Well, to be more precise, it’s not the same type of logic as Western traditional philosophy, but it does nevertheless correspond to a model of truth - and one that is arguably more accurate than anything traditional Western philosophy could hope to wrestle into an assertion. But I’m not saying you shouldn’t keep trying. Drastically simplified, I think Chinese philosophy highlights the practical flaws in Western logic, and Africana philosophy highlights the missing experiential content in Western philosophical discussion. — Possibility

I don't think my argument is drastic simplification. Even in Western Philosophies, each school have tried to re-define what Philosophy is, or must be. For instance, in Kant, Philosophy is mainly to limit human knowledge and understanding. In 20th century, Existential philosophers, their definition of Philosophy is, defining what human existence is. They are not concerned much with the problem of validating external world or proving existence of God, but they have been focusing on human, life and freedom.
In Analytical Philosophy, nothing is really philosophy unless it is to do with verifying and clarifying meanings of linguistic concepts. So, I have been talking from the main tradition of Western Philosophy, and from what I think Philosophy should be. It is not black and white or mathematical conclusion.

If anyone is starting to philosophizing, then first he / she should start with defining what philosophy is and should be. Otherwise, it tends to become an Art of Mysticism in the end. And if different school of philosophers debate about a philosophical topic, it juste tends to end with a piece of soap or comedy episode, unless they agree or understand, on what ground or definition of philosophy they are debating.

so your argument is that you friend the car mechanic has a shit philosophy, and hence we ought not consider Eastern thought as philosophy. — Banno

no no never said that. you are getting into personal level again. always you seem to be targeting arguments or statement from others into the speaker himself in blaming or accusing tone, rather than keep on going with the topic itself.

Just gave you an example, how anything can be called a philosophy, but not all of them are strictly speaking, "Philosophy" under the scope of the Western Philosophical Tradition.

My friend is a car mechanic, and I don't take him seriously for his alleged DC philosophical system. In fact, I think he just talks whole load of bs. To him, it is the best philosophy in history. I don't even know what it is about.

As I said, you can call whatever, as Philosophy. But from the Western Academic Philosophical point of view, I feel that they are just type of mysticism.

I know a friend of mine saying he has his unique view of his own life, and he calls it Philosophy of Dog Crap.

In the face of that, we have the widespread and long-standing convention of talking of Eastern and Western philosophy, to which has been added various other geographically based divisions.

These terms are useful; moreover, they are used.

Perhaps you are pissing upwind. — Banno

You can call anything under the Sun, Philosophy. It is up to you. But would it be wise, or meaningful?

If you are even half awake, you would want to limit the scope of Philosophy. After all large part of Philosophical tradition and methodology is about limiting and defining.

And you seem having symptomatic habit of falling back into personal attacks while debating philosophical topics.

I don't believe I was pissing upwind at all. I was just expressing what I was thinking on the topic. If you don't agree with someone, then just say so in clear and to the point, and why, if you believe it is worthwhile doing so. Nothing more or less. That is what is philosophical discussions are about.

I am not trying to dismiss anything or being egotistic (it doesn't benefit me in whatever manner or fashion in any possible fantasies and imagination by the suggesters), but just saying that they are in different level or dimension.
A typical Chinese logic or philosophical system / methodology goes like this.

"When you call Tao, Tao, it is not already Tao." I think it is a famous saying by LaoZu or some influencing master of Chinese Religion. (Philosopher)

That is not logic in the same level of logic from Western traditional philosophy. In the Chinese teachings, one has to read that, and meditate for a while, and come to some enlightenment or understanding in his own head, rather than relying on human sensory perception and material existence validation for the perception or knowledge.

I mean, if you go to these LaoZu masters, and ask "Can you validate the external world and existence of God?", and they will simply say "Well mate keep meditating until it comes to your own head." or just rubbish the question, what on earth are you asking to validate the non sense, when you must keep meditating and learn the teachings of the masters."

