No, I don't think that is so. I think the forms are understood to be real, in the sense that principles are real. Where do you see principles? They can only be grasped by reason. — Wayfarer
So I thought I must take refuge in discussions and investigate the truth of beings by means of accounts [logoi] … On each occasion I put down as hypothesis whatever account I judge to be mightiest; and whatever seems to me to be consonant with this, I put down as being true, both about cause and about all the rest, while what isn’t, I put down as not true.” (99d-100a)
I simply, naively and perhaps foolishly cling to this, that nothing else makes it beautiful other than the presence of, or the sharing in, or however you may describe its relationship to that Beautiful we mentioned, for I will not insist on the precise nature of the relationship, but that all beautiful things are beautiful by the Beautiful. That, I think, is the safest answer I can give myself or anyone else.” (100c-e)
When it comes to philosophy, the subject was always been seeking out the imperishable, changeless, the first principle — Wayfarer
That is mistakenly seeking an idea as though it had substance; committing Whitehead's "fallacy of misplaced concreteness". — Janus
The Forms are hypothetical entities posited as real. — Fooloso4
There are two subdivisions, in the lower of which the soul uses the figures given by the former division as images; the enquiry can only be hypothetical, and instead of going upwards to a principle descends to the other end; in the higher of the two, the soul passes out of hypotheses, and goes up to a principle which is above hypotheses, making no use of images as in the former case, but proceeding only in and through the ideas themselves (510b).
Plato describes CD, the "lower" of these, as involving mathematical reasoning (διάνοια dianoia) where abstract mathematical objects such as geometric lines are discussed. Such objects are outside the physical world (and are not to be confused with the drawings of those lines, which fall within the physical world BC). However, they are less important to Plato than the subjects of philosophical understanding (νόησις noesis), the "higher" of these two subdivisions (DE):
"And when I speak of the other division of the intelligible, you will understand me to speak of that other sort of knowledge which reason herself attains by the power of dialectic, using the hypotheses not as first principles, but only as hypotheses – that is to say, as steps and points of departure into a world which is above hypotheses, in order that she may soar beyond them to the first principle of the whole (511b)."
So, what do you make of the division between 'lower' and 'higher'? Do you think the image of the soul ('she') 'soaring beyond' hypothesis to symbolise an account of 'opinion'?
It would be, if I were mistaking ideas for empirical objects. I am advocating the view that ideas (in the sense I have explained) are of a different order of reality to empirical objects. I say that the world that you assume has 'substantial reality' actually doesn't possess that and that this is borne out by the massive conundrums that now exist in theoretical physics. — Wayfarer
So, what do you make of the division between 'lower' and 'higher'? Do you think the image of the soul ('she') 'soaring beyond' hypothesis to symbolise an account of 'opinion'?
What use is the brain without senses and what use are senses without a brain? What use is reasoning without anything to reason with or about?Very simple. Senses are for info gathering, reasoning is for info processing. — Olivier5
But what is it like for you to add two plus two? How do you know you are adding two plus two? Do you see numbers in your head, or hear sounds, "two plus two equals four"? Again, what form does your reasoning take, and isn't your reasoning always about things?No. Burning your fingers is a sensation. Two plus two is not a sensation. The most elementary steps of linguistic reasoning are not sensations. This doesn't mean that reason and sensable impressions are entirely separate. But as said previously many animals have far greater sensory abilities than humans, but they don't reason. (I know this is not a fashionable opinion.) — Wayfarer
That'd be why we have both senses and reason, no?What use is the brain without senses and what use are senses without a brain? What use is reasoning without anything to reason with or about? — Harry Hindu
Assuming you are self-conscious, you can sense what you are thinking and thus you should consider your thoughts substantive, in your way of thinking. — Olivier5
So, if thoughts are not internally linguistically intoned they are like faint traces of cloud, or dimly sensed movements or visualizations; they seem to be anything but substantive. — Janus
Reasoning is a sensation, no?
— Harry Hindu
No. Burning your fingers is a sensation. Two plus two is not a sensation. — Wayfarer
Very simple. Senses are for info gathering, reasoning is for info processing. — Olivier5
he mind senses patterns — TheMadFool
How different is mental info processing from that which takes place in the eyes when it sees something? — TheMadFool
figuratively speaking. — Wayfarer
Completely different. I've been through with others, why mathematical reasoning is more than pattern recognition - for example with respect to the sequence of prime numbers. They don't form a pattern but are grasped by reasoning, by understanding the concept of 'divisible' - which is also not a pattern. — Wayfarer
Prime numbers are a pattern: numbers that have exactly two factors, 1 and itself. — TheMadFool
Prime numbers are a pattern: numbers that have exactly two factors, 1 and itself.
— TheMadFool
That is not a pattern - it’s a concept. — Wayfarer
pattern recognition — Wayfarer
There are a number of Zhuangzi passages where artisans are connected to how results appear. Plato works with that kind of "knowing" as leverage in different dialogues. — Valentinus
How different is mental info processing from that which takes place in the eyes when it sees something? No difference, in my humble opinion. — TheMadFool
By this reasoning, eagles are smarter than us because they have better eyes. — Olivier5
I don’t think it nonsense to describe reason in terms of pattern recognition, but I might be inclined to claim it is metaphysically lazy not to consider the mode from which patterns arise. — Mww
As a philosophical conception, Empiricism means a theory according to which there is no distinction of nature, but only of degree, between the senses and the intellect.
Algorithms are also not patterns. — Wayfarer
This sentence is not a pattern. — Wayfarer
So, what is the pattern behind Egyptian hyroglyphs? Is there one?Or behind any language, for that matter? This sentence? Language, generally? — Wayfarer
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