Not primordial, as language only began about 50,000 to 150,000 years ago. — RussellA
My approach to "the world is all that is the case" is similar to that of Markus Gabriel: — RussellA
In my view, those totality of words do not refer to anything which is capable of having the property of existence" — RussellA
Users of the same language agree to a basic meaning of a word, even though they can have very different concepts as to its particular meaning. For example, an Australian living in Alice Springs will have a very different concept of the word "grass" to an American living in Spokane. — RussellA
I think Gabriel is missing the point. The world as that which is the case is methodically minimally specified. If Gabriel says that that kind of metaphysics is vague, he is describing what is the case, talking about the world --- as whatever is the case. — plaque flag
I think the distinction is that the direct realist believes that apples and their properties are manifest in conscious experience such that how an object appears is how it is (even when it doesn't appear), whereas the indirect realist believes that the properties which are manifest in conscious experience (e.g. shapes and colours and tastes and smells) are properties only of conscious experience, albeit causally covariant with (and perhaps in a sense representative of) apples and their properties. — Michael
experience is not-real though causally connected to what is real — Moliere
So how do you get to the properties of objects outside of the body when shapes, colours, tastes, and smells are properties that are only inside conscious experience, which is restricted to brain activity? — Moliere
Just how you avoid what appears to be the problem for indirect realism: perception is indirectly connected to reality. So how does science get directly connected to reality such that the inference that it is indirectly connected isn't self defeating, and doesn't lead one back to direct perception? — Moliere
Scientific scripture, in its most canonical form, is embodied in physics (including physiology). Physics assures us that the occurrences which we call ''perceiving objects'' are at the end of a long causal chain which starts from the objects, and are not likely to resemble the objects except, at best, in certain very abstract ways. We all start from "naive realism', i.e., the doctrine that things are what they seem. We think that grass is green, that stones are hard, and that snow is cold. But physics assures us that the greenness of grass, the hardness of stones, and the coldness of snow, are not the greenness, hardness, and coldness that we know in our own experience, but something very different. The observer, when he seems to himself to be observing a stone, is really, if physics is to be believed, observing the effects of the stone upon himself. Thus science seems to be at war with itself; when it most means to be objective, it finds itself plunged into subjectivity against its will. Naive realism leads to physics, and physics, if true, shows that naive realism is false. Therefore naive realism, if true, is false; therefore it is false.
I'm trying to puzzle through how you make indirect realism coherent. — Moliere
So it's real, but maybe conscious experiences' properties are different from the properties of whatever is outside of our bodies, and whatever is outside of our conscious experience? — Moliere
I feel pain when I put my hand in the fire. The pain I feel is "in my head". Do you understand this much? Now just replace "feel pain" with "see red" and "put my hand i the fire" with "open my eyes and look in that direction". It's the exact same principle. — Michael
Yes. Different things have different properties. Pain is a type of brain activity, and apples don't have brain activity so don't have properties of pain. Red is a type of brain activity, and apples don't have brain activity so don't have properties of red. — Michael
Wittgenstein's "The world is all that is the case" is poetry. — RussellA
Just look at perception from a purely biological perspective. Electromagnetic radiation stimulates the rods and cones in the eyes. This sends signals to the occipital lobe which processes visual information, which is then sent to the temporal lobe where the visual information is processed into memory and to the frontal lobe where the visual information is processed into intellectual reasoning and decision-making.
Now what happens if we ignore the eyes entirely and find some other means to activate the occipital lobe, such as with cortical implants or the ordinary case of dreaming? I would say that the subject undergoes a conscious experience. And I would say that their conscious experience is one of visual imagery, such as shapes and colours. Seeing shapes and colours does not require electromagnetic radiation stimulating the rods and cones in the eyes (or an apple to reflect said light). Seeing shapes and colours only requires the activation of the appropriate parts of the cerebral cortex.
Given that seeing shapes and colours only requires the activation of the appropriate parts of the cerebral cortex, regardless of what triggers it, it's understandable why one would argue that the shapes and colours we see are "in the head" and not properties of apples. Seeing shapes and colours is no different in principle to feeling pain or hot or cold. — Michael
And as far as I can tell you believe two things exist: science, and experience. Science is what is real, and experience is what is indirectly connected to science. — Moliere
I feel pain when I put my hand in the fire. — Michael
You must mean (?) that you feel pain when an internal image shows you 'your' hand in a fire. — plaque flag
I don't mean that. — Michael
My gripe is that indirect realism smuggles in naive realism to set itself up with a world in which social organisms have sense organs and nervous systems. Taking all of that for granted, then intermediate images or some kind of dualism is postulated. — plaque flag
OK. So...what is a fire then really ? What is your hand really ? — plaque flag
Bundles of superstring according to one theory. — Michael
Why would math be more real than color ? — plaque flag
I'm not saying that math is more real than colour. I'm saying that colour is a type of sensation, i.e. brain activity, not a property of apples. — Michael
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