I suppose some kind of answer to this would arise if you look at our closest genetic creatures, namely primates.

There have been studies done on different kinds of them, and they show varying levels of cognition. They can solve some problems, but nowhere near close to what we can do.

You mention another issue which is problematic to this day, thinking. We don't know what it is, nor what it consists of in. When we attempt to say something about it, we are separating several cognitive components that may be deeply intertwined.

Yes, language is a very important - perhaps a crucial component. But when we go on to speak of non-linguistic thought, here we are really lost and have been for thousands of years.

Cult X by Fuminori Nakamura

Yes. That's in line with 'my' point. [because knowing is make-believe]. We cannot know what body is We can only be the body is-ing. — ENOAH

It's not that we can't know. Maybe we in principle can't know, that is yet to be established. We may never know what a body is. It's also possible that we may someday be able to postulate what a body is, and then we can formulate body problems.

Hence attributing a "x-ing" activity to a body, suggests there are other "x-ing" activities that are not body.

At some vague length of time, that real natural process evolved into an autonomously moving system, with its own laws etc., not just admittedly already mediated sensation, but sensensatiin displaced by a working world, a system of triggers and responses, by nature empty fiction; though displacing everything, including primitive sensations and feelings. — ENOAH

I think a lot of these issues arise from taking the given for granted: C.I. Lewis and Raymond Tallis discuss these topics very lucidly. As it stands, the issue of sensations being more true or real can be misleading, to my eyes anyway.

where does body stop and mind begin? — ENOAH

I think there is good evidence that indicates that we don't know what a body is. If we don't know what a body is, then I don't think it makes much sense to say that a mind is a thing distinct from a body, or an additional stuff to body.

Mind is part of body and body is part of the world.

That may well be interesting. I'll be sure to read some and give my opinion and/or ask for feedback, etc.

Ok, let's me take it piece by piece, see if I follow.

I am understanding virtually everything uniquely experienced by humans to be only experienced in the first place because over millenia (generationally transmitted) our once simply organic sense 'organ', imagination, overproduced and the images 'intended' to be used for conditioning responses, e.g. a roar means run, evolved, eventually into language, and out of that, or around the same time, human Mind. — ENOAH

That already has some important mental components, which, though appear to be given (that is, self-evidently "there"). If correct, then by already stating that a sense induces a creature to run, or attack a prey, or indicating mating season, you have built in a sensation as representation. Sensations "by themselves" are just noise, photons bouncing off objects, molecules hitting our nose, etc.

The "run", "see prey", etc. Are already transformed.

It's not clear at the outset, that a sensation caused us to develop language, it appears to be a genetic mutation that spread to the species very quickly.

The triggered feelings and actions, and effects on the body and nature are real; but the coding, Mind, and the so called experiences, really just empty structures having evolved into the linear form, Narrative, requiring a Subject, a dialectic, the illusion of truth, for what is just a structure, belief, one of the neverending settlements of dialectic, these are what I call fiction--maybe exagerratedly out of an overzealousness about the understanding (not invented, found in/ constructed out of everything heading its way)--the point is this. — ENOAH

So, we get feelings directly, no mental component is involved, but somehow when it comes to mind or intellect, then we do add this component.

But if we look at animals, who lack language, they don't merely take a flash of light, or a moving bush and stay still, they react to it in a manner which is appropriate to the situation, they may run, or freeze for a moment, but this is interpreting what is going on, this has some mental properties.

Only if they did nothing, and did not react to stimuli, could you make a case that there is just senses and nothing else, as I see it.

Reality, the feelings and actions, the sensations unfiltered, and drives, including bonding, are not [meant to be: meaning is exactly what is constructed, hence the brackets] experienced that way, fictionally, in linear narrative form attaching to the Subject. The body, Reality, is not in knowing, the becoming narrative, a fiction, but in being [the] body. — ENOAH

Here is the issue again, sensations are not unfiltered. If they were unfiltered, we wouldn't have them.

You can say that with human language, we do add meaning to things, but I don't see that as being less "real" than sensations. It's a faculty we have, that other animals lack.

