Hello Janus,

A robot, just like the person who suffers from visual agnosia can see and respond to what they are seeing, but do not have the self-reflective awareness of seeing.

I would argue that they do not “see” in the same manner (i.e., one is qualitatively seeing while the other is just quantitatively processing its environment), so I think you are equivocating when using the term “seeing” in this sentence to refer to both.

The way I interpret this is that both lack subjective experience (of seeing). To put it another way, both the robot and the blindsight person do not know that they can see.

I think it makes more sense, given that blindsight only demonstrates a disassociation with one’s experience, that the person simply isn’t meta-conscious of or perhaps able to identify with their qualitative experience.

If a person suffered agnosia in regard to all their senses, including proprioception and interoception, it would seem hard to say how they would differ from a robot that had functional equivalents of all the human senses, that is a robot that could respond to tastes, smells, tactile feels, sounds, and sights, as well as proprioceptive and interoceptive data.

As far as I understand, ‘agnosia’ is when one fails, despite having adequate senses, to process those senses; so a robot that can process senses would actually have more capability to navigate its environment than the human with agnosia. However, the human would still be qualitatively experiencing, they just fail to process that qualitative experience correctly. Part of qualitative experience, for normal people, is much more than what is required to have baseline ‘qualitative experience’ to me.

Bob

:kiss:

Hello Janus,

Perhaps it would be better to start afresh and in a more concrete way. You seem to be saying that by virtue of feeling our basic existences which you would characterize as "being a mind" (?) we can confidently extrapolate to a view of the basic nature of the cosmos. Are there other steps that need to be added in there or is that it?

Sounds like a plan!

I wouldn’t say that we should be idealists because we can “confidently extrapolate to a view of the nature of the cosmos” as mind, because one can be very confident in virtually any metaphysical theory. Here’s how I would word a simplified, general depiction of my view:

The theory of what reality fundamentally is that is the most parsimonious (viz., maximizes explanatory power while minimizing conceptual complexity), is internally & externally coherent (viz., how well does it cohere with one’s currently more highly prioritized beliefs, such as scientific facts?), is logically consistent (i.e., there’s no logical contradictions), is the most complete (i.e., what can’t it account for?), and aligns best with one’s intuitions (i.e., everyone relies, to some degree, on what “intellectual seems” to be the case). I submit to you that Analytic Idealism, that reality is fundamentally a mind, meets the aforementioned requirements better than physicalism (and any other possible metaphysical theory).

Why (is Analytic Idealism the best theory), you might ask? Well, long story short, it coheres perfectly with scientific knowledge, accounts for the entirety of our experience in the most parsimonious manner (in comparison to any other possible theory), and is logically consistent. The only areas, nowadays, where it suffers is that it is not intuitive to most people (although I think that after properly understanding it people could see it as intuitive) and it isn’t complete (but no other theory is other than the one’s that dream up magical wishful thinking to explain everything).

That would be the spark notes.

Bob

Hello Philosophim,

My intention was not to address the hard problem of consciousness. From the argument I've presented, you can see there is no hard problem to address.

I thought you were arguing that minds emerge from brains? Am I misunderstanding you? Or you are saying that the objective vs. subjective consciousness distinction is the out of scope of that claim?

If so, then I think it is very relevant to your claim implicitly because your distinction is predicated, as far as I am understanding, on an outlook that the mind is emergent from the brain. For example, to say that a camera + AI has qualia only makes sense if you are implicitly claiming that consciousness arises out of mechanical (i.e., quantitative) processes which immediately invokes the hard problem.

The reason I explicitly brought it up was because that was what the article you sent was talking about; sorry, I must have misunderstood what you were trying to cite by that article.

I want to ask you what you mean by qualia Bob.

Let me layout how I use the terms in their most generic sense:

Consciousness : qualitative experience.
Qualia: instances of qualitative experience (e.g., seeing a car, feeling a pillow, tasting an apple, etc.).
Meta-consciousness: self-knowledge: ability to acquire knowledge of one’s consciousness (e.g., I not only taste the apple, but I am aware of my tasting of the apple: I can gain knowledge of my own qualitative experience).

These terms are not compatible with your terms, so let me try to cross-reference:

Your use of consciousness is broader than mine, and I think my fits in your “subjective consciousness” category; but to me, you seem to also use my term sometimes to refer to “objective consciousness” as well, or at least I am confused as to whether you think that “objectively conscious” beings have qualitative experience or not? That’s all I mean by consciousness: observation and awareness are not synonymous with consciousness to me—I have found that it just muddies the waters when discussing the hard problem (which I know you are saying you aren’t trying to discuss here, but it is inevitably pertinent hereto).

Isn't this then an example of an objectively conscious being that lacks subjective consciousness? This is actually a limited example of a P-zombie.

No it is not a P-Zombie. Like I said before: there is a difference between not having subjective (qualitative) experience and being unable to identify it. I would argue that the blindsight person is still qualitatively seeing, they just don’t identify themselves as seeing. This could be because they simply don’t think they are having the qualitative experience (like the woman giving childbirth asking “who having this child?”) or that they have lost meta-consciousness when it comes to seeing (just like how some lower life forms have qualitative experience but they are unaware that they have it). A P-Zombie is a being with no qualitative experience, and I am not seeing why blindsight would be an example of such a being.

Qualia to my knowledge, is almost always identified as the experience one has. Qualia is seeing the color green as only you see it.

Correct: qualia is the instances of qualitative experience we have, which doesn’t necessarily mean per se that you see a different color green than I do.

If you believe qualia does not require consciousness

I do believe that qualia requires consciousness, but you refer to things that aren’t qualitatively experiencing as conscious; so under your terms, yes, I do think you are arguing that there could be a being which doesn’t have qualitative experience (or at least we don’t know if they do) but yet we can decipher that they are observing, identifying, and acting upon their environment (which meets your definition of consciousness). Within my terminology one has to be qualitatively experiencing (to some degree) to be conscious: it’s your view that your critique here applies I would say (i.e., If you believe qualia does not require qualitative experience, then what is special about the word qualia at all?). For you, you can cogently claim within your terms that one can be conscious without qualia.

At that point, a p-zombie has qualia, they are just not conscious of it. And if that is the case, then my point that subjective consciousness can be separated from objective consciousness stands does it not?

Again, I hold that P-Zombie are being which observe, identify, and act (to use your terms: conscious) but do not have qualitative experience (consciousness in my terms).

No, but how is that relevant? I'm not claiming that you need subjective consciousness for someone to claim you have objective consciousness. This example once again supports the division I'm noting.

But your division is just a broader definition of consciousness than what is typically used: non-qualitatively observing beings are not standardly included in the definition of consciousness.

As far as I am understanding your terms, there can be objectively conscious beings that are not subjectively conscious, and the former entails nothing about the latter. This entails two important things:

1. There is no bridge between the two, so I don’t think you can claim by abduction with criteria from objective consciousness (i.e., observing, acting, and identifying) that someone is subjectively conscious—and this is just the definition of epistemic solipsism.

2. The terms are perfectly cogent, as laid out, because it just includes more than I would be willing to semantically associate with “consciousness”. I would argue it is leading and will lead to confusions. For example, a philosophical zombie, when they say it isn’t conscious, they are not referring to your “objective consciousness”--so it would incorrect to think that a merely objectively conscious being is “conscious” for intents of the PZ debate. Consciousness is qualitative experience.

Although, I'm once again surprised to hear from you that you don't believe qualia comes from brain states. That's the assumed knowledge of science, psychology, and medicine. Its nothing I have to prove, its a given Bob.

I don’t know why you would say that it is given: that sounds awfully dogmatic. I figured you would have a proof for it, are you saying you just assume that is the case? Am I understanding you correctly?

Moreover, when you say it is assumed knowledge of science (and the other disciplines similar thereto) I think you are wrong and right—it doesn’t entail what you are implying. There’s a difference between scientific consensus and scientists having a consensus: the former is a consensus within a subject within the field of science, and the latter is merely a consensus amongst people who also have the professional of doing science. This is important to distinguish; for example, I think it is safe to say that most scientists are atheists, but I would be wrong to claim that “there is a scientific consensus that God doesn’t exist”--rather, it is really that “there is a consensus amongst scientists that God doesn’t exist”. Likewise, I could, with some truth, claim that “it is assumed that God doesn’t exist in science”. But whether God exists is not a scientific question but, rather, a theological one. Likewise, whether the brain produces consciousness is widely recognized as a matter of philosophy of mind which is metaphysics and not science. Yes, most scientists are physicalists, but that isn’t a scientific consensus—that’s scientists having a consensus.

Can you prove that qualia does not come from brain states? As I mentioned in your last OP, it is not in dispute by anyone within these fields that the mind comes from your brain

Firstly, yes it absolutely is disputed: not every scientist is a physicalist. Secondly, science doesn’t tell us whether the brain produces consciousness.

Thirdly, no I cannot prove that qualia cannot come from brain states but, rather, I can prove that methodological naturalism (which is the same method as science) cannot account for consciousness as brain states. There’s no proof that consciousness is produced by the brain, and so, within metaphysics, it becomes a question of what has the most explanatory power (in terms of explaining the world we experience) while minimizing complexity (of the explanation). Physicalism is less parsimonious than idealism. It’s not about proving it impossible; if that was the case then I should hold that unicorns exist on the other side of the galaxy, that there is an invisible cookie monster that watches me sleep, that there is a teacup floating around saturn, that everything is within my mind, etc.

We can't under my view. We can believe them. We can observe the objective conscious actions they take and assume they must be experiencing qualia

To clarify though, you are saying that determining someone is objectively conscious does not entail that they have qualia, correct?

To clarify, we can't say its the entire cause. When something affects another, that result of that affectation is part of the chain of causality.

I was getting at that correlation is different than causation. When we determine something causes something else, we provide proof in the form of empirical observations and conceptual explanations. We don’t just say: this impact that, so this caused that if we can’t conceptually explain what is actually happening.

But we can certainly say that it has an influence in producing mind, therefore is part of the cause of qualia

I disagree. We can say that consciousness is impacted by brain states which doesn’t entail, in itself, that the brain is influencing the production of the mind.

To claim that there is something else besides brain states would require an example of something besides a brain state affecting qualia.

No it wouldn’t. The claim is that “something else is producing qualia” only has to rely on the fact that the something in question isn’t regarded as producing it. We can’t claim that we know brain states are producing it, so we venture out by claiming “something else might be producing it”. Then, we examine what is the best explanation for the mind-body problem: I would argue it is the exact reverse of what you are claiming: the physical is weakly emergent from the mental, not vice-versa. The reason there’s such a strong correlation is because the physical are representations and at rock bottom it is minds “interacting” with minds so to speak. We have direct, introspective knowledge of ideas being manifested within the physical, whereas we have no knowledge of the physical producing the mental. I think it is more parsimonious to hold consciousness as fundamental.

In what way does the brain have a qualitative state that cannot be explained by the brain alone?

All of it: science doesn’t provide any conceptual explanation of how any mental state is produced by any brain state.

Do you have any example of something else besides the brain which would affect the mind?

I don’t claim that there is something else besides mind, some other third substance, that producing mind but, rather, that mind is fundamental. Mind is affecting mind: ontologically there are ideas in a mind. In schopenhaurian terms: the world is will and representation.

Bob

Hello Janus,

What I really meant was that unless either of us can come up with some new and convincing arguments, neither of us seems likely to change their mind. So, I wasn't calling a halt to the conversation tout court.

Oh, I apologize: I must have misunderstood. If you would like, then I can resume our conversation by responding to your original post (that we left off on)? It is entirely up to you and what you are comfortable with.

I've enjoyed conversing with you, Bob, on account of your being able to engage without distorting what your interlocutor is saying, and to remain patient and civil throughout.

Thank you and same to you my friend!

Bob

Hello 180 Proof,

There are not any grounds to believe I am a BiV and compelling evidence that I am not

And this is why I would claim my thoughts are mine. We aren’t saying anything different, as far as I am understanding.

I take your evasive reply as you conceeding the point, Bob, that without public evidence one does not "know" one is not hallucinating

This is just false. If you have to have public evidence to know if you are hallucinating, then you, by your own argument, even under naturalism, can’t prove your thoughts are yours. Likewise, if it were just you left on the planet, you wouldn’t, by your lights, be able to prove ever that anything is not a hallucination.

Other than ideas (re: "idealism"), to what does this phrase refer?

Idealism refers, most broadly, to any metaphysical theory that posits mind as primary (to include less conventional views like Kantianism); and, more specifically, it usually refers to a substance monist view that there is one mental substance which contains mental properties and minds which are responsible for them. The phrase etymologically stems from the word “idea” and “ideal”, but that doesn’t mean it is refers to the metaphysical theory that everything, literally, is an idea.

Bob

Hello Mww,

There’s a box on the shelf at the post office….
(a.k.a., a thing-in-itself)
Guy brings you the box….
(a.k.a, your perception of a thing)
….hands it to you….
(a.k.a., square, solid, heavy, your intuition of a thing)
You open the box….
(a.k.a., the content of your intuition, packaging material, something in a plastic bag, is a phenomenon)
Phenomenon gets passed on to the cognitive part for object determination.

I appreciate the analogy: thank you!

Here’s what I am trying to say in terms of that analogy: the idea that the box is a thing-in-itself which is, by definition, that which we cannot know and my intuition of the box (when I open) it is a phenomena which is a representation of that thing which we cannot know, then it seems self-undermining; for the box as thing-in-itself on the shelf is merely an abstraction (assuming I am not looking at, then it becomes a phenomena) based off of phenomenal boxes. If one were to posit there is something of which we cannot know, then I would reckon we can’t know anything about it—including that we are even representing anything in the first place (because our notion of representating things-in-themselves is just an abstraction of our phenomenal experience, which is supposed to give us no insight into the things-in-themselves). Perhaps you can clarify my confusion with that analogy?

You still don’t know what the content of the box is, only that the box has something in it, and you never would have had the opportunity to find out if it had stayed on the shelf at the post office. You could have lived your entire life without knowledge of the content of that box even while knowing full well post offices contain a manifold of all sorts of boxes; you can only know the contents of boxes handed to you. And, at this point, the last thing to cross your mind is how the box got to the post office in the first place, a.k.a., its ontological necessity

This sounds like maybe you don’t hold that we cannot know the things-in-themselves that appear to us, is that correct?

Analogies really suck, when it comes right down to it, there’s never a perfect one

I agree!

Phenomena are only one of three general classes of representation, the other two are conceptions and judgement, which is technically the representation of a representation.

My point is that you have to use your representation to argue that we have the other two classes, and if that class is supposed to give us zero knowledge of what actually is then that makes me wonder what grounds there are to say there are two other classes beyond that class (if we are using that class to determine the other two).

In other words, we start with just empirical inquiry (which can be as basic as introspection) and so we start with phenomena. We then reverse engineer that we those appearances that we are analyzing are produced by a representational system which has two other classes of representation and what not. We use phenomena to argue there is something beyond phenomena: but this isn’t compatible with the claim that phenomena give us zero insight to non-phenomenal things.

Sorting out the illusory has nothing to do with phenomena. Reason, the faculty that subjects judgement to principles to determine the logical relation of cognitions to each other, separates the illusory from the rational. Humans can confuse/delude themselves in their thinking, without the possibility of experience correcting them, hence phenomena are irrelevant.

I didn’t follow this part. Kant is very avidly arguing that phenomena give us no insight into the things-in-themselves, and I would say his argument for them (i.e. transcendental argumentation) is predicated on reverse engineering the phenomena—so, by my lights, illusions is just the working out by comparison different phenomenal experiences from each other to see how a particular thing (as a phenomean) expresses itself sans other factors (that can produce illusions).

That which assembles the parts of the representation of a perception in order, is intuition. That which assembles intuitions in order for successive perceptions of the same thing, is logic. In this way, it is not necessary to learn what thing is at each perception, but only understanding that either it’s already been learned, and subsequent perceptions conform to it, or they do not. Already been learned taken as a euphemism for experience.

In the tripartite human logical sub-system in syllogistic form of synthetic conjunction, understanding is the faculty of rules, by which phenomena provided a posteriori are taken as the major premise, conceptions provided a priori by understanding according to rules, serves as the minor premise or series of minors, the logical relation of one to the other is represented in a judgement, which serves as the conclusion.

Thank you for the elaboration, but I am still not completely following. My question was what is the logical part of the representation system and, if I may add now, what the representation system is—not in the sense of every piece or part that produces how it works but, rather, ontologically what it is. A thing-in-itself vs. a phenomena are ontological statuses, so to speak, (viz., one exists merely as an appearance and the other the represented existent things beyond space and time): what ontological status does the logical part of the representational system have it is not a thing-in-itself nor an appearance. I get it is a logical system, but ontologically what is it?

Oh man. And we haven’t even started on the aspect of human cognition that is completely logical, which just means there’s no dogs or kids or sensations of any kind, and nobody to tell you how wrong you are. You know this is the case, because you’ve conceived the notion of a universal mind as a completely valid and no one can tell you you’re wrong, that the conception is invalid, but only that the synthesis of the manifold of conceptions conjoined to the major, used by each, don’t relate in the same way, or do not relate at all, which only invalidates the one judgement relative to the other.

I didn’t quite follow this either: someone can prove me wrong about there being a universal mind. I don’t take it as absolutely true.

Bob

Hello 180 Proof,

How do you know that you are not hallucinating "that you have thoughts"? or that those alleged "thoughts" are yours and not someone elses "thoughts"?

This is just unparsimonious hard skepticism. How do you know that you aren’t a brain in a vat? You don’t.

I know that I am having thoughts because it accounts for the data (i.e., the thoughts occuring in my head) most parsimoniously. I can’t be certain that I am not in a matrix, within a matrix, within another matrix, … .

I don't understand what you mean by "metaphysically necessary". At least as far as (e.g.) property dualism is concerned, the negation of "universal mind" – mental substance – is not a contradiction.

Of course it isn’t a logical contradiction, but, then again, literally every sophisticated metaphysical theory is logically consistent—so it isn’t saying much.

If by “contradiction” you were referring to “metaphysical impossibility”, then, yes, under Analytic Idealism, there is nothing with any potency to produce a mind-independent world. In other words, the Universal Mind is posited as existing in all possible worlds, and that excludes the possibility of any mind-independent objects.

... and yet you claim to be monist positing "mental substance" wherein there are only ideas. :roll:

I am not claiming that a “mental substance” is a substrate which only bears ideas: it bears mental properties and minds which are responsible thereof.

Bob

Hello Janus,

I don't think we are going to agree on these things, so maybe we should leave it before we start going around in circles.

Absolutely no worries! I can respond more adequately if you would like, but it seems like you are hinting that you would like to end the conversation. I appreciate you having a conversation with me about it and look forward to many more to come!

Bob

Hello Philosophim,

I appreciate you sharing those links with me: blindsight is, indeed, a very interesting topic. I read through the article and, long story short, I do not think that the author provided a resolution (nor a partial resolution nor a method to providing a resolution) to the hard problem of consciousness. Although the scientific inquiry into how consciousness relates to the brain is most definitely a fascinating subject and fruitful, I did not find anything the author was citing as evidence as proof of consciousness being emergent from brains.

Firstly, blindsight, and many other related disabilities (e.g., blindhearing, blindtaste, etc.), is the dissociation of a person with their qualia and not the absense of qualia. The author even admits this implicitly:

To DB himself, his success in guessing seemed quite unreasonable. So far as he was concerned, he wasn’t the source of his perceptual judgments, his sight had nothing to do with him.
…
One of the most striking facts about human patients with blindsight is that they don’t take ownership of their capacity to see.

Of course, a person who lacks the ability to associate their qualia with themselves is going to say that they aren’t seeing anything when, in fact, they obviously are. This is no different than people who lose all sense of self: they don’t thereby lose their qualitative experience but, rather, their ability to identify it as theirs. I heard a fascinating story of a woman who suffered from complete loss of self; and during childbirth, she kept frantically asking “who’s having the child?”. Does the fact that she can’t associate herself with her own childbirth prove (or even suggest) that she isn’t giving birth to a child? Of course not! Does the fact that someone can’t associate themselves with their own qualitative seeing prove (or even suggest) that they aren’t having it? Of course not! So, right off the bat, I think the author mistakenly thought that neuroscience was proving that qualia is gone with patients suffering from blindsight: no, they still have qualia.

Secondly, I would like to note that I have no problem admitting that brain states and mental states are inextricably linked and, thusly, damage to the brain directly affects the mental activity (and abilities) of a mind. So, I have no problem admitting that it may be possible for a person to lose all sense of self (viz., self-identity), meta-consciousness (i.e., self-knowledge), etc. but as long as they are alive they are having qualitative experience to some degree—even if they don’t recognize it.

Thirdly, throughout the article the author, despite recognizing their work as pertaining to the hard problem, didn’t give any solution to it other than vague notions of evolutionary processes:

Their properties are to be explained, therefore, not literally as the properties of brain-states, but rather as the properties of mind-states dreamed up by the brain.
...
I believe sensations originated as an active behavioural response to sensory stimulation: something the animal did about the stimulus rather than something it felt about it.
…
In short, the animal can begin to get a feel for the stimulus by accessing the information already implicit in its own response. This, I believe, is the precursor of subjective sensation. But, of course, it will not at first be sensation as we humans know it: it will not have any special phenomenal quality.

In short, none of this explainshow mind-independent stuff produces mind. Also, the first sentence (I quoted) doesn’t even make any sense: if qualia are properties of mind-states rather than brain-states, then that means it is irreducible to brain-states—there’s some extra “mind stuff” happening that has those uniquely qualitative properties. If not, then the author still has to provide how the brain-states are producing the so-called “mind-states” that, in turn, produce such properties. I know you don’t like camps, but to summarize here briefly, their argument sounds like a mixture of property dualism and physicalism in a manner that is incapable with eachother. Maybe I misunderstanding something.

The last thing I will comment on (for now) about the article was the 6 criteria of investigating whether an animal is conscious (according to the author), which were:

1. Have a robust sense of self, centred on sensations?
2. Engage in self-pleasuring activities – be it listening to music or masturbation?
3. Have notions of ‘I’ and ‘you’?
4. Carry their sense of their own identity forward?
5. Attribute selfhood to others?
6. Lend out their minds so as to understand others’ feelings?

None of these have anything to do with the hard problem.

I think it is important that we separate two different claims that we have since been mushing together: knowing how qualitative experience is for a being is different than knowing that they have it. So, when you say:

Do I know the exact qualia of someone else getting blacked out? No. But I know my own.

I agree, but I want to clarify some things. Firstly, I don’t see how you can prove that a being is having qualitative experience (under your view)--not just how they are experiencing it themselves. Secondly, the hard problem has nothing to do with either of these two: it is about how something mind-independent produces mind, which is not the same claim as “how a being experiences qualia” or “how one knows that other’s have qualia”: the former doesn’t matter and the latter is a presupposition of the formulation of the problem.

If it is the case that we can use quantitative processes to change our own qualia, then the argument I made stands and you're still holding a contradiction.

Another important clarification I think we need is that knowing that something affects something else does not entail, in itself, that it causes it. You can certainly prove that quantitative processes affect qualia, but not that the former produces the latter: these are two different claims. I have no problem admitting that qualia is affected by quantitative processes; but, I would say, we cannot fully account for all emergent properties of a human being (specifically mental properties) by means of the quantitative processes of the physical properties, whereas we can with a camera + AI. So there’s a symmetry breaker there.

Secondly, I would like to note, although it may be too far beyond the scope of our conversation right now, that I don’t actually hold there are quantities ontologically. Just like how I think the “sun” is a nominal distinction, so is mathematics: it isn’t real. So yeah, I am a mathematical anti-realist: I’m sure we probably disagree on that (; But, the important thing to note is that from the perspective of everything being mind, the camera and all its “quantitative” processes are a steady flow of qualities and our quantifying of those qualities is just an approximate thereof. The reason I was using the “quantitative cannot produce qualities” argument was to keep this friendly to physicalist notions, because a mind-independent world usually entails that reality is fundamentally quantitative and qualities are only emergent with minds.

Where is the evidence of qualia? If I operate on a dog and open up the brain, do I see the image and smell the smells the dog is experiencing? No

We know by abductive argumentation: I have evidence of my qualia, and, on the other “side” of it, I am a physical organism which operates the exact same (just with more superior functionality) to a dog—so the best explanation is that the dog is also qualitatively experiencing. Otherwise, one runs into unparsimonious explanations (e.g., my dog is obviously dreaming right now….but he could be a philosophical zombie that isn’t really dreaming).

You are right that PZs can’t be disprove because they are unfalsifiable; however, they are not the best explanation of organisms around us at all.

I look forward to hearing from you,
Bob

Hello Philosophim,

Thank you for the clarifications: now that I have a better grasp (hopefully) of what you are saying, let me offer some worries/critiques I have. To simplify it down, here are the three main ones:

1. The fact that a being observes, identifies, and acts does not entail, in itself, that it has qualia.

2. The fact that a being has qualia does not entail, in itself, that there is something to be like it.

3. Qualia is irreducible to brain states.

I will let you navigate the discussion where you deem fit. Apart from the parts of your post (that I think) fall under one of the above categories, here’s my responses:

But beliefs about something are not objective, therefore they do not belong in objective analysis or discussion

Beliefs are behavioral attitudes towards things which are objective and, as such, absolutely pertain to objective inquiry. I don’t think you can name a single field of study which isn’t predicated on beliefs—not even science.

We use beliefs to try and figure out what reality is, and most of our “knowledge” is made up of beliefs about the world (based off of evidence): this includes science and any empirical inquiry anyone can do.

For example, I believe that “every change has a cause”, and this is one of the axioms of science—one of the axioms of studying objectively brains.

I don’t think you can neatly separate beliefs from some sort of objective inquiry like you are implying.

And yet that's not logical. I can look at a brain, know what it is made of and see that there is no room for qualitative anything: it is all chemical, quantitative operations. So according to your argument, you could confidently say that you know no human being has qualitative experience, including yourself. This is a contradiction, so we know it to be wrong.

This isn’t true: you can’t account for qualia, which you do know exists because you have it, by looking at the quantitative processes of the brain. We can account for a camera simply by its quantitative processes and parts that produce those quantified measurements. I don’t see any contradiction here.

Bob, I don't care about philosophical identities. They're useful as a digest to get into particular thoughts, but the identity itself is unimportant. What's important to me is whether arguments have consistent, logical applications that allow us to function in the world optimally. If my points blow through some type of philosophical ideology but meet the criteria I value, so be it.

Fair enough! Let me re-phrase it: it is important if you are claiming that there is a mind-independent world which has mind-independent brains that produce qualia.

proof would be a logically consistent belief that is concurrent with reality

The idea that a dog has qualia is logically consistent and concurs with reality; but yet you said we cannot ‘prove’ it: why? The belief that a dog has qualia is a reasonable, cogent, and evidence based claim which meets your definition of proof.

I take you to mean that observing, identifying, and acting are pragmatically useful for determining if one has receptivity, sensibility, and some knowledge of its environment: is that correct? — Bob Ross

No, I very purposefully excluded anything that had to do with perception as a requirement for consciousness. Perception is often associated with the five senses.

By “knowledge of its environment”, I am not referring to “perception” necessarily, so I agree with you here; and “sensibility” is not referring to only human (or higher animal like) senses but, rather, sensing at all (which includes mechanical sensing).

That subjective experience is what they have, which is undeniable.

Under your view, how is this undeniable? I thought you are claiming that we can’t know.

For example, I like the color blue. Its my favorite color. No one else can say objectively that its my favorite color, because there's no way of proving it

Although you are correct that “I like the color blue” is subjective, it doesn’t follow that no one can invalidate that claim. If it turns out, unbeknownst to you, that you don’t like the color blue, then your proclamation of “I like the color blue” is in fact false. A proposition being subjective just means that the truthity is indexical (i.e., relative to the subject at hand), not that the subject is 100% correct pertaining thereto. You can absolutely get your preferences wrong (e.g., be delusional or simply really bad at psycho analysis). If the proposition “I like the color blue” is factually (i.e., objectively evaluated) as false and you claim it to be true, then you are wrong: it doesn’t matter that we are talking about your preferences.

I will stop here for now and let you respond,

Bob

Hello Tom Storm,

I wasn't referring to your arguments. I was saying in general any argument for universal mind would be held by fallacious ideas

Those two statements contradict each other.

like the ones I already mentioned and probably others

Can you refresh my memory? What fallacious ideas?

Such as universal mind being metaphysically necessary - this is no different than a Christian presuppositional apologist making the same claim.

This is true of all metaphysical theories and has nothing specific to do with Christian apologists (nor any other mainstream religion): physicalists also posit something as metaphysical necessary. Atheists which subscribe to a metaphysical theory of reality necessarily posit something as metaphysically necessary. There’s no way of avoiding it.

I do want to clarify though that I am not arguing that the Universal Mind exists because it is metaphysically necessary but, rather, that, under this metaphysical theory, it is posited as existing (for other reasons); and because it exists and there is no more data of experience to explain it seems best to posit it as metaphysically necessary. Metaphysics is about giving the best general account of what reality is while increasing explanatory power and decreasing complexity. Every theory stops somewhere, and that stopping point is the metaphysically necessary stuff.

I didn't mean it was like Yahweh (in personality). I said like Yahweh it plays a similar role - I am very familiar with Kastrup's account of what he calls mind-at-large - instinctive, not metacognitive, etc.

I see.

It's not a straw man (at least not intentionally) - it comes from Kastup interviews where he essentially says - for there to be object permanence, a universal mind is necessary. His line (I'm paraphrasing) ' It means that when I park my car in the garage it is still there after I go inside'. If I knew which interview, I would include a clip here but I don't have to time to go find it.

But you can help us all here by answering the question - does your understanding of mind-at-large provide object permanence?

The idea there is not that the Universal Mind is metaphysically necessary because of object permanence but, rather, that there must be an objective world to best explain object permanence; and in the case of Kastrup, since he is an idealist, he utilizes the Universal Mind to explain it (i.e., there is an objective world which is the ideas in a universal mind and not subjectively in my mind only).

And, yes, I would say there is object permanence—but that doesn’t mean that the Universal Mind is metaphysically necessary. It’s “necessary” to explain the world around us (which exhibits permanence) by positing that there is an objective world of which we are in. The same line of argument can be used in the opposite direction for physicalism.

Bob

Hello Mww,

That time of year, me ‘n’ the Better Half pack up, temporarily donate the furry grandkids to a sitter, and hit the road. Maybe there’s a message herein: last time we came here a “never-happens-here” hurricane had just blown the place into the sea, this time “never-happens-here” wildfires burnt the place to the ground. (Sigh)

I am sorry to hear that Mww! I hope you are all ok!

Try this on for size. Thing-in-itself is out there, just waiting around, doing what things-in-themselves do, minding their own business. Human gets himself exposed to it, perceives it, it affects him somehow, it gets translated it into this stuff that travels along its nerves to its main processing center

Here is an example of where I am confused: if the phenomena don’t provide knowledge about things-in-themselves, then how can you claim that we have a representational system which is the translation of the stuff that travels along the nerves to the main processing center? To me, that concedes that we actually do get inferential knowledge from the phenomena about the things-in-themselves: which, by my lights, negates Kant’s argument. He was claiming that we cannot know anything about things-in-themselves.

That stuff on the nerves represents what the perception was, but the owner of the nerves isn’t the slightest bit aware of any of that nerve stuff. That stuff is phenomenon stuff.

I get that, under Kantianism, each person is considered to be a representational system, so to speak, that has receptivity and sensibility which get translated into perception, and those perceptions are phenomena; but, to me, Kant’s flaw is that he then claims that, given that representational system, we shouldn’t expect phenomena to tell us anything about things-in-themselves: but that’s what he used (i.e., phenomena) to come to understand that he is fundamentally a representational system. To me, that seems a bit self-refuting, what do you think? Am I still not grasping the distinction between things-in-themselves and phenomena?

It is an empirically proven fact humans sometimes get what they perceive wrong

True, but this doesn’t matter for Kant, because, to him, sorting out the non-illusory from the illusory is just more phenomena: which says nothing about things-in-themselves.

Oh, neither, absolutely. Those conceptions are already methodologically assigned; to use them again in a way not connected to the original, is mere obfuscation. The logical part is just that, a part, operating in its own way, doing its own job, not infringing where it doesn’t belong. Why have a theory on, say, energy, then qualify it by attributing, say, cauliflower, to it as a condition?

Interesting, if the logical part of the system is not a part of the thing-in-itself and is not phenomena, then what is it? To me, it either exists as a part of the things-in-themselves (i.e., reality) or it is an appearance from our representational faculty—there’s no third option.

Ehhhh….I don’t need an account of reality. All I need is an account of how I might best understand the parts of it that might affect me, be it what it may. Ontological agnosticism sounds close enough to “I don’t really care”, so yeah, I guess.

Fair enough; however, I think that if one endeavors to give an account, idealism is the best choice.

but even if there is, nothing changes for me. If I think the moon is just this kinda thing because the universal mind’s idea is what gives it to me, it is still just a moon-thing to me

This is fair and true: the world of which we experience does not change depending on what metaphysical theory we postulate as true—but what we are trying to do is get at the truth.

Universal mind is just as empty a conception with respect to human cognition, as is lawful brain mechanics

I wouldn’t say it is an empty concept.

You and I talking here aren’t invoking any universal mind in just the doing of it, and even if such a thing is operating in the background we’re not conscious of it as such, so…..

In terms of practicality, one can live a perfectly fine life without subscribing to a metaphysical theory; but the goal is to get at the truth not what is practical for most laymen. Most people don’t need to know physics or calculus either, but that doesn’t take aware from what they get right about reality.

Bob

Hello Tom Storm,

Yes, I figure universal mind is essentially a god surrogate - held in place by similar fallacious justifications and essentially by faith

I did not come to say there is a universal mind on faith nor is it grounded in fallacious argumentation. What fallacies do you think I have committed?

Instead of (in the case of Yahweh) arguing there can't be something from nothing, therefore god

The Universal Mind that I am discussing is not Yahweh—not even close. Honestly, some philosophers (like Schopenhauer) are atheists that hold there is a Universal Mind.

AI seems to be saying, there can't be consciousness from nothing, therefore universal mind

This is a straw man: I never made this argument nor has any Analytic Idealist I have ever encountered.

Bob

Hello 180 Proof,

There is not any publicly accessible evidence for such an entity

One does not have to have public evidence of something to know it necessarily. If that were the case, then you can’t know that you have thoughts.

"everything is fundamentally mind-dependent" (including this "fundamental", which I find self-refuting)

The idea is the the universal mind is what is metaphysically necessary: what is self-refuting about that?

By “everything is fundamentally mind-dependent”, I mean that it is a part of a mental substance and not that there are no facts, if that is what you are trying to get at.

then "a universal mind" is only an idea, not a fact or "natural process".

A universal mind is not an idea, it would be an fact that it exists: it is a mind within a mental substance. Natural processes are not only physical (i.e., mind-independent) processes.

Bob

Hello Janus,

Can you elaborate as to just what data is being explained by the idea of the world as will or mind at large?

It is the best, allegedly, the most parsimonious general account of what the world (i.e., reality) is. In contradistinction to its main competitor (which is physicalism), it accounts for the data of qualitative experience, which is arguably the most real aspect of all of our lives, much better.

The main difference, in terms of explanatory power over the data of experience, revolves around consciousness.

Our introspective access to consciousness I would not class as data. I would only class as data what can be observed publicly and corroborated by repeated experiment. It's not even clear that our purported introspective access to consciousness is what it naively seems to be.

I would. Introspection is a form of empirical inquiry; and, yes, we can have illusory ideas of what consciousness is, but this is no different for anything else. Humans have had illusory ideas of objects for as long as history can remember.

Conscious experience is what one can be the most sure of—not objects. We use our conscious experience, we trust it enough, to determine the objects.

Yes, but all of this is purely speculative and cannot be tested.

Again, empirical inquiry is only a negative criterion for metaphysics. You can test and not test physicalism in the exact same manners as idealism. There are aspects that cannot be tested, and aspects that could technically indicate their implausibility.

I can come to know what seems right and wrong to me

Then you agree that ethics is a form of knowledge?

For example, if one can only gather knowledge by observation and logic, then they can never come to know what a concept of concepts is. — Bob Ross

I have no idea what this means.

My point was that scientific inquiry and logic are not exclusive means of determining knowledge: it doesn’t work; and an example of that is the ‘concept of concepts’.

Bob

Hello Philosophim,

Thank you for the elaboration, as I think I am beginning to penetrate into your terminology. However, I want to keep explaining it back to you to ensure I am getting it right. We simply do not use the terms the same, which is totally fine.

As I am now understanding you, “consciousness”, in general, is any being which “observes” and “identifies” its environment (and, as an optional addition, acts upon it); and “objective consciousness” is simply to be “conscious” (in the sense I defined above) whereas “subjective” consciousness is to be “conscious” plus qualia. In other words, every “subjectively conscious” being is “objectively conscious”, but not necessarily every “objectively conscious” being is “subjectively conscious”: is that fair?

However, there’s another aspect to this that I am sensing: the terms “objective” and “subjective” are meant to distinguish between the epistemic access we have to consciousness, and that is perhaps why you didn’t just use the term “consciousness” to refer to “an observing and identifying being” and “qualitative experience” (or what have you) as “an subjectively observing and identifying being”. Is that correct?

In terms of the distinction in epistemic access, I am understanding you to be claiming that we can only “know” of “objective aspects of consciousness”, where “knowledge” is perhaps restricted to what is empirically verifiable? Is that correct?

You can act as well, its just not required to subjectively be conscious. Think about someone in a coma that was unresponsive, but later comes out of it and is able to repeat conversations they heard while unresponsive. They were conscious, just unable to act.

I think perhaps “acting”, in the sense that you are using it (i.e., a visible bodily motion), is insufficient (which I think you are alluding to here). I think of being conscious as having receptivity (i.e., ability to receive input), sensibility (i.e., ability to acquire sensations from the receptors), knowledge of one’s environment (i.e., whether that be perception, self-knowledge, or basic stimulus responses), and having mental activity (e.g., qualia, thoughts, concepts, etc.). For you, I would imagine the last element there is not required (for one to be conscious), but the first three I think fit well into what I think you are trying to convey: I don’t think it matters if a being is actively displaying high-level bodily motions (i.e., actions). Maybe we can agree on that.

Observing identifying and acting are objective measures of consciousness that can be known from monitoring a thing

I take you to mean that observing, identifying, and acting are pragmatically useful for determining if one has receptivity, sensibility, and some knowledge of its environment: is that correct?

Qualitative experience would be the experience of observing and identifying from the subject observing and identifying.

This is where I get a bit confused: are you saying that the exact same “observing” and “identifying” is occurring objectively and the only subjective aspect is the viewpoint of the subject which is objectively “observing” and “identifying”? Because then it sounds like you might be saying qualia are not subjective, but merely the viewpoint of a subject that is having them is.

No, we cannot actually know whether other beings qualitatively experience, we can only assume or make an induction that they do.
…
Its like this: Both of our eyes see the wavelength for the color green, but I can never know if what you subjectively experience as green is the same as what I subjectively experience as green.

To me, your example argues a different point than your original claim (in that paragraph): the example is already conceding that “there is something to be like me” but that you can’t know what that is like, whereas your original claim was that we can’t even know that “there is something to be like me” (from you viewpoint). Are you claiming both of these claims (i.e., that you cannot know that there is something to be like me from your perspective and that you cannot know, even if there was something to be like me, what it would be like to be me)?

We can assume that there is, but we cannot know that there is. Whether a robot has qualitative experience and what its like is outside of the realm of knowledge.
…
Bob, can you prove that I have qualitative experience?

Firstly, I just want to note that I do not think I need certainty to “know” things. Yes, I think that I can “know” you have qualitative experience insofar as it would be special pleading of me to think of myself as the only human being who has it. No I am not certain of it.

Secondly, I am be confident enough to say that a camera and an AI do not have qualitative experience because I can know what they are made of and there is no room for qualitative anything: it is all mechanical, quantitative operations. I am not certain that a pool of water cannot, all else being equal, turn into a car; but I am very confident that it won’t.

If you give me something which only has quantitative measuring capabilities, then I expect it to not have qualitative experience (but I do expect it to have awareness in the sense of the ability to quantify its environment).

It is just as difficult to prove I have qualitative experience as it is to prove a dog has qualitative experience. Since we cannot, when talking about what we can know objectively, qualitative experience of beings or things other than ourselves is unnecessary.

I would like to note that it is very necessary to prove it if one is a reductive physicalist: the entire metaphysical theory is riding on it.

Also, it seems like ‘proof’ to you implies certainty: is that correct? If so, then I agree that I cannot prove that a dog has qualitative experience, but then again I can’t prove that boiling eggs in water will cook them either. If I remember correctly, then the vast majority of your “knowledge” is cogency (i.e., inductions and abductions), right? If so, then you can run a very confident and cogent argument (‘proof’) that dogs have qualitative experience, but it doesn’t provide certainty for sure.

I'll refer back to seeing the wavelength green vs experiencing the qualitative color of what green is to you. Its not that there isn't anything qualitatively happening to other people. Its that its outside of our knowledge

To me, it seems as though you are claiming sometimes that we can’t know that other people have qualitative experience (viz., that there is something to be like them: they have qualia) and other times you are conceding that point, like the above paragraph, and saying just can’t know what it would be like to be like them.

Can you prove it otherwise? Can you demonstrate with full knowledge that I have subjective qualitative experience?

Why would I need to prove it with full knowledge (and am assuming full certainty) for it to be worth believing (or claiming to know)?

