Heidegger spent a whole career introducing a new way to think about the word ‘is’, such as S is P.
— Joshs
OK, so then we're back to "why?". I don't see a way out of this. Before diving into Heidegger, I'd rather just make sure we've got the frame of investigation right. If a claim is about the way the world is, it is a factual claim. If a claim is about some way we could look at the way the world is, then it's a normative or aesthetic claim and it needs a 'why' - why ought I look at thing that way, as opposed to any other.
That 'why' must itself be a factual claim "it will make you happier", "it will work better", "it's more useful"...etc. A claim which takes a position on the way the world is.
If all we have is a series of 'ways of looking at things' which never terminate in a claim about the way the world is (such as to advise I look at things that way) then I'm not sure I see the point. — Isaac
↪Wayfarer
Perhaps the most difficult exposition to fathom in transcendental metaphysics,....a speculative idealism if there ever was one.....is how I, as thinking subject, can at the same time be the object I think about. — Mww
Dummett’s Manifestation Argument
Dummett’s Language Acquisition Argument
Putnam’s Brain-in-a-Vat Argument
Putnam’s Conceptual Relativity Argument
Putnam’s Model-Theoretic Argument
Each would be a source of further discussion. — Banno
is how I, as thinking subject, can at the same time be the object I think about. — Mww
In turn, objects of judgement, imagination, volition, and so on, including cognition and even (gasp) experience itself, then assume the guise of phenomena, at the expense of the notion of sensory “appearance” from which the term originated. — Mww
But the principle of perception is better explained by a Cartesian framework: what matters is what the subject reacts to, now what's happening in the so called external world — Manuel
The problem of including the observer in our description of physical reality arises most insistently when it comes to the subject of quantum cosmology - the application of quantum mechanics to the universe as a whole - because, by definition, 'the universe' must include any observers. [Physicist] Andrei Linde has given a deep reason for why observers enter into quantum cosmology in a fundamental way. It has to do with the nature of time. The passage of time is not absolute; it always involves a change of one physical system relative to another, for example, how many times the hands of the clock go around relative to the rotation of the Earth. When it comes to the Universe as a whole, time loses its meaning, for there is nothing else relative to which the universe may be said to change. This 'vanishing' of time for the entire universe becomes very explicit in quantum cosmology, where the time variable simply drops out of the quantum description. It may readily be restored by considering the Universe to be separated into two sub-systems: an observer with a clock, and the rest of the Universe. So the observer plays an absolutely crucial role in this respect. Linde expresses it graphically: 'thus we see that without introducing an observer, we have a dead universe, which does not evolve in time', and, 'we are together, the Universe and us. The moment you say the Universe exists without any observers, I cannot make any sense out of that. I cannot imagine a consistent theory of everything that ignores consciousness...in the absence of observers, our universe is dead'. — Paul Davies, The Goldilocks Enigma: Why is the Universe Just Right for Life, p 271
Am I wrong in thinking that this was only something taken seriously by those defending physicalism? Is it possible an idealist position actually depends on a failure to define criteria fro 'real' such that there can be equivocation on what does and does not belong in that category? — Isaac
realism holds that there are things we can't know. Antirealism, including idealism, holds that whatever is true is somehow related to mind.
The core problems for idealism are explaining consistency in the world around us, explaining error and explaining the existence of others. All three are dissipated by supposing that truth is not dependent on mind. — Banno
When one's mind constructs reality, what is it it constructs it from? — Banno
'The external universe, outside the scope of observation by any living being, is the residue after all sensable qualities have been taken away. What remain are only formal entities which have no concrete interpretation. Thus, the universe uncoupled from observation is an abstract system in search of an interpretation. ...The material universe, of course, has an independent existence quite apart from observers. But the important lesson for us is that this external universe is very different from the way we imagine it to be. The mind of living beings projects all manner of sensable features onto material objects, hence we perceive the world with all the properties we have projected onto it—but objectively the unobserved universe is formless and featureless.'
Pinter, Charles. Mind and the Cosmic Order (p. 85). Springer International Publishing. Kindle Edition. — Wayfarer
Moreover, if there is a something, independent of mind, then in what sense does the theory remain a version of idealism? — Banno
It can be considered a form of pan-psychism, but it does not assume a notion of psyche as an inner, spiritual substance. — Joshs
Vijnanavada [says that] that the reality a human being perceives does not exist, any more than do the images called up by a monk in meditation. Only the consciousness that one has of the momentary interconnected events (dharmas) that make up the cosmic flux can be said to exist. Consciousness, however, also clearly discerns in these so-called unreal events consistent patterns of continuity and regularity; in order to explain this order in which only chaos really could prevail, the school developed the tenet of the Ālaya-vijñāna or “storehouse consciousness 1.” Sense perceptions are ordered as coherent and regular by the store consciousness, of which one is consciously unaware. Sense impressions produce certain configurations (samskaras) in this unconscious that “perfume” later impressions so that they appear consistent and regular. Each being possesses (instantiates) this store consciousness, which thus becomes a kind of collective consciousness that orders human perceptions of the world, though this world does not exist (in its own right). — Encylopedia Brittanica
Get involved in philosophical discussions about knowledge, truth, language, consciousness, science, politics, religion, logic and mathematics, art, history, and lots more. No ads, no clutter, and very little agreement — just fascinating conversations.