Only that it's a failed interpretation, because in a competition they all survive, not only the fittest one. — Alkis Piskas

The idea as I understand it is that it is the competition for survival, so they don't all survive. It is not necessarily competition directly against the others as in fighting to the death, but competition for resources. Those who gain the resources survive and those who cannot die.

This is true too. But as with competion, I'm afraid that these interpretations are only attempts to moderate the bad effect that Darwin's (controversial) theory has. — Alkis Piskas

What "bad effect"? I see that part of Darwin's theory as being pretty much tautologous: it amounts to "those who can survive do and are more likely to reproduce than those who cannot survive."

If not Pantheism, how would you describe Spinoza's concept of "deus sive natura"*1, which equates Nature with god-like creative powers? — Gnomon

More panentheist than pantheist; I think Spinoza understood God to be both immanent to and transcendent of nature, and by that, I mean transcendent of nature as we know it; knowing which is exclusively under the attributes of extensa and cogitans. Spinoza believed those are just the two of God's infinite attributes that we humans can know. Have you read Spinoza's Ethics?

Well to say that "there is no room for disagreement" is different from saying "there is intersubjective agreement." — Leontiskos

I don't think it is necessarily different. There is universal intersubjective agreement that 2+2=4, and no room for disagreement (excluding insanity or perversity), for example. In fact, I would say "no room for disagreement" is equivalent to saying, "necessary intersubjective agreement".

My conclusion that they are contraries comes from your own words. For example, "[it's] a spectrum from purely subjective to comprehensively intersubjective." The poles of a spectrum are contraries. — Leontiskos

I'd agree that in one sense purely subjective and completely intersubjective would count as contraries, but in a different sense all intersubjective agreement consists in agreement between subjectively held opinions. Or in other words the intersubjective is comprised of the subjective.

But the end of pleasure is not subjective, and therefore not all ends are subjective. — Leontiskos

Perhaps not all people seek pleasure, some may prefer pain or enjoy being depressed. You might object that then those are sources of pleasure, but if everything people do, whether painful, depressing or whatever is stipulated as being pleasure-seeking, then it will be tautologously true, but uninformative that all human activity is pleasure seeking.

So, it depends on how broadly you define 'pleasure'. Anyway, to be honest, I'm not getting much sense of where you want to go with this discussion; what conclusions are we supposed to draw from the idea that all human activities are pleasure-seeking in some sense of other?

The other question that comes to mind is whether you think there are other ends which are not subjective.

Here arises the question of whether there are universal human ends. If one answers negatively then they will say that we should not argue about what those ends are, whereas if one answers affirmatively then they will say that we should argue about what those ends are (or their priority, or how to achieve them, etc.). — Leontiskos

I don't disagree with anything here, but I'm still wondering where you want to go with this.

Well above you spoke about points on which there is "no room for disagreement," or that "all humans are bound to agree about." Surely not all intersubjective agreement is like this, and therefore there are at least two different kinds of intersubjective agreement. — Leontiskos

As I've said I see it as a spectrum or continuum, so there are (in prinicple at least) degrees of intersubjective agreement from zero to one hundred percent.

Well, look at it this way. You speak about what you are justified in claiming. I am wondering what you are justified in believing. Are you allowed to believe things that you are not justified in claiming? (Apparently you believe things that you cannot demonstrate. What is the status of these things? And do you believe them rationally?) — Leontiskos

What I believe and what I choose to claim are two different things. For example, I don't believe there is a God, but I don't choose to claim that there is no God because I think the truth or falsity of that statement cannot be demonstrated or even really coherently argued for or against. Another example is that I believe there are real aesthetic differences of quality in the arts, but I cannot mount a rational argument for that, so I acknowledge it is a matter of faith.

The main point for me in this is that what I might personally feel intuitively convinced of does not, on account of that conviction, constitute a reason for anyone else to be convinced of its truth. You ask whether I believe such things rationally. The conviction, if not based on empirical evidence or strict logic might not be counted as rational, but then it might be pragmatically rational for me to believe those things I find intuitively to be true, even if I cannot give empirical or logical reasons for that intuition.

I think Kant makes a similar distinction between pure and practical reason when he says that there is no purely rational justification for believing in God, freedom and immortality, but that there are (or, as I would rather say, "may be") practical reasons for believing in those things. In other words, if Kant means to say that there are universal practical reasons for believing in those things then I would part company with him.

So maybe we agree that arguing about ends is inevitable. Let me say that I think it is also good. It is good that a school argues about its curriculum, or a nation about its ideals and laws. — Leontiskos

I would agree that it is good that such things be discussed, and that people seek to understand the views of others and realize that there can be no arrival at definitive answers to the questions motivating such discussions or the truth or falsity of competing claims.

