To chime in a bit, experiences such as those of religious ecstasy are in no way inferential, but, rather, experiences. One would determinately know what one experiences just as much as one determinately knows what one sees, hears, etc. in the everyday world. — javra

Right, you're just repeating what I've already said above (I think it was in this thread) so I agree. Although in the case of religious experience one experiences feeling, perhaps a sense of profound knowing, maybe accompanied by images. What is experienced is not as determinate as seeing a tree, or a river or a mountain, because we don't just see those things, we can swim in the river, climb the mountain or tree, cut the tree down, take water from the river and so on.

And we know that other see the same trees, rivers and mountains that we do. So, the case is quite different when it comes to perceptual experiences which can be shared compared to religious experiences which are strictly personal.

Your own personal believes aside, can you provide evidence that Witt was one to deny the metaphysical reality of the Good via his own writings? The quote which you again post sorta provides evidence that he in fact did support the metaphysical reality of the Good, and of the Beautiful to boot. And again, if so far know of no metaphysical reality greater or of more import that that of the Good. — javra

I think this is what you refer to.

6.42 Hence also there can be no ethical propositions.

Propositions cannot express anything higher.


6.421It is clear that ethics cannot be expressed.

I disagree with your interpretation if that is what you are referring to. He says propositions cannot express anything higher. To say that the good is metaphysically real is an attempt to express something higher propositionally, and I think that is specifically what he denies is possible.

OK, but in all this your are maybe unintentionally forsaking a rather important, if not essential, aspect of all possible experiences: the intellect's intrinsic understanding of that experienced. A person who honestly experiences a near death experience will be entitled to claim, and quite validly so, fallible knowledge of an afterlife. This can be in principle replicated by bringing (all?) people into near-death -- barring the grave ethical considerations of so doing -- or else not replicated thereby taking credence away from the claim to fallible knowledge. Furthermore, it hasn't been just one person in history who's claimed this, but numerous, over the span of both time and cultures.

To be clear, I'm not one to then believe in a Christian concept of Heaven as a place that's eternally divided from a likewise Christian concept of an endless Hell.

That personal observation made, what further validation can one ask for short of the category error wherein one insists that the afterlife must in and of itself be physical/material and thereby empirically verifiable by all in the here and now?

Else asked, given the surplus of near-death experience accounts, on what grounds can one maintain that none of these folk can validly claim fallible knowledge of an afterlife?

the intellect's intrinsic understanding of that experienced. A person who honestly experiences a near death experience will be entitled to claim, and quite validly so, fallible knowledge of an afterlife. — javra

I disagree for all the reasons I've already given. I don't believe in "intrinsic intellectual understanding" I don't even really know what it could mean. So-called near-death experiences, assuming for the sake of argument that the reports are both honest and accurate have not been explained—who knows why they occur?

To be clear, I'm not one to then believe in a Christian concept of Heaven as a place that's eternally divided from a likewise Christian concept of an endless Hell. — javra

But many do believe that and believe it on the basis of some religious experience. Which I think just goes to show how deep confirmation bias can run,

That personal observation made, what further validation can one ask for short of the category error wherein one insists that the afterlife must in and of itself be physical/material and thereby empirically verifiable by all in the here and now? — javra

One could ask for a cogent reason to believe in an afterlife. I've never seen such a thing. I can't prove there is no afterlife, I've just never seen a good reason to believe in one. Also, it's easy to see that people would like to believe in an afterlife—the idea, hell aside, being more palatable than annihilation. So, it's reasonable to infer the role of wishful thinking.

—who knows why they occur? — Janus

Precisely! But that they have and do occur is about as undeniable as is, say, the claim that REM dreams occur.

But many do believe that and believe it on the basis of some religious experience. Which I think just goes to show how deep confirmation bias can run, — Janus

Hey, I fully agree. The difference between experience as data and inferences regarding it, which is not data. Be this in the spheres of science itself or else in the sphere of comparative religions.

One could ask for a cogent reason to believe in an afterlife. I've never seen such a thing. I can't prove there is no afterlife, I've just never seen a good reason to believe in one. Also, it's easy to see that people would like to believe in an afterlife—the idea, hell aside, being more palatable than annihilation. So, it's reasonable to infer the role of wishful thinking. — Janus

This isn't about your beliefs and likes nor about my beliefs and I'll again reiterate that my own personal likes are by in large that of instant "annihilation' of all awareness upon my corporeal death: to me, instant "salvation" form all forms of suffering. It just that I don't believe this to be the case, on rational grounds. All this is, your views or mine, is utterly irrelevant to the issue at hand.

