The point about Einstein is that his was an empirical theory about motion, distance measurements, etc. An apriori theory of time and space is very different. It tries to describe the conditions in place that make such observations even possible. A bit like checking out what a telescope does prior to processing the data it gives us. Experience is not a mirror of nature, to borrow a phrase. How could it be this? Have you seen a brain? — Constance

-You can never say that an objective set of observations can or cant mirror nature accurately!
You are using an argument from ignorance fallacy as an excuse to dismiss our only credible and objective source of knowledge and sneak in pseudo philosophical speculations as competitive ontological frameworks.
Again I am not saying that our observations are absolute true or the picture we receive is 100% accurate. I only pointing out that we can not evaluate the accuracy of our observation so we are forced to work with what we got (pragmatic necessity) either they agree with our metaphysical worldviews or not! On the other hand idealistic and supernatural claims fall outside our Cataleptic Impressions and our methods of observation so we have zero objective information about these speculations.

I caught that "whatever that means." You need to get out more, I mean, read something else other than what Neil Tyson DeGrasse tells you to read. Me, I've taken lots of science, and I do understand it quite well. But I have also read lots of phenomenology. The latter is philosophy. An entirely different order of analysis. — Constance

I don't read Tyson. He is too poetic for my taste and diluted in epistemology. Again phenomenology has many varieties. Some are philosophical but many are pseudo philosophical. This is the problem with Philosophy. Under the same umbrella term its possible to found good and bad Philosophy!
My statement "whatever it means" was my response to the claim "consciousness being fundamental".
ITs was not a cheep blow. I used that statement because consciousness in Neuroscience has a specific definition and pseudo philosophy/supernaturalism definitions are pretty vague.
What verify in science is in direct conflict with the proclaimed "role" of consciousness by pseudo philosophical views.

You jest, no? Seriously, is this what you think? If a child is drowning and the event produces ripples in the water, then by an examination of the ripples, I know what the child's drowning is all about?? What do you think an MRI is? — Constance

-What I personally think is irrelevant. In science we establish Sufficiency and Necessity between a causal mechanism and the effect by verifying Strong Correlations between a process and a phenomenon. So to explain this process in terms of your example.....an Environmental or organic stimuli (a drowning child or a pebble or a fish breaking the surface of the water etc) produces connections in the brain (surface ripples ) that in turn enables the emergence of mental conscious state with a specific conscious content( wave, bubbles, foam, distorted reflections etc).

Again you are making an argument from ignorance (because we can not disprove that there is an addition level of reality responsible for mental states we can dismiss or ignore Neuroscience's epistemology without evidence against it and without any evidence for the suggested idea)!
This is NOT how the burden of proof works. This is not how we identify a Default position(Null Hypothesis) .
This is fallacious reasoning! We can not throw out of the window our objective observations and frameworks that make testable predictions (diagnose pathology) and real life technical applications (accurately read complex thoughts, surgery and medicinal protocols)...just because some believe a fallacious claim!
By definition the truth value of a fallacious claim is unknown so we are forced to dismiss it as pseudo metaphysics.

But when I say one cannot observe empirically the act of believing or knowing I mean to say that even in one's interior observations, where the belief arises and one can step back and one can step back and acknowledge this in an act of reflection, the knowing the belief is there is still bound to the indeterminacy of belief itself. — Constance

-I think I understand what you want to say. You are misusing the term "observation" and that creates a miscommunication. To set things straight , of course we can observe the act of believing and knowing by many methods. We can either compare brain scans in relation to specific stimuli, check blood profile , behavior etc.
What we can't observe is how others individuals subjectively experience those states. This is because it is a subjective experience!
Our goal is not to experience other peoples experiences!!!!! Its nonsensical to even suggest it! What w can do is to verify the processes responsible for the experience. We can do that with objective methods of investigation.

The question goes to what the knowing of anything is. You would have to show how anything out there gets in here (pointing to my head). Do this, and I will convert instantly to your side of this matter. — Constance

-The "knowing of anythings" is the process of interacting with the world and composing objective descriptions about it. Knowledge is any claim that's objectively in agreement with current facts and carries Instrumental value. Everything gets in our brain by empirical interactions. If you have ever observed babies growing up, you will see that in their early years they know nothing about the world. By interacting with it and testing their assumptions (this is why they are prone to accidents lol) their small brains construct a mental model. This process is called Learning. We can see the changes in the brain and how learning things affect size and function.