I think polemical argument— "you're wrong and I'm right"— is never a good thing and is based on the failure to understand that in regard to metaphysical, ethical and aesthetic matters, if not empirical and logical matters, there will inevitable be a diversity of subjective opinion. Everyone does not have to agree about everything, and the very idea of a society wherein everyone did agree about everything makes me shudder.

"Survival of the fittest" has come to imply competition, but there seems to be no reason to exclude cooperation. I also tend to think that when it comes to social animals "fittest" applies to groups more significantly than it does to individuals, and it is in the social context that cooperation seems to become more important than competition; more likely to be conducive to a fit society.

That's a good pickup. There is also the distinction between saying science pursues truth and saying that science yields truth. It also occurs to me that if knowledge is justified true belief and science pursues knowledge then it must also be pursuing beliefs which are justified and true, which would seem to entail that it is pursuing truth.

If knowledge is taken as "know-how" then it pursues knowledge in that sense too, since it seems obvious that science also pursues know-how.

The initial singularity was not located "anywhere" nor at "any specific time". Temporo-spatiality applies to the universe as we know it, — Benj96

Does it apply to the whole universe? Where and when is the whole universe located?

What's interesting here is that your theory of truth seems bound up with intersubjective agreement, which is nothing more than a form of consensus, but I leave this aside for now. — Leontiskos

True it is a form of consensus, but in relation to simple observations of phenomena and mathematical and logical truths there is really no room for disagreement.

That's why I said intersubjective agreement versus subjective belief is not a rigid dichotomy but is on a sliding scale, so to speak.

If you conceive of intersubjective agreement as the contrary of subjective, then it seems to me that the intrinsic worth of pleasure is not subjective (because it possesses intersubjective agreement). Thus the end of pleasure is not subjective, according to your theory. — Leontiskos

I wouldn't say they are contraries. Obviously subjective opinion is a component of all intersubjective agreement, although where there is no scope for disagreement as I indicated in my previous response, one might want to say there is no subjectivity at all involved. Even if all humans are bound to agree about something, though, this would still be a truth assented to be all human subjects and it might be claimed to have no provenance beyond that context.

Again, it seems to me that on your own system the intrinsic value of pleasure has as much a claim to objectivity as anything else. — Leontiskos

I think we've already been over this. If by "intrinsic value" you mean "universally valued (to some degree) by all humans" then I would agree.

Only because the end is believed to have intrinsic value. — Leontiskos

I don't find that I need to believe that something is universally valued by humans in order to value it myself. But even if I did need to believe that in order to value something, humans believing something has intrinsic value and something actually having intrinsic value (whatever the latter could mean) are two different things.

I rather doubt that we will arrive at the "unquestionably true" as opposed to merely arriving at intersubjective agreement. Do you have a notion of truth that transcends intersubjective agreement? — Leontiskos

I don't believe in context-transcendent truths if that is what you mean.

But I would maintain that this is confusing things, and that "intrinsically valuable," and, "demonstrably intrinsically valuable," need to be kept conceptually separate if we are to avoid question-begging. — Leontiskos

This confuses me because I cannot see how I would be justified in claiming that something has intrinsic value, as opposed to my claiming that it seems to me to have intrinsic value (which is not arguable), unless I could show that it was demonstrable or somehow could not fail to be self-evident.

My initial argument is simple: Ends are the most important things in human life, therefore they should be the object of discourse and scrutiny (and argument). I am going to try to construct your own argument to the contrary in my post following your next reply, but feel free to set it out yourself if you like. You've already given a number of the pieces of that argument. — Leontiskos

The argument over ends, it seems to me, will of course be inevitable and necessary in human life, since some peoples' ends (and the means they use to achieve them) may have consequences for others or even for the whole of humanity. So, it would not be the purported intrinsic value of the ends being argued over, but their likely consequences, and this is where it becomes an empirical, pragmatic issue, and good evidence for and/ or against the end in question might be presented.

I'll repeat again, for a large part of the essay, I'm not concerned with God-as-such, but with God-as-experienced, which in one aspect means dealing with one's conscience. — Brendan Golledge

If there are phenomenological commonalities to be found across so-called spiritual or religious experiences, and a significant portion of those who apparently enjoy such experiences (for example Buddhists) do not interpret them as being experiences of God, then do you not see that you are already tendentiously presupposing God in some sense in speaking of "God-as-experienced'?

My question was about how Aristotle would categorize those topics. Would he include them in the Physics section of his books, or in the section that later came to be known as The Metaphysics*1. — Gnomon

You're asking the wrong person: I'm no scholar of Aristotle's philosophy.