Hence sensations and "narratives" are both constructions of the occasion of sense. Again, a sense of burning, is particles moving quickly, but creatures react far more richly than the stimuli would lead is to believe.

On the (admittedly weak; but ultimately, all we've got) prima facie presumption (which has been mistakenly rejected) that what we sense is a real world.

I would submit that it is our constructions which have seduced us into thinking our senses cannot deliver reality. We are not born with any 'reasons' to doubt that they do. It is our perceptions which displace/distort our senses; our emotions which d/d our feelings; our ideas which d/d our [intuitive] imaginations, etc — ENOAH

I am of the opinion that what we have access to are representation (or notions or anticipations) on the occasion of sense. There are "real", as real as anything could be.

Whatever may be the ultimate cause of these representations, is beyond our knowledge.

So, I think the senses do give us access to reality. But that reality is a notion, which is the only reality any creature can have, as I see it.

Even so, I don't follow what you are saying about mind or self being more fictional than body.

That's the grand old problem of the self. It could be an illusion, of course. It may not be one, also possible. We don't know enough to establish this one way or the other.

But I do agree that we cannot detach mind from body, as if it were a spirit animating otherwise dead matter.

Now, you say that "I" is a construction, which, is in a sense true: everything we analyze is a construction, including what we call our "body".

Nature does not distinguish.

I don't quite see how mind could be "more fictional" than body.

That's fine and a lot of it true. However, it seems to me to be the same issue Descartes pointed to back in his day. He had scientific and religious reasons to make such a distinction.

We no longer (of very few of us do) speak of substance dualism, of a body being a substance and the mind being another different substance. We speak now of the so called "hard problem", which is that we can't explain in scientific terms, subjectivity in essence.

The tone and perspective are secular, the problem is similar in most respects.

The issue, if I understood you correctly, is merely a linguistic one. What we choose to call "mind" or "body" and what is it that you want to include (or exclude) in the definition. But I don't see any logical problem in saying that mind is part of a body.

Or alternatively, that body is perceived through mind. I don't see a dualism here.

You don't hear people saying there is a body gravity problem or a biological mental problem. Which you could choose to make a problem quite legitimately.

It depends on the level of specificity you want in an answer. Corpses are human bodies, no? Do corpses have minds or experiences? It would appear not. So, the one can exist without the other.

Likewise, it is at least conceivable that one's consciousness could exist outside the body, or be transferred to other bodies. Personally, I think that conceivability is a very weak standard for possibility, since we can often conceive the impossible as possible due to not understanding what we are talking about, but at the very least the two don't seem as essentially linked as say, a triangle and its lines.

---
Anyhow, I think the better arguments for the existence of incorporeal souls' existence outside the body tend to rely on a very particular metaphysics, and presenting them in a coherent manner is going to require extremely large detours into concepts like vertical reality, the nature of being/God, Logos/logoi, etc. But when people try to copy these arguments into the context of prevailing contemporary metaphysical assumptions I think they almost always fall incredibly flat, and I don't think they can be justified as part of a philosophy of nature. — Count Timothy von Icarus

The corpse example does not say much. I mean, if the body is dead then the mind is dead too. You would have to show how a mind can exist outside a corpse, which is crucial evidence that is missing. That would be a very strong indication that mind and body are different categories.

Conceivable, yes. But very weak, as you say.

You could attempt to give a naturalistic account of mind being separate from body, without going into Platonic metaphysics. You could say that the laws or habits of mind are, in principle, different from the laws of physics and heavenly bodies. Maybe that's true. Maybe not.

But I don't think we know nearly enough about body to say that the mind cannot be a body modified in a specific way.

I limit myself to monism, and I call it "materialism", but it can be called "naturalism" or "mentalism", it doesn't matter much. I very much admire the Platonic tradition, and I think it has a lot of value, but it also needs to be modernized a bit.

Those are all very, very different positions; but you said it like they are all claiming the same thing. — Bob Ross

Not really. Not in this specific case. They are using different words to signal the same general thing: what we have access to are out mental constructions, not external objects.

