But it's not. I claim that you've simply adopted bad assumptions from a more primitive era of philosophy. — plaque flag

The self this side of the senses may be in part shaped by what is on the other side of the senses from information passing through the senses, but the self doesn't exist the other side of its senses.

That is, not unless one has the belief in telekinesis, psychic empathy and the paranormal.

The self this side of the senses may be in part shaped by what is on the other side of the senses from information passing through the senses, but the self doesn't exist the other side of its senses.

That is, not unless one has the belief in telekinesis, psychic empathy and the paranormal. — RussellA

As I see it, the whole idea that the self is some gremlin in a control room, redeyed peeping at screens, only guessing at what lives outside its bunker, is a wacky viral meme. Part of its allure is that it seems so humble and careful. It minimizes assumption.

But all of this is a mutation of something real. As a discursive self in a social world, you ought indeed be careful about making claims. It's only in this world where people can punish you or alligators can eat you that such caution about claims and beliefs can matter.

Just look at what you are doing and the assumptions you enact without yet noticing them. You invoke spooky stuff like telekineses as if people who dare to believe they live in a real world with other people are the silly ones. Are you not telling me you are trapped in an illusion ? I respectfully urge you to reconsider this crazy story that came out of old books.

Animals of all sort have no conception of pain but do a good job of avoiding fire. — Richard B

If animals are able to avoid pain but without any conception of pain, then they are no more than automatons, machines. If animals are no more than machines, as it would not be morally reprehensible to hit a machine with a hammer, society would not be disapproving of animal cruelty.

Society is disapproving of animal cruelty because society accepts that animals do have the concept of pain, even if the animal has no verbal language to express it.

For example, see the article Animal cognition and the evolution of human language: why we cannot focus solely on communication

As I see it, the whole idea that the self is some gremlin in a control room, redeyed peeping at screens, only guessing at what lives outside its bunker, is a wacky viral meme. — plaque flag

There is the screen, which are the senses. The question is, how do we have knowledge of what is on the other side of the screen, the other side of the senses.

Hegel presented the problem in The Phenomenology of Mind where he wrote:
For if knowledge is the instrument by which to get possession of absolute Reality, the suggestion immediately occurs that the application of an instrument to anything does not leave it as it is for itself, but rather entails in the process, and has in view, a moulding and alteration of it.
Or, again, if knowledge is not an instrument which we actively employ, but a kind of passive medium through which the light of the truth reaches us, then here, too, we do not receive it as it is in itself, but as it is through and in this medium.

The problem is, how do we know what exists on the other side of our senses independently of our senses, when all the information about what is on the other side of our senses comes through our senses.

The "Realist" in Indirect Realist means that the Indirect Realist believes that there is a real world the other side of one's senses, and that we can certainly be eaten by alligators. The Direct Realist also believes we can be eaten by alligators. The Indirect Realist and Direct Realist agree that we can only know about alligators through our senses. The Indirect and Direct Realist disagree about in which world this alligator exists. There are different worlds, i) inside the mind, ii) inside the minds of a community, iii) external to any mind and iv) the sum of all these.

My question to the Direct Realist remains. How can we know what is truly the other side of our senses, when, as Hegel pointed out, our senses alter what we know about what is the other side of our senses ?

Hegel was setting up that bowling pin to knock it down. Did you not finish the quote ?

I'm just using Bard for the first time. I prompted it and got these replies for you.

Solipsism can be seen as parasitic upon common sense because it relies on common sense assumptions in order to even be formulated. For example, the solipsist must assume that they have sense organs, that they can see other people's sense organs, and that other people are real. If the solipsist did not make these assumptions, then they would not be able to even conceive of the idea of solipsism.

In other words, solipsism is a position that can only be taken from within the framework of common sense. It is a position that is parasitic upon common sense, and it cannot stand on its own.

***
It is absurd to make the sense organs the product of the sense organs because it is a circular
argument.

The problem is, how do we know what exists on the other side of our senses independently of our senses, when all the information about what is on the other side of our senses comes through our senses. — RussellA

Your use of we is a tacit acknowledge of that inferential norms are public --- and that we are discursive, worldly persons, not imps locked up in a cage made sense data. One can only create such a theory as a citizen of the world who sees sense organs and takes them as real.

