But we experience them, from or through our human perspective. — plaque flag

Yes, of course we experience everything through our human perspective. We are trying to work out what is best and most plausible to say about things from within that context. Regarding that I don't say that we know anything beyond what we can experience, but we can conjecture beyond that and argue for what seems most plausible to say.

I acknowledge that there will inevitably be disagreement and no way of definitively establishing the truth, since we all have our own groundless and perhaps affectively motivated starting presuppositions, so I don't expect us to all end up on the same page.

I would hope that this process might show all of us where our attachments to particular ideas (confirmation biases) lie, and that we are capable of letting go of what we might want to be the case, if we can come to see just what those biases are.

And I'd say that the sentience of those creatures 'is' also the being of the world. — plaque flag

This is an important point of disagreement, I think. I would agree that the sentience of creatures is the being of the world, but I don't count it as the whole being of the world.

It surprises me that you say you challenge scientific realism; that seems inconsistent with your own avowed direct realism. What do you understand scientific realism to consist in, and on what grounds do you challenge it.

I did that in the OP. I provide the passage about Schopenhauer's philosophy by way of showing points of agreement with at least one historic philosopher. — Wayfarer

What matters (to me at least) is open discussion and cogent arguments, though, and points of agreement with historic philosophers (authorities) are worthless without cogent arguments presented in our own words and accompanied by a willingness to hear them critiqued and being prepared to sustain engagement as long as is required to either arrive at agreement or agreement to disagree.

In my view, the point is to see that the object is not hidden behind or within itself. It's just we are temporal beings, grasping the objects over time, seeing this aspect and then perhaps that one. — plaque flag

To me you seem to be misunderstanding the idea that objects are not necessarily merely the sum of their attributes. We only know of objects, the attributes that are accessible to our human cognition. The same goes for other species. But there may be completely unknowable dimensions of objects.

Kant's final claim is recklessly wrong. If space and time are only on the side of appearance, we no longer have a reason trust the naive vision of a world mediated by sense organs in the first place. — plaque flag

I have always thought that Kant is wrong about space and time: if there can be things in themselves, then why not space and time in themselves? Kant has no warrant to claim that space and time exist only in perceptual appearances, any more than he would to claim (which I think he doesn't) that objects only exist in perceptual appearances.

For me the distinction between primary and secondary qualities still stands.

I wish people would carry on discussions in their own words instead of posting walls of text which are quotations from supposed authorities. The argument from authority is a weak form of doing philosophy in my view; we need to learn to think for ourselves. (That said, I'm obviously not condemning reading other philosophers, but surely if we have mastered their arguments, we can present them in our own words).

Not to be difficult, but claiming that all metaphysical questions are undecidable seems to decide an important metaphysical question. — plaque flag

I don't see it as a metaphysical question, but a phenomenological one. It is a phenomenological fact that metaphysical questions are undecidable. The alternative would be to collapse metaphysics into phenomenology; in some respects, both Kant and Heidegger do this, but then metaphysics is no longer metaphysics, as traditionally conceived, and we have lost a valid distinction between avenues of investigation.

I don't say the undecidability of metaphysics disqualifies it, just as I would not say the ambiguity of poetry renders it pointless. metaphysics as traditionally conceived is a poetic and logical exercise of the imagination; it shows us what we can coherently imagination, but it cannot tell us anything about the world or the ultimate nature of reality, as it once purported to be able to.

In being,
present in time at the given moment is only that narrow
ridge of the momentary fugitive "now," rising out of the
"not yet now'' and falling away into the "no longer now”

This is a result of thinking of the present moment as separate. Now is not fugitive, it is perennial. Future and past also are always now, else they have no existence at all.

So, according to these and many other mainstream accounts, realists hold that universals have some mind-independent existence, while nominalists hold that universals do not have such mind-independent existence. — Joshua Hochschild, What’s Wrong with Ockham?

It seems to me odd that @Wayfarer will say that universals have mind-independent existence, but he will not admit that ordinary objects do. As I see it universals, or generalities, are only possible on account of the observed differences between, and commonalties shared by, objects.