Other than via emotive biases toward the comfort of instant "annihilation" via any metaphysical paradigm that supports this ultimate end of being, how can one rationally disprove the metaphysical possibility of an afterlife?

Notice, I'm not claiming that an afterlife can be proven. I'm only claiming that the fallible knowledge of an afterlife can be as valid as fallible knowledge gets for those who've had near-death experiences.

Be this in the spheres of science itself or else in the sphere of comparative religions. — javra

The difference is that inferences about what is the case and scientific inferences are testable.

This isn't about your beliefs and likes nor about my beliefs and I'll again reiterate that my own personal likes are by in large that of instant "annihilation' of all awareness upon my corporeal death: to me, instant "salvation" form all forms of suffering. — javra

I find this difficult to believe, but perhaps it's just that I love existing more than you do, and so cannot relate

how can one rationally disprove the metaphysical possibility of an afterlife? — javra

I've never claimed that the possibility can be disproven. But I for one would need a reason to believe in it, and have been unable to find one.

Notice, I'm not claiming that an afterlife can be proven. I'm only claiming that the fallible knowledge of an afterlife can be as valid as fallible knowledge gets for those who've had near-death experiences. — javra

I would call it belief, not knowledge, and it is not fallible because it cannot be falsified. Of course that doesn't make it infallible, just useless in my book. What difference could it possibly make to how you live your life, other than as a positive, albeit totally underdetermined, belief? From what I've observed those how have such positive beliefs do not value this life highly enough.

If you would really rather be annihilated and all the evidence, we can have points to the likelihood that you will get your wish (although you won't be there to enjoy getting it), then what possible incentive can there be for you to bother with the vague possibility of an afterlife?

.

I find this difficult to believe, but perhaps it's just that I love existing more than you do, and so cannot relate — Janus

No way to verify this, but perhaps you're quite wrong in this appraisal, despite the sincerity of what I previously expressed.

I would call it belief, not knowledge, and it is not fallible because it cannot be falsified. — Janus

Is one's experience of having seen a house in an REM dream a mere belief of one having seen a house in the REM dream ... or does one know what one has oneself experienced? How about one's seeing a house during waking states?

Fallible means possible to be false or else wrong. It does not mean possible to be falsified. So your affirmation is an utter mistake of interpretation in regard to what fallibility and fallibilism entails. M-theory, for one example is fallible (not infallible), but it certainly is not falsifiable ... despite being fallible.

If you would really rather be annihilated and all the evidence, we can have points to the likelihood that you will get your wish (although you won't be there to enjoy getting it), then what possible incentive can there be for you to bother with the vague possibility of an afterlife? — Janus

Your presumption that "all the evidence points to ..." is founded upon materialistic premises. These are not the premises upon which my metaphysical, and hence ultimately physical, understandings are founded. There's no way to adequately address my own premises in this forum's soundbite form. If you are sincerely curious, though, you can always check out my profile wherein I've placed a link to my personal philosophy. What I've got uploaded so far amply explains why I don't believe in what you call annihilation upon death. Otherwise, the topic is beyond the scope of this discussion.

So back to the issue at hand ...

Is one's experience of having seen a house in an REM dream a mere belief of one having seen a house in the REM dream ... or does one know what one has oneself experienced? How about one's seeing a house during waking states? — javra

Depends on how reliable you think memory is. Seeing a house in a waking state is easy enough to verify. Having seen one not so much. Although that said, since memory is not often proven wrong, we might have good reason to trust it.

For about six months I took to writing what I could remember of my dreams. The more I wrote the more I recalled...or was I confabulating on the little bits I did remember? I couldn't tell, but I realized it didn't matter anyway, because either way— dream or confabulation— is an exercise of the creative imagination, and as a writer that is what is most importrant to me.

Fallible means possible to be false or else wrong. It does not mean possible to be falsified. So your affirmation is an utter mistake of interpretation in regard to what fallibility and fallibilism entails. — javra

That might be your apparently dogmatic understanding of the term; it's not mine. To be fallible in my lexicon means 'could turn out to be wrong'. If there is no possible way to determine if something is wrong, then it simply cannot turn out to be wrong, and I don't count it as either fallible or infallible.

Your presumption that "all the evidence points to ..." is founded upon materialistic premises. These are not the premises upon which my metaphysical, and hence ultimately physical, understandings are founded. — javra

This is nonsense as I see it. All evidence is material, meaning something we can observe, or logical, meaning something which can be shown to be necessarily true. If you disagree then present an example of immaterial evidence for anything.

.

Depends on how reliable you think memory is. Seeing a house in a waking state is easy enough to verify. Having seen one not so much. Although that said, since memory is not often proven wrong, we might have good reason to trust it. — Janus

It's maybe subtle, but you missed the point I was making. Suppose you see a pink elephant and it in fact is an illusion. So there was no pink elephant in the external world you thought you saw. All fine and dandy. Now, is your experience of seeing a pink elephant which in fact was not there, in and of itself, just a belief ... or do you know that you had an experience of seeing a pink elephant.

As to verifiability in the walking state, it is quite impossible to fully verify every single thing ever seen. Indeed, quite impossible to fully verify every thing one sees at any one given juncture. Most things seen we accept on trust. And not due to empirical verification. It would be exceedingly bizarre otherwise.

But the point remains. When is one's personal experiences ever not knowledge of what one is personally experiencing? To be clear, not of the significance of what one is experiencing, but of the experience itself.

Fallible means possible to be false or else wrong. It does not mean possible to be falsified. So your affirmation is an utter mistake of interpretation in regard to what fallibility and fallibilism entails. — javra


That might be your apparently dogmatic understanding of the term; it's not mine. To be fallible in my lexicon means 'could turn out to be wrong'. If there is no possible way to determine if something is wrong, then it simply cannot turn out to be wrong, and I don't count it as either fallible or infallible. — Janus

Uhm. In short,

Originally, fallibilism (from Medieval Latin: fallibilis, "liable to error") is the philosophical principle that propositions can be accepted even though they cannot be conclusively proven or justified,[1][2] or that neither knowledge nor belief is certain.[3] The term was coined in the late nineteenth century by the American philosopher Charles Sanders Peirce, as a response to foundationalism. Theorists, following Austrian-British philosopher Karl Popper, may also refer to fallibilism as the notion that knowledge might turn out to be false.[4] Furthermore, fallibilism is said to imply corrigibilism, the principle that propositions are open to revision.[5] Fallibilism is often juxtaposed with infallibilism. — https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fallibilism

Of course one is free to idiosyncratically define terms as one pleases and then declare that thier quite commonplace usage is a "dogmatic understanding". I'm myself not one to do so.

This is nonsense as I see it. All evidence is material, meaning something we can observe, or logical, meaning something which can be shown to be necessarily true. If you disagree then present an example of immaterial evidence for anything. — Janus

OK: Consciousness, when strictly defined as a first-person point of view, occurs in others out there.

As far as I know, this proposition is neither verifiable via observation nor something which can be shown via logic to be necessarily true. But go ahead and either show me a consciousness out there or else logically evidence why the just expressed proposition is necessarily true logically.

:100: :up:

:pray:

Wayfarer and Count Timothy von Icarus may enjoy a recent piece written by James Ungureanu, "The Perfume of an Empty Vase: The Rise and Fall of Evidential Religion." — Leontiskos

Very good. I have a précis of Harrison's earlier Fall of Man and Foundations of Science and have read other articles of his. I think that 'history of ideas' approach is indispensable for understanding the present.

Now, is your experience of seeing a pink elephant which in fact was not there, in and of itself, just a belief ... or do you know that you had an experience of seeing a pink elephant. — javra

You think you see a pink elephant.

When is one's personal experiences ever not knowledge of what one is personally experiencing? To be clear, not of the significance of what one is experiencing, but of the experience itself. — javra

You have whatever you are experiencing, and you have whatever judgements you are making about it.

Nothing in what you quoted form Wikipedia contradicts anything I've said.

OK: Consciousness, when strictly defined as a first-person point of view, occurs in others out there.

As far as I know, this proposition is neither verifiable via observation nor something which can be shown via logic to be necessarily true. — javra

It is verifiable beyond reasonable doubt that others are conscious, because we can ask them what they perceive and when it agrees with what we perceive we have no reason to believe they don't perceive what we do.

You think you see a pink elephant. — Janus

A thought you based on what experience? Other than that of in fact visually experiencing a pink elephant, an experience which one knows one has had.

You have whatever you are experiencing, and you have whatever judgements you are making about it. — Janus

Again: how is that personally experienced not known to be personally experienced.

Nothing in what you quoted form Wikipedia contradicts anything I've said. — Janus

Sure it does: fallibility is not contingent on being falsifiable. Read the quote again. Again: example: M-theory could be wrong and is thereby fallible, but it is not falsifiable. This is in direct logical contradiction with:

and it is not fallible because it cannot be falsified. — Janus

It is verifiable beyond reasonable doubt that others are conscious, — Janus

Yes, but neither via observation nor by being a logically necessary truth, as per the material and logical evidence you've claimed to be the only type of evident to be had. As a reminder, this here;

This is nonsense as I see it. All evidence is material, meaning something we can observe, or logical, meaning something which can be shown to be necessarily true. — Janus

A thought you based on what experience? Other than that of in fact visually experiencing a pink elephant, an experience which one knows one has had. — javra

You think you see something which looks like a pink elephant.

Again: how is that personally experienced not known to be personally experienced. — javra

I don't understand the question.

Sure it does: fallibility is not contingent on being falsifiable. — javra

I don't read that in the passage. Please quote directly from it.

Yes, but neither via observation nor by being a logically necessary truth, as per the material and logical evidence you've claimed to be the only type of evident to be had. As a reminder, this here;

This is nonsense as I see it. All evidence is material, meaning something we can observe, or logical, meaning something which can be shown to be necessarily true.
— Janus — javra

We observe them telling us what they see

and when it agrees with what we perceive we have no reason to believe they don't perceive what we do. — Janus

I've so far done my best to politely and patiently engage in debate with you, as as debates should be, but you so far don't seem to understand what I find to be rather simple propositions and inferences. And I will not start entering into endless debates on what is is, or the like. This can very well be a failure on my part. Acknowledged. But to be blunt, I've got better things to do. I'm done.

:ok: No worries...at least it's been a polite exchange.

Interesting. Charles Taylor covers some of the same ground in "A Secular Age." An interesting point he makes re empiricism/verification and its relation to historical events and notions of Providence is that people are not "forced to the facts" (as they might be by some experimental conclusion) when it comes to rewriting history on secular terms. It's rather a particular sort of framing.

And it is a framing people get comfortable with. It's fairly uncommon to see historical drama/fiction not depict all the lead characters, or at least the heroes, as post-modern agnostics with contemporary class consciousness, etc.

He has a pretty compelling diagnosis of the psychological impetus for the "disengaged" frame of Hume and Gibbon vis-á-vis questions of religion as well. It represents a sort of control and insulation. At the same time, I think critics (including the post-moderns) have a point that it is always somewhat illusory, while also not being appropriate for all epistemic situations.

He has a pretty compelling diagnosis of the psychological impetus for the "disengaged" frame of Hume and Gibbon vis-á-vis questions of religion as well. It represents a sort of control and insulation. — Count Timothy von Icarus

Isn’t that close in meaning to Taylor’s ‘buffered self’? Which is not coincidental with the advent of liberal individualism and the primacy of the egological point of view.

Ah yes, by "he" I meant Taylor. I feel like the empirical approaches to faith in the article have much to do with adopting the "disengaged" frame. It's a frame that very much lends itself to a "method epistemology," although there is obviously a certain virtue of apatheia elevated here too.

You could contrast it with the virtue epistemology of someone like St. Maximus the Confessor, where the attainment of truth is itself dependent on a deep personal transformation, and where all virtue is ultimately connected to knowledge (and love!).

From my knowledge of Eastern philosophies, this is often a common thread there too. One does not recognize the Dao or come to Enlightenment by withdrawing into a widely accessible frame and applying method to sense data, but it is rather a internal process.

This sort of admonition that spiritual/ascetic therapy must come prior to understand is pretty typical of Eastern Christianity for example:

17. If wounds in the body have been neglected and left unattended, they do not react to medicine when the
doctors apply it to them; but if they have first been cleansed, then they respond to the action of the medicine and so are quickly healed. In the same way, if the soul is neglected and wholly covered with the leprosy of self-indulgence, it cannot experience the fear of God, however persistently it is warned of the terror and power of God's judgment. When, however, through great attentiveness the soul begins to purified, it also begins to experience the fear of God as a life-giving medicine which, through the reproaches it arouses in the conscience, burns the soul in the fire of dispassion. After this the soul is gradually cleansed until it is completely purified; its love increases as its fear diminishes, until it attains perfect love, in which there is no fear but only the complete dispassion which is energized by the glory of God. So let us rejoice endlessly in our fear of God and in the love which is the fulfilling of the law of perfection in Christ (cf. Rom. 13:10).

From the Philokalia - St. Diadochos

Eastern Christianity generally tended to avoid the sweep towards empiricism, although this is in part because it often seems suspicious of anything that isn't at least close to a millennia old as "innovation" (which can have its own difficulties :rofl: )

:pray: I watched an archival 60 Minutes documentary about Mt Athos the other day and found it very affecting.