Yet, 2500 years later, we continue to argue about the immaterial philosophical concepts that he defined so succinctly. — Gnomon

Yes, agreement about metaphysical theories is unlikely since their truth or falsity cannot be demonstrated. By the way, I think of philosophical concepts as being material, but obviously not in the sense of saying they are physical objects.

Although he spoke of nature gods, they were more like Spinoza's deus sive natura than the anthro-morphic gods of Greece*2. That's why I interpret Metaphysics in terms of abstract philosophical concepts*3 instead of socio-cultural religious precepts* — Gnomon

I don't agree with your first sentence; I don't see Spinoza as an animist or a pantheist. And I don't know what your second sentence is attempting to say; surely metaphysics is to be found both in philosophy and in religion, no? Are you just saying that you personally prefer to focus on the philosophical context of metaphysical ideas rather than the religious context?

Public demonstrability is not an end in itself. For this reason, the person who always responds with, "but your claim is not publicly demonstrable!," is not being rational. Not everything needs to be publicly demonstrable. Indeed, some things need to not be publicly demonstrable, and included in this group are the most important things of all. — Leontiskos

I don't at all believe that everything needs to be publicly demonstrable; what I would count as the most valuable things in life cannot be. My point is only that if you want to argue for something, then you must appeal either to evidence or logic.

Many things get their rational support by consensus, by the fact that whatever the claim is commands wide or even almost universal support. I think this is the case with valid phenomenological claims. I see phenomenology as being the attempt to explicate how things seem to humans in general. It is reliant on assent not on strict public demonstrability. The point is that even such claims as enjoy virtually universal assent may nonetheless be mistaken or superceded.

Obviously, this goes for science too. The truth or falsity of scientific theories is not publicly demonstrable. As I keep repeating only direct observations and mathematical and logical truths are strictly demonstrable.

When it comes to metaphysical matters, we find ourselves even further away from anything that can be demonstrated or even find any kind of universal consensus.

I don't know why you would think that ends are subjective like tastes. — Leontiskos

Ends are subjective because they are based on what is valued. Some people value some things and others other things. There may be some intersubjective agreement of course; a lot of people like the Beatles or Mozart for example, heavy metal not so much. So, it's not an all or nothing thing but a spectrum from purely subjective to comprehensively intersubjective as I see it.

Of course, what I am arguing here is not publicly demonstrable, so I am happy to admit that what I am arguing is subjective, how things seem to me. But that is phenomenology.

So to this:

Do you have any arguments for these claims you are making? That ends are subjective, or that a source of pleasure cannot be of universal value, or that intrinsic value does not exist? — Leontiskos

I would answer that if something can be shown to be universally valued or agreed upon then we could say that it is as close as possible to being objective. But even if all humans valued something that still does not show that the thing valued has intrinsic value, it would only show that is has universal human value.

Hedonism is a theory that aims to do more than explain one's own actions. It is a moral theory of human action, not a theory of a single human's actions. The intrinsic value of pleasure is an axiom of hedonism.

What I would say is that instrumental acts have no value if nothing is intrinsically valuable, and I think we agree on this. Further, public demonstration is an instrumental act, a means to an end. So if nothing is intrinsically valuable, then public demonstration has no value. — Leontiskos

Hedonism explains not only my own actions but the actions of others. It seems that all organisms seek pleasure or comfort or ease or whatever you want to call it, but it does not seem to me that pleasure seeking is generally, or at least universally, considered to be the most important aim in life. I think this is shown by Robert Nozick's 'Pleasure Machine' thought experiment.

You say that instrumental acts have no value if nothing is intrinsically valuable, but I don't see valid reasoning in that. If something is a means to an end I value, then that means has value to me. It doesn't need to be shown to be intrinsically valuable in order to be valued by me. I don't even say you have to value public demonstration, but if you want to rationally convince someone of something being unquestionably true, then you need to appeal to public demonstrability in either empirical, mathematical or logical form. That is not to say you cannot convince someone to believe that what you claim is unquestionably and universally true by rhetoric; it seems obvious to me that that happening is commonplace.

A flippant remark. We have intersubjective or subjective: do you have an alternative or third categorization that can be rationally justified or is this just something you personally have a vague emotionally motivated belief about but cannot argue for? If the latter, then that is the very definition of subjective, isn't it?

Is not "knowing thyself" the first step to becoming something other than what you already are? I mean, you could merely pay lip service to an imposed injunction, but that would not count as being a real change, but merely an act of self-repression designed to make you appear to others (and perhaps to yourself) to be living up to some introjected ideal. It would only be by understanding or knowing yourself that you would be able to tell the difference.

Ultimately, we act for ends in themselves. Or at least we should if we are rational. — Leontiskos

Sure, since means are pointless, they are not even means, without ends.

