…..a bare minimum criterion….
— creativesoul

I agree that for a creature to have a meaningful experience, such creature must be able to at the very least describe the conditions of that experience, even if only to himself, in order for the meaning of it to be given. — Mww

I don't agree with that. Weird way to use "I agree".

At what age are we able to do that?


I agree that that is one kind of meaningful experience. There are several. Your proposal has several layers of complexity; several layers of existential dependency. We're looking for a bare minimum form of meaningful experience. We start with us. We set that out. Then, we look to see if there are any parts that do not require language. We end up with parts and kinds of experience that require language, and parts that are not existentially dependent upon language. Perception is one necessary constituent thereof. Perception is necessary but insufficient for attributing meaning to different things. I think we agree there.

All experience is meaningful to the creature having the experience. Perception is necessary but insufficient for attributing meaning to different things; meaningful experience.

The experience you suggest as bare minimum is itself existentially dependent upon language use(naming and descriptive practices). The consequence is not being able to admit that any of us have meaningful experience prior to becoming able to describe the conditions of our own experience. That is metacognition. We're looking for cognition.

You begin by denying that all sorts of humans have meaningful experience.

..we must first get our own meaningful experience right prior to being capable of discriminating between experiences that only humans are capable of and experiences that some other creatures are as well.
— creativesoul

And how do we get our experiences right? — Mww

That's a great question. Methodological approach matters. Guiding principles matter. Basic assumptions matter. Comparison to/with current knowledge base matters.

I think one important thing to keep in mind is that meaningful human experience happens long before we begin to take account of it. I would go as far as to say that meaningful human experience began happening prior to language creation, acquisition, usage, and/or mastery of it.

There is when and where we would 'look for' common denominators with language less creatures also capable of having meaningful experience(s).

Again, I think that one basic necessity for having meaningful experience is the ability/capability of attributing meaning to different things. I do not see how it is possible for any creature that is inherently incapable of perceiving different things. Hence...

The biology matters.

Just because it is so for humans does not mean it is so for all intellects. — Mww

Agreed. A little early on for an anthropomorphism charge though.

If it is the case that multiple kinds of creatures are capable of meaningful experience, including those without naming and descriptive practices, then we would expect to find some shared common denominators/elemental constituents between the candidates that satisfy the bare minimum criterion for being a meaningful experience. One basic common denominator - a bare minimum criterion for experience - shared between all individual cases thereof, is that the experience itself is meaningful to the creature having it.

If all experience is meaningful to the creature having the experience, then the candidate under consideration(the creature having the experience) must be capable of attributing meaning to different things. That basic capability must be shared/possessed by all creatures capable of having meaningful experience(s). I'm saying that direct perception of distal objects is necessary for all cases of human perception, and that there are many other creatures capable of it as well.

Are you saying that direct perception of distal objects is not necessary for meaningful experience, or that direct perception of distal objects is insufficient for meaningful experience, or that direct perception of distal objects is something that is exclusive to only humans?

This presupposes all experiencing creatures experience via direct perception, which makes explicit there is no other way to experience, irrespective of the type of creature. We have no warrant for claiming that is a valid condition... — Mww

Sure we do. It just hasn't been laid bare yet. It's a complicated topic, and you're not easily convinced into believing anything that contradicts your current view.

What meaningful experience is of a creature that is entirely incapable of perceiving distal objects? How could mindless behaviour evolve into meaningful experience(becoming meaningful to the creature) if not by virtue of the creature being and/or becoming capable of attributing meaning to different elements/constituents therein?

More rhetoric straight from the lips of the disinformation campaign...

...the irony.

There is a distinction between meaningful and meaningful TO someone.
— Possibility

I missed this. I completely disagree.

