were true it would mean that without consciousness humans could never have evolved, and the should also be true of animals. There does seem to be a kind of immanent imperative in being itself to evolve, so maybe that is why there is consciousness, because without it, evolution would be impossible. I won't go all the way to invoking the overarching teleology of entropy as @apokrisis does; that is another conversation.

But, I haven't addressed your question about why some physical states are conscious and others not. This could be taken in two ways; you might be understood to be asking it of all physical states whatever or just referring to the bodily physical states of humans and other organisms. Assuming the latter, then I would say it is because so much awareness would be too confusing. If you were asking it of the former, then I would in turn ask whether we know that all physical states are not conscious to some minimal degree. If they were then this would be the panpsychist or panexperientialist answer to the "hard" question as to how 'brute' matter could by virtue of mere configuration and complexity, become conscious.

Well. yes, since definitions are codifications of usages.

So 'analytic' for you just means 'true by virtue of some current definition'?

I put a question to ChatGPT:

Q: What did Heidegger say about the impact of 'objectification' of consciousness? — Wayfarer

Here is what the Bingbot had to say in answer to the same question:

Heidegger believed that the human subject had to be reconceived in an altogether new way, as “being-in-the-world.” Because this notion represented the very opposite of the Cartesian “thing that thinks,” the idea of consciousness as representing the mind’s internal awareness of its own states had to be dropped. Heidegger makes a strong case that consciousness should not be considered either neurons firing in the brain or some substance in itself; instead, both of these understandings are inauthentic as they fail to recognize the primordial worlding that is necessary for consciousness to understand itself in either manner1.

In other words, Heidegger believed that objectification of consciousness is problematic because it fails to recognize the primordial worlding that is necessary for consciousness to understand itself

If a dog means a domesticated mammal, then the statement "a dog is a mammal" is analytic, whereas, if a dog means a terrible film, then the statement "a dog is a mammal" is not analytic. — RussellA

What if, however unlikely it might seem, dogs turned out, on further investigation, not to be mammals? A better example might be the related understandings (which you would presumably say are analytic) "reptiles are cold-blooded" and "dinosaurs are reptiles"; what if dinosaurs were warm-blooded (as some paleontologists theorize)?

The Merriam Webster defines analytic as "being a proposition (such as "no bachelor is married") whose truth is evident from the meaning of the words it contains". The Cambridge dictionary defines analytic as "(of a statement) true only because of the meanings of the words, without referring to facts or experience"

There is some ambiguity between these definitions of analytic

IE, even though the definition of analytic may be ambiguous, given a particular definition, the analytic expression itself cannot be ambiguous. — RussellA

Both of those definitions seem to state that a proposition is analytic on account of its truth being given purely in the meanings of the words. So then, what if the meanings of the words are ambiguous? Would that make the truth of such an expression undecidable and hence no longer analytic?

Or else, if we were to stipulate that 'bachelor' means 'unmarried man' whatever 'unmarried man' might be taken to mean, or even if we cannot precisely determine its meaning, would that not be trivial?

You say that because of your faith in the unerring testimony of the senses. Yet the fact that there might be a woolly mammoth behind a hill (or not) is not sufficient for drawing a conclusion about the overall nature of the human condition. — Wayfarer

My faith in the senses is only relative to the collective representation we call the phenomenal world, and I don't think they are infallible either. It is intersubjective testimony and agreement that drives our normative conceptions of reality.

I don't believe any definitive conclusion about "the overall nature of the human condition" can be drawn. We may all draw our own various conclusions, but they are subjective and driven by far more than just reason.

I agree that faith plays a role in science; it too relies on assumptions which cannot be emprically demonstrated. But the thing with science that impresses is that predictions are so often fulfilled, and science has grown into an immense network of coherent and consistent understandings, all of which are nonetheless defeasible, and any of which may be falsified or become redundant if the paradigm changes.

All that said, science cannot answer the questions that matter most to us (or at least many of us), so there is plenty of room for faith, and in fact faith inevitably plays a significant role in all of our lives, so it is not to be denigrated or despised.

These metaphysical assumptions are not themselves subject to empirical verification but are instead based on faith in the rationality of the universe and in the ability of human beings to understand it. — Wayfarer

Metaphysical speculations certainly play, have played, a significant role in science, particularly in abductive reasoning, but established theories and practices are not reliant on metaphysical assumptions, since it is possible to just "shut up and calculate" if that is your wont as a scientist.

