Problematic scenario for subjective idealism

Reply to Marchesk You don't just perceive some water; you perceive drugged water, since on drinking it you have other experiences of getting drugged. To say that the water remained drugged is just to say that these regularities in experience obtained, and your example in fact relies on this in order to be coherent.

Reply to The Great Whatever

What would it mean "to perceive drugged water"? You don't perceive the water as being suffused with drugs. Even when you become high you don't perceive the water as such, but you infer that the water had been suffused with drugs.

Reply to John The idealist would say there is nothing to perceiving drugged water other than perceiving the experiential consequences of water being drugged, which might include an odd color, but would also include feeling funny on drinking it.

Reply to The Great Whatever

Yes but all the idealist can acknowledge as 'real' are the experiences of drinking the water (which are, let's say for the sake of argument, subjectively indistinguishable from drinking ordinary water), of becoming high, and of making the inference "There might have been something in the water".

But that inference is actually inconsistent with radical idealism, because it is inferring the existence of something that had real causal efficacy, but which itself never appeared in or as experience.

Quoting John

Yes but all the idealist can acknowledge as 'real' are the experiences of drinking the water (which are, let's say for the sake of argument, subjectively indistinguishable from drinking ordinary water), of becoming high, and of making the inference "There might have been something in the water".

It seems to me that experiences are always subjectively distinguishable, otherwise they are simply the same experience. For example, the experience of drinking regular water is distinguished from the experience of drinking drugged water subjectively - in one case after I drink it I go like "Ahhh! That's refreshing", in the other I go like "Oh wow, whose that beauty my eyes are seeing?"

Reply to John Not at all. The idealist simply equates the presence of a drug in the water with a certain connection of experiences. No inference to something non-expeirential is required.

Reply to Agustino

But the action of the drug would not be instantaneous.Only if it were would what you say be true.
Also, there is no inconsistency in saying that the experiences of drinking the two different waters would not be the same, and yet that they could be indistinguishable, in other words, that they could be, although not the same, subjectively the same.

Quoting Marchesk

Let's say in a meeting room with nobody else around, I dissolve some drug in the water pitcher, not knowing who will be using the room next, just because. You come in for your meeting an hour later and drink the water. You get high and act erratic during the meeting.

Here is the problem. How did the water remain drugged in between my leaving the meeting room and you entering an hour later, if nobody was there to perceive it? All you perceive is some water. Why would it have a drug in it?

For subjective idealism, what connects my perception of adding drug to the water earlier, with your perception of normal water followed by getting high after drinking it, given that there is a gap between perceptions, and I'm not in your meeting to perceive the drugged water?

Realism and objective idealism have a dead simple answer for this. There is a drug persisting in the water in between my experience of adding it, and your experience of drinking it. This sort of explanation doesn't work for subjective idealism. There can't be anything persisting in between experiences (no God, universal mind, or panpsychism to keep it there).

I might be reading this wrong, but your wording seems to presuppose that the water itself persists between your experience and my experience. So we have this half-realist half-idealist scenario where the water persists but the drug doesn't, and you're trying to reconcile what appears to be a (rightly) nonsensical scenario.

So forget any presupposed realism. You experience yourself putting drugs in water. Then I experience myself drinking water and either find myself drugged or find myself refreshed. If the former happens then we say that I drank the same water that you drugged. If the latter happens then we say that I drank a different water.

That the water I drank and the water you drugged are the same (or different) is simply an instrumental narrative that develops according to whatever epistemic conditions are satisfied (and is open to change when new epistemic conditions are satisfied).

Quoting John

But the action of the drug would not be instantaneous

So? No experience is instantaneous, experiences last over time. For example, I put the glass to my lips, feel the cold touch of the water, then drink, feel it go down my throat (don't think anything nasty now John), and then into my stomach, and afterwards, I still feel the coldness of the drink in my throat. The experience doesn't last one second, it's always connected and always exists in time, with no crisp boundary to delimit it.

Quoting John

Also, there is no inconsistency in saying that the experiences of drinking the two different waters would not be the same, and yet that they could be indistinguishable, in other words, that they could be, although not the same, subjectively the same.

This doesn't make sense. If there is nothing at all by which they can be distinguished, how are they different? If nothing at all is different about the color of one book and the color of the other, than aren't the two colors the same - isn't that, in fact, precisely what we mean by something being the same as something else? We compare them, and upon our comparison find no differences, and hence we say "Aha! They are the same".

Reply to The Great Whatever

But the drug in the water is not experienced; or at least it is not known to subjective experience. Unless the drinker is told she will not know there was a drug in the water; and that may be just one explanatory hypothesis among others for why she suddenly began hallucinating thirty minutes later.

Explanatory hypotheses are always inferences to causal influences that are not known to subjective experience; and so they are always inconsistent with the radical idealist hypothesis itself.

Reply to Agustino

The water would have to be subjected to chemical analysis to discover whether there really were drugs present in it. The water may or may not taste different. But there is no direct subjectively experiential link between drinking the drugged water and hallucinating thirty minutes later. What if the drinker injected what they thought were drugs, but which were not immediately prior to hallucinating. Then they would falsely think the hallucinations had been caused by the injected substance and would not think the water had been drugged at all, irrespective of whether or not they had been able to detect any unusual flavour in the water they had drunk.

Quoting John

But the drug in the water is not experienced; or at least it is not known to subjective experience.

Yes it is, by the fact that you feel funny if you drink the water. This is baked into the very example.

Quoting John

What if the drinker injected what they thought were drugs, but which were not immediately prior to hallucinating. Then they would falsely think the hallucinations had been caused by the injected substance and would not think the water had been drugged at all, irrespective of whether or not they had been able to detect any unusual flavour in the water they had drunk.

Yeah sure. But that's still subjective inferences they make based on their connected experience. They inject what they expect to be drugs in their veins, and so they expect the drugged sensation to follow, and it does, so they think that what they injected were indeed drugs.

Quoting John

The water would have to be subjected to chemical analysis to discover whether there really were drugs present in it.

And what is chemical analysis? It is, say, dropping a few drops of something in the water, and seeing the water turn red, as opposed to staying transparent. The water turning red, we know through our experience, indicates the presence of drugs. It's still reasoning within experience. I don't care if you call this objective or subjective, because as far as I'm concerned, all we ever have is experience, so objective is merely a different species of subjective in my own humble fucking view.

Reply to The Great Whatever

But you don't "feel funny" as you are drinking it. If you did, then the drugged water would be distinguishable from plain water. but you still could not be sure the water was drugged until you analyzed it. There could be some other explanation for your feeling funny".

Quoting John

But you don't "feel funny" as you are drinking it. If you did, then the drugged water would be distinguishable from plain water. but you still could not be sure the water was drugged until you analyzed it. There could be some other explanation for your feeling funny".

And analyzing it isn't done experientially no? The results aren't experienced? We just gain mysterious access to them in a flash of insight...

Reply to Agustino

To be sure testing the water does not actually prove there are drugs in the water. But the more tests ( preferably of different methodology) that you submitted it to, the less reason there would be to doubt that there had been drugs in the water.

Reply to Agustino

Don't be silly; I never said, or even suggested, that.

Quoting John

To be sure testing the water does not actually prove there are drugs in the water. But the more tests ( preferably of different methodology) that you submitted it to, the less reason there would be to doubt that there had been drugs in the water.

Okay so? What does this have to do with anything? You're like Samuel Johnson disproving idealism by kicking a mental stone with a mental foot >:O

Reply to John OK, and that other thing would have to have experiential consequences, or else the example could not work by its own logic without begging the question.

Quoting Marchesk

How did the water remain drugged in between my leaving the meeting room and you entering an hour later, if nobody was there to perceive it? All you perceive is some water. Why would it have a drug in it?

Bryan Magee:Once, in Karl Popper's living-room, I asked him why he rejected [idealism], whereupon he banged his hand against the radiator by which we were standing and said: 'When I come downstairs in the morning I take it for granted that this radiator has been here all night'

Schopenhauer's Philosophy

Reply to Wayfarer So he rejects idealism because he rejects idealism?

Reply to Michael That was in the context of a discussion by Magee of why so many people do. His point was that 'even eminent philosophers', such as Popper, reject idealism on grounds which he regards as fallacious, i.e. because they take it to be making claims which it really isn't making. He goes on to talk about how a change in perspective, something like a 'gestalt shift', is required, to understand what idealism is driving at, which I think is true.

The continuity of existence is what we take for granted. But how is this continuity real?

Reply to Wayfarer

I disagree strongly with this. I don't think there is any shortage of people who understand very well what idealism is driving at. Or rather, what idealisms are driving at, because there are many of them. To think that few people are capable of understanding idealism is to partake of the hubris of those who congratulate themselves that they can see something that others cannot; who like to think so because they like to think they have discovered an arcane secret difficult to divine. This comes out of a desire to inflate the importance of idealism. I've read McGee many years ago, and I think he was one of those hubristic people; a popularizer who entertained an exaggerated opinion of his own degree of philosophical understanding. For me, this comes out very clearly in many of his interviews with contemporary philosophers.

I think the one central tenet of any form of idealism is that being is intrinsically mental; that being is constituted by consciousness; although just how it is constituted by consciousness is variously conceived in the various versions of idealism.

If all idealism were saying is that the way we see things is partly conditioned by the nature of our perceptual organs; then who could disagree with that? That's no world-shattering revelation! But it is a very different thing to go further and to say that being is constituted, rather than merely that the experience of being is partly conditioned, by human consciousness. And to assert the position that being is constituted by a divine consciousness would not be to profess a pure idealism at all, in my book, but could be seen to be as much, or even more, consonant with realism.

But, that's really the point; the argument between realism and idealism is misconceived; to take a position on one side or the other which seeks to exclude the other is just another expression of the human tendency to reify and absolutize, and that seeks to reduce life to a cold abstract formula.

Realism and idealism are the two sides of a counterfeit coin minted by a heartless rationality. If they are not taken in a strong ontological sense though, they are just harmless exercises in imagining the possibilities that can be conceived by the rational intellect; the mind exploring its own capacities for certain kinds of speculation.

Reply to John I went back and looked at the context of the quote from Magee - it's a bit too long to reproduce the entire section, but it's about the counter-intuitive nature of transcendental idealism. Furthermore, in many of the debates I've had about this subject on this and the other forums over the years, nearly all of the objections to it amount to pretty much what Popper said - that it means "the world exists only in my mind". In fact, I'm sure that my esteemed philosophy lecturer, David Stove, never truly grasped the basic idea of Kant's 'Copernican revolution in thought' and was generally dismissive of idealism on very similar grounds.

John:If all idealism were saying is that the way we see things is partly conditioned by the nature of our perceptual organs; then who could disagree with that? That's no world-shattering revelation! But it is a very different thing to go further and to say that being is constituted, rather than merely that the experience of being is partly conditioned, by human consciousness.

I think it does say that - but what does 'constituted' imply? Does it mean when you look at an object, that 'mind' or 'human mind' is one of its constituents?

(That is what pan-psychism is saying - that what we understand as 'mind' is an attribute of matter itself - Galen Strawson's 'basic things (protons, for example) are loci of conscious experience' - from here.)

But I don't interpret transcendental idealism as an ontological theory, a theory of 'what things are made of' but as a theory of the nature of knowledge. Because of the way in which we know, we see the world a certain way.

The dichotomy between materialism and idealism is a consequence of Cartesian dualism.

[quote="Dan Lusthaus:]The term "Idealism" came into vogue roughly during the time of Kant (though it was used earlier by others, such as Leibniz) to label one of two trends that had emerged in reaction to Cartesian philosophy. Descartes had argued that there were two basic yet separate substances in the universe: Extension (the material world of things in space) and Thought (the world of mind and ideas). Subsequently opposing camps took one or the other substance as their metaphysical foundation, treating it as the primary substance while reducing the remaining substance to derivative status. Materialists argued that only matter was ultimately real, so that thought and consciousness derived from physical entities (chemistry, brain states, etc.). Idealists countered that the mind and its ideas were ultimately real, and that the physical world derived from mind (e.g., the mind of God, Berkeley's esse est percipi, or from ideal prototypes, etc.). Materialists gravitated toward mechanical, physical explanations for why and how things existed, while Idealists tended to look for purposes - moral as well as rational - to explain existence. Idealism meant "idea-ism," frequently in the sense Plato's notion of "ideas" (eidos) was understood at the time, namely ideal types that transcended the physical, sensory world and provided the form (eidos) that gave matter meaning and purpose. As materialism, buttressed by advances in materialistic science, gained wider acceptance, those inclined toward spiritual and theological aims turned increasingly toward idealism as a countermeasure. Before long there were many types of materialism and idealism.[/quote]

I am nearer to a view with the very drab title of 'neutral monism' - that the nature of reality is such that it has both physical and mental aspects, but that one can't be reduced to the other. But I also believe in the hierarchical nature of reality with what we understand as mind is on a higher or deeper level of being than what we understand as matter.

Quoting Wayfarer

I think it does say that - but what does 'constituted' imply? Does it mean when you look at an object, that 'mind' or 'human mind' is one of its constituents?

To say that would be silly I think. I don't think it could have any real meaning. That is one of the problems I have with asserting mind as a constituent. Our notion of mind comes from our experience of being mindful. Most of the ways we talk about mind are actually quasi-materialist metaphors, "I made up my mind". " I changed my mind". 'I don't mind", means the same as "I don't object". "I don't object" means there is no barrier, no object in the way.