Of course, it is the observer that formulates these observed differences and commonalities as generalities and specificities, but it would seem implausible to think that these are created ex nihilo or arbitrarily by the observer; it seems more plausible, to me at least, to think that the observed differences and commonalities are real attributes of the objects and do not depend for their existence on being observed, even though they obviously do depend on the observer for being apprehended and distinguished.

Most contemporary philosophers of mind employ a Cartesian conceptual space in which reality is (at least potentially) divided into res extensa and res cogitans. Then, they ask: how res cogitans could possibly interact with res extensa? — Dfpolis

Spinoza already solved this Cartesian puzzle. There are not two substances, extensa and cogitans, but one substance seen under two attributes. This renders the interaction problem moot.

"Fact" is an ambiguous word in that it can be taken to signify a statement of an actuality or simply an actuality;
— Janus

Disagree. A fact, as the argument states, is specific. — Wayfarer

Your response does not contradict what I said. States of affairs or actualities are specific, and so are statements about them. If the actualities were not specific, then no specific statements about them could be made.

You speak about the word "fact" as though only one true definition pertains to it (the one that serves your argument, of course). I think it is a matter of usages, and the usages are patently equivocal. To put it another way 'fact' is an ambiguous term.

Finally, after 20 odd pages of discussion, you still seem to think idealism is saying that 'without an observer reality does not exist'. I do not say that. — Wayfarer

I know this wasn't addressed to me, but I think it raises a pertinent issue. If the in-itself nature of things cannot be known, we cannot with certainty say whether they exist in themselves or do not. From the fact that we cannot be sure whether they exist or not, it does not logically follow that they neither exist nor do not exist.

As I understand it Kant posits things in themselves because of the absurdity that would be involved in saying that something appears, but that there is nothing that appears. If there is something that appears, then it follows logically that the something that appears exists. So, I say that what we can say about the in-itself is governed only by logic, since we cannot know the in-itself nature of things, and it seems absurd to say that there could be something non-existent whose in-itself nature cannot be known.

But 'exists' means 'to have an identity' - to be this, as distinct from that. And I can't see how you can have that, without an observer. — Wayfarer

I think this is a matter of logic; to be this or that no observer would seem to be required. To be distinguished as this or that an observer is required. Something has first to be this or that in order to be able to be distinguished as being this or that.

A fact does not hold in the universe if it has not been explicitly formulated. That should be obvious, because a fact is specific. In other words, statements-of-fact are produced by living observers, and thereby come into existence as a result of being constructed. It is only after they have been constructed (in words or symbols) that facts come to exist. Commonsense wisdom holds the opposite view: It holds that facts exist in the universe regardless of whether anyone notices them, and irrespective of whether they have been articulated in words.

I don't see it that way at all. Again, it is a matter of logic. "Fact" is an ambiguous word in that it can be taken to signify a statement of an actuality or simply an actuality; so the encyclopedia is a compendium of facts in the first sense, but not in the second.

If 'fact' can signify either 'actuality' or 'statement of actuality' then it follows that on the first definition facts can exist without being observed, but on the second definition they obviously need to an observer who can, at least in principle, state them.

I don't think citing QM helps your case, because it trades on one interpretation of the so-called "observer problem", by interpreting "observer" to mean "conscious observer". In any case QM seems to show that all things consist in different and unique configurations of energy, and there seems to be no reason that configurations of energy should not exist absent observers, or that what pertains to the microphysical world regarding its counter-intuitive behavior should be translatable to the macrophysical world.

I claim that we can only talk sensibly about something at least possibly experienceable by us. I'm saying connected to our experience, not fully and finally or even mostly given, for even everyday objects are 'transcendent' in the Husserlian sense: they suggest an infinity of possible adumbrations. Note that I think a person can be alone with an experience --- be the only person who sees or knows an entity. — plaque flag

Of course, I agree that we can talk sensibly only about what we are familiar with. And I agree that everyday objects are transcendental, where that term is taken to signify that our experience of them cannot, even in principle, exhaust their natures or apprehend them in their wholeness.

As you say there are perhaps an infinite number of possible "adumbrations" of any object. But it does not follow that these transcendental objects which appear to us do not exist, or that they are not more than the totality of their possible adumbrations.

I meant you are stipulating that the sense of the term "existence" should be restricted to "exists for us".

As we look down on that city in the valley, it exists only as the-valley-for, never from no perspective at all. — plaque flag

You are appealing to a narrow concept of existence here.

Metaphysics has to reduce the many to the one, and if we assume the many is truly real this cannot be done. I think you'd have to admit that the incomprehension of philosophers suggests that they're missing a trick. . — FrancisRay

I see it more as reducing duality to non-duality; non-duality being neither one nor many. Duality is simply based on the notion of separation, a conception which is essential to thought and perception, but has no being or provenance beyond that.

Clearly the need being fulfilled is not salvation so religion must be fulfilling other needs.. — praxis

I don't think it is quite as clear as you seem to think it is. but I do agree that religion also fulfills other needs; it can provide a sense of community and caring for example. It can also satisfy tribal impulses; or the desire to belong to a group that stands for some ideal. It may even satisfy pride in some cases or the need to be told what to do.

There is a fourth possibility, and that is that there are many people who have psychological needs for salvation, but that there is no real possibility of the kind of salvation people are after, no rea salvation.

In that case salvation is an illusion and those who think they are saved are deluded. That delusion may be a happier state than desperately feeling a need for salvation, though. I don't think anything can be imposed on people en masse for long that does not satisfy, or appear to satisfy, some need they feel.

But saying, for example, that someone "inoculated people against reality" is already an interpretation of his act, not the act itself. Of course, then there are those who will say it's not so, that it's not merely an interpretation. — baker

If Trump lies, some may interpret it as him speaking truth. Nonetheless it seems plausible to think there is a fact of the matter as to whether he lied. When it comes to whether Trump's vision for the US and the world is a good one or not, then we might be harder pressed to justify claiming there is a fact of the matter about that, even though it might seem obvious that his vision is bogus.

Free will in a deterministic world would not be free will as it is conceived in the libertarian sense. It would simply consist in a lack of constraints preventing you from acting according to your antecedently determined nature.

If we want to discuss Trump, then we must all see him as Trump, not as Hillary Clinton or Shirley Temple, no? We must all first agree about what he has been recorded as saying and doing, before we can disagree about our interpretations of his acts, no?

Sure, there are some obvious instances of people "seeing the same things".

Is Pluto a planet or not? When you look at Pluto, you might see a planet, but someone else doesn't. How so? — baker

When you and I see Pluto, whether through a telescope (that we also both see) or on a TV ( a TV that we both see) or a photo in a magazine (a magazine that we both see) we presumably see the same image or object, but we might disagree about what category to assign it to.

How do you know we in fact see the same things? — baker

It seems obvious. When I'm working with another carpenter and I ask her to pass me the saw, she does not pass me the router. When I throw the ball for my dog he sees it as a ball to be chased, not a food bowl to be eaten from. No social coordination at all would be possible if humans and animals did not see the same things in their environments.

It's not clear to me what you are trying to get at, Baker.

If we all saw different things; if I saw a bus where you saw a tree, then no normativity would be possible. The fact that at the basic level of bare perception we see the same things is not a fact engineered by us. My dog sees the same things I do, judging from his behavior.

What kind of question is that?

So let's apply this to a practical example:

When the critics of Trump and his followers make claims about them, they (ie. the critics) believe that they are making claims about how things really are.


How do you comment? — baker

I've been talking about perception not politics.

I don't see it that way. Why do we, as societies, desire normativity? I'd say it is because we care about social harmony. We don't need to establish normativity when it comes to bare perception; the commonality is there for us, it is not something engineered by us. Psychological normativity and moral normativity are pragmatic concerns; a society functions better and people are happier if there is harmony.