Okay, sure. It seems to me that this fact will significantly undermine an overemphasis on public demonstrability, as well as the idea that ends are not proper objects of discourse (or that ends cannot be argued about, for example). — Leontiskos

I see the pointlessness of arguing about ends as being entailed by the fact that ends are subjective; it depends on what we care about. It's like taste; if I prefer to listen to Beethoven than I do Mozart, and you prefer the opposite; what could be the point of arguing about it. Not to say we might not get something from hearing each other's reasons (if we have reasons) for preferring one or the other, but ultimately,
as the old saw goes "there's no accounting for taste".

In this case the pleasure is of intrinsic value. — Leontiskos

Yes, but the source of the pleasure cannot be of universal value, and that is really my only point.

As humans we all believe in and seek intrinsically valuable things. — Leontiskos

I don't think this is true; I think we all seek things that we find valuable to ourselves. Maybe we are simply talking at cross purposes, since you seem to have quite a different notion of "intrinsic" value than I do.

For example, if the hedonist denies that pleasure is intrinsically valuable, then their account of action collapses. — Leontiskos

This is a good example; the hedonist only needs to argue that pleasure is valuable to her in order to justify, or at least offer a rational reason for, seeking it. That said, someone addicted to hedonistic activities might explain that they don't think that what they seek is really valuable to them, but that they cannot help pursuing it because they are addicted to it.

Metaphysics: reason. Religious doctrine: revelation. But this is for another thread. — Leontiskos

Reason is involved in all "giving of reasons" whether the reasons given are strictly rational or not. I see metaphysics (if the ideas are novel) as consisting in exercising the creative imagination in thinking of possible scenarios that could explain why the world appears to us as it does.

It depends on what you mean by science. Science is based on ordinary observations, and they can often, if not always, be determined to be true or false. Scientific theories cannot be determined to be true or false, although they can be so coherent with all that we take ourselves to know and be so predictively successful as to become pretty much universally taken to be true. There are also logical and mathematical truths.

Accurate science relies on accurate observations. It may not be right to say science taken as a whole pursues truth, but some scientists may understand themselves to be pursuing truth

. Are Wisdom and Virtue physical or metaphysical concepts? — Gnomon

It depends on what you mean by wisdom and virtue. Aristotle spoke of phronesis usually translated as 'practical wisdom'. Wisdom and virtue can be understood to be pragmatic virtues.

What Gautama thought nirvana consists in is a matter of debate, as he would not give a straight answer to those who wanted to settle on some metaphysical viewpoint concerning its nature.

Kant pointed out that metaphysical knowledge as transcendently conceived is impossible. We cannot know whether there is a God, we cannot know the "absolute truth", we cannot know whether there is an afterlife, rebirth, resurrection, heaven and hell and so on. All these ideas are matters of faith, not of knowledge.

What we can know is immanent, phenomenological—altered states of consciousness and personal transformation— and not what the "ultimate" metaphysical, transcendent implications of those phenomenologically knowable human possibilities might be.

Note, I'm not saying people shouldn't believe, just that they should be intellectually honest enough to admit that what they believe is faith-based whenever there is no empirical evidence or strict logical warrant. It follows that it is pointless to argue about faith-based beliefs, because there is no way to demonstrate their truth or falsity.

You did, but I think you are not quite right in a small but important way. The potentiality is in the observer, not the changes. — unenlightened

I see the potentiality as being in both, and the actuality as being in the interaction. I think the changes are real and independent of the observer, although the ways in which they are perceived and understood are obviously not. I was trying to get away from the notion that reality is entirely constructed by the mind, and I don't think that Bateson thought it was either. I don't have the impression that he was an idealist.

I noticed this, that seemed related to the topic. — unenlightened

Cheers, will have a look.

I was referring to ancient philosophical "schools" such as Stoicism, Epicureanism, the Cynics, and Neoplatonism and also Eastern teachings such as Buddhism, Vedanta and Daoism that were more concerned with theory as an aid to practice than as an end in itself.

For example, remember that the Buddha cautioned against metaphysical views.

Okay, so that's where I think we would end up disagreeing. I don't think that phenomenon is absent from religion, but I don't think it explains all metaphysical beliefs. — Leontiskos

So, apart from the interpretations of altered states by individuals who experience them, and the prevailing prior cultural accretions of such interpretations that might influence new interpretations, what else do you believe explains metaphysical beliefs?

Okay good, and I conclude that listening to music is intrinsically valuable (for some, or most). Obviously this also exists at a cultural level, from Gregorian chant, to Beethoven, to Radiohead. Such composers aim to produce something that is intrinsically valuable, and which will be chosen as an end in itself.

