The case fails because there's no evidence for the natural world (either).

A number of things, but the foremost was reading the scriptures.

I've been drifting that way for a while.

Lifelong apostate of various sorts, sympathies with Gnosticism. Now a reforming Catholic.

Looking to start these next:

The Sign of the Unicorn – Roger Zelazny
The Lost Continent: The Story of Atlantis – C. J. Cutcliffe Hyne

Nine Princes in Amber – Roger Zelazny
The Guns of Avalon – Roger Zelazny

The classic example is in free will debates. If you use the word ordinarily, there seems to be no room for an argument to even get in the door that people don't have free will. So in insisting that we don't, the determinist has to use the word in a special way, but can't invent a new technical term, or else the thesis won't be shocking/sexy.

Professional disciplines can have their own language games, but the problem is taking words from ordinary vocabulary and using them only quasi-technically, such that on the one hand the philosopher wants the claims made to have results for the ordinary use of the expression, yet on the other wants to be careful to divorce it from its ordinary use (so that the claims made aren't obviously false/ridiculous).

I think language stabilizes around a core set of uses for which it's well-suited, which are extremely narrow. Most everything in the world, and even in our daily lives, 'internal' and external, aren't really in its ken. Language is a small part of the world and our lives – an important one, but small.

There's no Cyrenaic theory of language, but there are comments to the effect that words can have common usages without reflecting any common internal reality.

Wittgenstein had a lifelong obsession with solipsism that appears never to have left him before his death. There's some speculation that his worries over privacy, the nonexistence of subjects, and the linguistic inefficacy of private experiences were a result of his poor theory of mind, since he was likely somewhere on the autism spectrum. Early on he even tried to dissolve reference to psychological subjects in belief reports.

I've read the OP a couple times, but I don't understand what it's asking.

Color realism seems plausible. Mary doesn't learn any new facts, but gains a new ability, which in turn might help her learn certain facts about individual red things in a way she couldn't before.

It seems to me the more visual the imagining is, the more I must commit to certain qualities. So the the extent I commit to no such quality, to that extent I'm not 'visualizing.'

I don't think it's the fact that causes us to believe it, any more than the fact that the root of 2 is 1.41421... is what causes us to believe that. Rather it's either the case that we've been told it and we trust the teacher (as is the case for me with root 2) or it's what we've concluded after performing our own calculation, and we believe that the calculation was performed correctly (as it the case for me with 2 + 2). — Michael

So the fact that 2 + 2 = 4 has no influence on whether we believe that 2 + 2 = 4? Is it a complete accident that we believe it truly? Or do we sometimes have methods of inquiry that arrive at truth, and so the fact that certain things are true influence us toward believing them?

The latter position seems far more plausible to me, but it's just interesting that you'd be committed to something like the former on your view. I'd say that would be a bad result for your view, since that consequence strikes me as quite bad.

I don't know what you mean by this. If you accept that "X has these properties" and "X is wrong" mean different things then that X has these properties and that X is wrong are different facts. — Michael

Suppose that 'ought p' has a modal semantics – something like, 'in all deontically accessible worlds, p,' where p denotes the proposition that you perform some action. Then it might be that 'ought not p' maps to true for all such p that denote propositions that you perform an action with certain physical (or other) characteristics, and so to have those characteristics would be ipso facto for those actions to be wrong. But still the two would mean different things – one would have a modal semantics, the other would not. Of course, there might be congruence of another kind: either material or maybe even modal. But that's not enough to get synonymy in every relevant sense.

Well, you did say that "X is wrong" means "one ought not X" and "to be a certain physical way is to be wrong". So you're saying that to be a certain physical way is to be something that one ought not do? The wording seems comparable to say that being a bachelor is to be an unmarried man, i.e. that "bachelor" means "unmarried man". — Michael

I think you're reading 'is' inappropriately, as some sort of modal equivalence. All I mean is that, relative to a world, there may be no other thing that needs to be added to the world over having those sorts of properties for it to be wrong.