Your use of we is a tacit acknowledge of that inferential norms are public — plaque flag

Exactly, the Indirect Realist believes that there is a world the other side of their senses, an inferential world. A conclusion reached on the basis of evidence and reasoning, not because we have direct knowledge of it.

Hegel was setting up that bowling pin to knock it down. — plaque flag

Hegel clearly sets up the problem - here - as to how we know what is the other side of our senses.

The Indirect Realist argues in Hegel's terms that there is knowledge on one side and an Absolute on the other side.

Within the quote forwarded, Hegel says that this is a presupposition, yet gives no reason or justification why this is a presupposition rather than a fact. He makes a statement.

How does Hegel explain how we can have direct knowledge of the Absolute the other side of our senses, yet such knowledge can only come through our senses, and our senses alter anything that passes though ?

Solipsism can be seen as parasitic upon common sense because it relies on common sense assumptions in order to even be formulated. — plaque flag

The Indirect Realist is not a Solipsist. Indirect Realism is the philosophical idea that other minds exist.

It is absurd to make the sense organs the product of the sense organs because it is a circular
argument. — plaque flag

Neither the Indirect nor Direct Realist would argue that their perceptions are of their sense organs rather than what has passed through their sense organs.

As an Indirect Realist, I directly see a tree, I don't see the image of a tree.

You challenge me (within the norms of politeness too, another ethical frame) in the name of inferential norms, calling upon me to defend my claim. Indeed, in making that came, I have indeed committed myself to its defense. If I can't defend a strong challenge, it's my duty to withdraw or modify the claim. — plaque flag

Ultimately, epistemic agreements and disagreements rest upon assumptions as to what speakers means by their words:

Doesn't it strike you as odd, the assumption that a person can believe in something impossible? For what is said to be impossible is also said to not exist, and so cannot be said to be the cause of the person's belief. So how can a belief even refer to something that is impossible?

And what then of falsified beliefs? Aren't they also a problematic concept for similar reasons, for weren't one's previously held beliefs, that one presently judges to be "falsified", also caused by something that fully explains their previous existence?


Isn't a physicalist, who is committed to a causal understanding of cognition, forced in the name of objective science to always side with the epistemic opinions of the speaker, no matter how wrong, mad or contradictory the speaker might sound? For shouldn't the physicalist always interpret a speaker's utterances in the same manner that he interprets as a sneeze that is understood to refer to nothing more than it's immediate causes?

(When interpreted with empathy, do Flat-Earther's really exist?)

One supports this approach phenomenologically, which is to say by simply bringing us to awareness of what we have been doing all along. Scan this forum. See us hold one another responsible for keeping our stories straight. See which inferences are tolerated, which rejected. Bots can learn this stuff from examples, just as children do. — plaque flag

From the perspective of an engineer who has a causal understanding of AI technology and a responsibility to fix it, the gibberish spoken by an "untrained" or buggy chatbot is meaningful in a way that it isn't for a naive user of technology who is intending to play a different language-game with it. And obviously, any agent of finite capacity can only learn to play well at one language game at the expense of doing worse at the others.

I am also not allowed to contradict myself, for the self is the kind of thing (almost by definition) that ought not disagree with itself --- must strive toward coherence, to perform or be a unity. — plaque flag

When you find yourself disagreeing with the beliefs of your earlier self, are you really contradicting your earlier self? For didn't the facts of the matter change that you were responding to?

Consider a sequence of beliefs {b 1,b 2, b 3 ...} regarding the truth of the "liar sentence" L unfolded over time, where L = "this statement is false" :

b 1. Presently at time t = 1, L is believed to be true.
b 2. Presently at time t = 2, b 1 is understood to imply that L is false, and hence that b 1 is false.
b 3. Presently at time t = 3, b 2 is understood to imply that L is true, and hence that b 2 is false.
b 4. Presently at time t = 4, b 3 is understood to imply that L is false, and hence that b 3 is false.

In spite of the fact that each belief negates the previous one, each belief can nevertheless be considered to be "true" at the time of it's construction without entailing contradiction with any of the other beliefs, for none of the beliefs were simultaneously held to be true, and each belief refers to a different object, namely it's own temporal context.

Society is disapproving of animal cruelty because society accepts that animals do have the concept of pain, even if the animal has no verbal language to express it. — RussellA

Your pet does not need a concept of digestion in order for it to digest food. So, please feed your pet if you think it does not have the concept of digestion, or it will starve.