There you fixated on contamination and distortion, ignoring conditioning. Anti-Realists certainly hold that reality is conditioned by the human subject. Imputation of or fixation on distortion tends to beg the question, but it is ultimately pertinent given that we are considering the possibility of knowing reality as it is in itself. Thus it is a distortion in relation to that counterfactual possibility. — Leontiskos

I would have thought that reality as it is in itself cannot be known in principle, because reality as it is in itself is defined by its not being reality as it appears to us. It's an imaginable conceptual distinction. On this definition it follows that anything we know is not reality as it is in itself.

But I don't consider reality as it appears to us to be any less real than reality as it is in itself. Reality as it appears to us is a function of reality as it is in itself, because reality as it appears to us is on account of the effect the environment has on us precognitively.

In the lived moment we are blind to that process; the best we can do is observe and analyze the environment and our physiologies as they appear to be. So, I'm saying that appearances are real, as real as what gives rise to them, and more real for us, given that we can only think of the in itself, we cannot know how it is.

The "glassy aspect" is merely representative of that which conveys reality in a way other than it is in itself; a "distortion," so to speak. — Leontiskos

I would not agree that Kant thinks our cognitions distort reality. I think he would agree that what we perceive is real; the way I see the tree, for example, is just the real way the tree appears to a human percipient. So, our perceived appearances of the tree are real, not illusory or distorted in any way, but they are not the whole story of the tree. It can appear differently to different kinds of percipients, different animals.

The way the tree appears to us is a function of what it is in itself, in conjunction with what we are in ourselves, but being an appearance, it is perspectival, whereas what it is as unperceived cannot be perspectival. The tree can only appear from some perspective or other, but it does not follow that it can only exist from some perspective or other. It also does not follow that we can only exist from some perspective or other, even though it is true that we can only understand our existence from some perspective or other..

:up: All you say there makes good sense to me.

:up:

a lack of transparency in argument leads to a weakening and breakdown of philosophical communities. — Leontiskos

I agree with that, assuming that you mean everything should be out in the open and that there should be no hidden or unacknowledged premises at work in philosophical discussions.

But I am probably not honing in on the exact difference that Banno and creativesoul are meting out. — Leontiskos

I think @creativesoul is either trading on, or confusing himself with, an ambiguity of expression: "S believes a broken clock is not broken". The belief S holds is not that a clock is both broken and not broken, so while it is correct in one sense (from our POV) that S's belief is about a broken clock, from S's POV the belief is not about a broken clock. It's all about context.

I’ll ask you the same question that I asked the thread starter (and they ignored). Do you know of anyone who religion has provided deliverance from sin and its consequences? — praxis

I don't think so. I guess the question is who is to be the judge when it comes to personal salvation...or enlightenment?

:up:

It pertains to empirical arguments and metaphysical arguments and arguments about astrology and homeopathy and alien abductions. The advice given in the OP is meant to aid arguments of all kinds. — Leontiskos

OK, fair enough...I guess I misunderstood where you were going with it.

If you don't believe metaphysics is truth-apt then presumably you don't get into a lot of arguments about metaphysics. Similarly, because we don't believe taste is truth-apt, we don't argue about taste ("de gustibus non disputandum est"). My advice in the OP applies to arguments, and people argue about theses that they believe are susceptible of truth and falsity. — Leontiskos

Well, I do get into arguments about whether metaphysical arguments are truth-apt, and I think it is true that they are not, for the simple reason that their premises cannot be determined to be true or false. I think acceptance or rejection of metaphysical premises cannot but be a matter of taste, and as you say we don't argue about taste. People believing metaphysical premises are susceptible of truth and falsity and their actually being so are two different things, at least if you mean by "susceptible of truth and falsity" that their truth or falsity is determinable.

Classically, a sound argument is an argument that possess both validity and true premises. An unsound argument lacks one or both. — Leontiskos

Fair enough, I am stretching the conventional meaning of "sound" somewhat to apply to premises as well as arguments. I think it is fair to say that when an argument is claimed to be sound, we mean it is taken to be true, because every part of a sound argument, if it is valid, must be true, that is true premises and true conclusions consistent with those premises. But idiosyncratic terminology aside, I think my point stands; metaphysical arguments cannot be determined to be true or false (or if you prefer, sound or unsound), whereas empirical arguments can be.

