Not only recognizing similarity, difference, repetition and pattern, but use. — Banno

All those have to be in place before there can be any use. But sure, use is obviously important; we, like all other species, are basically pragmatists.

I didn't say most economists ignore resources, I said they ignore ecology; the reality of limited resources and the cost, both to the environment and economically, of so-called externalities. If you think growth can continue with business as usual, without dire results, you are as deluded as those economists.The only solution to our ecological woes will be to transition to a non-growth, even a shrinking, economy.

Everything you say here ignores, as so many economists do, the reality of limited resources. I don't think you understand how ecology (of which economy is merely a subset) works and there certainly is an epidemic of such people and they are indeed the root of the problem.

I don't say anyone has to. Personal faith is fine, as I've said all along. But some people want to claim that some kinds of faith constitute knowledge. Personally I think such a claim is dangerous because it may lead to fundamentalism, where people feel they know what the Truth is, or what God wants, and they feel they have a right to foist this "realization" on others. In any case if people come to a philosophy forum to assert such things, and it is always without cogent argument, then they should expect to be challenged.

Cheers. I think this subitising discussion is off-topic; — Banno

Perhaps, but on the other hand if numeracy can be explained by recognizing similarity, difference, repetition and pattern if real objects, then there would be no need to appeal to the reality of universals, a kind of realism which, ironically, is really idealism.

If we are saying that religious experiences are "real", then presumably we know that they are real. In consequence, we cannot insist that "we don't know".

Besides, I was not talking exclusively about "religious" experiences. It can be experiences without any specific "religious" content. — Apollodorus

All I meant by saying that religious experiences, or any experiences for that matter, are real is that they really were experienced by the experiencer. Of course memory is not infallible and the longer the interval between the purported experience and the claim that it really happened, the more shaky that claim may become.

My aim, though, was at religious experiences which claim to prove something. If I have an experience, for example, wherein I am convinced that I am remembering my past five thousand lives, that does not prove that I actually had five thousand or indeed any past lives. So, in my view any claim to such kinds of knowledge are unjustifiable.

Of course the feeling of certainty may be so great for the experiencer that she feels there can be no doubt; but that is still a matter of faith on the part of the experiencer.

So, we don't always depend on others for knowledge. What we know does not always need to be confirmed or validated by others. — Apollodorus

I would say we don't depend on others for our beliefs. For something to count as knowledge it needs to be demonstrable to others. Sure, we may feel absolutely certain that it is knowledge, but that certainty is a matter of faith. I am not saying that this is not the case withl all knowledge that is not a direct empirical observation like "it is raining, here, now". Claims such as those can be verified to be true by anyone else who is present.

Believing in something without evidence is a choice, — Xtrix


It is neurologically impossible to believe something without evidence. — Isaac

Perhaps it is neurologically impossible to believe something without what is thought to be evidence. Different people have very different ideas about what counts as evidence. Is there a reliable standard by means of which it could be judged that some conceptions of what constitutes evidence really don't add up?

I think that's self-evidently true to an extent, but then again people regularly make significant sacrifices for the sake of their children's comfort (going without to pay for education, for example), so it would be quite hard to reconcile that with a purely selfish greed outweighing a known risk to one's children's future. People are not inherently greedy and selfish to the point that they'd sacrifice their children's well-being for a flashier car. These behaviours are played upon by advertisers, corporartions and media influences to get the desired outcome. — Isaac

It's true that people do make such sacrifices when the need is staring them in the face. People don't seem to be very good at genuinely, viscerally acknowledging threats until the reality can no longer be denied. And don't forget that the currently enjoyed prosperity, comfort, convenience, material wealth and so on of a family is such for the children of that family also.

Of course I agree that the common desires for comfort, convenience, material possessions and general prosperity are manipulated and exploited by advertisers, corporations and the media.

Yes, but I don't see how it will be possible to bring the poorer countries to greater prosperity without diminishing the general prosperity of the richer nations; not if the aim is to ameliorate global warming, species extinctions, habitat destruction, soil destruction, pollution and over-exploitation of the oceans and so on. It seems that reduction of populations will also be necessary.

I think of groups of objects of any number as kinds of patterns regardless of their precise configurations. So a group of three objects is a kind of repetition pattern however the elements are arranged.

