I would say, reality is not generated by the mind but that everything we experience and know is generated by the mind. But we cannot see that process of construction ('vorstellung' in Schopenhauer, 'vikalpa' in Buddhism) 'from the outside', as it is the act of cognition. That's why it's a not a model as such. — Wayfarer
But, 'In order to make a comparison, we must know what it is that we are comparing, namely, the model on the one hand and the object on the other. But if we already know the reality, why do we need to make a comparison? And if we don't know the reality, how can we make a comparison?' — Wayfarer
Splendid question. To a fruit-fly, an apple is host to its eggs. If I throw an apple at an annoying bird, it's a weapon. To fruit bats and primates it is food, whereas it wouldn't necessarily register to a carnivore. Which is 'the real apple'? — Wayfarer
Full circle, then. As I replied to that post, when one's mind constructs reality, what is it mind constructs it from? — Banno
So if I see a rock in the next room through a TV screen and a camera feed then I am not seeing that rock indirectly? Then it's not entirely clear to me what you even mean by seeing something either directly or indirectly. Because that seems to me to be a prime example of seeing something indirectly.
Yes, and we paint people and write about history. But it doesn't then follow that there is a direct connection between the painting and the woman or the writing and the war. So it doesn't follow from us perceiving external world objects that there is a direct connection between perception and those external world objects. The grammar of how we describe the intensional object of perception says nothing about the (meta)physics of perception.
I'm saying what I said above: that experience is a mental phenomena, that there is no direct connection between mental phenomena and external world objects, and that the qualities of mental phenomena are not properties of external world objects.
This is true, but these are all experiences of the one thing as seen by different beings? It's a type of species-perspectivism, perhaps, but the same object is in play. This notions seems more like a phenomenology. — Tom Storm
I understand by the transcendental idealism of all appearances the doctrine that they are all together to be regarded as mere representations and not things in themselves, and accordingly that space and time are only sensible forms of our intuition, but not determinations given for themselves or conditions of objects as things in themselves. To this idealism is opposed transcendental realism, which regards space and time as something given in themselves (independent of our sensiblity). The transcendental realist therefore represents outer appearances (if their reality is conceded) as things in themselves, which would exist independently of us and our sensibility and thus would also be outside us according to pure concepts of the understanding. — CPR, A369
As I replied to that post, when one's mind constructs reality, what is it mind constructs it from? — Banno
experience is a mental phenomena, that there is no direct connection between mental phenomena and external world objects, and that the qualities of mental phenomena are not properties of external world objects. — Michael
The topic of this book is the relationship between mind and the physical world. From once being an esoteric question of philosophy, this subject has become a central topic in the foundations of quantum physics. The book traces this story back to Descartes, through Kant, to the beginnings of 20th Century physics, where it becomes clear that the mind-world relationship is not a speculative question but has a direct impact on the understanding of physical phenomena.
The book’s argument begins with the British empiricists who raised our awareness of the fact that we have no direct contact with physical reality, but it is the mind that constructs the form and features of objects. It is shown that modern cognitive science brings this insight a step further by suggesting that shape and structure are not internal to objects, but arise in the observer. The author goes yet further by arguing that the meaningful connectedness between things — the hierarchical organization of all we perceive — is the result of the Gestalt nature of perception and thought, and exists only as a property of mind. These insights give the first glimmerings of a new way of seeing the cosmos: not as a mineral wasteland but a place inhabited by creatures.
Incidentally I don't place G E Moore's refutation of idealism anywhere beyond Johnson's argumentum ad lapidem. 'Here is a hand' is no more a refutation than kicking a rock. — Wayfarer
Whereas you think that there's a real world, out there, and an idea, in here, not seeing that this is itself a mental construction. — Wayfarer
Thoughts just are inherently meaningful. Thinking just is meaning-making. — Janus
How can there be anything to discuss, then? You’re not saying anything, you’re just making marks that show up on a screen. I might interpret them to mean anything whatever — Wayfarer
neural processes, like marks or shapes or whatever, have no inherent meaning, but that we read meaning into them. — Wayfarer
You’re sawing off the branch on which you sit. — Wayfarer
that model is not what you see; it is you seeing. — Banno
if you say that it requires reflection to find meaning in thought, then all you are really saying is that it requires thinking to find meaning in thought. If thinking can find meaning in itself, doesn't that imply that meaning is necessarily inherent in thought? — Metaphysician Undercover
otherwise we end up having to define the mechanism which is 'seeing' the model. — Isaac
And the way forward will be far from clear.our thoughts do have inherent meaning
— Edward Feser
↪Wayfarer — Isaac
Brain processes, like ink marks, sound waves, the motion of water molecules, electrical current, and any other physical phenomenon you can think of, seem clearly devoid of any inherent use. By themselves they are simply useless patterns of electrochemical activity. Yet our thoughts do have inherent use– that’s how they are able to impart it to otherwise useless ink marks, sound waves, etc. In that case, though, it seems that our thoughts cannot possibly be identified with any physical processes in the brain. In short: Thoughts and the like possess inherent use or intentionality; brain processes, like ink marks, sound waves, and the like, are utterly devoid of any inherent use or intentionality; so thoughts and the like cannot possibly be identified with brain processes.
