Suppose we agree that the sentence “The cup has a handle” is true. Put the cup in a cupboard. Does it still have a handle? A realist might say that it either does or it doesn’t, and perhaps add that since we have no reason to suppose otherwise, the unobserved cup on the cupboard still has a handle and the sentence is true. An idealists might in contrast say that the cup only has a handle in relation to some language construct, and that somehow as a result we cannot or at least ought not commit to the sentence being either true or false; instead it has some alter value, perhaps “unknown” or “neutral” or whatever. — Banno

Yes, this example makes sense. And we can get marooned by talk about which things exit when no one is there to see or hear. To some extent where you land on this seems to depend on the frame you want to use or how you interpret language. I can already hear the phenomenological talk about a cup only existing as such if we share an intersubjective community of agreement involving some anticipatory relationship with the object we can understand contextually as a cup, subject to a specific purpose - or something like this...

Some of this might be rich territory, but as a minimalist, with only so many years left to live, I don't think I can use this type of understanding.

Food for thought.

Our differences are perhaps of greater interest than our agreements, and so tend to grab our attention. But the things on which we agree overwhelm those disagreements. — Banno

Yep. Something many of us lose site of.

So I reject the suggestion that we live in different worlds. Rather it seems that we have different descriptions — Banno

Sure - I was using it metaphorically for this kind of distinction.

What might be worth considering is if these two views are actually incompatible. After all, not just any sentence will do. If the cat is on the mat, yet someone insists that the cat is not on the mat, then there are a few possibilities. They may be using "cat" or "mat " in some alternate way; or they may just be wrong. What we can say about the world is in some way restricted by the world - that is, there is a difference between true statements and false ones. — Banno

Nice - yes this seems critical.

But there is a difference between those statements that are true and those that are not. Hence, one way or anther, there is a shared world that underpins that difference. — Banno

Don't disagree but the phrase 'one way or another' here might be said to hide a multitude of sins, from Kant to phenomenology. But I hear you.

Thanks.

I'd say language, being our primary medium of communication, is not capable of getting "behind itself" in order to derive "a realist theory of language". — Janus

I think this is right.

Language makes communication of ideas about the world possible, as evidenced by ordinary life — Janus

Yes

to ask for a realist theory that could explain that would be to already presuppose that language is capable of communicating ideas about the world and be asking for some more fundamental guarantor of realism than our merely taking it to be so, and the obvious successful practical communicative applications of language we routinely experience. — Janus

So if we have no fundamental guarantor of realism, what does this say about our ability to communicate successfully about metaphysics?

I feel like this is a Kantian matter - language is like our phenomenal world.

So the initial OP stated the following problem:

While we may wish to reject the materialist realism of science as a form of metaphysical prejudice, we cannot do so in favour of an alternative metaphysical framework that also claims to describe an ultimate reality be it a new form of idealism, panpsychism, or some Hollywood influenced Matrix version of 'we are living in a simulated reality' without having a theory of language that explains how any of these realist claims are possible.

Yes, it was Hilary Lawson writing this, but Lawson is incidental, it's the point I'm curious about.

I was initially wondering if all our conversations about idealism, etc, can cease if we accept this point. It seemed like a cute idea worth investigating.

What is clear is that there is a diversity of opinion on the nature of language and reality. As someone with no expertise in this area, I can't comment other than to say language appears to be a useful tool that affords us extraordinary power.

A realist might argue that there is a clear and fixed correspondence between language and the objects, events, and concepts in the real world. I am not so sure what 'real world' means. It seems to me there are a series of real worlds, subject to experience and context. Julian Assange, for instance, surely cannot doubt that he has had his freedom taken away.

Can we meaningfully talk about idealism without a theory of language that explains how realist claims are possible?

I accept that the social constructivists are right when they argue that language is socially constructed and that meaning arises from shared agreements and conventions within a particular community. The meaning of words and expressions can vary depending on cultural and social contexts.

