Any ontology that includes terms like "souls" and "spirits" to define different levels of "substance" does not map onto the world as we understand it scientifically. How do you map souls and spirits with what we understand scientifically?

That is not the solution. The solution is for you to start being more logically consistent, intellectually honest and take your own advice to ignore delusional claims.

These terms definitely still get used in the philosophy of physics, philosophy of biology, complexity studies, etc., but they are often used confusedly in different senses, with all the baggage they have accumulated — Count Timothy von Icarus

Do we have the same problem with the term, "process"?

In the scientific context, the term substance refers to pure matter alone, consisting of only one type of atom or one type of molecule.
— Harry Hindu

That's the point of the OP - that using the term 'substance' mistakenly equates 'being' with 'stuff'. And in the current scientific context, there is no real material ultimate in the sense of a material atom. Atoms are nowadays understood as excitations in fields, the primitive idea of the atom as 'indivisible particle' (that's what the word means, 'not divisible') is long dead, in the age of wave-particle duality. — Wayfarer

Where in the scientific explanation was the word, "stuff" used, or what makes you believe that "stuff" was implied when "substance" is used? It seems you are projecting a strawman into the description that isn't there.

You solve your own problem by incorporating other scientific knowledge that there is no real material ultimate in the sense of the material atom. If science also says that atoms are excitations in fields then it is not saying that substance is stuff. So your explanation only works if you compartmentalize scientific knowledge, like you just did. But as I said before, the conclusion in one domain of knowledge (or one field of science) should not contradict the conclusions reached in another. All knowledge must be integrated.

Yes, people spoke up, opposed, etc. but it was exactly that which became easy for Hitler and the Nazis to oppose by using free speech absolutism as a rhetoric. "See they want to silence us". — Christoffer

But was the opposition really silencing them? If the citizens heard them both and the rhetoric from alternative views was not calling to silence anyone else, then the claims of the Nazis was not true and plain for everyone to see. Wasn't it more that the prior government was corrupt and the economic hardships from the depression that made them look for alternatives like the Nazis?

You have whole libraries of material to read about the psychology of the German population from the 20s into the 40s. I suggest you go into the details because it will explain why some becomes spellbound and others not. — Christoffer

But why couldn't you just post the answer here as to why some people are incited by speech and others are not? That is the critical question and you seem to be avoiding it. If you wrote all this other stuff but ignored the key question then it seems you are trying to play the same game Hitler was.

What I'm saying in this thread is that the absolute state of freedom of speech is an utopian delusion either by those who don't understand Poppers tolerance paradox, or those with a very simplistic understanding of society and social psychology, or who are simply using it like the extremists, to champion an ideal in which they can say whatever extreme views they have without consequences. — Christoffer

It is your view that is simplistic if you cannot answer how some people are incited by speech and others are not. Popper's paradox is solved by using logic to determine which arguments each side is making are valid or not. Abolishing political parties (group-think and group-hate) and making critical thinking a required course in school would go a long way in preventing things like fascism and communism from taking hold again. Limiting free speech (as the capacity to question and criticize authority) is not the problem. It is the solution.

Good. Ignore it then. — frank

I can't when people like yourself do not ignore it and assume their claims are true and then start threads like this to have a debate about bathrooms when it isn't necessary if you would take your own advice and ignore them.

Sheesh. It's just full-circle hypocrisy with you, but else would one expect of one that sees the world through the prism of politics/religion.

As you can see in that speech, Hitler positioned himself and his party as being suppressed and as championing free speech to allow them to spread their propaganda which eventually eroded the public into a radicalized state. The power of that rhetoric is that he gained power by putting himself in the position of standing up for free speech, not suppression. — Christoffer

But if Hitler was really standing up for free speech then alternative views would have an equal amount of play-time on the radio waves. There must have been something that kept citizens from hearing alternative views, or that made alternative views to fascism less desirable. What was that? Would you be enthralled by Hitler's words to commit genocide? There were some that opposed Hitler and hid Jews at their own risk. What makes some people become spellbound by fascism and others not even though they hear the same rhetoric?

