We don't just have the photo. We have our own eyes with which to check the image; and the vocalisations of others which we can match up to our own.

No one of these has primacy.

Adding the camera puts me in mind of homunculi. — Banno

Why would you think of homunculi with cameras? You think there are little people inside of cameras or something?

There's not a little person in the camera taking a picture of a tree. The camera takes a picture of the tree.

So per the analogy, the difference we're talking about is whether the camera is directly taking a picture of the tree, or whether (at least we can only know that) the camera is producing an image that's the camera itself, where we have no idea how it connects with other stuff.

Has nothing to do with homunculi.

When you encounter something in a dream you are experiencing something which is there. — TheWillowOfDarkness

It's in the dream, sure. The fac tin the world is that this happened in a dream.

Yes, and the dream exists, so that fact happened in the world.

To further your analogy in context of my replies to Banno, if your camera then adds a filter along with some metadata to the picture, then that extra stuff are properties not from the object itself. That information is generated by the camera. — Marchesk

The camera is coloring it, sure. The issue then is whether we can know this or not. Direct realists say we can. Representationalists say we can't know it.

whether the camera is directly taking a picture — Terrapin Station

as opposed to... indirectly taking the picture?

I'm lost, and don't mind admitting it. Are you just talking about the physiology of sight? In which case you are doing physiology, not philosophy.

The camera is coloring it, sure. The issue then is whether we can know this or not. — Terrapin Station

We don't just have the photo. — Banno

...

as opposed to... indirectly taking the picture? — Banno

As opposed to (as I've just explained a couple times) presenting images that are of/generated by the camera itself, where we have no idea how it connects to the outside world.

This definitely has a lot to do with physiology. It's philosophy of perception after all. That's going to involve studying how perception works/being aware of the scientific study of that, etc. You can't do philosophy of x where you simply ignore the study of x by other fields, especially when the target is just as much something that another field studies.

The issue then is whether we can know this or not. — Terrapin Station


We don't just have the photo. — Banno — Banno

There's no us in the analogy.

The camera is coloring it, sure. The issue then is whether we can know this or not. Direct realists say we can. Representationalists say we can't know it. — Terrapin Station

Direct realists tend to say objects are colored, that's why we see color. Indirect realists are fine with perceivers coloring in the world. We can know this through scientific inferences. Thus objects have shapes, but probably not colors, although they do have reflective surfaces.

And yeah, I'm aware that @creativesoul and a few others will take issue with that. But this is where the qualia argument gets started. Because there are reasons to think that some prosperities of our experience are mind-generated, while the other properties are good for scientific investigation.

Direct realism does not at all posit that we're infallible.

Re fallibility, it posits that we can know that we're fallible when we get things wrong. We can know what's going wrong (because we can know what's right), and we can develop scientific accounts of what's going wrong.

Representationalism can't do this, because per its claims, we can never directly access the world. The best we can ever do is conjecture.

Meh. I think it pivotal. It brings us back to private languages, and that there are none.

You seem to think that you are alone in the world, and can't decide if the camera is telling you what is real and what isn't.

But even having the notion that some things are real and some are not requires that you are embedded in a conversation with other folk.

You seem to think that you are alone in the world, and can't decide if the camera is telling you what is real and what isn't. — Banno

I'm saying the exact opposite of that.

I don't know why it's so difficult to communicate that.

I'm saying the exact opposite of that. — Terrapin Station

Good.

I don't know why it's so difficult to communicate that. — Terrapin Station

...

Representationalism can't do this, because per its claims, we can never directly access the world. The best we can ever do is conjecture. — Terrapin Station

It does leave itself open to skepticism.

What if we said that we directly perceive some aspects of an object, like it's shape and location, but other aspects. such as its reflectivity to visible light are indirect?

We can see this with eating shrimp. We can know things about the shrimp from putting it in our mouth, like size and solidity and that it's an animal, but we don't know about its chemical makeup from the taste, without developing a science of chemistry first.

Perhaps this is a good time to go back to the beginning...

So for example, we have this:

A...............................@......................................B

The properties of are different at @, at A and at B (and at every point in between). If A and B are persons with perception, etc., they can directly perceive what @ is like at their spatio-temporal location, but that's not identical to what @ is like at any other spatio-temporal location. — Terrapin Station

A and B can agree as to the facts, by considering what @ looks like from the other's point of view.

You and I can agree that there was a filter on the camera.

A and B can agree as to the facts, by considering what looks like from the other's point of view. — Banno

Only if both A and B agree on what defines @. @ is not 'seen' at all, it does not 'look like' anything from any perspective without a model which defines @ as being something distinct from everything surrounding it. We must already decide what @ is, then look to see if we were right. The looking doesn't come first, the model of @ comes first, the looking is just to check.

How is direct realism incompatible with private content? Set it out for us. — Banno

Ask @Terrapin Station?

What is meant by "unsharable content" in this thread? That you can't talk about it? Or that other people can't directly access it? — Marchesk

Think of the man who just is infatuated with love. He says that it goes beyond what is sayable.


Paradox?

It does leave itself open to skepticism.

What if we said that we directly perceive some aspects of an object, like it's shape and location, but other aspects. such as its reflectivity to visible light are indirect?

