The bit where someone explains what indirect realism is still needs work. Seems unclear. — Banno

Something like: the kind of thing that we hear in the case of a veridical perception is the same kind of thing that we hear in the case of an hallucinatory perception (e.g. the schizophrenic who hears voices). The difference between a veridical perception and an hallucinatory perception is that in the case of a veridical perception the thing that we hear is causally covariant with some external stimulus (and, if a representationalist kind of indirect realism, that the character of the thing that we hear is isomorphic with the nature of this external stimulus).

the kind of thing that we hear in the case of a veridical perception is the same kind of thing that we hear in the case of an hallucinatory perception (e.g. the schizophrenic who hears voices). — Michael

And, I suppose: the kind of thing that we read about in true factual literature is the same kind of thing that we read about in fiction?

And, I suppose: the kind of thing that we read about in true factual literature is the same kind of thing that we read about in fiction? — bongo fury

Yes.

Yes. — Michael

So the true factual literature "my dog has fleas" isn't about an actual dog?

Or is it that actual things are the same kind of things as made-up things?

So the true factual literature "my dog has fleas" isn't about an actual dog?

Or is it that actual things are the same kind of things as made-up things? — bongo fury

Reading a history textbox doesn't give us direct access to history.

Reading a history textbox doesn't give us direct access to history. — Michael

But the book itself: is it directly about the historical events, or only indirectly?

But the book itself: is it directly about the historical events, or only indirectly? — bongo fury

I don't know what "directly" means in this context.

Regardless, as I said above, reading a history textbook doesn't give us direct access to history, and similarly (according to indirect realism) seeing an apple doesn't give us direct access to the causal world. But that's not to say that nothing in history "corresponds" to what is said in the history textbook, or that nothing in the causal world "corresponds" to what is seen. So I don't understand the point you are trying to make. You just appear to be trying to play some kind of word game.

Obviously the point for me is the usual one, of whether or not seeing an apple is a case of seeing a picture of the apple.

Obviously the point for me is the usual one, of whether or not seeing an apple is a case of seeing a picture of the apple — bongo fury

Does the schizophrenic who sees people who aren’t there see a picture of people (who aren’t there)?

Your Cartesian theatre grammar is a strawman.

Does the schizophrenic who sees people who aren’t there see a picture of people? — Michael

That's my question. Prompted by,

the kind of thing that we hear in the case of a veridical perception is the same kind of thing that we hear in the case of an hallucinatory perception (e.g. the schizophrenic who hears voices). — Michael

What kind of thing is it, if not an actual voice, and now apparently not a mental image either?

What kind of thing is it, if not an actual voice, and now apparently not a mental image either? — bongo fury

I didn’t say it’s not a mental image. When a schizophrenic hears voices those voices are just “mental imagery” but it’s bad grammar to then describe this as “hearing mental imagery.”

So a question back to you: do you accept that schizophrenics see and hear things that aren’t there? If so, what is it that they see and hear?

I didn’t say it’s not a mental image. — Michael

Oh, so it's a picture, after all?

it’s bad grammar to then describe this as “hearing mental imagery.” — Michael

But you just did:

When a schizophrenic hears voices those voices [that you just said this person hears] are just “mental imagery” — Michael

do you accept that schizophrenics see and hear things that aren’t there? — Michael

Literally, they obviously don't. They 'see and hear things'.

Oh, so it's a picture, after all? — bongo fury

They don't see a picture. They see an apple. And the apple is mental imagery. Your mistake is in conflating two different domains of discourse. It's like saying that Frodo carried the One Ring to Mordor, that the One Ring is a fiction, and so that Frodo carried a fiction to Mordor. It's just bad grammar.

Literally they obviously don't. They 'see and hear things'. — bongo fury

That's just playing word games.

What matters is that the visual and auditory imagery that occurs in the case of veridical perception is no more "direct access" to their external cause than the visual and auditory imagery that occurs in the case of hallucinatory perception. The difference is that in veridical perception the visual and auditory imagery is causally covariant with some external stimulus, and maybe also that the character of this visual and auditory imagery is isomorphic with the nature of the external stimulus. That's indirect realism. You cannot simply dismiss this by appealing to some strawman Cartesian theatre grammar.

That's just playing word games. — Michael

Logic, hopefully.

They don't see a picture. They see an apple. — Michael

Do you mean, they notice an apple (shape) in their mental picture?

It's like saying that Frodo carried the One Ring to Mordor, that the One Ring is a fiction, and so that Frodo carried a fiction to Mordor. — Michael

You're not being serious. Ok.

The perception you describe is reading the conclusion on a screen at CERN or conceptualizing the meaning of the particles existence outside of the scientific logic behind the detection of it. — Christoffer

Yes, there needs to be someone reading the data, and interpreting the data. Machines don't do science. They do not bypass human perception either, they just enhance it. And the logic behind the apparatus itself and its design and correct operation is theory-based and theory-ladden. The questions that are being tested, the theories that are built to make sense to the data, are all human ideas.

