It's been a long time since I did drugs, to be sure, it's a fine way to be shown the arbitrariness of the world. However there's plenty of folk who have tried to walk through a tree after eating those mushrooms from around Dorrigo. The result is not supernatural abilities, but a bloody nose. Reality doesn't care what drugs you take. — Banno

:rofl: I've seen plenty of people on mushrooms and LSD and I've never seen anyone try to walk through a tree, a wall or anything else of a solid nature. Nor have I seen or heard of anyone jumping off a building or out of a tree, imagining that they can fly.

You completely missed the point, which was not about the nature of empirical reality, but that the propositional character of empirical reality is a dualistic collective representation, which may dissolve when one is in an altered state of consciousness. And no, such altered states are not states of confusion, but of utmost clarity, but I guess you would have had to experience it to understand. Perhaps try meditation if hallucinogens are too daunting.

You completely missed the point...

...the propositional character of empirical reality is a dualistic collective representation, which may dissolve when one is in an altered state of consciousness.. — Janus

Of course it is. That's obvious to the point of being trite. But you still only get the bloody nose.

Try this: You are roughly right, Janus; so what goes next?

..what goes next? — Banno

Not being able to answer this question is why the sequels to The Martix were so philosophically inept. Having pointed out that our world could all be a simulation, the Wachowskis found that they were just dealing with a slightly different reality within which that simulation took place... that despite the pretence, no great revelation about the nature of reality had actually occurred; it had all just moved one step back.

Of course it is. That's obvious to the point of being trite. But you still only get the bloody nose.

Try this: You are roughly right, Janus; so what goes next? — Banno

You only get the bloody nose if you are stupid, and as I say I've never seen or heard of anyone so stupid.

"What goes next?"...I have no idea what you are asking. I'm not denying empircal reality, if that is what you're getting at. The mayahanists recognized that samsara is nirvana; It is not a matter of positing two realities, it is a matter of altering the way you see reality, not of altering reality itself.

. It's been a long time since I did drugs, to be sure, it's a fine way to be shown the arbitrariness of the world...Reality doesn't care what drugs you take.
— Banno

Or perhaps it shows that perception’s role is to adaptively guide behavior rather than to veridically recover ‘reality’.

I agree.

So how you see stuff isn't significant - the internal world doesn't matter. It's what you do that counts.

Gonna do my thing here and say these aren't at odds, and in fact, are favorable to one another.

Perception's role is not truth or a veridical recovery of reality.

What you do certainly counts. More and most. Given my existentialist bent.

But, throwing a wrench in all the thoughts, philosophy is that which disrupts perception, or language-use, such that our behavior becomes interested in the veridical.


And, then, bringing up an end to all that -- the ineffable -- if you've been bitten by the bug, that's a big disappointment.

(EDIT: Thinking here “There are more things in Heaven and Earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy.” )

You only get the bloody nose if you are stupid, and as I say I've never seen or heard of anyone so stupid. — Janus

Just going to note that "what come's next?" is a question for after the trip, when you have to... well, do the things. work, or whatever it is.

What comes next after realizing the world is not dualistic, and propositions are a collective representation?

What comes next after realizing the world is not dualistic, and propositions are a collective representation? — Moliere

How does it go? Before enlightenment, carry water, chop firewood... :razz:

Given my Marxist bent --

After enlightenment, carry water, chop firewood

After enlightenment, carry water, chop firewood — Moliere

Mine is after philosophy, park the car, shop for groceries, let the cat in...

:D

OK, yeh, so maybe (and only maybe) "carry water" was metaphoric.

Just going to note that "what come's next?" is a question for after the trip, when you have to... well, do the things. work, or whatever it is.

What comes next after realizing the world is not dualistic, and propositions are a collective representation? — Moliere

It's not as though people cannot function in a dualistic world even at the height of their non-dual awareness; it is possible to hold both views "in tandem" so to speak.

Dōgen:
“Before one studies Zen, mountains are mountains and waters are waters; after a first glimpse into the truth of Zen, mountains are no longer mountains and waters are no longer waters; after enlightenment, mountains are once again mountains and waters once again waters.”

Mine is walk to the shop to get some mustard for the ham.

after enlightenment, mountains are once again mountains and waters once again waters.” — Janus

Yes!

Ok, it wan't a tree - I fell off the bed and bumped my forehead. Point is, regardless of your state of mind in deep mediation or enlightenment or Psilocybe subaeruginosa, you remain embedded in the world.


That what you have to say can be said in another way does not imply that what you have to say is wrong.

So back to

You have it all wrong, mate. You're like a man who refuses to open his eyes and then complains that he can't see what everyone around him is talking about. It's all around you; it's just a non-dual way of seeing that cannot be captured by language. Perhaps the best thing for you would be to drop some acid, and then see if you can communicate what you've experienced. That should open your mind at least a little. As Dylan says "Don't criticize what you can't understand". — Janus

Perhaps I've been there, procured the T-shirt, taken the selfie and am back to seeing the mountains as mountains and waters as waters.

Point is, regardless of your state of mind in deep mediation or enlightment or Psilocybe subaeruginosa, you remain embedded in the world. — Banno

:up: Yep, there's no denying that!

Just wanna run something by you.

What exacty do you mean by "the coffe cup has a handle" is true IFF the coffee cup has a handle?

Well, it's true, if anything is...

The only time when the ineffable has been mentioned in this page is between hyphens (and here). I think we're approaching a point where we stop effing the ineffable!

It feels that this is a general philosophy thread at this point with no particular topic. No offense @Banno

Well, it's true, if anything is... — Banno

That's just avoiding the question.

That's just avoiding the question. — Agent Smith

I think he's pointing to the obviousness of when something is the case. If we can't determine whether a cup has a handle, then we can't determine anything, right?

Well, no. The T-sentence has a few uses. Here it was a somewhat facetious response to an oddly ambiguous question (not yours, another...). One thing the t-sentence can do is to set out how the truth predicate works in truth-functional terms, and indubitably.

There's already a long thread on the topic somewhere.

sort off. The left side is about a proposition, the right side is about how things are. So together it's about the relation between a proposition and how things are. One of the important things about the T-sentence is that it is true even of the cup does not have a handle. Consider: "the sky is green" is true IFF the sky is green.

Isn't this like the correspondence theory of truth? More suited to matters which can be resolved empirically?

It works for any sentence, empirical or otherwise.

"2+2=4" is true IFF 2+2=4
"2+7=4" is true IFF 2+7=4

Right. If something is the case.

The T-sentence, the IFF in it feels wrong.

It's the distinction between logical truth and soundness that often feels wrong.

The IFF is exactly right. What could be more appropriate here than a truth-functional operator?

The question was

how epistemic connections work between knowledge claims and objects in the world. — Constance

with conditions that they wanted an answer in twenty words of less, back-of-envelope style. Now the question might be understood as asking how we knowledge claims are justified, but it is doubtful that any such general account could be given - there are as many different justifications as there are knowledge claims. They may have been asking how reference works, another topic not amenable to brief answers. Or they may have been asking about truth, which when pressed is the answer I gave. oN the left of the truth sentence is a sentence being talked about, on the right is a sentence being used, and the truth sentence shows the connection to be truth-functional.

I was amused, but the joke fell flat, since I'm now explaining it. :sad:

The left side is about a proposition, the right side is about how things are. — Banno

↪Banno Isn't this like the correspondence theory of truth? More suited to matters which can be resolved empirically? — Tom Storm

↪Tom Storm It works for any sentence, empirical or otherwise. — Banno

This is about correspondence, even if it consists of correspondence within a discursive community rather than between that community and things-in-themselves. In order for it to be correspondence, the referents that are being compared have to ‘sit still’ long enough to be compared. We have to be able to trust that what we are referring back to in a comparison has a sense that continues to remain what it was for the sake of the comparison. Entities to be shuffled, arranged and rearranged are required to have persisting identity during all this calculative coordinating .

I bring this up because I want to contrast it with what may appear to you as a strange way of thinking, what Andrew4Handel might call ‘extreme philosophy’. This strange way of thinking is common to poststructuralism, phenomenology and the later Wittgenstein, and it consists of the following analysis of propositional statements such as ‘snow is white Iff snow is white’, or, more generally, ‘on the left of the truth sentence is a sentence being talked about, on the right is a sentence being used’

According to this analysis, to be talked about is already to be used. S is P is usage.In stating S is P, we are seeing S as P. What that means is that the ‘is' connecting S with P is not a neutral relational copula between two pre-existing things, it is a transformative action altering in one gesture both the S and the P. The ‘as' enacts a crossing of past and present such that both are already affected and changed by the other in this context of dealing with something. When we take something as something, we have already projected out from a prior context of relevance such as to render what is presenting itself to us as familiar and recognizable in some fashion. But in this act of disclosure, we only have this context of relevance by modifying it, that is , by USING it in a new way.
This is how we understand ‘snow is white’. And it is also how we understand the move from ‘snow is white’ to the conditional IFF. This conditional, like the ‘is’ in S is P, is not a neutral , external relational connector specifying conditions of truth between two pre-existing sentences. It transforms the sense of meaning of the first sentence (snow is white) as it is used in the context of the second sentence, while the second sentence, in being used in the context of the first, constructs a fresh sense of meaning for itself .
So what one has in this logical construction is not an external combining, comparing , shuffling and coordinating of extant symbolic meanings , but a continually self-transforming construction of sense. Every step of the process involves producing new sense and relevance rather than taking extant persisting symbolic forms and shuffling them around to discover truth or falsity of their relations. Propositional statements aim to stay a step ahead of ineffability by capturing anything sayable within a formal logic of use. But the very formality of the logic, with its presuppositions of extant, persisting symbolic meanings ,neutral , external connectors (is , iff) and activities of shuffling and coordination achieves its triumph over ineffability at the expense of meaninglessness.

Hu?

Thanks for clarifying your perspective on this one. There is an entire and very complex world contained in your response. Perhaps this is just because it is not the world I normally inhabit. All world views rest on complex presuppositions and taken for granted 'facts'. I do find this fascinating material and, because I have a limited philosophy background, this stuff is elusive and shadowy.

Propositional statements aim to stay a step ahead of ineffability by capturing anything sayable within a formal logic of use. But the very formality of the logic, with its presuppositions of extant, persisting symbolic meanings ,neutral , external connectors (is , iff) and activities of shuffling and coordination achieves its triumph over ineffability at the expense of meaninglessness. — Joshs

Wow.. This is probably confronting for those of us who think that some stable meaning can be arrived at using language. I hadn't considered the 'transformative' power held by words like 'is' and 'as'.