Ask yourself when you last acted as if there were no other people, no things, no animals, i.e. nothing other than yourself. When did you last refrain from eating because you doubted the existence of food? When did you last believe, and treat, people you see across the street from you as if they were only, e.g., 6 inches tall because that's how they appeared to be when you saw them, and thought that they became 6 feet tall when they crossed the street to speak to you — Ciceronianus
https://eprints.whiterose.ac.uk/1211/1/owensdj3.htmDescartes and Hume both distinguished beliefs produced by reason from beliefs produced by the imagination (i.e. by instinct, custom and habit), an imagination which we share with the beasts. In their view, a method of belief formation presents itself as a method of reasoning only if it appears to justify certainty about its conclusions. Any method of belief formation which fails to promise certainty must first be vindicated by a proper method of reasoning before we can rely on it. And if this can’t be done, we must admit that to form beliefs by that method is to yield to the workings of our imagination. Since induction could not be so vindicated, Hume made the required admission:
"the experimental reasoning, which we posses in common with the beasts, and on which the whole conduct of life depends, is nothing but a species of instinct or mechanical power that acts in us unknown to ourselves (my italics) (Hume 1975: 108)
And he thought the same applied to any method of belief formation. For Hume, ‘belief produced by reason’ is an empty category; for him, our beliefs are governed by the very principles of instinct and imagination which rule the mental lives of the beats. — D. Owens.
...how pervasive a problem do you see this kind of thinking as being within the contemporary philosophical community as a whole , or the history of philosophy? — Joshs
When did you last ponder whether the car you're driving was in fact a car having the characteristics of a car as you understand them to be, or instead something else you can never know (if, indeed, it was anything at all)? — Ciceronianus
"Affectation" according to the Merriam-Webster Dictionary Online, is:
"a. Speech or conduct not natural to oneself: an unnatural form of behavior meant especially to impress others; b. the act of taking on or displaying an attitude not natural to oneself or not genuinely felt." — Ciceronianus
Apart from your disagreement with Descartes, how pervasive a problem do you see this kind of thinking as being within the contemporary philosophical community as a whole , or the history of philosophy? — Joshs
Hume elsewhere confesses that he does indeed expect the future to be like the past, and the ground not to collapse beneath him. — unenlightened
My understanding that he is not in fact attacking the common-sense understanding of the world at all, Rather he is attacking the over-reach of "reasoning". — unenlightened
My suspicion is that it is found in those with a little philosophy, but not enough. — Banno
What was Simon Blackburn’s quote - everyone is a realist when they walk out the door. — Tom Storm
I think this is all a dream, but it's a remarkably persistent and painful dream that I'm currently unable to wake up from. — RogueAI
have a thing where I lose confidence that the road in front of me will be there when I get to it. I think it's along the lines of OCD. I get through it by humming. For some reason, the worst drive is through West Virginia when the big open valleys appear between the peaks. In other words, philosophy probably isn't for you. :razz: — frank
Well, one is left wondering if some professional philosophers were unduly pretentious. If not He of the Great Moustache, then certainly some of his acolytes; Feyerabend, maybe - Hero of the Left as he was; a few more recent French "thinkers", perhaps...
But one's prejudices will show: I'm authentic, you are ostentatious, he's a wanker. — Banno
Why call it a dream, then? — Ciceronianus
And besides, one has to try on different philosophies for size, so to speak, given them a trial run. That's not hypocrisy. — baker
Because I think it is one. I don't think non-conscious non-mental stuff can produce minds and consciousness. — RogueAI
What happens when you wake up? — Ciceronianus
As you say, such things are normally put forth as though experiments. What they generally try to show is that the common sense explanation of things cannot be the case, not that the silly view is the case. This isn't always true, but it often is. I think that when people embrace extremely counter intuitive ideas of the world, it is because the problems with the naive view start to become insurmountable. — Count Timothy von Icarus
Which I think some (like me, maybe) would maintain constitutes a confession he himself
disregards the claims he makes in philosophy all the time. One would think that should make a difference to him, and to others, in assessing the validity and value of his claims.
I think those like Austin show that in most cases, if not in all of them, the "naive view" starts to "become insurmountable" only due to confusion and error
I think those like Austin show that in most cases, if not in all of them, the "naive view" starts to "become insurmountable" only due to confusion and error. — Ciceronianus
This isn't inconsistent with Hume saying that "of course we still end up using inductive reasoning, because we sort of have to." — Count Timothy von Icarus
This isn't inconsistent with Hume saying that "of course we still end up using inductive reasoning, because we sort of have to." — Count Timothy von Icarus
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