I'm willing [to] consider your points... — Merkwurdichliebe

:rofl:

Yeah, you've really left me with that impression.

If only it were just a matter of calling names!

I wasn't calling you a toxic fool, you're cool to me.
I was only commenting on the necessity of toxic fools

neutrality works for me

Wisdom can be funny too

You should take my word for it, afterall, I'm a man of my word

And also because fuck Kant. — StreetlightX

This is going on my list of favorite quotes

I am with you there. — Merkwurdichliebe

I am opposed with you there. — Merkwurdichliebe

How very Trumpian.

Trump has great hair

...just rhyming

When we think we are being objective but find out we were wrong, the reasons we find that we were wrong was because we were being more subjective and less objective. We were missing information, lied to, or committed a logical fallacy, like pleading to authority. — Harry Hindu

What if we were misled by feelings of revulsion, a preference for blonds...

These would be subjective. — Banno

Isn't appealing to feelings or emotions a logical fallacy? So I would agree that any conclusion reached by appealing to emotions or authority would be a subjective conclusion, and not actually be true in any sense of the word.

I just do most see what "objective" is doing here. Both are aspects of the world that we can talk about. — Banno

Yes, but remember how I explained that a subjective conclusion is a category error, where one projects their own feelings and values onto external objects, as if everyone would agree that vanilla ice cream is the best if they just tasted it. So, a subjective claim isn't a claim about some external object in the world, it is a claim about one's values. So if we were to use language properly and say things like, "It is my belief, or preference, that vanilla ice cream is the best." instead of "vanilla ice cream is the best", then we would be properly assigning the characteristic of "the best" to Banno and his preferences instead of to the ice cream.

Talking about something doesn't necessarily mean that what you are talking about is true. In order to find that out, we need to verify your claims by using logic and reason.

Isn't appealing to feelings or emotions a logical fallacy? — Harry Hindu

Only in the right context.

objective and subjective do not form an antithetical pair. — StreetlightX

So subjective and objective are not a pair. — StreetlightX

And also because fuck Kant. — StreetlightX

Do you say the last because you think him guilty of the first two? None of his epistemological tenets are being used by name on this thread, so......just wondering.

Why must 'subjective' and 'objective' mean only one thing each? Surely if we're talking about the terms in ordinary language then we would fully expect them to have a range of meanings (including, as @StreetlightX says, no coherent meaning at all) in different contexts.

If, on the other hand, we're trying to fix a meaning for the purpose of some further investigation, then we should be advancing advantages and disadvantages of each option. Certainly then, similarity to ordinary use might be one advantage, but there may be others unique to some particular enquiry which would render the same definition useless in another.

No, that's just how it works in a very narrow context. Consider that you're using language wrong in both the context around us, which is philosophy, and in general, which is ordinary language. — S

I'm not pitching philosophy against ordinary language. I'm pitching ordinary philosophy against senselessness. You say there's a 'context' for your claim - well, show it.

For instance, what would it mean to say that objectivity can be predicated of fact about existence, for instance? What kind of question, or questions, would it take to eatablish this (or not?). I know the question for reproducibility: is this observation reproducible under fixed conditions, yes or no? (Therefore it is objective (or not)). Now say I want to disagree that the existence of Jupiter is an 'objective fact' - what exactly am I disagreeing with here? Why is it not just a fact tout court? What conceptual work does the modifier 'objective' do, in this context? And what concequences follow - or not - from agreeing or disagreeing with this statement? And why are those concequences significant? What do they tell us about things - about Jupiter, or about facts, or about the relation between the one and the other (or something else perhaps?) What, in other words, is the grammar of 'objectivity' as you use it?

Note that I'm not saying there isn't such a grammar. Only that you've not provided one, and without it, the claim is - and remains - senseless: not even wrong.

Because Kant done fucked it up for everyone, including everyone in this thread, myself included.

I'm not pitching philosophy against ordinary language. I'm pitching ordinary philosophy against senselessness. You say there's a 'context' for your claim - well, show it.