Your pet does not need a concept of digestion in order for it to digest food — Richard B

Neither do humans. But there cannot be any doubt that pets have the concept of hunger, as well as pain, even though they don't have a verbal language with the words hunger and pain.

They are living creatures, not machines, which is why it is not socially acceptable to hit pets as it is socially acceptable to hit machines.

Is it socially acceptable to hit a machine that is providing medical assistance to a human being?

Probably not, and it would be nonsense to assume the machine has a concept of human pain.

Is it socially acceptable to hit a machine that is providing medical assistance to a human being? Probably not, and it would be nonsense to assume the machine has a concept of human pain. — Richard B

No, it wouldn't be, not because of the pain it would cause to the machine, but because of the pain it would cause to the human if they didn't receive medical assistance.

It is also not sociably acceptable to hit pets, not because of the pain it would cause to its owner, but because of the pain it would cause to the animal.

As an Indirect Realist, I directly see a tree, I don't see the image of a tree. — RussellA

Say what now ? Is that a typo ?

The indirect realist agrees that the coffee cup exists independently of me. However, through perception I do not directly engage with this cup; there is a perceptual intermediary that comes between it and me. ... The indirect realist claim is that all perception is mediated in something like this way. When looking at an everyday object it is not that object that we directly see, but rather, a perceptual intermediary.
https://iep.utm.edu/perc-obj/#H2

<recap>
We talk about the object and not some private internal image of the object, therefore it's cleaner to talk also of seeing the object and not some private internal image of the object.

Doesn't it strike you as odd, the assumption that a person can believe in something impossible? — sime

I don't believe in 'strict' impossibility. Roughly speaking, norms are fundamental here. Some sentences we can't make sense of or we don't find remotely plausible. This royal we is something like the high ground that individuals fight to assimilate and transform.

(When interpreted with empathy, do Flat-Earther's really exist?) — sime

Yes. They make claims about our world in our language. Their claims have inferential purchase. If I believe them, I will also believe implications of their claims --- which may be why I can't believe them, for their claims imply others that are not consistent with other of my beliefs.

A dynamic-evolving logic comes first here.

From the perspective of an engineer who has a causal understanding of AI technology — sime

I also know the tech pretty well, studied it in grad school, for whatever that is worth.

any agent of finite capacity can only learn to play well at one language game at the expense of doing worse at the others. — sime

As far I know, we humans are of finite capacity.

each belief can nevertheless be considered to be "true" at the time of it's construction without entailing contradiction with any of the other beliefs, — sime

I view the self as temporally stretched. The nowpoint of physic's time might not be relevant here. The liar statement is a fun example though, maybe because it helps show indirectly that the self must be consistent.

When you find yourself disagreeing with the beliefs of your earlier self, are you really contradicting your earlier self? — sime

Just to be clear, the point is to be coherent now. So you can imagine two bits that shouldn't both be on at the same time, with one of them having been on and the other being switched on. Zap ! Cognitive dissonance. A discursive self now has the duty to flip one of these bits off. This is a brutal oversimplification, but hopefully you see the point.

Say what now ? Is that a typo ? — plaque flag

No, certainly not a typo, as this is what I have been saying since page 2 of this thread.

The term "Indirect Realist" should be thought of as a name not a description, as some aspects of Indirect Realism are direct and some indirect.

I directly see a tree. There is no doubt about this. The question is, in what world is this tree. There are different worlds, i) the world in my mind ii) the world in the minds of a community iii) the world external to any mind iv) the world as a sum of all these. Problems arise in philosophical discussion when there is ambiguity in the meaning of "world". For example, Wittgenstein in Tractatus para 1 writes "the world is all that is the case.", and creates unnecessary debate by never explaining where this world is.

As Searle wrote:
The relation of perception to the experience is one of identity. It is like the pain and the experience of pain. The experience of pain does not have pain as an object because the experience of pain is identical with the pain. Similarly, if the experience of perceiving is an object of perceiving, then it becomes identical with the perceiving. Just as the pain is identical with the experience of pain, so the visual experience is identical with the experience of seeing.

From Searle, the experience of seeing a tree does not have seeing a tree as an object because the experience of seeing a tree is identical with seeing a tree.

We talk about the object and not some private internal image of the object — plaque flag

Exactly, for both the Indirect and Direct Realist. The passage from the IEP is consistent with my statement that "As an Indirect Realist, I directly see a tree, I don't see the image of a tree."