Well, there is a lot of language in this, and it is all from science. You need, if you want to understand philosophy, to look elsewhere, other than a body of thinking that is self confirming. This would bring in questions. A physiologist reads about, witnesses the digestive system, say, microscopically as well, and with all the detail. Ask this scientist, how do you separate what you witness from the phenomena produced in your brain such that your thinking and intuitive impressions are not REALLY just about the hard wired problem solving mechanisms that deal with the affairs in general? How do you separate your knowing about what is before you from the conditions of knowing? — Constance

The think is we are talking about the knowledge on a phenomenon that is studied by a Scientific discipline so "understanding philosophy" or better listening to pseudo philosophical ideas on the mind or consciousness is irrelevant.
When we need to learn things about the causal mechanisms of a biological phenomenon....we study science.
When we want to understand the implications in real life of this knowledge, its value and meaning for our lives...then we use philosophy.
WE NEVER use philosophy to assume magical ontologies that are Unnecessary, Insufficient and Unfalsifiable.
Its not like they are the products and conclusions of our observations!! Someone made up an magical realm and placed his idea in a safe place away from falsification without any epistemic foundations!

Philosophy observes the world of observations.Look at it like Dewey or Rorty do: There is a volcano. An event. And my perception of the volcano is an event. I am "here" and the volcano is "there". Do I know there is a volcano? Of course. What does it mean to know, that is this relation that exists between me and that over there? Now wait....that is a different kind of question entirely. I have to remove my geologist's smock. This is an epistemic relation, not a causal one.
You should be able to see that this is a problem. For philosophy, it was THE problem for more than a hundred years, until many just decided to forget it. It will NEVER be resolved is empirical science. You can think as you please, ignore it as you please, but every philosopher knows this. — Constance

-Yes some fields of philosophy deals and analyzes how we make observations...but it doesn't have the tools to test whether those observations are capable to be accurate or not of reality.

-" It does not go beyond this, but into it."
-When speculations about the accuracy of them are adopted as worldviews....then no they do go beyond this.


-" It is not that there are no reasonable knowledge claims in science, but rather that such claims themselves bear analysis."
-All theoretical frameworks in science are reasonable BY DEFINITION. They describe Objective facts. This is all we have to work with and our theories provide a narrative without making up realms, substances or entities that we can not falsify.

-"This is an epistemic relation, not a causal one."
-Correct....observing doesn't cause the event you observe....where exactly do you see a problem???
I don't get what problem do you see in an event (volcano) and an observer observing the event (which is a different event on its own).
Could you point out where the problem is????

How about the idea that metaphysics is the condition of possibility for understanding the theoretical framework within which proven facts make sense in the first place? — Joshs

So metaphysics is foundational, without which interpreting scientific results and speculations go nowhere? This is a bit vague for me, but my background in philosophy is limited. When I think of metaphysics I think of infinitesimals. I need specific examples of concepts in order to understand the concepts. I don't think of string theory as metaphysical, although it may be seen as a result of an initial metaphysical trigger.

The conclusion is that science has never ceased being ‘philosophical’ in the sense that theoretical frameworks represent a naive metaphysics. — Joshs

I agree if pondering implies philosophical.

You are probably correct. Certainly science evolved in philosophical frameworks. But I think apart from logical structures science is no longer philosophical. Just the way I see it as a a non-philosopher. Once the technicalities of an idea require extensive specialized knowledge that idea becomes speculation by the scientists involved. I consider string theory to be speculative science as long as there is the faintest possibility it can be experimentally verified. If it were clearly shown to be non-verifiable, well, that's a different thing.

Now, there are concepts in science/mathematics that I do in fact believe are philosophical, metaphysical to be exact. Infinitesimals, conjectured by Leibniz and others, are objects of metaphysics. They can be considered foundational in analysis and support a mathematical structure that describes much of the physical world. But they cannot be proven to exist. — jgill

-To be accurate science didn't evolved in philosophical frameworks. Science was philosophy with bad empirical methods. As our methods advanced Natural Philosophy was forced to abandon the shrinking ship of Academic Philosophy.

-"But I think apart from logical structures science is no longer philosophical. "
-No it is a specialized Philosophical Category. It deals with ontology within nature since we figured out this is the only ontology that makes senses and has epistemic value.
Like philosophy, science uses the available facts and produce theoretical models in our effort to understand the world. The main difference is that Philosophy as a method expands in a larger number of fields.