Yes. So one would either have to say that obligations are empirical facts or that non-empirical facts can be causally efficacious. — Michael

So, I think that the fact that 2 + 2 = 4 causes us to believe that 2 + 2 = 4, given that we're creatures that can realize mathematical truths. We don't have to think it, but its truth influences us to think it, because some of our inquiries tend toward truth.

Do you disagree with any of that?

But to be wrong just is that one ought not do it. So you're saying that "this act has these particular physical properties" means the same thing as "one ought not perform this act". That doesn't seem right. — Michael

No, I'm not saying that "one ought not to perform this act" means that it has such-and-such physical properties. But it can be that something is wrong in virtue of (and in virtue of nothing but!) those properties.

What I mean is that if we believe that we have an obligation to not kill then we may very well be motivated to not kill. But our belief may be wrong; perhaps we don't have an obligation to not kill. So whether or not we actually do have an obligation not to kill has no practical relevance.

For example, it's not the fact that there's a monster under the bed that motivates a child to not look under it (because there isn't one); it's the belief that there's a monster under the bed that motivates the child to not look under it. — Michael

So the idea is that thinking you ought to do something has practical relevance, but that you ought to do something doesn't.

But suppose whether you ought to do something influences whether you think you ought to do it. Then, by your own admission, whether you ought to do it has practical relevance.

So you are in effect committed to claiming the following: whether or not you ought to do something cannot influence whether you think you ought to do it. Is that right?

My point is that that one ought not do [it] is an extraneous (non-physical) fact about that act, separate to any empirical fact about it. Only the empirical facts about the act have any practical relevance. — Michael

I don't agree with this. Things are wrong because of what they are (physical or otherwise) – in fact I can't really make sense of the notion that they're not. To be a certain way (physical or otherwise) is to be right or wrong.

Perhaps I should have said that it isn't necessarily a sufficient reason. If I were to somehow know that I have an obligation to kill children, I would need a more convincing reason to carry it out. That I am obligated isn't reason enough for me. — Michael

I should revise and say, I can make sense of this if I'm obligated according to some law or standard – but then, I would say the reason I don't take that to be sufficient reason is because I don't take the obligation of some law or standard or command to be equivalent to my obligations simpliciter. That is, I can weigh whether some fact about some particular standard requires something of me, and choose to weight other things more heavily. But whether I am required to do something period – I can't make sense of thinking I'm required but don't have sufficient reason to do it.

Perhaps I should have said that it isn't necessarily a sufficient reason. If I were to somehow know that I have an obligation to kill children, I would need a more convincing reason to carry it out. That I am obligated isn't reason enough for me. — Michael

I can't make sense of this. How can you claim you're obligated to do it but that there's not sufficient reason to? To claim the latter seems to me just to say that you aren't obligated to do it.

We consider what we believe to be moral facts/obligations. Whether or not they are moral facts/obligations has no practical relevance. — Michael

Of course it does. We aren't motivated because we take things to be believed to be obligations, but because we take them to be obligations. Thus in deliberating, the question 'is X an obligation?' is important, not just the question 'does Y believe X is an obligation?' But if decisions turn on the question of whether something is an obligation, then whether it is an obligation has practical importance.

Now you might say everyone is just deluded and think there are obligations but there really aren't any, and only this delusion of thought has practical implications. But that would be an odd opinion, since you'd commit yourself to thinking you have no obligations, which in practice you don't (and in practice you take those obligations to actually be incumbent upon you).

The only thing of practical relevance is whether or not I kill children. The morality of the act seems practically irrelevant. — Michael

This strikes me as deeply confused, but it's a little hard to tease out why. What I want to say, again, is that you're assuming morality is like an invisible blanket or something that goes on top of the act committed. But the act itself is wrong – it's not that there's the act and then 'wrong sprinkles' on top of it. So to say it's practically relevant whether you kill babies is to say that it's practically relevant whether you do something wrong. And its being wrong will be a force in your deliberations as to whether you do it.