My own experience is that if groups of more than about four objects are arranged "geometrically" I can recognize the number of objects immediately. If they are placed randomly I may have to count them; that is, the number of the group is not instantly recognizable. Others' experience may be different, obviously.

I tend to think the recognition of numerosity and the beginnings of numeracy do begin with pattern recognition. If counting begins with noticing multiples of similar objects then apprehending similarity of conformation (which is a kind of pattern recognition) would be important

We don't normally ask others every five minutes whether what we are experiencing is real. — Apollodorus

I wasn't questioning whether religious experiences are real. Of course they are real. It is the interpretation of their significance and the commonly made inferences to God, Ideal Forms. Spiritual Beings and so on that are questionable.

If we take reported instances of precognitive dreams, for example, where a person has a particular dream that corresponds to real events experienced a few days later, should that person dismiss it as "imagination"? If yes, on what criteria? — Apollodorus

If I had dreams on a regular basis that predicted the future, then I would not dismiss that. If someone tells me they regularly have such dreams I would probably be skeptical. If someone told me regularly about dreams and the events described were regularly proven to come to pass, then I would not be skeptical. The possible explanations for such phenomena. if they exist, are another matter, though.

And yet:
https://core.ac.uk/reader/224990548
https://www.jstor.org/stable/1422405

I recently finished Enlightenment Now (Pinker), and I basically agree with him, but there's nevertheless a sort of sterility or humorlessness about the enterprise, which he does not seem to recognize. — hanaH

I haven't read that, but I get what you mean by "sterility or humorlessness about the enterprise". Some, like Dawkins and the so-called "Four Horsemen" seem to want to dismiss, even eliminate from human life, all religion, and that is in my view a ridiculous, not to mention arrogant, aim.

I think it's fine that people have their faiths, and I think religious faith can even be transformative in ways that nothing else can. My whole argument is merely that conflating faith with knowledge is where the danger begins.

I agree, but the fun of religion is precisely in the wickedness. A 'reasonable' religion is something you can buy and sell at the mall. — hanaH

Sure, but do you really want to valorize a wickedness that may not merely be "wicked" (in the sense of a wicked sense of humour) but truly wicked in the sense of the Spanish Inquisition?

That isn't necessarily true. If another world or dimension exists, then there may be a possibility of establishing contact with it. — Apollodorus

Maybe, but you could never demonstrate that you have, so the possibility that it could be an illusion remains. We should be open to such numinous and transformative experiences and yet draw no conclusions from them in my view.

It could be but it doesn't have to be. — Apollodorus

That is a possibility, but there could be no way to know. No matter how certain we might be that we know something transcendent, the possibility that it is an illusion remains. You can't get from a feeling of certainty to an absolute certainty that could not be mistaken.

1. You think. You don't know.

2. You can't exclude the possibility.

3. I didn't say "necessarily". — Apollodorus

I know that education and intelligence are finite and necessarily limited, no matter how great they might be. So I can exclude the possibility of knowing that you have knowledge of the absolute truth. I could grant that you might think you have and actually do have it. just like you might think something about a distant planet that you know nothing about which just happens to be true.

Weren't you suggesting that a certain level of intelligence and education would enable you to "tell the difference"? If it is only that they might enable you to tell the difference, then you are back to my position; that is that you cannot be sure you can tell the difference. So, the "necessarily" seems to be necessary to your argument.

Well, you don't know that, do you? You only think so.

Plus, the person who has been outside the cave does not necessarily know the whole truth. It is sufficient for them to know more than those inside, which they will logically do once they've seen the world outside.

It is not a matter of being omniscient. It is enough to know that you know something that you didn't know before. Of course, in theory it could be imagination, but I think most people with a certain level of intelligence and education would be able to tell the difference. — Apollodorus

I do know that because it is true. And it is not an absolute truth, so there is no contradiction or inconsistency. It is a contextual truth; humans beings cannot be infallible. Also the idea of absolute truth is an idea of an otherworldly or eternal truth. We are beings of this world, and can know truths only in the context of this world.