I also accept that cognitive linguists are right when they argue that language is closely connected to human cognition and conceptual systems. Meaning is seen as being shaped by cognitive processes, metaphors, and mental structures.

Language and its ability to generate meaning seems a kind of conjuring trick of metaphor, or a type of game where contingent rules or customs rather that 'reality' determine meaning.

You're steeped in philosophical tradition - ordinary language philosophy - what is your take home message?

So, how Does Language Map onto the World?

Was anything decided? — Banno

I don't think so. We seem to employ language to communicate fairly well on many matters - that's as deep as I'm going.

Thank you that's a very succinct and informative summary of the position you've been articulating.

Yes.

Trying to be whole is like trying to relax, it has the opposite effect — unenlightened

Yes, this I get. I've made the same point many times. :up:

Such a conflict can be resolved instantly by seeing the whole of it from the inside, which means by fully, consciously, being both sides of the conflict. If I am the conflict, I no longer experience the conflict. As long as I am being one side of the conflict, I experience the other side of the conflict as the problem. — unenlightened

Ok. Thanks for clarifying. I'm unclear how this would work in practice (how would one become both sides of a conflict?) but I kind of see the argument as a theoretical position. Interesting.

Understand. This is a tendentious subject. I just like having a sense of the scope of enquiry. :wink:

Interesting. Thank you.

We are human beings, capable of telling likely stories, but incapable of discerning the truth of such things. Timaeus proposes it is best to accept likely stories and not search for what is beyond the limits of our understanding. — Fooloso4

That's generally been my game plan. I think I'll try to find a thread on the Forms to see what's been said here.

For me it's the things we should fix but can't see that matter most - biases, values, patterns of thinking and behavior that seem normal to us but are harmful or self-sabotaging. They aren't unfixable but it sometimes takes a serious mishap or situational crisis to highlight the problem to us. It's then in crisis that we may decide to make vital changes. Sometimes the changes endure, sometimes they don't. Sometimes it's too late.

Rarely will ever anyone say, "Yes, I worked hard, but I had the right connections & genetics, and that's what really mattered", or anything along those lines. — Judaka

I saw an interview with a successful actor recently (I forget who) he said that his success was attributable to luck and knowing the right people. Most ambitious people work hard, but only some succeed. Many of the wealthy and successful people I've met have said similar things about the role of timing and good fortune. I suspect there are cultural differences in how people interpret their success.

Because the sage always confronts difficulties,
He never experiences them. — Lao Tzu

I rarely make sense of Lao Tzu. How does confronting a difficulty allow you not to experience it?

Not really for this thread, but I understand Plato's notion of the Forms evolved throughout his writings and that he was sometimes 'self-critical' - there are explorations of the problems of participation (Phaedo) and the issue of infinite regress, 'the Third Man Argument' (Parmenides). But does Plato stop thinking of the Forms as a source of truth and ultimate reality?

Bertrand Russell says in his chapter on Pythagoras that the numerological and rationalist tendency in Pythagoras and in the later Greek tradition is one of the things that differentiates it from Asiatic mysticism. — Wayfarer

Yes, this is where I was heading. Reason as pathway to higher awareness - very different. It does strike me that the notion of a reawakening of the wisdom we held before brith 'anamnesis' has within it some of the characteristics of enlightenment traditions.

Seems to me that the Greek approach was far more likely to give rise to later science than the Indian and Chinese traditions. — Wayfarer

Yes, this is also what I was wondering. Thanks.

There is no axis along which the idea of ‘higher’ makes any sense. — Wayfarer

We retain some of the ghostly afterlife of this through various notions of wisdom, I guess, but it's faint.