We think the material world is materially constituted, because we experience it as material. We don't really know what it could mean in any ultimate sense for things to be materially constituted; it is just an idea derived from the materiality of objects. But then, it's like saying "How else could we think of the world as being constituted other than how we experience it, which is as being material, right"? We don't experience the world as being mental; that notion makes no sense ta all. Our experiencing of the world is thought of as mental, but not the world itself. But "mental" in that context just means something like "intangible" in contrast to the tangibility of the things we experience.

We can get our heads into the world, but we simply cannot get the world into our heads. When we get your heads into the world we can speak about the material world and the mind perfectly coherently and know exactly what we are talking about in the ordinary sense, but when we try to get the world into our heads, the ideas 'world', 'material' and 'mind' are reified and turned into incoherent monstrosities.

I think our experience, or at least our thinking about it, is ineliminably dualistic; but I don't think that fact justifies the metaphysical idea of substance dualism. I think the idea of substance monism is even more unsupportable, and in fact is simply not intelligible at all. We just can't reduce reality to any formula, is all; as much as that might disappoint us. I think that is the one really important insight of transcendental idealism.

Quoting John

We think the material world is materially constituted, because we experience it as material. We don't really know what it could mean in any ultimate sense for things to be materially constituted; it is just an idea derived from the materiality of objects

But isn't that precisely what materialism says? Isn't that what the whole 'mind and matter' debate revolves around? There was a poster at Online Philosophy Club, and his presentation of materialism was that all that exists, is matter-energy-space-time. That is the updated version of what used to be 'matter'. He believes that evolution is basically a material process, that life is something very like a large-scale chemical reaction - 'chemical scum' was the name given to humans by some leading scientist.

So the characteristic view of materialism is that humans, and everything else, are material entities, the consequence of physical laws, their actions transmitted via material mechanisms, and having material consequences. Furthermore, that is a view that many educated people believe in and defend. That is what I am arguing against, on the basis of various forms of idealism, including Kant's (as far as I understand it. And hey, I've been listening to an excellent lecture series whilst working out this week - recommend it!)

Quoting Wayfarer

So the characteristic view of materialism is that humans, and everything else, are material entities, the consequence of physical laws, their actions transmitted via material mechanisms, and having material consequences. Furthermore, that is a view that many educated people believe in and defend.

It's consistent with taking science at face values which explains the universe's development from the Big Bang where there were no minds to star formation to Earth to simple life developing until finally we get to a point where you have complex nervous systems similar enough to our own to call it mind.

The one way around all that is to interpret QM so that it is consciousness which collapses the possible universes into one with the history we observe. Humans or before us, animals, or aliens, or whatever mind collapsed it, it was just a giant probability wave, or something like that.

Quoting Wayfarer

But isn't that precisely what materialism says? Isn't that what the whole 'mind and matter' debate revolves around?

I agree it is precisely what materialism says; but since we don't know what it could mean for objects to be ultimately materially constituted; I don't think it means much. Consequently I don't think the "whole 'mind and matter' debate means much either. It's just not very interesting, although it does seem to exercise many minds these days. I have noticed that threads with this and like subjects seem to attract by far the most activity on these and other philosophy forums.

Thanks for the Kant link; I'll have a listen. Bernstein also has some interesting online audio lectures on Kant and Hegel: http://www.bernsteintapes.com/

Reply to John I agree, its pointless, other than as an academic exercise. I'm curious though if you say that substance monism is unintelligible. Is there a monism which is intelligible?

Reply to Punshhh

I don't think there is. The 'many' kind of stuff it up.

Reply to John Ok, but the many may only be an extension of the one, so still one.

Quoting John

To think that few people are capable of understanding idealism is to partake of the hubris of those who congratulate themselves that they can see something that others cannot; who like to think so because they like to think they have discovered an arcane secret difficult to divine. This comes out of a desire to inflate the importance of idealism.

Exactly. But the hubris goes deeper. Idealism arises from a person's desire to make their consciousness primary. The thinking goes : If all of reality exists only through me, then I am God. I lose my special place if I am nothing more than a part of a larger reality.

Consider :

Idealism can make one feel immortal. "There is no existence without me, so I am alive for all of existence. I am mortal only if there is a world after I cease to exist, which is absurd."

Idealism can make one feel omniscient. "I know all there is to know. If I do not know a thing, it is because I have not experienced it, and it does not exist. Are there any things I do not know? Where are they?"

I can only imagine the indignant replies!
:D

Reply to Punshhh

The problem I see with that is that we don't know what it could mean. Now we might have a mystical vision wherein we see what it means; but we cannot say what it means, and what cannot be said should be, as Wittgenstein said, passed over in silence. Or it can be alluded to by poetry; but to do that would not be to assert anything.

Reply to Real Gone Cat

It's not necessary, though; one could easily imagine one's soul continuing after death, only not in this world. In fact even if the world ceases when one dies then one could still cease with it. Idealism would properly deny the existence of any other realm beyond what is experienced personally. To admit there could be anything at all existing beyond my own experience is to admit that there could be anything beyond my own experience; external objects, other minds, other worlds or even God.

Reply to John

But if one's soul continues on after death, can one be said to be really dead? Thus, one is immortal in that scenario as well.

It is true that one's existence may be finite. But if the world is contingent on my observing it, then there is no existence without me, and I may be said to be immortal (i.e., alive for all of existence). That the world is then also finite is no concern of mine.

Reply to John
I can only agree, within the field of philosophy, from what I know. Otherwise I see no trouble in saying what it means, although discursive communication may be in the form exercised in religious and mystical traditions. There is a tradition of allegory, or analogy and oral traditions. So two people who see what it means can discuss it. I have been a member of a group on more than one ocassion in which such discussion was commonplace. Although the interlocutors would require the appropriate intellectual articulation for affective communication to occur, I expect.

Quoting Marchesk

It's consistent with taking science at face values which explains the universe's development from the Big Bang where there were no minds to star formation to Earth to simple life developing until finally we get to a point where you have complex nervous systems similar enough to our own to call it mind.

I do accept the facts on face value, i.e. as facts about the physical universe. However there are considerable gaps in the accounts - not only the obvious and now well-acknowledged gaps in cosmology and physics, but also any sense of why life developed at all. (Dawkins was asked that very question on a TV panel show, and didn't comprehend it - 'you're playing with the word "why" there', he responded.)

Hey, what does 'cosmos' mean? It means 'ordered whole'. And even that is now being called into question by scientists, who believe the the universe we can see is one of a vast ensemble of unseen universes; and also that the matter we do know about, is only a small percentage of what is out there somewhere.

So what is behind the order of the universe? I think scientific materialism quite unreasonably claims to have solved or eliminated this question.Science relies on 'the order of nature' to even get going; but 'the nature of the order', why the Universe just is such a way that matter forms and life exists, is not necessarily a scientific matter. (That doesn't imply open-mouthed gullibility towards religious mythology, either.)

Quoting Marchesk

The one way around all that is to interpret QM so that it is consciousness which collapses the possible universes into one with the history we observe. Humans or before us, animals, or aliens, or whatever mind collapsed it, it was just a giant probability wave, or something like that.

I am of the view that the discovery of uncertainty principle and the related concepts radically undermines materialism, unless you're prepared to say that 'matter' comprises fields or probability waves or even numerical values. Then you get into the wildly speculative, virtually sci-fi realms of Tegmark.

Quoting John

since we don't know what it could mean for objects to be ultimately materially constituted; I don't think it means much.

Whereas I think it is hugely influential.

Quoting Real Gone Cat

Idealism can make one feel omniscient. "I know all there is to know. If I do not know a thing, it is because I have not experienced it, and it does not exist. Are there any things I do not know? Where are they?"

I have encountered numerous forum posters over the years who say something that. They're nearly always solipsists, and nearly always young - so, basically, very self-centred, they think the universe revolves around them.

But don't forget the original 'subjective idealist' was Berkeley, and Berkeley was a convinced empiricist. His whole argument was based on a very close analysis of the nature of experience. I won't try and summarise or abstract it here, but when Berkeley says esse est percipe - translated as 'to be, is to be perceived' - he does so on the basis of very detailed arguments. Many of these are presented as dialogues, with one voice presenting all of the sceptical rebuttals that his opponents were likely to voice, and if you read those dialogues, they are very clever indeed. (Well-edited copies available here. Nevertheless, it should be added that Kant found it necessary to add a section to the second edition of CPR on the way in which his philosophy differed from Berkeley's.)

Reply to Real Gone Cat

No one cannot be said to be dead if one continues to exist after death of the body, although it depends on what is meant by "one", but I'm not sure what point you are trying to make.
:s

Quoting Wayfarer

Whereas I think it is hugely influential

Influential to those who take it seriously I suppose. But then does that matter to you? Isn't it a matter just for them?

Quoting Wayfarer

So what is behind the order of the universe?

An interesting question, in a meta- sort of way : Is order a property of things (like universes), or is order a tag humans apply to particular things? Perhaps we see the universe as "ordered" precisely because we are of the universe and are incapable of seeing it any other way. Should the universe be otherwise, would we not still view it as ordered? (Of course, "order" might mean something different then, but we wouldn't know it.)

That we inhabit a universe favorable to life is not a miracle. Should we inhabit a universe hostile to life, now that would be a miracle!

Fish need water to breathe. And where do you find fish? In water! A miracle!

Reply to John

The point is that idealism appears to lead to absurdities : If existence is contingent on my experiencing it, then there is no existence if I do not experience it (regardless of my corporeal state). Should I cease to exist (as ghost or man), then the universe ceases as well. So the universe's existence is tied to my existence - they are in fact equivalent. I need not be infinite to inhabit all of existence. But if I inhabit all of existence, am I not then immortal?

Reply to John I think many people hold materialist views without thinking through what they really mean.

Reply to Real Gone Cat The point is that idealism appears to lead to absurdities

But it's also possible that it is often misunderstood.

Quoting Real Gone Cat

. I need not be infinite to inhabit all of existence. But if I inhabit all of existence, am I not then immortal?

If all existence is infinite then you would need to be infinite to inhabit it, or so it would seem.

If you inhabit all of existence, and existence is immortal, then you would have to be immortal and if not, then not; or so it would seem.

Quoting Wayfarer

I think many people hold materialist views without thinking through what they really mean.

Agreed, but I think the same could be said about idealist views. Personally, I don't believe one or the other, per se, is more or less conducive to, or associated with, spirituality; which I am guessing may be your concern.

Quoting John

Personally, I don't believe one or the other, per se, is more or less conducive to, or associated with, spirituality;

Philosophical idealism is the tendency in Western philosophy most associated with spirituality. The way I understand idealism, it is not a matter of having views, but a matter of having insight into the mind.

Reply to Wayfarer

The problem I see for what you are claiming is that philosophical idealism was not formulated as such until Berkeley; so it will always be controversial as to whether philosophers prior to that were idealists.

Even Berkeley's idealism did not propose that the world and its objects depend on the human mind. Things exist for Berkeley insofar as they are perceived by God. For God, to perceive something is to create it, so this kind of idealism is perfectly consonant with naive realism. Objects really exist because God creates/ perceives them.

Also the "insight into the mind" you refer to I suspect is largely dependent on the science of perception; which is a realist analysis. If you are instead just referring to introspection, I would say that no amount of that could ever give you insight into whether or not objects exists independently of their being perceived.

What idealist philosophers do you have in mind when you say idealism is more strongly associated with spirituality than realism?

Reply to Punshhh

Yes, I agree that people who share the same insights or presuppositions can certainly discuss such things. My position is just that nothing determinate or outwardly demonstrable can be established in such discussions, in the kinds of ways that things can be when it comes to empirical matters.

Quoting John

The problem I see for what you are claiming is that philosophical idealism was not formulated as such until Berkeley; so it will always be controversial as to whether philosophers prior to that were idealists.

Plato was indubitably idealist, as were many Platonists. Of course idealism is - what is the word? - a polysemic term, it has many meanings and no easy definition.

But the 'theory of forms', the reality of universals and other abstracta, and the 'degrees of knowledge' that characterises Platonic epistemology, are generally associated with idealism.

Quoting John

Also the "insight into the mind" you refer to I suspect is largely dependent on the science of perception; which is a realist analysis

That's cognitive science, and not what I mean. I have in mind something much nearer to self-knowledge, through meditation.

Quoting John

What idealist philosophers do you have in mind when you say idealism is more strongly associated with spirituality than realism?

Plato, Plotinus (and other neo-platonic philosophers); Berkeley, Kant, Schopenhuaer and Hegel (and the other European idealists); C S Pierce, Josiah Royce, Timothy Sprigge (obituary); the New England transcendentalists (e.g. Emerson and Thoreau); to name a few.

And in terms of Eastern philosophy, Yog?c?ra Buddhism is translated as 'mind-only' and has many points of convergence with idealist philosophy (as well as differences).

None of the philosophers you have mentioned were notably spiritual, except perhaps Berkeley and Royce. Hegel is arguably not really and idealist, nor is Kant and Peirce certainly is not an idealist. I think even Schopenhauer is arguably not an idealist since he considered will, a kind of blind force of striving to be ontologically primary.
Plato was certainly no idealist, as he thought the world of the forms was the real world and he certainly did not think it was dependent on the mind, human or otherwise. Rather the reverse in fact. Plotinus maybe although he did not speak in terms of mind, but in terms of "the One"., from which all reality emanates.

Even the notion of 'mind only" in Yogacara is subject to interpretation. Buddhists generally think in terms of co dependent origination.Some, but not all of the nidanas are rightly thought of as mental phenomena, and none of them are thought as primary. The world arises with the mind. It cannot pre-suppositionlessly be said that one is primary.

The meditative self-knowledge you refer to is not knowledge of the mind alone but of the body/mind. Knowledge is of the body/mind and is also a function of the body/mind. You can't have one without the other; mind without body or body without mind makes no sense.

