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I can't imagine what the weak sense of the word would be in this connection...'seems most plausible given the evidence we do have perhaps'...?

I was taken it to mean "evidenced". An unsubstantiated claim is a claim without any evidence. — flannel jesus

Two things which "seem" to be different must be proven to be the same before they can be accepted as being the same. — Metaphysician Undercover

What do you mean by "substantiated" if not proven? Scientific theories, much less philosophical claims, cannot be proven. Your apparent demand for absolute certainty (proof) leads if the logic is followed consistently to absolute skepticism. In that case just forget about claiming anything at all that is not analytically true or tautologous.

Nothing can ever be proved either way. proofs are obtainable only in the domain of math and logic. The best we can do is investigate empirically as much as possible and then provisionally accept what seems most plausible. What seems most plausible to one will not necessarily seem most plausible to another.

I think I know what you're getting at, but . . . if you use a word like "seeming," you're inevitably faced with the question, "Then what is it really?" Do you want to reply, "Neural processes"? Why is the "seeming" of a mental process less actual than the "reality" of a neural process? This sounds like another version of physical reductionism. — J

I'm not denying that what things seem are part of it. As I said earlier in this thread (I think) I count experiences of things as being as real or objective as the things are absent their being experienced. Remember Spinoza's idea that extensa and cogitans are two modes of the one substance or in our modern parlance, two descriptions of or perpsectives on the one thing. So what I'm saying doesn't amount to reductionism.

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But that doesn't mean that an individual thought (or "reasoning") is caused by the brain's wetware. Likewise, we don't have to postulate mental causation as somehow closing the loop and making changes in the neurons. — J

If by "wetware" you mean neural activity, I'd say individual thoughts just are neural processes, and that the brain provides the conditions under which both neural activity and individual thoughts are possible. So I wouldn't say that mental states cause changes in the neurons. I would say that mental states just are neural processes (taking 'states' here not in a 'static' sense but as signifying process).

We are 'blind' to neural processes in vivo, so of course mental processes don't seem to us to be neural processes. I think this "seeming" is what causes all the difficulties.

" You've written a lot there Timothy and I'll have to some back to try to address it when I have more time.

Yes, all this is plausible, because we've allowed ourselves the placeholder term "correlated". But what else can we do? We don't know the right word yet. — J

There is a distinction, as is well known, between causation and correlation. If two things are necessarily correlated I don't think it necessarily follows that one is the efficient cause of the other. There are also distinctions between difference kinds of causes. For me the basic distinction is between efficient (local) causation and (environmental or global) conditions.

I think it is implausible that any thought occurs without accompanying physical (neural) process. Spinoza's solution allows the unproblematic idea that the mental does not cause physical processes, and vice versa. The two run in parallel, so to speak. No epiphenomenalism is then required

But this conceives of a "reason" as a particular event that occurs in my mind at time T1. If the "same reason" occurs to you as well, it isn't actually the same reason, on this understanding, because it's in a different mind at a different time. But the more usual way to think about reasons puts them in a rational world of meanings or propositions, so that you and I do indeed share the "same reason" for X. Taken in that sense, it seems more plausible to me that reasons are not necessarily correlated with neural processes. — J

I'd say that 'reason' is a generalization like any other. A particular act of reasoning is an event that occurs in your mind at a particular time. So even if i have the same reason for doing or thinking something that you do, my attendant acts of reasoning will never be exactly the same as yours.

So I agree with you that reasons (as distinct from reasonings) are not necessarily correlated with neural processes.

There's plenty of room for reasons. — J

Do you think it is plausible that we could entertain reasons without that being correlated with neural processes? Say on reason or reasoning leads to the next and say the first reasoning is correlated with some neural processes and the reasoning that follows is correlated with further neural processes. Do you think it is plausible that there are causal connections between the neural processes, just as there are logical connections between the reasonings?