Talk of "meaning" is not going to get very far. There's to much baggage, too much variation in the meaning of "meaning"...
The same holds for "thoughts"; so put them together in
our thoughts do have inherent meaning
— Edward Feser
↪Wayfarer — Isaac
And the way forward will be far from clear. — Banno
There may be an interesting digression here following Wittgenstein. Rather than looking to the meaning, we might look to the use. What do we get if we paraphrase the Feser quote in terms of use? — Banno
There is also in the quote an equation of meaning and intentionality, something that ought not go unremarked. But that is a whole new barrel of herrings, red or otherwise. — Banno
Throwing cliches isn't an argument. — Isaac
Thoughts aren't entities capable of possessing inherent properties, and even if they were, what kind of analysis produced the conclusion that they had inherent meaning? — Isaac
Your question has 'inherent meaning' doesn't it? You didn't just blurt out random sounds. — Wayfarer
I don't see how our thoughts are any different to the "marks or shapes or whatever" in that they lack 'inherent' meaning. We might find meaning in them on reflection, but I don't see any evidence that the meaning is inherent. — Isaac
Yes. I find it such an odd phrasing of Feser's that he would carry out this general equivalence. That a thought might 'have' a meaning or intentionality in the same way an apple has the property of being spherical. It seems such a messy way of analysing the distinctions. — Isaac
if you say that thoughts don't have any inherent meaning then neither does your asking of this question. — Wayfarer
the meaning you give it will be similar enough to the meaning I give it — Isaac
At least, a neural network with some task would seem to have a directionality of the sort seen in the aboutness of an intentional act. — Banno
I do agree with Wayfarer that physics is not capable of explaining everything. — Banno
No, it does not follow.
The "model" at point here is a distribution of probabilities in a neural net. That is the apple you see?
No, that is your seeing the apple. — Banno
We wouldn't say that because building just is house-making building is inherently a house. — Isaac
When you think "I'm cold", it has a different meaning to you than it does when I think "I'm cold". As such the meaning of "I'm cold" (the thought) cannot be inherent to the thought, can it? It must be something we construct.
My distinction between direct and indirect pertains to viewing the world. The TV screen, being in the world, is viewed directly, as is anything else in the periphery, like the TV stand. An indirect view would be representationalism, the assumption that we are viewing a representation of a TV. — NOS4A2
I don’t understand. The only direct connection I am speaking of is the viewing of the painting (along with everything else in the periphery), not that there is any connection between a painting of a woman and a woman. The connections and contacts are real, not figurative, for instance light hitting the eyes. — NOS4A2
I don't see how that follows at all. If metal-detecting can find metal in a metal-detector, does that imply that metal is inherent in metal-detecting (or detectors)? — Isaac
No we can make plastic metal detectors and some metal-detecting is completely without metal. — Isaac
Since the same thought "I'm cold" can have different meanings (to you it might be unpleasant, to me it might be desirable), those meanings cannot be inherent to the thought. — Isaac
Just like an actual apple has a different meaning (values, emotions, utility) to you as it does to me, so the meaning cannot inhere in the apple. — Isaac
Yes. I've already agreed that my asking of that question doesn't have any inherent meaning. — Isaac
Of course, if one accepts that 'thoughts' and 'neural networks' are the same thing from different perspectives, the problem disappears. — Isaac
The process of enculturation, ... of which physics, and the physical, is one parameter. — Wayfarer
Building is not inherently house-making, though, but structure-making, And structure is inherent to building, just as meaning is inherent to thought. — Janus
I'm saying that it doesn't follow from "the painting is of a woman" that there is a direct connection between the painting and the woman, and similarly that it doesn't follow from "the experience is of an external world object" that there is a direct connection between the experience and the external world object.
You need to do more than just say "we experience external world objects" to make a case for direct realism. If I see a rock through a TV screen then I'm seeing a rock, but I'm seeing it indirectly. So it can be that we experience external world objects and that indirect realism is the case.
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