This is an extremely entitled view. Why do YOU need all the information, are you that special? Are you going to riot if you don't have all the information? I have already outlined why the initial information wasn't released to the public, should we change the law in place that protects minors because racist people will riot if they are not immediately told EVERYTHING. — Samlw

Wasn't it your argument that they rioted BECAUSE they didn't know the race of the person? You can't have your cake and eat it too.

When you see minors out in public, is their sex and race private information or is that public information for anyone with eyes?

this is where absolutism falls apart in my opinion, — Samlw

Absolute speech is not free speech. Absolute speech is what authoritarians practice. Free speech is the capacity to question authoritarians, thereby placing limits on their absolute speech. This has been the main point I have been making all along.

Exactly. The person that is disseminating propaganda is not exercising their right to free speech. The ones that possess the capacity to question authority - what is being said - are the ones exercising their rights. The one disseminating propaganda is actually infringing upon the rights of others free speech precisely because they are suppressing other information that would allow listeners to make up their own mind instead of being incited. So again, you are simply describing an instance of totalitarianism - where only one view is propagated while all others are suppressed, not free speech.
— Harry Hindu

Another straw man, I have not once disagreed with this — Samlw

Perfect. Then we agree on my main point as stated above.

Obviously, there are vast differences between ancient and modern, and we know an enormous amount more than did they, in a scientific sense. That is not at issue. The motivation for the original post, though, was a specific confusion arising from a misunderstanding of a key idea, which is still relevant despite all of that. That anyway is the argument spelled out in the OP. — Wayfarer

What I'm asking is how does either notion of substance compliment what we currently know scientifically and vice versa. The conclusions we reach in all domains of knowledge (philosophy and science) should not contradict each other. Is there a difference between the way we describe a substance philosophically and how we might describe it scientifically?

In the scientific context, the term substance refers to pure matter alone, consisting of only one type of atom or one type of molecule.

You mean like out on a street corner? — frank

:roll: Are Christians trying to bring God back into public schools from a street corner?

Both Christians and atheists are protected by the first amendment. People can be as deluded as they want to be. It's none of your business. — frank

I don't want it to be my business but they try to make my beliefs their business so that they can cancel or ban me if they do not align with their views. That is my point.

Those laws protect trans people from discrimination based on their trans status. It's illegal to refuse employment or housing to trans people. Does that cause your head to explode? — frank

Like I said, we already have laws that made discrimination illegal. The reason why we still have the laws is because people still discriminate. That is what the laws are for. We don't need more of the same laws. We need to enforce the ones we already have. If there is discrimination happening, then point it out specifically, so that we may fight it together. But using these vague, nebulous accusations of discrimination isn't helping anyone.

Both Christians and atheists are protected by the first amendment. People can be as deluded as they want to be. It's none of your business. — frank

Straw man. I'm not talking about the people that are deluded and keeping their delusion to themselves. If I identified as the reincarnated spirit of Elvis Presley and petitioned government to force people to refer to me as, "The King", to upgrade bathrooms toilets to thrones for the King, or that children must pray to the spirit of the King in school, would I be keeping my delusion to myself?

For the most part, the support the LGBTQ community is getting is about capitalism. Companies want to virtue signal. And there's nothing anybody can do to stop them. Have you not received diversity education from your employer? — frank

No, I haven't. Although, I have worked for myself for a significant portion of my life. Companies are abandoning DEI initiatives. To even implement them in the first place is implying that you weren't treating people fair and equal before your company implemented them. Again, they are assuming the premise that systemic racism exists. We already have laws in the books for discrimination and treating people equally. DEI was a push to give special treatment to certain groups.