Music, then, becomes a value and an object of discourse, even when conceived as an end: — Leontiskos

What about pop music, or heavy metal? Also, is music chosen as an end in itself or a means to enjoyment and/ or elevated feeling?

Nevertheless, the act of music appreciation is not publicly demonstrable in any obvious way, largely because appreciation is not the sort of thing done for the sake of demonstration. It would be incongruous to try to demonstrate appreciation (because demonstration pertains to means and appreciation pertains to ends). — Leontiskos

Yes, I've said the same about appreaciation of art and literature in general. I say the same thing goes for appreciation of religion or metaphysical ideas.

The idea here is that there are two kinds of human acts: acts which are instrumentally valuable (means), and acts which are intrinsically valuable (ends). So if someone tells me that there are no intrinsically valuable things, I must infer that there are also no instrumentally valuable things.

I think this is actually what is happening on a large scale: the culture tells us that there are no intrinsically valuable things, and the logical conclusion is that there are also no instrumentally valuable things (and this leads to a form of nihilism—more or less the form that I have been discussing with Tom Storm). — Leontiskos

I don't see it. I think people value things because the things them pleasure, inspire, them, uplift them or whatever. This could be art, music, literature, going to the gym, a spiritual discipline, watching sport, reading phislsophy etc,. etc.

How could intrinsic value be determined? Why would a lack of belief in intrinsic vale lead to nihilism, when people still value things? I'm not seeing any argument.

The statement quoted already was right out of the positivist playbook.

Positivism: a philosophical system recognizing only that which can be scientifically verified or which is capable of logical or mathematical proof, and therefore rejecting metaphysics and theism. — Wayfarer

You've reached a new low—this is not worth responding to.

Quite the question. I think the primary reasoning or justification available would be some kind of appeal to tradition - Platonism, the perennial philosophy and what not. — Tom Storm

Right, but appeal to authority is universally regarded as a philosophical fallacy. Even Gautama said so, reportedly.

Here is where I say that you echo positivism. — Wayfarer

Trying to dismiss what I say by associating it with a philosophical position I don't hold is both a red herring, and a strawman. If you want to take issue with what I said, then present a rational, logical or empirical argument that purports to show that there must be, or at least that we should believe there are, higher things, higher things which can be determined to be such and such, not merely an ineffable experience or feeling.

Your dislike of positivism (which I share, although probably not for the same reasons) and your preference for the idea that there must be higher things do not constitute such an argument.

I agree with this. Are you not also saying that the altered states are primary or prior, and the metaphysical beliefs are derivative or posterior? — Leontiskos

Yes, I would agree with tthat.

I gave the example of music, and the appreciation of music. Do you hold that this is not intrinsically valuable, and is instead only a means to an end? — Leontiskos

There are people, perhaps not many, who don't like music. If we accept that almost everyone likes some kind of music, althought their tastes may vary considerable, then I would say that for those people liistening to (their preferred) music certainly has value for them.

I tend to think there is a complex interrelation between ideation and experience. — Leontiskos

I don't doubt that.

Like ↪Wayfarer, I do not read Hadot this way. I think Hadot sees discourse and practice as two poles that mutually influence one another, and he critiques the undue emphasis on discourse in modern philosophy, but I don't see him claiming that practice subsumes or displaces discourse. Or in other words, forms of philosophical practice are in some ways as vulnerable to argumentation as philosophical discourse is. The renewed emphasis on practice creates a more holistic philosophical environment; but it doesn't make argument futile. — Leontiskos

I haven't said that discourse and practice don't influence one another, and I don't take Hadot to be saying that practice subsumes discourse, either. I see the relation between discourse and practice as being something like this: for each kind of spiritual practice there will be some discourse appropriate to, and supportive of, that practice.

I think this is unarguable when you look at the different discourses associated with, for example Stoicism, Neoplatonism, Epicureanism, Buddhism, Vedanta, various kinds of Yoga, Daoism, Zen and so on. Of course, there will also be commonalities, since the altered states of consciousness will, being human phenomena, necessarily share some commonalities.

It is the interpretations of the significance of those altered states vis a vis the different metaphyseal ideas like God, karma, rebirth, resurrection, Brahman, Boddhisatvas that show the various culturally mediated contexts that shape those metaphysical ideas that I find questionable.

My claim is that those altered states and their various cultural interpretations underdetermine the various metaphysical beliefs associated with them.

It seems crucial to assert that the intrinsically valuable (ends in themselves) are a proper subject of argument. I think that is where we disagree. I think we must argue about the highest things. — Leontiskos

This is where we disagree because I see no reason to believe that there are any intrinsically valuable things. I think there are certain values which reflect necessary pragmatic concerns for any community, the main moral principles which are to be found in almost any community, but that is about as far as I would go. I cannot see any demonstrable or decidable otherworldly criteria that could justify believing in intrinsic overarching metaphysical values.