If we replace "someone" with "a creature capable of attributing meaning" there is no distinction between being meaningful and being meaningful to a creature capable of attributing meaning.
— creativesoul

Okay, now I think we might be getting somewhere. You’re talking about meaningful as a way of being or becoming in relation to a creature. This seems to be a temporal relation for you, as if at some point the relation, once meaningful, can cease to be so. Would that be accurate? — Possibility

I know that this was years ago, but recent discussions on the forum have me revisiting this thread.

I must've been in too argumentative a mood or something else perhaps when first reading the above, because upon rereading it today, I found myself wondering why I had not concurred, hesitantly anyway, with the interpretation above.

Yes! Without doubt, meaningfulness has temporal duration/relation. Things that were once meaningful can cease to be so.

After rereading this thread, I want to once again commend you on continuing to maintain a respectful 'tone' despite what clearly looks to me - now at least - like my own unwarranted bristling/taking unwarranted offense at different times throughout.

Experience, as such, yes, the reason being, all of that by which experience is considered a valid concept is derived purely a priori from the nature of human intelligence alone, and insofar as this concept is a priori, it can never apply outside the intelligence from which it arises.That being said, experience, as such, is forbidden to non-human animals, but that does not preclude them having something conceptually congruent with it, albeit exclusive to their kind of intelligence. — Mww

Even granting Kantian terms, that first part makes little to no sense to me whatsoever M.

:brow:

Have you forgotten that, in philosophy, a priori and a posteriori are used to distinguish types of knowledge, justification, or argument by their reliance on experience. A priori knowledge is supposed to be independent of any experience.

I agree that there are differences between human experience and other animals', but there also are similarities. Finding and/or figuring out what those similarities are finds importance here. I mentioned a general rule of thumb which ought help guide our endeavor. All experience is meaningful to the creature having the experience. Here, despite our differences in preferred terminological frameworks, perhaps progress can be made. You wrote "exclusive to their kind of intelligence" which may provide segue.

I'm arguing that there are things we can know about other creatures' minds, and thus experience, based upon adequate evidence and sufficient reason to infer/conclude that other creatures have minds/experiences. The catch here, however, is that we must first get our own meaningful experience right prior to being capable of discriminating between experiences that only humans are capable of and experiences that some other creatures are as well. Successfully doing so avoids anthropomorphism. It is worth mentioning here again, that we need not know everything in order to know some things.

Circling back to the OP...

Direct perception of distal objects is one physiological capability that all experiencing creatures must possess. This points towards the irrevocably important role that biological machinery plays.

These sort of considerations warrant their own thread.

No it's not. Light often causes us to see colours, but they are not the same thing, as evidenced by the obvious fact that I can see colours when I dream and my eyes are closed in a dark room. — Michael

measure the wavelength of light and then program it to output the word "red" if the wavelength measures 700nm.

Well, say what you will... when your eyes are closed in a dark room or you're dreaming, you're doing neither seeing light nor seeing colors. You're dreaming or hallucinating. I've seen enough here.

Be well.

This is where you're getting confused by grammar. The words "see" and "experience" and "perceive" and "aware" are all being used ambiguously and interchangeably. — Michael

An open admission of equivocation.

Are you asking if I'm aware that eliminative materialism and property dualism are incompatible? Yes, I'm aware. I'm undecided between them, but my inclination favours property dualism although I'm open to eliminative materialism. — Michael

Arguing for them both results in saying incompatible things when compared to one another. Have you been arguing for both throughout this thread, at different times arguing for one, and then the other later?

Hence, we've arrived at incoherency/self-contradiction.
— creativesoul

How so? — Michael

Light is color. Light does not reside in the brain/mind. Remember this?

It's not odd at all. We build it to measure the wavelength of light and then program it to output the word "red" if the wavelength measures 700nm.

Your words about color matching. Either light resides in the mind or color is not a constituent of experience.

You do realize that they are incompatible with one another, yes?

Have you abandoned the eliminative materialist approach in favor of a sense data theorist one?