Perhaps the understandings or lack of understandings of logical entailments are themselves correlated with neural networks. The idea doesn't seem implausible or problematic to me. Like Spinoza's idea that cogitans does not cause extensa and vice versa, it gets around the supposed conundrum that thoughts processes being causally connected neural processes rules out the rational /logical connections between ideas. They are just two different descriptions of the one set of phenomena..

Its singularity is a universal, like seeing a tree and knowing its a tree is an instantiation of the general idea. No general idea, no singularity. — Astrophel

I disagree. One can see a tree without thinking of it as a tree. Animals obviously do this.

It's a good question. I'd start conservatively and argue, what do we know about substance? Well, for one thing it is a concept, and in this regard is mental. — Manuel

Yes, 'substance' is an idea—the question is whether the idea refers to something real or is merely an idea. How could we find out?

Beyond that? Well, traditionally, it was argued that it that which binds things (properties) together, so that we don't have a kind of Humean world: just properties all over the place. — Manuel

Yes properties were traditionally thought to inhere in something and that something would be substance. So, Aristotle thought individual entities as the bearers of properties are substances—I'm a substance, you're a substance and your cat is a substance and so on.

If we go down to the microscopic level, I think it's not coherent to say that say, atoms or fields are substances. — Manuel

We have the idea of chemical substances, which have different properties. But then microscopic and subatomic particles are thought to have properties too.

The other idea of substance, as I said earlier, is 'the ultimate constituent of things'. That could be energy, for example, or mind if you're an idealist.

I suppose we should refine it a bit more. But there's a possibility it's just our commonsense way of viewing the world, and thus not literally true, that not something in the extra-mental world. — Manuel

Right, it might just be our way of making sense of things, although it is hard not to think of the extramental world as consisting in something. The problem is how could we ever know we had found the most fundamental constituent of things when it is always possible that there could be something more fundamental that eludes our grasp.

And it raises an interesting question—can we ever come to know what substance is, and if so, how? Via science? Philosophy? Some other way?

One last thing: The phenomenology of consciousness -- how we do experience subjectivity -- is an entirely different matter, one that science is powerless to speak about. For that we need philosophy. — J

I was going to object to your first two paragraphs, but when I read this final one, I realized we are largely in agreement.

Although I will point to a couple of things which presents some difficulties for scientific investigation and understanding of consciousness—that is that with all the fMRI advances in understanding which parts of the brain do what, the investigators still rely on personal reports from the subjects as to what they are experiencing or thinking about and so on—which means we haven't really gotten away from phenomenology in this investigation.

Also, the so-called hard problem of consciousness seems much more intractable, because it attempts to deal with the question of how processes in the brain, which can be understood in causal terms, can give rise to subjective experience, which, if we are to accept that subjective experience is just as it seems to us, and to phenomenological analysis, cannot be strictly understood in causal terms, but is better understood in terms of reasons.

I have subjective empathy and that causes me to give a person 5$ who needs it. I don't have subjective empathy but I have objective knowledge that a person needs 5$ so I give it to them. The action of giving 5$ is correct because it actively helps them. — Philosophim

Right, the act of helping them is correct, the act of harming them not correct. There you have objective morality in a nutshell.

Morality is not a feeling. That's just someone being directed by their own emotions. — Philosophim

When I spoke of a "moral sense" I did not have in mind any mere feeling. Sure, you could do what you think is the right thing, helping someone, without actually feeling any empathy. In that case what would you be motivated by? Is that motivation to do help, even absent any empathy, not a moral sense, a sense of what is right and wrong?

Also, I spoke of not causing others to suffer, actively helping others is a more complex issue.

A huge question, but it boils down to whether there's anything at all that can properly be called "objective." In the conversation about mental/physical, supervenience, the nature of consciousness, etc., I think it's generally assumed that an objective account of all this is possible. If it isn't, then a great deal else that we consider objective knowledge would also have to be given up. This might be the case, to be sure, but to consider it would immediately open a different conversation. For myself, I do think we can talk about subjectivity from a subjective point of view, and still discover truths about it that are general and open to reasonable investigation -- which is all the objectivity we're likely to get. — J

I count as objective that which is actually encountered or experienced. Say I feel sadness, then I would count the sadness as an objective fact or an objective feeling. You say it is generally assumed that an objective account of say the nature of consciousness is possible. I'd say that all accounts are objective in the sense that they are actual accounts, but it would seem that in the sense you probably mean an objective account of consciousness would be possible only insofar as it is encounterable as an object. Are so-called "quales" able to be encountered, experienced, or are they after the fact ideas of the subjective qualities of what we experience?

