The terminology of cause and effect seems to me to beg the question.
Instead, let us ask if it is possible for any physical entity or event to exist spontaneously and in isolation from all other physical entities and events. Haven’t physicists determined that certain virtual particles emerge spontaneously from the quantum background (empty space)?

I do not think the central issue is whether, or not, we want to have completely free will, or even our emotional reaction to having it. The question is whether, or not, we have it and what it consists of.

To claim that I am free because I can participate in this existence is like a prisoner contending that he/she is free because he/she can participate in prison life.

All your actions "operari" follow necessarily from who you are, your character, your "esse."

And you are absolutely free only if you chose your character, your "esse,"

What would it mean for me to know and to experience that I have a completely free will?

What conditions would have to be met?

Ultimately, I think it means that I would have to have an indubitably certain consciousness that I am my own creation. For only if I know and directly experience that I am my own creation can I legitimately be held to be responsible for all my actions and all my omissions.

But, instead, as far as I can tell I had no say with respect to the fact that I exist and I had no say about who I would be. I have no consciousness and no experience of having participated in such matters.
Thus, the fact that I exist and the fact that I am who I am (i.e., my personality, my character) are simply experienced as brute facts over which I had no control.

Thus, it could be argued that there is no cogent basis for my feeling responsible for (i.e., either feeling guilty about or taking pride in) any of my actions or omissions, because both the former actions and the latter omissions are behaviors which must follow necessarily from and be pre-determined by the personality/character I have been given and the motives to which it must respond.

In short, a completely free will does not exist.

Perhaps the three discussions I've posted regarding Descartes might interest you. They are entitled:

Why I Think Descartes' Ontological Argument is False

The Nature of Descartes' Proposition, and

Scope and Limits of the Invalidation Effects of a Defective Cognitive Nature on the Cogito Sum

I believe you're missing my main point which is as follows:

Schopenhauer claimed that the human Understanding (the brain) spontaneously applied the Principle of Cause and Effect to human sensations.

The fundamental assumption was that it was possible for the human Understanding to spontaneously construct a veridical cause (the empirical object) out of the isolated, non-synthesized sensations (the effects).

But, then, the question arises as to what the originating source of the isolated sensations is before the brain constructs the empirical object out of them?

In other words, how can we verify that the cause of the isolated sensations before the brain constructs the empirical object out of them is identical to the cause of the isolated sensations after the brain constructs the empirical object out of them?

What really counts, after all is said and done, is precisely truth "in the real world" among "the common folk,' as you condescendingly refer to them. The majority of humanity (those unaware of this fallacy) could care less for this "fallacy." And, furthermore, it is extremely presumptuous and elitist to think that one is, in fact, privy to the "real deal,".like a Gnostic logician, as it were. If one lives long enough, one realizes that no one is, or ever will be, privy to "the real deal," at least this side of the grave

No Joke!! I would submit that I have, in fact, described the "false" criterion commonly used and accepted by most unsophisticated humans to distinguish the true from the false; whether one (the elitist logician) likes it, or not.

For example:

Isn't uncontrolled global warming due to climate change deemed "true" precisely because of the deleterious effects to humanity that would result from it?

And, by contrast, isn't uncontrolled warming due to climate change deemed "false" precisely because of the lack of deleterious effects to humanity that would result from it?

What else would be able to bring actionable meaning to this issue????

How about trying a more “down-to-earth” definition of what is true and what is false. For example: Any system of human thinking, doing, and governance which promotes and enhances the physical, biological, and mental health of the human race is true; those which do not are false.

Hopefully, this will get us away from focusing exclusively on overly abstract semantical arguments and dry propositional analyses.

Very interesting alternative approach to addressing the issue, precisely because it questions a basic assumption of the accepted epistemological paradigm; viz., that elemental, primordial sensations exist first in a state of isolation and are subsequently synthesized, integrated, or constructed by the perceiving subject into empirical objects that comprise the world.

If you reference a prior discussion of mine on this Forum entitled "Is the Foundation of British Empiricism Sensible?" you'll see that I, too, in my own way questioned the legitimacy of the basic assumption of isolated primordial sensations.

Yes, Schopenhauer certainly had quite a lot to say about how the brain processed sensations (he did not use the term stimuli), especially visual sensations, into empirical objects, but where did he, or Kant, have a lot to say about WHERE THE SENSATIONS CAME FROM BEFORE THEY WERE PROCESSED BY THE BRAIN INTO EMPIRICAL OBJECTS. Kant speaks of the manifold of sensation as "being given." And this is as detailed as he got.

