A belief is an experience — Hanover

Is it? Where's the argument for this?

When you're done eating popcorn the experience is over, but the belief that you were eating popcorn persists indefinitely. Recalling that you were eating popcorn is also an experience, but not the same as eating popcorn, and neither is the belief that you were eating popcorn.

The process of acquiring a belief may be an experience, or it may be something you can have an experience of, but really the differences between beliefs and experiences are so numerous, I can't imagine why you you'd think beliefs are experiences (rather than, say, like a good empiricist, thinking they have their origin in experience) except that you think they are both mental somethings.

Is it? Where's the argument for this? — Srap Tasmaner

Your experience is a single event, tied together by all sorts of things, like sensations, beliefs, emotions, and it occurs all at once. Let us suppose a Vietnam war vet and a 12 year old child who knows nothing of the war watched a movie glorifying the war, do you suppose their experience of the movie would be at all the same during any frame of the movie? The background, education, beliefs, emotions, ideologies (or lack thereof) will have a profound effect on every moment of the experience. My point is that all those things are part of the unity of the indivisible experience.

You then ask what about the permanency of the belief because it continues to exist even when unexperienced. That is simply a question of memory in that we store sensations, emotions, beliefs and everything else in our memory and we can bring them up when we need them, but is the smell I remember of a rose not an experience because it sits in my memory bank waiting to be thought about?

You can have all the phenomenal states you like. I'm pointing out that if they are private, then they are irrelevant; and if they are public, they are just the everyday stuff we already talk about - colours and beliefs and such. — Banno

So what is this public state but the belief that the private state is sufficiently shared?

Is there a public state unless you have phenomenology in play? It you talk to the wall, is that a conversation? If you talk to the cat, is that some kind of conversation? If you talk to yourself, is that not a kind of public act too?

So the I or the we doesn’t fall out of the picture. The whole point of the deal is this tricky relation between what you call the private and the public.

Our beliefs, in part, shape our experience. Sure. Why do you think that's the same thing as saying beliefs are experiences, or are an aspect of experience?

My height, in part, shapes my experience. But my height is a physical fact about me. I experience being the height that I am, sure, but that doesn't make my height just an aspect of my phenomenal mental life.

However, statements also include the following, which are not propositions.

A command: Stand there!
A question: What is that?

These are statements, but not propositions. — Sam26

A question is not a statement.

It is incoherent to ask for a description of a rock without reference to your subjective interpretation of it. That is, I can't distunguish for you the external object from the phenomenal state, so I can hardly parse out the phenomenal state itself into raw presence sense data and preexisting interpretative data like beliefs. I experience a rock and part of that experience is having all those beliefs about rocks, like it will fall down, not up, that it will hurt if it hits my toe etc. Which part of the experience of the rock do you wish to declare non-experiential?

Yes, it's a sentence but not a statement/proposition. I should have said these are sentences, but not propositions.

Yes! Once the spell of a grammar that leads us to treat beliefs as mental individuals is broken, our view is vastly more fluid.

And now I want to ask the further question, after that conversation is done: How much of the belief is found in real situation one finds oneself in, and how much is mentation?

but none of this is suggestive that the phenomenal state is not what gives rise to my behavior and that my beliefs are not mental furniture, as you say. — Hanover

See Sam. We use grammar in a way that seems to point to mental furniture; but that is an artifice of our grammar.

A question is not a statement. — Sapientia

Could you state your question again? :rofl:

Could you state your question again? :rofl: — Janus

Wat?

Yes, it's a sentence but not a statement/proposition. I should have said these are sentences, but not propositions. — Sam26

You would have been correct in that case, but 1) that was in no way in contention, and 2) this explanation conflicts with what you actually wrote:

The use of the word statement is much broader in scope than the use of the word proposition. A statement can be a proposition, for example, "The earth has one moon," is a statement, but it's also a proposition, in that the statement/proposition can be said to be true or false. However, statements also include the following, which are not propositions.

A command: Stand there!
A question: What is that?

These are statements, but not propositions. — Sam26

You also suggested that the IEP's definition was just different wording, leading me to wonder if you even know what truth-aptness is. None of this is at all advanced. For someone who has immersed themselves in Witt, it should be second nature to speak about the philosophical issues he was addressing and to also make quick work of the criticisms (occasionally devastating) of his views.

None of this would be a concern to me if it weren't for your history of raising the smug quotient on this forum. Just say it. You were wrong.

Wat? — Sapientia

Tink, baby, tink...

No need to be a dick, Frank. That's my job.

I can't distunguish for you the external object from the phenomenal state, so I can hardly parse out the phenomenal state itself into raw presence sense data and preexisting interpretative data like beliefs. — Hanover

Huh. So you can't distinguish anything from anything else, there's just the endless unified flow of Hanover's experience. Nothing special about beliefs-- they're part of your stream of consciousness like everything else, like me, and rocks.

Bored now. If I had known this is where we were headed, I wouldn't have bothered.

do you suppose their experience of the movie would be at all the same during any frame of the movie? — Hanover

Of course they will be. They will be seeing the same images. That's rather the point of the thought experiment you set up.

But further, they can talk about the film. They can share their reactions.

If your argument is founded on the pretence that they share nothing, it fails.

Tink, baby, tink... — Janus

I genuinely can't tell if you're laughing at the incongruity of the wording, due to bad grammar, or whether you actually think that it's a counterexample, which it's not.

I didn't ask a question, so I can't ask it again. But I could restate my statement.

The dynamics of belief

Our beliefs change over time.

How do we tell?

No need to be a dick, Frank. That's my job. — Banno

I actually asked a friend: should I be a dick? My friend said considering the story, absolutely. So I did. If I invited bad karma by doing that, well, I'm a dick. Not like it really makes much difference.

I'm just checking, so we don't get our roles confused.

I didn't ask a question, so I can't ask it again. But I could restate my statement. — Sapientia

Your statement was a questioning of Sam's statement....

Your statement was a questioning of Sam's statement.... — Janus

No, it wasn't a questioning. I simply corrected him.

None of this would be a concern to me if it weren't for your history of raising the smug quotient on this forum. Just say it. You were wrong. — frank

Yes, yes, the wording was wrong. I often make mistakes. I've made plenty of them, believe me. Besides I love raising the smug quotient it's fun, and just for you I'll continue.

No, it wasn't a questioning. I corrected him. — Sapientia

Very questionable...

No, it wasn't a questioning. I corrected him. — Sapientia

Congratulations, you want a star. :razz: If you look, I'm sure you can find others, I've been known to make others too.

Yes, yes, the wording was wrong. I often make mistakes. I've made plenty of them, believe me. Besides I love raising the smug quotient it's fun, and just for you I'll continue. — Sam26

Banno, didn't you say it was your job to be a dick?

Sam. You didn't mis-speak. Your wording wasn't wrong. You were wrong.

You backing down so easy?

No, my wording was wrong, I know what propositions are.

No, my wording was wrong, I know what propositions are. — Sam26

That's great. What are they?

There's a super easy three word answer. What is it?

Why, should I fight harder. :lol: