Yes, we’re not viewing a representation of the tree. We need not include the “thing in itself”, which considers the tree independent of any perception of it. I refer you back to my previous posts. — NOS4A2

I'm not introducing the "thing itself" in the "noumena" way. Rather, I am using it in the sense that we are perceiving the tree exactly as it is in reality. What do you think it is that is "directly" perceived? If you say the "tree", then that is the very thing being disputed. Is the tree in reality how we perceive it? Otherwise, this debate makes no sense to me. What is the content that you are debating? We see a tree is not the issue. Rather, whether epistemologically what we are seeing corresponds to what is the case (what is external). Otherwise, it would be an argument of circular nonsense or just one without any impetus (we see a tree).

Perhaps you’re a naive realist. Suppose the following image is accurate.



Which tree do we perceive? And who is perceiving that tree?

Which tree do we perceive? And who is perceiving that tree? — NOS4A2

Yes, this another way of saying what I am asking, which is why I'm perplexed at your objection. The naive/direct realist believes the perceiver is perceiving the tree exactly as it is, without any "indirectness" (mediation/interpretation), and I am refuting thus. I am saying that, unless you think that the tree is exactly as we perceive it in "reality", then direct realism is false. The tree can only be thus interpreted by the human subject. It is a tree "for us".

I see no other way of looking at it, because if you ask, "No what I am asking is if we 'distort' the tree in any way", this STILL automatically implies that the question is, "Are we seeing the tree for how it is in reality, or not". Otherwise, you get circular arguments such as, "Are we seeing what we really see?". That makes no sense. Rather, it is, "Are what we seeing, what is corresponding to what is there (in "reality"/externally)?"

I still don’t know why we’d add the qualifier “exactly as it is”. Do you believe we are viewing the trees exactly as they are not?

I still don’t know why we’d add the qualifier “exactly as it is”. Do you believe we are viewing the trees exactly as they are not? — NOS4A2

That is why I have to bring in metaphysics, I am sorry. Humans bring an interpretive point of view. Do you believe there was a time without humans, or a possibility of a no human universe? If you are not a solipsist or brand of idealist, I am sure you will answer, "yes, of course". There is a tree that exists without human interpretation. What direct realism seems to indicate is, humans have direct access to that view, as if humans are like the "eyes and ears" of the universe itself. But I am sure you don't believe that either, that the tree can have qualities, and properties that are not how it is perceived by humans. But humans have their own schema, that creates for us what we usually think of as how a tree is perceived.

No problem at all. Yeah, I’m not sure how one can have direct access to a world that does not exist. I’m concerned strictly with the tree as it is perceived by human beings, though.

Direct/naïve realism is easy to understand: one perceives what is actually out there (a green object is green). Indirect realism, however, posits that we're only aware of mental representations of things (green is just how the mind sees the "green" object).

Right, so what is @NOS4A2 getting at? Can you see how I am confused as to what he is saying?

He doesn't like terms like "actually out there". He only cares what we perceive, but it is exactly the fact that direct realism posits that what we perceive is "actually out there" that is the question at hand. But then he keeps not wanting that to be the case!

I think your approach has been correct. I also thought that that is arguing direct realism - that there is an objective unmediated reality 'out there', external to human perception that humans apprehend and see alike.

It's been interesting to read.

Ok, I thought I was crazy. I looked back at the previous conversations, and it seems like he is asking a basically empirical question: "How is it that what I think is immediately correct about the world is but just a representational component of mind?". Well, that's like saying, "The computer screen is displaying everything without any computation occurring to make it so". That seems wrong, even on the face of it. Besides the fact that, I don't think that idea is really "direct realism" so much as naive computationalism, or something of that sort.

Right, so what is NOS4A2 getting at? Can you see how I am confused as to what he is saying?

He doesn't like terms like "actually out there". He only cares what we perceive, but it is exactly the fact that direct realism posits that what we perceive is "actually out there" that is the question at hand. But then he keeps not wanting that to be the case! — schopenhauer1

Then he's talking about something else and latched onto the nearest object so to speak.

Ha, perhaps so!

Ha, perhaps so! — schopenhauer1

He's in a high level domain where one's mind and the thoughts its thinking can't be adequately distinguished; stuff like what he's going through is part of the territory.

Again, I think an empirical question. We know for example, that the brain has various ways of integrating information from sensory information. Humans develop over time from fetuses, and all that pretty standard stuff.

Again, I think an empirical question. We know for example, that the brain has various ways of integrating information from sensory information. Humans develop over time from fetuses, and all that pretty standard stuff. — schopenhauer1

That is what we all agree is the case. I don't see a problem/issue except that it's what it is.

I want to know the answer to the question “Who perceives what? For the indirect realist. I want to see if we can examine these objects and their natures.

I want to know the answer to the question “Who perceives what? For the indirect realist. I want to see if we can examine these objects and their natures. — NOS4A2

It seems like you are simply getting at the hard problem of consciousness, which is probably where @bert1 is coming at it, if I remember, as he (if memory recalls) is a kind of panpsychist. So the idea from a panpsychist would be that there is an internal aspect to the physical.

But getting back to your question, what do you mean by "Who perceives what"? As others explained, it is basically inputs integrating information and various neural networks doing what it is they do, when they come across these inputs through sensory apparatuses. Light shines on the retina, fires the optical nerve, causing a whole bunch of neurons to go through a series of networks moving up cortical layers and subcortical layers, etc.

I know how the biology works. The question can be answered in the form X perceives Y.

I know how the biology works. The question can be answered in the form X perceives Y. — NOS4A2

You are a human. Humans are comprised of various sensory organs that are wired to a central processing called the brain. This brain processes the data coming in from the sensory organs called stimuli. That is your detailed version of X perceives Y. In colloquial terms, we say a "person perceives a tree".

Right, that’s how naive realism would say it. How would an indirect realist say it?

Right, that’s how naive realism would say it. How would an indirect realist say it? — NOS4A2

You are playing around with definitions. A naive realist would say that what the person is perceiving is "really" the tree as it is, without any interpretation... But I just gave you the fact that the brain is doing stuff (that is the interpretation), so it is indirectly accessing the tree, as it filters through that process.. which by the way, if I haven't stated it, is a human process.

just gave you the fact that the brain is doing stuff (that is the interpretation), so it is indirectly accessing the tree, as it filters through that process.. which by the way, if I haven't stated it, is a human process. — schopenhauer1

All that is objective, extended, active—that is to say, all that is material—is regarded by materialism as affording so solid a basis for its explanation, that a reduction of everything to this can leave nothing to be desired (especially if in ultimate analysis this reduction should resolve itself into action and reaction). But we have shown that all this is given indirectly and in the highest degree determined, and is therefore merely a relatively present object, for it has passed through the machinery and manufactory of the brain, and has thus come under the forms of space, time and causality, by means of which it is first presented to us as extended in space and ever active in time. From such an indirectly given object, materialism seeks to explain what is immediately given, the idea (in which alone the object that materialism starts with exists), and finally even the will from which all those fundamental forces, that manifest themselves, under the guidance of causes, and therefore according to law, are in truth to be explained. To the assertion that thought is a modification of matter we may always, with equal right, oppose the contrary assertion that all matter is merely the modification of the knowing subject, as its idea. — Schopenhauer0

But I just gave you the fact that the brain is doing stuff (that is the interpretation), so it is indirectly accessing the tree, as it filters through that process.. which by the way, if I haven't stated it, is a human process. — schopenhauer1

Indeed. And in this argument it might be posited that via this 'human process' is built-in neuro-cognitive schema that impose what we think is reality upon the external world - in the Kantian sense, I guess, that time and space may not have a reality outside of human experience and are part of our sense making apparatus, etc.

This can all get highly complex when you add in intentional states and the work of direct realists like Putnam and Searle - none of whom I understand very well.

Then of course there is idealism, which would dissolve the entire problem of realism/antirealism and claim that while what we see is 'real' it is not what we think. Reality is the the product of consciousness and matter (trees, etc) is merely what consciousness looks like when seen from a particular perspective of mentation. This debate about realism is a kind of dress rehearsal for the mind body problem.

Being someone who likes flow charts more than chapters, I would like to see a chart expressing what each philosophical position holds is responsible for a human being seeing/experiencing a tree - in simple and direct language.

All this of course ends up in metaphysics or ontology... or both.

I'm afraid you'll need to pass through the gateless gate.

Before I had studied Ch’an [Zen] for thirty years, I saw mountains as mountains, and rivers as rivers. When I arrived at a more intimate knowledge, I came to the point where I saw that mountains are not mountains, and rivers are not rivers. But now that I have got its very substance I am at rest. For it’s just that I see mountains once again as mountains, and rivers once again as rivers. — Qingyuan Weixin

(I assume as a matter of course that all here are at the 'before' stage, myself included of course.)

Which tree do we perceive? — NOS4A2

But there is only one tree in that picture.

You are playing around with definitions. A naive realist would say that what the person is perceiving is "really" the tree as it is, without any interpretation... But I just gave you the fact that the brain is doing stuff (that is the interpretation), so it is indirectly accessing the tree, as it filters through that process.. which by the way, if I haven't stated it, is a human process

Is the brain perceiving the process, then?

But there is only one tree in that picture.

Exactly.

Nice diagram of the visual system. There's only 1 tree of course, but the point is the representation of the tree, the image on the retina, is, well, true (direct realism) or embellished (indirect realism).

Before I had studied Ch’an [Zen] for thirty years, I saw mountains as mountains, and rivers as rivers. When I arrived at a more intimate knowledge, I came to the point where I saw that mountains are not mountains, and rivers are not rivers. But now that I have got its very substance I am at rest. For it’s just that I see mountains once again as mountains, and rivers once again as rivers.
— Qingyuan Weixin

(I assume as a matter of course that all here are at the 'before' stage, myself included of course.) — Wayfarer

There's something very archetypal about that formulation: the quotidian/the higher awareness/the quotidian And comforting...