Bob

Hello 180 Proof,

Is breathing "reducible" to lungs, digesting "reducible" to intestines or walking "reducible" to legs? No, each is a function – "activity" – of the latter, respectively, just as mind(ing) – "mental activity" – is a (set of) function(s) of the brain-body-environment.

Of course breathing isn’t reducible to lungs, but it is reducible to the total functions and parts responsible for it. Obviously there is more to the weakly emergent property of breathing than simply having lungs. To me, that doesn’t seem like a good analogy to oversimplify the act of breathing to just lungs: it is still weakly emergent because it is reducible to the set of functions and parts which produce it.

If you think breathing has some irreducible aspect to it, then please elaborate.

To me, being “weakly emergent”, as a matter of definition, is to say that the emergent property is reducible to the set of constituents (and their relations to each other) that are responsible for producing it (regardless of whether those are functions or not).

I don't understand what "in a formal sense" means here.

The term ‘physical’ has two meanings (among more): tangible objects within conscious experience and mind-independent objects—and they aren’t the same thing. The latter is what is invoked by the metaphysical theory called ‘physicalism’.

The "physical" methodology certainly "exists"

A methodological approach that treats the world as if there are mind-independent objects is not the same as the ontological claim that there are mind-independent objects. So I agree with you here, but that’s not what I was talking about: “physical” in the formal sense, that I was talking about, is the claim that there are, as a matter of an ontological as opposed to a mere methodological claim, mind-independent objects (and that is, as well, different than merely claiming that there are tangible objects within one’s experience).

and facilitates productive sciences and technologies

I agree that methodological naturalism (although I am not convinced that the methodological physicalism, in the sense of treating everything as mind-independent, is actually necessary to produce the fruitful results) has produced many productive sciences and I do not plan on advocating their removal; however, that says nothing about ontology.

regardless of Analytic Idealists ignoring it "in a formal sense" or any other sense.

I am unsure as to what you are referring to here. One can be a methodological naturalist and an analytic idealist: the former is a methodology for inquiry about the world which takes the world to be a natural process while the other is an ontological claim that everything is fundamentally mind-dependent. A universal mind can be a part of a natural process, and one can claim that the only way to understand it is via empirical inquiry of the natural world. Supernaturalism isn’t necessitated by being an idealist whatsoever, although many end up going that route.

Bob

Hello Philosophim,

Very glad to see you Bob! The reason I bowed out from your thread is I felt my points would deviate too much from your original intent. I felt that your thread was addressing those who were somewhat familiar with your topic, and agreed and understood basic points. My questions and critiques seemed too far out of place for your OP, and I did not want to derail your thread from others.

Oh I see: fair enough!

Although I understand it better, I still don’t think I have completely pinned down your terminology; so let me ask for further clarification (and then I will revisit your post to respond adequately).

Is “qualitative experience” (i.e., qualia) different to you than observing, identifying, and acting (or are they the same)?

Is “awareness” different than “qualitative experience”? Is it the same as observing, identifying, and acting?

Do those terms, to you, refer to the exact same thing?

Am I correct in saying that, under your view, “objective” and “subjective” consciousness are both referring to qualitative experience? Awareness? Both?

This is mostly because subjective consciousness of other beings is outside of knowledge. It is something we simply cannot know.

Correct me if I am wrong, but it seems like you are saying that we can objectively know that other beings have qualitative experience and that there is something to be like that subject but we cannot know what it is like to be that subject: is that correct?

They can have robotic consciousness.

Are you saying that there is something to be like a robot as a subject (but we just can’t know what that is like) and it has qualitative experience?

Objectively, consciousness does not require you to be human, can we both agree on that? Is a dog conscious? A bat? A crab?

I agree, but I think this is equally true within your “subjective” consciousness as well. I am not sure what the distinction is doing here (in terms of specifying only “objective” consciousness does not require you to be human).

To observe, then identify, doesn't some "thing" have to observe, then match it to an identity?

So this is where I need to re-evaluate depending on what you mean by the terms “awareness”, “qualitative experience”, “consciousness”, and “observation”. I don’t hold that a camera + a computerized interpreter (of the images) equates to a conscious being but I do agree that the camera is aware (as an observer) to some limited degree (in order to take in a photo of the environment). I just don’t hold consciousness and observation as the same thing, so can you elaborate on what you mean? Are they the same to you?

Is that not the qualitative experience?

No, I do not hold that there is something to be like a camera + computerized interpreter (of those images or what have you). I do not hold that the camera has qualitative experience: all that is occurring is quantitative measurements through-and-through. It quantifies its environment and then quantitatively analyzes the image (or what have you). qualitative experience, on the other hand, can’t be completely quantified—e.g., the subjectively experienced redness of the truck can’t be accurately quantified, whereas the camera is capturing quantitatively what it thinks is there and displaying it quantitatively via pixels (in hex encoded colors or what have you), of which you qualitatively experience when you look at the image via the camera screen (after taking a picture). There’s nothing qualitative happening in terms of the internal processes of the camera nor is the camera subjectively experiencing anything (I would say).

Objective consciousness is the observation and confirmation that there is consciousness apart from the subjective experience itself.

I don’t see how you can come to understand a thing as conscious but yet say you haven’t thereby posited it as subjectively experiencing: could you elaborate?

By my lights, the whole point of saying something is conscious is to grant that it has subjective experience, and the outer, objective analysis of that looks like the an aware, organic entity. It sounds like, under your view, there could be a being which is conscious but doesn’t have any subjective experience but, to me, that’s like saying that we can determine something thinks while holding it may not have a thinker.

Bob

Hello Philosophim,

I know we terminated our conversation about consciousness on my thread because you felt there wasn’t much more that could be said, but I figured I would still put in my two cents into your thread to see if we can come to some agreement. Of course, it is your thread, so if you still feel as though there is nothing more to be productively said, then please feel free to terminate our discussion wherever you would like. I have a feeling that we are on polar opposites of the discussion when it comes to this topic, but that’s exactly what makes conversations the most interesting (;

To start, let me try to understand fully what you are saying. To me, it seems as though you are claiming there are two types of consciousness (i.e., subjective and objective) which are completely separable from each other; but, to me, when I read your post, it seemed like ‘objective’ consciousness is merely a more restricted scope of ‘subjective’ consciousness: the former seemed to be the latter with just the redaction of “what it is to be like a subjective experiencing” or, as you put it, “the viewpoint of consciousness itself”.

If that is correct, then I don’t see how “They are entirely separate realms of discussion and analysis”: when one analyzes how an organism has conscious experience of something, that is still “tied” to the same “consciousness” as that organism that is subjectively experiencing. I fear that this distinction implies that there could possibly be a being which has consciousness but doesn’t subjectively experience, but the consciousness we are studying objectively (from the side of behavior) is the same thing as the qualitative experience that the subject itself is having: we just don’t have direct, private access to it like that subject does.

This leads me to your definition of “consciousness” (i.e., “Awareness [consciousness] is a combination of two main factors: Observation and identification”): to me, being “conscious” and being “aware” (in the sense of observing and identifying) are not the same thing—perhaps this is a semantic dispute though. A being can be “aware” in the sense of being capable (to some degree) of observing its environment and identifying different aspects of its observation without having qualitative experience: for example, even basic AIs today can observe their environment and identify things (such as cups, tables, chairs, etc.) and they do not have conscious, qualitative experience: there is nothing to be like that AI (as of yet at least): it simply gathers input, interprets it, and produces output. When it touches something, it doesn’t feel it qualitatively; when it sees something, it has no qualitative sense of seeing happening there; when it hears, it doesn’t experience the sound itself but, rather, is just input/output like a computer. For these reasons, I think “awareness” should be distinguished from “consciousness”; otherwise, there becomes an ambiguity of what one is saying (e.g., are you talking about qualitative experience or just the ability to take in input and interpret the environment?--these are two very different things). Perhaps, is that what you are trying to get at with “objective” vs. “subjective” consciousness? Is “subjective” consciousness the qualitative experience and “objective” consciousness the mere awareness of the environment (plus the interpretation of it)?

For now, I think this is a good start.

I look forward to hearing from you,
Bob

Hello Wonderer1,

Much more important, it seems to me, is how undisciplined is the the speculation. Scientific speculation is disciplined, by looking to external reality for support or falsification. Mother Nature can smack you upside the head if you get it wrong.

Metaphysics is just as disciplined as science: they just use different criteria to determine their respective inquiries. Also, metaphysics also looks at external reality for support or falsification, but it doesn’t only look at that (nor does science quite frankly when it comes to scientific theories).

A metaphysics that denies the existence of a non-mental external reality simply isn't comparable.

I am failing to see the relation between specifically idealist metaphysics and your previous contentions: what you said equally applies to a physicalist metaphysics. They both use the same criteria to assess what the best general account of reality is (e.g., parsimony, coherence, empirical adequacy, logical consistency, reliability, intuitions, etc.).

Bob

Hello 180 Proof,

No. A much more so "weakly emergent" function like e.g. breathing or digesting or walking.

How can mental activity be both weakly emergent and irreductive? That seems, to me, like a contradictio in adjecto.

Nonreductive physicalism. I've previously (twice!) provided you a link to an article summarizing T. Metzinger's phenomenal self model which seems to me a highly cogent and experimentally supported research program within a nonreductive physicalist framework.

I see. I took a look: let me explain back to you what I interpreted PSM and PMIR to be (and correct me where I am misunderstanding).

The self-model theory of subjectivity (SMT) is split generally into two parts: the phenomenal self-model (PSM) and the phenomenal model of the intentionality relation (PMIR).

PSM is a theoretical postulation that we can possibly empirically observe that certain areas of the brain (e.g., prefrontal cortex) are responsible for producing unity of self (i.e., “mineness”, “perspectivalness”, and “selfhood”).

PMIR is the ongoing ‘mental model’, which is builds off of the PSM, that the subject is constantly using to evaluate ‘itself’ and ‘not-itself’.

Did I generally get it correct? Before I give some critiques, I want to make sure I am at least in the ball park.

Well, "no physical substance" implies there are no physical laws to "violate";

Not at all. I think you may be conflating two usages of the term ‘physical’: the colloquial (i.e., something tangible with size and shape within experience) with the formal (i.e., a mind-independently existent entity). Analytic Idealism posits that everything is in a mental substance and that includes the physical (in a colloquial sense of the term) and procludes the physical in a formal sense of the term. Matter still exists under analytic idealism, but by the term ‘matter’ an analytic idealist is referring to the extrinsic representation, which is physical in the colloquial sense, of mentality.

Or rather, how is it that "the physical" is publicly accessible if "all of reality is mental" and "the mental" is not publicly accessible?