Not necessarily. I am seeking any explanation that works. See my response to I LIKE SUSHI.

I think you misunderstand me! My question could care less about the materialist/idealist dispute. In fact, personally, as a matter of record, I agree with Schopenhauer. But please explain to me what any of this has to do with explaining the originating source of human (under the skin) sensations.

Yes, it would! But who the hell knows where the unprocessed sensations come from in the first place? The processing of said sensations is certainly by the human brain (materialistic), but who knows what the nature of the originating source of the pre-processed sensations might be.

For Kant, space and time were pure a priori intuitions and the manifold of sensations were a posteriori intuitions to which space and time were applied. The things-in-themselves would be the originating source(s) of the a posteriori sensations BEFORE being processed spatially and temporally.

We do NOT know if the BSCPO's NEVER coincide with the "real" causes. We are, in fact, unfortunately unable to determine, with certitude, if the BSCPO's actually coincide with, or are accurate renditions of, the "real" cause(s) of the subjective sensations which comprised the BSCPO's. For all we know, the brain constructed tree may, or may not, be an accurate rendition of the real cause of the subjective sensations of which it is comprised. Explain to me, please, with specificity, how those "doing biology" today are superior with regard to ascertaining the originating source of human sensations when compared to these so-called alchemists.

I certainly expect present day neuroscience to continue to provide us with more precise detailed descriptions/explanations of the myriad complex ways in which the human brain processes subjective sensations into perceived phenomenal objects and perceived phenomenal states-of-affairs; but no matter how successful neuroscience may be, and continues to be, in this regard, it will, I think, still not be able to describe/explain where the subjective sensations come from (their originating source) before they undergo neuro-cognitive processing.

The only "reason" this question arises is because the human intellect is an ontological and epistemological prisoner of the Principle of Sufficient Reason and, therefore, is always necessarily compelled to presuppose its unrestricted validity and applicability to all things and circumstances -- which, for all we know, may simply not be the case.

TASTE IT!!!!!

I don't believe consciousness went anywhere. It's still situated in the human brain. However, it is no longer a Kantian consciousness, but an indubitably certain Cartesian consciousness. It possesses
a transcendental faculty of sensibility which generates the a priori forms of space and time, a transcendental faculty of understanding which generates only an a priori principle of cause and effect, and a transcendental faculty of perceptual imagination which provides an ability to visualize empirical phenomenal objects.

What I would strongly suggest, however, is that, if you have not yet done so, you should familiarize yourself with at least two of Schopenhauer's works to determine what he ACCEPTED and what he REJECTED of Kant's epistemology; viz., "On the Fourfold Root of the Principle of Sufficient Reason" and, especially, his "Critique of the Kantian Philosophy."

To a large extent, Schopenhauer accepted the ideas expressed by Kant in the Transcendental Aesthetic, and he rejected most, but not all, of the ideas expressed by Kant in the rest of the Critique.

For example, Schopenhauer rejected all of Kant's Categories of the Understanding, except the Principle (Category) of Cause and Effect. Also, unlike Kant, he claimed that the human understanding was not separated from the faculty of sensibility but, rather, always intimately involved with the faculty of sensibility by making the day-to-day perception of empirical (phenomenal) objects possible by spontaneous application of the Principle of Cause and Effect. For Schopenhauer, it was human reason, not human understanding, that was separate from the faculty of sensibility; and he also accepted Kant's distinction between Noumena and Phenomena, although he thought the noumenal Will could be accessed by humans.

For Schopenhauer, Kant's epistemology simply could not bridge the insuperable gap that separated the faculty of understanding from the faculty of sensibility, and he considered Kant's Chapter on the Schematism, wherein Kant attempted to do so, a dismal failure.

First, thanks for simply taking the time to read my essay and for your gracious comments, and, second, "poke" away my friend!!!!!!

Locke considered matter to be a "something, I know not what."
Berkeley considered matter to be synonymous with "Nothing," and
Hume claimed that experimental observations can be conducted without any assumption of the existence of material objects.

So, then, I guess the logic of each of these thinkers was also "backwards" and they, too, were blind to your "obvious."

Matter and energy can only be experienced and studied in an a posteriori way and in accordance with the principles of non-Euclidean geometry.
Matter and energy are empirical, but not perceptual, objects because, as Einstein showed and as physical experiments verified, they do not conform to the principles of Euclidean geometry or to the Newtonian notions of absolute space and time. In fact, from the frame of reference of quantum physics, matter and energy even seem to defy certain principles of logic.