For instance, what would it mean to say that objectivity can be predicated of fact about existence, for instance? What kind of question, or questions, would it take to eatablish this (or not?). I know the question for reproducibility: is this observation reproducible under fixed conditions, yes or no? (Therefore it is objective (or not)). Now say I want to disagree that the existence of Jupiter is an 'objective fact' - what exactly am I disagreeing with here? Why is it not just a fact tout court? What conceptual work does the modifier 'objective' do, in this context? And what concequences follow - or not - from agreeing or disagreeing with this statement? And why are those concequences significant? What do they tell us about things - about Jupiter, or about facts, or about the relation between the one and the other (or something else perhaps?) What, in other words, is the grammar of 'objectivity' as you use it?

Note that I'm not saying there isn't such a grammar. Only that you've not provided one, and without it, the claim is - and remains - senseless: not even wrong. — StreetlightX

Is it not a massive problem to interpret my claim about the existence of Jupiter to be a claim about an observation being reproducible under fixed conditions? For starters, I'm not talking about an observation.

The logical consequences of what I am saying, if we assume it to be true, is that Jupiter would still exist even if we had all ceased to exist. It is about a planet, not an observation.

Contrary to what you've said, it is very much about mind and feelings and independence and perception and reality and truth and so on.

Contrary to what you said, I do know what subjectivity means.

Yours is a very peculiar and self-defeating approach to the topic. You can't just waltz in and erase the ordinary meaning of terms and dictate a new approach to the issue which flies in the face of how the issue is more commonly understood. That carries a giant burden, and I wish you luck, as it seems kind of futile to take that approach. It seems like you'd just not be properly engaging with what folks like myself and Banno are wanting to discuss, but instead it seems as though you're wanting to reframe the topic in a different way, where the language has a different meaning, and we're at risk of talking past each other.

Ahhh, yes.....the infamous and oft-misrepresented Copernican Revolution, I’m guessing. THAT kinda messed up for everybody.

Thanks.

The second is suggestive of phenomenology, which takes into account the ultimately subjective nature of existence, but tries to do so in a way which doesn't fall into mere subjectivity. — Wayfarer

I haven't thought of phenomenology as starting from the premise that existence is ultimately subjective. It think Heidegger would say that subject and object are two sides of the same coin, only separated by analysis.

So there's the unified existence (the word itself having meaning relative to nothingness), and the dismantled cuckoo clock laying in parts on a table.

This thread is focused on trying to make sense of the latter, with people standing in line to offer their favorite way to analyze.

Mine was about aesthetics. I think yours is about cultural identity: east/west, naturalism/supernaturalism. True?

Is it not a massive problem to interpret my claim about the existence of Jupiter to be a claim about an observation being reproducible under fixed conditions? — S

Sure, but I wasn't interpreting your claim. I don't much care about your claim - whatever it is - at all, and I believe the 'interpreting' was done by you.

The logical consequences of what I am saying, if we assume it to be true, is that Jupiter would still exist even if we had all ceased to exist. It is about a planet, not an observation. — S

Sure, and this is fine! And I agree it's also an entirely different use of the word objective to mean something entirely different. I mean, I still think it's rather a bit of noise still - as if anti/realism is at all a worthwhile debate having - and it remains rather arbitrary: as if one ought to qualify the 'existence' of anything (as 'objective' or otherwise) as turning upon 'our existence', or lack-thereof. As if we were so important that existence itself begets a whole new qualifier ('objective', or 'not-objective') to mark its proximity (or lack-thereof) to our existence. But why not the existence - or lack-thereof - of George? Or this rock here? Or that blade of grass there? Whence the conceptual necessity of this qualification, and not another? (not a rhetorical question! - It's only here that one even begins to do philosophy at all). (Edit: And maybe you can begin to see why your question isn't about Jupiter at all - it's about - and always has been - about 'us').

And I'm sure you know what subjectivity means. Everrryyonnee knows what subjectivity means.

Sure, but I wasn't interpreting your claim. I don't much care about your claim - whatever it is - at all, and I believe the 'interpreting' was done by you. — StreetlightX

Okay, so you just decided to turn up to a discussion relating to such claims, only to make it known that you don't care about them?

