I don't know where to place myself in that picture.

That's very kind ND. I, for one, have always found you and your ideas to be very congenial, and by no means insignificant.

I get what you're saying, but I view it a bit differently. I don't believe Dennett is stupid enough to deny that we are subjects of experience; to say that would be to say that we don't experience anything at all, which is totally absurd. Even under the aegis of materialism we can be understood to grow and develop, be more or less compassionate and ethical in our treatment of others and ourselves; but if there is no afterlife then these things only matter in the context of this life. So, what I am saying is that under materialism we can have it all except (perhaps?) eternal life.

I love the eternal Janus @Wayfarer saga. — Noble Dust

I'm glad we are providing you with some love in this often harsh world,,,or is it merely entertainment?

I don't think I've ever used that as a premise in an argument. — Wayfarer

But isn't that why you object to materialism, why you think it is demeaning of human life; because it seems to you to rule out soteriology?

I wasn't offering an assessment of @Wayfarer's arguments, just highlighting that if one really seriously believed in the importance of preparing for an afterlife, then one would live a very different life. The only beliefs in immanent philosophies which are comparable to the life-altering ethical power of belief in a transcendent reality that I can think of are totally committed or fanatical adherences to political ideologies and their purported critical importance for the quality of human life going forward. I suppose global warming would be another possibility, but I am yet to meet anyone who is really prepared to make the necessary lifestyle and prosperity sacrifices.

So much better than most folk hereabouts. — Banno

"Comparisons are odious".

But Wayfarer has presented converse arguments such that those who espouse materialism are afraid less they be obliged to face the reality of a spiritual or transcendent world - they refuse to countenance such things out of fear of having their world overturned. And I think this is probably right, too, in many cases. — Banno

This warrants a reply. I can't imagine anyone who genuinely and committedly believed in a transcendental reality "refusing to countenance" it. And I can't imagine anyone who saw no reason to believe in such a thing needing to refuse to countenance it; it is usually not even under consideration. My experience has has shown me that of all those I've met who espouse such transcendental beliefs, the vast majority don't practice in accordance with what they claim to believe anyway.

it makes sense for us to want our acts, efforts, projects, and enterprises to have a point. — Chisholm

Our "acts, efforts, projects and enterprises" do have points, though. Is it necessary that there should be some absolute point over and above those relative points in order for those relative points to be pointful?

Is there a point of difference between us? — Banno

Of course there is a very significant difference between you: @Wayfarer, if I am not mistaken believes there is an afterlife and I think that is why he doesn't like materialism, because if it were true then the conclusion would be that there is no afterlife. Whether or not one seriously believes there is an afterlife constitutes perhaps the greatest difference imaginable concerning how one would be inclined to live their lives.

It seems absurd to say that the idea that innocents do not deserve to come to harm tout court comes from God, when it is God as creator who purportedly created this world wherein innocents may indeed, due to misfortune, be harmed. — Janus

Above not addressed by you.

And they do not deserve to come to harm either, do they? — Bartricks

An innocent may fairly be said not to deserve coming to deliberate harm, and that is a moral issue for the person who deliberately harms and for society itself. It seems absurd to say that the idea that innocents do not deserve to come to harm tout court comes from God, when it is God as creator who purportedly created this world wherein innocents may indeed, due to misfortune, be harmed.

You're not taking account of the point that several have now made that innocents don't in any absolute sense deserve to be harmed or protected from all harm. Another point is that maybe we all need to experience some pain in order to grow and mature.

In any case as compassionate beings, we have a natural tendency to want to protect innocents from deliberate or even random 'bad luck' harm; we don't need to invoke the idea of deserving or not deserving to feel that.

Thinking in terms of deserving or not deserving is a category error when it is taken out of the context of what is earned and of reward and punishment.

It's about Fitch's paradox. — Banno

No, I'd say that here, in the context of this discussion, with you it's more about Red's Herring.

If it is true in an over-mind, it remains true in a mind. I don't see any accrued advantage in such speculation. — Banno

The point is that in either model, materialist or idealist. there is no problem that there should be truths unknown to us; which tells against your apparent claim that there could be no such truths under the idealist model, no? Or were you objecting because there could not be truths unknown to the Big Mind? :roll:

And when I say unavoidable, I am not referring to its reality but to it's explanatory power in idealism. Any thoughts on this? — Tom Storm

I agree with you; the idea of idealist reality without a Big Mind or a completely unconscious linking of all minds, is incoherent. There would be no way to explain how it could be that we all see the same things.

Although what I just said above may not be right, thinking further on that, if we imagined it to be the case that all minds are unconsciously linked, and no big conscious mind at all, then there could be truths unknown to all minds, some to be discovered and others not.

Where I think the technical difference must be placed, on my present understanding, is in the point made earlier, that for me there are things that are true, yet not known, believed, or otherwise in some positive relation to our minds. I think idealism must deny this, since it insists that mind is somehow indispensable. — Banno

Since according to idealism the world is a product of Big MInd, not your mind or mine, then on that position there may indeed be truths that are not known. Have you read Berkeley at all, or are you at least familiar with his philosophy via secondary sources?