I'm asking for a reason to be moral. That it's moral isn't sufficient motivation, as it is possible that one doesn't want to be moral, given that "X is immoral and I want to do X" isn't a contradiction. — Michael

I'm not sure I follow what the significance of this is supposed to be. I agree that "X is immoral and I want to do X" isn't a contradiction. Are you worried that something being immoral won't in fact make you not do it? If so, I agree – but I don't agree that it doesn't give sufficient reason not to do it. To ask for additional reason is to ask "Why should one do what's right?" which seems to harbor some grammatical confusion, like "Why ought one to do what one ought?"

I'm saying that if moral facts are not the same thing as physical facts then there's no practical difference between a world with moral facts and a world without them. In terms of how we actually live our lives, whether or not there are moral facts is irrelevant, as their (non-)existence has no bearing on how we actually behave. — Michael

Of course there's a practical difference. For example, in deliberating whether one will do something, we might consider these moral facts, and choose what to do or not based on them.

Then the influencing factor here is our reasoning and beliefs, not the (non-)existence of some actual obligation. — Michael

The two aren't somehow in contradiction. In reasoning, we appeal to obligations – in fact in such a case our reasoning only influences our action because of the obligation. If we had no such obligation, or didn't think we did, then we wouldn't bring it up in reasoning.

Presumably "I believe that I ought not X" does not just mean "I don't want to do X"? So "I believe that I ought not X and I want to do X" isn't a contradiction.

And if it isn't a contradiction then I don't see the problem with my question. — Michael

Sorry, I think I've lost the thread. No it's not a contradiction, but I don't see how that's related to your question. Is it now about wants? Can you rephrase it in terms of wants?

I'm not saying that obligations are distinct from the world. — Michael

And if they're distinct from physical facts then there's a possible world which has the same physical facts but doesn't have the associated obligations. — Michael

This is contradictory, if physical facts are exhaustive, which I'm not sure if you're assuming. If you assume there are other relevant sorts of facts, then I'm not sure what the problem is. For example, if you think there are moral facts, then you have your answer – in one world the moral fact obtains, in the other it doesn't. If you protest that this is no difference at all, then you've reneged on your thinking that things other than physical facts make a difference – so I'm not sure how to make sense of the position.

The only thing that is of practical relevance is whether or not we actually will kill babies (which is influenced by whether or not we want to kill babies). — Michael

But that's not right. We might decide to kill babies based on deliberating, for example – and in deliberation we can bring concerns to bear other than what we want to do. There's no contradiction in supposing I want to do something, but don't, because I realize I shouldn't. There may be some underlying assumption here that only one's desires can be reasons to do or not do something, or some such, which isn't right.

Because presumably there are non-duty reasons to behave a certain way. It's certainly not the case that every decision I make is made on the grounds that I (believe that I) ought do it. So assuming that I have a duty to behave a certain, what is my motivation to behave in this way? Perhaps I don't care that it's my duty and decide to do the opposite.

Or would you argue that it's impossible to do something that one believes is wrong? — Michael

I think it's not possible both to do something you think is wrong and not be committed to the claim that you ought not to have done it. And I can't see how you can think you ought not to have done something and think you had reasons for doing it more powerful than not. You might have had motivations, sure – but if you think you oughtn't to have done it, then you're admitting those motivations weren't sufficient reason to do it.

So to ask 'what reason do I have to do what I ought to do / to do what's right?' seems to me grammatically confused in some way, though it's hard to pin down exactly why.

That strangling a baby will result in a loss of brain function and so biological death isn't a priori that one ought not strangle a baby. — Michael

OK, but who said anything about a priori? It may very well be that strangling a baby results in such and such does mean that one oughtn't to do it – in fact this is the ordinary way of thinking about it, that things are bad for reasons. There's no appeal to the a priori.