If there were no experiential dimension then there would be no hard problem, but since there is, there is. — Luke

Right, and as I said if there were no experiential dimension there would be nothing else either, so putting the question as to why there is experience is really equivalent to putting the question as to why there is anything at all, or why there is something rather than nothing.

If it's all just physical information processing - as the physicalists insist - and there is no mental "stuff" that is categorically different from the physical "stuff", then the physicalists should find that people would behave the same way even if they were not phenomenally conscious. So, how and why are we phenomenally conscious, dear physicalists? — Luke

If it were all just physical information processing and there were no experiential dimension, then there would be no one to find anything, nothing to be found, and indeed, no physicalists or physicalism, either.

I'll mention again the essay by Edward Conze on Buddhist philosophy and its European parallels, where he says that in classical philosophy, East and West, there was recognition of an hierarchy of persons, some of whom, through what they are, can know much more than others; that there is a hierarchy also of the levels of reality, some of which are more real, because more exalted, than others; and that the wise have found a wisdom which is true, although it has no empirical basis in observations which can be made by everyone and everybody; and that there is a rare and unordinary faculty in them by which they can attain insight into those domains - through the Prajñāpāramitā of the Buddhists, the logos of Parmenides, the Sophia of the Greeks, Spinoza's amor dei intellectualis, Hegel's Vernunft, and so on; and that true teaching is based on an authority which legitimizes itself by the exemplary life and charismatic quality of its exponents. — Wayfarer

I would say there was a belief in a hierarchy of persons and a hierarchy of levels of reality and that the wise have a "rare and unordinary faculty in them by which they can attain insight into those domains" rather than a "recognition", because the latter terms assumes that there is a truth to be recognized, and yet that is the very point at issue.

The Buddhist, Parmenidean, Greek, Spinozan and Hegelian ideas that you enumerate, are not shown to be true simply by virtue of having been thought, and the idea that "true teaching is based on an authority which legitimizes itself by the exemplary life and charismatic quality of its exponents" is very clearly a faith, not reason, based belief.

Because this spiritualism and supernatural beliefs produce negatives in other areas. Why do we need them? It's not prejudice it's looking at the positives of religion and removing the negatives. There's no wonder that smaller spiritual movements today in the West are dominant in other factors like fact-resistance and conspiracy theories. The focus on supernatural stuff can make people invent practices that aren't positive for the self or the community.

There's no point in having those things when the positives of ritual behavior and traditions can exist without supernatural angles. — Christoffer

I'm yet to be convinced that the practices and the attendant beliefs can be separated. But in any case, maybe many people want to live in what you would call a faith-based fantasy world regarding metaphysical beliefs, and what would be wrong with that if that is what they want and even need, if it benefits them and does no harm to others?

My argument that "bachelor is an unmarried man" is analytic because:

1) Before it can be decided whether "a bachelor is an unmarried man" is analytic or synthetic, the meaning of the words in the statement must be known.

2) We know that the set of words "unmarried" and "man" have been named "bachelor".

3) So knowing that the set "unmarried" and "men" has been named "bachelor", we know just by virtue of the meaning of the words alone that "bachelors are unmarried men" is an analytic statement.

Is there a flaw in my logic ? — RussellA

We know that the meanings of the terms 'bachelor' and 'unmarried' man were considered to be synonymous, when it was perhaps considered unthinkable that a man would live with a woman out of wedlock. Are they still synonymous?
So, a couple of questions: is the statement: "a dog is a mammal" analytic? Can analytic statements be ambiguous?

:up:

But surely the cultural context is fundamental to that. Our culture does have an agreed basis, and that is scientific method. — Wayfarer

What I meant was that everyday empirical observations are intersubjectively confirmable, and this doesn't require a cultural context. For example: "It is raining", "the mammoth is behind that hill", "hear that thunder" and so on. I think basic scientific method is an extension of this; we must observe what is happening accurately, and once we have collated accurate data we can conjecture as to the explanations for the phenomena observed. Then we have more accurate observations to make to check if the predictions entailed by our hypotheses obtain.

These kinds of empirical observation, as far as I can tell, are the only things that can be directly confirmed intersubjectively. We find out we are wrong on those occasions (perhaps very rare) by checking with others. If no one else sees that it is raining, or the mammoth behind the hill or hears the thunder, then I might conclude that I have been hallucinating.

