How so? I don’t need to experience something to talk about it. — Michael
:up:It is as if you think what's in your box somehow can define what's in everyone else's box. — Baden
The blind can talk about things just fine. — Michael
I don’t understand why you and others think I must be able to see something to talk about it. — Michael
if you have a locked box that I can’t look inside, the phrase “the hidden contents of your box” refers to the hidden contents of your box. — Michael
My issue is that we can't describe things that are mental. — Andrew4Handel
And that is not the same as not being able to describe anything we experience. Again, we do describe things.We do not have the language to accurately describe everything we experience. — Andrew4Handel
The beetle argument shows this to be a poor analogy. It works on the assumption that words are all labels for things; they are not.The problem is that we do have a box with contents hidden to other people and then we try and describe to some extent what is happening inside us. — Andrew4Handel
I think Wittgenstein's analysis can help you untie this knot.My primary concern is that there are mental states that only we experience that can never be compared to any kind of model or to other peoples also private mental states. — Andrew4Handel
But we do talk about red and pain, so they are not private. — Banno
But let's take it a step at a time, do you agree with that much? — Baden
What is private is the sensation like redness or pain that is not captured in the physical description of body parts. — Andrew4Handel
My issue is that we can't describe things that are mental.
— Andrew4Handel
Again, and yet we do. — Banno
Tell me what there is that you cannot put into words? . — Banno
it takes a social space for meaning to tango — Baden
...refer... — Andrew4Handel
...referring... — Andrew4Handel
...referring... — Andrew4Handel
I am using words to transmit ideas and concepts not to transmit my veridical experiences. — Andrew4Handel
Sure, you cannot say everything. But that does not mean you cannot say something.Everything. — Andrew4Handel
We understand pain not because we have access to each other's private experience's through language but that it is a concept that allows through its nature a public shared conceptualization. — Baden
So my green could be your blue, and yet you still manage to hand me the green cup when asked. So something more is going on here. — Banno
:up:we’re smart enough and sympathetic enough that we assume that other people experience much the same thing. We’re very good at projection. — Michael
I am certainly not arguing it is impossible to communicate them but it is difficult. The examples I have given is a sighted person who doesn't dream in images like me and My mother who hasn't had a headache. They can use the words "dream" and "headache" without referring to the same thing. — Andrew4Handel
I'd say it's the label given to the contents of the box. That's why we use the word "private" in the phrase "one's own private thought". If it was a label given to the box, which is public, then the phrase would be "one's own public thought".
Or, to use Wittgenstein's example, the phrase "the contents of the box" refers to the contents of the box, not to the box itself. — Michael
. In which case, how I am supposed to interpret a speaker as referring to my experiences? — sime
dispute that requirement. I can talk about the future. — Michael
The set {all things inside this box} is not the same as the things inside the box. The set could be empty. Just like the set {6,7,8,9} is neither 6, 7, 8, nor 9. The set {all things which are both A and not-A} has no members, one ca refer to the set, but one cannot refer to the members of it, since there are none. — Isaac
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