Are those constituents of experience? Earlier you said they were. Hence, we've arrived at incoherency/self-contradiction.

ndirect realists don't believe or claim that our eyes respond to light reflected by mental phenomena and that our ears respond to sound emitted by mental phenomena, so you clearly misunderstand indirect realism and are arguing against a strawman. — Michael

Coherency/consistency demands that all constituents of experience reside in the mind.

Light comes from where? External to the mind. So, light itself cannot be a constituent of experience. What is color again?

What all is involved? That’s gonna be a pretty long list, I should think, depending on what one thinks experience is. In my world, experience is an end, the terminus of the human speculative intellectual methodology, from which follows, all that is involved for that end, is the sum of the means necessary for the attainment of it. — Mww

Indeed. Carelessly worded on my part. I suspect neither of us requires omniscience from us in order to know anything about experience though. I also note the use of "human" here. Combined with the earlier reply concerning the cow, I'm left with a question: Do you restrict experience to only humans? Are non human animals forbidden, by definition, from having any experience?

For my part, although we cannot know everything, we can surmise one very important feature of our own experience. It is meaningful to us. Thus, if any other mind is capable of experience, it ought at least be meaningful to them. I'm curious what you think about that?

Help me understand what agreement we’re having here? — Mww

Seeing a cow requires a cow. It's the direct perception part we agree on, I think? Perhaps it's the a priori reasoning that cows are necessary for seeing cows? We differ when it comes to what all is involved in/for experience.

The difference now is, you said “talk of what the cow is doing”, which presupposes it as an extant experience. — Mww

This topic finds agreement between us.

What the cow is doing may or may not qualify as an experience. Extant behaviour seems better here. Experience is always meaningful to the creature having the experience. So, we ought to know how creatures attribute meaning in order to have any clue about whether or not cows can have experience, and to what extent they are or become meaningful to the cow.

Biology looms large.

One cannot adhere to both, an eliminative materialist, and a sense datum theorist account of perception.

What do you think "constituent" means? — Michael

Feigned interest is rather unbecoming.

Re read our exchanges, or better yet, click my avatar, click my comments and read for yourself how I use the word. Then you'll know what it means.

Something that exists in one location cannot be a constituent of something that exists in a different location. — Michael

:lol:

That's the missing presupposition. As I said, it didn't follow. The above is just plain false or there is no such things as constituents of any kind. Two things cannot occupy the same place at the same time.

Conscious experience occurs in the brain, distal objects exist outside the brain, — Michael

What is below does not follow from what is above.

...therefore distal objects are not constituents of conscious experience.

.

Measuring is an interesting act to consider here. If all constituents of experience exist only in the head and never distal objects, then what exactly is happening when we begin measuring the size of the red cup? We're certainly not measuring things that exist in the brain. The same question can and ought be asked about measuring the reflected wavelengths of the visible spectrum. Do we measure things in our brain, or do we measure light being reflected off the cup, neither of which are in our brain?

It follows that on a naïve realist view, the veridical perceptions and hallucinations in question have a different nature: the former have mind-independent objects as constituents, and the latter do not.

Yup.

[N]aïve realists hold that ... [t]he conscious visual experience you have of the oak has that very tree as a literal part. — French and Phillips 2023

Yup.

when we describe what's going on when we dream and hallucinate we're describing what's happening to/in us and not what's happening elsewhere in the world. The indirect realist simply argues that the same can be true of veridical experience because veridical experience, hallucinations, and dreams are all of a common kind – mental states with phenomenal character – that differ only in their cause (which is not to say that we can't also talk about their cause). — Michael

That's yet another place in reasoning where the indirect position goes wrong. All experience is experience, of that we can be certain. It doesn't follow from that that there are not differences between veridical, hallucinatory, and illusory experiences. It certainly does not follow that veridical experiences are the same as hallucinations and dreams. That is to willfully neglect the difference between them.