Reply to John When I first started posting on these forums, I was surprised to encounter this school of thought called idealism. I was expecting that my spiritual perspective was going to be viewed as outlandishly immaterial and that the accepted ontology would be some kind of materialism or physicalism. When suddenly I was confronted with these notions like solipsism and radical forms of idealism. I thought such ideas would have been discarded long ago, as I had done myself. Although I did understand the rationale and had gone through the intellectual ramifications etc myself and seen it for what it is.

Suddenly I found myself thrust more on the side of the materialists in this dialectic. This is not to say that I don't consider the reality of idealism playing some fundamental role in the processes of our existence. Or that I don't consider transcendental idealism to be fundamental. But rather that it is pointless exercise in itself, other than as a contemplative tool to be used on ocassion, like solipsim.

Quoting John

None of the philosophers you have mentioned were notably spiritual,

I think you're defining 'idealist' differently to me. Plato is widely understood to be the seminal figure of Western idealism; 'eidos', is translated as 'idea', 'image' or 'form' and is one of the seminal ideas of Western philosophy. The 'Theory of Forms' is regarded as the foundational theory of idealism, generally. Platonic number theorists believe that number is real and not material, i.e. a real idea.

Schopenhauer's 'Vorstellung' (world as representation) is supported by hundreds of pages of argument explicitly advocating idealism.

Hegel 'epitomized idealism' according to the SEP entry on him. He is categorised as 'absolute idealist' in any anthology of philosophy.

Pierce wrote 'matter is effete mind' - 'Peirce increasingly became a philosopher with broad and deep sympathies for both transcendental idealism and absolute idealism.' (SEP)

Platonic idealism is called 'realism' in old texts - because 'realists' were those who held to the 'reality of universals'. This is a very confusing point, due to the change in the meaning of the word 'real' (and that ought to tell you something!):

Plato is one of the first philosophers to discuss what might be termed Idealism, although his Platonic Idealism is, confusingly, usually referred to as Platonic Realism. This is because, although his doctrine described Forms or universals (which are certainly non-material "ideals" in a broad sense), Plato maintained that these Forms had their own independent existence, which is not an idealist stance, but a realist one. However, it has been argued that Plato believed that "full reality" (as distinct from mere existence) is achieved only through thought, and so he could be described as a non-subjective, "transcendental" idealist, somewhat like Kant.

I would say that what is meant by 'full reality' is actually 'being' as distinct from 'existence', although the current philosophical lexicon doesn't allow for this, as in our lexicon, 'existence' has only one value, which is binary (a very significant point.) However, the distinction between 'being' and 'existence' is found in pre-modern philosophy and theology. But that snippet says, in a roundabout way, that Plato was an 'objective idealist', i.e. he believed that there are real ideas, (and not just as the product of our meat brain.)

Quoting John

Even the notion of 'mind only" in Yogacara is subject to interpretation.

One of the names for that school is 'cittamatra'. Cittamatra is Sanskrit for 'mind only'. It is not ambiguous.

Quoting John

Knowledge is of the body/mind and is also a function of the body/mind. You can't have one without the other; mind without body or body without mind makes no sense.

That is true, but here we are on a Western philosophy forum. Here, the division between materialism and idealism, mind and matter, religion and science and the many other dichotomies, are very important to the cultural situation. We have inherited this dichotomy.

I understand why you say there is no 'mind as substance', and that idealism as a 'theory of mind as substance' is just as empty as 'materialism'. From one perspective - actually the superior perspective - that is true.

But in the context of the Western philosophical tradition, there is indeed a primary distinction between materialists philosophies and idealist philosophies. Materialist philosophies include neo-darwinian materialism (which is the de facto worldview of the secular intelligentsia), Marxist dialectical materialism, and all the other forms of scientific materialism and post-modernism, all of which espouse versions of physicalism or materialism.

Who are 'idealist philosophers' in the current cultural landscape? Who is opposing materialist philosophies, on philosophical grounds, in current culture? And the opponents of philosophical materialism, if they're not idealist, then what are they? What are some examples?

Quoting Wayfarer

Platonic number theorists believe that number is real and not material, i.e. a real idea.

It's a bit confusing, because Platonists are considered realists about math. The anti-realists in the debate would be conceptualists or nominalists, so they would say that numbers and their relations are ideas in the mind, or social constructs, not independent ideas in some Platonic realm.

It's also interesting because many materialists who are also realists are highly suspicious of Platonism. And Platonists may or may not be realists about the physical world. They may even think the material world is actually mathematical. I would guess Plato was realist about matter being something. It was the various particulars, which were imperfect imitations of the forms, right?

Quoting John

Plato was certainly no idealist, as he thought the world of the forms was the real world and he certainly did not think it was dependent on the mind, human or otherwise. Rather the reverse in fact. Plotinus maybe although he did not speak in terms of mind, but in terms of "the One"., from which all reality emanates.

You seem to be reluctant to separate ideas from mind. I think that is a materialist premises which clouds the issue. Ideas are seen to be dependent on the human mind, and the human mind is dependent on the brain. In order to understand idealism you need to allow for the separate existence of ideas. You need to accept the idealist proposal, for the sake of discussion, that perhaps ideas are prior to minds.

I think that the true question of idealism is the issue of whether ideas are dependent on the human mind or not. Platonic Idealism in its modern form assumes that there are Ideas (mathematical, geometrical, and such) independent from human minds. As Wayfarer indicated this is sometimes called realism. Aristotle argued convincingly that ideas could not have actual independent existence, but left the back door open, for the assumption of independent Forms. So the Neo-Platonists assumed independent Forms.

Now we have a distinction between human ideas and Forms (which are like human ideas, but independent). It is demonstrated that there is a necessity to assume that the Forms are prior to the existence of material objects, because when a material object comes into existence, it comes into existence as what it is and not something else. (It has a particular form, and is not something random, thus we assume a Form as that which determines what it will be when it comes into existence). So the Form of the object, which is similar to a human idea, but not a human idea, is necessarily prior to the material existence of the object.

Quoting John

If all existence is infinite then you would need to be infinite to inhabit it, or so it would seem.

Let me try again : If existence is contingent on my experiencing it, then there can be no existence without me. In that case, I inhabit all of existence whether it is infinite or no.

Remember, I am trying to follow idealism to its logical conclusions. I am not presenting the arguments as my own.

****************

How might I be infinite? How many real numbers exist between 0 and 1? Perhaps each moment of our existence is like a point on a line segment - infinite points on a finite line. (I don't really believe this - just tossing it out there for fun.)

Quoting Wayfarer

I think many people hold materialist views without thinking through what they really mean.

Perhaps. But as John has pointed out, one needs to beware of hubris. It seems that one who has experienced such an epiphany (i.e., embracing idealism) should desire to help others achieve it as well. The Buddha was not content to leave this plane of existence, but instead decided to stay and teach. In similar fashion, let us simple materialists benefit from your wisdom. Who knows - maybe a well-constructed argument will sway a few more converts to the side of enlightenment.

(And I won't continue to insist that the driving impetus behind idealism is a need to feel important in an otherwise uncaring universe.) :D

Quoting Marchesk

I would guess Plato was realist about matter being something. It was the various particulars, which were imperfect imitations of the forms, right?

There wasn't really much discussion of the nature of matter in Plato - that came along with Aristotle and hylomorphism. Platonic espistemology was more concerned with the nature and forms of knowledge. There's quite a good summary here the analogy of the divided line.

Platonism was very similar to Vedanta and other ancient philosophies in designating the 'realm of sense' as being delusory or treacherous. What the hoi polloi, the ordinary man, takes for granted as real, is ephemeral and passing. 'What a fool believes he sees, the wise man in his power, will reason away'.

Quoting Real Gone Cat

. It seems that one who has experienced such an epiphany (i.e., embracing idealism) should desire to help others achieve it as well.

Sure!

Quoting Wayfarer

I think you're defining 'idealist' differently to me.

I think that's part of the problem. Remember I have said that there are many idealisms and it's not clear how some of them differ from realism (and realism does not necessarily equate to materialism). Also, to go back to the OP, Marchesk made it quite explicit that he had in mind that the problem of the drug being in the water when no one was looking is a problem for subjective idealism, but not for Objective Idealism or Realism.

Objective Idealism as represented by Hegel and Peirce I take to be the position that says that objects are always in conceptual shape, so to speak, even when they are not being looked at. This is very clearly not to say that objects are dependent on minds, whether human or otherwise, but that being in conceptual shape or form is altogether independent of minds, just as being visible is altogether independent of actually being seen. I think the same can be said for Plato's Forms.

I had said earlier: Quoting John

I think the one central tenet of any form of idealism is that being is intrinsically mental

and this is a bit misleading because I don't think it applies to either Objective Idealism or Transcendental Idealism.

Quoting Wayfarer

But in the context of the Western philosophical tradition, there is indeed a primary distinction between materialists philosophies and idealist philosophies.

And now the argument is shifting from realism vs idealism to materialism vs idealism. I think that is a different kettle of fish; although to be fair it has already appeared, even in some of the things I have said. But in any case realism does not necessarily equate to materialism. There is also a different sense of materialism vs idealism; namely the ethical sense in which the argument is over whether it is better to be motivated by material considerations or ethical ideals. But a person who is an ontological materialist could still consistently believe that it is better to be motivated by ethical or even spiritual ideals.

Quoting Wayfarer

One of the names for that school is 'cittamatra'. Cittamatra is Sanskrit for 'mind only'. It is not ambiguous.

It may not be ambiguous that 'cittamatra' means 'mind only', but I wasn't arguing that it is; I was arguing that the significance of 'mind only' may be ambiguous. In fact I have a book on my shelves somewhere the name and author if which i cannot remember ( although I do remember that the author is, I think, an Indian Buddhist scholar, and certainly, at least, not a Western scholar) the substance of which is an argument that 'mind only' should not be interpreted in the conventional idealist sense. So it is certainly not uncontroversial, even among Buddhist scholars, that 'mind only' must be interpreted as an assertion of the kind of idealism which is understood as a claim that reality is, at bottom, only mind.

Reply to Metaphysician Undercover

I don't think it makes sense to separate ideas from minds, but it does make sense to separate conceptual forms from minds. See my answer to Wayfarer above for more detail.

Quoting John

Objective Idealism as represented by Hegel and Peirce I take to be the position that says that objects are always in conceptual shape, so to speak, even when they are not being looked at.

I can't understand what it means to say that 'objects are always in conceptual shape'.

I take objective idealism to mean that there are real ideas, i.e. ideas that are not simply in the minds of humans; I think mathematical Platonists would cite natural numbers as examples, although there are many vexed issues sorrounding that.

In Hegel, the word 'geist' can be translated as either 'spirit' or 'mind'

Pierce went through idealistic phases, i.e. wrote essays of a rather romantic-idealistic-Emersonian feel, however that was separate from much of his work on semiotics and logic (as Apokrisis points out).

However I think it is generally agreed that idealism was the dominant trend in Anglo-American philosophy until Moore's Refutation of Idealism, 'ordinary language' philosophy, and analytic philosophy displaced it, around WW1. Since then, idealism has been an academic speciality.

Quoting John

And now the argument is shifting from realism vs idealism to materialism vs idealism.

There is huge scope for arguing at cross-purposes in this matter. What I mean by 'idealism' and 'materialism' refers to the developments after Cartesian dualism. So, after that, 'idealists' tended to be those who looked to mental/spiritual/idealist accounts, materialists those who looked to 'bodies in motion'. In the centuries following, that remained a visible distinction between the two, even though there were many kinds of 'idealism' and many kinds of 'materialism'.

Quoting John

So it is certainly not uncontroversial, even among Buddhist scholars, that 'mind only' must be interpreted as an assertion of the kind of idealism which is understood as a claim that reality is, at bottom, only mind.

I agree, there are fundamental differences between Buddhism and Western idealist philosophy, as they originate in very different cultures and periods of history. Dan Lusthaus is a notable Buddhist Studies scholar, and he would agree with that also. He points out that the main emphasis of Buddhist philosophy is 'how do we know', not 'what are things "made of" ':

Yog?c?ra doctrine is summarized in the term vijñapti-m?tra, "nothing-but-cognition" (often rendered "consciousness-only" or "mind-only") which has sometimes been interpreted as indicating a type of metaphysical idealism, i.e., the claim that mind alone is real and that everything else is created by mind. However, the Yog?c?rin writings themselves argue something very different. Consciousness (vijñ?na) is not the ultimate reality or solution, but rather the root problem. This problem emerges in ordinary mental operations, and it can only be solved by bringing those operations to an end.

Yog?c?ra tends to be misinterpreted as a form of metaphysical idealism primarily because its teachings are taken for ontological propositions rather than as epistemological warnings about karmic problems. The Yog?c?ra focus on cognition and consciousness grew out of its analysis of karma, and not for the sake of metaphysical speculation. Two things should be clarified in order to explain why Yog?c?ra is not metaphysical idealism: 1. The meaning of the word "idealism"; and 2. an important difference between the way Indian and Western philosophers do philosophy.

What Is and Isn't Yog?c?ra

So 'mind only' is not saying that mind is a polymorphic substance out of which things are 'made'. I suspect that is what you think that 'idealism' is arguing, which is why you reject both materialism and idealism - i.e. they're both theories based on abstractions, i.e. 'mind' and 'matter', that are meaningless in themselves.

I agree with that criticism, but I am trying to pursue an 'epistemic idealism', not 'ontological idealism', i.e. idealism concerns 'the nature of knowledge', not 'the constituents of physical reality'.