As to intellectual intuition, I take it that a proponent would say that it is possible to directly see metaphysical truth. Kant was one of, if not the, first to deny that possibility, the point being that maybe we can, but we cannot demonstrate empirically, logically or discursively that we can, so it remains a matter of belief. I can't see how that can be denied. I can't see any kind of rational argument against it, but I'm open to hearing one.

Kant says we have practical, not pure, reason to believe in God, freedom and immortality, so he understands that it remains a matter of faith. That was his project, to discover the limits of reason in order to make way for faith.

I expect better from you. — T Clark

Chill out, I was just joking, and not even at your expense.

:up:

And you are probably right: "ship of fools" and all that...

The purpose of a fool is to provide amusement. — Banno

I'm laughing, so you must be doing a great job. :joke:

1. I think it is more that certainty is desired, than truth. That said, no one is going to feel certain unless they have been able to convince themselves they have found truth. Certainty makes us feel secure, and our inability to feel certain unless we feel we have discovered truth means that our "advantage" is intimately tied up with what is true, or at least with what we believe is true.

2. This I think is an over-generalization. Some people may be satisfied with material and social security, and others not so much; so for some, God may be existentially important whatever their material and social circumstances might be.

3.Science is accepted, when it is, because it works, when it does. Part of this working, but not an essential part, is the provision of technological development. The other part is predictive success (and of course the ability to provide technological advances is part of that). Predictive success is not a proof of truth, however.

4. It's true that some undertake meditative practices merely to relax, but others need the motivation of entertaining the idea that they are seeking, and will find, truth. Of course, you can say that if our desire is for truth then practicing what is understood to be a viable discipline to that end will be seen to be to our advantage. But any human activity can be framed that way, which really just means that there are various angles one could look at anything from. What you refer to as "the contextual nature of our beliefs" applies as much to the belief that everything done by humans is done for the sake of advantage as it does to any other belief.

5.Human exceptionalism may be thought to be based on wishful thinking, but it could also be based on the observation that we really are very different from all other animals insofar as we possess language, culture, history, philosophy, the arts, science and religion. On the other hand, all animals are exceptional in their own ways, and since it is thus ordinary to be exceptional it follows that in this sense, no animal, including the human animal, is exceptional. Again, it's back to the contextual and perspectival nature of ideas and beliefs.

From the Bing AI, when I asked it this question: "can there be any evidence for the veracity of intellectual intuition":

That’s an interesting question. According to Wikipedia1, intuition is the ability to acquire knowledge, without recourse to conscious reasoning or needing an explanation. Some philosophers, such as Descartes and Kant, have distinguished between different types of intuition, such as sensory intuition and intellectual intuition. Sensory intuition is based on direct perception of external objects, while intellectual intuition is based on direct apprehension of abstract or metaphysical truths.

One possible way to understand intellectual intuition is as a kind of rational insight that reveals the necessary or essential features of reality. For example, some philosophers might claim that they have an intellectual intuition that torturing a sentient being for fun is wrong2. This would mean that they grasp this moral truth directly and with certainty, without needing any empirical evidence or argument.

However, the veracity of intellectual intuition is not uncontroversial. Some philosophers have challenged the reliability, validity, and explanatory power of intuitions as a source of knowledge. They have raised various skeptical arguments, such as:

The argument from lack of independent calibration: We have no way of checking whether our intuitions are true or false, since we cannot compare them with any other source of evidence2.
The argument from unreliability: Intuitions are prone to error and inconsistency, both within and across individuals2.
The argument from lack of explanatory necessity: Intuitions are not needed to explain our knowledge or justify our beliefs, since we can appeal to other sources of evidence or methods of reasoning2.
The argument from inexplicability of reliability: Intuitions are mysterious and inexplicable, since we have no account of how they are generated or how they track the truth2.
These arguments pose serious challenges for the defenders of intellectual intuition. They would need to show how intuitions can be calibrated, reliable, necessary, and explicable in order to establish their veracity. Alternatively, they might try to undermine the force of these arguments by appealing to self-support or epistemic circularity2. That is, they might argue that intuitions are justified by themselves or by other intuitions, and that this does not undermine their credibility.