This is not to say that there is no "outside reality" (outside of what, exactly?). Reality is whatever there is, and to my knowledge, that includes ideas, which are real, and stuff that are not ideas.

It is a paradox that we readily interpret present information as referring to absent entities, e.g. the photograph of my dead grandmother who has long since departed...

In my view, dissolving the paradox requires defining the notion of 'absence' in terms of present information, whereupon the notion of reference is reduced to a set of relationships within present information.

From such a perspective , the concepts of doubt and epistemic error are reinterpreted as semantic notions rather than metaphysical notions related to unobserved truth values. Essentially, semantics becomes holistic, immanent, and under-determined, comprising of partial-definitions that change over time in such a fashion as to alleviate the concerns of idealists who reject transcendental signification, and realists who reject epistemic infallibility.

Yes, there needs to be someone reading the data, and interpreting the data. Machines don't do science. — Olivier5

This is a fundamental misunderstanding of my argument. The machine works outside of anyone reading the data, it still detects the object, independently of anyone interpreting the data.

Let's say we establish an AI that has the purpose of interpreting the data. Its only job is to read and conclude the data to be correct. Now, it hasn't any kind of perception like humans do, and the output will be a binary "yes" or "no". "Is there a Higgs particle?", it answers "Yes". The interpretation of this data will be binary, its mathematical and bypasses human perception at every level. The output is either positive or negative, it has no human interpretational value.

They do not bypass human perception either, they just enhance it. — Olivier5

A logical machine working with mathematical equations bypass human perception. It's based on physical laws, not perception.

And the logic behind the apparatus itself and its design and correct operation is theory-based and theory-ladden. — Olivier5

A "scientific theory" is different from lay-man definitions of "theory". A scientific theory, especially within physics, are bound to logical and mathematical truths. Math is not a human perception. So if the machine is based on such mathematical theories, it does NOT become influence by human perception.

These theories are also testable. An atomic clock that shifts according to relativity is a result that has a binary interpretation, it's either relative or it is not. Then utilizing the same result as a foundation for functional GPS systems means we have a system that couldn't work without a scientific theory informing us how to build it. There's no perception at all to this other than perceiving the result of these machines and functions.

To apply perception as a causational factor to something that acts upon the functions of universal physics is a fundamental error in reasoning for phenomenology.

The questions that are being tested, the theories that are built to make sense to the data, are all human ideas. — Olivier5

Any interpretation of data is philosophy if it only acts upon a conjecture. But a binary output of a machine analyzing universal physics through mathematical logic is not conjecture. If you build a machine that on a macro scale shows either a Red light or a Green light, the spectrum can be read by a machine as either red or green per definition of wavelengths, regardless of the human eye and brain seeing those lights with interpretational values. The fact that there are waves and photons is detectable through detectors that works upon physical laws, not our perceptions. The CERN Atlas detector wasn't built through "human perception", it was built according to mathematical logic, and that bypass any kind of human interpretation.

That a nine looks like this: "9", doesn't mean the function of "nine" is a "human perception" within math. Nine is nine regardless of our perception and the aesthetics of how we talk about "nine" in text, speech, countable objects etc. "Nine" as a mathematical and logical concept is a rule of physical law in the universe, the results of predictability calculations using "nine" within mathematical equations can predict things we haven't even found out about the universe yet, since it doesn't rely on "human perception", it relies on physical laws and logic, i.e it is external to human perception.

This is not to say that there is no "outside reality" (outside of what, exactly?). Reality is whatever there is, and to my knowledge, that includes ideas, which are real, and stuff that are not ideas. — Olivier5

"Outside reality" in terms of phenomenology is "outside human perception". Some think that phenomenology is about our human perception being responsible for the external world, that our perception is, in lack of a better explanation, a religious cause for reality and that any external reality outside of human perception doesn't exist.

This is the fundamental issue I have with that sub-section of phenomenology and why I say that phenomenology should be considered to be about the duality of reality being both something interpreted and perceived by humans and external reality that exists in a far more complex manner than we can even conceptualize.

I.e the way people speak about human perception in phenomenology is more akin to the Von Neumann–Wigner interpretation of quantum physics and that interpretation, that our consciousness collapse quantum states is almost a laughable conclusion that isn't really taken seriously by quantum physicists.

I think such conclusions are pure human narcissism on a religious scale. We attribute life with having control over external reality in a way that fits more in a X-Men comic than actual logical and rational deduction about our relation to physical reality.

Note on your image. *This kind of dimensional thinking, reminds me of basic tree-fractals, which in turn remind me of the shape of neuron-trees. Maybe there is a link? When we go to look at something, and than think of that something, you get what you got in this image, recursive mirroring. The neurology of it is probably quite fascinating and fairly complex.

of looking at the problem differently, — Banno

Like with a blindfold on? :razz:

Ah good, you added more.

the visual and auditory imagery is causally covariant with — Michael

Yes that's much better than

the thing that we hear is causally covariant with — Michael

But then what's indirect about it? You say the homunculus is straw, but don't you need him, for indirectness?

But then what's indirect about it? — bongo fury

It is this visual and auditory imagery that informs our intellectual considerations, not whatever distal causes are responsible for such imagery.

He's straw but intellectual?

Why the denial about the Cartesian theatre?

Or, better denial, please.

Is there a Cartesian theatre when I hallucinate? Is there a Cartesian theatre when I am presented with an illusion? Is there a Cartesian theatre when I dream? Is there a Cartesian theatre when I think about the pain I feel?

It's just a strawman. The grammar of ordinary conversation doesn't dictate the (meta-)physics of perception. You need something better than "saying that we see the mental image of an apple sounds stupid, so indirect realism is false", or whatever it is you're trying to say.

No worries.

If you can prove the existence of an object like the Higgs particle then you can logically prove the existence of a larger object that we humans refer to as "an apple" through the same methods of testing and using instruments that bypass our perception. We can provide all the data about the apple that confirms it to be that kind of an object, based on how it correlates with what our perception tells us. — Christoffer

Right. So we tell the machine how to distinguish an apple, and it does so. How does that prove that aliens would also distinguish apples? The machine only did it because we told it to, and told it how.

It is this visual and auditory imagery that informs our intellectual considerations, not whatever distal causes are responsible for such imagery. — Michael

Different thread, same issue. What are the steps that the visual and auditory imagery take to inform our intellectual considerations? Do they do so directly, straight from the "I see a post box" cortex to the "I think I'll put my letter in it" region?

You seem to think that the hidden states' steps (light scattering, retinal stimulation, occipital modelling...) mean that the connection is indirect, but the steps that the visual image takes to our response (hippocampus re-firing, working memory channel, sensorimotor inference, proprioceptive cascade...) are direct. Why? Both processes seem to have steps. There are a number of steps between object and model. There are a number of steps between model and response. Why are the latter steps direct and the former indirect?

You seem to think that the hidden states' steps (light scattering, retinal stimulation, occipital modelling...) mean that the connection is indirect, but the steps that the visual image takes to our response (hippocampus re-firing, working memory channel, sensorimotor inference, proprioceptive cascade...) are direct. Why? Both processes seem to have steps. There are a number of steps between object and model. There are a number of steps between model and response. Why are the latter steps direct and the former indirect? — Isaac

It might be worth us looking into what is actually meant by “direct perception”. The SEP article is a good place to start:

Putting the pieces together, our ordinary conception of perceptual experience involves:

Direct Realist Presentation: perceptual experiences are direct perceptual presentations of ordinary objects.

And to better explain what I have said above:

Clearly, there are differences between these categories, but from a phenomenological point of view, these experiences seem the same in at least this sense: for any veridical perception of an ordinary object, we can imagine a corresponding illusion or hallucination which cannot be told apart or distinguished, by introspection, from the veridical perception.

…

Thus, a veridical, illusory, and hallucinatory experience, all alike in being experiences (as) of a churchyard covered in white snow, are not merely superficially similar, they are fundamentally the same: these experiences have the same nature, fundamentally the same kind of experiential event is occurring in each case. Any differences between them are external to their nature as experiences (e.g., to do with how they are caused).

…

The two central arguments have a similar structure which we can capture as follows:

A. In an illusory/hallucinatory experience, a subject is not directly presented with an ordinary object.
B. The same account of experience must apply to veridical experiences as applies to illusory/hallucinatory experiences.

Therefore,

C. Subjects are never directly presented with ordinary objects.

(C) contradicts Direct Realist Presentation, and thus our ordinary conception of perceptual experience.

If it’s not direct then it’s indirect (unless there’s some third alternative?).

I don't disagree about the indirectness of perception.

You said...

It is this visual and auditory imagery that informs our intellectual considerations, not whatever distal causes are responsible for such imagery. — Michael

If it is not distal causes which informs our intellectual consideration on the grounds of indirectness, then it is not the visual and auditory imagery either, because that too is indirect.

I'm not contesting your claim that perception is indirect. I'm disputing your claim that indirectness prevents aboutness.

Let's say we establish an AI that has the purpose of interpreting the data. Its only job is to read and conclude the data to be correct. Now, it hasn't any kind of perception like humans do, and the output will be a binary "yes" or "no". "Is there a Higgs particle?", it answers "Yes". — Christoffer

The AI would still be human-made to emulate a human scientist. It wouldn't be in effect very different from a human scientist. It would be able to fail, in particular. It would also rely on data fed to it, by a system which can fail. This system is also man-made and based on human theories and perceptions.

I'm disputing your claim that indirectness prevents aboutness. — Isaac

I wouldn’t make such a claim. To borrow bongo’s example, a history textbook is about history, but it doesn’t provide direct access. The indirect realist’s claim just amounts to the claim that when reading about history we’re just reading words, which is true.