In any case, even if for the sake of argument it is granted that some people might know the "Answer to the Ultimate Question of Life the Universe and Everything", it could never be formulated or communicated, and even if it were it would be as meaningless to the human mind as "42", so it would be incapable of demonstration.

Of we are not and cannot be omniscient and that is just what it would mean to know the Absolute Truth. And of course we all experience knowing that we know something we didn't know before at times. In theory and in practice it could be imagination, and I think it is hubris to think that "a certain level of intelligence and education" would necessarily enable you to tell the difference. We tell the difference between what we know and what we think we know by checking with others.

No, you're dead wrong and actually have it backwards: I am concerned with arguing that religion/ spirituality cannot be done on the terms of science or philosophy, or on any terms analogous to them. In other words they are matters of faith, not knowledge.

And just for the record; I'm not saying there is anything wrong with having religious or spiritual faith, provided you are intelligent and honest enough to realize that that is what it is, and not to conflate it with knowledge. Such a conflation is dangerous; it is the first step towards fundamentalism.

No one can ever know that they have access to truth in any absolute sense. — Janus


So ironic. — baker

No, I wasn't being ironic. How could anyone possibly have access to absolute truth?

No one can ever know that they have access to truth in any absolute sense. We can know things are true within certain contexts, but that is a different conception of truth, because believing we may have that is based on inter-subjectively accessible observations which are capable of corroboration..

Capital T truth is a kind of mirage. We can say the real thing is "out there", but we can only guess at it, and we don't even really know what we are saying when we say it is out there.

So, what you call "having access to the truth" really amounts to just someone believing they have access to the truth.

We live in a world which is on a path to mutually assured destruction (via climate change) and yet the vested interests of the super rich mean we do nothing about that. — Isaac

It's not only that; it's the vested interest of the average person in their accustomed prosperity, convenience and lifestyle, which means they won't vote for any government that presents plans to ameliorate global warming, if those plans involve any lessening of personal prosperity and comfort (like extra taxes or rising costs, etc)..

Indeed, this is a philosophy forum, and philosophers should know better than to attempt to do religion/spirituality on the terms of science or philosophy. I'm amazed that they don't; I wonder why this is so. I mean, they are supposed to be so much smarter than I! So why are they making such a basic mistake?! — baker

The only people who seemed to be concerned with "doing religion/ spirituality on the terms of science or philosophy" seem to be those who consider themselves to be religious/ spiritual. And they seem to want to claim that there is real knowledge to be had in religious/ spiritual practices. instead of admitting that it is all a matter of personal feeling and faith.

There is a certain quality of one's mind, or spirit, which, at any given time, one either has or doesn't have, and which cannot be obtained overnight, or by contemplating a syllogism. — baker

Yes, and one can certainly be deluded about the quality of one's mind or spirit or disposition or whatever you want to call it. In regard to self-knowledge it pays to remember that.

Take it or leave it. — Wayfarer

Well of course I'll leave it. The more interesting question is as to why you take it.

In relation to this particular discussion I'm not concerned with anything other than clarifying the distinction between faith and knowledge. I don't know why you feel it necessary to make personal comments about someone you know next to nothing about; but that you do says more about you than it does about anyone else. What is it exactly that you feel you need to defend I wonder?

I don't disagree with anything you say there. But it doesn't seem to have any bearing on what I've been arguing. which is that there is something temporally persistent there which is reliably appearing as a door to both animals and humans. Sure animals don't conceive of it in human language, in English for example as a door; but, judging from their behavior, they certainly see it as a kind of affordance, as something like a "to be walked through".

(And I do think he was/is a genuine sage, not a hoodoo guru.) — Wayfarer

How would you be able to tell the difference? I have known highly intelligent people who thought Osho was the real deal (including the eminent German philosopher Peter Sloterdijk who was a disciple for some time).

I know you think Osho was a charlatan, but why would your opinion in such a matter be worth any more than anyone else's? It's obviously not, so it all really just comes down to personal interpretation and belief.

And how does Apollodorus know what he says is true? Is he enlightened? He certainly doesn't act like he is, judging by his own standard:

That's why the enlightened don't go around preaching to the unenlightened. — Apollodorus

Really? When, say, Evangelical Christians tell you who you really are, do you deem yourself as "knowing yourself better"? — baker

I was referring to neuroscience, not evangelical christianity. That said, any immersion in aspects of culture; whether science, the arts, sports, drug use, meditation practice, religious practice, gambling, addiction or whatever, can lead, through your own experience and the apprehension of others' experiences, to better self-understanding. It can also, of course, lead to greater confusion.