Another way to approach the question of the veracity of intellectual intuition is to examine the empirical evidence from psychology and cognitive science. Some researchers have conducted experiments to test how people form and use intuitions in various domains, such as logic, morality, mathematics, physics, and language3. These experiments have revealed some interesting findings, such as:

Intuitions are influenced by various factors, such as culture, education, emotion, motivation, framing, and context3.
Intuitions are often biased, inaccurate, or inconsistent with scientific or logical principles3.
Intuitions can sometimes be improved by training, feedback, or reflection3.
Intuitions can sometimes outperform conscious reasoning or deliberation in complex or uncertain situations3.
These findings suggest that intuitions are not a homogeneous or monolithic phenomenon. Rather, they are diverse and context-dependent cognitive processes that involve both conscious and unconscious elements. They also suggest that intuitions are not infallible or authoritative sources of knowledge. Rather, they are fallible and tentative hypotheses that need to be evaluated and revised in light of further evidence or reasoning.

Therefore, the answer to your question may depend on how you define intellectual intuition and what kind of evidence you consider relevant. There may not be a simple yes or no answer to whether there can be any evidence for the veracity of intellectual intuition. Rather, there may be different types and degrees of evidence that support or challenge different kinds of intuitions in different domains.

But nevertheless the general idea stands, which is that there is genuine insight into the domain of the first cause, etc. It is hard to obtain, and few obtain it, but real nonetheless. But as our view of all such matters is indeed so thoroughly jaundiced by the very dogma which our particular forms of religious consciousness have foisted on us, then it is impossible to differentiate that genuine type of insight from its ossified dogmatic remnants. But, as the sage Rumi said, 'there would be no fools gold, were there no gold'. — Wayfarer

There is no intersubjectively definitive way to determine whether something is the case regarding the veracity of purportedly pure intellectual insights into the nature of things; that is, whether the insight is real or somehow illusory cannot be determined. The advantage of everyday observation and its elaboration, science, is that, within their contexts, observations can be confirmed to be veridical or not.

When it comes to metaphysical speculations, there is no way to determine whether they are veridical. An individual may feel absolutely certain that they are seeing into the nature of things, and that may well satisfy the individual seer, but their seeing cannot be evidence for anyone else. That is the insurmountable hurdle that any philosophical attempt to do metaphysics as traditionally understood faces.

So, in summary, it could be that intellectual intuition really can give real insight into the nature of things, but how could we ever demonstrate whether this is the case or not? Also if you were so certain of some insight, would it even matter to you whether it's truth could be discursively, empirically or logically confirmed. Judging from my own experience I would say not. It only becomes a problem if you wish to demonstrate it philosophically to others.

The "gold' analogy from Rumi seems to fall down on examination. On the one hand we can learn to recognize the difference, just as we may be thought to be able to learn to intuitively recognize the truth or falsity of metaphysical claims, but the learning in the case of being able to recognize real gold is based on sensorially perceptible attributes that can be taught and that are. being observable, unequivocal. Also, chemical tests can be done to determine whether something you might think is gold, but have not acquired the skill to be sure, is the real thing or not.

Never heard of the tea ‘ceremony’ or oryoki? — praxis

Of course, the ritual there is an aesthetic elaboration or formalization of the ordinary event, which is itself more or less ritualized, of drinking tea together, but it's not overblown as the kinds of ceremonies I have a distaste for are.

Yeah. Something about baptizing an object provides a causal link between name and object. You don’t need a description, just this link to make the name refer to a given object or referent. — schopenhauer1

Right, but you need to be present when the name is first applied, or to be informed later that the name has been applied. I could say, for example, that my fridge is called 'Peter', then you would know what I meant when I said, "Peter's been running nicely, so I put the milk in him, and took out some carrots". On the other hand if I just uttered that sentence you might have no idea what I am referring to, and only a supplementary description (or in this case maybe clue-based guessing) would inform you of what "Peter" refers to in this context.

Though I agree often a description is needed to differentiate people with same name, that the name is referring to that particular person is still the case. — schopenhauer1

I agree, but that a person was baptized with a particular name entails that the name refers to that person seems to be a somewhat trivial truth; a truism. I don't see it as telling us anything much.

There is a causal link of a name and a person that transfers so that that person is designated by that name in all possible worlds. — schopenhauer1

The problem with names for persons and places is that more than one may have the same name, and that is where descriptions may need to come in to determine who is being referred to.

The name 'bachelor' seems to be non-functional without any description (definition), and the name itself is inherently tied to description anyway. The problem there is, as you point out, that the defining descriptions cannot be adequately disambiguated.