Bit strange.

Sure, and this is fine! And I agree it's also an entirely different use of the word objective to mean something entirely different. I mean, I still think it's rather a bit of noise still - as if anti/realism is at all a worthwhile debate having - and it remains rather arbitrary: as if one ought to qualify the 'existence' of anything (as 'objective' or otherwise) as turning upon 'our existence', or lack-thereof. As if we were so important that existence itself begets a whole new qualifier ('objective', or 'not-objective') to mark its proximity (or lack-thereof) to our existence. But why not the existence - or lack-thereof - of George? Or this rock here? Or that blade of grass there? Whence the conceptual necessity of this qualification, and not another? (not a rhetorical question! - It's only here that one even begins to do philosophy at all). (Edit: And maybe you can begin to see why your question isn't about Jupiter at all - it's about - and always has been - about 'us').

And I'm sure you know what subjectivity means. Everrryyonnee knows what subjectivity means. — StreetlightX

Jupiter was just one example out of innumerable others. We can talk about George or that rock or that blade of grass if you want to. But you don't, it seems, because you're above such discussions, right? Such discussions are beneath you. You're more sophisticated than that, and you have it all figured out, unlike us peons.

Yet your answer to the questions those discussions focus on isn't clear, unless it is basically just to stick your head in the sand.

And what's your problem with the meaning of subjectivity? Why are you making out that it's so absurd that I would know the gist of that word, such that it isn't meaningless? It's not a word that I've coined just now that no one has any familiarity with. You're the one who's coming across as absurd from where I'm standing.

Your contribution has basically been to disregard the intention of this discussion and to set out a different meaning of the terms which apparently comes from a narrow scientific context. What exactly is that supposed to achieve? I don't get it.

as if one ought to qualify the 'existence' of anything (as 'objective' or otherwise) as turning upon 'our existence', or lack-thereof. As if we were so important that existence itself begets a whole new qualifier ('objective', or 'not-objective') to mark its proximity (or lack-thereof) to our existence. — StreetlightX

Just as Jupiter is a necessary existent for the Great Red Spot, a brain and an array of senses is necessary for the existent of an observation. The existence of Jupiter is not dependent upon an observation. It's existence is dependent upon the natural forces (gravity, etc.) that led to it's existence as we observe it now. So it really has nothing to do with us. We are just another group of objects that we can talk about. It is just a question of cause and effect. What are the necessary causes for some effect (like an observation of a planet) to exist?

Subject and object are in a weird hinterland between the everyday use of language and philosophical constructions. Subjective things are typically aligned with taste; relational properties of humans and non-humans, predicates that have one term being human. Objective things are typically aligned with predicates that do not involve humans as a term, properties of the 'things themselves' that do not depend on human relation with them, or like the relationship between acceleration and unbalanced force.

In my experience with the 'everyday' use of the terms, the only way I've seen them used without reference to anything academic, is to furnish an epistemological distinction in a folk-theory of tastes, opinions and the like. People can say 'that's just my opinion!' and vindicate it using something like the distinction, people can suspend criticism of others' tastes under the banner of them being subjective.

What we get out of analysing the everyday use are that subjective and objective are actually properties of properties - predicates which apply to predicates- rather than things themselves. 'Subject' resonates with this by being the term in a predicate that relates to a human or human property, such as a mental state or a brain state, or the presence of a neural correlate, all of which are a necessary constituent of a 'subjective' property. Object resonates with this distinction by denoting the terms in predicates which have no human or human derived term in them. Often these properties are immediately equated with the distinction between primary and secondary qualities; the former being non-sensory or non-perceptual properties of things, the latter being sensory or perceptual properties of things.

