I think it would be a relatively short thread, for my part.

I am fine being in the experience machine.

I think I am pretty much on this same wavelength. None of it matters, ultimately. But its all a lot of fun!

How do we differentiate between hallucination or spontaneous mystical experience and God? Could God not speak through those means? He's described as communicating through dreams. It's silly to ask for "evidence" here because no one knows what that means. What would qualify as evidence? Could you give me some examples? Some criterion? — BitconnectCarlos

I think you're missing the specific point i'm making here, which accepts your criticism of what's being asked.

I agree, if God was termed to speak through dreams, they would be, essentially, indistinguishable phenomena. But then, that flies in the face of the nature of God. I think we can appeal to the traditions/texts themselves to write off certain suggestions. But, this is hte not the point i'm making.

The point i'm making, is that:

Could be aliens. Or we could be hallucinating.
— BitconnectCarlos

There is better evidence for these two, than the Bible story. Delusion and spontaneous mystical experience also. — AmadeusD

The only reason to move on from these suggestions and either propose 1) a totally different explanation, for which we do not have evidence; or
2) Increase the above hypotheses in the way you have done (adding divine sourcing) is unreasonable. THe theories, and their exploration, do not require, invoke or hint at the divinity you're adding to it. This isn't even a point about probability (though, given my initial response around using the text to deduce probabilities still stands strong, it could be an additional one). It's about the sheer unreasonableness of just saying "I don't like that; i'll seek a different truth".

I respond in the proceeding way to elicit response, not to give my view, necessarily:

how do we understand/frame disability? Such content is revealed to Moses and has deep repercussions. — BitconnectCarlos

I do not think it has any repercussions, as I do not believe (and do not believe it reasonable to believe) that it ever happened. How we understand disability is as much an empirical discussion as it is a 'moral' one. What to do about it is another discussion. And here, I would posit, you run into your discomfort and so require a truth other than the following:

"What we do about disabilities and disabled people, such as they are, is something on each individual to find within themselves, and on society to merely represent the former in aggregate".

So, if that's uncomfortable, or looks like it might result in something emotionally difficult for you, you need another 'truth'. That might be one 'revealed to Moses'. But it is a story, like any other. I just don't understand foregoing reason to achieve comfort. I have this aversion to discussion around Psychedelics and their purported effects. May we can come to terms by analogizing..

But for better or for worse, we are made by our relationships with other people -- parents and siblings first, then peers, teachers, neighbors, gangs, acquaintances, partners, lovers, etc. — BC

While it's probably impossible to reject the underlying idea (that relationships are unavoidable, and carry meaning even if we ignore it) I don't think they 'make' us, any more than our biology does. Which is to say, a lot. LMAO.

I wasn't aware the Ten Commandments had changed. What do they say now? — Ciceronianus

Around the end of the second century, apparently.

There are other ways these things have changed over time, also.

Because such truths — BitconnectCarlos

Ah, this sort of begs the question. I'm wondering how you get 'truth', given your motivation is not seeking truth, but avoiding uncomfortable utterances.

an answer must be chosen — BitconnectCarlos

This being clearly false, is motivation for my enquiry, largely. One need not chose and answer to any of these existential questions to properly participate in the world.

Could be aliens. Or we could be hallucinating. — BitconnectCarlos

There is better evidence for these two, than the Bible story. Delusion and spontaneous mystical experience also. Kind of the point. Your motivation for rejecting these (not this specifically, but as a mode of illustrating the short-fall of reason), more reasonable, conclusions, is that they are uncomfortable to you, or you would rather another answer.
That seems to me, to be unreasonable.

I do too. But for me that "afterlife" does not include my ego--the Subject,"I"--nor any of its Narrative. So, admittedly this is that ego taliking: thanks but no thanks. — ENOAH

Yes, that's the part that is 'rub'-y. Harris (Sam) put its well - how is it possible that a decaying mind(dementia) that no longer recognises one's children suddenly departs from the body, in tact as at some random point in the past.
It's not coherent, to me. But again, I'm unsure that identity extends beyond the fact of the vessel. Consciousness doesn't, on it's face, consist in memories, so I see no reason to have them at-base.

I feel you brother! — ENOAH

It's a hard go, this lifetime :D

Despite the evidence? I don't see where evidence factors into it. Did God speak to Moses? Are we to consider the evidence for and against such a claim? — BitconnectCarlos

Yes, we are. But that wasn't quite my point. My point was that the motivational factor seems to stem from merely a discomfort with certain answers, regardless of the supportability of alternate views. This seems so with the majority of historical religiosity - 'I don't like that answer, so I'm looking elsewhere, even if that makes no sense'.

What fascinates me about the book is that it reveals certain things that we wouldn't otherwise know or take for granted. It's just my intuition picking things up. I find some of the dialogues to be fascinating. I find some of the parables to be transformative. — BitconnectCarlos

That's fair. I just don't understand why that would be motivation to reject, or accept, any claims. Or, reject good ones that you don't like. Just trying to see if you can pick up that thread in your mode of thinking..

What a horribly bad existence you must lead.
Take acid. Buy a hooker.

And there's the rub. How then? And I am asking sincerely, not argumentative. — ENOAH

FWIW, I read this as a great question, not any kind of dig or gotcha.

Yeah, that is the question (in this context - i also am making this same claim about the lack of necessity for phenomenal consciousness in another thread). I really am unsure. I have many theories around what consciousness might be, or how it might come about which, if any were seriously plausible on the facts (unsure that's a coherent claim in this lane of enquiry) they would give an account that could extend to this question.
So, disappointingly, I don't know!

Conceptually, though, I see absolutely no issue with Consciousness being some more general concept, and 'a mind' being 'bodily bound consciousness' or some such. This-wise, you could imagine bodily death causing the end of that one mind, but not the consciousness. The image that came to mind was a water balloon. That balloon of water is gone. Done and dusted (once burst) but hte water persists. Idk lol

Hmm. Okay, I appreciate you.

I do not think you addressed what i'm saying though. You've restated it.

I need conclusions. We all need to plant our flag somewhere and our own rationality will only get us so far. — BitconnectCarlos

This speaks the same language as what I was enquiring about. Doesn't it make you uncomfortable that a random desire to not be given multiple responses has you committed to certain cosmological 'truths' despite, perhaps, the evidence?

I do not see how something "computing really hard," ever necessitates the emergence of first person subjective experience. — Count Timothy von Icarus

This is the thing. The thing. It simply isn't needed, until we can assess why. At what point what a being need phenomenal consciousness? It's an accident, surely. Emergence, in whatever way, on the current 'facts' we know.

I think panpsychism might fall under the heading of a paradigm shift. — Patterner

I think it might present one, in the Nagel sense. I don't quite think it's anything new, generally. Panpsychism the concept has been around millennia.

Fair enough. I guess I'm plumbing the 'I don't want' part of it, which seems a little more personal.
To me, it seems that this wish has informed a huge amount of religiosity - good and bad - without a shred of rationality to it. I wondered if you saw that, in your view, there is a gaping epistemological hole in that respect (not that it's 'wrong' but that there may need to be more to that in justifying such a search for a mono-theistic answer to those questions).

But when you are looking for meaning in this life, you will find it in your relationships with other people. — BC

You can find it many other places, depending on your dispositions. I think it's reasonable to know this, a head of time, so you don't despair if those relationships are unfulfilling. It took me nearly 30 years to find meaningful relationships - and there is no discernable reason for this. Other things fulfilled me.

I think polytheism is inherently more tolerant than monotheism; but personally I don't want plurality when it comes to the big questions of life. — BitconnectCarlos

Do you see a lot of historical baggage in this view?

Given our shared history and shared experiences, these NDE's could be akin to dreams and the appearance of shared symbols or archetypes. Sure, tge testimonials are cross cultural. But if one wished to research it, they might find striking similarities in the ways we dream of witches or falling. Yet we accept that our common dreams about witches do not translate into witches are real. — ENOAH

I agree, and I actually vaguely recall that this is what the research shows regarding some recurrent elements of dreaming, qua human dream, rather htan individual dreams. I think the most likely scenario is something akin to dreaming, which includes an 'extra' psychological component (perhaps, a type of neural networking that only occurs when S is expecting death).

That said, I think the peculiar shared context of NDEs allows us a bit more leeway in terms of moving away from parsimony. The ideas above might explain this phenomenon. But, equally, another explanation would be as likely, given it's a disparate experience from standard dreaming. It doesn't have to include the survival consciousness, per se, but just something which is not a match for the mechanics of dreaming.

Having been interested in this exact topic for more than 20 years, and having done plenty of 'research' into plenty of theories and ideas around it, it seems to me probably untrue that consciousness dies with the individual mind. But that it survives the body is just as perplexing.

aws of nature are descriptive, not prescriptive, and do not imply a conscious lawgiver. The word 'laws' is a distraction. 'Natural regularities' might be a better term. — Tom Storm

:ok:

This is hte perfect place for Hume's 'constant conjunction'.

As an outsider, who has spent significant time in the USA, I think the charges of the kind OP makes are over-blown, somewhat hangover concepts. Not many people care.
But not many people vote either. So, therein, the charge becomes palpably worth discussing.

AS such, booming voter numbers would make representational democracy more than a line on a page. I think the problem would vanish, in this scenario. Enough people with enough views voting can only be good, unless you're a 'for thee, not for me' type of person around views, and freedoms etc..

↪boethius :lol: I'm not even a "liberal" (or member of the Democrat>c Party). Pro tip: stop disinforming yourself with FOX Noise (or other MAGA media). — 180 Proof

You continue to astound.

Unless you can have indirect awareness of your perceptual experiences, then it makes no sense to say that you have direct awareness of your perceptual experiences. The "direct" qualifier has no contrast, so it doesn't mean anything. — Luke

This is clearly untrue, without much need to qualify that. We can understand 'direct' without a perfect conception of indirect and vice verse. Even a decent analogy makes this so, if you want to reject the brute fact. This smacks of a random limitation on concepts to service a particular view. The quote from ChatGPT makes it clear what each would consist in. We need not have experienced them to talk about htem with meaning. In any case, several possible 'more direct' types of perception have been put forward.

More specifically, they are of the same type constitutively, because they employ the brain's perceptual system unlike other types of conscious experiences, such as beliefs, desires, memories, imaginations. — jkop

Great point.

I have no clue what you're talking about now.

I didn't claim you lied. Not sure how your first utterance is either true, or relevant here.

I don't care, per se. I enjoy interesting exchanges. I don't even know who you are. You are responding to my comments. If you stop, it will mean only I have nothing to respond to. If you don't like how I play, that's fine. But it is entirely possible you're just wrong and don't like that.
No, that isn't objective or moral. It is.. your subjective emotional dummy-spitting. I acknowledged this earlier. ..

I simply do not care that you're frustrated. That's something for you to deal with in your own mind. The result may be refraining from responding. — AmadeusD

It has no moral valence. It just prevents you from adequately interacting with people who have an interest, and further knowledge, in a shared field of interest. And that's fine. No moral content there.

This misconception rests upon a failure of historical perspective. If Christianity today appears to be a benign and peaceful religion, it is because modern secularism and the rule of law have drawn its fangs. — alan1000

I think you're just wrong about people's thoughts. I don't think I've heard anyone make the former claim without acknowledging the latter. It's Islam's resistance to update that puts it in the position it's in, in this context.

At least a democracy, even a flawed and corrupt one, tends toward less autocratic laws - and makes it easier to change the laws. — Vera Mont

Thats true. I take Churchills line on this.

I will ask you to hold your opinion until you have read the book "The Science of Good & Evil- Why People Cheat, Gossip, Care, Share, and FOLLOW THE GOLDEN RULE by Michael Shermaer, or in some way validate the notion that you know what you are talking about when it comes what we share with other social animals. Right now you appear to be as someone who is practicing medicine despite having zero education in that field of knowledge. — Athena

You are free to ask. That may be your defensive position, but I don't take it all that seriously. I am aware of socialisation in many animal genii, species and groups. They do not have notions of 'good' and 'evil'. they are literally invented by humans. They may have analogous reactive states. And even that's not clear.

Excuse me, how can a completely ignorant person make moral decisions about how we live on this planet? We have destroyed much of our planet and may have caused the end of life as we know it because of our ignorance. The greatest evil is ignorance. — Athena

This is literally nothing but your emotional response to the idea that morality isn't objective. And that's absolutely fine. But it says nothing about my comment. Unless you have an infallible conception of an objective morality, knowing more states of affairs can't inform your moral judgements. I understand that we need guiding principles to make any moral judgements. But facts about oil don't do the guiding, morally. The facts guide us to solutions (or, not lol) once a moral jdugement and aim has been established. "saving the planet" seems a good moral aim, which would exist even if you were misinformed about Earth sciences. Alas, I personally just don't care. Let the world die. Or, to use your terms, kill it. Who cares. Its insignificant to me. It would be extremely hard for you to show i was 'morally wrong' without enforcing your emotional response as a moral benchmark.

" the science isn't moral, nor does it inform morals" your inability to grasp the meaning of what I say about moral judgment is a source of frustration for me. Let's see if you can follow this moral reasoning- saying that I lie is offensive and I take that as an invitation to attack. Can you see that cause and effect of having bad manners? If you can't get informed this problem might get worse. — Athena

The bolded is just you justifying your being offended. If you aren't lying, you'll ignore me. If you take it as an attack, that is not reason. That is emotion. I simply do not care that you're frustrated. That's something for you to deal with in your own mind. The result may be refraining from responding. That would be fine. As would many other responses. Continually being offended probably isn't going to help anyone in any way. I simply take the phrase 'bad manners' as juvenile.

to saying I have lied, — Athena

You'll need to point out where I said that before I can respond. I don't recall, and cannot see my doing so. Interestingly, your two overall objections (ignorance, hubris) apply equally to you in this instance.

1. You seem to think I must not know anything about this subject and have proceeded to make some sweeping, digging remarks based on that erroneous assumption - which stems from my disagreeing with you. That's wild. And extreme hubris.

2. You are, apparently, completely unaware of the maturity of this research which goes far beyond what you've just said. There are, in fact, more than 2000 flood myths around the world. Almost all of them point to a specific point in time (including the Atlantis Myth). We know exactly what happened at this point in time: the end of the Younger Dryas. A time when billions of gallons of melt water flowed into the oceans, swallowing up coast lines, creating the Arabian peninsula etc... The Comet Research Group have been working on this for quite some time.

The Garden of Eden was most likely in Iran. — Athena

It was far more likely in South Eastern Turkey. But also, it most likely did not exist and persists merely as a allegory to speak about a time when North Africa and parts of the Levant were lush and wet. (I'll add here I am biased toward that theory because I have been involved in in: I am cited as a reference in this book.

This is determined by evidence of the four rivers, a very long and harsh drought, and flooding. — Athena

The Biblical story of creation being a Sumerian story of many gods and goddesses and a river asking a goddess for help it stay in its banks so it would not flood her plants again. The goddess used mud to create a man and woman and she breathed life into them. — Athena

This is one theory, yes. It is more likely it is an amalgamation of several pre-Talmudic myths, not limited to Atra-Hatsis (Gilgamesh, Ziusudra et al...) but extending as far out as India (Manu), China (Nuwa) and many others. There is, in fact, an analogous myth carved into the walls of the Edfu temple in Upper (southern) Egypt. There is some, close-to-direct, evidence that the Atlantis Myth was derived directly from these writings originally found at Saiis.

I appreciate that this is something you are interested in, and have much to say and think on it.

I don’t quite recognise my claims in its responses to me.

True, of politics and legislation. But societies generally adhere to a single set of basic values, though the members may disagree on detail and there will always be transgressors who have to be dealt with in order that the society may continue to function. — Vera Mont

So, yes, rule of the majority. And it is tyrannous if the basis for that interference with 'transgressors' is violent or restrictive.

I do know, actually. I can ask any living human organism if he perceives and the answer is invariably “yes”. — NOS4A2

This doesn't establish any knowledge, my man. This merely puts you in the same position of 'other minds' worriers. It does not establish anything about what the perceiver actually consists in (necessary, sufficient). If the body is necessary for the perceiver to perceive that may well match your presumptions. But, if there is any daylight between the two (i.e brain in a vat being possible) then we can safely say this conception is misguided and a body is where a perceive exists - not in what it consists.

Since we don't really know one way or the other there, it's hard to say anything, one way or the other. It certainly seems the 'perceiver' can perceive regardless of the body's status and is therefore not accurately embodied(phantom limb eg). There's no reason, currently, to presume that a body is required beneath the brain to elicit perception per se - but perception of bodily sensation would require the body, for sure. I don't take the view that 'everything' is required for 'something' to be a perceiver, if that makes sense - I can't think of a better line right now.

I’m willing to hear your arguments and evidence that say otherwise, but to me this is more evidence of an attempt to smuggle dualism and idealism past the customs. — NOS4A2

I'm unsure 'otherwise' to what, you are asking for arguments to support? can you please clarify? The immediately preceding passage doesn't clarify for me as It isn't counter to anything i've put forth. It seems to just boil down to you having a very, very vague and undefinable conception of a 'perceiver' where I am trying to actually understand what is required, at base for a perceiver to exist. Not exist within a body. The human is the holistic, physical being - the 'perceiver' might not be. I'm not smuggling anytthing. That is the position.

It should be done by a consensus of the community — Vera Mont

I think this is a bit of red herring for Moralists.
There is never going to be a consensus. There is going to be a majority rule. I cannot see my way to thinking that's the best possible outcome. Particularly if we reject moral objectivity.

That's never a hard sell! — Vera Mont

Why do you think that is? My position (probably close to Joshs') is that they prey on the existing truth of these differences in morality. And, that's in aggregate. Plenty of gay conservatives, along with the homophobes for eg.

Note that none of the nouns used in this sentence refer to any person, place, or thing, so it isn’t clear what you are speaking about, if anything. — NOS4A2

Yet, you intuited it perfectly in your next paragraph? I smell nonsense.

Given your empirical facts you ought to be able to at least point to one of them. But we have examined the biology of animals and human beings and have found no such entities, nothing that any of those nouns refer to. — NOS4A2

I genuinely, given the above making little sense to me, don't know which aspect of the discussion you're referring to. If you're trying to say that I cannot point to an intervening element in the process of perception, the transition of light rays to electrical impulses is one. If you mean I can't point to "a perceiver", then again, you've already done my work for me by noting that 'you' or 'me' fits there- or, more accurately, made it clear that I'm doing nothing wrong by referring 'a perceiver' as you can easily note that this must be a human, in our discussion. It refers to anyone who could be perceiving. This is not ambiguous. and is not hard to determine, as you rightly did so while objecting.

Last I check we are a little more than brains, or some other organ, so I need not pretend the perceiver exists somewhere on the inside. And if your claim is that perception is mediated by our own body, which amounts to saying the perceiver is his own intermediary, I’ll just have to laugh it off. Sorry. — NOS4A2

Nothing in this passage has anything to do with any of my claims, besides you pretending that our sensory system is not mediated, heavily, between object and experience. Which it is. Plainly. So, if that's not your claim, you'll need to do a bit better than state something I haven't claimed, and laughing it off.
It is an empirical fact that our sight is mediated by parts of our body. You are not being serious if you rthink the body perceives. A dead body cannot perceive. End of discussion, as far as that goes. So I hope that's not your claim. I would further hope that you've noticed your version of a perceiver flies in the face of the majority of conceptions of identity or personhood. I would also hope you'd have noticed that I've addressed that unfortunate fact about the sum human knowledge - we do not know in what a 'person' or 'perceiver' consists. We simply do not. You don't. No one does. We do our best with what we have, and you seem to be rejecting that attempt on the basis that you have some secret, fool-proof conception of what a perceiver is. Given that you do not, i fail to see how these incredulous objections could go through.

That is a shame; it's been a long whirl :P MUch appreciated!

The science of good and evil can begin with studying animals. — Athena

No it can't. These concepts were invented by humans. Animals have no notions (possibly, at all, but at least) of these things.

Earth sciences are very important to moral judgments about how we use and dispose of resources. — Athena

No they aren't. They are important as to the empirical data of the same field. This is hte key distinction between morality and empirical investigation. EI gets us what is. Morality gets us what ought to be. That is, if you think there is such thing as morality above-and-beyond the human assertion of it, on it's own terms.

based a real climate event of a drought and flooding and return to a climate favorable to farming — Athena

This seems to run quite counter to the science, though.

The stories we tell ourselves are very important and a failure to include science in our understanding of reality is a serious mistake. — Athena

I think this is true. And is very, very important in noting the two above responses to you - the science isn't moral, nor does it inform morals. That is actually, why it's science, in some large part.
Social science is where it get's murky - as noted in the quote you've used, implicitly - is it right to continually point out the organisational failings of certain cultural groups? Is it right to point out the crime rates of non-oppressed groups? Is it right to.... Well, who knows? But in sociology, you at least have to consider this.
The facts behind it (i.e the statistical data) has no moral worth.

For me morality is a complete human invention (non-realism), so moral guilt has to be assigned, it is never actual — Lionino

:ok:

Thank you for saving me time lol

The question of "what perceives" absolutely relates to the discussion because If we don’t know who or what perceives we cannot say whether perception is indirect, direct, or otherwise. — NOS4A2

I don't think that's the case. And I addressed that. Nice.

If we don’t know, or refuse to say what it is that perceives, then it is impossible to distinguish between the perceiver, the intermediary, and the objects of perception. — NOS4A2

I don't think so, no. We do not need to know what constitutes the 'homunculus' to know about our visual system - and I both addressed that (as above) and noted what the perceiver is. If you missed that, do feel free to re-read the comment you've quoted from. I am not being facetious - it's easy to miss things when responding to multiple-point comments.

If we do not know where the perceiver begins and ends we cannot say where it ought to appear on the causal chain. — NOS4A2

We can know this without knowing what the perceiver is. We simply don't know what the perceiver is. No one does. We don't know. This doesn't preclude us from understanding that between the object and the perception (i.e perceptual experience - you DR guys use words quite badly in this discussion imo so im trying to get on board with your usage) are several instances of transfer from one medium to another, none of which preserve any visual image from the object. It is literally created in hte brain/mind. Yet, for some reason this just doesn't matter?

I'm fine with saying that through the direct perception of light we indirectly perceive the object — NOS4A2

Neat. I think anyone being honest would need to. And this would remove the disagreement between IR and DR.

I am indirectly perceiving an apple — NOS4A2

Sure, but that's doubly-indirect ;)

That is still direct perception because it describes a direct relationship between a perceiver and his environment — NOS4A2

As you have described, it clearly does not.

Indirect perception proposes the perception of a host of cognitive mediators, mental constructions, representations, and so on. — NOS4A2

It takes account of the many, empirically factual, mediations which cause a mental construction of a representation presented to 'the perceiver'. :)

You continue to equivocate on the meaning of “perceptual experience”. — Luke

No i don't, and I am utterly done with going int he circle you lead yourself in. Your words are getting you into a muddle that i have tried for two pages to bring you out of. I don't need to be correct to note this particular issue you're having.

It is only mediated in the production of the perceptual experience, not in the experience itself. — Luke

Suffice to say, as a final thought on the actual disagreement in position, that this line above is utterly incoherent and again, a perfect exemplar of what I have tried for at least two pages to avoid, directly addressing where your terminology is either 1. nonsense, or 2. unhelpful and attempted a coming-to-terms.

Far be it from me, Luke :)

:nerd: nice. I agree with those sentiments

None of this relates to the discussion/distinction we're talking about. We are perceivers - I was trying to avoid the chess move a lot like to make which is to retreat into the "No true homunculus" type of reasoning. I get that objection, but don't think its reasonable to then infer that there's no distinct perceiver. It wasn't at you, just to clear that up.

Light is of the world. Light is distal. We perceive light. Isn’t that so? — NOS4A2

Hmm. Kind of (imo), and I see where you're going (i think). Light can be distal (obviously), but even distant light physically enters the eye to produce anything in our mind. The light from a galaxy far, far away might have taking 10,000 years to get to your eye, but it still physically enters the eye to initiation perception of it (and visual experience of hte object which reflected the light).

Do perceivers have eyes? Human perceivers do. Light comes into direct contact with the eyes. So how is the perception of light indirect? — NOS4A2

I did not claim that this was the case, at all. The light directly entering the eyes is one of the 'way points' mentioned earlier, which, quite obviously, causes our visual experience to be indirectly of whatever objects caused that light to enter the eye/s.

If the position was that we 'directly perceive light, which represents distal objects, of which we have no direct perception' i'd be fine with that, because that appears to be the case. Again, the need to hold on to certain language, that doesn't not best-fit the position seems to be causing a big problem here.

I'm not sure which members you are thinking of. But I do agree that these days there is significant self-loathing in the West - we are often self-described as patriarchal, misogynist, war mongering, colonizing fascists and I can see why some people embrace 'strong men' and forms of nationalism, just to escape to a place of certainty and confidence, no matter how bogus — Tom Storm

Hey Tom - fwiw, my responses in that thread in which we had a disagreement are somewhat pursuant to the aim of not heading down this path of pathologising disagreements into 'bigotry' and 'moral failure'. Not in any way trying to resurrect that disagreement, just thought this a good, cooler scenario to point that out :) I had 'felt' we were somewhat close in terms of how to approach those issues, and this tells me I may have been right, and it was 'on the facts' that we had crossed wires.

That depends on what your conception of a perceiver is.
It is the experient. The consciousness who apprehends the end-result of the process of perception. It has a referent - if you're not able to adequately fine-grain your thinking here, I get that - largely, because whether fine or coarse grained, we could all be wrong.

The idea you're putting forward to seems to rest on the idea that we cannot pin-point a perceiver. If that were the case, we should be able to show that we share minds or experiences. We cannot.

We perceive light. Not objects. Quite literally, we see the converse of a shadow: a light-refracted image which represents the object enters our eyes. We don't even have the 'direct' contact put forward by DRs who seem to think an indirect sense system is directly perceiving things. It isn't, even on that account. But, I thank you for giving me a wider circle to walk around in. It is now clear that we perceive representations of a representation.

if a process which necessarily disconnects the end receiver from the distal object is “direct”, alrighty :)

that our perceptual experiences are of real objects — Luke

But they couldn't possibly be this. It isn't a move open to you, and you have rejected the two possible versions where it's true: physical objects in your mind, or non-mediated vision.

The issue is not whether our “perceptual system” is direct, as you seem to assume. The issue is whether our perceptual experiences are direct. — Luke

The circle grows ever-smaller.

Reducing the inputs of data to a system would probably reduce the instances of possible misfiring. This seems fairly normal inference to me..