Another issue is the unstated but mistaken presupposition at work here. Distal objects do both, cause and become and/or 'act' as necessary elemental constituents of veridical experience. Those are not mutually exclusive roles when it comes to how physiological sensory perception works. Moreover, it is only after those things have happened that the biological machinery is primed and ready(so to speak) act as if red cups are being perceived once again, even though they're not.


----------------------------------------------------------------

Circling back to where I left you to think about the difference between a dinner party and a painting. Dinner parties are experiences. Paintings are not. That's one difference. Dinner parties consist of guests, hosts, food, drink, conversation, furniture, etc. If apple pie is served, then it is a constituent of that dinner party. It's not a mystery. It's very straightforward. Some parties may include and/or directly involve a painting. If the party includes a conversation about a particular painting on the wall, then that painting is also a constituent of that party. Anyone involved and/or listening to the discourse is having an experience that includes the painting, and the paint as constituents thereof.

In short, portraits are not experiences. Dinner parties are.

This is the third time I've pointed out the issue with your analogy. It's false. Continuing to use it is a textbook example of a non sequitur, strawman, red herring, misunderstanding, and/or perhaps deliberate misattribution of meaning to the term "constituent". Very unhelpful.

Red cups are necessary elemental constituents of seeing red cups. The red cup has a reflective outer layer. The color we talk about is not inherent to the cup, but the outer layer is, so the cup inherently reflects/refracts the wavelengths we've named "red". The cup will reflect those wavelengths if we all die tomorrow.

Seeing red cups that are not there is malfunctioning biology. The red cup is not a part of hallucinations. Hence, the difference between hallucinations and veridical experience is whether or not distal objects are constituents thereof.

...our perceptions are shaped by those objects. — Luke

That's what I'm saying; earlier pointing at the need to unpack the phrase.

He didn't listen.

I'll leave you to think about it.

So, distal objects are literal component parts of conscious experience; in the same sense, perhaps, that the red paint is a literal component part of a painting — Michael

No.

In the sense that an apple pie is part of a dinner party.

For my part, the issue is that some folk think there is a need to justify that they see this text, even as they read it.

But that is a symptom of an excess of doubt. Cartesian fever. — Banno

I think Searle may agree with that sentiment.

Does sensory experience provide us with direct knowledge of distal objects and their mind-independent properties? — Michael

Not all direct realists hold that color is a mind-independent property of distal objects.

Odd that all that color matching can be successfully achieved by a brainless machine.
— creativesoul

It's not odd at all. We build it to measure the wavelength of light and then program it to output the word "red" if the wavelength measures 700nm.

This doesn't entail naive colour realism. — Michael

To be expected from another option.

If impressing one's own face into a custard pie does not count as directly perceiving the pie, then nothing will and one's framework falls apart if it is of the materialist/physicalist variety. One issue is the failure of Michael's framework to be able to conclude/admit that the custard pie is a constituent of such an experience.

The absolute epitome of trying to ignore the issue — AmadeusD

I strongly suspect you and I have different opinions on what the issue is.

See what happens when one irrelevant comment is made? It becomes the focus. Easy to avoid the difficulty that way, I suppose.

:brow:

...this has nothing to do with the dispute between naive and indirect realists. — Michael

Sigh...

Yeah, other options should be that way, ought they not?

You asked for other options, and yet complain when they avoid the rabbit holes. Have fun, I've got a vanity to paint.

It's not in my brain. It's wildflower blue coloured paint, and that's not in my brain either. It's in the can. There are machines that can give an exact color match. You give it a sample, and it spits out a formula to exactly match that sample.

Odd that all that color matching can be successfully achieved by a brainless machine.

Have fun.

I don't know what you mean by "seeing things". — Michael

If the cow is in the field, then it is not in the brain. If we see the cow, then we see things that are not in the brain. The cow is one of the things we see.

What scientific account of ocular nature forbids us from seeing cows in fields?