Quoting John

But a person who is an ontological materialist could still consistently believe that it is better to be motivated by ethical or even spiritual ideals.

But, on what basis? If you believe that a living being is a moist robot, who is only executing the algorithms of the selfish gene, then you might have 'spiritual ideals' but they can't have any basis in reality; they're only devices, clever imaginings, to make yourself feel good.

Have you got any examples of materialists who espouse spiritual ideals? How could the two co-exist?

Reply to Wayfarer

For an object to be in conceptual shape would be for it to have an intelligible form. All objects have intelligible forms otherwise they would not be objects.

A person who is an ontological realist and yet thinks that one should follow ethical ideals, could be a Christian who believes this world was created by God as a world material through and through, which He has made intelligible to the human soul by giving it a conceptual shape.

When you say you are pursuing an epistemic idealism I must confess I don't understand what you mean. You don't take me to be denying that we understand the world in terms of ideas do you?

I don't agree with you that 'Geist' can mean what we mean by 'mind' for Hegel. I have said this before: you can have a spirit of the times, a spirit of love, a spirit of friendship, a spirit of cooperation, and so on; that is what Hegel mans by spirit. "mind' is not notion adequate to this kind of understanding. Geist is understood by Hegel to be not only what is conscious (mind) but what it is conscious of (world).

Quoting John

Objective Idealism as represented by Hegel and Peirce I take to be the position that says that objects are always in conceptual shape, so to speak, even when they are not being looked at. This is very clearly not to say that objects are dependent on minds, whether human or otherwise, but that being in conceptual shape or form is altogether independent of minds, just as being visible is altogether independent of actually being seen. I think the same can be said for Plato's Forms.

Quoting John

For an object to be in conceptual shape would be for it to have an intelligible form. All objects have intelligible forms otherwise they would not be objects.

OK, let's assume that an object is always in what you call a "conceptual shape". You also agree that the object must be in a conceptual shape, or else it is not an object. Do you understand the logic which leads to the conclusion that the conceptual shape must be prior to the material object itself? Everything in the world is changing, such that all objects come into existence at some time. Whenever an object comes into existence, it must be predetermined by the "conceptual shape", what that object will be when it comes into existence, or else it will not come into existence as an object (it would be something completely random and therefore not an object with conceptual shape).

Quoting John

A person who is an ontological realist and yet thinks that one should follow ethical ideals, could be a Christian who believes this world was created by God as a world material through and through, which He has made intelligible to the human soul by giving it a conceptual shape.

The reason why "God" is necessary, is that we have to assume an act whereby the conceptual shape is given to matter, to produce the object. (Matter itself being the principle of unintelligibility.) This is the act of creation, because as you say, without conceptual shape, there is no object. So this is the act whereby the object gets its existence. Prior to this, it is only a conceptual shape, but not yet a material object, it is the conceptual shape of what will come into existence. But this "will come into existence" is contingent rather than inherently necessary, due to the unintelligible nature of matter itself, time and possibility. It is better stated as what could come into existence at that time, depending on this act. So we appeal to a free will act of God to account for the existence of objects..

Reply to Marchesk

First off, there's no real water on the idealist view. The water, as well as the act of drugging the water, is just an idea/just mental phenomena the individual in question has. When the individual drinks the water later, they still have the idea, via memory, of having drugged the water earlier.

Quoting John

A person who is an ontological realist and yet thinks that one should follow ethical ideals, could be a Christian who believes this world was created by God as a world material through and through, which He has made intelligible to the human soul by giving it a conceptual shape.

But no Christian believes the soul is material.

"My soul shall make her boast in the Lord: the humble shall hear thereof, and be glad." - King David.

Reply to Wayfarer

True, but the world and the body are thought to be material.

[i]I pray God your whole spirit and soul and body be preserved blameless unto the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ (1 Thessalonians 5:23).

For the word of God is quick, and powerful, and sharper than any two edged sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints and marrow (body), and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart (Hebrews 4:12).[/i]

This is most certainly not idealism, monism or even dualism. It is something else; humanity is thought to be in the image of the father; a trinity.

Reply to John But obviously, if the soul, and God, are not material, then that understanding can't co-exist with a philosophy which sees the world as 'material through and through'.

All of the intricacies of philosophical theology, idealism, and the rest, were worked out over periods of centuries after the Bible was written. The early Greek-speaking theologians, Clement of Alexandria and the like, incorporated Platonist ideas into theology. Then of course Aquinas incorporated many aspects of Aristotelean philosophy, and the whole history of philosophy, up until Hegel, comprised of exploring the fundamental ideas of substance, idea, nature, matter, mind and the rest. Cartesian dualism was created from a modernisation of the previous tradition.

The point that is getting lost here is that it is the modern conception of 'scientific materialism' that is monistic, i.e. there is only one kind of substance, that is 'matter-energy', and everything science knows (what else is there?) is the product of that, via the processes described by physics and evolutionary biology. Mind has come along as a very recent evolutionary development, by way of the output of the h. sapiens forebrain. God, spirits, souls, and the rest, are all anachronistic supersitions of an ignorant age. That is what materialism says. Berkeley, who was a Christian (a bishop, for that matter) intended his philosophy as a rebuttal of atheism and materialism. He may not have succeeded in so doing, but it can't be denied that this was his aim.

But no Christian believes the soul is material

Reply to Wayfarer

Does anyone believe that anything is immaterial? I mean material in its broadest sense, so the soul, while not constituted of physical matter, is constituted, has a constitution, of some kind of subtle material, or ethereal substance. Even God must surely have a constitution of some kind. By constitution I mean structure, body, matrices. How can a mind operate in a void? An absolute void?

Quoting Wayfarer

The point that is getting lost here is that it is the modern conception of 'scientific materialism' that is monistic, i.e. there is only one kind of substance, that is 'matter-energy', and everything science knows (what else is there?) is the product of that, via the processes described by physics and evolutionary biology

When "matter" and "energy" refer to two very distinct things, how can these two be conflated to claim only one kind of substance? We have a very similar problem with wave/particle duality. Through a wave or through a particle, are two very distinct ways that energy moves. Instead of properly separating two very distinct aspects of the universe, under dualist principles, there is an inclination in modern science to deny dualist principles, and conflate.

The desire to simplify ontology produces the inclination toward a monist metaphysics. This desire itself is very complex, probably coming from an atheist denial of God, and the denial of the reality of anything which cannot be seen. Seeing is believing, so what cannot be seen cannot be believed. But the monist metaphysic is nothing other than the conceptual premise that the intelligible (form) is inseparable from the unintelligible (matter). Failure to separate allows that the unintelligible permeates through all aspects of the universe, rendering the entire universe unintelligible.

Quoting Wayfarer

Have you got any examples of materialists who espouse spiritual ideals? How could the two co-exist?

Have you got any examples of an Idealist espousing spiritual ideas?

Reply to tom The idealism of whatever school advocates that the basic principle or fundamental ground of reality is mind rather than matter. All Berkeley's arguments are aimed against materialism and atheism. Hegel's major work was The Phenomenology of Spirit. Certain of the Platonic dialogues, particularly the Timeaus and the Phaedro, are mainly concerned with spiritual themes. It's a long list.

As I was explaing above, after Descartes, philosophies tended to cluster around either the mind or matter half of the Cartesian duality. Materialism tended towards the latter, the various idealist philosophies toward the former. But all of that looses sight of the fact that Descartes' model was an abstraction in the first place, so that both mind and matter become reified abstractions (Ed Feser has a good blog post on this point http://edwardfeser.blogspot.com.au/2012/08/concretizing-abstract.html).

Quoting Punshhh

Does anyone believe that anything is immaterial? I mean material in its broadest sense, so the soul, while not constituted of physical matter, is constituted, has a constitution, of some kind of subtle material, or ethereal substance. Even God must surely have a constitution of some kind. By constitution I mean structure, body, matrices. How can a mind operate in a void? An absolute void?

That's a very interesting question. The Jains, and the Stoics, both believe that the soul is made of fine material. But the orthodox doctrine of God is that of 'divine simplicity', and one of the meanings of 'simplicity' is not being composed of parts.

One of the principle difficulties of philosophy is arriving at an understanding of the nature of spirit. It is not 'nothing', that is simply an indication of the inadequacy of the mind for the nature of the question. It is also not something. My approach is, it can't be understood through the exercise of thought and reason, so my approach is negative, 'not this, not that'. It is something that has to be realised on a deeper level. (I'm sure you of all people on this board would undersatnd that ;) ).

Reply to Wayfarer That has nothing to do with spiritual ideas.

Quoting Metaphysician Undercover

Do you understand the logic which leads to the conclusion that the conceptual shape must be prior to the material object itself?

Do you mean logically prior or temporally prior? Remember that conceptual shapes or forms are both general and particular. Considered abstractly they are general, considered concretely they are particular. Particular forms are instantiations of a general evolution of forms. Is it reasonable to posit the prior existence of the general form of the rhinoceros, prior to the advent of actual rhinoceri? Would it be reasonable to posit the pre-existence of the the particualr form of a particualr rhino prioir to its birth?

To repeat, I am saying that particular things are conceptually articulated; they are natural symbolic expressions of a spiritual order. But I don't think it makes sense to say that the unique form is an expression of anything pre-existent.You might say that all forms are eternal, but that would not imply anything pre-existent, because eternity does not pre-exist temporality. The idea of etermity is the idea of that which is a-temporal; so that there can be no 'before' and 'after' in eternity.

Quoting Wayfarer

But obviously, if the soul, and God, are not material, then that understanding can't co-exist with a philosophy which sees the world as 'material through and through'.

The world can be material through and through; and even the soul, as Aristotle and other ancient thought, may be. Spirit is not, but it is not a part of the world.The world is the material, symbolic expression of spirit. I think Hegel got that right.

All of the intricacies of philosophical theology, idealism, and the rest, were worked out over periods of centuries after the Bible was written. The early Greek-speaking theologians, Clement of Alexandria and the like, incorporated Platonist ideas into theology. Then of course Aquinas incorporated many aspects of Aristotelean philosophy, and the whole history of philosophy, up until Hegel, comprised of exploring the fundamental ideas of substance, idea, nature, matter, mind and the rest. Cartesian dualism was created from a modernisation of the previous tradition.

Ironically, I think much of philosophy has been concerned with objectivization and naturalization of the spirit. So I don't think the problem is with the claim that the world is objective and material, but that God and the spirit are a higher order of objective existence. This rationalistic idea is actually quasi-materialist. The 'super-natural' is then seen as just a transcendent greater naturality subject to its own set of deterministic laws.

The point that is getting lost here is that it is the modern conception of 'scientific materialism' that is monistic, i.e. there is only one kind of substance, that is 'matter-energy', and everything science knows (what else is there?) is the product of that, via the processes described by physics and evolutionary biology. Mind has come along as a very recent evolutionary development, by way of the output of the h. sapiens forebrain. God, spirits, souls, and the rest, are all anachronistic supersitions of an ignorant age. That is what materialism says.

Sure, a materialism that says there is no God and no spirit; nothing at all beyond the material says that. But there is no contradiction involved in saying that the world is material. and that it is a manifestation of spirit. Spirit is not something that has objective existence beyond the material.Spirit exists wholly and only in spiritual experience. Spiritual experience is not an expression of some objective reality; spiritual experience is it own reality. All of these philosophical controversies about the existence of God and the spirit treat God and the spirit as some kind of objective existence that may be real or merely imagined. That is the problem, because it closes people to having faith in their own experience as real spiritual experience.

Of course mind is emergent, it is part of the natural order. Worms have minds, fish have more evolved minds, mammals more evolved still, and so on. So, of course mind is emergent. We might even say that there are evolving vegetal and animal souls, as Aristotle did. Spirit, though is not emergent; emergence is a manifestation of spirit.

That's my take on it anyway.

Quoting John

Do you mean logically prior or temporally prior?

I believe all forms of priority are reducible to temporal priority. If logic proves that X is necessary for Y, and therefore prior to Y, then Y cannot occur until after X occurs. So any time there is a demonstration of logical priority, it is also necessarily a temporal priority, whether it be a matter of efficient cause or final cause.

Quoting John

Considered abstractly they are general, considered concretely they are particular. Particular forms are instantiations of a general evolution of forms. Is it reasonable to posit the prior existence of the general form of the rhinoceros, prior to the advent of actual rhinoceri? Would it be reasonable to posit the pre-existence of the the particualr form of a particualr rhino prioir to its birth?

Clearly we are talking about particular forms here, as indicated by our discussion of the "conceptual shape" of an individual object. And, according to my explanation, it is not only reasonable, but also necessary, to posit the pre-existence of the particular form prior to the existence of the particular material object. This is demonstrated by the fact that the material object always comes into existence as an object with a particular form. The form is therefore prior to the material object.

To answer your question about the particular rhino, it is necessary that you understand the nature of "change", in the same way which I do, before I proceed with any explanation. The existence of change demonstrates that any object can cease being, and become something other, another object, at any moment in time. This necessitates that we assume that each object ceases to exist, and is recreated according to the form, at each moment of time. But change demonstrates that the form itself is actively changing at each moment. The DNA of the rhinoceros has the capacity to keep changing the form of the object, from one moment to the next, such that a baby rhino develops.

Reply to Metaphysician Undercover

I don't see an actual argument here for the prior temporal existence of particular forms. In any case, would such a postulated prior temporal existence be an objective existence in our spatio-temporal world or would it be an existence in some other spatio-temporal order? If it were in a separate spatio-temporal order then on what grounds would you say it could be temporally related to our spatio-temporal world such as to justify the claim that it would be temporally prior?

Quoting John

But there is no contradiction involved in saying that the world is material. and that it is a manifestation of spirit.

No contradiction provided you admit the duality of matter and spirit.

Reply to Wayfarer

Yes, although as I said before I think it is a trinity of body, soul and spirit. They are 'three-in-one, though; so this is not any kind of metaphysical claim of pluralism, that would be contradictory to a metaphysical claim of dualism or monism. Matter is a manifestation of spirit,they are not the same and yet they are not different, either.

Reply to John But if you say that matter is a manifestation of spirit, then you're admitting the reality of spirit. In which case, I've forgotten what it is you're taking issue with.

Reply to Wayfarer

I haven't denied the reality of spirit, though. I am taking issue with the philosophical debates that are based on the presumption that the purported reality of spirit is a purportedly objective reality. i am saying that is the problem, not whether someone holds a metaphysically materialist, as opposed to a metaphysically idealist view. It is the holding of metaphysical views in general that is the problem because they are based on a kind of thinking that objectifies.

Quoting John

I am taking issue with the philosophical debates that are based on the presumption that the purported reality of spirit is a purportedly objective reality.

Where did I say that it was that? I go to great lengths to make that point.

Quoting John

It is the holding of metaphysical views in general that is the problem because they are based on a kind of thinking that objectifies.

Exactly - as per the 'poison arrow' parable of the Buddha. That is something I well understand.

This current exchange started when you said 'Personally, I don't believe one or the other [i.e. materialism or idealism], per se, is more or less conducive to, or associated with, spirituality'. But now that you're acknowledging the possibility that 'the material world is the manifestation of spirit', then this is a basic tenet of idealist philosophy.

Reply to Wayfarer

Not exactly; when I say that I don't think that either idealism or materialism, per se are more conducive to spirituality I mean that to hold one or the other metaphysical view makes no difference. To hold either metaphysical view is not so conducive to spirituality; so i can't agree that the material world being a manifestation of spirit in the sense I have in mind, at least, is a "basic tenet of idealist philosophy'. Most idealist philosophies objectify spirit which could be seen to be either almost as bad as, or perhaps even worse than, denying it in my view.

Quoting John

I mean that to hold one or the other metaphysical view makes no difference.

So why waste time on a philosophy forum?

Quoting John

In any case, would such a postulated prior temporal existence be an objective existence in our spatio-temporal world or would it be an existence in some other spatio-temporal order?

Being non-material, these forms are understood to be non-spatial. And as I explained, being prior to material objects, implies a temporal relation. I don't know what you mean by "objective existence in our spatio-temporal world", but clearly the existence of these forms is as objective as anything can be, though their existence may not be spatial, in the sense of 3d Euclidian space.

Quoting John

If it were in a separate spatio-temporal order then on what grounds would you say it could be temporally related to our spatio-temporal world such as to justify the claim that it would be temporally prior?

In reply to this, I can only say that I believe that the best understanding produced by human beings at the present time, of the relationship between space and time, comes nowhere near to being adequate for a true understanding of that relationship. So the spatio-temporal order referred to here is completely different from the spatio-temporal order which you refer to, but this is because human beings presently misunderstand the relationship between space and time.

Reply to Wayfarer

To sharpen up my thoughts and expression of them. To identify errors of thought. To come to understand what it is that I think about life, the best way to live and so, in dialogue with others.

If I thought the only, or even the main, purpose of philosophy is to hold and defend metaphysical positions then I would, no doubt, think participating in forums, as such, is a waste of time. Sometimes it does, circumstantially, seem to a waste of time, though, I must admit.

Reply to John I was being polemical. Generally I'm on board with a lot of what you write, but I had to take exception to equating materialism and idealism. X-)

Reply to Wayfarer

Yeah I get that; I don' t think we disagree about anything of major importance.
:)

Quoting Metaphysician Undercover

Being non-material, these forms are understood to be non-spatial.

Wouldn't any form, being extended and configured, have to be thought to inhabit some kind of a space, whether its a logical or purely conceptual space, or an actual or perceptual space?

One of the principle difficulties of philosophy is arriving at an understanding of the nature of spirit. It is not 'nothing', that is simply an indication of the inadequacy of the mind for the nature of the question. It is also not something. My approach is, it can't be understood through the exercise of thought and reason, so my approach is negative, 'not this, not that'. It is something that has to be realised on a deeper level. (I'm sure you of all people on this board would undersatnd that ;) ).

Reply to Wayfarer

Yes I agree, infact I don't often mention spirit because it is so volatile that it can't be addressed without failing to address it. Rather like God, both terms and concepts became essentially irrelevant to me in my contemplation a long time ago. I simply house them in place referred to as eternity, or for God, perhaps, the one about whom naught may be said.

Refering to material though my position is such that I rarely ever see it mentioned on forums like this. That material as a philosophical concept is all forms of extension, division, differentiation. Or everything which is not "the one about whom naught may be said". So to me the soul, mind, concepts, being, even spirit are all material. And all material behaves according to natural law. So to me the immaterial is a scarce thing indeed, like hens teeth. But vital nevertheless.

Not exactly; when I say that I don't think that either idealism or materialism, per se are more conducive to spirituality I mean that to hold one or the other metaphysical view makes no difference.

Reply to John Yes, likewise. Actually for me both metaphysical views dovetail nicely into one whole, absent the rhetoric in either which denies something in the other. In fact all this argument about metaphysics we see here is largely irrelevant to me because I have developed my own metaphysic a while ago, which neither comes close to.

Reply to Punshhh

What you say agrees, at least in part, with what I have been saying; that idealism and realism are the two sides of a counterfeit coin. I say counterfeit, because I think materialism reifies the object and idealism objectifies the subject, and I think both moves are illegitimate. I mean, both moves are fine for everyday thought and communication, but are not when it comes to making strong metaphysical claims or as establishing foundations for ethics. Actually I am distrustful of strong metaphysical claims altogether. I think metaphysical speculation is great for working out how the mind is capable of thinking about being, experience, thought and all the rest; but should never be taken too seriously.

Yes, metaphysics is always a means of limiting the mind, the imagination. There is an implication that we, humanity, have the capacity to both determine and understand the nature of existence, or something. I know that some folk would say that they build in an acknowledgement of our limitations. But this itself would lead to the realisation that we don't know anything, apart from what we find before us. So limiting again.

For me an understanding of the nature of existence is much more a living and intuitive experience, in which thought, thinking is nothing more than one of a number of tools in my tool kit.

Quoting John

Wouldn't any form, being extended and configured, have to be thought to inhabit some kind of a space, whether its a logical or purely conceptual space, or an actual or perceptual space?

No. that's the thing, you are not allowing the form to exist separately from the material object which it is the form of. We know that the form of the object is separable from the matter, because that's what we do in abstraction, when we come to know the object, the form exists in the mind, therefore it must be separable from the material object. The material object is what we know to have spatial existence, we cannot simply assume that the form also has spatial existence, especially since we need some principle whereby the material object itself is different from the form of the object, which can exist in the mind, separate from the object itself.

I don't know what you mean when you suggest that the form could inhabit a "purely conceptual space". We conceive of space as a necessary condition for the existence of material objects. The concept of "space" is the means by which we understand the object's existence, so we can conclude that space (real space) is necessary for the object's existence. Space is what all material objects have in common. We do the same thing with "time" and change. We produce the concept of time to understand changes to the object, so we can conclude that time (real time) is necessary for change. Time is what all changes have in common.

When we look at concepts, especially pure concepts, such as mathematical, we see unity and order as the fundamental principles which represent space and time respectively. Unity though, in its fundamental form, does not require spatial extension. We can conceive of a non-spatial point, as a single unit. That conceptual point does not require space for its existence in conceptual form. It is only when we utilize the point, to position the point within a spatial realm, that it becomes related to space. So the point, as a single, non-dimensional unit, is completely free from space, and this is why it is so versatile as a spatial implement. It also demonstrates that the concept need not inhabit a "conceptual space". The conceptual point is free from space, in an absolute sense. In fact, there are many ways to demonstrate that the non-dimensional, conceptual point, is fundamentally incompatible with space. These involve the problems with infinite divisibility, Zeno's paradoxes, the irrational nature of pi, and such issues. No amount of dividing space can give us the non-dimensional point, nor can any amount of non-dimensional points accumulate to produce a line. Each non-dimensional point adds absolutely zero in spatial extension.

Next, we have order, and order is a temporally based concept. We can have a succession of non-dimensional points, separated by time, and count them, one, two, three, and so on. Now we have the non-spatial unit, the point, with temporal extension, such that there is not a line, in the sense of a two dimensional, spatial line, but a succession of points, with time separating each point, such that the points may be numbered according to the order given to them by time. Now we have the fundamental mathematical concepts, the primary unity, and the ordering of numbers, and these require absolutely no spatial reference or spatial existence.

Quoting Wayfarer

Ed Feser has a good blog post on this point http://edwardfeser.blogspot.com.au/2012/08/concretizing-abstract.html.

As a physicalist, I actually agree with the vast majority of Feser's post. The primary aspects where I didn't agree with him were in his comments about brains, genes, etc. as (not being) "substances in their own right"--but primarily because I'm not sure just what he's claiming there, and in comments that seem to suggest that he believes that mentality is "whole body phenomena" rather than brain phenomena. I agree that brains can't be isolated and function anything like they normally function, but I don't agree that mental phenomena actually obtain in other parts of one's body. Being a necessary support and interactive system for x isn't identical to being x.

Reply to Metaphysician Undercover

I can't make any sense of a form that is not a configuration, and a configuration cannot be coherently thought as being dimensionless, like a point may be able to be.

So an abstract form would have to be in an abstract space, just as a concrete form is in a concrete space. In other words form is unthinkable without space.

While searching for something else I stumbled across this, I think quite relevant, passage in the IEP:

In Zettel, Wittgenstein asks the reader to consider two philosophers, one an idealist, the other a realist, who are raising their children to share their philosophical beliefs. An idealist holds that physical objects only exist in so far as they are perceived; talk of unperceived physical objects is merely a means to making predictions about future observations. The realist holds that physical objects exist independently of our capacity to perceive them. Wittgenstein suggests that both philosophers will teach their children how to use vocabulary about physical objects in exactly the same way, except, perhaps, that one child will be taught to say, "Physical objects exist independently of our perceptions," and the other will be taught to deny this. If this is the only difference between the two children, says Wittgenstein, "Won't the difference be one only of battle-cry?" (Wittgenstein, 1967, 74). For Wittgenstein, to understand the use of a word, in the manner that is relevant to philosophy, it is necessary to understand the role that sentences involving that word play in our lives. His claim in this case is that those sentences which philosophers take to express substantive statements about realism and idealism play no role whatsoever in our lives. The metaphysical sentences have no use, and so there is nothing to be understood—they are strings of words without a meaning. Wittgenstein's hope is that once we see that, in a given metaphysical dispute, both sides are divided by nothing more than their different battle cries, both parties will realize that there is nothing to fight about and so give up fighting.

Quoting Terrapin Station

The primary aspects where I didn't agree with him were in his comments about brains, genes, etc. as (not being) "substances in their own right"--but primarily because I'm not sure just what he's claiming there,

That's because he's referring to the traditional, Aristotelean definition of 'substance'. This is not anything like the modern 'substance, stuff, or thing', but 'the subject in which attributes inhere'. So 'the soul' is a substance, due to its unity and simplicity; something similar to that is still represented in the problem now known as the 'subjective unity of experience'. In contemporary language, the body and mind are holistic, i.e. they function as a seamless and simple unity even though on the cellular level it is an enormously complex bio-mechanical-electrical system.

Quoting Punshhh

Refering to material though my position is such that I rarely ever see it mentioned on forums like this. That material as a philosophical concept is all forms of extension, division, differentiation

That's rather like the Aristotelean 'hyle', the 'prima materia' which is then imprinted with 'form'. Whereas, when I am talking about materialism, I am referring to the materialism that believes that only matter is real.

Quoting John

An idealist holds that physical objects only exist in so far as they are perceived

Berkeley is the only idealist whose explicit formulation was esse est percipe. But there are many forms of idealism which say something other than that. The idealism of the Greeks was born out of the discovery of laws or 'logos', the governing principles of both the cosmos and individual types. The discovery of types and forms, of form as distinct from matter, also gave rise to the idea of the 'form' as an 'ideal type', which is made explicit in Plato's dialogues. So the 'forms' in that context are almost like the potential or the perfect idea of some particular, which the particular form then 'realises' or 'instantiates'. Whereas nous is able to perceive mathematical and ideal forms directly (in the 'mind's eye'), perception of the physical forms is always mediated by the senses. So the 'ideal realm' is not something physically existent, it's like an 'idea in the mind of the One', which the physical specimens 'down here' can only try and emulate. That is the motivation behind the formality of classical art and architecture, which attempts to depict the perfection of the 'changeless realm of forms' that is behind or above the physical world.

Quoting John

For Wittgenstein, to understand the use of a word, in the manner that is relevant to philosophy, it is necessary to understand the role that sentences involving that word play in our lives. His claim in this case is that those sentences which philosophers take to express substantive statements about realism and idealism play no role whatsoever in our lives. The metaphysical sentences have no use, and so there is nothing to be understood—they are strings of words without a meaning. Wittgenstein's hope is that once we see that, in a given metaphysical dispute, both sides are divided by nothing more than their different battle cries, both parties will realize that there is nothing to fight about and so give up fighting.

I don't think Wittgenstein was right. First of all, I think ordinary language expresses naive realist views. Secondly, science has an awful lot to say about what goes on when we're not around, including the deep past and far off into space. That seems to be a bit more than just making useful predictions. As if science is an attempt to explain the world, not just provide useful predictions. And thirdly, people with an interest in philosophy, including professional philosophers have continued to have metaphysical debates, even while knowing what Wittgenstein had to say on the matter.