The very idea that objects cause these “anticipations” (or more accurately: representations) is itself subjected to your own critique; which you seem to have overlooked. — Bob Ross

This is what is being discussed in effect: when we speak about "ordinary objects", we are actually speaking about representations (notions, anticipations) and is what any example we can use to illustrate any point consists of.

The only "help" I can see this offering, as opposed to thinking that we see are objects themselves, is that conscious experience is what we are most confident exists in the universe.

We complicate things considerably if we say that we are confident that objects (which ground) our representations also exist. It's a postulate, which I think makes sense, but now we have to worry about "proving" representationsin addition to objects which stimulate these representations.

The latter is extremely obscure to analyze with much depth.

What is a body? Can you specify when a body "ends" and a mind "begins"?

I can't. Either mind is part of body, or body is part of mind. The point is the distinction needs to be made as to what the difference between these two are - IF it can be stated.

So, asking am I my body is problematic.

Quite. For all we know the cup could have vanished from existence, or turned into a basketball or anything you can imagine. Quite unlikely, but we can't say for certain - at least I can't.

But to claim the cup remaining were I last put it proves it exists, no more proves that because I can see an oasis in the distance on a hot sunny day, they must exist in the world as well.

It is easier on the brain. I personally can't get over the fact that what we take for granted (almost) completely is precisely what we put into the object. It's so counterintuitive, goes against every fiber of my instincts that I can't believe it. Yet it must be true.

one can trust their experience enough to know that (1) they exist — Bob Ross

Well...

One thing is to state this within an everyday context of tables and chairs and going to work and going to sleep and the whole routine thing. This is the given.

But in the empirical world, there are no certainties, only grades of confidence. They can be quite high (I know what I am experiencing at this moment) to medium (I don't know if that person is pretending to be in pain) to low (am I dreaming?).

You can't prove objects exist. We take it for granted for the sake of convenience, but the proof is not established. It may sound excessively skeptical, but is nonetheless a serious issue.

If not Kant himself, then his predecessors are on the right track, the world is representation (Kant, Schopenhauer), notion (Burthogge), or anticipation (Cudworth).

We can then say we have high confidence that our notions are real things in us. But as to the objects which cause these anticipations, we know very little if anything.

A disaster. It may grow much bigger, maybe beyond the Middle East.

Iran is firing misses at Tel Aviv

So now we move to Lebanon, which, given the current dynamics at play, and explicit and overwhelming support by the Biden administration of Israeli evil, was, in hindsight inevitable.

It's lamentable that Nasrallah was murdered. He was, till the day of his death, willing to cease the attacks on Northern Israel, in exchange for a ceasefire in Gaza.

Quite a reasonable view. Now comes someone who will be much harsher and less sensible.

And more mass death for everyone.

It's just my perspective, you could end up liking it and finding it convincing. His aesthetics might be good. If you want to, give it a go. It just didn't live up to the hype in my areas of interest, with some exceptions to be fair.

Edit: more details.

His analytics were quite shaky and dubious.

His physics were ok, some interesting stuff in it.

His metaphysics were pretty bad.

The main bulk of the work, aesthetics and ethics, I did not read, as these aren't my cup of tea, but I can't say if it's good or bad.

Human language is countably infinite because:

its alphabet is finite
every string in human language is of finite length — Tarskian

But it isn't.

But it isn't true.

But it isn't true, manifestly.

But it isn't true, manifestly you can go on forever.

But it isn't true manifestly you can go on forever and ever.

And I told him "But it isn't true, manifestly you can go on forever and ever."

We had a discussion, and I told him ""But it isn't true, manifestly you can go on forever and ever."

etc.

How do you know that what you believe in is true if you can't express it?

Oh man... they are torture... But once you find the good stuff, then you get top tier idealism.

Yes, they should, though Burthogge is not a Cambridge Platonists. He has certain strong Platonist elements.

Thanks for giving them a shot- as always if you have something you think I'd like, I'd be happy to take a look.

:victory:

Damn! On Amazon for MUCH less: 8 dollars for the Kindle version. Don't know how much it would be in Australia.

My paperback was around 30 bucks, while not cheap, is worth it given it's a rare reprint type of thing.