Ok. I think you're going a little too far, though. There's room on the planet for people who become trans. There's no reason to squash them. Just let them be. The woke bullshit will stabilize itself over time. — frank

I never said there isn't room on the planet for anyone, nor am I trying to squash anyone. My whole point when it comes to politics - if you've read any posts of mine recently in political discussions - is live and let live. The problem is that the trans-movement is not letting others live by petitioning the government to affirm their delusions. Have you been consistent in informing atheists that there is room on the planet for Christians and the atheists should not squash the Christians? I'm not a Christian. I'm an atheist. The difference is that I'm consistent in my rejection of all delusions and those that want government to affirm their delusions.

There’s an important distinction that often gets glossed over in discussions of philosophy, especially when dealing with early modern or classical sources. That is, the difference between substance in the philosophical sense, and substance in everyday usage. — Wayfarer

Is there a difference between process in the philosophical sense and process in the everyday sense?

In the long run, 'substantia' became the English 'substance', but again, has a different meaning to 'a material with uniform properties'.

The use of 'process' as in 'process philosophy' is a much later arrival, associated with the philosopher Whitehead, in the early 20th century. However, 'process' doesn't really map easily against either 'ousia' or 'substantia'. — Wayfarer

Sounds to me like our understanding has evolved since the Greeks, and some terms are no longer relevant. Does either 'ousia' or 'substantia' map easily against reality as we now understand it (with relativity, QM, etc.), as opposed to how the Greeks understood reality?

If you read the OP, the point is that the meaning of substance in philosophy is not 'an unchanging material', but that is how it has come to be (mis)interpreted. — Wayfarer

And my point is why use the term, "substance" when there is a better term to use - "process"? If what you really mean is "process" when using the term, "substance" then just use "process".

Maybe, but there's nothing you can do about it. — frank

What I'm doing about it is exposing the hypocrisy and motivations of the extreme left for open minds to see. It was only a few years ago that even questioning trans-genderism would get you banned or canceled. I was one of the few going against the grain here on this forum. Now you have many Democrats calling out the trans-movement as hurting the party. The needle is moving.

…. substance is the permanence of the real in time…. — Mww

The only permanent thing is change. There is no substance - only process or relations. Things only appear to persist in time because of our limited perception of time. We cannot perceive change happening over millions or billions of years but it is happening. The universe is expanding last time I checked. What is it that is expanding? Is space a substance?

I usually keep my bullshit to myself. — frank

That wasn't the question. And you didn't keep your bullshit to yourself until I exposed your hypocrisy. Now you, and everyone else that drank the trans-Kool-Aid, is silent. Will you all bring the same tiring arguments back up the next time a Trans thread appears on the forum? Of course you will because it's not about what the truth is to you. It's about acquiring political power in the form of using people with mental disorders as political clubs against your political opponents.

Jumping in very late, here. I do not know what trans means, or what a trans person is. But it does seem plain easy to prove that no trans-man is or can be a man, nor any trans-woman a woman, for the extremely simple reason that a trans-man, If a man, is already a man, and a trans-woman, if a woman, is already a woman. That leaves the alternatives of a trans-man being a woman or neither a man nor a woman, and a trans-woman being a man or neither man nor woman. — tim wood

Confusing, I know. But Frank seems to think that everyone should know what a trans-woman is and what it means for a man to live as a woman, but when pressed on what that means... silence.

All this talk about who can enter which bathroom is irrelevant because if you really have spoken to a trans person then they will tell you that a woman is simply someone that believes they are a woman. So that person with a penis entering the women's bathroom IS a woman and there are no men entering women's bathrooms - ever.

This is what happens when you don't bother asking the right questions when someone makes extraordinary claims because all you are really concerned about is using people as political pawns. They don't care about what trans-gender really means, or else their definitions and explanations would be consistent.

All this talk about pronouns when the same people advocating for calling people by their preferred pronouns as a sign of respect have themselves called people names (bigot, racists, idiot, moron, etc.) that they did not identify as. The hypocrisy is so easy to point out precisely because they are simply repeating the same bullshit they've heard without questioning it themselves. They don't reflect on what is being said because it reinforces what they already believe (the arguments from the left (or right) are always right). This is what happens when you see the world through the prism of politics.