The equivocation between the two is another problematic wrinkle of the opposition between object and subject, but it is flawed in much the same way. We are often in states where perceptual, sensory or cognitive content reflects the nature of a thing. A sphere will be seen as round, sticks in water are seen as bent due to the refraction of light, things which are far away have less visual angle to map their extent than things which are nearby; sharpness and smoothness are opposed, a cut feels different coming from a serrated blade or a non-serrated blade, the variable roughnesses of sandpaper through its grain can be felt as textures. For cognitive ones, an account of something always tries to capture the nature of a thing. All of these are relations between humans and non-humans in which non-subjective properties of things are transformed through our bodies and minds; providing a perceptual or sensory expression or representation of the non-sensory or non-representational.

Edit: TL;DR everywhere subjective and objective inter-permeate in a manner which undermines the utility of either term.

Edit2: If you want to generalise subject to be possibly non-human, replace any instance of 'human' with 'experiencer'.

'Subject' resonates with this by being the term in a predicate that relates to a human or human property, such as a mental state or a brain state, or the presence of a neural correlate, all of which are a necessary constituent of a 'subjective' property. — fdrake

This is just anthropomorphism.

Is a starfish a subject or an object? What about a mosquito?

Is a starfish a subject or an object? — Harry Hindu

You read what I wrote very literally, 'human' can easily be replaced with 'experiencer' in what I wrote without damaging the meaning.

But in answer; it (starfish) can be both, depending on how it is considered. It has an umwelt or sensorium dominated by temperature gradients and the textural elements of water currents. The water around it is structurally similar to our own environment (in terms of the S/O distinction), impressing itself upon its sensory apparatus in a manner that reflects environmental properties.

That a starfish has these sensory capacities is not dependent upon its study, nor is their high degree of rotational symmetry.

When I say that the existence of Jupiter is objective — S

'Subjectivity' aside, I'm asking genuine questions though. They really aren't rhetorical.

'Subjectivity' aside, I'm asking genuine questions though. They really aren't rhetorical. — StreetlightX

But I think I've answered your questions, although I grant that I might not have spelled absolutely everything out. I don't really get what your problem is. It seems like you're making a fuss over nothing if you ask me, which would be ironic given your complaints about noise.

The terms seem useful, as more commonly understood, in the right context, such as the debate between idealists and realists. Like I said, we can discuss George or that rock or that blade of grass in this context if you really want to. I wouldn't have a problem with that. Some things might turn out to be more clearcut than others, but that doesn't mean that we should throw the baby out with the bathwater. Talk of Jupiter, for example, seems sufficient to use as an example in my argument for realism, and I've made clear what I mean by talking of the existence of Jupiter as something which is objective.

What more is there to say?

Why must 'subjective' and 'objective' mean only one thing each? Surely if we're talking about the terms in ordinary language then we would fully expect them to have a range of meanings (including, as @StreetlightX says, no coherent meaning at all) in different contexts.

If, on the other hand, we're trying to fix a meaning for the purpose of some further investigation, then we should be advancing advantages and disadvantages of each option. Certainly then, similarity to ordinary use might be one advantage, but there may be others unique to some particular enquiry which would render the same definition useless in another. [*bold added] — Isaac

This point should be emphasized.

Yours is a very peculiar and self-defeating approach to the topic. You can't just waltz in and erase the ordinary meaning of terms and dictate a new approach to the issue which flies in the face of how the issue is more commonly understood. That carries a giant burden, and I wish you luck, as it seems kind of futile to take that approach. It seems like you'd just not be properly engaging with what folks like myself and Banno are wanting to discuss, but instead it seems as though you're wanting to reframe the topic in a different way, where the language has a different meaning, and we're at risk of talking past each other. — S

But folks like you and banno haven't sufficiently demonstrated that your position is superior to others, and until folks llike you do, it's fair game.

It's not about superiority, it's about appropriate engagement. I wouldn't turn up to a discussion on some scientific topic like general relativity and start redefining terms to my liking.

I haven't thought of phenomenology as starting from the premise that existence is ultimately subjective.  — frank

I think that is a very accurate statement. Afterall phenomenology is a response to the critical errors of empiricism. Phenomenology begins with the immediate, exactly where empiricism does. But instead of stopping there and getting lost in absolute doubt or solipsism, it introduces a dialectic that clarifies the subject-object distinction.