In contrast, a typical Western Philosophical tradition could be well sensed from David Hume, when he said "If we take in our hand any volume; of divinity or school metaphysics, for instance; let us ask, Does it contain any abstract reasoning concerning quantity or number? No. Does it contain any experimental reasoning concerning matter of fact and existence? No. Commit it then to the flames: for it can contain nothing but sophistry and illusion."

There’s something wrong with this picture.

I recognise that use of the word ‘philosophy’ developed out of the Aristotlean or ‘Western’ tradition. But its etymology suggests a ‘love of wisdom’, without qualification as to what ‘wisdom’ might be, or what practice might be employed in ‘loving’ it. So a broader application of the term than how we argue, analyse and know the world is well within the original field to which it refers.

Your argument is a bit like saying it would be wrong to term Aboriginal peoples’ response to death as ‘grief’, because the word never existed in the country for 40,000 years. Plus their response is not the same as the years of French and English tradition, from which the word originated. So we have wrongly called it grief. — Possibility

But we are not talking about purely Etymology here. We are talking about the origin as well the traditions, the contents and also methodology in Western Philosophy. Without these contents, the subject Philosophy will become empty and has to start from scratch.

According to your argument, even a guy who believes that if he sees a black cat in the morning, then it will be an unlucky day, should be called a Philosophy.

If you are talking in terms of any academic tradition and methodologies and historical aspects of Philosophy, I feel that we have to limit the scope of the subject.

The word Philosophy originated from the ancient Greeks, and it has 2500 years of tradition. In there, there are many schools and fields of different Philosophies and philosophers. So, it depends which philosophical school or fields one is talking about.

In other parts of the world, the word Philosophy has never existed. It was always Religion or Rules of How one should live based on their religions and political ideologies. Then they have wrongly called them Philosophy. Their interest is not about how to argue, analyse and know the world, God, freedom, self identity etc critically like the many Western philosophical tradition. Their purpose was how to live for the regime or their Religious principles or their Gods or get enlightenment or saved from this material worldly problems, just like Western Religions and Mysticism are about.

When you say Philosophy or Western Philosophy, it is vastly wide term of 2500 years of History of Philosophy. And there are many different types and schools of methods and ideas and topics they have been working on.

Outside of Western Philosophy, it would be wrong to term the other parts of the world's Religion or Political Ethics or Mysticism as Philosophy. Because they are simply Religion or Politics or Mysticism, which are not strictly Philosophy as such.

Sorry for my bad English. I am not a native English speaker, but I read Philosophy in English time to time.

To me wisdom is knowing that Religion and Mysticism are not based on reason. They are based on the belief, faith and mystical experiences.

Philosophy is based on reason and logic. Therefore we can debate on all the topics in critical way in philosophical discussion.

In Religion and Mysticism, we cannot debate the topics as we do in Philosophy in critical way. The distinction is clear, and understanding that difference, to me is wisdom.

"Mysticism is entirely emotional, entirely made up of subtle, incommunicable sensations, which are even more incapable of verbal expression and logical definition than are such things as sound and color and line." -pp. 19 Esotericism and Modern Thought by P.D. Ouspensky

When one believes in something, that is a mental attitude or perceptual state from result of reasoning or sensory perception.

But when one wants to believe in something even if it is wrong, then it is just an emotional state, which is a desire or wish?

I quite agree with TheMadFool. I feel that discussion on validation of consciousness and external existence must be done from Analytical approach. After all these are the topics of Epistemology, not Mysticism or Religion. Why would they ask and debate these topics from mystical or religious grounds, when the discussions will fall back to mystical and subjective realm, which cannot be objectified or logically validated in its nature.

If you are a colour blind, you won't see red. It will appear as grey?
In either China or Korea, colour red is symbolises blood, therefore death.
They write dead person's name in red ink. It is taboo writing living person's name in red ink.

Another thing about Reality is, that it must have some sort of objectivity. If you see something, but no one else can, and if you can hear something, but you are the only one who can, then is it reality? I don't think so. It is your illusion and you might have problem with you hearing mechanism.