They're certainly not identical things. So the wrongness of that act isn't identical to the physical event of the act. Therefore the wrongness must be something else. — Michael

That the two are not identical does not mean that they're freely separable. I don't think, for example, that you can have two worlds identical except for the obligations in them. That doesn't make sense – and your question seems to be positioned in a weird limbo, in which you want to insist such a thing is possible, but then notice that this very insistence makes obligations seem like nothing at all.

No, it's exactly because I don't think that obligations are physical facts that I believe that they're of no practical relevance. Whatever an obligation to not kill children is, it's something other than the physical fact of children being killed (and not being resurrected). — Michael

Yes, but notice it doesn't follow from that that whether or not one ought to kill children is something separable from, or not determined by, physical (or whatever sort of other) facts about the world. In other words, you cannot insist that obligations are distinct from the world by fiat and then complain that you can't tell the difference between worlds in which they hold and don't. Your own stipulations are causing the problem.

It's not a second decision as to whether or not I ought kill babies. It's a decision as to whether or not I will or want to kill babies. — Michael

If the question is whether you will kill babies, then that is answered only by seeing whether you actually do – there's no philosophical question there, and no reason to be given, since it's just a fact whether you will or not. The same for whether you want to. That's just a fact about your psychology.

If you are asking something like 'why should(n't) I,' or 'what reason have I...' etc., then again some grammatical error seems to be committed.

So it seems to me that obligations, if anything, are something "extra". — Michael

So you are assuming that obligations are something extra added to the world, and then puzzling over what the difference between a world with obligations and without it is.

The point I'm making is that these supposed obligations have no practical relevance. The physical world would still behave the same in their absence — Michael

Again, it's not as if there's a physical world 'first,' and then obligations get layered on top of it like an invisible blanket. If there are obligations, it's presumably precisely because of the way the world itself is.

So to answer your question, I might say: if killing kids weren't wrong, the world might be such that people were immediately resurrected on dying with no ill effects. Or you can imagine some other such scenario.

And it's pretty ridiculous to say that obligations have no practical relevance – that's precisely the sort of relevance they have.

The question isn't "why ought I to do what I ought to do?". The question is just "why do what I ought to do?" It's a question of motivation. I don't think the existence of some claimed obligation is sufficient. If it could be shown that I was obligated to kill babies, I still wouldn't. — Michael

I can't distinguish between those two questions. How do they differ?

I think you have a very strange understanding of obligations. It's like you think they're some kind of physical fact that has no physical implications. "So if it could be shown that I was obligated to kill babies, I still wouldn't" – it's as if you found some thing under a microscope saying "kill babies!" and you kept your old moral convictions intact, and decided to disobey it. But that second decision as to whether you ought to kill babies isn't something in response to a priori physical "discovery" of an obligation – that is itself simply sorting out one's obligations.

There is still of course the question "Will I do what I ought to?" but that seems like it's not what you're asking. It seems like you're asking "what reason have I to do what I ought to?" which strikes me as a confused question. At least, if someone asked me that in daily life I wouldn't know what they meant.

Yes. "Why ought I to do what I ought to do?" is a confused question.

To make it simple. Explain to me the difference between these possible worlds:

1. No morality.
2. It is immoral to kill babies.
3. It is moral to kill babies. — Michael

The question is confused, since it assumes that things being wrong is something extra on top of the rest of the world and what happens in it.

Such an assumption not only begs the question, but profoundly misunderstands morality, which is concerned with things being wrong due to the way they are (in the world, where else).

Without some qualia, you mean. — SophistiCat

No.

I was just using it as an example in the literature of philosophers assuming a certain capacity for visualization on the part of their readers.

Yeah, a vague image. In the same way I don't need to decide on how many stripes the zebra has, I don't need to decide exactly on the triangle's shape.

I've been reading a lot of fiction lately, and I've noticed I can have a visual presence in the story while barely deciding on any visual details, if I don't want to imagine anything – so just the visual outlines of the scene appear to me. The characters might not even have any specific eye, hair, or skin color, or height.