You may not want to engage this take, but I think it is apposite in that you speak of people coming to understand that philosophical arguments are true or false.

There are two basic ways that an argument can get at truth✝: by being right and by being wrong. Yet in order for this to work the argument must be seen to be right or wrong. If it is seen to be right then it will lead the one who sees it into the truth of its conclusion. If it is seen to be wrong then it will lead the one who sees it away from specious reasoning and away from an unsound conclusion. In each case the crucial factor is that it be seen that it be transparent. — Leontiskos

Now, if all you meant was that people can come to believe that philosophical arguments are true or false, then there would be no problem, but you seemed to be claiming that the truth of philosophical arguments is determinable and that is what I have been taking issue with.

That is why I acknowledged that in the case of phenomenological arguments, which are quasi-empirical, it might be more appropriate to speak of arguments (well, descriptions really) being true or false.

Can they be sound or unsound? I hold to the common view that they can. — Leontiskos

I understand "sound or unsound" to be equivalent to "true or untrue". Premises can be sound or unsound, true or untrue, but when it comes to metaphysical arguments the truth is not determinable. For example, two metaphysical postulates are "being is fundamentally physical" and "being is fundamentally mental"; these two polemical posits are the basic presuppositions of materialism and idealism respectively. Can we determine which is true? No.

Empirical propositions, and arguments based on them, can be sound or unsound, when their truth is determinable by observation. That's my take, anyway.

As I undertsnd it a propositional attitude can be a belief even if not all propositional attitudes are beliefs. So, I searched and found this:

Propositional attitude, psychological state usually expressed by a verb that may take a subordinate clause beginning with “that” as its complement. Verbs such as “believe,” “hope,” “fear,” “desire,” “intend,” and “know” all express propositional attitudes.

So, according to that article saying that S had a belief about the clock and saying that S had a propositional attitude towards the clock could indeed be two ways of saying the same thing and would be in the case that the propositional attitude in question was a belief, rather than a hope, desire etc..

Hence belief presupposes truth. — Banno

Belief presupposes a belief in truth, not the possession of it. If the truth cannot be determined, it is a mere human presumption that says there must nonetheless be a truth.

There are two basic ways that an argument can get at truth✝: by being right and by being wrong. Yet in order for this to work the argument must be seen to be right or wrong. If it is seen to be right then it will lead the one who sees it into the truth of its conclusion. If it is seen to be wrong then it will lead the one who sees it away from specious reasoning and away from an unsound conclusion. In each case the crucial factor is that it be seen, that it be transparent. — Leontiskos

I just came across this thread, so apologies if I repeat what has already been said. I don't see philosophical arguments as being true or false, but rather valid or invalid; that is consistent with their premises or inconsistent with their premises.

I think only in phenomenology, which is descriptive rather than argumentative, can truth be somewhat more determinable, and then only by common assent.

You might object that people can come to see the conclusion of an argument as true, but that would entail their assenting to the premises, and the conclusion being true to, that is consistent with, those. And the problem is that when it comes to metaphysics there is much more scope for polemical understandings than there is with phenomenological reflections on what seems to be the case with human experience.

So, either S's attitude towards the broken clock - at time t`- was not a belief about the broken clock or not all belief is equivalent to a propositional attitude, because broken clocks are neither propositions nor attitudes. — creativesoul

Why can't it be said that S had a propositional attitude towards the clock; namely the belief that it was functioning. I must admit I'm struggling to see what issue you are trying to highlight here.

It is tangential, and I'm being pedantic in saying that it is not that they couldn't have imagined it, but that they didn't. Although, that said, if determinism is true, then perhaps they couldn't have imagined it, but that would not be because it was unimaginable, per se, but because they were constitutionally incapable of imagining it. I hope you'll excuse me for being off-topic—I'm just having a bit of fun playing with ideas. :halo: