The question then becomes: what must be true for such experience to be possible at all? Kant’s answer is that space and time must be a priori forms of intuition — conditions of possibility for experience, not attributes of things-in-themselves. Without them, there could be no experience of a world in the first place. And this is based on analysis of the nature of experience and reason - not of the observations of the natural sciences. — Wayfarer

How can anything be deduced about the in itself from "the nature of experience and reason"? I cannot see how anything could come from such a phenomenological analysis other than insights into the nature of experience. As I see it this is the weakness in Kant's system―on the one hand it concludes that nothing at all can be said about the in itself, and he proceeds to make claims about it, for example that it could not be spatiotemporal, differentiated and so on.

You still haven't outlined any actual argument to that effect. You say the argument is not inductive or deductive (or I imagine abductive) and that it is "transcendental". Merely labelling it tells me nothing, I want to see the argument laid in whatever terms are appropriate.

That said, all arguments are either deductive or inductive. Deductive arguments are based on premises which themselves are not demonstrated within the arguments themselves. Inductive arguments are inferences to the best explanation―but there province is the empirical, so that won't do according to your own standards. Is the argument merely stipulative?

You want an empirical argument, and there isn't one. — Wayfarer

As I said, I simply want any kind of argument clearly laid out that demonstrates that space, time, differentiation etc. must be confined to the world as cognized. I'm still waiting.

This is why it’s an error to object that “all our science tells us there was space and time before humans.” Of course science presupposes space and time, because its subject matter is appearances; but that doesn’t show that space and time belong to or are caused by the in-itself. — Wayfarer

The existence of anything we can imagine presupposes space and time, and you are right that doesn't demonstrate that space and time exist beyond perceptual experience, or that they are caused by the in-itself. But it also doesn't demonstrate that they cannot belong to or be caused by the in itself.

The whole point of The Blind Spot is not to complain that chemistry or astronomy fail to include the subject, but to highlight what happens when the methods of natural science are misapplied to questions of philosophy. — Wayfarer

I don't think it a matter of the methods being misapplied to questions of philosophy, so much as the knowledge given by science being applied to questions of philosophy. Science has given us a very different picture of the nature of the world as it is experienced than the medieval or the ancients had. We simply don't know how different the philosophies of the greats of antiquity and medieval times would have been if they had been around today.

It all depends on what you mean by "philosophy". Science may not be of much use to phenomenology, for example, although that said the phenomenology of a modern individual will not be the same as that of a medieval or ancient. Gadamer argues that we can only approach an understanding of those times via the texts we have access to hermeneutically.

When it comes to metaphysical speculation, I can't see how we have any better, or even other, guide than science. Science doesn't prove anything metaphysical (or even empirical for that matter) but for met at least, when it comes to questions which are undecidable, because no logical or definitive empirical purchase can be gained on them, science remains the source of knowledge that informs decisions about what is most plausible. As I've said many times, though, what seems most plausible will vary from pone individual ot another, and there is no definitive criteria for what is most plausible.

If you insist. I think the essential difference is that you’re framing the question of 'mind-independence' as if it were about what lies behind appearances, whereas the point I’m making (following Kant and Schopenhauer) is that space, time, and differentiation themselves are forms of appearance. — Wayfarer

I understand that is what Kant and Schopenhauer contend, but the salient question is as to whether they are also more than that. Kant says space and time are "the pure forms of intuition"―I don't know about "pure" but following Kant's usage of 'intuition' we can say that perception comes in spatiotemporal form. Reflecting on experience in a phenomenological way we can say that all perceptions are spatiotemporal, even that all perceptions must be spatiotemporal.

If you then go on to say that there is no space and time absent perception an argument is required, and that is just what is not to be found. It doesn't follow deductively that if space and time are forms of intuition they therefore cannot exist outside of that context. It also doesn't follow inductively, because all our science tells us there must have been space and time prior to humans or even percipients in general.

The transcendental point isn’t that time and space “began with us,” but that these forms belong to the structure of experience itself, not to the world as it is apart from any observer. — Wayfarer

And here it is again―a claim without an argument to support it. It's true that those forms "belong to the structure of experience" but it certainly doesn't follow deductively or inductively that that is all they are. So, just what is the actual argument?

Kant allows things in themselves, which Schopenhauer takes him to task for, because it is inconsistent with his claim that space and time are only forms of intuition and have no other existence, and you can't have things without differentiation, space and time. Schopenhauer then posits that there can only be a 'thing in itself', and that this is a consequence of Kant's own contentions.

But an amorphous 'thing in itself', undifferentiated (as it must be absent space and time) seems to be a highly implausible candidate for being able to give rise to the almost infinitely complex world we find ourselves in.

You’re conflating the empirical and the transcendental again. The point isn’t that, because we only ever observe appearances, we can’t be certain about what lies behind them. I'm not talking about what lies behind them. That’s an empirical framing or speculation. The transcendental point is that “differentiation” itself is already one of the conditions under which anything can appear to us in the first place. So the claim is logical, not empirical: it’s about the structure of experience, not about what we can or can’t infer about the in-itself. — Wayfarer

And here is the same unargued framing again. I don't accept that the world, that nature, is bifurcated into "empirical" and "transcendental"; that framing merely assumes what is to be demonstrated.

I don't deny that differentiation is one of the conditions under which anything can appear to us in the first place. I agree with that. You then say it is a logical claim not an empirical one―I would say it is neither, that it is a phenomenological claim based on reflection on the nature of experience. In any case, to say it again, that is not the point at issue―the point at issue is whether it follows logically from the accepted fact that differentiation is required for perception to occur, that there is no differentiation absent perception. And that claim simply does not follow logically. That there must be differentiation for perception to occur rather suggests, to me at least, that it is plausible to think that differentiation is in the nature of the pre-conceptual, pre-cognitive, world. Of course I acknowledge that that conclusion is also not strictly logically necessitated. It is an inductive or abductive claim, and we all know none of those are certain. Nothing in science is absolutely certain.

So, you thought it pointless. Is that an argument? — Wayfarer

I have already said at length why I think it is pointless. I think it is pointless because the natural sciences cannot deal with the subject. How would you include the subject in the disciplines of chemistry, geology, astronomy, paleontology and so on? Only the human sciences and ethology can bring in the idea of the subject, and the latter only the non-human subject.

Different kinds of beings—animals with other sensory endowments, artificial intelligences with architectures unlike our own, or even extraterrestrial intelligences—would inhabit worlds structured in ways not reducible to ours (recall Wittgenstein’s remark: “If a lion could speak, we would not understand him”). — Wayfarer

None of that is at issue―I have never denied that human experience is different from (most) animal experience. I say "most" because the experience of some kinds of animal seems to be much closer to human experience than that of others.

I always thought that Wittgenstein quote to be somewhat silly. If a lion could speak the same language as we do, then we should be able to understand it. If the lion could speak, but is speaking "lionese" then of course we could not understand it, just as we don't understand any other unfamiliar language. We could learn lionese if the lion could learn our language and then translation may be possible. "It takes two to tango".

While is true that the perceptual experience of different animals is very different form ours on account of the different nature of the sensory organs, observation shows us that animals inhabit the same world we do. This is shown by the consistency of their behavior. Lions prey on gazelle, wildebeest; animals small enough for them to effectively bring down. We don't see them trying to bring elephants or rhinoceros. So they must be able to assess the size of animals in ways that make perfect sense to us. They have to eat, mate, sleep, defecate and they play and show affection to one another in ways similar to how we do. So they are not all that far apart from us.

Finally, there isn't much point quoting Kant, since I am well familiar with his philosophy, and since I've already said many times that I don't agree him on some central points. Are you wanting to appeal to authority by quoting him (and others)?

I want to hear an actual argument for why space, time, differentiation, form, matter and all the rest cannot exist beyond the context of perception. And I should note, I acknowledge that if there is space, time, differentiation, things in general outside the context of perception, we should not expect them to be just as we experience and understand them. That would be naive realism, and I'm not arguing for that. I have in mind something along the lines of Ontic Structural Realism.

I don't think anyone would deny that numbers are different kinds of things than squirrels, that attributes and relations are different kinds of things than cabbages and kings, that turds and thongs are different kind of things than words and songs.

I have no more time today, so I'll have to leave it there for now.

You said:

The truth doesn't matter to me, because it has no real impact on how I live my life. — Wayfarer

It's all about context, which is something you apparently don't understand, or choose to ignore when it suits you tactically.

I believe you know perfectly well I was referring there to the truth regarding that particular issue (the nature of the in itself). And you know perfectly well that what I meant is that the question has no certain answer, and that it therefore has no real bearing on how I live my life. Talk about lacking charitability and good faith!

Done here. — Wayfarer

Right, you're "done here " without actually having done anything.: roll:

I never said I don't care about the truth. I said the answer to the question about the nature of the in itself is not particularly important to me. I've said many times I have no issue with views that don't accord with mine, and all the more so in relation to this particular issue.

All I ask is for coherent arguments and coherent responses to the questions I am posing in good faith, which is something which you seem to lack.

You try to distort everything I say in order to wriggle out of answering straightforward questions.

You don't really believe I'm a troll, that's just another deflective tactic, or if you do believe that then you are an idiot with no insight. The fact of the matter is that you apparently just don't have any answers.

I notice you don't try to address any of the more telling points, and even when you do as here you always seem to cherry-pick, and leave off part of what I've said, hopefully not deliberately in order to make it look like I'm saying something different. Anyway its a good practice in general to quote the whole of what you are responding to.

Of course I don't deny tout court that there are determinable truths, it is a denial that there is any certainly determinable truth of the matter as to whether our science and our experience in general gives us any knowledge of the in itself. Do you agree that it can only be assessed in terms of what seems most plausible or not. If not, why not?

:cool:

So though we know that prior to the evolution of life there must have been a Universe with no intelligent beings in it, or that there are empty rooms with no inhabitants, or objects unseen by any eye— the existence of all such supposedly unseen realities still relies on an implicit perspective. — Wayfarer

And here is the nub of the conflation you continually make. It is not the existence of such realities that relies on an implicit perspective, but our thinking of such an existence. If you disagree with this what seems to me most obvious point, then please explain your disagreement.

This mis-states my view. I am not saying that “because we think about a time before we existed, therefore that time must be mind -dependent.” That would indeed be a trivial claim. What I have argued is that the concept of “a time before we existed” is only ever available as a thought..The point isn’t that the past did not exist independently, but that whatever we say about it is mediated by concepts. That is very different to how it's been paraphrased above. — Wayfarer

As I read it the first underlined sentence in your response says essentially the same thing as the quoted sentence from me above it. Perhaps you could point out an essential difference between the two. The second underlined sentence in your response is also a trivial claim― of course it is true that if discourse is always conceptual, then anything we say is "mediated by concepts".

If you agree that a world, a universe, of things existed prior to the advent of humanity, then we have nothing to argue. I must say, though, that it puzzles me that you continue to think we are disagreeing about something despite the number of times we have gone over this.

I know about the 'blind spot' book and the prior article, the latter of which I read. I thought it was a pointless argument. because most of the natural sciences have no way of including the subject in their investigations. It is certainly true that what the various sciences investigate are the ways that different phenomena appear to us, and how they appear to function.

The question about whether or not science tells us anything about the "world as it in itself" is strictly undecidable. We can makes inferences about whether science does tell us anything about the in itself, but we cannot be sure.

For example, it seems highly implausible that a totally undifferentiated in itself could give rise to a perceived world of unimaginable differentiation―so we might find it plausible to think that differentiation is a real feature of the in itself, even though, since we can, by mere definition, only observe things as they appear, we obviously cannot certainly demonstrate such an inference to be true. That view also makes more sense of the fossil record, and astronomical observations.

The truth doesn't matter to me, because it has no real impact on how I live my life. I can understand that for those who long for there to be more than merely this life, the idea that what exists independently of humans is a world of physical existents lacks any appeal. It doesn't matter to me what you think, what motivates me to respond is that you always seem to be pushing the idea that there is a certainly determinable truth of the matter, rather than it being instead a matter of what seems most plausible. I see a kind of dogmatism in that view, and I am not a fan of dogmatic thinking.

Suppose a table exists mind-independently. A table is an object, not a relation.

Suppose space exists mind-independently. As with the table, then isn't space an object rather than a relation? — RussellA

A relation is an object of thought. I think it can rightly be said that spatial relations are concrete (as opposed to purely conceptual). The distance (amount of space) between any two things at some "point in time" is not dependent on perception, even though the measurement of that distance can be said to be so.

Objects are generally thought of as being perceivable macro entities. I would say the space between two perceptible things is itself perceptible (although of course it will mostly not be a perceptually empty) space.

There is always going to be something that can be construed as ambiguous in anything we say, which may be interpreted as going against what we are saying. It's a lovely feature of natural language.

Ha, yes it also seems to be related to the substance dualist/ aspect dualist polemic, but I think it's really quite different. Wasn't it Hegel who first alerted us to the fact that all ideas contain the seeds of polemic?

Seriously though, I think the MWI/ CI polemic is a far more complex issue―at least on the CI side.

Either way, to me, it appears as if you have an intellectual disability. I apologize for saying "mentally handicapped". — Metaphysician Undercover

I see no difference between the two terms. Anyway either way I'm not offended, so no need for apology. I found your saying that rather amusing.

I can understand your words easily enough, but they seem irrelevant and thus pointless, so I think our starting assumptions are probably so far apart that the effort required for me to unpack what you might be getting at seems to be not worth it.



Cheers J, it seems we agree about the "takeaway".

If I claim that universals and abstracta have no existence apart from minds, I'm saying they lack the property of mind-independence. — J

The problem I see is that it's not clear what we mean by "mind" and even less clear what we might mean by "mind-independence". For example Wayfarer says that because it is us thinking about the time before we existed that the time before we existed must be mind-dependent. On that stipulation everything we think about must be mind-dependent, as opposed to merely the way we think about it. He'll say that physicalism is incoherent because it is a concept we invented, and concepts are not physical, therefore physicalism cannot be true. I think that is tendentious nonsense.

But it may well be the case that something like Wayfarer's schema, for instance, can do excellent philosophical work for us, without requiring us to pin "real" down to some fact of the matter or some correct usage. — J

Pretty much all I see in Wayfarer's posts is the attempt to explain (away) modern philosophical positions and dispositions in psychological terms―the rise of science has caused us to become blind to something important in traditional "proper" philosophy, modernity has lost its way, "blind spot in science", physicalism could not possibly be a coherent position, blah.

I don't find any of that remotely convincing, worth taking seriously or even interesting, so you must be seeing something there I don't.

You may feel there's not much difference in clarity between "mind-independent" and "real," and I agree it's not a huge categorical difference; I just find myself knowing a little better what I'm thinking about, when I think about what "mind-independence" means. — J

That's fair enough―we probably all carry different sets of associations with these terms―which of course is part of the problem with the attempt to mint clear and precise definitions. One thing I think is not needful of precise definitions in order to be clear to me―if I say I can think about a mind-independent reality, say whatever existed before there were any percipients and someone says "but you're not really thinking about a mind-independent reality, because you're using your mind to think about it", and then i point out the conflation in such an argument between what is being thought about and the act of thinking about it, and that falls on deaf ears, then my respect for the one making that argument falls, because I start to smell an unpleasant odor of confirmation bias at work.

Yes. I keep getting myself into arguments that leave me wondering what definition of independence is in play. A lot of people seem to think that anything in one's mind must be mind-dependent. I think that only things that are created and maintained in existence by the mind are mind-dependent. That makes for quite a short list. — Ludwig V

Right, and the words you used show the ambiguity that is traded on "anything in one's mind must be mind-dependent"; on one construal this is true by definition of course anything in one's mind must be mind-dependent, but if you say 'the objects I have in mind are not necessarily mind-dependent, even though the thoughts I have about them are" that, for me, clears up any confusion.

Then where is this relation? — RussellA

The relation just is the amount of actual space between them. That is, if you allow that space exists mind-independently, which I find it most plausible to think.

I find 'indirect/critical realism' (e.g. perspectivism, fallibilism, cognitivism/enactivism) to be much more self-consistent and parsimonious – begs fewer questions (i.e. leaves less room for woo-woo :sparkle:) – than any flavor of 'idealism' (... Berkeley, Kant/Schopenhauer, Hegel ... Lawson, Hoffman, Kastrup :eyes:) which underwrites my commitment to p-naturalism. — 180 Proof

:100:

When someone says that they perceive the colour red, science may discover that they are looking at an electromagnetic wavelength of 700nm.

Where in an electromagnetic wavelength of 700nm can the colour red be discovered? — RussellA

I think this way of speaking is misdirecting. We don't look at wavelengthts of light, wavelengths of light affect our eyes producing the perception of colours. So, red is not discovered in an electromagnetic wavelength of 700nm, as though we are somehow looking into light, light enters our bodies causing the discovery of colours.

It strikes me that, in a sense, Kant is a kind of dualist with his phenomena/noumena distinction. — Tom Storm

That would be one interpretation. As far as I recall form when I was reading Kant and reading about Kant quite intensively (although it was quite a few years ago now, so I could be getting it not quite right) Kant scholars are divided between a 'dual worlds' interpretation where there is the phenomenal (empirical) world and the noumenal world and a 'dual aspect' interpretation where there is one world with both a phenomenal and a noumenal aspect.

Sorry my remark about metaphysics was prompted by many of the comments made here about it, but you're right, it is a field that has made a comeback in current philosophy. — Wayfarer

And it is now a field very different from "traditional" metaphysics.

Russell makes a simple but important point about universals: things like the relation “north of” or the quality “whiteness” are real, but they’re not located in space or time, and they’re not just mental events.
Here’s the gist of his argument in four steps: — Wayfarer

To me this makes no sense. The relation "north of" exists in space and time between objects. If you move the objects the relation may change. When you think about it everything is either north or south of everything else. To my way of thinking "north of" only exists in its instantiations. If The Problems of Philosophy was written after his rejection of idealism then it seems Russell didn't completely escape it's hold on him.

And the question is, in what direction does the justification go? Do we discover a knowledge or nous of a certain sort of thing, and say, "This is real", based on what "real" means? Or do we have a term, "real", which we then attempt to match with certain sorts of things in order to discover what it does or could mean? — J

At first I thought you were suggesting that we might have a noetic intuition as to what's real and then define 'real' according to that intuition. then I wondered whether you were using nous in the modern sense of know-how.

Then I noticed that you were not suggesting defining "real' in terms of the nousy intution, but saying the nousy intuition might be thought to be real or not based on the meaning of 'real'.

Your second idea seems to make more sense, anyway. We can cite examples and say whether they qualify as real or not. It would really just be using examples to illustrate how the term is commonly used in various contexts. We might discover that some examples qualify as real in one context and not in another.

I think the takeaway is that we cannot hope to get a "one-size-fits-all" definition of 'real', or 'existent'. It seems the best we can do is hone in on a somewhat fuzzy sense of the term and hopefully sharpen that sense up a bit.

And BTW, I think (most) universals are every bit as mind-independent as you do. But there we are: "mind-independent" is a property or characteristic we can get our teeth into. Adding ". . . and real" seems unnecessary. — J

And in turn that begs the question as to what we might mean by "mind-independent'―a term that seems to be much more slippery than 'real'.

My own view is that a naturalistic account of the strong emergence of mental properties, (that incorporates concepts from ethology and anthropology), including consciousness, can be consistent with a form of non-reductive physicalism or Aristotelian monism (i.e. hylomorphism) that excludes the conceivability of p-zombies and hence does away with the hard problem. Form in addition to matter is ineliminable in the description of our mental lives, but form isn't something standing over and above matter as something separate or immaterial. — Pierre-Normand

Yes, no matter without form and no form without matter―that makes good sense to me.

:ok:

:up: Too subtle for me, it seems. Can you explain why Davidson is being inconsistent in dismissing the view that Clark Kent cannot fly?

I think they are used in both ways, but the answer to "What is red" is never a frequency. Largely because that's an unsupportable answer... — AmadeusD

I am out of time, but I just want to address this; the frequencies are in the science of optics referred to as being of different colours―the colours of refracted light we can see plus colours we cannot see, but some other animals can, and certain instruments can detect―ultraviolet and infrared.

Who here thinks honour killings are... honourable? — Banno

I certainly don't―there can be no reasonable justification for them―they are despicable, as are genital mutilation and foot-binding.

He is inconsistent with his views at this juncture -- if he is dismissing the view that Clark Kent cannot Fly so readily. — I like sushi

If Superman and Clark Kent are the same entity, and Superman can fly, then so can Clark Kent. Do you think that Superman needs his suit in order to be able to fly?

I have to say, I'm not so sure. Billions in communities outside the West see, for instance. Honour killings as a requirement, morally. All but the victim will agree. Just an example, but its these things I'm speaking out (while trying not to target religious thinking). This may ultimately not be all that important, though. — AmadeusD

Ok, you're right that "honour lkillings" are an exception. I guess if people are understood to have seriously transgressed in a context of very strict dogma, then they may become "othered" so that killing them then is seen as a duty.

But in such cases it would not be seen as murder, but as execution. It is also interesting to note that honour killing sometimes happens to women who have been raped―as though it must have been their fault and they are now forever defiled.

But even within communities who see each other as 'kin', horrifically violent actions take place with support of the law, and one's family, all the time. — AmadeusD

Yes such things of course do occur, but they are generally motivated by dogmatic religious views which effectively dehumanize the victim.

Unfortunately, I think a quote from Sam Harris bears repeating: There are good, and there are bad people. Good people do good things. Bad people do bad things. But to get a good person to do bad things, you need religion. Ah fuck, now I'm just bashing religion. Perhaps I shouldn't be so reticent. It is poison. — AmadeusD

I see no harm in individuals holding religious views of all kinds, provided they admit to themselves that they do not conflate faith with knowledge, that they understand that their faith is for themselves and should never be inflicted on others. So, it is institutionalized religion that is the problem, not the religious impulse perse, as I see it.

We see it among that which can be, though. I'm unsure its particularly reasonable to presume everyone accepts "empirical evidence" as actual evidence. Those of us who understand what you're saying will do, but plenty (perhaps most) do not. They are skeptical of 'evidence' unless it agrees with their feelings. You and I would want to jettison this, and assess it against the claim, rather htan our feelings. I suggest this is far more common, and far more obvious than you are allowing here. — AmadeusD

Yeah, I agree that many, I don't know about most, people are motivated by confirmation bias rather than the attempt to establish what is true or most reasonable to think. Some people just cannot accpet the idea that life may not be as they wish it to be.

Nothing to quibble with here. I guess I just don't understand why the response I get isn't satisfactory. I don't know that anyone claims numbers exist outside examples of number. Or that colours exist outside examples of color (though, perhaps Banno would). — AmadeusD

I think there are those who think numbers and universals are real independently of the particulars that instantiate them, well certainly if you can take them at their word they do. I cannot speak for @Banno but I suspect he would say that it depends on how you define colour. If you define it as a subjective experience then it would only exist as such. But if you allow that different wavelengths of light reflected from things are colours then they would be thought to exist independently of percipients.

Do you recognize that this may indicate that you are in some way mentally handicapped? — Metaphysician Undercover

No, because I know my command of the English language is such that I would be able to understand any coherent explanation. It doesn't follow though that I would necessarily agree with it. Are you one of those who think that you are so right that if anyone disagrees with what you write, they must therefore not understand it?

He thinks that to eliminate the concept of matter is to remove an important cause of atheism, scepticism and even socianism – and who could not think that those are important issues? — Ludwig V

I can understand why Berkeley would have thought getting rid of matter would "remove and important cause of atheism" (although the belief in a mind-independent world is not strictly logically inconsistent with belief in the Christian God) and I can see that the idea of a mind-independent physical world coupled with the dualistic problem of "interaction" could be thought in Berkeley's time to lead to the possibility of skepticism, but I'm not seeing just how socianism would be debunked by the elimination of matter. They according to this source believed that the soul dies with the body, but that the souls of the faithful will be resurrected.

Empirical objects do have the appearance of being mind-independent — they confront us in space and time as separate objects — but that appearance is conditioned by (dependent on) the structures of perception and cognition. — Wayfarer

That is uncontroversial―of course appearances are mind-dependent, or body-dependent―however you want to frame it. It simply doesn't follow that what appears to us as objects in space and time are themselves mind-dependent ―you just don't seem to be able to understand that. They might be mind-dependent in themselves or they might not, and that is the question we cannot answer with any certainty.

They are never given except as appearances to a subject. That is the main point of the mind-created world argument, as it pertains to 'the world' as the sum of sense-able particulars. — Wayfarer

Again that is completely uncontroversial― if objects appear of course they appear to subjects (subjects being defined as percipients). Do the things which appear to us have their own existence independently of appearing to us? For me the answer would be "most likely they do". Of course I don't know for sure, but that seems to be the most plausible answer given everything we know about the world as it appears to be. If you don't think that is the most plausible answer, that's fine―you are entitled to that view, but don't pretend that there is a provable truth of the matter.

Mathematical truths are of a different order: they are independent of any individual mind in the sense that they’re the same for all who can reason — but they are only accessible to mind, not to the sensory perception (hence the subject of dianoia in Platonist terms, so of a 'higher' order than sensory perception.) — Wayfarer

Mathematical truths can be understood as possible logical entailments of the basic rules of number, and number can be understood to exist everywhere in the empirical world. It is a bit like chess―once the very simple rules of chess are established the possible series of combinations of the pieces are virtually infinite. We could say that there are a far greater number of those possible sequences of moves that have never occurred than those which have occurred. Do they exist out there somewhere? Or think of the simple iterative function which generates the Mandelbrot Set.

You've lost me once you start speaking of "higher order" because there can be no explanation of what it might be. We can have a feeling or sense of a higher order, but that is a different matter―it cannot be coherently subjected to analysis and discourse.

As for time and space, they’re not mind-independent containers but, as Kant said, “forms of intuition” — the necessary preconditions of any experience. They are objectively real for the subject, in the sense that all appearances to us must be ordered in temporal sequence and spatial perspective. But that’s not the same as saying they exist as things-in-themselves apart from all possible subjects.

You still seem to think I believe that the world is 'all in the mind', but I'm not arguing that. — Wayfarer

That time and space exist only for minds is itself not demonstrable, just as is the case with "things". That Kant said it is so does not make it true. I'm sorry but Kant is not my guru, I prefer to think for myself. That said I have read him and about him quite extensively so I'm well familiar with all the arguments. I know just where and why I part company with Kant.