From the IEP Objects of Perception section 2:
The indirect realist agrees that the coffee cup exists independently of me. However, through perception I do not directly engage with this cup; there is a perceptual intermediary that comes between it and me. Ordinarily I see myself via an image in a mirror, or a football match via an image on the TV screen. The indirect realist claim is that all perception is mediated in something like this way. When looking at an everyday object it is not that object that we directly see, but rather, a perceptual intermediary.

It comes down to the fact that there are different worlds that tend to coalesce into a vague and unspecified mystical unknown whenever Indirect and Direct Realism is discussed.

In the world in my mind I directly see a tree and in the world that exists independently of me I indirectly see a tree.

Here's Hegel. — plaque flag

In your support of Direct Realism you referred to Hegel. Hegel clearly sets out the problem with Direct Realism in the passage linked to above.

But what is Hegel's solution to the problem of how can we know what is truly the other side of our senses, when our senses alter what we know about what is the other side of our senses ?

I directly see a tree. There is no doubt about this. The question is, in what world is this tree. There are different worlds, i) the world in my mind ii) the world in the minds of a community iii) the world external to any mind iv) the world as a sum of all these. — RussellA

I see. I claim: The world is not in your mind. The world is not in our minds.

There is just the one world that we all live in and see and talk about. Yes we need our nervous systems to do this, but we are not trapped behind or in that nervous system. I'm aware that others have claimed that we are, but I claim that this misunderstands the position of the philosopher within a space of reasons which is always already normative and social and worldly. If people deny this, they know not what they do, because they are telling my I am wrong about our world. Philosophical claims take for granted a logic that binds others within a negotiation or articulation of the discursive character of the world.

For example, Wittgenstein in Tractatus para 1 writes "the world is all that is the case.", and creates unnecessary debate by never explaining where this world is. — RussellA

It's a brilliant and difficult line. The world is all that is the case because it is the articulated world we talk about, the shared world we articulate. The world as articulated is all true statements. It's as if language is always already pointed at an otherwise indeterminate but primordially shared space. The world is the 'target' of claims. It is the wherein of our concerned beingthere. You might want to check out Heidegger on the issue of forehaving and various theoretical prejudices that interfere with grasping this 'object' (the world) correctly.

Just as the pain is identical with the experience of pain, so the visual experience is identical with the experience of seeing. — RussellA

I think Searle is on the edge of direct realism here, but I think 'pain' has its own weird grammar and distracts from contemplating seeing worldly objects. To me it's just better to say that I see the apple, the one out there in our world. Yes, I need my nervous system to do this. But my eyes and brain let me see this apple in our world directly. Yes, I need light to come from the apple to my retina. That's part of how I see the apple. But I don't see an image of the apple, and I don't see a private world in which the apple is given directly. I see the apple right there in our world, the world. And I talk about that apple. It is the case that an apple is there in front of me.

In the world in my mind I directly see a tree and in the world that exists independently of me I indirectly see a tree. — RussellA

That 'world in your mind' is basically the same as the internal image I've been talking about. I claim there is no world in your mind --- or that it's at least an inefficient way of talking.

In your support of Direct Realism you referred to Hegel. Hegel clearly sets out the problem with Direct Realism in the passage linked to above. — RussellA

I think you need to read the whole quote carefully. It's a difficult passage. He opens by sketching indirect realism. Then he makes fun of it. He says fear of error becomes fear of truth. Indirect realism seems humble to itself, but it's accidentally a bold theory which is taken for granted.

Following the general Renaissance custom, Locke defined an idea as a mental entity: “whatever is the object of the understanding when a man thinks.”
https://www.britannica.com/topic/Western-philosophy/The-Enlightenment

If a man is looking at an apple, thinking about eating it, then the object of his understanding is that apple in our world, the only world. But Locke and others created the myth of a tiny picture or internal private world inside people's heads. There were reasons this was tempting (mentalistic talk in ordinary language), but it leads to confusion. It's an oldfashioned idea, demolished in the 20th century by lots of thinkers (the later Wittgenstein and early Heidegger and Gilbert Ryle and...)

