The difference between so-called hallucinatory (incl dreams) and so called real perception is that generally* in the former Mind constructs experience out of available images stored in memory, and in the latter Mind constructs experience out of available images stored in memory, triggered by sensation of something in the physical world. And, yes, "experiences" involving/derived from concepts (classical examples, "I" think, therefore "I" am, and most everything appearing in this Forum) fall under the first, hallucinatory. *there are complexities and qualifications

Good point. So simple, but something I haven't thought about properly. One I'll consider more thoroughly. Especially its implications on my personal interests about human Mind and the status/role/nature of logic. Thank you.

I see the relevance of your point, though indirect. It remains, then, the answer to whether or not, as you put it, we can derive mathematics from logic alone, requires at the very final stage at least, a leap from logic. Some say no, dissenters say yes, in the end, a leap must get one there.

Thank you for the clarification on Godel. I see that.


My question was twofold.
1. Isn't it futile to "make sense" of paradoxes?
2. Dont paradoxes expose the limitation(s) of Logic (here, in pursuit of absolutes)?

I'll presume your answer is no; and therefore, you think that we can make sense of paradoxes, or, at least that it's a worthwhile pursuit; and, either they don't expose the limitations of logic or logic is not limited in its pursuits.

If that's the case, I'm interested in understanding your reasons.

Am I viewing the problem too simplistically? Isn't the point of the liars paradox, and all others, not in trying to make sense out of them, but in the very thing they expose? That is, that we can never conclude absolutes in our ideas, thoughts, Language, when our strongest tool for such conclusions (Reason/Logic) are threatened by fallibility. The mathematical paradoxes (forgive me, I am far from expertise) like Russell's and Gödel's expose that same threat, I.e., we cannot, using our most powerful language, conclude absolutely.

Understood (or, in fairness, maybe not) But if feelings are not, in their "essence" the raw binary, and meaning is not tacked on by thinking, where does the meaning come from? If the feeling triggers/gives rise to meaning, or thinking, no matter how seemingly immediate, isn't there a split? Is our confusion not just a necessary/functional illusion?

true, and so has history written us.

I would reflect on the Bodily feeling presently "occurring" or released (?) during what one might interpret as anger or as hatred. Presumably, both would be felt as, for lack of a better word, "unpleasant," subject to possible varying degrees or subtle undectable differences (if any. maybe degree of unpleasantness is the only difference). Perhaps, from the Body's perspective that is the extent that our "purest" most raw reflection, can tell us about these so-called emotions, i.e., that they are unpleasant bodily feelings varying only in degrees of unpleasantness,
suggesting that at the purest "level" of feelings, or in Truth, we can only access the binary, pleasant/unpleasant. It is only when the Language of human Consciousness enters the picture that the Fictional emotions, anger or hatred, are constructed. That is, to answer the question, what is anger? Or what is hatred? Or what is the difference? Anger and hatred in Truth, do not exist. They are, in truth, unpleasant feelings of the Body. However, out of, or to, these real feelings, we construct our Narratives in human Mind, those fabricated Narratives, being what we collectively call emotions, and, being constructed by fleeting Language, and not actually real organic processes (which are restricted to the binary pleasant/unpleasant) we only think these emotions are Real, their differences relevant, etc. In otherwords anger and hatred are only constructed Fictions which come to displace the real feelings which cannot be accessed beyond how we feel, cannot be discussed in truth beyond the simple binary, pleasant or unpleasant.

Time is the illusion which necessarily emerges out of the illusion of change. Reality is beyond both something and nothing. Both something and nothing, like time and change arise as constructions in human connsciousness.

Count Timothy, sorry, I haven't figured out how to reply directly.

I agree that belief, and more specifically, belief in Truth, is functional, even functionally necessary within the context of our uniquely constructed Fictional world. What I'm saying, and particularly with respect to the original post regarding metaphysics and its pursuit, is can we recognize that, while functional (the foundation of arts, sciences, etc.), it cannot do what it tries to claim: it cannot uncover any iota of Real Truth. Real Truth is in Being, not knowing (knowing, being a thing we construct and believe, or settle upon, following a dialectical-like process which takes place only within the Fiction and applying only the tools of that Fiction). Or, in other words, "yes, everything I am saying is a lie, including this" is a trap we cannot exit. But the lies are nevertheless useful, since that's where we inescapably find our "selves"

To answer your last question first since you're right, in my thinking, that is always implied. If any human (necessarily meaning humans with that seemingly unique human Consciousness) pursuit including expressions are necessarily Fictional, then so is This expression, and so on. But the so called liar's paradox, paradoxically affirms my hypothesis (and paradoxically, I have to assume my hypothesis is valid for this present point to work). It reveals a defect that (yes, I am necessarily also that defect, always implied) one would think doesn't belong in Truth. Paradoxes reveal a crack in the foundation...therefore of Fiction. Truth (if we are even qualified to address It, and, we're not) wouldn't have any cracks.

As for your reference earlier to my suggestion about Language. Sorry, I don't doubt you were clear, I rather lack the confidence to be sure in my reading: are you suggesting Language and, I would presume, Reason, pre-exist their emergence in the human experience? In Kantian (and I think Platonic, see the slave and the triangle, anamnesis ) terms, are you suggesting Reason and Language are Real (even, have a higher place in the hierarchy of Reality than human perception, for e.g.) and that, even if you were to concede that all of our experiences are Fictional, Language and Reason were already there to build that, otherwise, how did we get to our seemingly pure ideas? If that's what you're suggesting, pardon my simplistic terms, this is what I think, to keep it simple. Before Language developed into the very structure of human Consciousness, it existed as images stored in memory and used by the organically aware human animal to organically trigger conditioned responses helpful to survival and prosperity. A roar means run, no need to "think" about it. Language and reason developed out of that X means Y (note X isnt really Y). And there's no room for any explanation of that process of evolution here. But that process is Real. However, the idea that Language, and especially sophisticated reason, pre-exist our Fictional Structure in which they were both incubated and reached their current form, I think is a falsehood we are compelled to believe in order to support that fictional structure. Anyway, that's me making assumptions about your point, and trying to express mine briefly. I hope I haven't frustrated you by missing yours entirely.

Apologies that I cannot briefly do so. But to put it overly-simply, each of metaphysics (and ontology, for that matter), and the objects of its pursuit, and the person pushing are inescapably bound by (very simply) Language (Structures made of Signifiers stored in memory, operating under a system of rules, having an affect on the Body). It requires no proof here that Language isn't the "thing" it only re-presents the "thing." Thus, it is irredeemably alienated from the Truth at the instance of its manifestation or use. All human experiences, including the noblest pursuits in pure reflection, pure reason, metaphysics, are necessarily bound in Language, where the Truth is displaced (traditionally, "mediated") by what only pretends to be the Truth, or, Fiction.

Please explain, beyond the perspective of metaphysics initially given? Or beyond the perspective that, with regard to metaphysics, while it is futile in its attempt to access Truth; it is valuable in its efforts at accessing that which structures our experiences, ultimately Fiction, and since we seem to be inescably bound to the Fiction, the more we understand it the better?

Not no to metaphysics. It's the foundation upon which all other human, hence, ultimately fictional pursuits are built, from poetry to mathematics.

An archeological dig of a site structured by Fiction, applying as tools of excavation, the very same Fictional structures, hoping to find Reality, but digging up the only possibility, artifacts of Fiction, improperly labeled and indexed as Reality; all the while forgetting that the digger is Real, and the site is Fiction.

Flannel J, I appreciate the point you are making but I think your premise is naive, one-dimensional, or wrong. I don't think the immigration of Jewish people into Palestine pre-state of Israel can stand alone as the cause of Palestinians' suffering. I don't think they are or were opposed to the Jewish settlers' way of life. I don't think Palestine was a majority 90% Muslim, but already had a significant indigenous Christian and smaller Jewish population. I dont think therefore that the allegedly leftist position on immigration does pose the amusing inconsistency you suggest. I think that if the current migration of Muslims (as you say) into western countries was coupled with an international order that these migrants be permitted to partition the US or UK and set up their own state, even western so called leftists might object. While you highlight that you are a leftist, you are implying that immigration alone, in mass numbers could create the same problem for Americans and Western Europeans as it (you imply) did for the Palestinians. The better analogy would be to compare Palestine/Israel to the expansion of the US by white settlers into Mexican or Native territories and the corresponding imposition of American statehood on same. If the indigenous Americans (rather than the so-called Left) were the ones loudly supporting mass migration of immigrants into America, and calling for those immigrants' rights to establish statehood, a finding of amusing inconsistency might be more apt.

There is only the Body. Mind is a fiction constructed over time and stored in memory, having the effect of displacing Reality, but not replacing it with a new reality. So, when an organism like Riker is duplicated, although the same fictional narrative is superimposed to date, the Organism, that is the Real Riker remains the same, and the duplicate is a twin. If both were given the choice to kill the other or die, subject to their ethics, both would exercise the same drive to live and choose the other’s demise. Neither would be comforted by, "oh, well, the story lives on," and yet, that seems to be the very thing we cling to. The desire to keep the narrative "alive" and dismiss the organism is the same folly which has gotten us into this mess over what is Mind, in the first place.
A simplistic start: sensation and the natural drives, which may be summed up as the drive to live and multiply, and its aware-ing by the body is real activity involving the real consciousness of the human Organism. Perception is an activity restricted to human Mind wherein what is sensed is seized by Language, and, by forming attachments to other Language structures, converted into meaning which meaning is not derived from Reality, but constructed by these attachments, and thus, ultimately, fictional.