What scientific account of the conscious 'phenomenal' character of experience allows for distal objects and their properties to be constituents? — Michael

The "phenomenal" approach presupposes a difference between reality and appearances thereof. So, that's of no help here.

What scientific account of ocular nature forbids seeing things that are not in the brain?

I do not see how scientific evidence refutes 2. The emphasized part needs unpacked.
— creativesoul

The important part is this: “… where this is understood in a constitutive, rather than merely a causal, sense.”

Distal objects like cows are causally responsible for the activity in my visual cortex, and so the resulting experience, but they are not constituents of that resulting experience. — Michael

Right, for you, according to the framework you're employing, that's the important part, but science has nothing to say specifically about the notion of "experience" one employs.

For example, some hold that all experience can be reduced to the physical, in the head, or something similar. Consistency/coherency alone demands that all components/constituents within experience must also boil down to the physical, in the head, etc. That seems to be what you're arguing for/from.

Others claim that experience is entirely subjective, in the head, but cannot be reduced to the physical. They claim that experience has a qualitative nature to it, that there is something it is like to be an experiencing creature.

Others claim that experience is an ongoing process, consisting of all sorts of things, some in the head, some not. Consistency/coherency alone demands that not all components of experience are located in the head.

The history of the topic tends to work from/employ the subjective/objective dichotomy recently employing a basic materialist/physicalist approach. Searle argued against computationalism/functionalism. Nagel argued that the materialist/physicalist/reductionist approaches fail to explain the subjective nature of 'what it's like to be' an experiencing creature. Chalmers granted Nagel's argument and claimed that a purely reductive physicalist approach leaves out the subjective nature of qualia within all experience. Dennett wanted to eliminate the subjective 'what it's like' and the qualitative parts of experience by virtue of offering materialist/physicalist explanations in addition to showing the inherent issues with qualia.

I, for one, when it comes to the nature of experience, reject objective/subjective, mental/physical, and internal/external dichotomous approaches, because none of them are capable of properly accounting of things that consist of both, and are thus neither one nor the other.

Specifically, I think that "our visual perception of these material objects is not mediated by the perception of some other entities, such as sense-data" means "the conscious 'phenomenal' character of that experience is shaped by the objects of perception and their features, where this is understood in a constitutive, rather than merely a causal, sense."

Those who call themselves non-naive direct realists seem to want to accept the first part but reject the second part, but I can't make sense of the first part except as the second part.

So the relevant considerations are whether or not these are true:

1. Everyday material objects, such as caterpillars and cadillacs, have mind-independent existence
2. The conscious “phenomenal” character of that experience is shaped by the objects of perception and their features, where this is understood in a constitutive, rather than merely a causal, sense
3. These objects possess all the features that we perceive them to have

If (1) is true and (2) true then direct realism is true (and (3) is true).
If (1) is true and (2) is false then indirect realism is true (even if (3) is true).

I think the scientific evidence supports the claim that (1) is true and that (2) and (3) are false. Therefore, I think the scientific evidence supports indirect realism. — Michael

I personally would reject 3, for it overstates the case. Some, not all. I do not see how scientific evidence refutes 2. The emphasized part needs unpacked.

P.S.

Strictly speaking I would reject 1 as well, but for the sake of this argument, I'll let the attribution of "mind independent" to cadillacs stand, although they are not. It's the difference between an object's emergence and/or persistence as compared/contrasted with/to "existence". Cadillacs may persist for some time in a mind independent fashion, after they emerge in a mind dependent one. They do not persist until after they emerge, so...

Not necessarily. I’m undecided between eliminative materialism and property dualism. — Michael

You may be interested in listening to Searle's lectures on philosophy of mind. It's an entire course available for free on youtube. He has an interesting take on this subject matter that you may find appealing. You could start around lecture 8 to avoid the groundwork setting out the history/exegesis of the topic prior to him getting into his own view on it.

Crossposted. I'll address the quote soon.