Some people say things like 'consciousness cannot be an object, it is like the eye that sees, nut cannot in the act of seeing see itself'. Of course, the cheeky response to that is 'go look in a mirror'. What parts of objective knowledge do you think would have to be given up if it were decided that an objective account of consciousness is impossible?

One finds what is there that is not among the many, not "a" being. — Astrophel

Seems to me that is just a general idea of existence. When it comes to what we encounter that we are able to talk about, it is only particulars.

There is a sense in which, as Markus Gabriel says the world does not exist. This is because 'world' signifies the totality, and this totality is never encountered—it is just an idea.

I'm not sure Spinoza had the last word on this, but yes, supervenience involves different levels of description. Where it gets tricky is to give an account of why a subjective description has the characteristics it does. — J

Would an account of why a subjective description has the characteristics it does not simply be another subjective description?

The difficulty is that the physical is contained within the mental, and only known or even conceivable within the mental. For "being" to mean anything at all (to have any content) if must be that which is given to thought. Hence, the Parmenidean adage "the same is for thinking as for being." — Count Timothy von Icarus

The idea of the physical is contained within the mental, but it seems obvious that what the idea of the physical is the idea of is not contained within the mental.

Mental" can be understood to be just a word (and a misleading one at that) for a concept that signals that we cannot understand how experience, judgement abstraction and conceptualization, although always of physical things, are themselves physical processes. The only alternative is dualism, or the idea of a mental realm or substance which does not depend on the physical or idealism, which renders the physical as a mere idea.

What like atoms? Or something along those lines? If so, that's a bit different from substance as Locke (and others) talks about it. — Manuel

It might be atoms, or quantum fields, or something more fundamental. I was not suggesting we know what substance is, but that the idea of substance is not hard to understand.

What do we need to measure? If we are empathetic, we know when someone is suffering. The idea of an objective morality is, as much as possible, to avoid causing others to suffer. It is not so much a matter of a moral system; it is more a matter of having a moral sense.

I don't think the idea of substance is that difficult—it is simply what is fundamental, what everything is composed of-—the basic nature of things.

What you're describing is human empathy which is a subjective experience. — Philosophim

Whether someone fells empathy for others or not is an objective fact, just as whether or not someone suffers is an objective fact.

Because it doesn't hold up if we treat it as an objective principal. Suffering is a subjective principal in many cases. Take two people who are working at a job and look at them from the outside. How do we know how much suffering each has? — Philosophim

Empathetic people know when others are suffering. Suffering is an objective fact; if someone suffers they suffer regardless of whether anyone knows about it.

Some would argue that's just storytelling, making things out to be more than what they really are. — Darkneos

"What they really are" is just another story. Discursively rendered, what anything really is depends on how you are looking at it.

For Aristotle, this meant affirming the reality of the vast multiplicity experienced by the senses, while also affirming principles of unity that exist within this multiplicity. It is these principles which produce a “One” from the “Many.”iv

This is, though, a bare description not an explanation. We are left with no idea how the "one becomes the many".

I don't think it's obvious to many, most, people that this is true. As I understand it, the implication would be there is no objective reality, only a mixture of our internal and external worlds. I endorse this view as a metaphysical position, a perspective. — T Clark

What I meant is that the world, as experienced, is a cooperative reality involving the organism and the environment. I understand this world as experienced to be as objective as the world considered as it is absent any experience of it.

But this is all terminological -- I definitely concur with the need to stop trying to get mental and physical items to cause each other, under any description. — J

Spinoza already sorted this out—by understanding the physical and the mental as the same thing under different descriptions.

