Any position regarding the metaphysical would be a metaphysical position I guess.

If 'natural' is taken to be synonymous with empirical. But there's always the question of what gives rise to the empirical. What is the nature of existence? — Marchesk

The nature of things as we experience them is certainly physical or material. Those very words have been created to denote the way things are as we experience them. So nature is what we experience. Naturally, we suppose that things have their own nature independently of how we experience them, but that nature is not certainly decidable. So in that sense that imagined nature is (whatever it is) the supernatural or the metaphysical (leaving aside whatever woo-ish baggage those terms have managed to accumulate over time).

it then becomes the proverbial “transcendental illusion” to suppose systems not anything like ours, operate the same way. — Mww

Sure, but. all other things being equal, we have no more warrant to suppose that they don't operate the same way than that they do. Add to that the inconceivability that an amorphous 'great whatever' could give rise to a world of diversity, invariance and change, and I think we actually have more warrant to suppose that the cosmos operates along more or less the same principles as we do, than we have to suppose that it doesn't. But I guess, in the final analysis. it remains a matter of taste.

:up: I've no doubt you wouldn't have it any other way! (I know I wouldn't).

'Metaphysical' seems to be, in a certain sense at least, synonymous with 'supernatural'.

We could, without experience, iff the human cognitive system is itself logical. We think logically for no other reason than that’s the mandate of the system with which we are equipped. Which explains why we can never use logic to explain logic, insofar as a necessary condition of a thing cannot at the same time be an explanatory device for that thing. Maybe why we don’t know how the brain presents subjectivity. — Mww

That seems reasonable, but then the 'machinery in itself' of the human cognitive system is also, in the final analysis, noumenal, part of the "great whatever" (to borrow a phrase from the moniker of a departed member of TPF).

So, if logic is intrinsic to the structure of the human cognitive system, and we have no reason to believe that we are any more separate from the "great whatever" than a tree is, then we could reasonably infer that the cosmos is, always already, prior to human experience, logically structured, or "conceptually shaped" as John McDowell puts it if I remember correctly.

both of which show that even the Lockean primary qualities of objects are relative to perspective. — sime

Mass, size and distance, for example, are not relative to perspective.

True the idea in a particular form is in Plato, the noumenal world of the Ideas as opposed to the phenomenal shadows of the Cave.

The idea is fascinating just because it is so hard to get a purchase on. The one thing I think we are entitled to say is that the world in itself must be energetically "carved at the joints" more or less isomorphically with the ways we perceive it. It's hard to imagine how a rich world of diversity, invariance and change could manifest out of an amorphous mass of whatever.

I agree, I think the idea is useful and inevitable just because we can make a logical distinction between something in itself and something for us. It seems an intelligent, inquiring human mind would inevitably at some point wonder: I see a tree, but it is as it is as an object of my seeing; what could it be in itself?

Sure, we could have had any other word instead of 'God'. That is trivially true But the idea we have which is signified by that word (or at least the particular sense of that word relevant to this discussion), which determines the definition of the word 'God' we are using, and the conception of the being God the word is taken to refer to, necessarily involves omnipotence, otherwise it is a different conception, a different God.

Yep. Think about it. What was it before it was a tree? And that thing, why is it a “tree” and not some other named thing? That thing always was a thing, it just wasn’t a tree until some human said it was.

Besides, if it always was a tree, why do we have to learn it as such? Why didn’t we already know it as tree bore having to be instructed about it? — Mww

I don't think the question has any real sense. It might have been a configuration of microphysical particles or energy fields, but then even that is part of our experience. But it doesn't follow that it is nothing sans our experience. And whatever it is it obviously reliably manifests to suss and animals as what we would call a tree. So its manifestation as a tree depends on both its percipients and on its own structure, whatever that might be. You say it was a thing, but that too is as conceptual, even though obviously broader, a category as "tree". So it wasn't called a tree until some human named it such, but neither was it called a thing until some human named it as such.