You didn't answer my question. — baker

And you didn't explain why your thought my response didn't answer your question, so...

And yet some people can, together or independently, know fancy stuff in, say, advanced mathematics or nuclear physics, even though nobody else knows what they know, or even that they know -- and nobody frets about it!! — baker

Nobody's fretting about—except perhaps you—but the point is that their knowledge is demonstrable; whereas the so-called knowledge that comes with religious experience is not. If you can't see the difference, then I don't know what else to say. I'm not saying that such "knowledge" is of no subjective value to individuals, but the point is that it is really faith not knowledge; the definition of knowledge being that which can be intersubjectively demonstrated.

And you display this same kind of confidence about other things you don't know? — baker

It's self-evident by definition: god not being an objectively knowable phenomenon. If you want to believe that God is inter-subjectively knowable, then go ahead; I'm done talking to someone who is obviously not open to argument.

I do understand your perplexity about this point. — Wayfarer

I'm not perplexed; I just outlined the possibilities.

As I said, we can imagine the universe with no humans in it - which was empirically the case until a couple of hundred thousand years ago. But that doesn't take into consideration the sense in which even such an 'empty universe' is also an intellectual construct. — Wayfarer

It is you who seem to be perplexed on this point. So you're claiming the universe did not exist prior to consciousness, or you are claiming that it could not have existed? And I'm asking about it actually having existed then, not about our imagining now it having existed then.

BUT, this is a severe digression within Banno's thread, so I will cease and desist. — Wayfarer

I wouldn't worry about that, Banno has himself also derailed this thread. But if you are worried about it, then answer me in the 'realism' thread instead.

It is 2 that I am calling into question. It puzzles me that you apparently cannot grasp that basic distinction. — Wayfarer

We don't know for sure whether the entities that science describes and every day perception encounters are mind-independently real. And it also depends on what you mean by "entity". Are you saying that it is impossible that these entities are mind-independently existent?

So, I can see the basic distinction between the possibility that those entities are mind-independently real and the possibility that they are not. They are (the) two (logical) possibilities, granted. So what distinction is it here you think I am not grasping?

You seemed to be claiming that an empty universe is (or definitely would be, not merely may be) nothing but a mental construction. And I responded saying that obviously our imagination of the empty universe is a mental construction, but that it does not follow that an empty universe must be a mental construction. There might have been an empty (I took you mean empty of life or consciousness, not totally empty) universe prior to the advent of life. In fact it seems that all the evidence points to the conclusion that there was. And if the universe existed prior to the advent of life and consciousness then it could not have been a mental construction, obviously, unless you were to posit a universal mind in which it existed. Personally I think the idea that it simply existed is the more plausible view, but I grant you that could be thought to be a matter of taste.

Even if you imagine an empty universe before there were any subjects to observe it, that empty universe, even if characterised by scientific and empirical rigour, is still a mental construction, to the extent that you reference it or contemplate it. — Wayfarer

Of course your imagination of an empty universe is a mental construction, that is a tautological truism; but the empty universe itself (if it exists) is not. It puzzles me that you apparently cannot grasp that basic distinction.

I understand the concept of "7" denoting seven, but it is not itself a seven.

End of the test. you get 0/10. — Banno

I answered this before, and my answer has been deleted. So here it is again:

It is a poor analogy because a series of 7 can be instantiated (in the sense of the word as I mean it) : 1,2,3,4,5,6,7. whereas an infinite series cannot. I was arguing in good faith.

I don't see it that way at all: I see it as knowing yourself better with the added benefit of others' experience.

If there were someone who knows, how could she demonstrate her knowledge such that everyone would be able to see that in fact she does know? — Janus

Why everyone?

Can you explain? — baker

Any knowledge which is reliably transmissable is intersubjectively corroborable; so if anyone understood what consciousness is in a way which was demonstrable it would have already been demonstrated.