The world as experienced by humans is obviously "half human". Likewise, the world as experienced by animals is "half animal". This is in line with Spinoza's idea that matter or substance can be both extended and cogitative, both perceived and perceiving.

It's less inconsistent and more parsimonious, it seems to me, to conceive of "physical" and "mental" as two properties – ways of describing / modeling – substance than positing them as "two substances" (which do not share a medium by which to interact with one another). Property dualism, for example, does not have "substance dualism's" interaction problem. — 180 Proof

:up: Spinoza's model also resonates with me. It allows us to think of substance as "fundamental stuff" which can be both extended stuff and thinking stuff. The idea that thinking stuff is a contradiction only stands on the basis of thinking of matter as incompatible with thought because the latter is understood as an "immaterial" activity. This thinking reflects an entrenched Cartesian/ Newtonian prejudice.

:up: Yes contrary to the popular picture.

Judging from modern anthropological studies of existing forager societies it would seem likely that much of the violence towards both women and men would have involved members of other tribes and clans.

It seems that most social animals treat members of their own group well enough but can be savage towards rival groups.

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Every morning, the sun rises, so one assumes it will rise tomorrow as well. However, despite consistent past experiences, there is no absolute guarantee this prediction will always hold true. — DasGegenmittel

Yes there is no absolute knowledge. But we do know many things beyond reasonable doubt. That the Sun will rise tomorrow is one of them because for it to fail to rise would, according to all our experience and scientific understanding, require conditions which we understand to verge on the impossible. So, this I agree mostly with

Even the rain could be an illusion, but we can still reasonably claim that it is not: — DasGegenmittel

...but...I would state it more forcefully; when I look out the window and see it raining (it is still raining here, and the creek is still in flood) I have absolutely no reason to think it is an illusion. Many, if not most things in our lives are like this. The mere logical possibility of error does not justify doubt in these kinds of cases. And even in cases where we do not, or even cannot, know the truth we have no reason to doubt there is a truth and that it is worth seeking.

Nice work! I basically agree with you. I think the two issues are, as you say, timestamping and justification. I would not want to discard truth—we know many truths. I know it is raining as a I sit at my desk writing this. I can see the creek from my window—I know it is flooded and up about two metres from its average level.

Of course, this knowledge and the truth of it applies to what for me is the present moment—the truth of the situation and the knowledge of it may be quite different in a couple days. But I can say that it is and will remain true that on 28/03/2025 at 12.42 EST at my then location it was raining.

The problem I have always seen with the Gettier examples is that there is no objective measure of just what counts as justification. Taking the fake barn example, I might have no reason to doubt when looking at the facade that I am looking at a real barn, so in the context of the everyday I might say that belief was justified. But if I didn't walk around the back then it might be said that I didn't investigate the situation adequately. Same with the cut-out sheep example.

Perhaps so. Yet rigorously identifying an out-of-tune note still depends on someone knowing how to do it. And identifying the aesthetic quality of music is learnt and requires practice. — Ludwig V

Out of tune notes can be detected by electronic devices. We all think some music is better (aesthetically) than other music, but it remains that there is no objective measure.

That's my impression as well. So I would have thought that identifying Enlightened people was a special case of identifying someone state of mind (mood) - anxiety, joy, etc. That's not like identifying the Word of God. And you need to learn how to do that from someone else who knows. It's a social/cultural tradition. — Ludwig V

So, again there is no absolute measure. We can identify someone's state off mind, but there is always the possibility of convincing fakery. Same for identifying enlightenment. Also, it's not clear exactly what the purported enlightened state consists in. Is it a permanent state of ecstasy? Or is it simply an invincible state of equanimity? Considering neuroscience and the discovered role of neurotransmitters on mood and disposition, and the reality of dopamine and serotonin depletion, are permanent states of mind even possible?

So, I would say there is no way of definitively identifying whether someone is enlightened or even what enlightenment is. That's not so different from identifying whether something really is the word of god as far as I can tell. I agree that these matters are "social/cultural traditions", but it follows that they cannot be absolute, as is usually claimed by adherents, but are culturally relative.