Yes. I think Berkeley was wrong about this. He was either misdescribing his own powers of imagination to make a rhetorical point, or, like Grandon, lacked a power of generalization that I seem to have. I don't find that I need to imagine some particular concrete triangle – the qualities I imagine can be more or less fuzzy – a triangle 'neither equilateral, nor isosceles, 'nor scalenon' seems possible to picture, not as some sharp visual image (which no visual images are anyway), but as a kind of blurry pre-visual mass.

OH baby, your visual cortex is so big, etc. etc.

Good point, I think that's fair. I've been using the term in the wrong way, or at least loosely.

But I still think even the idea that there are people without qualia, who differ in some minimal functional way from those who do, is still one people rule out a priori.

The term comes from David Kaplan – LD means 'logic of demonstratives.' His classical example was 'I'm here now,' but that one seems not quite to be a case, depending on how you construe 'here.' For your examples, (1) and (3) would seem to depend on how you construe the tense, and (2) is liar-paradoxical where it's the first thing someone ever utters (and the tense is interpreted in the right way), no?

That is to say, I don't think there's anything at all unusual about those who say they have limited visualization skills — Hanover

I'm not sure what it means out of context to say people have limited visualization skills – limited as judged by what standard? Obviously people can't literally reproduce visual impressions in their imagination, but no one has ever claimed that.

People with aphantasia seem to have no visualization skills, in the relevant sense.

I took Dennett to be talking about people's capabilities of imagining a horse visually specifically (hence the reference to the fact that the image didn't have any specific number of stripes). I'm not sure where the comment came from, though, so I can't track it down.

I am no Latin scholar but I note that the Latin original 'cogito ergo sum' contains no pronouns. Literally it seems to say something like 'thinks therefore exists'. Usually, as in other pronoun-drop languages like Italian, a pronoun is implied. But just because a pronoun is usually implied in a sentence with this type of grammatic structure, does not mean it is always implied. Just because the sentence would seem to make sense with the pronoun inserted (in Italian the 'I' pronoun would be Io. I don't know what it would be in Latin), that doesn't mean that Descartes intended to imply one. Perhaps it was intended for there to be no pronoun, implied or otherwise, and - in a pronoun-drop language - one cannot distinguish between a sentence in which an implied pronoun was intended and one in which it was not. — andrewk

The Latin pronoun is ego, which can be added, but even without it the cogito and sum are inflected for the first person singular, so the sentence means the same with or without the overt pronoun.

The second part 'I am' is a tautology. — andrewk

It's not a tautology: it's LD-valid, which means it can't be uttered in a context by an agent without being true. But the proposition that it expresses, that the speaker exists, is contingent.

There have been studies conducted showing that men and women differ in a statistically significant way among the philosophical positions they adopt – but it's hard to know if that's for physiological reasons or for cultural ones.

The thing about women being 'earthy' and men having their 'heads in the clouds' – women as unified bodies and men as souls attached to bodies – is an old stereotype. The general consensus among modern Westerners is that it's highly sexist and demeaning of women (as is I take it the notion of 'feminine wisdom,' which is supposed to be more earthy, less abstract wisdom). But who knows? Maybe men tend naturally to dualism and abstraction away from their embodied circumstances.

Step 1 in avoiding philosophical mistakes:

Resist the urge to generalize from yourself to all others. — Marchesk

Well, in their defense, whenever early modern philosophers pulled this sort of thing, they entreated others to see whether they could not do it in their case, and said for their own cases only they couldn't. But there was always an air of irony in this entreaty, i.e. the implication that they did not actually expect anyone else's capabilities to differ significantly from their own.

Also relevant is certain empiricists, like Berkeley, claiming to be unable to visualize e.g. triangles in the abstract, and so claiming to have no general idea of them.

I wonder if men are worse visualizers than women, or tend to have more p-zombie tendencies. It wouldn't surprise me if women generally had a greater depth or subtlety of feeling than men.