So, I think it all comes down to faith, and I have no argument with that. Why must we argue about "higher things" when it is not rationally, logically or empirically demonstrable that there are in fact any higher things? This would seem to be just your and other believers' preference or intuitve feeling, which is fine, provided it is acknowledged that that is what it is.

If believers discuss such things with other believers of like mind, then there will be little argument, and the participants may benefit from discussion, but that is different than arguing with those, whether unbelievers or differently oriented believers, about whose metaphysical beliefs is right. That is what constitutes fundamentalism and would seem to me to be at best "pouring from the empty into the void" and at worst stoking the fires of divisiveness.

But can they be subject to philosophical discourse? The whole point of the remainder of your post is to uphold a taboo - these things ought not to be discussed, they're subjective, they're transient and basically inconsequential. Hadot himself doesn't say that. He says that philosophy as understood in the contemporary academy has lost sight of its original motivation, to its detriment. — Wayfarer

We can talk about the practices themselves, but ideas like Karma, God, the afterlife and so on are too nebulous and underdetermined to be able to form subjects for philosophical discourse, in the form of arguments at least, in my view. I'd say the same about aesthetics and metaphysics. I mean, there's nothing wrong with speculating; the problems come when people think the purported truths of such speculations are in any way rationally (not to mention empirically) demonstrable.

I see such speculations as good and potentially enriching exercises of the imagination; arguing about them; like arguing about poetry is a waste of time. For example, you might think T S Eliot is great, and I might think he is mediocre; or Osho was a sage and Sri Aurobindo was deluded or a charlatan, there is no point arguing about it; so, I don't think such things have a significant place in philosophy; philosophy considered as argumentation, at least.

Hadot's point, as I understand it, is that the older kind of philosophy, which was not about argumentation and asserting anything, has been lost. I don't know if that's true; there may be practicing Stoics, Neoplatonists and Epicureans for all I know. To repeat, the point of such philosophies is about practice and not about proving any metaphysical theory. I'm not saying they have no value; obviously they have value to those who want to practice them.

True, but I think there is also an inverse correlation between public demonstrability and intrinsic value. That which must be publicly demonstrable tends toward utility, as a means rather than an end. — Leontiskos

Yes, I agree with that. The important aspects of life are precisely those which cannot be publicly demonstrated. The aesthetic dimension in architecture music, literature and the arts is of more value, or at least consists in a different kind of value, even though aesthetic quality, like any form of "direct knowing" cannot be rationally demonstrated or couched in propositional terms.

So, I agree with Hadot's characterization of some of the ancient philosophies as being (like the Eastern religions and some later Western practices) about personal transformation and not about establishing definitive metaphysical truths. As Hadot says in Philosophy as a Way of Life, the ideas in those kinds of ancient philosophies were not to be critiqued or discussed, but to be used as aids and inspiration to practice "spiritual exercises". Altered states of consciousness are to be realized not by argument and critique but by praxis.

I think it also needs to be acknowledged that if such transformations are ever achieved it is exceedingly rare, and mostly (perhaps always) transient, and given that those most likely to achieve such altered states are renunciates, I think it has little practical significance for general human life apart from possibly being a relatively minor (compared to the arts and popular religion) enriching aspect of culture.

:up: Yes, as I said, changes, even absent anyone to observe them, are news "at least potentially".

Glib.

In Proverbs we are told that fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. It is both a starting point and a terminus. The Biblical God is a willful God.

There is another sense, which is what I think you have in mind. Perhaps you intentionally left open the question of whether one comes to know or only feels they know a higher truth. — Fooloso4

Yes, faith is very much emphasized in Christianity, but I think it is also important in other religions like Buddhism; one of the seminal texts is The Awakening of Faith in the Mahayana. Religious practice cannot but be sustained by faith, even in religions like Buddhism where it is the 'living' insights that come with practice that are considered to be the most important.

But as you seem to imply in your second sentence, even in relation to "spiritual experience" it is faith that grounds any interpretation or propositional exposition of that experience, despite the protestations of those who want to claim that direct knowing is possible. (If you ask them whether what is directly known is anything propositional, I've found that you will not get a straight answer).

That said, faith plays an important role in almost every aspect of human life, so it comes as no surprise that it should be pivotal in all religious and spiritual practices.

So, in answer to your last sentence I would say that one, even an enlightened one, could only be certain of their conviction that they know anything propositional (such as claims about previous lives. karma, God or the afterlife and so on, to be the case); even the enlightened, being mere humans, could not be infallible.

Agree it might be a generalisation, but it is an observable tendency. — Wayfarer

I'd say it is more of a tendentious observation.