Because the ‘physical’ in a colloquial sense is weakly emergent from the mental: it is an extrinsic representation of mentality. However, the ‘physical’ in a formal sense does not exist at all.

Bob

Hello Janus,

I see the speculative part in science as consisting in abductive reasoning

Abductive reasoning is the most speculative type of reasoning we have, and metaphysics is also engaged in abductive reasoning.

and I would say that even those speculative aspects of science are informed by the general picture of the world that is yielded by science, or else they may be informed by mathematics.

Having speculation be informed by the world around us is not special to science: metaphysics also tries to inform its theories based off thereof.

I can't think of any speculative what we might call "pure metaphysics" that is like this, but that doesn't mean there isn't any. I'm open to learning about things I was not aware of.

Firstly, I grant, and agree with you, that metaphysics is usually more speculative than science, but there’s a couple things I would note:

1. Some science is actual metaphysics (e.g., Einstein’s “scientific” theory, to explain the facts of his field equations, that there is a mind-independent space-time fabric is a metaphysical commitment—not scientific itself).

2. Science and metaphysics are both engaged in abductive reasoning (i.e., trying to discern the best explanation to account for the data). Neither claim certainty nor absolute truth, and both are meant to get at a better picture (a model) of the world. The jursdiction of the models is just different: science is about modeling the relationship between (i.e., behavior of) the world we experience, whereas metaphysics is about modeling what the world fundamentally is. For example, science tells its best guess at how a car works (e.g., gas, engine, friction, etc.), metaphysics tells its best guess at what the car fundamentally is (e.g., an instantiation of a universal Car, fundamentally mind-independent, etc.). Both, I would say, are useful in their own ways.

3. Metaphysics is ‘purer’ than science because it deals more heavily in the realm of ‘pure reason’, but science still deals with ‘pure reason’ as well. They both need it to determine their axioms, jurisdiction of inquiry, etc. ‘Pure reason’ is not special to metaphysics: it just is more prominent.

4. If one gets rid of metaphysics, as a practice, then there’s no method of inquiry for us left to decipher what world we live in. Science doesn’t tell us what metaphysically exists: it is just a pragmatic tool for navigating and discovering how things behave.

The main thing I have against Kastrup's metaphysics is that "will" or "mind at large" are notions derived from our understanding of the human and some higher animals.

It is derived from our understanding of all life: not just higher animals. Kastrup posits that all life is a grade of consciousness. Of course, we only immediately, through introspection, have access to our own, so that is where we typically start.

@Apokrisis refers to global constraints (i.e. entropy) as 'desire' sometimes, but again, in that context entropy is a scientific idea that does not derive specifically from the human. I guess we can't help being somewhat anthropomorphic in our thinking, since our thinking itself is "human-shaped".

Under analytic idealism, everything is will and representation; so entropy, as well as all observable phenomena, are extrinsic representations of mentality—of will. It isn’t that entropy is a special case of which it is associated with an extra will that isn’t the case for everything else but, rather, that the entire phenomenal world is fundamentally the representation of the will of a universal mind. So the natural forces, as well as entropy and everything else, is within the universal mind and thusly is upheld by the will thereof. The will is ‘outside’ of the system of which represents it, just as necessarily as my mind’s will to dream of a beautiful forest is ‘outside’ of that dream forest.

Right, except I don't count ethics as knowledge

Are you saying that you don’t think you can come to know what is right and wrong (even if the propositions are indexical: subjective)? Because then I don’t know how you could assess what is right and wrong (even subjectively).

I also think ethics can be framed as "if we want to achieve that, we should do this" and ethical action can be understood as what promotes rather than detracts from human flourishing
…
distinct from being determinate propositional knowledge.

You can’t invoke hypothetical conditionals without propositions, and, as far as I understand you, you are claiming ethics is non-cognitive (non-propositional): you can’t assess that “if p, then q” (“if we want to achieve that, we should do this”) if ethics doesn’t provide propositional or otherwise knowledge.

I do think we can only gain definitive knowledge from observation and logic.

I disagree if by observation you mean scientific inquiry. For example, if one can only gather knowledge by observation and logic, then they can never come to know what a concept of concepts is. One will never observe the concept of concepts and logic (which is just the form of an argument) does not provide any means of determining the content necessary to figure out what the true concept of concepts is. I do not empirically observe the concept of concepts, and simply making a logically valid argument for what it is does not entail whatsoever that I have nailed down what a concept of concepts truly is.

Bob

Hello Janus,

The difference is that scientific theories are testable by seeing if the phenomena they predict obtain. Of course, that doesn't prove they are true.

This is true that science uses testable hypothesis (and that doesn’t positively prove the theories) while metaphysics isn’t as engaged in that (all it still does to some extent): however, that would just mean that metaphysics is more speculation than science, but both are engaged in speculation. My point is that I don’t think you can consistently reject metaphysics as “pure speculation” while fully pardoning scientific theories. Once one realizes that we are fundamentally engaging in some speculation no matter what, then it really becomes a question of how much is too much.

As I understand it, scientism is the claim that science can answer all our questions and will save us. Of course, there are ethical and existential questions that science cannot answer, although it may certainly inform them.

Scientism is the idea that we only gain knowledge via the scientific method; and, thusly, that all other forms of inquiry (such as metaphysics) doesn’t get at the truth. It sounds like you may be in agreement with me that we can come to know things without the scientific method (e.g., ethics). I would merely add metaphysics in there too.

Bob

Hello 180 Proof,

I conceive of the latter two as distinctly methodological approaches within the former's paradigm.

Interesting: what would you say are the methodological distinctions between them?

Well, I "subscribe" to both.

Fair enough.

Would you classify yourself as a property dualist (i.e., irreductive physicalist)? — Bob Ross
Yes, more or less.

I am never gotten the opportunity to discuss with a property dualist, so forgive me but I would like to pick your brain a bit pertaining thereto. Would you consider consciousness strongly emergent then (as opposed to weakly emergent)? If so, then how does its irreducibility not warrant the positing of another substance (i.e., substance dualism) as opposed to merely another property? Since the reductive methodology doesn’t work on consciousness (which is, and correct me if I am wrong, what I am interpreting you to be agreeing with me on as a property dualist), do you deploy a different methodological approach that still retains (ontological) naturalism? If so, then could you give a brief elaboration thereon?

If your "Universal Spirit" is conceived of as a separate nonphysical substance that interacts with (or even generates) a physical substance

I am a substance monist, so I don’t claim that one entity from a mental (i.e., nonphysical) substance is “producting” or “interacting with” an entity (or entities) within another physical substance: all of reality is of a mental substance—there is no, under Analytic Idealism, physical substance. With that in mind, do you still think it violates the law of conservation of energy (and what not)?

Bob

Hello Janus,

I don't think that is what metaphysics is, I think it is a purely speculative exercise of the imagination; that is it consists in what we are capable of imagining might be the nature of reality.

I somewhat agree, we are certainly in the business of plausibility and not certainty; but this is also true of scientific theories: it is likewise an “speculative exercise” of what we imagine is the best explanation of the scientific facts. I think if you are being consistent, then a lot of science goes out the window to.

In the absence of ways to test these speculations, we have no possibility of determining what could be "the best general account of what reality is",

This is dangerously close to scientism (to me): no, we do not only gain knowledge via empirical, scientific tests. For example, we don’t gain the knowledge that every change has a cause by scientific inquiry; in fact, it presupposes it. If I were to take what I think you are saying to its fullest extent, then the very necessary presumptions we make for science (as well as a large portion of our knowledge in general) goes out the window as “purely speculative”.

Each person will have their own preferences, which will depend on what their basic presuppositions are. Or perhaps it would be more accurate to say that what their presuppositions are will depend on their preferences

True, we cannot separate ourselves from our own inquiry of the world; but this doesn’t mean that we can only acquire knowledge by empirical inquiry (and, honestly, even empirical inquiry has a layer of psychological interpretation to it as well).

Bob

Hello 180 Proof,

By ontology I understand the consititutive, necessary and sufficient conditions of all human practices; therefore, it makes most sense to "subscribe" to naturalism (à la Laozi, Epicurus, Spinoza, Hume, Nietzsche, Dewey ... )

Interesting. Let me phrase it a bit differently: what ontology of being/reality would you subscribe to (if any)?

To me, I don’t mind if you use ‘ontology’ to refer to the conditions of all human practices, but that doesn’t say anything about what fundamentally is: it just determines what is required for humans to do what they do. To me that’s not what ‘ontology’ is about (as a shorthand for the philosophical practice--of course there are many ontologies of different things).

By ‘naturalism’, are you distinguishing it from ‘physicalism’ and ‘materialism’? Are you referring to ontological or/and methodological naturalism? Correct me if I am wrong, but it seems as though you may be a methodological but not ontological naturalist (e.g., Nietzsche, which you cited, is definitely not an ontological naturalist but was a staunch methodological naturalist).

I think "consciousness" – phenomenal self modeling – supervenes on the brain's neurological systems bodily interacting with its local environment.

Would you say that “consciousness” is reducible to the brain or is it just supervenient? Would you classify yourself as a property dualist (i.e., irreductive physicalist)?

probably violates conservation laws and as a conjecture does not explain anything.

Why would it violate conservation laws?

Bob

Hello Janus,

But you acknowledge all this is groundless speculation, right? There are no experiments we can do to confirm whether phenomena predicted by this conjecture are observed or not, right?

Metaphysics is not science: it doesn’t posit a hypothesis that can be empirically tested. Metaphysics is in the business of trying to give the best general account of what reality is: it is about that which is necessarily beyond the possibility of all experience, but pertains to that experience (e.g., Universals vs. particulars).

Science can only be a negative criteria (i.e., it can falsify some metaphysical theories, but its inability to do so does not thereby affirm any of them either). Instead, metaphysics uses intuitions, parsimony, explanatory power, coherence, internal consistency, etc. to determine the best general account.

Physicalism (like all other metaphysical theories) is no exception either: if you say analytic idealism is groundless speculation, then so is physicalism. There are no scientific tests that will ever falsify nor prove physicalism either.

Bob

Hello Mww,

Are you implying the difference in knowledge from the human olden days to the human current days, is a reflection of a changing world? If so, sure, why not. That lightning came from angry gods reflected the ontological status of the old world, lightning as electrostatic discharge reflects the ontological status of the current world. It is impossible to prove or disprove the world changed on the whim of a universal mind.

How do we know? We don’t, but we raise more questions by supposing our changing knowledge reflects a changing world, then we do if we suppose the world stays constant and it is our knowledge that changes.