A facile dismissal of the entire issue, then. Isn't there more at stake? Doesn't it really count whether you're an aggregation of physical forces, or something more than that, or other than that? — Wayfarer

Why? We are what we are and the world is what it is no matter how we might think about what constitutes us or the world in any imagined metaphysical sense. Such a metaphysical or ontological question has no necessary bearing on our ethical sensibilities. Sure, the answer they arrive at to this question might have a bearing for some individuals, but not for others, which means that it has no essential bearing.

It's impossible to generalize. And the fact is that we don't know, anyway, and it is impossible to discursively determine an answer that any unbiased person would be compelled to accept.It may well be, as Andrew M suggests, that the question itself is malformed and mal-informed.

Why's that ironic? — Bartricks

I'll leave that to you to figure out. Good luck.

Yes, a truly feeble response it was!

It's ironic that you are always complaining about lack of argument in others' posts. :roll:

Right, I think that is a decent aspiration, though, at least in principle. Whether it ever could be achievable is another question. I think it would be great if governments did everything they could to enable as many people as possible to own their homes. This could include government funded cheap housing schemes, financial penalties, taxes and/or prohibitions, on property speculation such as to make it way less attractive or even non-viable, and so on. But maybe I would be indulging in magical thinking if I were to believe that governments would ever stand up to the plutocracy. "Money doesn't just talk, it swears".

:up: The nail has been hit!

The question was whether an innocent person deserves to come to harm. And the answer is 'no'. — Bartricks

Accepting for the sake of argument that innocents do not deserve to come to harm, it does not follow that they deserve to be harm free either. They do not deserve anything; if deserving is a valid notion at all, then deserving consists in being entitled to what one has earned, and being innocents they have not earned anything.

As I see it the GFC was caused, in great part, by corporate greed; setting up loans for people who could not afford them and probably didn't understand the fact that they couldn't afford them, and then manufacturing credit default swaps so they could profit from the inevitable masses of defaults caused by the banks' imposing margin calls when property prices declined and interest rates rose. Nothing much to do with "magical thinking", as far as I can see,

If anyone is entitled to own a home then why not everyone? It has been the property developers and investors who have made owning a home unaffordable for many. This is part of the financialization of the economy which has greatly increased the wealth gap which has been so detrimental to human life in so many ways.

:up: What you say makes sense to me.

Yes, I agree that it's a lot to do with resentment, even desperation. When people are desperate, they are easier to dupe

I agree with both your answers, but the question seeks a deeper answer; why do they want to overthrow the Government, what motivates their participation in a "culture war". Baker's question seems inapt because this is not typical right-winger behavior. Typically they are conservative and want to maintain the status quo; this taste for revolution is coming, it seems, from the disaffected working class; those who you would expect to be more aligned with the left. So, Trump seems to have played on this disaffection and duped people into thinking he is all for the worker, the 'every woman and man'.

So, it seems to me the answer lies in the growing perception that the left have sold out to corporate and plutocratic interests.This perception is also there in Australian politics, but the intensity is dialed down somewhat.

I dismissed the latter as there would be no possible way of knowing if thoughts could exist without meaning as we would be unaware of them. The argument then begs the question.

So we're left (by my reckoning) with the former. That 'inherent' means that the thought has meaning regardless of the interpreter (inherent), as opposed to meaning assigned by an interpreter as external objects like ink marks, trees, structures etc.

Hence the counterargument to Feser shows that thoughts do not have inherent meaning in this particular sense. Whether thoughts have inherent meaning in any other sense of 'inherent' is irrelevant to the argument at hand. — Isaac

OK, I didn't read the Feser piece. My point was only that thinking necessarily has meaning in a semantic sense otherwise we could not count it as thinking. We can determine the meaning of our thoughts by reflection on them, by writing them down if necessary, basically by expressing them linguistically. Any coherent linguistic expression has meaning, even if not just one literal meaning; linguistic expressions are meaningful in a symbolic way that physical objects like trees. mountains and neural nets are not.

So, I disagree with your conclusion: I think we can know that thoughts, even pre-linguistic, pre-symbolic ones, cannot exist, i.e. would not be thoughts but would be something else, without meaning. The idea of a meaningless thought is nonsense in other words; and yet even that nonsense idea itself has meaning.

But if Feser claims that a thought can have only one inherent meaning, then I agree with you that that is mistaken.

No, it does not follow.

The "model" at point here is a distribution of probabilities in a neural net. That is the apple you see?

No, that is your seeing the apple. — Banno

Neural nets have nothing to do with what we are discussing. This is about the way we would normally speak about things. If my seeing an apple is a modeling of an apple then I see a model of an apple, just as if my carving is a modeling of an apple then my carving is a model of an apple.

Of course I can say I see an apple, just as I can say I carve an apple but in the case of claiming that my seeing is a modeling, then what is it that is modeled in your view?

We wouldn't say that because building just is house-making building is inherently a house. — Isaac

Building is not inherently house-making, though, but structure-making, And structure is inherent to building, just as meaning is inherent to thought.

When you think "I'm cold", it has a different meaning to you than it does when I think "I'm cold". As such the meaning of "I'm cold" (the thought) cannot be inherent to the thought, can it? It must be something we construct.

I didn't say that a particular meaning is inherent to thoughts. If I think "I'm cold" that thought is inherently meaningful to me, just as (presumably) when you think "I'm cold" the thought is inherently meaningful to you.

I submit to you that such belief was based purely upon the deliberate perpetuation of the falsehood. They took Trump at his word. — creativesoul

Let us grant that the deliberate perpetuation of the falsehood was Trump's; still the belief of others cannot be based simply on that. The interesting question is as to why they take Trump at his word? What motivates their taking Trump at his word?

I take that to mean "No,,,argument". By your own argument the apple is a model, since the act of seeing it models it. Try and wriggle out of that one.

What you see is the apple. — Banno

I have already corrected you on this; by your own argument what we see is the apple as modeled. So are we seeing a model or not? If our seeing is a modeling then the apple, or whatever, is being modeled. Does it not follow that if something is modeled in the act of seeing, then what is seen is a model? We don't see the apple in its unmodeled state, do we?

I don't see how our thoughts are any different to the "marks or shapes or whatever" in that they lack 'inherent' meaning. We might find meaning in them on reflection, but I don't see any evidence that the meaning is inherent. — Isaac

Thoughts just are inherently meaningful. Thinking just is meaning-making.

What happens is that the eyes and associated neurones build a model, and this is not what we see, but the very act of our seeing. — Banno

The second removes the homunculus. The model is our seeing. What we see is the things in the world (as modeled). — Banno

I agree, but I added an important clarifying qualification.

Isn't the body/world collaboration a dualism? If we're asking whether there's an external material world, then we have to go beyond just the world as presented to ourselves and ask about the world itself. The world that's presumably much larger and older than we are. — Marchesk

But we already know there is a multitude of things external to our bodies; we perceive them as such. We can think of everything as being processes which go on, and we refer to the conceived totality of these "goings on" as "the world". We can also conceive of our perceptions of these things as processes going on inside our bodies. and in one sense this is true. But it does not follow that the things perceived are somehow in our bodies, in our heads or minds.Perception is a process involving things both interior and exterior to our bodies. There is no real inner and outer from the "point of view" of the world, there are only relative, localized instantiations of inner and outer.

Fair enough, but it's not just the things presenting themselves to us, since we're doing a decent chunk of the presenting. — Marchesk

Right, it's a body/world collaboration, which we, in our usual dualistic manner, conceive of as an artificial separation between the two.

That's a cool mat for the cat to be on!

I'd say we see things as they present themselves to us. If we stipulate that there must be things in themselves, i.e. things as they are when not being seen, than we can say that we see those things, but obviously (by definition) not as they are in themselves.

It is kind of odd how much vision is focused on in these kinds of discussions. There are other senses and types of experiences. — Marchesk

I don't think it's so odd when you consider that seeing presents us with determinate objects, that can be turned over, examined. moved around and viewed form a multitude of positions and so on. Remember the old adage: "Seeing is believing"?

I think I'd call it more examination and pattern recognition than analysis and deduction.

Philosophical insights are a fine thing, but did the drugs help you get laid as often as and by whomever you wanted? If not, perhaps they provided a satisfactory substitute? — Bitter Crank

Perhaps occasionally they did help me get laid, but no they wouldn't satisfy the criteria you laid down there. On the other hand, they do provide a more than satisfactory substitute when the conditions are right (and please don't take the use of 'hand' to be suggesting anything).

Walking through the mall naked may prove my shame, but so does changing in front of my cats. — Real Gone Cat

;Are you serious; you get embarrassed appearing naked in front of your cats?

I'll try again. The essence is in the thing. The definition is in the words. — Banno

And yet we may have essential definitions.

However this immediately leads to some issues especially at the extremes.
If I take the word “everything” how do I define it? You cannot “divide” the concept of “everything” as it is parameterless. Any parameter to u try to place around the set/ content is also included in the set/content. — Benj96

I'd say that any particular thing, or collection of particular things, does not qualify as 'everything' so it or they do not fall within the parameters that define the concept.

:up:
My experience has been the same; LSD, Psilocybin, Mescaline, Cannabis. MDMA; all have yielded insight.

This may be of interest to those who wish to explore further: http://www.philosopher.eu/psychoactive-philosophy/

The world's allowable number of deep insights is fixed. So, if you have never had so much as a feeble lightbulb moment, rejoice and be exceeding glad. Your doltish brain has granted a brighter bulb the opportunity to have one or several insights, for the good of mankind. — Bitter Crank

:lol: Nice reversal! :cool:

Your argument is that we encounter statements directly because it's nonsense to say it's indirect. — Tate


Yep. You got it. — Banno

If it's nonsense to say we encounter statements indirectly, then it's also nonsense to say we encounter them directly. We simply encounter them. The same goes for seeing anything; it makes no sense to say we see things directly or indirectly; that dichotomous pair of qualifications is misplaced; we just see things.

I don't have doubt of other's minds. I just don't prove the assertion. — Moliere

Without other minds there can be no doubt, no proof, no assertion in the first place