When someone uses such a phase, I think the onus should be on the asserter as what would the world look like “as is” vs “not as is”. They need to set up the contrast. Descartes demon may be able to perfectly duplicate a world, but runs into the problem of distinguishing between the two. Better yet why not say that we have more of the same world in that case. — Richard B

Where would this duplicate world be relative to the original? It appears to me that the duplicate would be part of the greater reality that includes the original and duplicate, just as heaven and hell, along with the universe is all part of one reality as the events in one can affect the events in others.

If the duplicate mirrors the original, then it would be a world as well.

The problem appears to be a misuse of language more than anything else.

The issue isn't that our senses are wrong. An original table will look just like a duplicate table, even for the demon. The difference is our knowledge of another world - the original that we have yet to observe - that is lacking, not that our senses are lying to us.

Ok then. We've both spoken to trans-people. The difference is that you simply accepted their claims without question. Do you do that with other extraordinary claims that are made?

You mean you haven't and yet you're speaking for them?

I think you're pretending not to understand what a trans woman is. — frank

And I think you have drunk the Kool-Aid without questioning.

It's a guy who is living as a woman, — frank

How does one live as a woman if one is a guy?

A man can transition to being a trans woman. — frank

What does that even mean? What is a trans-woman and how does it differ from a man or woman? Man and woman are biological entities so to be a trans-woman appears to mean that you are intersex but have more female parts than male parts.

It's not a matter of rights. If the public owns the toilet. Access to it is up to the public. — frank

It's not even that because the trans-movement claims that one is a woman simply by claiming it. A man is no longer a man once they enter a woman's bathroom, so the discussion about men entering women's bathroom is irrelevant and we should instead focus on the trans claim that someone is a woman or man by simply claiming it, or by wearing a dress or entering a women's bathroom.

So you're abandoning your whole "everybody has a right to be safe" thing? You're leaving me to pee in front of dwarves even though I don't feel safe? — frank

Propagating a delusion as if it were real, creating mass delusion, is what makes everyone less safe.

If a man cannot be a woman then why have a debate about bathrooms? Should we abandon arguments that are red herrings?

Irrelevant. What needs to be proven here is if a man can be a woman.

There are probably more men assaulting women. What are the statistics on men assaulting women in bathrooms? — frank

I'm not sure as men have mostly been kept out of women's bathrooms so it would logically follow that most assaults on women occurred outside of the bathroom. By allowing men into women's safe spaces, the assaults in bathrooms undoubtedly will go up.

But none of this actually addresses the actual issue in that some in this thread are advocating that men should be able to enter a woman's bathroom or locker room based on the fallacious and incoherent idea that men can be women. Can men be women and vice versa?

What are the statistics on dwarf on normal-statured people assaults vs men on women assaults?

If I don't feel safe peeing with a dwarf in the room, is the state supposed to do something about that? — frank

That depends on whether your fear is realistic or not (delusional).

Here's a sqip: i

If you take any squip, and put an "i" on it's left side, the result is also a squip.

So since i is a squip, so is ii. and since ii is a squip, so is iii.

You get the idea.

Here's a language game about that language game: Is there a largest squip?

Now, where is the problem? — Banno

That's not a language game. That's a scribble game.

What makes a scribble a word?

Thats good, at least we both believe solipsism is a untenable position. — Richard B

You made solipsism a tenable position by saying things like, "we don't see the world as it is". I'm now asking you how you can then say "solipsism is an untenable position" after saying "we don't see the world as it is". How can you be so sure there is even an external world if you can't trust what your senses are telling you? Do you even have senses?

:roll: of course I can agree with all that (just read my recent posts in other political discussions), but that will take generations to accomplish. A more immediate solution to the trans problem is to start addressing it as what it is - a delusional disorder.

In the present case, it's a matter of having a word to denote a particular concept. If you read the word, it's to your benefit to understand what the word means- there's no control involved. If you get triggered when you see others using the term, that's your problem. If you feel to need to correct others when they use the term in the way you oppose then you are as guilty of trying to control others as anyone. — Relativist

This is so laughable that you cannot see the contradiction in what you just said here.