I do not disagree with your comments. I'm not necessarily being as clear as I ought to be. Please make room for the fact that the focus of my thinking can shift as I think about things and entertain the comments of others. So, then, let me first set forth some presuppositions of Kant's epistemology, as I understand them, and then restate my original question.

Space and time are not empirical objects; instead, they are a priori (i.e., necessary and strictly universal) forms of sensible intuition.

The spatial and temporal characteristics exhibited by empirical objects originate in the human mind, not in the objects.

The human mind uses the a priori forms of sensible intuition to transform raw sense data, or the manifold of sensation, into empirical objects. This is not a deliberate, but a spontaneous activity.

All empirical objects must exhibit spatial and temporal characteristics in order for human beings to perceive them.

Given the above assumptions of Kant's epistemology, why can it, or why can it not, be argued that matter and energy are empirical objects?

Or, what precisely is the meaning of matter and energy from within the context of the Transcendental Aesthetic?

You say: "Matter and energy are what you get after the mind imposed time and space." And I would ask: ON WHAT???

I do not agree with this statement at all. If anything, Kant claims that PERCEPTUAL OBJECTS are what you get, not matter and energy, when the forms of intuition are applied to raw sense data, or, as he refers to it, to the manifold of sensation.

I know that Kant claims other variables are involved in explaining the process of empirical perception. But here I am focused, instead, primarily and narrowly on Kant's explanation of the initial conditions which make possible the perception of empirical objects as presented in the Transcendental Aesthetic.

I think you would get more out of reading Schopenhauer yourself. He's a much easier read than Kant.

OK. But, again, what am I misunderstanding when I ask whether, or not, the human mind imposes Euclidean space and time on matter and energy?

Furthermore, even if it is granted that the human mind imposes Euclidian space and time on matter and energy, would this be all that is required to explain the production of the empirical, phenomenal objects that we actually perceive about us and interact with every day?
Arthur Schopenhauer did not think so and he explained what he considered to be missing from Kant's epistemology in his critique of it.

If, as you conclude, "empirical objects do not have transcendental properties," then I suspect that you disagree with Kant's contention that the empirical objects of human intuition, in order to be possible objects of human intuition, must exhibit the transcendental (necessary and strictly universal) properties of Euclidian space and time.

By the way, empirical objects and phenomenal objects are synonymous terms for Kant.

You state that "matter and energy are phenomena, so they are empirical and not transcendent". OK, I agree with you. But, what, then, are the necessary and strictly universal (transcendental) characteristics matter and energy must exhibit which make it possible for them to become perceptual phenomena; i.e., objects of human perception, in the first place? As I understand Kant, In order to be an object of human intuition or perception, said object, not matter and energy, must exhibit spatio-temporal characteristics.

No, this is not like a logic problem.

You are not grasping the difference between the meaning of transcendental and the meaning of transcendent as it relates to Immanuel Kant's epistemology.

Transcendental means necessary and strictly universal (a priori) properties or characteristics exhibited by the objects of HUMAN perception (Euclidian space and time) which enable said objects to be objects of HUMAN perception.

Transcendent means an entity which lacks the necessary and strictly universal (a priori) properties or characteristics (Euclidian space and time) which would make it an object of HUMAN perception.

My question, then, is whether, or not, matter and energy exhibit any necessary and strictly universal (a priori) properties or characteristics. Are matter and energy objects of HUMAN perception? Or, do they fall outside of HUMAN perception? Are they transcendent?

[reply="Joshs;251630"

Fundamentally, mysticism, in all its forms, is not so much meaningless or nonsensical as it is primarily ELITIST. The Gnostics, for example, were very forthright about their inherent superiority. They promoted, among themselves, a false kind of consciousness of superiority. They claimed to be a special breed of pneumatic humans who were above the majority of merely material or psychical humanity. Only they were able to have a direct, intimate, personal encounter with the transcendent via some secret (magical) way of knowing, which the rest of us poor slobs, by our inferior natures, could never hope to be privy to. Mysticism evolves by promoting a religious frame-of-reference that would turn the rest of humanity into inferior beings. It is this dangerous elitism that I find shallow and self-serving about the paradigm of mysticism. It promotes, either explicitly or implicitly, the idea of the Transcendent Nothingness of the worth of the rest of humanity.

Thanks. Very interesting.

Since when do simians have self-consciousness?

I suspect simians are incapable of performing a simian Cogito Sum because they don't have a Cogito that can reflect upon itself; at most, they have a pre-reflective or, better, a non-reflective Cogito which is always oriented toward objects, only. Technically, a monkey is incapable of knowing that it exists while thinking because it can't perform the Cogito Sum in the first person, present tense mode. In short, a monkey can't perform a monkey Cogito, so a monkey can't know that it exists.