I think this is a good point. I wonder where the line is. — Tom Storm

Competence in many areas is, at least in principle, publicly demonstrable. For example, technical proficiency, if not aesthetic command, is demonstrable in music, the arts and literature. Competence in science and mathematics is demonstrable to one's peers, if not the public. Competence in the trades, crafts and all kinds of practical pursuits is easy enough to demonstrate. Competence in religion or spirituality is not, and hence there is no way to determine whether a purported master or man of God is the real deal or a charlatan.

I agree with a distinction between experienced and consciously experienced, which is what you seem to be aiming at. I was certainly not wanting to diminish the status of animals or humans to that of machines.

If anything, I want to raise the status of cliffs and rivers, as well as animals and humans and even the lowly machine, but not claim they are all equal.

Cliffs don't have eyes or noses or nervous systems, so there is no 'news' generated by anything that happens to them, and thus no experience. — unenlightened

I would say that when the rain streams down the cliffs and the wind howls against them, there are changes and that changes are "news", at least potentially. I'm not claiming the cliffs, the rain and the wind are conscious.

We are completely unconscious of the processes by which our senses are affected, we are (possibly) conscious only of the end result; of those things we come to notice and care about.

Read a little beyond what I have quoted, and you will find a suggestion that we moderns have formed a distorted conception of ourselves as angel/devils or soulless machine masters of the universe. It is in how we understand the 'human condition' that I think a paradigm shift is being proposed. A psychological shift that reunites human with nature, and mind with body. Quick as you like please, because the soulless machine masters are killing us all. — unenlightened

This is an important point; we are bedeviled by polemics. the battle between the "too otherworldly" and the "too this-worldly". On account of this state of conflict and confusion we are killing ourselves or at least allowing ourselves to be killed.

Yes, that is my position. It is possible that I am wrong, that I do not recognize wisdom because I am not wise. By the same token, unless someone is wise they may be wrong when attributing wisdom to Aristotle or anyone else. Is there anyone here able to make that determination? — Fooloso4

I agree with this, and this is where faith comes in. For those who believe in higher truth it can only be a matter of faith, and even if there is a possible state of knowing higher truth, what that could mean is not clear, since it cannot be a truth in the discursive sense.

I think altered states of consciousness are certainly possible wherein one feels that one knows a higher truth, but that knowing cannot be expressed propositionally.

Suppose that your experience leads you to a fork in the road. On one fork is said to be a place of great natural beauty, on the other a person you have texted with and are interested in, but not met or made any commitment to. I am saying that your choice of which fork to take is based on how you choose to value these incommensurate goods. On your theory, how is this valuation made? — Dfpolis

I have to say I don't really know. I will choose that which motivates me more, and what motivates me more is a characteristic of my nature (my nature at the specified time, since it might change). So, for example, presuming that you were referring to someone of sexual interest, the choice I make might depend on the strength of my libido at the time.

Cheers 180 :cool:

What you say basically seems to come down to the idea that if the universe is one, and we are not in any way separate from that one, self-determining being, then the idea of radical freedom is inappropriate. I said "radical freedom" but I could have said 'pure freedom' or 'simple freedom'.

And while self-determination is not identical with the complex idea of "freedom," it is often what we are talking about when it comes to the metaphysical side of "freedom" as a concept. — Count Timothy von Icarus

I would say self-determination is not identical with the simple idea of freedom; the idea of pure or absolute freedom is not complex, whereas self-determination is, because it consists in the absence of external constraints on an entity's capacity to act according to its own nature, but its own nature is complex. We can act according to our natures (absent external constraint and within the bounds of nature itself) but we do create ourselves, our natures, so libertarian free will seems to be a non-starter.

That action modifies my brain state, causing a presence we can be aware of as an "image." That is Aristotle's phantasm. We can also imagine things not so caused. If an image is not caused by an object, it cannot be our means of knowing an object, because it is not the dynamic presence of an object. — Dfpolis

I agree with what you say, but I see imagiation as involved in both interpreting or undertsnding something as something and in imagining something that does not actually exist. Note that this latter function of imagination relies on the combining of preformed images of objects that do exist.

I agree with this statement. I don't think it is what Kant meant, but I am not a Kantian and so no expert. As I understand him, the mind adds forms of understanding, rather than basing concepts such as space, time and causality on reality. — Dfpolis

I do read Kant that way, but then even Kant scholars disagree about certain aspects of his philosophy. I agree with you that Kant seems to think, or is often interpreted as thinking, that concepts of space, time and number are not based on experience, but are given by the mind as a priori forms of intuition or categories of understanding. I don't agree with that take myself.

If you mean, as Spinoza did not, that thoughts and neural processes are two activities of a single person, I agree. — Dfpolis

Spinoza did not think in terms of neural processes (as far as I know) but I think he would agree.