-"Once the technicalities of an idea require extensive specialized knowledge that idea becomes speculation by the scientists involved."
-I don't know what that means. Science and Philosophy produce Hypotheses. Metaphysics are a common branch for both methods.

-"I consider string theory to be speculative science as long as there is the faintest possibility it can be experimentally verified. If it were clearly shown to be non-verifiable, well, that's a different thing."
-Yes sting theory is Metaphysics on the ontology of matter? We don't know if we can falsify Sting Theory....well the we have some ideas but nothing close to applicable. I don't understand what your point is? The metaphysical nature of STring Theory support my position, why did you use it?

-"Now, there are concepts in science/mathematics that I do in fact believe are philosophical, metaphysical to be exact."
-Again ALL scientific hypotheses are Metaphysics. Mathematics are NOT science. Its a tool based(that science uses) on an accurate language of logic that has the same role like human language in Philosophy.
So can we agree that Science is Philosophy that doesn't deal with meaning and value because those doesn't have objective metrics?

What I'd like to do with Tallis as an extension of Heidegger is to continue to explore the notion of making knowledge visible. I think that in a time when a great deal of discussion in the phil. of mind is about neuroscience and these abstract models that I think are generally very misleading, essentially a more sophisticated version of what the 17th century classics called "animal spirits" acting in the brain, a new approach is badly needed.

These models often make us out to be much more passive creatures than we actually are.

Yes, there is a lot of literature about Heidegger on the environment, technology, science, history and so on. Some of it is interesting (Dreyfus, Caputo, Fink), some if it is very bad (Derrida, parts of Foucault, Levinas - though I might get hate for mentioning him.). I personally can't see a positive project I can make out of it. So I'm grateful to have read him and I admire his uniqueness, but, I had my fill.



Thank you.

I suppose that some of the problem here has to do with our intuitions. Had we better intuition (differently "constructed") we could perhaps see how mind emerges. We seem to lack such intuition.

So can we agree that Science is Philosophy that doesn't deal with meaning and value because those doesn't have objective metrics? — Nickolasgaspar

Science is full of meanings and values that are germane to discussions within those disciplines. It's usually the scientists who participate. Whether they perform "philosophy" when doing so seems irrelevant.

I think I found the issue.
What do you think philosophy is?

btw I didn't say science isn't full with meaning and value....science doesn't include meaning and value in its investigations. Science isn't interested in what Big Bang means for humans or what is the value of a life or a moral act. Science just describes the BIG BANG and identifies the metrics for morality.
Can you distinguish those two aspects of these concepts?

What do you think philosophy is? — Nickolasgaspar

After 426 posts on this thread there doesn't seem to be a consensus. It's certainly not the philosophy of nature of past ages, having been eclipsed by modern science.

Science isn't interested in what Big Bang means for humans — Nickolasgaspar

In fact, astrophysicists study the results of the BB and what they find may very well have implications on future space travel for humans. But I hear what you are saying.

But those figures you mentioned are good, I just really dislike postmodernism. That's where I draw the line. — Manuel

But then, there is that very mysterious phenomenological reduction. People take this as best they can, and even Husserl was surprised by the effect it had on students, making ”protestants out of catholics and catholics out of protestants.” The reduction is an essential part of philosophical insight, I would argue.

I would agree.

I think however there are some very useful pearls of insights in Descartes and Cudworth (who is unknown) that really set the stage for a kind of special "power" in our souls, in which with our "cognoscitive" powers we are able to take stimulations (not objects) and enliven them.

Once this is cleared up a bit, I think one could proceed down the lines of "reduction" or Tallis "episteogony" and much else that follows. But before checking consciousness, I think there are some obscure factors in play, which allow the mind to have the capacities it does.

After 426 posts on this thread there doesn't seem to be a consensus. It's certainly not the philosophy of nature of past ages, having been eclipsed by modern science. — jgill

Well the lack of consensus is because every single one of the authors present a version of philosophy designed to "include" their ideologies.
By referring to the philosophy of nature of the past you are just chronicling....you are not doing philosophy or science.