Also, there is a free version of the book online:

https://quod.lib.umich.edu/e/eebo2/A30630.0001.001?view=toc

It's quite readable. But I'm with you on preferring to read philosophy in physical form, for the most part.

Correct! :cool:

You know of Cudworth and More. Music to my ears. :cheer:

Yes - His Treatise though not his True Intellectual System.

And also Richard Burthogge - extremely, extremely interesting - An Essay Upon Reason. A mix of Locke and Kant. Superb.

Other forms of consciousness are not even hypothetical, we have all kinds of animals which, according to all available evidence do experience the world in a very different way.

But as for shifts in human consciousness - well, so little is understood from a scientific perspective, that speaking of "evolution" of consciousness may be premature.

But possible. For us right now? We likely won't see a massive change. But, who knows?

Ah. Maybe. It's hard to say.

Full sense meaning being experts or elite at something? I mean, very few, there is an important genetic component to consider when talking about elite level anything.

But I think the of a highest ideals "in all areas of life" is probably not possible. Or if it is, it is very very rare. Unless you have in mind something else.

Yes, that did come out much more literal than it should have. It's a metaphor, not literal, meaning, we can see how certain activities are reflected in the brain, we can see a certain patterns between a person doing one thing vs. a person doing another and what that reliably may trigger.

But what we don't know is how we do X rather than Y. For that we don't have a way to do research.

It's been a while since I read Metzinger - very interesting from what I recall.

As for Hume, yes, but he was analyzing the self in so far as it could be subject to empirical investigation, meaning his system.

But he was very clear that his system concerning the self was "very defective". and concluded, lamentably that:

"In short there are two principles, which I cannot render consistent; nor is it in my power to renounce either of them, viz., that all our distinct perceptions are distinct existences, and that the mind never perceives any real connexion among distinct existences. Did our perceptions either inhere in something simple and individual, or did the mind perceive some real connexion among them, there wou’d be no difficulty in the case. For my part, I must plead the privilege of a sceptic, and confess, that this difficulty is too hard for my understanding."

How useful is this area of brain research to the debate between free will and determinism? — Jack Cummins

It might be interesting or useful if choices were made by brains. But choices are made by people.

We have learned a bit about the strings and the pulling of them but are completely in the dark about the puppet master.

Do you think that self-mastery is possible? — Jack Cummins

Sure. At least, I don't see what is problematic about self mastery.

Ooo a Discord server, nice! Will join later today. The other philosophy servers on Discord aren't bad per se, but the topics I've seen covered are quite limited.

A TPF one would probably suite me. Good plan B.

Sure thing!

Do animals have rational thinking? Do animals have communication skills? Is intuitive thinking rational or maybe something better? — Athena

I suppose a bare minimum has to be symbolic representation akin to something that arises with language use. Animals do not have language, if by "language" one has in mind propositional knowledge.

There may well be other aspects to thinking that are not related to language, but we don't know what they are. We are back to speaking about these things through language. So, until we have some proposal as to what non-linguistic thought is, we are stuck.

As for communication? Yes, they do, and they seem to be highly efficient at it. Look at bees or birds or dolphins, they have some amazing capacities for communication that we lack.

Intuition is somewhat hard to describe. I don't think it's better than non-intuitive thinking, just different. Though we should keep in mind that our intuitions can be quite wrong.

To clarify and or get rid of certain words or tendencies that prevent discussion from advancing.

This applies to a lot of metaphysics and a part of epistemology.

But as for ethics or aesthetics, I don't think ordinary language helps much, because we are dealing with facets of life which we have less depth of insight. And when there is lack of depth of insight, what we can say about it amounts to very little:

Why should we be just?

Why should we not do evil?

Why is this beautiful?

These questions have answers which don't give much depth of insight. They tend to be rather trivial but are nonetheless crucial issues for life.

If so, then it is a sensible approach. It would be hard to believe that ethical or aesthetic considerations could be eliminated.

I don't know Austin's claim. I was replying to your comment.

Austin's argument is about what he sees as the misuse of particular words in philosophy. He is not making (or does not see himself as making) arguments about 'realism' (naive, indirect, or otherwise) per se. — cherryorchard

Sure - words can be problematic in philosophy. People get stuck discussing words rather than ideas all the time, so there is room for "ordinary language philosophy".