What you just said can be applied to yourself and the trans-community. So when trans people hear the word "gender" being used a as a synonym for "sex", or pronouns being used to refer to sex, and are triggered, then that is their problem, right? This is just more of the left's "rules for thee, but not for me" (the right is hypocritical in this regard too, so it's more of an extremist tactic to control others to reinforce their delusions).

symptoms of delusional disorder may include:
Feelings of being exploited.
Preoccupation with the loyalty or trustworthiness of friends.
A tendency to read threatening meanings into benign remarks or events.
Persistently holding grudges.
A readiness to respond and react to perceived slights. — Cleveland Clinic

Physical alteration of one's body is presentation. Is biology being changed? Amputation of a leg isn't a change of biology, nor is cosmetic surgery. — Relativist

That is changing one's physiology which is part of one's biology.

The point is that why change your body if gender is a feeling and/or a social construction? If gender is feeling then changing your gender would be changing how you feel. If it were a social construction then changing gender would require changing society, not an individual's body parts.

Not to mention, that they never achieve creating real sex organs so the only thing they could be presenting is a fake version of a man or woman. When the the doctor creates hole between a man's legs as a "vagina" a medical grade dilator has to be used to keep the wound from closing. The body knows what it is, despite what the mind might think.

You're wrong. Consistency is present if a word corresponds to a concept. It's an entirely different matter as to whether or not you (and others) are willing to accept the linguistic shift. But languages evolve all the time. — Relativist

The problem is that this linguistic shift is based on a misunderstanding of other terms as well as contradictory with the rest of what we know. This is typical of religious claims. They end up contradicting other claims they have made, as well as being logically inconsistent in accepting some claims over others when they all have no evidence to support any of them.

Are you saying that women have a right to use the bathroom without biological men in the room? — frank

I'm saying that everyone, including women, has the right to feel safe.

My Master? Yes, I would refuse. Dark Sith Lord? And I knew you had a severe mental compulsion to be called that or it causes you distress? Sure, why not? But you didn't answer my question about pronouns. Do you refuse to call a man her or she? — RogueAI

You didn't answer the most important question on why you would believe a man can be a woman more than a man can be a Sith Lord, or believe in the existence of the Christian god.

As for pronouns - they refer to one's sex, so I will use them to refer to one's sex regardless of what one wishes.

Have you ever called someone a name that they did not identify with - idiot, moron, ass, bigot, racist, sexist, stupid, etc.?

If you're concerned about people's safety, just let trans men use men's bathrooms and trans women use women's bathrooms. — Michael

That's not the issue here. The issue is men that are not trans entering women's bathrooms and locker rooms. The ultimate issue is assuming that extraordinary claims with no evidence are true.

Again, if gender is merely a feeling, then that is all you need to be one gender or the other. The need to use one bathroom or the other would be irrelevant if all that is required is one's feelings to affirm one's gender.

We don't need a scanner to check for inter-sex people entering one bathroom or the other, so the discussion regarding that is irrelevant. Inter-sex people are already using the bathroom they want and their case is so rare that it is a non-issue. The issue is that predator men will use transgenderism as an excuse to enter women's safe spaces.

It would seem to me that the ones that are using people with a mental disorders for political gain are the true haters here. And it is these people that are actually putting everyone in danger, including trans-people, by affirming their delusions, instead of helping them get the proper care they need. This would be like prescribing diet pills to an anorexic instead of providing the proper psychological care they need. The left is not about helping people. They are about using people as a political club against their political opponents.

If a biological male wants you to use "she" and "her" do you refuse? — RogueAI

If I want you to refer to me as, "My Master" because I identify as a Dark Sith Lord, would you refuse?

If not, then it is incumbent upon you to explain the discrepancy. Why do you believe a man can be a woman more than a man can be a Sith Lord? Why do you believe a man can be a woman more than the claim that the Christian-right's God exists?

There is no logical inconsistency in the semantics, if sex is defined as biological and gender is defined as what is presented and (presumably) felt. My sense is that this won't catch on, because many are like you: unwilling to accept the semantics. As I indicated initially, that's the most trivial aspect of the TG issue. — Relativist

There is logical inconsistency in both the semantics AND the acceptance of extraordinary claims with no evidence.

Gender as "what is presented and felt" are biological. Feelings are biological, or more specific - neurological. I'm not sure what "presented" means other than using sexist tropes to "present" oneself as either a male or female.

If gender and sex are separate, then why is changing one's biology an affirmation of one's gender? If presenting and feeling are what define one's gender, then why the need to change the biology and control other's speech? Why the need to enter female spaces - which are divided by sex, not by gender?

The ultimate issue here though is that you and the others here have ASSUMED the claims of people that claim to be a woman when they are a man are true. Not only that, but you are being inconsistent in your acceptance of one claim over another when they both have the same amount of evidence - none. This is no different than how Christians accept the existence of one God over others, when there is the same amount of evidence for the existence of all gods - none.

You don't want to admit this because doing so will undermine everything that has been said in defense of transgenderism here.

The pot calling the kettle black here. . . you want to separate them out for safety reasons yet not actually give a solution to why there was a need for said separation to begin with. — substantivalism

We're talking about feelings here. Does a woman's need to feel safe override a man's feeling to be a woman? Who's feelings get affirmed at the expense of the others?

Right. As far as I can tell it's not a matter of rights. It's just up to the community's sentiments. — frank

Do we have a right to feel safe? Does our need to feel safe override other people's rights to do other things?

The right to pee without any biological males around? — frank

It's really more of not wanting to take off your pants with any males around as that would include cases in the locker room as well.

Since you are asking "how we can know about the world even though "we don't see the world as it is", I will assume you could not keep yourself from sliding, and so you believe solipsism is the case unless demonstrated otherwise. — Richard B

I'm not a solipsist so the rest of your post is irrelevant. The fact that you did not answer the question is indicative that you do not have an answer yet you keep claiming that we do not see the world as it is, so my point was that YOU are the solipsist, not me.

To even attempt to answer the question, how about you start off by answering whether you experience your mind as it is or not.

You tell me. You seem to think that there are good reasons to separate bathrooms according some biological binary. What are those reasons? Perhaps when we examine those reasons we might conclude that, actually, we ought separate according to genitals, and that DNA, hormones, and mammary glands are irrelevant. — Michael

You seem to think there are good reasons to change what has worked. The only reasons you provide is to point at 0.1% of the population of intersex people and being logically inconsistent with assuming the claims of some delusions but not others without question.

I would love for there to be an actual intersex person with the traits you provided to speak to and hear what they have to say. You seem to think they would be easy to find. I'm not worried about that small fraction of society. I'm more worried about the much larger portion that preys one women.

Changing society is often a good thing. I think society should be more tolerant of trans people. It's a lot better now than it was when I was growing up in the 70's and 80's. — RogueAI

I am tolerant of anyone who keeps their delusions to themselves - whether it be believing in a God or believing you're a woman in a man's body - and not expect others to change in ways to affirm their delusion.

There's a political dispute about semantics. This portion of the dispute is a waste of time- I mentioned some serious issues; this isn't one of them- it's a distraction. — Relativist

Incorrect. You want to discuss the symptom while I want to focus on the cause. If you don't value logical consistency and questioning ALL extraordinary claims that are being made, then what's the use?

I don't need to understand why they wish to transition to understand that trans men do not believe that they have a penis. Indeed, the very fact that they transition (if they do) proves that they know that they don't have a penis.

So it's unclear what delusion you think they're suffering from. — Michael

...that they should have a penis.

Again, why would one need to transition if gender is separate from sex? Doesn't the fact that some do and some don't means that we're talking about two separate conditions, not one, yet we put those that do transition and those that do not under the same umbrella of "trans-gender".

Then they have 3 female traits and 2 male traits and so are female and ought use the women's changing rooms, compete in women's sports, etc.? — Michael

What I have said would support this, yes. Is there a problem? Notice though that we have moved from talking about trans-gender to trans-sexual, or intersex. How can this be if gender and sex are distinct?

there remains biological ambiguity, — unenlightened

It smacks of the one drop rule to me. — unenlightened

I would hardly call 99.9% vs. 0.1% a biological ambiguity. In nature, this is about has unambiguous you can get. This smacks of confusing mutations (mistakes in copying genes from one generation to the next) as biological ambiguities within a species.

Your assertion is consistent with my view that part of the issue is semantics. — Relativist

It's not semantics. It's politics.

The type of reasoning the left side of the spectrum is practicing here is no different than the reasoning the right makes when advocating societal change based on their unfounded beliefs. The leftists here have no problem questioning the claims of the right when it comes to the existence of God when the right is proposing changing society in ways that "affirms" their beliefs. The leftists are failing to question the claims of a transgender person when they claim to be a man or woman when they are the opposite.

This is no different than the religious right advocating for God in public schools when they cannot even provide evidence for the existence of God. You are assuming the person's premise that they are a woman or man and then using that to affect societal change.

This is typical of political and religious discussions where one side abandons logic and reason because they have an emotional attachment to the claims they are making, or are wishing to score political capital.

I am being logically consistent in this regard. I question the claims of the right and the left when they are using those claims for the basis of societal change but cannot provide any good evidence that any of their claims are true.

Is that always a problem? People often have trivial delusions that their friends and co-workers humor. For example, someone might think they're a great singer or deep thinker and they're not and nobody has the heart to tell them the truth. — RogueAI

It is when they are using their claims as the basis for changing society. Did you friend demand they receive an Grammy?

Yet you are making all these claims about reality as it is. Am I to believe the claims you have made about reality?

As my eyes scan across the image, I'm convinced shapes are moving and shifting. Of course they aren't, and I can figure that out analytically, and yet it seems so deeply true of my experience of the image, that I'm experiencing looking at moving shifting shapes.

Some illusions are perhaps conscious misinterpretations, but our experience of the world comes through a lot of filters before it becomes a conscious experience. The existence of those pre-experiential filters, which I think unambiguously exist, prove that we can't just be "experiencing reality as it is". — flannel jesus

This is due to a conscious effort of shifting one's attention to a specific area of the picture to the picture as a whole and back.

What does that even mean, "experience reality as it is"? Is your mind part of reality? Do you experience your mind as it is?

The fact that you know that there are unconscious filters is evidence that you are experiencing reality as it is.

You need to provide an explanation as to how we can still know reality as it is when we cannot experience or see the world as it is.

Firstly, not all do. Secondly, you'll have to ask them, not me. Thirdly, the same can be asked about anyone who undergoes cosmetic surgery, whether transgender or not. — Michael

But you are speaking for them, so you appear to know what they think. It's ironic to see you speak for them up to the point when you are faced with difficult questions.

It's a long discussion and I haven't read every post. — Michael

Yet you are notified of responses to your posts. If notifications are not working, maybe you should notify an admin.

The point is that in continuing to make the "bathroom" argument you are merely trying to address a symptom of the problem, not the cause - which is affirming someone's delusions for political capital.

If someone born without a penis believes that they have a penis then they would be suffering from a delusion, but this isn't what trans men believe. — Michael

Then why do trans people modify there biology? If merely believing something is an affirmation, then there would be no need to modify one's biology.

What would it scan for? Chromosomes? Genitals? What if someone has XX chromosomes and a penis? — Michael

As I pointed out earlier in this thread that you appeared to have ignored, there are five traits that determine one's sex. You are one or the other based on having a majority (three or more) traits of a male or female.

In the absence of any sexual context and intention to cause alarm and distress – being naked in public is within the law.

How do you determine one's intention in this case? And this does not address the point I made in explaining what a trans person would be in a society where there are no clothes, and everyone is naked.