My point is that under Kantianism, we don’t get knowledge of the world: we just get phenomenon; and, so, how can you claim that the world itself doesn’t change in its time as much as our knowledge does? Are you inferring from phenomena something about the things-in-themselves?

We got the whole passel of folks, all through the ages, experiencing a certain thing, in exactly the same way, when they push the very same kind of round something down a hill. Basic mathematics hasn’t changed since the invention of numbers.

But, under Kantianism, I don’t see how you can claim that those observed regularties are anything but phenomena: they don’t tell you anything about the world beyond that. Would you agree with that?

Only if the thing-in-itself is conceptually maligned, usually by invoking a theory that defines it differently or finds no need of such a thing, than the theory in which it was originally contained.

Can you elaborate on what you mean by things-in-themselves vs. phenomena?

Nope. You said conscious experience is the representation of something. It isn’t representation, its knowledge. Conscious experience is knowledge of something, whether a determined something or just a plain ol’ something, depends on whether or not the tripartite logical part of the system, the proper cognitive part, comprised of understanding, judgement, and reason (but not intuition or consciousness, or the mere subjective condition) can all get their respective functional eggs in the same basket, re: the synthesis of representations conforms to the effect the object causes on perception.

I see. Would you say that the logical part of the system is a thing-in-itself or a phenomenon (or neither)?

I’m fine with distinguishing my will from yours, given the similarities or differences in our behaviors. But how I’m going to distinguish my will from a mind that wills the universe, is inconceivable.

It’s everything not associated with a will already (until proven its association with a different will).

Which gets us back to why propose such a thing in the first place.

To give the most parsimonious metaphysical account of reality. Under your view, it seems like you may be committed to ontological agnosticism: is that correct?

Bob

In other words, disembodied consciousness (i.e. spirits) :roll:

Yes, in a sense, if you wanted to use that terminology, then fundamentally there is one Universal Spirit whereof there are derivate "spirits" (viz., alter perspectives within the one spirit).

Out of curiosity, what ontology would you subscribe to? Do you think that consciousness can be provably determined as reducible to brain states? What problems do you find with positing a Universal Spirit?

Bob

Hello Mww,

Technically, it is only knowledge of representations, hence not of the world per se
…
The world itself doesn’t change in its time as much as our knowledge of it does in our own, so it is obvious there is a major distinction between the two.

If you can only have refined knowledge of representations, then how can you know that the world itself doesn’t change in its time as much as our knowledge of it does?

If it is to say epistemic solipsism is the notion that the only absolutely certain knowledge is that which belongs to the subject capable of it

I am saying that Kant’s original view is a form of epistemic solipsism, which is to say that since one cannot know anything about things-in-themselves they cannot know that anything exists other than their own “mind” (even if you would like to use a weaker usage of the term “mind”, such as a faculty of understanding that creates representations of the things-in-themselves). For example, I don’t see how you can know that there are other people with minds that have the same kind of a priori understanding (in Kant’s terms) that produces representations: that requires a metaphysical jump into the things-in-themselves.

Sensations. The thing of sensation is the same thing as the thing of the ding an sich.

I think this just pushes the same question a step deeper: how does Kant know that he has sensations without appealing to the phenomena, which are supposed to give us no knowledge of the things-in-themselves? I don’t see how Kant can claim there is a ‘bridge’ of sensations which are of the thing of things-in-themselves without such an appeal (which self-undermines his argument).

To me, Kant can’t claim that phenomena give us no understanding of the things-in-themselves and posit that we have sensations of them: what do you think?

In other words, I agree that we are affected by sensations, but this fundamentally requires the concession that phenomena gives us some access to things-in-themselves—even if it is very limited or what have you.

It is an object for the sake of communication, for talking about it.

Fair enough.

Technically, conscious experience shows us we know something. Theoretically, knowledge of things presupposes the representation of them necessarily, given the kind of system by which humans know things.

Your first sentence here suggests you agree that phenomena give us access to things-in-themselves to some degree (otherwise, I don’t understand how you could agree with me there). Your second sentence I didn’t fully follow: why does conscious experience presuppose sensations which are being represented necessarily theoretically without appeal to phenomena?

Again, how do you know what kind of ‘system’ humans know things without granting that phenomena (which are supposed to be mere representations that give us nothing beyond them) do give us some access (even if it is transcendental or slightly transcendent)?

All of it, re: conscious experience, is not phenomenon, and experience, as a methodological terminus, is not itself a mere representation. In Kant, the last rendition of a representation is in judgement, an aspect of understanding, which, in the form of a logical syllogism, is way back at the point of the manifold of minor premises, whereas experience stands as the conclusion.

Interesting; but how do you come to understand that there is such a faculty of understanding without appealing to phenomena (appearances)?

With respect to representations, on the other hand, how does the subject determine which idea/representation belong to the universal mind and which are his own?

We are within the ‘objective’ world of the mind-at-large and, as such, we come to know that the reality in which we reside is superordinate; and this is distinguished by our intuitive distinctions between what is a part of our will vs. a port of another’s will vs. a part of a will greater than ours.

In terms of Kastrup’s Analytic Idealism, we are only separate minds insofar as we perceive the world from different ‘angles’ and, at rock bottom, we are a part of the one mind which produces our experience: we are two characters in a dream, but when that universal mind ‘wakes up’ the two characters were facades—but that doesn’t take away from the fact that those two characters has real, distinguishable experiences of the dream world. We are two whirlpools in on ocean, when we die down we re-assimilate into the ocean and even when we were distinguishable two different whirlpools we still were of the same ocean.

Bob

Hello Janus,

So, if our brains are representations like anything else, then how can consciousness be said to reside there?

For analytic idealism, consciousness does not reside in the brain: the brain is an extrinsic representation of aspects of mind. The mind is beyond the perceptions of the brain.

For (reductive) physicalism, to make it work, I would say that the phenomenal brain is the intrinsic (within conscious experience) representation of an noumenal (or otherwise non-phenomenal) brain. At this point, to me, there’s no warrant to posit a noumenal brain: the only way would be, to me, if a (reductive) physicalist could account for how the noumenal brain is producing the conscious experience (which would have to be to account for it in the phenomenal brain and, once that is done, posit that that brain has a noumenal correlate); but at that point it is becoming a bit absurd to posit a brain outside of or beyond the mere phenomenal one.

If the brain is a representation, then the consciousness that seems to reside there, and the self-model that comes with it must also be representations.

Under analytic idealism, not all of conscious experience are perceptions: my ideas are not perceived by me by means of sensory input (that gets generated into a perception): it originates in me (as a mind). Therefore, we can acquire knowledge of what is being represented (i.e., perceived) within the tangible representations in our conscious experience: immaterial ideas.

I think your argument affects physicalists much more than it affects idealists: if your mind is an emergent property of a brain and that brain is only ever phenomenal, then why would we expect to come to understand what is outside of that mind? We wouldn’t. Why would we even have reason to believe that the phenomenal brain has a noumenal brain correlate?--and, thusly, why would we expect to prove that the mind is emergent from the brain simply because brain states affect mental states? We shouldn’t.

The question then is what is doing the representing? Perhaps nothing? Or everything?

For analytic idealism, consciousness is fundamental; and so we can know what is being represented (because not all of our experience is a representation made by an emergent mind from a physical brain): immaterial ideas: will.

Bob

Hello Mww,

So the deal is, in K-speak, in a human representational system, that which is represented by the system, is not what is is entailed in human knowledge, which is the same as saying that for which the representation stands, is unknown by the system, which just is the human himself. That which is represented in humans is the world, so first and foremost the world itself is that which is unknown by humans.

Would you say that Kant thought we could gather knowledge of the world (which is being represented by us) or would you say he thought that we could never acquire such knowledge (since the representations are mere phenomenon)?

To me, Kant goes dangerously close to (if not actually argues cryptically for) epistemic solipsism.

How does Kant even know, if he cannot know anything about things-in-themselves, that his mind is representing objects (which he seems to assume a lot to me)? Why not one object? Why not “the unknown which may not be an object at all”? Why not nothing?

To me, we only come to realize by empirical inquiry that our minds are the best explanation for the production of the conscious experiences we have which, in turn, show us that we are representing something—but this doesn’t work if one is positing that all of it is mere phenomenon that cannot furnish them with knowledge of things-in-themselves and, in that case, by my lights, one can’t even argue that their mind is representing anything but rather that there’s just given conscious experiences.

The fix for that, is to say, in S-speak, even if the world is not known by humans, it is surely known by something not human, whatever it may be. If it happens to be a universal mind, and if Aristotle is still in force, then that universal mind will necessarily know everything about everything, which makes explicit it will know all about the very things humans do not, which the most important would be the world itself.

Long story short, the universal mind has ideas, wills them into worldly object manifestations, complete in themselves, subsequently representable in humans just as completely as the willed idea prescribes in its manifestations. This, of course, logically, makes human knowledge of the ding an sich not only possible, but given. If the universal mind has the idea of it, wills it, then the human system can represent it in himself, and K’s human knowledge limit is exceeded. Which was, given the time and place, the whole raison d’etre for S’s world as will and representation (idea) in the first place.

For now, I accept this summary: please refute away! As you refute, I will understand better what you are saying. So far, this seems like a fair-ish summary (for intents and purposes).

The only thing I will say now is that the universal mind, under Analytic Idealism, doesn’t will them directly into our representations: there are “objective” ideas that our faculty tries represent (and depending on how well that faculty is, it may not be represented all that accurately). Also, I wouldn’t claim either that a human with supreme perceptive capabilities gets a 100% accurate representation of the world around them. It sounded like you may be saying that the will gives us 100% accurate representations: it doesn’t.

If close enough, however, it remains to be posited what is gained by such a program, and why it should not be dismissed as a bridge too far.

That is exactly what I would like to hear about! Why do you think it is dismissable as a bridge too far? Why do you think we are completely cut off from knowing the things-in-themselves? And do you think it entails epistemic solipsism?

faults in the universal mind theory must be addressed from a Kantian perspective, insofar as the one is almost directly connected to the other, thus if I can refute it, if the universal mind theory cannot withstand refutation, your questions would be answered thereby.

Sounds good to me! Refute away my friend!

Bob

Hello Janus,

If everything is a representation in our heads, are our heads also representations...in our heads?

Our “heads” which we experience phenomenally, in the sense of a physical head of our bodies within our conscious experience, are, under both physicalism and analytic idealism, representations. When you look in the mirror, your head is a representation that your brain (if you are a physicalist) or your mind (if you are an idealist) has of itself. Your brain (or mind) is trying to represent itself to itself when it views itself by producing perceptions of it (just like anything else).

Bob

Hello Tom Storm,

However, since it is provably impossible for explain consciousness under physicalism, — Bob Ross

I wonder if this is a bit dogmatic?

Analytic Idealists, like any other world view, can become dogmatic: some of the things that Kastrup says about physicalism I disregard on that account. However, I don’t think it is dogmatic, in itself, to claim that physicalism has the hard problem of consciousness (and that it is, as a hard problem, irreconcilable). I think it is provable that the reductive physicalist method fails to account for consciousness.

My argument, in short, would be as follows:
Every possible explanation, under reductive physicalism, that a physicalist could give for consciousness is of the form “consciousness is [this set of biological functions] because [this set of biological functions] impacts consciousness [in this manner]”. The reductionist method, assuming it is reducing into physical stuff, can only afford, as can be seen the form of the argument, to provide better insight into the relationship between conscious and brain states but doesn’t actually, even when attempting to explain it, account for what consciousness is nor how it is produced by brain states.

I agree that there is no obvious answer at hand, but thinkers like Metzinger point in certain directions.

Interesting: what is Metzinger proposing as a resolution?

But even if all forms of physicalism end up being superseded, this does not make mind-at-large necessary

No metaphysical theory can proclaim to be necessary. It is about trying to give the best general account of reality.

there might be any number of other explanations we have not yet considered

I am always open ears to new ideas, but I don’t think this negates the fact that analytic idealism (I would argue) is the best known theory for accounting for reality (on the contrary to the popular belief that it is physicalism or substance dualism). I am never going to pretend that I have found the absolute truth.

I wonder about our expertise to make totalising statements on this highly complex and speculative subject. I also wonder about the limitations of human cognition to solve some of the problems we seem to identify.

This is fair, but, nevertheless, I do think metaphysics is good for navigating the world in which we live; and it is good to come to a generalization of what one thinks reality is even if we can’t absolutely know for sure.

Bob

I think we have gone about as far as we can with going over the same things again. I appreciate that despite our differences the discussion remained civil.

I appreciate you taking the time to converse with me Foolos4!

Have a wonderful day!

Bob

Hello Mww,

Agreed; I’ll go with the three logical laws of thought.

Which three? Principle of non-contradiction, excluded middle, and identity?

Hmmm. This looks like it puts representation in the external world, when I want it to be in my head

Representation are within our heads: they are perceptions; but, the world one is fundamentally representing is will (i.e., ideas in a universal mind) as opposed to something unknown (for Kant). Kant seems to think that we can’t gain knowledge of anything that goes beyond our pure forms of intuition, whereas Schopenhauer claims it is will.

Is it just the same to say representation of immaterial ideas are what’s expressed in space and time?

Yes.

And is it representation of immaterial ideas that is expressed by the mental?

Yes, but as an organism that has evolved to have perceptions (i.e., to represent the world: the sensations).

So the physical is just mental representation of immaterial ideas.

Correct. It is mental representation of the outer world, which is fundamentally more immaterial ideas (and I think that part you may disagree with).

I consider reality to be that which corresponds to a sensation in general, that, consequently, the conception of which indicates a being.

If this is just another way of saying “reality is the totality of what is”, then I agree.

It follows that there isn’t need for a further account of reality, but there would certainly need to be an account for sensation.

The way that you defined reality sort of confused me: I don’t think that the totality of what “corresponds to a sensation in general that...the conception of which indicates a being” encompasses necessarily all reality—there could be something which is never impressed unto our faculty of intuition (in Kantian terms) but is still a part of reality.

Sensation is how we are awakened to reality, which, of course, thereby presupposes it, be it what it may. No need to account for it.

Why wouldn’t you need to account for what is sans-”impressed sensations”?

Sorta like your metaphysical necessity?

I mean something that has to be there in all “possible worlds” or is a brute fact. Are you saying that the laws of thought for a mind is what is the brute fact of reality?

What are the other parts of the account of reality.

I wouldn’t say there are other parts to reality but, rather, Analytic Idealism is meant to account for all of it the best. The claim that there is a universal mind doesn’t explain everything immediately, in itself, about reality other than it is the bedrock of it.

Both conceptions and ideas are representations, an idea is a conception, but a conception is not necessarily an idea.

Agreed. I would say that fundamental reality is ideas and not conceptions. Conceptions I would posit as only available to higher evolved life forms that have acquired the ability to cognize. I remember now about the Kantian categories: I would side with Schopenhauer in saying that the representation of the world (as perception) is just the principle of sufficient reason of becoming and not the use of concepts: conceptions, as I would use the term, are the productions of the faculty of reason (of which it is not necessarily the case that an organism with perception has it nor that it is very adept to sophisticated reasoning) which takes in perceptions as its input. I don’t see a need to posit categories (of conceptions and functions) for the understanding, but I would love to hear why your perspective on it.

But the real problem is expressions of will, which for me belong in moral philosophy alone, which makes this metaphysical nonsense…..….for he who would attribute to will no more than autonomous volition predicated on subjective principles.

Very interesting. To me, will is fundamental to our operations. When we think, those conception and ideas are fundamentally guided by (or, to me, quite literally fundamentally the) will. Will is not just morality to me, it is the essence of being alive. Conscious activity, at rock bottom, is willing. Do you disagree?

Which brings out one of S’s gripes with K….causality, cause and effect. S rejected K’s invocation of freedom as a causality, so without it, for him, will does not stand the relation to cause and effect.

Correct, because, as I understand S, the will is fundamentally outside of time and space which is just an overly precise term (‘will’) for mind (as mind is fundamentally will, but not just will).

What’s next?

I bet there is a lot you will want to respond to in my post (; If not, then there’s plenty Kantian questions I have for you.

Bob

Hello Fooloso4,

So of course we should expect to a dead body to still have an alive mind — Bob Ross

You might expect that. I don't expect that. The majority of the medical community does not expect that. The majority of those working in cognitive science do not expect that.

I apologize: that was a typo—it was supposed to say “so of course we should not...”. I was meaning to agree with you on that.

I am aware of the tree that is providing me with shade, but that experience does not mean the tree is within experience, only that my awareness of it is.

I agree that the tree doesn’t merely exist within your conscious experience (i.e., within your perceptions), but that doesn’t mean it exists in-itself as the composition of mind-independent parts nor that it exists materially in the sense that you perceive it. The information is accurate (enough), but the appearance is just an appearance.

Bob

Hello Mww,

You’re on record as admitting a Schopenhauer-ian bent

Correct. I consider it a neo-schopenhauerian view.

He was the champion of the PSR, yet brute facts negate the PSR. It must be that being “metaphysically necessary” is sufficient reason, or the PSR doesn’t apply here.

Schopenhauer claimed that there are four modes of the PSR: mathematical, motive, reason, and causal. He claims that the principle of sufficient reason of becoming (i.e.,. causal) doesn’t apply to the thing-in-itself as will, but the PSR of motive does in time. I didn’t understand him to be claiming to be a necessitarian: the will, outside of space and time, is not affected by the PSR: the PSR only comes about in space and time.

But why should it be necessary that reality be a universal mind, or manifest from such a thing?

Firstly, under every metaphysical theory, there must be something posited, by my lights, as metaphysical necessary: even if it is the infinite regression of contingencies itself. So I would say it is a matter if inevitability.

Secondly, the idea is that what is expressed in space (and time) is the representation of immaterial ideas (from a previous time): the physical is just an expression of the mental. Now, what is being expressed in time (which is fundamentally ideas being expressed as physical) is either mental or non-mental. If it is non-mental then we have the hard problem of consciousness all over again. If it is mental, then we don’t: the latter is more parsimonious than the former. Metaphysics is about maximizing explanatory power whilst minimizing complexity.

Thirdly, it is not necessary that reality must be a universal mind but, rather, that the universal mind is being posited as metaphysically necessary as a part of what would be claimed as the most parsimonious account of reality (as a general account). I am not claiming that we can have air-tight metaphysical theories about reality.

The representation is never the physical stuff, and the mental is sometimes what is represented

The representation within the physical world is the representation of an immaterial idea. From the side of the physical, it appears as a seemingly potential infinite chain of physical causes; from the side of the mental, it was the expression of will (i.e., of immaterial ideas).

The mental is always what is represented when it comes to the physical stuff: that physical stuff is a representation of the mental: this doesn’t mean that the mental always gets represented as intended (by our wills) in reality.

How is yours not backwards? Actually, it is backwards, so the real question becomes….how do you justify the backwardness, without merely saying it isn’t?

I am not following why it is backwards: please elaborate.

Why is it not that coming to know the world from two sides isn’t two kinds of knowledge?

It is two kinds of knowledge: the physical, on its own, from that side, appears as an potential infinite chain of causality—but what it is representing, the thing-in-itself, is immaterial ideas. I would say that they are two kinds of knowledge, but they don’t give a holistic account of the world on their own: one needs both to account fully for each event (if that makes any sense).

a priori as representations of mental events, and a posteriori as representation of physical stuff, but only the latter is coming to know the world.

If I am understanding you correctly, then you can come to know the world as well by understanding that the a priori representations of mental events are what is being represented, when it comes to your body, by the a posteriori physical stuff. With self-knowledge, and this where you probably will disagree and is the dispute between Kant and Schopenhauer, you can come to know the thing-in-itself of your body: your mind.

I’d be happier if it was the case coming to know the world from two conditions, which would be physical stuff and mental events, but not so much that each is a kind of knowledge all by itself without influence from the other

I am saying they don’t influence each other insofar as causally. The physical is still influenced in the sense that it is a representation of the mental: you need both to account holistically for the events, but in the vast majority of cases you only have direct access to the physical account (and not the mental account).

Perhaps instead of two kinds of knowledge, we could call it two viewpoints that are required to gain knowledge.

For S it is the will, I thought, but either way…same-o, same-o

‘Will’ is just the most fundamental aspect of mind: when we have ideas, it is fundamentally supplied by our will. You are correct that this is an overlap between schopenhauer and analytic idealism, as the latter is an extension (or adjustment) of the former.

Bob

Hello Tom Storm,

At what point might Kastrup's answer to materialism be a case of 'mind-at-large of the gaps'?

Good question: I think it would be a ‘mind-at-large of the gaps’ iff it was a soft problem for physicalism. However, since it is provably impossible for explain consciousness under physicalism, that invalidates the theory (as far as I am concerned) provably and not just merely “we don’t know, so it could be mind”.

He rather relies upon the frailties of the former in order to justify his version of latter. I think the first job is easier than the second.

This is true. But, for me, it is the hard problem of consciousness that removes physicalism from the race, not the idea that they haven’t explained it yet.

Bob