But what is Hegel's solution to the problem of how can we know what is truly the other side of our senses, when our senses alter what we know about what is the other side of our senses ? — RussellA

His solution is to point out that we aren't on the other side of our sense to begin with ---that this was all just a silly unjustified assumption from the beginning. He's articulating the assumption (that the world is transformed before we get it) in order to make it 'visible' and therefore optional. It's the assumptions we don't know we have made that trap us worse than all others. Phenomenology digs this stuff out and drags it into the light for investigation.

There is just the one world that we all live in and see and talk about. — plaque flag

The world that we live in and the world that we talk about refer to different worlds. There is more than just one possible world.

When you say "one world that we all live in" this could apply to a world external to any mind. When you say "the world that we...........talk about", this could apply to the world of language within a social community.

In addition, there is the total world, comprising both minds and everything external to minds.

There is also the world as experienced by each individual. It must be the case that each individual perceives the world differently. I cannot believe that the world as experienced by a thirteen year old growing up in Soweto is the same world as experienced by a fifty year old merchant banker in Wall Street, as you seem to be suggesting.

The world that exists outside language is certainly very different to the world existing within language.

Yes we need our nervous systems to do this, but we are not trapped behind or in that nervous system — plaque flag

The Indirect Realist would agree that we are not trapped behind our senses, in that the Indirect Realist has no problem interacting with either other people or the external world.

The world is all that is the case because it is the articulated world we talk about, the shared world we articulate — plaque flag

It seems highly unlikely that for 13.7 billion years before humans first appeared, the Universe didn't exist because it wasn't talked about.

Yes, I need light to come from the apple to my retina. That's part of how I see the apple. But I don't see an image of the apple, and I don't see a private world in which the apple is given directly. I see the apple right there in our world, the world — plaque flag

A wavelength of 700nm enters the eye and an electric signal travels up the optic nerve to the brain.

How is it possible to directly know what is on the other side of our senses, when the information we receive in the brain has come to us indirectly ?

He opens by sketching indirect realism. Then he makes fun of it. He says fear of error becomes fear of truth. — plaque flag

Fear of error becomes fear of truth is not a reasoned argument.

The Indirect Realist could equally well have said the same.

His solution is to point out that we aren't on the other side of our sense to begin with ---that this was all just a silly unjustified assumption from the beginning. — plaque flag

To say that the Indirect Realist's position that we are separated from the external world by our senses is a silly unjustified assumption is not a very strong argument.

There must be a stronger argument against Indirect Realism that that.

For example, why does Hegel say that it a silly unjustified assumption.

Yes, I need my nervous system to do this. But my eyes and brain let me see this apple in our world directly. Yes, I need light to come from the apple to my retina. That's part of how I see the apple. But I don't see an image of the apple, and I don't see a private world in which the apple is given directly. I see the apple right there in our world, the world. And I talk about that apple. It is the case that an apple is there in front of me. — plaque flag

Let's restart with something simple. Do we see colours?

The world that we live in and the world that we talk about refer to different worlds. — RussellA

No. That don't make sense. We talk about the world we care about --- the world we all live in together.

And which world are you talking about when you tell me this ?

There is also the world as experienced by each individual. It must be the case that each individual perceives the world differently. I cannot believe that the world as experienced by a thirteen year old growing up in Soweto is the same world as experienced by a fifty year old merchant banker in Wall Street, as you seem to be suggesting. — RussellA

Two people in the same room see the world through different pairs of eyes. But it's the same world.

Let's restart with something simple. Do we see colours? — Michael

We see red apples, the blue sky. We can talk about colors (as adjectives, concepts,...)

We see red apples, the blue sky. We can talk about colors (as adjectives, concepts,...) — plaque flag

Is the redness of an apple a mind-independent property of the apple?

To say that the Indirect Realist's position that we are separated from the external world by our senses is a silly unjustified assumption is not a very strong argument. — RussellA

Don't you see that it's the weird dudes who think they live behind screens that need to make a case ?

Our talk has always been directed toward others and about the one and only world, so it's pretty strange to invent internal images of the world just to explain the fact that people can be mistaken sometimes.

Indeed it is. Our perception (or our mind) of colour does not negate its existence. It’s a property of the Apple not a property of our perception of color.

Is the redness of an apple a mind-independent property of the apple? — Michael

I don't think 'mind-independent' is a very clear term. It might be better to say talk-independent or concept-independent. Then the emptiness of the phrase becomes obvious. It's the sound of one hand clapping.

I'm fine with the scientific image as an aspect of the encompassing (life-)world.