If you can see something as something, then all other people who are presented to the object must be able to see it. If you hear something, then others around you must also be able to hear it. So, it can be qualified as real object or real sound, and they are part of the reality.

If you have never had sensory perceptions in your life, then your sense of reality would be totally based upon on your imagination only, which obviously will be wrong from the real objective reality.

In many modern philosophical schools and traditions, your reality is your sensory perception. They are the same thing.

The concept of reality in Heidegerrian terms is that being which appears or presents (aletheia) into your perception.

If you had sensory perception before, but now for some reason, you lost it. In that case, your present sense of reality would be totally dependant upon your memory of reality you once had. But in that case, can you say that your sense of reality at present is correct?

I doubt my eyes but I see, I doubt my ears but I hear, I doubt touch but I feel, I doubt my nose but I smell, I doubt my mouth but I taste. I only trust what the spirit witness.

What am I?

Answer that question for me and that is my reality. — SteveMinjares

Problem is that, they might be illusion or dream. How do you know they are the real or your dreams? You are already doubting about them.

And the other question is, is reality then always private? Does it then exist within only your perception?
So, if you cannot perceive any of them, does it mean that reality does not exist? The good old idealist vs. realist arguments, but I am still struggling to know which one is definitely correct.

I feel that without your sensory mechanism, all you have is past memories of reality. Therefore your knowledge on reality would be limited to that. Perhaps you can still imagine and guess on reality, but that would be very limited knowledge if it could produce knowledge at all.

But I wanted to ask you even before that, what is your definition of reality. Does reality mean the World, the universe, or simply things around you, which is also called as external matters?

They were the words making up the part of the replies in the conversation. You have the other sentences clearly indicating what they mean, and the scope of the meanings getting delivered to you by all the sentences that are describing and supporting the situation. We have been engaging good conversation here, albeit trivial and off topic.

Whereas the uttered word by Banno was "And?" out of blue without any context or any scope of the meaning he intends to deliver. When you utter a word to someone who never exchanged any other words previously out of blue, then no one can expect or guess what the intention or meaning of the word is. And? ... the only thing I was sure at the point was, that it was not a complete sentence.

But when a member is engaging off topic conversation due to the way he communicated, I would have thought it would be sensible to stay away, or just carry on with discussing the topic, rather than taking sides. It gives impression you are ganging up for some personal argument rather than participating in serious philosophical discussion. Furthermore it gives impression that for some peculiar reason that you are insulted personally, when I told him a simple message that "And" is not a sentence. The real problem of course is not whether it was a sentence or word or a piece of cheese. The real problem is the uncertainty of his intention by uttering such a word in a philosophical discussion which has to be all serious and sincere, logical and crystal clear.

Well minor sentence? If you are a philosopher, would you accept that? To be honest, I don't accept the concept called Minor Sentence. It doesn't matter who wrote it or where you found it from. Just because it is in some Dictionary site, it all makes sense and right? No!

When you mentioned about it, and wrote the link, I rejected it immediately. Because it is like saying Minor death, and tell you that it is life but also a death. It is a word but also sentence? No to me, words are words. They make up sentences, but they are not sentences themselves.

It is like saying, a brick is a minor house, because it makes up a house. But is it? No. Illogical concepts and senseless ideas must be reasoned, and discarded immediately. That is what philosophy is about.

Yes, I don't feel this argument is worth your time or mine. But I just added what I thought, not to continue but to stop, and carry on with the investigation on validation of existence and reality without sensory activities.

No you don't speak in minor sentence or a word in philosophical discussion. You are not having a pub talk with your long lost friends as if just reunited after long time. Or it doesn't sound one is serious or sincere, or you don't know what he was actually wanting to hear or say. That was not cool.

By the way, I was talking to Banna. Who are you, and why are you speaking to me on behalf of him? I wasn't even talking to you. It sounds like you are ganging up for someone, and shouting loud all over the street for no reasons.

I was talking about validation of reality. But I don't understand why now the topic has turned to lecturing and native English speakers.

I was just replying to the other person on his response to me. He was insisting "And" was a sentence. I told him that it is not. There is nothing more to it than that. You seemed to have joined this "bandwagon of native speakers of English, and if one is not, then he must be wrong". It is not even logical, or making sense to say that all native speakers English is alway correct. Anyway, it is not my interest debating about this with you anymore. I am just interested in the definition of reality and world, and possible validation methods on them.

I have not tried lecture him. I just did let him know that "And" is not a sentence. A sentence requires at least a subject and verb to be qualified as one. Being a native English speaker doesn't mean that how he communicates with English is always correct or right.

To be able to validate these concepts, you must first define what reality is. Does reality means the World? Or just external matters outside of your perception? Can you ever define what reality and World is? Tell us first what your definition of reality and world is.

That was a word. Not a sentence. A proper sentence has a subject and verb for minimum. My point was trying to point out the difference between the reality itself and memories (or other mental reflections) of reality. I thought this is a huge topic in Philosophy of Mind and Metaphysics, albeit being classic and fundamental.

Can you validate the reality without sensory activity? I don't feel that they are in the realm of validation. Because they exist in different dimension.

And? That's not a sentence?

If you loose your sense, never had past experiences of your reality but maintain your own awareness does reality still exist? — SteveMinjares

From the OP

It would be memories of reality, not reality itself.

Freud was a psychologist?

I like W.T. Jones, a five-volume set. He's more modern and readable. Also, he understands his task is not to make a philosopher of you, but to introduce you to philosophers and their thought from the pre-Socratics through the 20th century. In my opinion you can leave modern philosophy strictly alone. In any case to make any headway there you will have to have some grounding in what came before them.

This set, maybe with a good dictionary of philosophical terms, isn't so much to be studied like a bible, but rather read as quickly as possible, with return as necessary. Unfortunately, there is no good history that is free enough of error in itself to be reliable. — tim wood

It seems difficult to get hold of the WT Jones 5 volume set. It is also very expensive.
How about Anthony Kenny's 4 volume History of Western Philosophy?

To me, beauty is just my feeling about something. The feeling, like all other emotions, vacillates through time and circumstances changes.

Meaning doesn't exist in the world anyway. Meaning or meaningless is just one's private mental state about something.

The Red Books by C. G. Jung.

Under that supposition, even ceasing the pursuit of earthly achievements would be meaningless.

Some irrationality is rational. For example, fear of death.

One is not dead yet, so it would be irrational to be fearful of death.
But one will eventually be dead one day, so it is rational to be fearful of upcoming death.

This type of irrationality is a human condition as temporal being.

I feel that NDE is not enough evidence to support claims of life after death. I have not read much about NDE as such, but it sound to me some sort of illusory effect of mind. Anyhow, we never hear about any life returning to this world after their death. It only once supposed to have happened and recorded in the Bible, but it is just writings about it. No body has seen or heard returned Jesus in this world.

Yes, I was able to download and view the PDF link. It seems a wonderful book. Thank you.

I can see your point, and fully agree with you about the Newtonian methods and Humean approach.
It woke me up from a slumber in that regard in Hume studies. Thanks.

So what is the actual Newtonian Method that Hume have adopted to study human nature?
How could principles of natural science be applied for study of mental workings of human nature?

Are there some examples of the actual methods being applied in the discourse of the Treatise and Enquiries?

Sorry but the link wouldn't let me download the document because my ipad had no MS Word.

Wow great debate on Hume.

I read someone in the previous posts said that Hume opposed to Newtonian Science? Is that justified comment? Because I also read from a book that Hume's whole purpose of writing the Treatise was studying and finding about human nature using Newtonian Scientific methods.

I think suffering is negative experience for life. It could destroy the soul of the sufferer, and it is not pleasant to have any type of suffering.

Good life is about having longest and most possible comfort and joy. Hence I would say suffering is harmful and inherently meaningless.

Hume is unique among philosophers in being more understandable himself than through any of his commentators. Just read Hume. Not that there's any shortage of folks discussing him.

And here's a little sideshow. — unenlightened

That's great resource links for David Hume studies. Thank you.