They cannot be taught like a mathematical calculation, which is a matter of drills and habits. But they are certainly learned and the reports of practitioners is that some people can help that process. It's a different kind of teaching for a different kind of skill. Perhaps we should not say that they are taught, but acquired through practice and that more experienced or expert practitioners can foster that process. — Ludwig V

It is true that aesthetic appreciation and creativity can be cultivated, but since there is no objective way of identifying when they are present or of knowing just what they are, their presence or absence or degree remains a matter of personal taste, so I agree with you that the claim that they can reliably be taught is implausible. If an aspirant believes that a teacher is an "expert practitioner" then that may indeed foster their process of development, but so might other means of inspiration.

I remember reading a quote from a famous poet. I can't remember who it was, but he was addressing a question from one of his students: 'How can I tell whether my poetry is any good?". The answer was, "If you need to know that then being a poet is not for you".

That's correct. Though I don't know enough to pronounce on Eastern ideas, interesting though they are. I got the impression that the idea was that a guru (who is himselt Enlightened) is able to discern whether someone else is Enlightened. I think of it as something like the idea that a trained musician is better able to detect when a note is out of tune than a member of the public. — Ludwig V

The point remains that the enlightenment of the guru must be taken on faith, whereas a note's being out of tune can be rigorously determined. Perhaps the aesthetic quality of a piece of music or performance would be a better analogy.

As I see it to be enlightened is not to know any extraordinary propositional thing about anything but rather to be in an altered state...of equanimity for example.

But then it remains questionable that those in such states know how to guide others to personal transformation. As an analogy, aesthetic judgement and creative vision cannot be taught.

What about "genocide is wrong"? Is that a hinge belief? — Hanover

Not according to the God of the Old Testament.

Regardless, change from what I said to "thou shall not stomp babies for fun." Is this just our rule, like a ball in the net counts as a goal, or is it immutable? — Hanover

That moral injunction is just an expression of a healthy human disposition. There's something wrong with you if you don't think stomping babies is wrong, and arguably almost every person recognizes this fact.

The answer is, of course, that such an authority is not much use. Do you think that applies to God? I fear it does. — Ludwig V

I do think it applies to God. According to general Abrahamic religious doctrine God can only be known via revelation, and the works of revelation are human works and thus cannot be considered infallible. Even if it is accepted that the voice of Gi9d was directly heard by the prophets, they are still just fallible humans, and their writings must be acknowledged to be infected by their own interpretations.

Ultimately the idea of God as authority must come down to considering some humans to be authorities, if not infallible, in their interpretations. We see the Catholic notion of the infallibility of the pope for example. I can't see how the same would not apply to the Eastern idea of spiritual enlightenment.

I have never found myself wishing I had never been born. For myself the interesting in life outweighs the boring, the enjoyable outweighs the distasteful and the pleasure outweighs the suffering. Of course, I've suffered through dark periods, and I have a dark side that is always there, but I find those prices acceptable.

Yes. I had in mind the possibility, for example, of someone believing that God is the final authority, but suitably cautious about thinking that they know the mind of God when it comes to what to do. — Ludwig V

That makes sense. It is not fundamentalism, The question it seems to leave me with though is: 'What use is an authority if you don't know what they want you to do?".

Morality is about what we think and feel about what we do. — frank

Intention? Sometimes we might seek to do good and unwittingly cause bad outcomes, is that what you have in mind?

There's a significant difference between faith in authority and forced obedience (imposition). — praxis

Apart from forced obedience imposition may also include brainwashing, resulting in faith in authority.

So how could Stalin effectively use enlightenment rhetoric to support totalitarian control? — praxis

It is well known that Stalin's most effective strategy was the cultivation of fear in the populace, and the imposition of punishment on transgressors.

Yes. Perhaps more cautiously, it is the confidence that one knows what the absolute authority is telling us that is the danger. — Ludwig V

Would you not say that one must first have faith that the authority is absolute before one could presume to serve it?