I frequently cite in support include Bertrand Russell's chapter on The World of Universals, the transcript of a lecture by Jacques Maritain The Cultural Impact of Empiricism, a book section about Augustine on Intelligible Objects, a book called The Theological Origins of Modernity by Michael Allen Gillespie. And this excerpt from a book on Thomistic philosophy which re-states, I think, the same argument Gerson refers to in respect of the immateriality of nous. — Wayfarer

A digression via some questions. Plato seems to regard nous as the highest form of understanding - the ability to contemplate the ultimate nature of reality via the Forms. Do you consider this to be approximately the same as enlightenment? Or something not quite as elevated? And is the idea that reasoning or intellectual intuition can help us to access a higher realm of knowledge - i.e., the reality behind the world of appearances? I'm interested in how this access is theorised to work. A rational process. I understand we can get there through anamnesis 'remembering' as we become reawakened through dialogue and learning.

What does having direct access to the Forms do for the perceiver?

I think the misunderstanding arises in no small part from amateur hedonists who, while trying to defend their theory, end up falling back into something which is so safe as to be merely descriptive. — Leontiskos

A good point. I think of them as untheorized hedonists - they are more likely to be using the term in an undifferentiated fashion to describe 'pleasure seeking' despite the consequences. Dissipated voluptuaries tend to have a limited shelf life.

.So maybe Epicurus is odd to us in part because we are surrounded by such lazy hedonists. :grin: — Leontiskos

What I've liked about Epicurus is the setting of achievable standards for hedonism - we do not really require all that much in order to be happy. It lends itself to a minimalist spin on the idea of contentment which contrasts well against the avaricious, materialistic acquisitiveness of consumer capitalism, even when pursued at an unambitious, middle-class magnitude.

The chances of any given person in the sex business getting a raw deal are pretty high. — BC

No question about that.

I don't really have answers to your questions. I do have a comment on labels. Where I work, we've assisted many sex workers (street sex to brothel sex) who frequently also had substance issues and untreated mental health concerns. They usually prefer the term sex worker to prostitute as it is held as more respectful and less stigmatising. Like most folk, I am in favour of using language carefully in a way that is more likely to build respect. I believe there is such a thing as 'sex work' and this therefore needs protections and appropriate, safe conditions for those who undertake it.

I have been criticized by more philosophical types that my philosophy is too dependent on introspection, which they find suspect. I've started at least five discussions that examine what different types of mental process feel like from the inside. — T Clark

That's really interesting. What things feel like on the inside has never captured my imagination. I'm not even sure what that would mean experientially for me. However I do have an intuitive grasp of my process. :wink: To some extent I know my limitations, my attractions and repulsions, my biases, my patterns, my omissions and my strengths.

Mostly when it comes to intuition or thinking I have instant access to a thought and it generally has no feeling attached to it or anything additional to the thought itself. Maybe this is why I don't care much for poetry and you do - it's in how we are wired to experience things. Or something like that. Do you think there is a connection between intuition and a love of poetry? Curiously, I am not very interested in stories or plots in books or films. I am more interested in language, atmosphere and character.

I only gave my religious leanings so that others may better understand what sort of animal they are dealing with. :smile: — Leontiskos

Probably for somewhere else on this site but I don't think a person's religious leanings help us understand anything about them. For the simple problem that no two people (even within a single faith) seem to beleive in the same kind of god or hold the same account of religion and morality. When someone says they are a Christian, for instance, they might be misogynist, homophobes, or inclusive flag waivers for LGBTQ rights.

Who knows? :wink:

In short intuition tells you what you already know, because it’s just fast thinking. — Darkneos

Interesting. If intuition is thinking it is thinking without reasoning or analysis. I guess that's why it is also called a gut feeling.

What is the part of intuition that is 'already known'? Can you give an example of this in action?

It’s why when tested, experts were found to be reliable in their intuition compared to randos. — Darkneos

That makes sense. Not everyone's intuition on a given subject is going to have equal weight.

Ok. Maybe this place will help you think through this. I can't help you, I am an atheist. :wink:

I am a Christian of the Catholic/Orthodox variety. — Leontiskos

Welcome. What does this mean? My understand of Greek orthodox Christianity is it considers the Catholic Church to be anathema. Or did you mean an orthodox Catholic?

People who lack intellectual self-awareness are often unaware of how their thinking processes actually work. — T Clark

I think I agree. Can you clarify something? What does an awareness of how one's thinking process look like? Do you have an example? In other words, are you talking about an awareness of one's biases and limitations, or an awareness of sound thinking in general and being able to compare sound thinking with one's own process?

:up:

FWIW, I'd say that there is only a tiny core that can't be denied without performative contradiction : 'we are in a world and a language together'. The details are intentionally left unspecified, for that's what we debate, the nature of the world, never (without absurdity) its existence. The other phenomenological stuff is relatively tentative, but the ideal is not theory construction so much as a pointing-out what's already there and not being noticed (famously including my blind knowhow as I hammer or drive and the strange being-kind of tools-in-use.) — plaque flag

Cool thanks. I'll continue to mull over this.

Thats useful, thanks.

Personally, I am exploring the idea that, while objects may have a temporal position, consciousness actually has a temporal "size." Objects are three dimensional and moving through or in time, as it were. But consciousness actually exists in the past, present and future, has actual temporal dimension. An intuition. — Pantagruel

Food for thought.

Shall I eat and drink only that I may hunger and thirst and eat and drink again, till the grave which is open beneath my feet shall swallow me up, and I myself become the food of worms? Shall I beget beings like myself, that they too may eat and drink and die, and leave behind them beings like themselves to do the same that I have done? To what purpose this ever-revolving circle, this ceaseless and unvarying round, in which all things appear only to pass away, and pass away only that they may re-appear unaltered; — this monster continually devouring itself that it may again bring itself forth, and bringing itself forth only that it may again devour itself? — Pantagruel

Ha! I can only agree with Fichte and have had similar thoughts, as I am sure many do. More recently I feel time is like being trapped inside a speeding train, the stations I see passing in a blur are like the obligatory seasonal and life events which come and go by with monotonous regularity and are also opportunities I've failed to make use of.

There probably aren’t any of the metaphysical conceptions. No such thing as reason, judgement, knowledge and whatnot. They’re inventions, meant to explain in the absence of truth, but never intended to prove in the absence of fact. I’m sure you must see the problem, that ↪Wayfarer historically takes so much care in exposing, in that it is we that propose to Nature the rules by which it operates, but in doing so, we should have prohibited ourselves from the capacity for proposing, re: the absolute determinism of natural law with respect to the brain, should not allow the indeterminate possibility of subjective inference.

We’re left with doing the best we can, in not making more of a shitstorm of things than we already have. — Mww

Are you essentially saying that we have constructed little conceptual 'prisons' for ourselves out of theory and intellectual models?

in that it is we that propose to Nature the rules by which it operates, but in doing so, we should have prohibited ourselves from the capacity for proposing, re: the absolute determinism of natural law with respect to the brain, should not allow the indeterminate possibility of subjective inference. — Mww

Can you clarify this by putting it slightly differently, I'm not entirely clear on this?

I've been pondering the same thing on and off for much of this year - the present moment may be all which exists, but how are we to understand looking back? I think we just have to take past, present and future as structures in human cognition which help us to make sense of our reality, but I don't know how much we can say beyond this. We can't really examine time outside of our experience of it.

As I see it, you are trying to do justice to the entanglement of subject and substance. I think it's better to talk of equiprimordiality. Self, language, community, and world are all co-given -- aspects of a single 'fused' lifeworld. The 'proof' of this is almost analytic : denials of it are performative contradictions. — plaque flag

Quick question: I can see merit in this and have a modest interest in phenomenology, but could it not be argued that this account is just words used as a kind of magic spell? A conjuring move to make the Cartesian conundrum appear to vanish. We can choose to describe our reality any which way we want and hold these accounts as foundational axioms - dualism, monistic idealism - or your equiprimordial, phenomenological construct above.