In fact, astrophysicists study the results of the BB and what they find may very well have implications on future space travel for humans. But I hear what you are saying — jgill

-again you fail to understand the difference in meaningfulness from efforts aiming to technical applications.
It's philosophy to try to understand what it means for our species to be able to travel in space and an other to solve the puzzle of how this can be done without affecting .
The colloquial use of the term"meaning" doesn't make objective and subjective matters of investigation the same ...

You're not responding. Could be we are on different pages.
I have one last question: modern science doesn't investigate meaning and value?
Is the institution of modern science lead by wisdom? If it's not, then isn't modern science run by fools?
If an organization that has the aim to understand nature...for what? A valid vision and purpose requires a why, not just a what, in order to be eligible to be considered wise.
If modern science doesn't have a Wise Mission/vision, ought it not be called out??

Edit PS: I'm not trying to only pick on modern science. Modern academic philosophy I believe also lacks a mission of wisdom as well, and ought be called out for straying from the path of wisdom.

But, I worry I'm arrogant for thinking I know what is best for institutions or to presume calling them out online will make any difference. I probably should be more worried about my own failings.

-"You're not responding. Could be we are on different pages."
-responding to what?

By reading your last comment I am not so sure that we can have a meaningful or fruitful conversation. You are confusing the investigation the meaning and values some facts to us humans with institutions being lead...by wisdom (whatever that means).

Let me try one last time with the following example
-Science investigates the ontology of life (what processes allow this biological phenomenon to emerge and evolve.)
-Philosophy investigates what is the meaning and purpose of life and if we value our life the same under different conditions (being in pain or after loosing a dear one).

BOTH methods use the available facts wise to arrive to their conclusions.
is this helpful????

is this helpful???? — Nickolasgaspar

I don't think so.
It seems to me like you don't want scientists to bear any responsibility for being unwise and irresponsible.

You said science is the investigation of the ontology of life. I don't know if this is good summary of what science does, but it doesn't mention the why. Why do scientists investigate the ontology of life? Without a valid, wise Why, then scientific knowlege is just as likely to do harm as it is to do good.

Are you catching my drift?

oh boy.....
You sound really confused... Can I ask if English is your mother tongue, what is your level of education and your age before investing time in this conversation..?

I am mainly asking what is the mission of science, specifically the Why, if it has a Why.
I only claimed that an institution needs a valid reason to exist, to be considered an institution worth investing time and money into. And in order to be able to measure its success relative to it's aim.

For example, if a business only has the mission to make money, and not make the world a better place by providing a useful service, I consider it illegitimate. It can claim it is successful if it makes money, but I consider that a superficial metric of success.

Seems like a valid question, even for a young uneducated non English speaker to ask.
If you want to determine if I am worth engaging with, please ask for more relevant life details.

Whatever though, I'm a native English speaker, late 30s, high school drop out with an Associates degree in psychology.

I haven't looked that deep into natural science, as I'm not convinced so far that it will help me understand myself and human nature much better nor how to live more wisely, which are some of my aims.

I think we are done.

-"It seems to me like you don't want scientists to bear any responsibility for being unwise and irresponsible."

The above statement of yours shows that you either have a hidden agenda or you are unable to understand that different methods of investigation produce frameworks with different qualities.
Scientific frameworks contain knowledge. If this knowledge is used wisely it can produce predictions and technical application.
Philosophical frameworks can produce wise claims on that same knowledge for other philosophical branches.(Aesthetics, Ethics, Politics...).

So just because science can not directly offer wise claims about human values and meanings in Ethics or aesthetics or politics etc ...THAT DOESN'T MEAN that SCIENTISTS DO THEIR JOBS WITHOUT UNWISELY OR IRRESPONSIBLE....lol
Do I really have to clarify this.......seriously??? Do you find your statement serious or wise?

I don't know, I think this is a waste of time and I think we are done..

You yourself are saying science(knowledge) is seperate from philosophy (wisdom).
Without philosophy means without love of wisdom...

Anything not guided by the love of wisdom is guided by something else, no?

Tell me how science can seperate itself from philosophy without being foolish?

Trying to understand nature without first understanding yourself (or in conjunction with) could be THE definition of unwise, on par with trying to gain the whole world but losing one's own soul.

"I was only doing my job!"