But there's also the temptation to treat all philosophy or almost all of it, through this lens which is a way to sidestep issues rather than deal with them.

It's up to each one to see if the topic under discussion is or is not an issue concerning the misuse of language.

Manuel, would you agree that Austin is wrong about indirect realism becoming meaningless due to a lack of contrast? I think an example of that kind of breakdown in meaning is the kind of idealism where one says everything is ideas. That makes the concept of idea meaningless because the very stuff that once gave the word meaning, that is physical stuff, has been redefined as ideas. If everything is ideas, the concept of idea becomes meaningless. — frank

I have not read Austin.

If the claim is that if everything is indirect, then nothing is because we would have no notion of what an alternative could be, or something along those lines, then I think that's right.

We have to experience some things directly to say that are something we don't experience directly, and the other way around.

I'm not sure it would apply to idealism, because we already know of alternatives to it. With the case of realism or indirect realism, it's a bit trickier.

This would depend on what type of panpsychism one envisions. The panpsychism I am familiar, Galen Strawson's, does include incomprehensible (to us) subjects of experience, but it's not to be viewed in terms of something that thinks or wills- it's a very, very, basic type of phenomenon, quite rudimentary.

Other forms of panpsychism many be more extreme, but I don't know them in depth.

You are right, I don't understand a lot of animism well, and I will take your word that it mirrors say, something like what William James argues for. Which is fine. It's not my persuasion, but it's a legitimate view.

As for Hoffman himself, it's somewhat hard to say, since he says we don't evolve to capture truth at all. That's seems to me more excessive than the current science indicates, including the science Hoffman uses to defend his views.

These merely reflect the respective impact on me, which of course is the only thing I can say.

Politics:

Understanding Power by Noam Chomsky

The Great War for Civilization by Robert Fisk

Never Let a Serious Crisis Go to Waste by Philip Mirowski

Philosophy:

A Treatise Concerning Eternal and Immutable Morality by Ralph Cudworth

An Essay Concerning Human Understanding by John Locke

The World as Will and Representation by Arthur Schopenhauer

Novels:

Novel Explosives by Jim Gauer

Grotesque by Natsuo Kirino

Ubik by Philip K. Dick

This forces me to leave our portions of books which I would otherwise recommend, such as Hume's Skepticism with Regard to the Senses which is a chapter, or Richard Burthogge's An Essay Upon Reason and the Nature of Spirits which I did not read in complete form, or indeed Kant's Solution of The Cosmological Idea of Totality in the Derivation of World Events from Their Causes,Possibility of the Causality through Freedom... Eludiation of the Cosmological Idea of A Freedom... or even essays, such as Chomsky's What Can We Understand? which I consider the most important essay in epistemology/metaphysics.

Same thing with fiction, I have to leave our portions of books, such as the first half of Michael Cisco's Animal Money, or the short stories of Borges, etc.

And I'm sure I'm leaving out stuff that I would kick myself for forgetting. But it's kind of inevitable.

It's almost impossible to write such a list, but it's an interesting exercise.

I mean, I don't think we can become the thing in itself either, at best we can perhaps say some negative things about it, or we can use "as if" (or "like a") language to speak about it, as Plotinus does.

But I don't think we will ever get more insight than that and furthermore, I fully understand why some may think this may a complete waste of time or effort (not that you are saying this.) But I find myself and always have been, extremely attracted to and fascinated by this idea.

Panpsychism could be a solution, but animism less so, though as you point out they can be similar. The issue as I see it is that panpsychism only considers the (conscious) mental aspects of reality, either explicitly denying or overlooking the non-mental aspects of reality, which by far outnumber those things we consider "mental".

If you believe knowledge is inherently relational (as I do), then I don't see an alternative interaction. At least none that I can detect using our human intelligence.

Maybe God or angels - or, if you want to be less poetic and more naturalistic, an extremely intelligent alien species - could have an intelligence utterly above ours, which may include other ways of knowing.

Or maybe it's impossible. Hard to say.