But how do we demonstrate the veracity of such models and of what use are they? Are they a variety of poetry, or are they something deeper which can be tied in some way to reality?

the genuine cogito, Merleau-Ponty argues, is a cogito “in action”: we do not deduce “I am” from “I think”, but rather the certainty of “I think” rests on the “I am” of existential engagement. More basic than explicit self-consciousness and presupposed by it is an ambiguous mode of self-experience that Merleau-Ponty terms the silent or “tacit” cogito—our pre-reflective and inarticulate grasp on the world and ourselves that becomes explicit and determinate only when it finds expression for itself. — plaque flag

On this I am simply unable to tell what fits. I find both 'I think' and 'I am' problematic. Even Merleau-Ponty's account seems to require a kind of faith.

Well, I prefer your account as it implies hope.

What I mean is, if the above statement is true, then good would be that which aids life and bad the opposite. — Kaplan

I guess as a presupposition I have generally subscribed to something similar - but the devil is in the detail. I have ususally held (something close to Sam Harris), it is better to be alive than dead, better to be well than sick, better to be happy than sad. My sense of morality follows from this.

I guess a good example of the first discussion would be when people discuss things like political and are open to actually listening to different view points. — Spencer Thurgood

Interesting. I generally see political conversations as amongst the most tribal and intractable, so I haven't often had the experience of common ground in those discussions. I would have thought simulation theory is much easier and more fun for people to talk about than right-wing versus left-wing political solutions.

Certain issues are just in themselves controversial, like abortion or taxation or gun ownership, which readily find people ranting and shutting down.

At the most basic level this would assist us with every single moral question as it is the foundation. What I mean is, if the above statement is true, then good would be that which aids life and bad the opposite. As to the exact permutations and combinations this would look like in specific moral questions and practical/applied ethics, that is not my goal here. — Kaplan

Living is not an obligation of life because life has no moral obligation to live regardless of needs and preferences. — Mark S

Agree.

The first is a discussion in which present day events and historical events are discussed and used as resources to create what could be argued as the perfect society. This is generally found in productive discussion of politics, ethics, morality, etc.

The second is a discussion that often revolve around the social sciences and even some of the psychological sciences such as "gender identity", "consciousness", "spirituality". These debate tend to be subjective in conception, ie "are we a simulations on a computer" and as a result are very difficult to have a productive conversation about. — Spencer Thurgood

I haven't noticed this. I've mostly noticed discussions about epistemology and metaphysics mostly. We seem to keep coming back to what it is we can say about knowledge/truth/reality and how we can know it. In the end most discussions or arguments hinge upon these matters as the fundamental building blocks for anything else we may go on to say about morality, science, the transcendent.

I don't think any discussion goes anywhere if people are too firmly attached to their presuppositions - doesn't matter if we are talking politics, cookery or bushcraft. But the curious thing is even zealots do change their minds and the debates they participate in can create significant shifts in their thinking, even as they fervently insist you are wrong. I've met many atheists, for instance, who are former religious fundamentalists and the process of change, when viewed from the outside by others most likely looked like complete resistance to new ideas. You just never know what will make a person change. Or when it might happen.

I don't associate aggressiveness with apologetics so much as naive confidence — wonderer1

I meant aggressive in the sense of super assertive and unassailably confident, not hostile.

The cultural gap is just too wide. — wonderer1

Probably right.

WLC is skilled at presenting arguments, and conveying the sense that any reasonable person must come to the same conclusions he does — wonderer1

He's definitely a very smart man but I find his style reminds me of a used car dealer, haranguing you to buy the product. For my taste he's too slick, too fast, too insinuating.

Interesting. There seems to be a similar performative contradiction in Donald Hoffman's idealist philosophy - if evolution is only about survival and does not support humans acquiring truth about reality, how does Hoffman ascertain that his metaphysics is true? I recall his response being something like - 'I don't, everything is wrong, even my theory.' Perhaps this is taking fallibilism too far.

Thanks.