If you are ignorant of the objective nature of the Scientific Method — Nickolasgaspar

There isn't such a thing as "A scientific Method". — Nickolasgaspar

:chin:

What we're "doing" when we do science is treating the world as natural or physical -- i.e., objective -- as substantive, quantitative, material. It takes on a view of the world as an object, a machine, or as forces acting on matter. — Xtrix

We look for natural explanations to natural phenomena. All of what I said above is an ontological position. None of it is "arbitrary," nor did I say that.
— Xtrix

science doesn't assume the world is material, mechanical etc. — Nickolasgaspar

-You are confusing Methodological Naturalism with Ontological Naturalism. — Nickolasgaspar

…

[Science] deals with ontology within nature since we figured out this is the only ontology that makes senses and has epistemic value. — Nickolasgaspar

It’s almost as if you’re making it up as you go. As if you’re more interested in posturing. :chin:

Yes, its easy for an ignorant individual to believe this statement.....

:rofl:

Or easy for an individual that can read.

:up:

I think however there are some very useful pearls of insights in Descartes and Cudworth (who is unknown) that really set the stage for a kind of special "power" in our souls, in which with our "cognoscitive" powers we are able to take stimulations (not objects) and enliven them.

Once this is cleared up a bit, I think one could proceed down the lines of "reduction" or Tallis "episteogony" and much else that follows. But before checking consciousness, I think there are some obscure factors in play, which allow the mind to have the capacities it does. — Manuel

On postmodern thought, it tends to be ignored because it is so damn mysterious and apart from normal thinking. But I think philosophy makes it clear that this is where questions lead. Analytic philosophers essentially say, oh well, nothing we can do, might as well talk about things we can talk about, which always leads massive question begging about everything they say. Continental ideas move forward into the "threshold". As for Derrida:

As I see it, one needs to take the matter all the way to Derrida, which is not a happy thought for people, because he is deliberately obscure. But what makes him so important is his arguments that show that language is, in its nature, not metaphysically groundable at all. Rorty like Derrida for this. One cannot ever escape the "regionalism" of a language use, is the way I think of it, borrowing from Heidegger who borrowed from Husserl, and this means that when I say, there is my cat, the term cat is not AT ALL a definite designation. It is a kind of context of terms, all related to cats that are not the term cat but "gather" in cat regional thought and relevance and out of this emerges, there is my cat, which is itself certainly definite enough in the usage, but the philosophical analysis yields no definiteness at all. It is, as I think of it, a diffuse meaning, spread out in a web of interference, no single referent of which is itself singular.

This is, I think close, and right. Caputo examines Derrida's thinking in terms of apophatic theology/philosophy: It puts language as, as I see this, a self annihilating position. Deconstruction is self deconstructing as the deconstructive analysis has no exceptions. This is Derrida's version of hermeneutics: radical. Language, to put it in a familiar way, never "touches" the world, for reference is impossible in the familiar way this is thought of. Reference is a "spread out" in language "regions" in which the difference of the interplay expresses as singularity in speech and thought and writing.

So, our language is not in an analogical relation to God's, if God is conceived as being anything at all, because all of our terms are in their nature, at the level of basic analysis, diffuse and in regional "play". And we are, as Caputo cites Eckhart, finally "free of God", that is, God the concept, the idolatry of know ing. Apophatically liberated.

since both aspects are not your a game...how would you know? lol

I think that what you're saying was already well known thousands of years ago, and was even discussed by Plato in his Cratylus dialogue.

And all this elaboration on speech and meaning were already discussed very sensibly by Locke, Reid, Priestley and others.

Was there more added later on? Very much so. Quite a lot.

I think you simplify analytic philosophy. People like Nagel, Haack, Tallis, McGinn and a few others are very, very good.

But, to each there own.

If you are ignorant of the objective nature of the Scientific Method
— Nickolasgaspar

There isn't such a thing as "A scientific Method".
— Nickolasgaspar — Xtrix

:rofl:

I'm not a post-modernist or deeply read in Derrida, but I find myself agreeing for the most part. For me it seems that the anti-foundationalist conclusions of po-mo are an inevitable consequence of a process that began in earnest (perhaps) with the enlightenment project. We have peeled away the layers of the onion and found that there are only layers and ultimately nothing at the core. While this represents a freedom of sorts, it terrifies and outrages those who insist on foundations. Humans seem hard-wired for this, we navigate via certainty. The challenge for us all is how to reinvent ourselves in relation to this conception. My prediction in the short term is that the culture wars will lead us back into flailing 'certainties' and ever escalating cant.

Again— best not to engage seriously with children.