We can see this with eating shrimp. We can know things about the shrimp from putting it in our mouth, like size and solidity and that it's an animal, but we don't know about its chemical makeup from the taste, without developing a science of chemistry first. — Marchesk

Well, direct realism isn't saying that you directly access "the complete set of details" of anything (as if "the complete set of details" isn't a ridiculous idea in the first place).

And as I've pointed out a number of times, you can only access what the world is like at a particular spatiotemporal location, where there is no reality for anything "at no particular spatiotemporal location(s)." (Or as it's sometimes more commonly put, there is no "view from nowhere.")

A and B can agree as to the facts, by considering what looks like from the other's point of view. — Banno

Sure, they can, but those facts won't be the same at the same spatiotemporal location, and their agreement is still something nonidentical, at different spatiotemporal locations.

is not 'seen' at all, it does not 'look like' anything from any perspective — Isaac

Wrong and wrong. Your model is wrong.

The looking doesn't come first, the model of comes first, the looking is just to check. — Isaac

I have no idea what you even think you are, exactly. Presumably your model there isn't anything like the standard account of evolution. Unless you think that life had the capacity to create models prior to being able to obtain any sensory data.

Unless you think that life had the capacity to create models prior to being able to obtain any sensory data. — Terrapin Station

Yes. Friston has demonstrated active variance reduction in sensory inputs of amoeba, even in programmed automatons. Modelling, in a mathematical sense, does not require any higher cognitive functions.

Yes. Friston has demonstrated active variance reduction in sensory inputs of amoeba, — Isaac

First, there's no Friston or amoeba in the real world in your view, is there?

First, there's no Friston or amoeba in the real world in your view, is there? — Terrapin Station

It depends on the context of our discussion. As I have said countless times, I hold that beliefs are dispositions to act as if, I can therefore hold different beliefs in different contexts, there's no reason why the model I use in one context (where I assume there are such things as Friston and amoebae) should in any way cohere with the model I might use when discussing the way things 'really are'. You're acting like the nerdy child who says in the middle of an game of Star Wars "you're not really Han Solo though are you?".

We're talking here (using models which we all share) about reasons to think that our model of the world itself is some way or other.

We use language to discuss the meaning of language. We make knowledge claims about what sort of thing knowledge claims are. It's not some new concept that we use some given concept to analyse the wider context within which it sits.

It depends on the context of our discussion. As I have said countless times, I hold that beliefs are dispositions to act as if, I can therefore hold different beliefs in different contexts, there's no reason why the model I use in one context (where I assume there are such things as Friston and amoebae) should in any way cohere with the model I might use when discussing the way things 'really are'. You're acting like the nerdy child who says in the middle of an game of Star Wars "you're not really Han Solo though are you?". — Isaac

Regardless, you're ALWAYS talking about models that you have, and not observations of the way the world really is, because you do not think you can access the latter. So there's no Friston or amoeba in your view outside of it being a model you have.

Or is this not the case?

We're talking here (using models which we all share) — Isaac

How is there a "we" beyond your personal model?

If you're going to endorse this sort of nonsense, don't expect to not be constantly called out on it.

Think of the man who just is infatuated with love. He says that it goes beyond what is sayable.


Paradox? — Wallows

But he just said how he feels, and then he goes on to say that what he feels isn't sayable? It's a contradiction, not a paradox, no?

What does he mean when he says that his feeling goes beyond what is sayable? I mean, this is a common saying. We say things like "it is indescribable" or "words can't describe it". How is it that it has become a common saying (it has a meaning in its use) if the listener/reader can't ever get at what it is that they are talking about? What does anyone mean when using those words and how can it become commonly used?

Is it that he doesn't have the vocabulary and that there are words that do describe what he is feeling, but he just isn't knowledgeable enough in the language to explain it? Is it that the language he is using doesn't have words to describe the feeling, and maybe another language does? What does he mean when he says that a feeling goes beyond what is sayable?

I feel as though the issue is resolved if we disregard the behaviorism. One must resort to talking about intentionality and volition, which come before words?

I feel as though the issue is resolved if we disregard the behaviorism. One must resort to talking about intentionality and volition, which come before words? — Wallows

Exactly.

When we use the words, "what did you mean?", we are asking about the relationship between what was said and the idea that they intended to convey, not how what was said is defined in a dictionary. If that is what we meant then we would go look in a dictionary and not ask about the intention or the idea that was in the person's head. But do the words in the dictionary adequately portray, or exhaust, what the user meant when they used the words? Of course not. Words in the dictionary are just ink scribbles on paper. The ideas in someone's head aren't composed of ink scribbles on paper. They are composed of colors, sounds, shapes and other sensations, of which words themselves are composed of. So we don't think in words. We think in colors, shapes, sounds, etc. and pointing to shared sensations is how we use words.

Bannos explanation doesn't seem to allow us to do that. If you heard someone say, "I have an upset stomach. I feel like I need to vomit." for the first time in your life, how will you understand how those words are being used, and then use them yourself correctly, if you can't see what the words are pointing to - their feelings. All you can see is their behavior of them holding their stomach and then that is how you use the words by emulating their behavior without associating it with a feeling. You would be misusing the words or be lying.