Yes, for their proofs, their empirical validity. Not for their construction, which are merely logically non-contradictory. Logic alone cannot teach us facts of Nature. — Mww

But how could we have logic without empirical experience? take the logical idea of identity. We recognize things because they are (relatively) invariant. If there were no relative invariance in the things we perceive then there would be no identity, no idea of identity (and obviously no us and no life, either).

The definition of a term is a contingent truth about it. — Bartricks

Rubbish! The definition of the God that we are discussing necessarily involves omnipotence, toss that and you have a conception of some other kind of God. Which is fine: Whitehead's God for example is neither omnipotent, omniscient nor omnibenevolent.

What follows from that is that since the idea of omnipotence necessarily involves contradiction, the idea of an omnipotent God is also contradictory and hence incoherent.

The world is neither necessary nor sufficient for pure a priori cognitions, under the assumption there are such things. — Mww

The world would seem to be necessary for there to be a priori cognitions as far as I can tell. If I remember correctly Kant acknowledged that the synthetic a priori requires the schooling of prior experience, even though it can be thought of as being independent of the the empirical world in the sense that, once in place, further experience need not be consulted. So, once we have experienced (and gone on to conceptualize) space and time, for example, we can then know that all experience must be spatial and temporal.

That's a bizarre comment. Existence is the very most commonplace. It is the attempt to answer the ill-formed question: "what is existence" that leads to all kinds of woo. — Janus


“It is not how things are in the world that is mystical, but that it exists” ― Ludwig Wittgenstein — Marchesk

I don't see any inconsistency there. Existence is commonplace until we try to explain it; at which point ti becomes mystical. Woo is the attempt to make the mystical commonplace, or the indeterminable determinate as I think I said earlier. The mystical is the indeterminable. In another sense the mystical, the indeterminable, is already commonplace, but not the commonplace of the determinable.

There may be two senses, but only one ends in knowledge. Possible knowledge. — Mww

I'm not sure what you're getting at here. Are you saying that it is knowledge of a tree (tree of knowledge :wink: ) only because of us? Again there would be no knowledge without us, granted, but there would be no knowledge without the tree, either, no? Or perhaps I have misunderstood?

But if you follow this out to its logical end, that which is present via us, can only be because of us, which makes the collaboration internal, eliminating the world from it entirely. Entirely, post-perception, that is. — Mww

I don't think the notion of internality is helpful here. Certainly the presencing or presenting of the world to us would not be without us, but it would not be without the world, either. So, the conclusion would seem to be that it is neither internal nor external or it is both internal and external; one or other of that dialectical pair is deployed alone usefully only in certain local contexts, not globally. That's my take anyway.

Existence is woo as far as I'm concerned. — Marchesk

That's a bizarre comment. Existence is the very most commonplace. It is the attempt to answer the ill-formed question: "what is existence" that leads to all kinds of woo.

Nope. We see.....sense..... something directly. It isn’t a tree until the intellect gets done with it, somewhere downstream in the mental process. — Mww

I think it makes sense, in different senses, to say it both is and is not a tree prior to the cognitive workings.

Perhaps, but then comes the notion that we are necessary causality for empirical realities. And if subjectivity is true, there can be no account for why a dog isn’t sometimes a ‘57 DeSoto.

There is a making present via us, but it isn’t perception. — Mww

I agree, it is a collaboration between us and the world (which are not separate except per conceptual distinctions) so yes the making present via us is not merely perception.

We can’t know the thing represented by its phenomenon directly, that’s true, but it is nonetheless directly presented to us. — Mww

Or it could be said differently as "there is nonetheless a direct presentation (as in "a making present) via us".

Correct on the part of him saying that we aware of our brains, through experience. But, as I understand it, Neutral Monism is not so much that mind and matter are indistinguishable. Neutral Monism is the idea that world is neither mental nor physical as we understand these terms. — Manuel

:100:

In Spinozistic terms, nature or God (as substance) is neither mental nor physical, but mental and physical are distinguishable attributes of substance.

Rudolph Steiner. — Mww

Or Swedenborg, or Madame Blavatsky, or Gurdjieff, or Aleister Crowley, or Eliphas Levi, or Sri Aurobindo, or Ramana Maharshi, or Yogananda, or Bubba Free John, or Gautama, or... countless others...in fact anyone who claims to be determining the indeterminable.

What is the much-vaunted "unity of consciousness" if not merely a sense and/ or idea of unity? We cannot be aware of everything at once, but aware only serially, from moment to moment, of what stands out as more or less determinate "local" figure against a more or less indistinct "global" ground.

Yes, although if, say, Banno said that, he would likely just mean that he was awake. If I say that when I'm in a philosophical mood, I would mean "I am a centre of experience" or something like that. But Banno rejects these other definitions. It's baffling to me, but one explanation is that he hasn't noticed he is conscious in that sense. I struggle to believe that though. — bert1

I can't answer for @Banno, but I suspect he is quite capable of the thought: "I am conscious"; which would mean that he is capable of remembering that he is conscious, but like the rest of us, he is not remembering that he is conscious, when he is not thinking that thought.

He might come and correct me and explain that he is not capable of that thought, though; but that would be surprising, and I doubt I would be capable of believing him. :wink:

If you're of the mindset that all mental states are brain states, then psychological solutions are material solutions. — RogueAI

I have no idea what else they could be, although I prefer the term 'processes' to 'states'. — Janus

Instead of mental state = physical state, you would have mental state = mental state, which would commit you to either idealism or dualism. — RogueAI

Saying that a mental state is a mental state is tautologically true, of course, but tells us nothing. It is only if we can determine that something is really something else that it is not immediately obvious that it is, that we can be said to have discovered something.

I prefer to say, with Spinoza, that the mental and the physical are just two different ways of looking at the same thing. So, the mind and the brain/ body are not different things; we are embodied minds or enminded bodies depending on which perspective you want to take. But this should not be taken to be advocating pan-psychism.

We conceive of inanimate objects as 'brute matter' but objects appear only in the "mental/ physical" act of perception. So we can think of what is perceived as either a mind-independent object or a mind dependent perception, and neither conception, on it's own, will be right. In this we approach the limits of language.

That's my take on it. anyway.

The whole comparison thing comes up every time the phrase 'what it is like' is discussed, and it's a total red herring, but an understandable one. I think it's revealing though, as it is an indicator of whether or not the concept of consciousness has actually been grasped. Stephen Priest has often said "Some philosophers have not noticed they are conscious." I always used to think that this was an uncharitable and ridiculous. But now I think he might have been right. — bert1

The interesting thing about "the whole comparison thing" is that. on the one hand we can say that being human or being a bat is not like anything, in the sense that neither are comparable with anything else, as I've said. On the other hand the only way to answer the question as to what it is to be some animal or other would be by specific comparisons with the human. So, being a bat is not like being a human, obviously, but how it might feel to be a bat may be guessed at by noting specific differences with how it might feel for a human. For example if I hung upside down and urinated all over myself I might get some inkling of how that particular dimension of bat experience feels...or not, since I am not covered in fur.

We all forget we are conscious much of the time. Is not remembering that we are conscious simply to repeat to ourselves "I am conscious"? I mean doesn't it just consist in entertaining, in that moment of remembering that I am conscious, a specific conception of myself?

I have no idea what else they could be, although I prefer the term 'processes' to 'states'.

:up:

OK, I was thinking more in terms of answers to questions, but in any case, "learning to accept my intrusive thoughts and not fight them" is a material change of behavior isn't it. I mean instead of sitting or lying there and ruminating, don't you go and do something else?

Right, good point; that's a further dimension to the question. If there were no capacity for self-reflection would anything feel like anything?

It's nothing to do with comparison. "I wonder what it is like to be a seagull" just means "I wonder how it feels to be a seagull"

"Is there something it is like to be a snail?" just means "Are snails conscious?" — bert1

Exactly! But the point is that the "what is it like" question fosters the illusion that there could be a comparison.

Also when you ask "how does it feel to be a seagull", what kind of answer would you expect? The question needs to be asked in specific ways. How does it feel for a seagull when it dives into the water after a fish? We know how it feels for us to dive into the water; how would it be different for a seagull? We have bare skin and the seagull has feathers; what kind of difference would that make to the feeling of diving into the water? How would it feel to eat with a beak instead of lips and teeth? What difference does it make to how the world looks to have eyes on each side of the head? And so on. Would the question "how does it feel to be a seagull" have any meaning beyond these specific inquiries?

Psychological solutions, or are therapists completely worthless? — RogueAI

Example?

God cannot overcome logic though. can he? He cannot be both omnipotent and be unable to lift a stone. — Janus


Of course they can. They are omnipotent. They are bound though by the possibilities. If they could do everything, they can do nothing. If you can't lift a stone, then you can't. If you can't travel faster than light then you can't. If they could there lives would be chaotic. A whimsical fleeting existence. God's are not like that. Like the universe isn't, which they created in their image. Is their will free? Of course. If they don't force the wills of each other. — GraveItty

You are contradicting yourself. You say they are omnipotent and yet "bound by the possibilities" and "If you can't lift a stone, then you can't".

The only clever things that come out of its mouth are ad homs. Which I have to say are top notch. — khaled

Seriously? You do set the bar low, don't you?

Yes, that's right Hugh. If you'd been paying attention, you'd have noticed that I said God is by definition omnipotent. However, that's just a contingent truth about the word God. — Bartricks

To say that God is by definition omnipotent just is to say that he must be omnipotent. Unless we are merely speaking about the word 'God', that it just signifies the idea of something omnipotent and not an actual being. But then that word 'God' signifies a contradiction, since as the example of the stone shows, the very idea of being omnipotent is a contradiction.

Cheers Manuel. :smile:

I think I understand why you might say that, but I don't think the private sensation that you seem to be referring to (trying to refer to?) can affect what I gesture toward with "meaning." I confess that I am trying to twist the meaning of meaning here, just as Wittgenstein and others have. — hanaH

I am not sure what you mean here by "twist"; I'm seeing it more as "restrict". I can refer to a sensation that, even though you have no hope of feeling it (since you are not me), you can nonetheless understand what kind of thing I am referring to since you ( presumably) also experience sensations. We can certainly say that this is a different kind of reference than ostensive reference, but I see no rationale for denying that it is reference at all. You (presumably) take yourself to be referring to meaning when you speak of it, and yet meaning is not a determinate object.

This is tricky, because the implications of my view are that nothing is ever cut and dried (or only relatively so.) It's like Ryle's interpretation of "John knows French" (quoted above) applied everywhere. If meaning is out there in the world, it exceeds what might have otherwise been called my 'intentions.' — hanaH

I agree that meaning exceeds our intentions, but I don;t view it as being merely what is "out there in the world". This is what I meant by "cut and dried", 'black and white", "either/ or"; wanting to say it is either what is out there in the world or it is "intentions", or associations, what is "in our minds". In my view it is both.

No, I have never said that. Indeed, a cursory survey of what I have said will tell you that I do not believe that anything 'must' be so, as I think there is no such property of mustness. — Bartricks

Oh, so, you don't claim that God must be omnipotent? In that case, how do you know he is? Have you met him?

That, Hugh, is what you have been saying in all of your posts, just more wordily. — Bartricks

Sure, because all you've been saying is "Look, it's true; it must be because I think so!"

I don't think Wittgenstein is of much help when it comes to consciousness. There is something it is to have experiences, and this is not easily accounted for in the sciences. — Marchesk

I agree that it is something to have experiences; it is to have experiences. But there is nothing it is like to have experiences, because anything that was like having experiences would be having experiences.

I could simplify this further and say 'to experience is something'; it is something different than not to experience. Any explanation as to how we are able to experience would have to be given in material, in physical, terms, otherwise it could not be a cogent (testable) explanation. But all explanation, all science, presupposes experience.

It doesn't seem to me that what it is (what it is like, if you prefer) to experience could be explained by science. We actually don't really explain what it is to experience; we describe it, or evoke it. Phenomenology and poetry serve here, not science.