No, the fact that humans can perform a Cogito Sum based upon contingent thinking activity, but cannot perform a Cogito Sum based upon necessary thinking activity, doesn't mean that God does not exist, it means only that we can't experience that God exists.

You are correct, both Descartes' and Anselm's ontological arguments (they are not proofs) involve the idea of perfection. In this sense, they do not differ. However, neither argument enables humans to have a DIRECT PERSONAL EXPERIENCE of said perfection, which is the basic issue.

I find Kant's thought extremely original and fascinating. However, I do agree with Schopenhauer's critical analysis of Kant's epistemology and the modifications (deletions and additions) he made thereto. But, I suspect that Schopenhauer did not go far enough with these modifications.

I'm a bit confused about your mentioning Husserl in this regard. Didn't he hold to a position that consciousness was intentional; that consciousness was always consciousness of an object that it did not constitute. And wasn't this position considered by many continental thinkers to be a refreshing "antidote" to German transcendental idealism?
Or, perhaps, are you referring, instead, to Husserl's later, more idealistic, position which was strongly criticized by Sartre in his essay "The Transcendence of the Ego"?

Yes, I think there are degrees of rationality. If I'm not mistaken, I think Descartes held to this position.

For example: The Cogito Sum as an indubitably certain performative intuition, or thought act, in the first person, present tense mode versus the Cogito ergo Sum as an inferential proposition which can be subject to indirect doubt. The former may be said to be true in a more fundamental way than the latter because the truths of the former are existentially consistent and existentially self-verifying while being performed, while the truths of the latter proposition may not be true when not being directly attended to.

Does your statement imply that there is direct opposition between fictional facts and direct observation?

No, I'm not. But could you direct me to some specific works about this topic?

I do not see how your first paragraph conflicts with my position; it's simply a restatement of it (I never claimed I could find a definitive answer to my question by actually performing an empirical test).

I will grant your position as expressed in the second paragraph.

However, I find the statement (objects don't exist in nature, they are our constructions of nature) to be quite an epistemological assumption to simply throw out there without making any attempt to justify it a la Locke? Berkeley? Hume? Kant? Fichte? Schopenhauer? Schelling? Hegel?, etc.?

No, I'm not saying that. I'm saying that my hypothesis is that the ultimate criterion for judging the rationality, or irrationality, of the attitudes human beings have toward Nothing (pre- or post) would be determined by the actual nature of Nothing itself which, unfortunately, cannot be experienced (i.e., Nothing is beyond the limits of possible experience).

But, on second thought, didn't Heidegger claim that when Dasein encounters Nothing it experiences Dread?

Interesting!

Unfortunately, despite your comments and protestations, I still find it impossible to experience that which would be required to provide a definitive answer to my original question.


Some comments follow regarding what you wrote (in no specific order).

By the way, emotion is usually about a personal relationship with another person, not about a concept.

To the contrary, I might be saying that seeing the nothing after my death as threatening is irrational, since I see the nothing before my birth as non-threatening. The assumption being, of course, that we are dealing with the same nothing. But, unfortunately, neither of us can verify this assumption.

If the "answer (were) right in front of me." I wouldn't be searching for it.

Problems will always vanish if I stick my head in the sand, won't they!!!

Instead, I think the question is: What is the difference between my experience of the negation of things before I am born and my experience of the negation of things after I die? However, to hope to provide an empirical answer to this question, it would have to be possible for me to have a DIRECT EXPERIENCE of each circumstance. But, since, while living, it is clearly impossible for me to have a DIRECT EXPERIENCE of each circumstance, I, therefore, cannot explain empirically why the latter circumstance should generate fear, while the former does not. All other conceptual explanations, no matter how interesting or complex they may appear to be, remain empirically unverified conjecture.

Prior and subsequent Nothing, by definition, can only do nothing. Nothing does not cause us to become old and to die. Nothing, by definition, does nothing to us. Why, then, fear that which can have no effect on us?

Technically, we do not know if we exist before we are born and whether, or not, we then feel any emotions. Yes, after we are born we do exist and fear the nothingness to come after death. However, my point is that existing now and looking back, PRESENTLY, why do we not fear the prior nothingness in the same way and to the same degree as we fear the subsequent nothingness? Are they the same nothingness, or are they different; the prior being benign and engendering no fear, the latter being malignant and engendering fear?

As far as we know, qualitatively, the Nothing that preceded our birth is identical to the Nothing that will follow our death. The only difference between the two is that we fear the latter, but not the former. Why??

But what does this have to do with my argument?