• Janus
    16.5k


    Many people are naive realists to be sure; from that it doesn't follow that they have necessarily worked through all the logical concomitants of their metaphysical view. Many naive realists do not even think of their view as consisting in one metaphysical standpoint called 'naive realism', that exists alongside other alternative standpoints.
  • Terrapin Station
    13.8k
    So yes or no, you'd say that naive realism can be something other than what the people who call themselves naive realists believe?
  • Janus
    16.5k


    Naive realism may logically entail things that some naive realists are not aware that it entails, so yes, their view might not be what they think it is.
  • Terrapin Station
    13.8k
    So would you say that it's impossible to have two different views that start at the same place but end up with different conclusions? For example, one person says that God exists and is omniscient but allows free will and another says that God exists and is omniscient but there is no free will. You'd say that it's just not possible for some people to have one of those views? (The impossible one being the one that you think doesn't follow logically,of course--I won't venture a guess which one you think that is.)
  • Michael
    15.8k
    So yes or no, you'd say that naive realism can be something other than what the people who call themselves naive realists believe?Terrapin Station

    Sure. You can believe that the world is nothing but subjective sense-data but nonetheless call yourself a naive realist. Or you can believe in God but call yourself an atheist.

    Anyone can call themselves anything they like.
  • Terrapin Station
    13.8k
    I'm not referring to using a term unusually. I'm referring to how a large number of people, if not most, use the term, especially those who self-identify as that term.
  • Michael
    15.8k
    I'd say that to call yourself a naive realist but to not claim that the objects we perceive and the properties we perceive them to have are perception-independent would be to use the term "naive realist" unusually.
  • Terrapin Station
    13.8k
    For the record, by the way, I couldn't disagree more strongly with the idea that a view can be something other than what the people who hold the view and partially self-identify by it says it is.
  • Terrapin Station
    13.8k
    Which of course has nothing to do with truth theory--which is where the description you gave earlier and that you were supporting was incorrect.
  • Michael
    15.8k
    I've already gone over that. If the apple you see and it being red is perception independent then the truth of "there is a red apple" is perception-independent.
  • Terrapin Station
    13.8k
    You're telling me what you think. What you think has nothing to do with what "naive realism" is. What has to do with what naive realism is is what naive realists believe re their naive realism.
  • Terrapin Station
    13.8k
    That's the case even if you believe that their views are absurd or involve contradictions or whatever, by the way.
  • Michael
    15.8k
    Well, here's an article on naive realism. It describes it as I've described it (see the section "Theory"). So it's not just about what I think naive realism is. It's about what I've learnt naive realism to be.
  • Terrapin Station
    13.8k
    For example, Heaven's Gatists believed that they'd reach an extraterrestrial spacecraft following comet Hale-Bopp by committing suicide. That their view might be absurd or contradictory to some of us does not make it the case that Heaven's Gatists believed something other than that, or that "Heaven's Gatism" would be something other than that. If you posit it as something else, you're no longer talking about the Heaven's Gate cult.
  • Terrapin Station
    13.8k
    Sure, so then we're going with that as an argument from authority.

    Why aren't you going by my contrary view as an argument from authority?
  • Michael
    15.8k
    Because you're just one person. A long-standing Wikipedia article on a major philosophical issue is more likely to accurately describe the view as it has been historically discussed.

    Furthermore, it's also consistent with the views I was taught at university.

    And besides, you already admitted to this account of naive realism here where you said "Yes, it's certainly possible to see a thing as red but for it to not be red.". How is that anything but a commitment to the view that the property of being red is perception-independent?
  • Terrapin Station
    13.8k
    Well, the Wikipedia author might just be one person, too, plus we don't know what the heck the background is of anyone who contributed to it. Further, a lot of people--like me--don't bother trying to change anything on there, because it's a pain in the butt, it's highly "political" or at least cliquey, etc. (Which I know from the couple times I did try to change something there. It's just not something I'd spend any time on since those experiences.)

    What I'm talking about is what I learned at university, and the views of the many naive realists I've interacted with over the years, etc. I wouldn't say that it's inconsistent in the sense of being incompatible with it, however. Naive realism is not a commitment to any particular truth theory. So it's going to be compatible with any approach to truth theory.
  • Michael
    15.8k
    Naive realism is not a commitment to any particular truth theory. So it's going to be compatible with any approach to truth theory.Terrapin Station

    It's a commitment to a particular kind of relationship between what we see and what there (objectively) is, which entails a particular account of truth, whether it spells it out (or recognizes it) or not.
  • Terrapin Station
    13.8k
    Sorry--a couple big typos in that last post I just fixed by the way.
  • Terrapin Station
    13.8k
    Again, it's irrelevant if you believe it entails a particular approach to truth, which is why I'm spending no time arguing about that. What's relevant is what naive realists believe.
  • Terrapin Station
    13.8k
    What x-ism is has zilch to do with what someone who isn't an x-ist believes is entailed by what they understand of x-ism. What x-ism is is given by what the people who identify as x-ists say that x-ism is to them.
  • Michael
    15.8k
    Again, it's irrelevant if you believe it entails a particular account to truthTerrapin Station

    Yes, it's irrelevant if I believe that it entails that but it's not irrelevant if it does entail that. And I'm trying to show you that it does. Given that "there is a red apple" is true iff there is a red apple, and given that there being a red apple is perception-independent (according to the naive realist), "there is a red apple" being true is perception-independent.
  • Terrapin Station
    13.8k
    Entailment is always belief.
  • Terrapin Station
    13.8k
    It doesn't exist aside from how individuals think about something. So there's not a FACT that something is entailed by something else.
  • Michael
    15.8k
    Entailment is always belief.Terrapin Station

    No, entailment is one proposition following from one or more others according to the rules of logic.
  • Terrapin Station
    13.8k
    Yes. Logic is nothing more than how individuals think about the world at the most abstract, generalized "level" of relations.
  • Michael
    15.8k
    Once again I can see this going nowhere, so let's stop.
  • Terrapin Station
    13.8k
    Haha. Okay. But it just seems like you don't want to deal very much with views that are "too different" from your own.
  • Janus
    16.5k


    It would depend on the conception of God you are concerned with and whether the logic of that conception is compatible with the logic of free will, determinism or both. I don't see what point you are trying to make.
  • Terrapin Station
    13.8k
    It would depend on the conception of God you are concerned with and whether the logic of that conception is compatible with the logic of free will, determinism or both. I don't see what point you are trying to make.John
    I explained it in detail above in my back and forth with Michael. Views aren't governed or delimited by what some set of individuals who don't hold the view believe is logically entailed by the view, where what they believe is logically entailed isn't something that the view-holders have expressed as the view.

    X-ism might be something that a non x-ist believes is absurd or incoherent or inconsistent, etc., at least in some of its tenets. Nevertheless, what x-ism is is what people who identify as x-ists say that they have in mind by x-ism; it's not something other than that.
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