So, the notion that some people could, together or independently, know what consciousness is, even though nobody else knows what they know, or even that they know, seems nonsensical.

You started with the example of knowing God. But God is not known through its effects. God is supposed to be known directly. — baker

The idea that God can be known directly is nonsensical. All we know directly is what appears to us via the senses and also emotions, feelings and sensations. So someone has an experience of overwhelming ecstasy with a sensation of being engulfed in a rising, all encompassing light, and they say they have directly experienced God; but the inference is not warranted, it is an interpretation of the experience, a reification.

Monotheists frequently demonstrate their knowledge of God with other monotheists; they form an epistemic community. — baker

How could they demonstrate their knowledge? What you should have said is that share their interpretations and beliefs, because that is all it can be.

That sounds fair enough...

Good, then you agree that the limit of the sequence is rigorously defined. — TonesInDeepFreeze

I agree to take your word for it, because I imagine that if I were more mathematically literate I would agree with you. In any case that was never something I was arguing against.

Of course, if one doesn't countenance infinite sets, then one might not countenance the classical notion of convergence to a limit. But that doesn't change that what ordinary mathematics mean by '.999...' is not some kind of "reaching" but rather convergence to a limit — TonesInDeepFreeze

I am not opposed to the idea of infinite sets. I can even accept that some infinite sets are larger than others. Logically I see convergence to a limit as analogous to an asymptotic approach, but I can also accept that the mathematical concept may be different, even though I don't have the background to properly grasp the difference.

My original point was only that what we understand intuitively can be understood in ways inconsistent with that in mathematics.

The word 'instantiate' has a certain meaning in mathematics. What you mean though - to type out in finite time and space individually all the members of an infinite set - is of course impossible. But that doesn't entail that the limit of an infinite sequence is not rigorously defined. — TonesInDeepFreeze

OK, thanks, I'm not familiar with the mathematics specific use of 'instantiate'. I haven't claimed that the limit of an infinite series is not rigorously defined, and you agree that an infinite series cannot be instantiated in the sense I meant it; so it seems we are not disagreeing about anything.

You misread it.

As I said, it's an issue of pedagogy. You need learnin'.

(the bit where I said I wan't going to do this...!) — Banno

You just don't want to admit the distinction I pointed to, so you default to patronising mode instead. I understand the concept of "1,2,3,..." denoting an infinite series, but it is not itself an infinite series. As I said, I'm not a mathematician, but that logical distinction is simple enough; there can be no actual infinite quantities of anything.

Yes, but the other point is that if you added .9, .09, .009, .0009. .00009, and so on forever the sum of what you had written could never equal !, and that was literally all I was saying.

By "instantiate an infinite series" I mean write it down as a full series, not in a shorthand form. I'm no mathematician, but that logical distinction is clear.

Here's an instantiated infinite series for you:
1,2,3... — Banno

LOL, no that's just a finite set of marks on the screen. I get that it stands for an infinite series but it is not itself actually an infinite series. Are you getting it yet?

I'm not being snide. It is a genuine issue amongst mathematics teachers. See the Wiki article on 0.99... It's on a par with kids who are not able to see three dots as three.

Folk who think 0.99...<>1 have missed a vital aspect of mathematics. — Banno

I can meet you halfway and say that I can see that for formal purposes, the conceptualized infinite series of fractions we are discussing equals 1. But since it is impossible to instantiate an infinite series, what we are really talking about is a rounding off, a "for all intents and purposes". I don't understand why you related this to the 'three dots' example; who would not be able to see that three dots are three? Someone who actually couldn't count, maybe?

The interesting thing about that Escher image is that unlike orthographic projections, that would be impossible to construct, this building with its stairways looks like it would be possible to construct; it just defies gravity.

The inability to see that " 9/10+9/100+9/1000... " is another way of writing "1" is a measure of someone's lack of capacity to do maths.

So let's not go down that burrow. — Banno

Are you going to make a cogent argument as to how a series that is approaching 1 and could do so forever without actually reaching it is the "very same as 1", or are you going to throw around snide comments instead? ( Note; I'm not denying that for mathematical purposes it may be good enough to count that series as equivalent to 1, but the logic says that no matter how many fractions sequentially decreased tenfold you add, you will never actually get there.