Does our explicit awareness of our thoughts come as we think them or after the fact? My experience tells me that I do not decide what to think prior to thinking it, and that my explicit awareness or consciousness of what I have thought comes after having thought it, via the "echo" of memory, wherein I can "hear" my thought repeated as a "silent locution" in my "mind's ear".
— Janus

Clearly, this is not completely true. I wanted to know how physical processes engender knowledge, so I decided to study authors who had written on cognition, such as Plato, Aristotle, Aquinas, Bucke, James, Stace, Suzuki, the Churchlands and Dennett. Clearly, I decided what to think about before I analyzed their arguments. As I read, my neural net activated related contents, giving me the means of testing what I read. Yet, even there, I valued some contents more and other contents less, and that valuation determined the amount of time I spent thinking about various points in light of various facts. — Dfpolis

Right, what I said was based on my own reflection on my experiences. Of course, if I read other authors I will be moved to agree or disagree depending on how what they say accords with that experience or not. I don't see any of that as saying anything about libertarian free will, though. I don't experience myself as being able to freely decide what to value or agree with; I experience that as being determined by what I have, through my own experience, been led to think.

I see my neighbor take the trash out. I believe that my neighbor is not just flesh but the site of another streaming of the world. — plaque flag

Of course, everyone takes it for granted that others, including animals, have their own inner experiences that are hidden from others. I cannot know your experience, even in principle, except insofar as you describe it, (assuming that telepathy is not a possible thing). Such descriptions are inevitably poor compared to the experience itself, and being dualistic in nature cannot ever adequately express the non-dual nature of experience. The conclusion is that all our propositional talk is really inadequate, except for practical tasks, and only poetry serves to possibly be able to present a more vivid picture by allusion and metaphor. But you can't coherently argue about the truth of poetry, as it is not truth apt in any propositional sense.

So, all these kinds of arguments, for example, about whether being or consciousness or matter is fundamental or whether things can exist independently of the human are fatally flawed and potentially misleading.

Note: when I wrote this, I hadn't read your above post where you mention ESP.

Because I view Consciousness as Emergent, instead of Elemental, I don't agree with the "pan-experiential" form of Pan-Psychism (all mind). — Gnomon

Thinking of Whitehead, I understand him to view consciousness as emergent, it is experience he sees as elemental. His concept of experience is broad, so he would say that, for example, "the cliffs experience the erosive effects of the wind and rain", which is analogous to the way our sentient bodies are precognitively affected by photons, sound waves, scent molecules and so on. These affects result in us seeing, hearing, smelling etc., a world of things, but we cannot be conscious of that process of affection except perhaps after the fact and then it is a defeasible analysis that yields propositional belief, not unmediated knowledge.

Yes, this would be how I think of it. I don't speculate beyond a certain point since there would be little value in doing so, but for the sake of relating consciousness and mind this would be my interpretation of what is said.by those who know. Plotinus states that we should not think of 'The One' as God or mind, and so this seems to be the arrangement. Would you agree? Or is there another way of looking at it? . — FrancisRay

Speculation can be a fun exercise of the imagination, but I don't take any of these ideas very seriously because I think what-is in its non-dual nature cannot be captured in concepts. I'm not too sure about the idea of "those who know" if it is understood that they know something propositionally that is hidden from the "unenlightened". I think of it rather as an altered state of consciousness, wherein a whole different way of (wordless) seeing and understanding opens up. So, I would agree with Plotinus that we should not think of 'The One' as God or mind, in fact I would say that we should not think of the non-dual as "one" because it is both one and many, and neither one nor many. and even saying that could be misleading.

The Transcendental Ego (or its equivalent under various other formulations) refers to the self that must underlie all human thought and perception, even though nothing more can be said about it than the fact that it must be there. — plaque flag

So, what's the difference between saying that about the transcendental subject and saying that the transcendental object must also underlie all perception, even though nothing more can be said about it than the fact it must be there. It would help if you could explain your position clearly in plain words and leave the salad for dessert. So far, it's mud to me, and that is not on account of my laziness or stupidity.

To me this reads as a word salad comprised of assertions which don't actually assert anything coherent, or an attempt at prose poetry. I guess you must have some sense of what you mean—if only you could explain it clearly.

I realise I made a careless mistake earlier. It is not consciousness that begins with distinctions but mind. For the advaita view neither mind not distinctions would be fundamental. . — FrancisRay

Is this a response to my having said that distinctions begin with consciousness? You have expressed it here in reverse; that mind (not consciousness) begins with distinctions, and I think that works too since we can say they are co-arising. So, I take it that for you mind is intentional consciousness, and by 'consciousness" you mean satchitananda?