I agree with Schopenhauer's critique― that there cannot be things in themselves if space and time exist only in relation to perception. Of course I don't accept that space and time exist only in relation to perception, because I find the idea that a completely unstructured undifferentiated "world in itself" could give rise to an unimaginably complex perceived world completely implausible― implausible as do I also find Schopenhauer's "solution" of a blind will. (And yes, I have fairly comprehensively read, and read about, Schopenhauer's philosophy― certainly enough to be well familiar with its central ideas. So I do understand his ideas, but I just don't agree with them).

I think you believe the world is an idea in some mind, not your mind or my mind, but some universal mind, probably not the mind of the Abrahamic God. If that is not what you believe then I confess I don't know what you are arguing.

Radical changes like that are bound to cost a lot in the short term. Which is not to say I think the DOGE was a good idea.

It's not a matter of 'locating' them. That depiction is only because of the inability to conceive of anything not located in time and space. The unreasonable effectiveness of mathematics in the natural sciences and the abilities that it provides to discover facts which otherwise could never be known, indicate that numbers are more than just 'products of thought'. They provide a kind of leverage (that also being something discovered by a mathematician, namely, Archimedes). Which lead to many amazing inventions such as computers, and the like, which all would have been inconceivable a generation or two ago (as previously discussed.) — Wayfarer

If we cannot coherently conceive of something being real without it existing somewhere at some time or everywhere at all times then that tells against your position.

If you want to say that the effectiveness of mathematics in science tells us anything about more than just how the world appears to us, then you are supporting the idea of a mind-independent reality. It seems obvious that number is immanent in the nature of things―once you have difference, diversity, structure then you have number. Time and space are quantifiable. But if you don't believe that difference, diversity, structure are mind-independently real or that time and space are mind-independently real―are you then
going to say that number is?

This is where I think the problem lies. They will say "I have direct knowledge of this, as do other Christians" (or whatever sect). You and I would largely reject this, but we also do not know their phenomenal experiences. Maybe they have... (this is unserious, but hopefully illustrates). — AmadeusD

Right, but religious experiences (which I of course would not deny that people do have) are not shareable, because they are "inner" experiences, not experiences of an "outer" "external" shared world. People may also experience hallucinations, and they are not considered to be empirically verifiable―if they were they would not be classed as hallucinations.

There are, on many reliable accounts, billions who do not find rape, murder, child abuse etc.. objectionable, when posited by a religious doctrine (or, rather, required by it). I suggest this is probably more prevalent than most in the West want to accept (and here we also need take into account the types within the West who perhaps feel these ways. We have enough abusers around for whom the Law is not a deterrent it seems). — AmadeusD

I think most people are against rape, murder, child abuse etc., when it comes to their own communities, to those they consider to be of their own kind. The word 'kindness' holds this implicit notion of kinship. People find it possible to accept violence against others if the others are understood to be enemies. But even then, look at the general disapproval of "war crimes'. The ideal would be if all people considered all others to be of their kind―humankind unbounded by religious bigotry and cultural antipathies. I don't deny that there are sociopaths, those lacking in normal human empathy, who don't have a problem with violent crimes.

If this is just a claim to an average, I think it's empirically true. I do not think your next claim follows. Among the 'smartest' people, you're likely to get more disagreement as each can bring more nuance and see different things in the same sets of data (or, different relations). I don't think this has much to do with feeling, though I am not suggesting we can avoid feelings when deciding on theories, for instance. — AmadeusD

I agree with you that it doesn't always predominately involve feeling (in the sense of wishing that things are some particular way) but I think in may cases it does, especially among the religious-minded. And remember I also said it can involve the hold that upbringing may have (although I guess that too might be counted as a kind of feeling―of for example attachment). Beyond that of course there will still be disagreement based on what different people find plausible when it comes to those matters the truth of which cannot be empirically determined (notably metaphysics and ontology).

Huh. I've had several give me what I think is a satisfactory answer. Something like:

"real" in relation to Universals obtains in their examples. The same as "red" which is obviously real, "three" can exist in the same way: In three things. Red exists in red things. I don't see a problem? — AmadeusD

Yes, but as I have said in this thread and many times elsewhere, I think number is found everywhere, which would mean it exists in the empirical world. Those who advocate for the reality of universals and number in some transcendental sense are the ones I had in mind―they are the ones who cannot say in what sense number could be real and yet not exist. (of course numbers considered as discrete entities, as opposed to number, are not encountered in the empirical world (except as numerals and of course they don't count because they are not themselves numbers, but are symbols of numbers).

We can agree, and do, agree on what's real in most contexts of ordinary usage. When it comes to metaphysics it's a different matter.
— Janus

This is important. "Real" is perfectly clear and useful in most contexts, because we know how to use it. — J

:up: Yes, and the interesting point seems to be that to agree on the meaning of 'real' would be to agree on what is real. The difficulty I have with those who posit the reality of transcendent things is that they are unable to say what "real" could mean in that connection.

:up:

Sounds dangerous―flipping tractors is not a good idea, but much easier to do than many people realize! Where the lantana is up here it is so vigorous it usually chokes out just about everything else. You get the odd rainforest pioneer tree coming up through it, and they are usually fairly easy to avoid. I acquired a little excavator a few months ago, and I intend to use that for the more precise work after the tractor has done most of the clearing, but since I bought it the ground's been too soggy to use it.

I think we might be straying off topic, but I don't think God will mind. Apparently he's very interested in everything we do.

There are a lot of old hippies up here to be sure. I have never really identified as a hippy, although I do have some sympathy for their values. I just like it up here, and it was time ( about six years ago) to get out of Sydney, since I was able to retire from my landscaping design and construction business.

Lantana is a bit of a bugger―though it's much easier to get rid of than devils fig. I just drive into it with the bucket of the tractor up and the blade of the bucket pointed down, lower the leading edge of the bucket to the ground and then reverse the tractor dragging the lantana out as it is so shallow rooted. Then I run over it with the slasher―it breaks down really fast―problem solved. The only bummer is that it serves as habitat for quite a few species of small birds, so I'm a little conflicted about getting rid of it.

I haven't been to Lake Cathie or Comboyne, but I stay at Flynn's Beach sometimes when I'm on my way down to and back from Sydney. I guess Lake Cathie would have been pretty conservative back in the day.

When I've asked, they mean what you go on to posit: it is an empirically real place one's soul ascends to after death (or, God, similar pseudo-physical terms get used). Not all, but that's the most common response I get. — AmadeusD

I've also struck theists who think that way. But it's not really defesnible since 'emprical' refers to the shared world of phenomena.

I presume the following was to indicate you want to ask about abstract, esoteric matters rather than "is gasoline running my car". I can. I can imagine a society in which there are less variant views generally. This is simply a temporal issue. in 2000 B.C it was probably quite easy, without force, to instantiate certain abstract beliefs in others, if you had a streak to do so. By that, I mean you are energized, articulate and willing to engage, no that you want to force yourself on others. — AmadeusD

Yes, esoteric matters. I did say I think there is general agreement about the nature of the perceived world. I even think there is general agreement when it comes to the "serious" moral issues like murder, rape, theft, assault, exploitation and so on. Admittedly some of the "agreement" may be lip service only.

That there would have been a greater degree of agreement in authoritarian and theocratic societies is no surprise I would say.

You've hit the nail here. I think the problem is that there are dumber, and smarter people. Those dumber people who might actually be precluded from employing the mental techniques required for this type of refinement are going to argue that they aren't dumber, and it's you (whoever, whatever) who has prevented their achieving success. This is patent nonsense, but goes to the issues i'm speaking about I guess: If they think "real" means what they interpret their Lot as, then we can't argue with them. There's no refinement to be had. — AmadeusD

I can't agree with you here. Of course there are smarter and dumber people, but if we allow that philosophers in general are among the smartest people, the great degree of disagreement among them when it comes to metaphysics at least shows that what people believe is more driven by emotion and upbringing than by intelligence.

Expertise is far easier to determine in science, technological pursuits, trades and crafts, and even in the arts technical expertise, if not aesthetic quality, is relatively easy to determine.

As to agreement about the meaning of 'real' I haven't seen a good definition emerge from the context of idealist and anti-realist metaphysics. For example when Platonists say universals and numbers are real, they cannot explain what they mean, because the usual understanding of what is real involves physical existence somewhere and/or the ability to act on other things. So when asked as to where the numbers and universals are to be found if somewhere other than in human thought, no answer is forthcoming.

There is plenty of herb available up here. I don't grow it myself. So much rain up here for the last few years―makes it difficult to get anything done. The weeds grow up here when it's warm and wet like you wouldn't beleiuve, and we are afflicted by the most horrible thorny weed called Giant Devil's Fig, apparently brought into Australia by some idiot to use as rootstock for growing aubergines (it's also in the Nightshade family). There are forests of the stuff everywhere up here―it's a massive problem.

Added: Not sure we should count Camus as an existentialist... — Banno

I have also read a bit of Camus―The Outsider, The First Man and The Myth of Sysyphus. If I recall correctly he disavowed being an existentialist and was opposed to any and all philosophical systems. I also seem to recall he and Sartre fell out over the latter's adherence to Marxism. I think his fiction is much better than Sartre's (although that said I've read only his Nausea).

That's excellent! I live on fifteen acres and recently had a dam put in, but there are so many other land maintenance issues that I am yet to get to starting a vegetable garden. It's definitely on the list. Luckily here in Nimbin we have excellent local farmer markets and a great organic food co-op.

We can agree, and do, agree on what's real in most contexts of ordinary usage. When it comes to metaphysics it's a different matter.

So, what do the theists mean when they say that God or Heaven is real? Mostly when we say something is real, we mean empirically real, that is that it is part of the shared environment of things, processes and events.

When it comes to metaphysics, if one wants to occupy a position, "my truth" is all that can be had. I've said elsewhere that the only criterion for veracity of metaphysical claims is plausibility. Good luck trying to get everyone to agree on what's plausible.

Wayfarer specifically has metaphysics in mind (although he might also have in mind the different ethics that might be thought to accompany different metaphysics), and if we all agreed on what "is real" meant in that context, then I can't see how we would not all be agreeing not merely on the meaning of the term but also as to what is real.

In the past in the West let's say for argument's sake everyone believed in God (or at least paid lip service to the belief out of fear). Can you imagine any context other than an authoritarian one, where everyone would agree (about abstruse as opposed to merely everyday matters?

Yes, thanks. Looks interesting...I will read it later...now I have some work to do outside.

The fact that 'real' and 'reality' don't have 'agreed upon definitions' is actually symptomatic of the cultural problem which the OP is attempting, in its own way, to address. — Wayfarer

You mean the "problem" that we don't all think the same, that we can have different viewpoints?

You would have us all return to living "under the aegis of tutelage"?

How conservative, how dogmatic, of you.

...criteria for the identification of things
— Janus
How do these differ from just plain properties - that is, we can identify the kettle form others if we specify that it is the one on the stove; but being on the stove is not, I suppose, a part of the essence of being that kettle. — Banno

I was thinking in terms of identification of things as kinds of thing, not identification of things as particular things. For the purposes of the latter we could bring relations into consideration. Although all indivduals have unique identifying qualities too.

For example we could say that there are essential characteristics that all tigers share, while there are also unique individual variations of those characteristics. A question I've wondered about is, in the context of modal logic, how far we can go in considering all those properties to be contingent, that is not logically necessary.

Perhaps the subjective experience of information processing systems of sufficient number and/or complexity is awareness. And when sufficient feedback loops are also present, the experience is self-awareness. — Patterner

Whitehead pointed out that any object is "subject" to effects from its environment. So cliffs are weathered, are subject to sunlight, wind and water erosion for example. But we don't usually think of inanimate objects as possessing internally maintained structural integrity. We might think that way about cells and even microphysical particles, though.

So, along with the idea of internally maintained structural integrity comes the biological phenomenon of homeostasis, and this requires the ability to respond to the external and internal environments appropriately, something that a rock responding to the sunlight, wind and rain by being eroded could hardly be said to be doing.

Of course even the most complex organisms, even we humans, are " weathered", "eroded" by the internal and external environments, so we are "subjects" in that sense as well.

I see no problem with the idea of essential qualities or attributes. But should we think of them as logically necessary or merely as criteria for the identification of things?

However, it seems to me that if the 'reality beyond/before phenomena' was structureless, it would not possible for us to give it a 'form'. — boundless

I made the same point myself earlier in the thread but it received no response―which is probably understandable.

Not sufficient to explain the commonality of experience. That's why Kant says there are things in themselves which appear to us as phenomena. Schopenhauer disagreed and claimed there cannot be things in themselves if there is no space and time (both of which are necessary for differentiation) except in individual minds. To posit an undifferentiated, unstructured thing in itself that gives rise to an unimaginably complex world of things on a vast range of scales is, to say the least, illogical. — Janus

Kant may have "gone too far" as you say―it depends on how you read him. There are realist interpretations of Kant―that is there are scholars who interpret him as thinking that things in themselves are mind-independently real, but unknowable as they are in themselves (and that by mere definition) and knowable only as they appear to us.

Anti-realists, anti-materialists, anti-physicalists have a vested interest in denying the reality of things in themselves, because to allow them would be to admit that consciousness is not fundamental, and, very often it seems, for religious or spiritual reasons they want to believe that consciousness is fundamental, especially if they don't want to accept the Abrahamic god. One can, without inconsistency, accept the Abrahamic god and be a realist about mind-independent existents.

Nominalism was clearly part of what was going on, but something as complex as the Renaissance/Reformation must have involved many interacting factors. — Ludwig V

That's right, it is just one thread within the whole tapestry. The attempt to characterize nominalism as 'where we went wrong' is a tendentious, "just-so" story. There are many points in history, right back to the advent of agriculture and land ownership where it could be said we "went the wrong way". The polemic between nominalism and realism of universals is a minor philosophical issue which is of concern only to (some) of the intellectual elites. There are also more nuanced views which avoid this very polemic.

I would go further and suggest that there are no "slam-dunk" arguments anywhere in philosophy. If there were, they would demolish ideas without understand them properly, and in metaphysics all ideas deserve a proper understanding — Ludwig V

Right, I'm obviously not going to disagree (except that you are "going further") since I said as much myself in the very passage you are responding to.

However, your argument proves too much. It is always the case that conclusions depend on what assumptions are made at the start. But that applies to good arguments as much as to bad ones.
I do agree that there is no fact of the matter that will determine the truth or falsity of any metaphysical view. But that doesn't necessarily mean that all views are equal. — Ludwig V

It is strange that you seem to think you are disagreeing with me somehow, when I have already said pretty much what you are saying here. Recall that earlier I said it comes down to what seems most plausible. Of course I agree that there are good arguments and bad arguments, and assuming that we are referring to consistent (with their premises) arguments, then evaluation must comes down to plausibility. It is a little like aesthetics―we all know there are good and bad artworks, but a precise and determinable measure of aesthetic value , just as a precise and determinable measure of plausibility, is not possible.

"Supervenience already implies a function from micro-configurations to macro-properties: if two systems are identical in all micro respects, they must be identical in their macro-properties. But this function need not be definable in purely micro-level terms. The criteria that fix the mapping may depend on high-level structures or capacities that cannot themselves be specified without invoking macro-level concepts." — Pierre-Normand

If you are trying to describe macro-level functions in micro-level terms, then the macro-level description is also indispensable. Otherwise what would it be that you are trying to describe in micro-level terms?

This just seems obvious. But the complaint that seems to be commonly made is that the macro-level description is lost in the micro-level description, and that the micro-level description is thus not a true description. But how could it be otherwise?

I think this problem is what constitutes the so-called "hard problem". No micro-level description will be acceptable to those who demand that physicalism should be able to explain subjective experience, if it eliminates the macro-level description. but it must eliminate the macro-level description (Sellars "manifest image" of human experience and judgement) otherwise it would not be a micro-level description.

So does this substance called mind have a molecular structure? — Wayfarer

And here is a fine example of this conflation of paradigms.