Sure, the phenomenological perspective is useless for scientific purposes. But one's own experience is all that a person has, and all that is or can be relevant to a person.Phenomenology may well study 'you looking out of the window', but what consigns it to the lesser status it suffers is not that, it's the fact that the corpus of information is derives from that study is completely ephemeral, having no anchor of 'fit-to-world' to hold it. — Isaac
Sure, the phenomenological perspective is useless for scientific purposes. But one's own experience is all that a person has, and all that is or can be relevant to a person. — baker
It's pretty much what practice according to Early Buddhism is about.I do wonder how one does phenomenology with any kind of rigour and if anyone can provide an example of a benefit it provides in more specific terms. — Tom Storm
Not the point at issue. Nobody disputes that modern engineering is a marvellous thing, but it’s applicability to the problems of philosophy is another matter. — Wayfarer
Not sure how you can study yourself looking out the window unless it means reflecting on your subjective experience of your experience (sorry for the gratuitous repetition). Introspection, I guess. — Tom Storm
Engineering is not applicable to the problems of philosophy. No-one's going to disagree there. Nothing in that means that alternative approaches are applicable. — Isaac
Cartesian anxiety refers to the notion that, since René Descartes posited his influential form of body-mind dualism, Western civilization has suffered from a longing for ontological certainty, or feeling that scientific methods, and especially the study of the world as a thing separate from ourselves, should be able to lead us to a firm and unchanging knowledge of ourselves and the world around us. The term is named after Descartes because of his well-known emphasis on "mind" as different from "body", "self" as different from "other".
Why would one want to do such a study?one's own experience is all that a person has, and all that is or can be relevant to a person.
— baker
True, but again 'all we have' is not sufficient to demonstrate that a study has a corpus of usefully shareable information either. — Isaac
As with all studies, one interested in a particular field of study has to play by the rules of said field.It does nothing whatsoever toward demonstrating that any alternative study does account for those values. (As opposed to it simply claiming to do so).
If the claim of scientism (that science does indeed account for them) is dismissed, then a claim alone is clearly insufficient ground to believe any study does so satisfactorily. — Isaac
Yes, it's a claim. A claim made by relatively small, highly specialized groups of people. If one wishes to test those claims, one has to become a member of said highly specialized group of people and play by their rules. (Just like one has to earn some degree and other credentials in science (ie. become a member of the group called "scientists") if one wishes to properly understand the claims that science makes and to test them.)You've literally just repeated, for the third time now, the exact deception I originally posted about. That entire post demonstrates (quite admirably) how science does not account for certain qualitative values.
It does nothing whatsoever toward demonstrating that any alternative study does account for those values. (As opposed to it simply claiming to do so). — Isaac
This is an inescapable problem that applies to every field of study when observed by an outsider.If the claim of scientism (that science does indeed account for them) is dismissed, then a claim alone is clearly insufficient ground to believe any study does so satisfactorily.
Here I'm assuming you're talking about what is usually understood as "scientific study", and the topic are personal/private experiences. — baker
As with all studies, one interested in a particular field of study has to play by the rules of said field.
This is true whether we're talking about the field of what is usually understood as "scientific study" or whether we're talking about what is usually understood as "spiritual study".
Staying within the domain of one field, one will not see the merit of other fields, nor be able to study them. — baker
This is an inescapable problem that applies to every field of study when observed by an outsider. — baker
Naturalism is the study of 'what you see out the window'. Phenomenology is the study of 'you looking out the window'. — Wayfarer
What differentiates naturalism (and appeals to those who - perhaps excessively - idolise it), is that the corpus of information it yields about it's object of study is readily shared, without (by and large), the person holding that information having very much impact on it. If an engineer says a car works, it probably works no less for me than it does for you.
Phenomenology may well study 'you looking out of the window', but what consigns it to the lesser status it suffers is not that, it's the fact that the corpus of information is derives from that study is completely ephemeral, having no anchor of 'fit-to-world' to hold it. — Isaac
Phenomenology redefines the nature of ‘what is out the window’ just as much as it redefines the subjective aspect of the relation to the world. Husserl spends as much time on the constitution of the real , the empirically objective and the socially constituted interpersonal realm he does on the subjective side. — Joshs
hence, 'physicalism', the contention that what is physical is real. I believe, Tom Storm, this is the paradigm you default to - hence your references to the 'evidential basis' for your beliefs. Of course, you are far from alone there, it's probably the view of the majority. — Wayfarer
Josh, that sounds good but what does it actually mean? Can someone provide a basic example of phenomenology at work looking out a window or doing something interesting? Vague articulations of subject-object and the observing subject aren't really useful to me unless we can see what the contribution of this perspective might be. — Tom Storm
I have this great metal detector. Nothing else can detect metal like this thing! And I think it shows beyond doubt that the only things worth collecting are metal things. If you believe otherwise, it's up to you to prove it! — Wayfarer
The problem is, as phenomenology saw, that we are in fact not outside or, or separate to, reality as a whole. We're separate from this or that aspect of reality, from the micro- to the cosmic level. But ultimately we're not outside of or apart from reality as such. This is the import of Husserl's concept of lebensworld and umwelt, that we live in a 'meaning world', not a world of objects per se. — Wayfarer
That is to say, what we, in a naive naturalist attitude, point to as this 'real' table in front of us, is the constantly changing product of a process of progressive constitution in consciousness. — Joshs
Merleau-Ponty’s Phenomenology of Perception — Joshs
I've thought about this in different ways for many years, and always asked myself how does it assist us and where does it take us? — Tom Storm
All knowledge is tentative and subject to observer bias and is held in place by a broader cultural presuppositions and personal psychological factors. — Tom Storm
Plato set the bar for knowledge very high. I wonder how much of what we think we know would clear that bar. As I said, I think modern culture creates a safe space for delusion. A lot of what people believe is real, incontravertible, is ephemeral and insubstantial. But it's very hard to perceive that in a culture in which illusion is amplified. — Wayfarer
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