And finally, I believe even Witty himself was not entirely convinced that you could do away with philosophical issues by understanding how language works. That the puzzle of philosophy continued to bother him.

Reply to Wayfarer

But then if an idealist says that objects exist independently of being perceived, then that idealist must be some form of realist, which is all fine and consistent unless you equate realism with materialism.

What other criteria could you come up with for distinguishing realists from idealists other than that of the perception-independent existence of objects that doesn't invoke the metaphysical mind vs matter discussion? If you invoke the latter then you are really talking about idealism vs materialism, and not idealism vs realism.

I think Wittgenstein's point is that when we talk about "perception independent" existence or non-existence of objects we don't really know what we are talking about.

Quoting John

I can't make any sense of a form that is not a configuration, and a configuration cannot be coherently thought as being dimensionless, like a point may be able to be.

We are talking about intelligible objects, ideas and concepts. A form in the way that you use "form" is an intelligible object. But it appears like you now want to restrict your definition of "form", such that a form is necessarily a spatial "configuration".

I suggest to you that this is a mistake. We create mathematical formulae which are by no means spatial configurations. Mathematical formulae are applied to spatial configurations. So for example we say that the circle has 360 degrees. This allows that the circle is divided into 360 distinct rays, or angles from the centre. Mathematics is applied to the circle, such that the convention is to have 360 degrees, but we could have made the circle with 320, 376, 400, or whatever number of distinctions we desired. The number of degrees in a circle is completely arbitrary. This indicates that the mathematical formula is completely distinct from the spatial representation.

So it is rather pointless, and a dead end argument, an untenable position, to insist that a form is necessarily a spatial configuration. Clearly mathematical formulae are not necessarily spatial configurations. Furthermore, you then deny yourself the means for dealing with the existence of these non-spatial things, numbers and non-dimensional points for example. You simply segregate these non-spatial things from their spatial application. Then what will you do with them, ignore them, or deny that they are real?

Quoting John

In other words form is unthinkable without space.

So the problem is, that there clearly is concepts such as numbers and points which are thinkable without space. To exclude mathematical formulae from your definition of "form", such that all forms are spatial, is just to close your eyes to the reality that not all forms are spatial. This is like saying that all human beings are men, but that closes your eyes to the reality that many human beings are women.

Reply to Metaphysician Undercover

I would say that mathematical concepts inhabit a logical space. In any case algebraic formulae for specifying the configurations of abstract forms are intelligible only insofar as they can be converted into visualizable forms.

A form simply cannot be intelligibly grasped unless it is visualized, and to be visualized it must be as possessing spatial dimension

Reply to Marchesk

I agree with you that ordinary language's 'native land' is naive realism. The problem is that the naive part of naive realism is where we naively imagine objects as existing just as we see them, independently of our seeing of them. I believe we are in a way logically committed to that in relation to our everyday communications; but I don't think that, on analysis, it can be shown that we really understand how that could be possible, or how it makes sense; it's just something we take for granted in an unexamined way.

It is when we try to examine it that the antinomies and the aporias begin to proliferate.It doesn't seem that it could be non-paradoxical to say either that objects exist independently of our perceiving them, or that they don't. We are kind of stuck in the middle; but we are not satisfied with our inability to solve this paradox; and so the endless debate rages on.

Quoting John

But then if an idealist says that objects exist independently of being perceived, then that idealist must be some form of realist, which is all fine and consistent unless you equate realism with materialism.

Well, my view is that reality always includes an observer, and there is no 'mind-independent' reality in that sense. But that doesn't mean the past doesn't exist, or that train wheels dissappear when the passengers are inside the carriage, or that objects go in and out of existence depending on who is looking or not looking. All of that is simply a stage-play in the theatre of the imagination. The sense of the 'independent reality' of the phenomenal domain is bred into us as a consequence of the age we live in.

Quoting John

would say that mathematical concepts inhabit a logical space. In any case algebraic formulae for specifying the configurations of abstract forms are intelligible only insofar as they can be converted into visualizable forms.

As I said earlier, I really don't know what you mean by "logical space". Anyway, as I explained earlier, number is intelligible as order, and not necessarily as visualizable forms. Two comes after one, and three comes after two, and so on ad infinitum. That is how we learn numbers, we do not visualize one object then two objects, then three objects, etc., we learn the procession of numbers, one after the other. Numbers are an expression of order, not spatial forms.

And, as I said, you can insist that forms are spatial, all you want, but your only fooling yourself. What's the point in self-deception?

Quoting John

A form simply cannot be intelligibly grasped unless it is visualized, and to be visualized it must be as possessing spatial dimension

Are you telling me that you cannot grasp numbers strictly as order, without spatial dimension? If that is the case, perhaps you should go back to elementary math, and relearn these things.

Reply to Wayfarer

Surely on that dualistic logic, reality also includes an observed; and why should we not think it is mind-independent outside the context of its actually being observed? After all, even when it is being observed, it is clear that what is observed does not exhaust its being.

And you say yourself that is doesn't mean "that objects go in and out of existence depending on who is looking or not looking." So, isn't that "not going out of existence" when not being observed a case of mind-independent existence?

I believe I can predict what you will say; you will say that that mind-independent existence is itself conceived by a mind. But that would just be to go around in circles within a state of conceptual self-confinement.

I will grant you, though,that we cannot get any clear idea of what a mind-independent existence (or non-existence) could look like. That's why I don't think it is an important issue; rather it's an insoluble issue. People come down on one side or the other of this argument, due to other preconceptions or preferences, or other ideas they favour, that they think are rightly associated one way or the other, with one side or the other.

Reply to Metaphysician Undercover

We were not talking about numbers, per se, we were talking about forms.
We were talking about numbers only insofar as they be used to create formulas. Formulas can specify two dimensional and three dimensional configurations. They can even specify four dimensional configurations, but we cannot visualize those.

Quoting Metaphysician Undercover

And, as I said, you can insist that forms are spatial, all you want, but your only fooling yourself. What's the point in self-deception?

If you can explain to me a way to intuitively grasp forms which does not involve spatial thinking then I will reconsider.

Quoting John

Surely on that dualistic logic, reality also includes an observed; and why should we not think it is mind-independent outside the context of its actually being observed? After all, even when it is being observed, it is clear that what is observed does not exhaust its being.

And you say yourself that is doesn't mean "that objects go in and out of existence depending on who is looking or not looking." So, isn't that "not going out of existence" when not being observed a case of mind-independent existence?

I believe I can predict what you will say; you will say that that mind-independent existence is itself conceived by a mind. But that would just be to go around in circles within a state of conceptual self-confinement.

Right! Whatever we say, or science says, about 'what exists', there is always a subjective pole in any such statement. It's very clear to me how this is developed - in the Enlightenment, there was the gesture, 'sweep metaphysics off the table, let's get down to what is "really there"'. And what is "really there" is the domain of sensory phenomena and underlying laws. But notice - as soon as a thread comes up on 'what are laws'? there is vast confusion. Same with 'what are numbers'. So what appears obvious, presented, clear for all to see, is not actually obvious at all. And people take that as the yardstick for reality. That is why there is vast confusion.

Philosophy is penetrating that confusion, that illusion. Few do.

Quoting John

We were not talking about numbers, per se, we were talking about forms.
We were talking about numbers only insofar as they be used to create formulas. Formulas can specify two dimensional and three dimensional configurations. They can even specify four dimensional configurations, but we cannot visualize those.

Right, so this is contrary to your claim: "abstract forms are intelligible only insofar as they can be converted into visualizable forms". The fact is that some abstract forms are intelligible by a means other than visualizing them.

A mathematical formula is a type of form. A mathematical formula is grasped by a means other than visualization. Therefore not all forms are grasped by visualization.

Quoting John

If you can explain to me a way to intuitively grasp forms which does not involve spatial thinking then I will reconsider.

I already painstakingly described this, it's called "numbers". We grasp numbers through "order" which is non-spatial, it is temporal. Two comes after one, then three comes after two, then four, then five. We do not need a spatial number line to grasp the ordering of numbers.

Quoting Metaphysician Undercover

Next, we have order, and order is a temporally based concept. We can have a succession of non-dimensional points, separated by time, and count them, one, two, three, and so on. Now we have the non-spatial unit, the point, with temporal extension, such that there is not a line, in the sense of a two dimensional, spatial line, but a succession of points, with time separating each point, such that the points may be numbered according to the order given to them by time. Now we have the fundamental mathematical concepts, the primary unity, and the ordering of numbers, and these require absolutely no spatial reference or spatial existence.

If you still don't get it, try the concept of "God".

Reply to Wayfarer

I think when it comes to the natural world what is there is "the domain of sensory phenomena". It is there for us as surely and reliably as we ourselves exist. I just tend to think the further question 'but what is REALLY there (in an objective sense) is misconceived, because we don't know, in any context independent of empirical experience, what we are asking. In a purely formal, everyday sense, in keeping with the logic of our linguistic usages, there is something there independent of us. But we can never analyze what that means.

But, I would say that what else is there is the domain of spiritual experience which is always personal, although obviously also conditioned by inter-subjective culture; the spiritual realities of ethical, aesthetic, interpersonal, religious and mystical experience. Those spiritual realities do not point to any further objective reality beyond themselves; to say they do would be to objectify the spirit; which I think is probably worse than denying it, because it causes people to think they are understanding something, when they are really confused. It's probably better to deny something on the basis of a commonsense understanding, rather than to misunderstand it. In practice, I don't believe anyone really denies the life of the spirit; it is not possible to deny it. They might say the words but then they go right ahead and live their lives as if the life of the spirit is true.

So, I just can't agree with you that there is confusion because people can't understand metaphysical idealism; I actually think metaphysical idealism (or materialism) as thought out positions which people cling to and defend is what causes all the confusion (but probably not amongst the majority who think such questions are "stupid" and a "waste of time" anyway). It is better for an unsophisticated materialist to believe in a materialist 'sky father' God, if that provides moral compass, than to turn away because an idealist has tried to correct him or because a materialist has managed to convince him it's all bullshit. But I don't think those not given to much thought often turn away under such influences; I think if they do turn away it is because they want to, not because they are influenced by idealist or materialist philosophy; unless of course in the context of materialism you are referring to the influence of consumerism; which is another story.

Quoting Metaphysician Undercover

The fact is that some abstract forms are intelligible by a means other than visualizing them.

But I have said I don't think they are intelligible as forms if they cannot be intuitively grasped as such. That's exactly why the warping of four-dimensional spacetime can be modeled mathematically, but I don't believe that makes it intelligible in the sense of it being able to be intuitively grasped. That is why relativity theorists and quantum theorists admit that they don't really understand what is going on and say that if you think you understand such things you don't really understand them. This is not to deny they can be understood mathematically.

Quoting Metaphysician Undercover

I already painstakingly described this, it's called "numbers". We grasp numbers through "order" which is non-spatial, it is temporal. Two comes after one, then three comes after two,, then four, then five. We do not need a spatial number line to grasp the ordering of numbers.


If you still don't get it, try the concept of "God".

Apart from the fact that number succession is understood by placing the numbers on a line, numbers, to say it again, are not the issue; forms are the issue.

God is not a form.

Reply to John So what are you saying, that the ordering of numbers, and mathematical formulae in general, are intelligible, but because they are not spatial, they cannot be "intuitively grasped"? What does this mean? We understand mathematics, but we do not "intuitively" understand mathematics? Isn't this a sort of bias? You seem to be saying that because it isn't an "intuitive" understanding (whatever you mean by that), it is not a real understanding.

Reply to Metaphysician Undercover

I actually think all understanding is intuitive. But, be that as it may, this conversation started off about the forms of objects, not about numbers or mathematics. Sure the forms of objects may be encoded in formulae in terms of numbers and other mathematical operations, but the form of an object can only be grasped visually or by touch, as least when it comes to most humans. When the form is intuitively grasped it is always grasped as a configured extension in space, however abstracted. It's quite simple, you can't have the form of the object without the spacial configuration of that form.

Quoting John

I actually think all understanding is intuitive.

I don't see how such a claim is tenable. We understand many things through the means of logic, and logic is not intuitive.

Quoting John

But, be that as it may, this conversation started off about the forms of objects, not about numbers or mathematics.

But the point was, the demonstration (which you didn't grasp because it was logical rather than visual) that the form of the object is necessarily prior to the material object. This implies that the actual form of the object, the form which determines what the object will be when it comes into existence, is completely different from the form that we grasp through perception, what we call the form of the material object.

As I explained, space is proper to the form of the material object, so the form which determines what the object will be must be non-spatial, therefore more like a mathematical formula. You cannot relate directly to the form which determines the existence of the object, through the material object itself, because the material object will be a medium, a separation between you and that form. So all you see is the form of the object, you do not see the form which determines the existence of the object. It's like looking at a screen with a projection on it. All you see is the projection, you do not see what's behind it, causing it. You can do all you want to analyze the forms on the screen, but this does not get you to the forms which are behind, causing the projection. And your intuitive understanding is really a big misunderstanding.

Quoting John

When the form is intuitively grasped it is always grasped as a configured extension in space, however abstracted. It's quite simple, you can't have the form of the object without the spacial configuration of that form.

But that's not true, the form of the object is not always grasped as a spatial extension. It may be grasped as a mathematical formula. That's what field theory gives us in quantum physics, a mathematical formula rather than a spatial extension. You would deny that the field mathematics represents the form of the object because it is not intuitive, it cannot produce a spatial configuration. Nevertheless, it is just as much the real form of the object as any spatial configuration which might be proposed. The point though, is that there is a separation between the two, the object itself which is the medium between the two forms is that separation. The spatial configuration is a representation, or form, of what the material object is, while the mathematical formula is the representation of what the object will be. So the material object exists as a separation between these two distinct types of forms, and this is why dualism is required in order to understand reality.

Quoting John

So, I just can't agree with you that there is confusion because people can't understand metaphysical idealism;

That is not the cause of the confusion; the confusion is that we can't distinguish truth from falsehoods, reality from illusion. We cite what we think is 'the scientific worldview' in a world which has severed facts from values. And look at what is happening, the most powerful nation has just elected a liar and charlatan as leader of the free world. Confusion reigns supreme.

Quoting Metaphysician Undercover

I don't see how such a claim is tenable. We understand many things through the means of logic, and logic is not intuitive.

If it is not intuited, then how do you know that one thing follows from another?

Quoting Metaphysician Undercover

This implies that the actual form of the object, the form which determines what the object will be when it comes into existence, is completely different from the form that we grasp through perception, what we call the form of the material object.

The form of maple leaves for example is a general form that can only be grasped as a visualization, it will be a description that will result in a visualization, an algebraic expression which specifies the coordinates on the x/y axis which will result in a visualization, or a direct pictorial representation. Now, let's take the example of the pictorial representation: it is probably never going to be the exact form of any particular maple leaf, because each particular maple leaf has its own form of the same general kind which can be abstracted to form a closer, but never perfect, visual representation. But there is no sense in which the present form of the maple leaf existed prior to the present moment. Prior to the present moment there were a succession of slightly different forms that evolved to the present form. Only the general form of maple leaves is prior to any particular maple leaf. But that general form too has evolved from a form that was once quite different.

The next paragraph reads to me like gibberish so I am not going to respond to that.

Quoting Metaphysician Undercover

But that's not true, the form of the object is not always grasped as a spatial extension. It may be grasped as a mathematical formula.

The visual form of an object cannot be grasped as a mathematical formula, well at least I can't grasp it as such, and I have spoken to mathematicians who say the same. The form can be modeled as a mathematical formula, the formula can of course be understood in purely mathematical terms, but it cannot be visualized directly, as mathematical formula; by definition it can only be visualized as a visual form. If you still disagree then there is no point continuing, because I am just going to say you are wrong; and you are probably just going to say I am wrong, and it will be a waste of time and energy.

Reply to Wayfarer

I think the truth about Trump is not a scientific truth. That he is a reprehensible character or not cannot be empirically established, it is a judgement call, like the judgement as to whether an artwork is good or not. There is no objective fact of the matter in regard to such judgements, but there are truths of the spirit. Some people can see those truths and others can't, but they can never be demonstrated like empirical truths can.

Reply to John Yeah, dumb argument on my part. It was only provided as 'symptom of general malaise'.

Quoting John

There is no objective fact of the matter in regard to such judgements, but there are truths of the spirit.

Which is what I try and arrive at, by philosophical means; that is what I regard as the overall aim of 'the idealist tradition' in Western philosophy.

Quoting John

If it is not intuited, then how do you know that one thing follows from another?

As I said, I really don't know what you mean by intuitive. My dictionary defines intuition as "immediate apprehension by the mind without reasoning". There is a second definition which is immediate apprehension by a sense, and a third definition which is immediate insight. Notice that all use the word "immediate". Logic is a tool which the mind uses, so there is a necessity to understand the premises, the principles of logic being employed, and how these are related, so that a conclusion is drawn. There is no immediacy here, the conclusion requires mental effort, so it is impossible that logical conclusions are "intuitive", instead, they are "rational".

Quoting John

The form of maple leaves for example is a general form that can only be grasped as a visualization, it will be a description that will result in a visualization, an algebraic expression which specifies the coordinates on the x/y axis which will result in a visualization, or a direct pictorial representation.

Again, I disagree with you. I think that it is impossible to grasp a general form through a visualization. That's the very essence of a "general" form. A visual image is always of a particular, and a general form is categorically different from this. There is an inherent incompatibility between the two. That is why the general is understood through definition, rather than through visualizing a particular. We can come to grasp the general through seeing particular instances, and abstracting certain properties, but we cannot immediately grasp the general from a particular instance. This would merely be grasping a particular, and clearly not a case of grasping the "general form", which requires understanding some general principles.

Quoting John

Now, let's take the example of the pictorial representation: it is probably never going to be the exact form of any particular maple leaf, because each particular maple leaf has its own form of the same general kind which can be abstracted to form a closer, but never perfect, visual representation.

Here is the difficulty with your presentation. Unless the representation is of a particular maple leaf, then it is not a visual, or "pictorial" representation at all. A pictorial representation, or imaginary image, is of a particular, even if that particular is only within your mind. The image consists of the particulars which your mind puts there. You can imagine the maple leaf as just a stem, with a vague shape on top, many particulars not filled in by your mind's imagining process, but this does not give you the general form. What it gives you is an incomplete particular.

So what you don't seem to be understanding is that when we abstract the form, from a particular, through sense and thought, it is always a particular form which is abstracted from that individual. The particular form abstracted will be incomplete, depending on which aspects of the form are apprehended as important. But this does not produce a general form. The general form is created by the mind adopting certain principles of recognition, and classification. This is what Aristotle described as distinguishing essentials from accidentals. By employing these principles, first to recognize the similarity between different leaves, and second, to hold that there is a classification called "maple leaf", the existence of a general form is demonstrated. Further, an individual human being is often mistaken in these principle, so the formal existence of a general form is by definition. The classification is named and the defining features are described, such that there is agreement amongst human beings, and the general form maintains its existence by means of this agreement, convention.

The point being made, is that the particular form is what is abstracted from the particular object. This is perception. The general form is something completely different, it is created by the mind. The general form exists as principles of recognition and classification, rules which the mind follows. There is a categorical difference between the two. The two cannot be conflated because there is a deep incompatibility between them, and this is why dualism is necessary.

Quoting John

But there is no sense in which the present form of the maple leaf existed prior to the present moment. Prior to the present moment there were a succession of slightly different forms that evolved to the present form.

Let me try once again, to explain this issue. As time passes, there is as you say, "a succession of slightly different forms". At each moment of the present, the maple leaf is this particular maple leaf, it is not that particular maple leaf which it was at the last moment, because it has changed. Therefore at each moment the maple leaf is a new, and different object. So at each moment a new object is created, we can call them MLt1, MLt2, MLt3, etc., each collection of symbols referring to a different object. Let's take MLt3 for example. When that object comes into existence, it necessarily comes into existence as the object which it is, MLt3, or else it is not MLt3. It does not come into existence as MLt2, Mlt4, or any random thing, it comes into existence as MLt3. Therefore we can assume that there is a cause of its existence as MLt3, a reason why it exists at that moment as MLt3, and not something else. This is the determining form of MLt3. Notice that in order for the object, MLt3, to exist at that present moment, as MLt3, it is necessary that the form of MLt3 existed prior to that. This prior form is not MLt2, it is not MLt4, because these are distinctly different. It is nothing other than the form of MLt3, which exists prior to the object MLt3, and ensures that object MLt3 will exist as that object, at that moment in time.

But we see material object MLt3. We abstract that particular form, and this constitutes our representation of object MLt3. Our representation is a representation of material object MLt3, it is not a representation of the determining form, which exists prior to material object Mlt3, ensuring that Mlt3 will exist as MLt3.

Quoting John

The visual form of an object cannot be grasped as a mathematical formula, well at least I can't grasp it as such, and I have spoken to mathematicians who say the same. The form can be modeled as a mathematical formula, the formula can of course be understood in purely mathematical terms, but it cannot be visualized directly, as mathematical formula; by definition it can only be visualized as a visual form. If you still disagree then there is no point continuing, because I am just going to say you are wrong; and you are probably just going to say I am wrong, and it will be a waste of time and energy.

The point I am making is that the visual form of the object is distinctly different from the form of the object which precedes the existence of that object in time, causing it to be that object which it is. The visual form of the object is created by human perception following the object's presence in time. It is a representation of the object's material existence at that time. The form which precedes the object's material existence, and determines what that object will be at any moment in time, as time passes, cannot be seen visually, because it is always prior in time to that object's material existence, which is what is seen. The only access we have to this prior form is the mathematical formula, which enables us to predict, and is inherently different from the visual form. The difference, I have argued, is that the visual form is spatial, and the mathematical is non-spatial. This, I believe, is due to the fact that there is no spatial existence prior to the present moment in time. Spatial existence is created at each moment of passing time.

So I am in agreement with you, that the visual form of the object cannot be grasped by the mathematical formula. The two are deeply incompatible, and that's why I advocate dualism. Here's an explanation of this incompatibility:

We see the object, thus creating a visual form. What we see is the object's material form, and this is necessarily post-present in time. The object is present to us, as a material object, at the present, so our representation of it is necessarily post-present, therefore this particular form is post-present. As human beings we proceed to create general forms, these are generalized rules, rules for naming, classifying, right up to the general laws of physics. Then, we turn back to the particular object, applying these general rules. So we have mathematical formulae, which we apply to the particular objects, attempting to determine the pre-present form of the object. This is prediction. But the essential nature of the pre-present form of the object is that it is particular. Each object has its own particular form, proper to it, which is prior to it in time, causing it to be the object which it is. Now we have general forms, mathematical, and physical laws etc., which are not specific to the particulars of the object. So we have an incompatibility between the general nature of mathematical formulae, and the particular nature of the pre-present forms of objects.

Quoting Metaphysician Undercover

There is no immediacy here, the conclusion requires mental effort, so it is impossible that logical conclusions are "intuitive", instead, they are "rational".

Understanding a complex logical argument results from the associating of its parts, The parts consist of immediately apprehended insights and the associations between them are also direct insights. What else could the associations be but further direct insights ? They cannot be composed of mechanically following rules without any insight, because then you would need further rules to tell you how to follow the rules, creating an infinitely regressive and complex proliferation of rules which would make any understanding or following of logical arguments impossible.

Quoting Metaphysician Undercover

I think that it is impossible to grasp a general form through a visualization.

Whether you draw the general form of the maple leaf or merely imagine it, it cannot be the exact form of any particular maple leaf. It is a kind of 'averaged' form.



Quoting Metaphysician Undercover

So I am in agreement with you, that the visual form of the object cannot be grasped by the mathematical formula. The two are deeply incompatible, and that's why I advocate dualism. Here's an explanation of this incompatibility:

Well, I'm glad we agree about something! :)

I think our understandings of the world are inevitably firstly in dualistic, but then more completely in triadistic terms. The subject, the object and the relation between them. Yes, no and undetermined. True false and irrelevant, Mind matter and symbol. Body, soul and spirit. Creation, preservation and destruction. Id, ego and superego. The three Gunas: rajas, sattvas and tamas. In Astrology the three qulaities: cardinal, fixed and mutable. And so on.

I am not going to attempt too address any of the rest of your long post. I think these are the salient points, anyway, and discussion will be much more manageable if we just deal with them.

Quoting John

Understanding a complex logical argument results from the associating of its parts, The parts consist of immediately apprehended insights and the associations between them are also direct insights. What else could the associations be but further direct insights ? They cannot be composed of mechanically following rules without any insight, because then you would need further rules to tell you how to follow the rules, creating an infinitely regressive and complex proliferation of rules which would make any understanding or following of logical arguments impossible.

So you've rendered all forms of thought as intuitive. There is no distinction for you between things known intuitively and things known by reason?

Quoting John

Whether you draw the general form of the maple leaf or merely imagine it, it cannot be the exact form of any particular maple leaf. It is a kind of 'averaged' form.

When you draw a maple leaf, it is a particular form which you have drawn. It is not the general form of the maple leaf.

Quoting John

I am not going to attempt too address any of the rest of your long post. I think these are the salient points, anyway, and discussion will be much more manageable if we just deal with them.

It appears like you do not distinguish between a particular and a universal. We would need to come to some agreement on this before we could produce any progress in this discussion.

Any particular instance of a maple leaf, whether it is drawn, or growing on a tree, is a particular. On the other hand, there is a class of things which we call maple leaves. "Maple leaf" is the title of that class. So there is a universal which is called "maple leaf". Any individual person has rules or principles which one follows, guiding one to class a particular thing as a maple leaf. When we refer to "the general form" of the maple leaf, we refer to these guiding principles by which we distinguish the class "maple leaf", and we judge particulars as maple leafs. The general form, cannot be any particular instance of a maple leaf, it is the defining features of the class. That is why it is understood that a general form exists by definition. You can see this clearly in geometry, things like "triangle", "square", "right angle", "circle", are all general forms which exist by definition.

Quoting Metaphysician Undercover

So you've rendered all forms of thought as intuitive. There is no distinction for you between things known intuitively and things known by reason?

Things are known intuitively by means of the senses, or intuitively by means of thought, no? A rational argument could never convince if you didn't 'get' it, right? 'Getting it' is intuitive.

Quoting Metaphysician Undercover

When you draw a maple leaf, it is a particular form which you have drawn. It is not the general form of the maple leaf.

Sure every drawing of a maple leaf is a particular form, just as every drawing of an equilateral triangle is really a particular form. But the drawings are particular only in terms of their inevitable imperfections.

Quoting Metaphysician Undercover

Any individual person has rules or principles which one follows, guiding one to class a particular thing as a maple leaf.

Yes, one intuitively grasps the general form of the maple leaf, and if one draws it looks something like this:



This is a visual representation of the generalized form of the maple leaf. It is not an image of any particular maple leaf. Probably no maple leaf in existence is so perfectly symmetrical, or has perfectly straight edges.

Quoting John

Sure every drawing of a maple leaf is a particular form, just as every drawing of an equilateral triangle is really a particular form. But the drawings are particular only in terms of their inevitable imperfections.

Quoting Metaphysician Undercover

We abstract that particular form, and this constitutes our representation of object MLt3

Ed Feser, who describes himself as 'Aristotelean-Thomist', presents the idea that 'the concept of triangle' is neither a visual representation or a particular idea, but a concept.

Consider the most unambiguous symbol of triangularity there could be—a picture of a triangle, such as the one to the right. Now, does this picture represent triangles in general? Or only isosceles triangles? Or only small isosceles triangles drawn in black ink? Or does it really even represent triangles in the first place? Why not take it instead to represent a dinner bell, or an arrowhead? There is nothing in the picture itself that can possibly tell you. Nor would any other picture be any better. Any picture would be susceptible of various interpretations, and so too would anything you might add to the picture in order to explain what the original picture was supposed to represent. In particular, there is nothing in the picture in question or in any other picture that entails any determinate, unambiguous content.

- See more at: http://biologos.org/blogs/archive/rediscovering-human-beings-part-1#sthash.YuCejRSh.dpuf

Consider that when you think about triangularity, as you might when proving a geometrical theorem, it is necessarily perfect triangularity that you are contemplating, not some mere approximation of it. Triangularity as your intellect grasps it is entirely determinate or exact; for example, what you grasp is the notion of a closed plane figure with three perfectly straight sides, rather than that of something which may or may not have straight sides or which may or may not be closed. Of course, your mental image of a triangle might not be exact, but rather indeterminate and fuzzy. But to grasp something with the intellect is not the same as to form a mental image of it. For any mental image of a triangle is necessarily going to be of an isosceles triangle specifically, or of a scalene one, or an equilateral one; but the concept of triangularity that your intellect grasps applies to all triangles alike. Any mental image of a triangle is going to have certain features, such as a particular color, that are no part of the concept of triangularity in general. A mental image is something private and subjective, while the concept of triangularity is objective and grasped by many minds at once.

Feser, Some Brief Arguments for Dualism

But to grasp something with the intellect is not the same as to form a mental image of it.

I'd say that when it comes to visual forms at least, to grasp something just is to form a visual image of it. So, I guess I disagree with Feser.

Also his point that purported representations of triangles could be thought to be representations of arrowheads or whatever seems irrelevant irrelevant since if a representation of a triangle was thought to be a representation of an arrowhead, then arrowheads would be being thought of as triangular.

Quoting John

I'd say that when it comes to visual forms at least, to grasp something just is to form a visual image of it. So, I guess I disagree with Feser.

Well, Feser has answers for that:

mental images are always to some extent vague or indeterminate, while concepts are at least often precise and determinate. To use Descartes’ famous example, a mental image of a chiliagon (a 1,000-sided figure) cannot be clearly distinguished from a mental image of a 1,002-sided figure, or even from a mental image of a circle. But the concept of a chiliagon is clearly distinct from the concept of a 1,002-sided figure or the concept of a circle. I cannot clearly differentiate a mental image of a crowd of one million people from a mental image of a crowd of 900,000 people. But the intellect easily understands the difference between the concept of a crowd of one million people and the concept of a crowd of 900,000 people. And so on.

Reply to Wayfarer

I don't believe we can visualize extremely complex objects except to kind of mentally traverse the charateristic features we are familiar with that make them the uniqely particular objects they are.

So I wouldn't agree with Feser that we can have a mental image of a chiliagon at all, other than kind of vaguely imagining what it might look like by analogy with something we can visualize like a hexagon or octagon.

I am basing what I say on my own experience, on what I find I can and cannot visualize. Others may well be able to do things I cannot.

Perhaps this is like try to getting your head around infinity. You just end up imagining a very large quantity or size, then you intellectually multiply it in some way to make it seem larger. But then there is a kind of leap from there to some kind of acceptance of a mathematical axiom. The imagined infinity is never realised. A grasping of an infinity always fails, or a mental representation of infinity always fails and the mind has to side track into a belief about mathematical principles and take it on faith from the math that there is such a thing as infinity. Then the mind goes back to where it tried to mentally represent the infinity in the first place and kind of puts a belief there instead of a mental representation. But then pretends that an infinity has been grasped, understood, a kind of conciet.

The best argument against subjective idealism is "account for intersubjectivity."

If esse est percipi, then others are exhausted by your perception of them.

Because others aren't exhausted by my perception of them (proof: it is undeniable you are reading this), subjective idealism is false.

Reply to dukkha those who have never laboured through Berkeley's texts are always convinced that he can be refuted with a sentence or two.

OP isn't arguing against Berkeley's idealism though, and neither am I. Granted, I shouldn't have wrote "esse est percipi", as it's confusing.

Reply to dukkha Esse est percipe is a phrase that is inexorably connected with Berkeley, who is also the poster boy for subjective idealism. Nothing 'confusing' about that.

In any case, the OP is an example of many of the kinds of objections that Berkeley's imagined opponents came up with in his dialogues. He didn't address the 'drugged water pitcher' scenario but I have no doubt, if Hylas had presented it, Philonous would have come up with a convincing rebuttal.

Quoting Wayfarer

the most powerful nation has just elected a liar and charlatan as leader of the free world

"Liar" is a another word for "politician," isn't it? We always elect liars, and we must always, since running for and/or holding office makes one a politician.

Of course I'm being a bit facetious there, but there are serious points in my flippancy, too. I believe that everyone is a liar in some respects, and I believe that it's impossible for anyone to have a viable chance of becoming president of a country like the U.S. without making promises one won't keep for various reasons, without being corrupt in some respects, etc.

Quoting dukkha

If esse est percipi, then others are exhausted by your perception of them.

I don't know why this fallacy keeps repeating itself. There's a difference between "to be is to be perceived" and "to be is to be perceived by me". You can't go from the former to "others are exhausted by my perception of them".

It's like going from "to be a wife is to be a married woman" to "so-and-so is a wife only if she's married to me".

Quoting Michael

I don't know why this fallacy keeps repeating itself.

It stems either from someone saying they can only know their own mental content or from not explaining how only mental phenomena exist yet nevertheless one can know and or experience other mentalities.

Quoting Terrapin Station

It stems either from someone saying they can only know their own mental content

Then it's a matter of epistemology, not ontology. So I might not know that other minds exist, but it is nonetheless the case that to be is to be perceived and that there are (or may be) other minds. It's no different to the materialist who might say that there are (or may be) unknown material things.

or from not explaining how only mental phenomena exist yet nevertheless one can know and or experience other mentalities.

I don't understand the problem.

Quoting Michael

Then it's a matter of epistemology, not ontology.

The idea is that what you're considering a fallacy is stemming from a view that the idealist in question's epistemology can't support the ontological claims they're making.

Realists often do not believe that they can't know externals. For example, I do not believe that.

The other problem is simply that that view seems to always be left unexplained in terms of how it would work.

Quoting Wayfarer

In any case, the OP is an example of many of the kinds of objections that Berkeley's imagined opponents came up with in his dialogues. He didn't address the 'drugged water pitcher' scenario

I believe OP is arguing against a subjective idealism where the only minds that exist are human minds (and possibly, some animals). Whereas the drugged water for Berkeley's idealism continues to be 'held' in existence by the mind of god. His whole argument makes no sense if he's arguing against Berkeley.

Quoting Michael

I don't know why this fallacy keeps repeating itself. There's a difference between "to be is to be perceived" and "to be is to be perceived by me". You can't go from the former to "others are exhausted by my perception of them".

Yeah but the default position is realism, and one generally comes to idealsim through epistemic concerns about realism. And so it only seems logical that the epistemic concern will follow a natural progression from external world -> ideal world -> my ideal world. Otherwise you don't have epistemic concerns in general, you just have epistemic concerns about the material world.

I mean sure, a subjective idealist can just dogmatically assert the existence of other minds, even though he does not perceive them himself. But it's kind of non-nonsensical to do this, along with bad philosophy.

Quoting dukkha

Yeah but the default position is realism, and one generally comes to idealsim through epistemic concerns about realism.

All that means is that one has yet to read Popper.

Reply to John, do you recognize that the drawing of the maple leaf you have presented to me is a particular? You have presented it to me as a representation of the general form of the maple leaf. Therefore it is not the general form of the maple leaf, it is a particular which is intended as a representation of the general form. So if we are talking about the true "general form" of the maple leaf we are talking about something other than such a particular representation.

The difficult factor to understand is that each representation such as that, is a particular. The general form is a universal, and therefore cannot be any particular. So it does not matter how many times you try to represent the general form as a particular, what you present to me will always be particular representation, and not the general form.

Quoting John

I don't believe we can visualize extremely complex objects except to kind of mentally traverse the charateristic features we are familiar with that make them the uniqely particular objects they are.

So I wouldn't agree with Feser that we can have a mental image of a chiliagon at all, other than kind of vaguely imagining what it might look like by analogy with something we can visualize like a hexagon or octagon.

I am basing what I say on my own experience, on what I find I can and cannot visualize. Others may well be able to do things I cannot.

Do you agree that you can understand the meaning of "chiliagon", as a 1000 sided figure, without having to visualize it? You can understand it by placing it into relationships with other things. You know that it is a 1000 sided figure, that it is different from a 1002 sided figure, and that it is different from circle. Simply by the means of such descriptions, you can understand it. This is how we understand the principles of mathematics, not by picturing 2 items 20 items, 200, or 2000 items, we understand through described relationships, order. The symbols are assigned an order, and the order is understood and maintained. You can understand what a trillion is, not because you can picture it, but because you know that it has a position in a very specific order, and you know that it cannot be otherwise from this very specific position. That order is not represented spatially.

I'm sure you are aware that in modern physics there is a large number of sub-atomic particles. The existence of the particles are understood with mathematics. When speaking to physicists, they will often caution you, not to try to visualize the things which they are telling you about. The words used, such as "particle", tend to bring up certain images, but you are told by the physicists not to refer to these images. The concepts are purely mathematical, and the words in the context of particle physics, refer to these mathematical concepts, rather than any image you can make in your mind. So they have "particles", and the particles have "spin", but these concepts are purely mathematical, and not something you can imagine. The fact that no one cannot imagine these concepts does not indicate that the physicists do not know what the words mean.

By maintaining faith in the numerical order we can come to understand all kinds of wonderful things which we cannot possibly imagine. You may be inclined to question that faith, but it's really not much different from the trust you give to your ability to imagine. You pass me a drawing of a maple leaf, and I trust you, that this is really what a maple leaf looks like. Now I know what a maple leaf looks like, but that knowledge depends on the veracity of that trust. In a similar way, if I multiply 465 X 43, I now know that this makes 19,995. But even after I confirm my ability to multiply, I only know this through my faith in the numerical order. The numerical order is not represented spatially, and this is why mathematical understanding is based in faith rather than visual representation.

Quoting dukkha

I believe OP is arguing against a subjective idealism where the only minds that exist are human minds (and possibly, some animals). Whereas the drugged water for Berkeley's idealism continues to be 'held' in existence by the mind of god. His whole argument makes no sense if he's arguing against Berkeley.

That's correct, which is why I mentioned subjective idealism.

Quoting Metaphysician Undercover

I'm sure you are aware that in modern physics there is a large number of sub-atomic particles. The existence of the particles are understood with mathematics. When speaking to physicists, they will often caution you, not to try to visualize the things which they are telling you about. The words used, such as "particle", tend to bring up certain images, but you are told by the physicists not to refer to these images. The concepts are purely mathematical, and the words in the context of particle physics, refer to these mathematical concepts, rather than any image you can make in your mind.

Physicists spend a great deal of time and computing power creating images of what they are studying, including new fundamental particles:

Quoting tom

Physicists spend a great deal of time and computing power creating images of what they are studying, including new fundamental particles:

The problem is, that these images don't adequately represent concepts which cannot be represented by images, so all they're doing is making an appeal to the sensibilities of common people who enjoy such phantasms. That they spend a great deal of time and computing power on this is an indication that they need public funding.

Quoting Metaphysician Undercover

The problem is, that these images don't adequately represent concepts which cannot be represented by images, so all they're doing is making an appeal to the sensibilities of common people who enjoy such phantasms. That they spend a great deal of time and computing power on this is an indication that they need public funding.

But that is the actual image which confirmed the discovery of the Higgs boson.

Reply to tom Have you ever come across the word "simulation" before?

Funny, I was thinking that Berkeley's God is similar to the Matrix, to the simulation of reality. We are really only Sims :)

Quoting Metaphysician Undercover

Have you ever come across the word "simulation" before?

Sure, that is HOW scientists create the images and WHAT they use the computing time for.

Because visualisation is such a powerful tool, scientists go to great lengths to visualise aspects of reality they are investigating.

But then again, sometimes they just draw sketches:

Reply to tom As I said, these crude visualizations cannot provide one with an understanding of the concepts. These are simply symbols. A depiction of symbols is in no way a visualization of what is meant by the symbols.

Quoting Cavacava

Funny, I was thinking that Berkeley's God is similar to the Matrix, to the simulation of reality. We are really only Sims :)

But with real blood. X-)

Quoting Metaphysician Undercover

do you recognize that the drawing of the maple leaf you have presented to me is a particular?

Of course it is a particular, but it is not a particular leaf, it is a particular drawing of the generalized form of the maple leaf.

Quoting dukkha

If esse est percipi, then others are exhausted by your perception of them.

For Berkeley it is God's perception of objects, not our perception of them, that holds them in existence. So they really do, for Berkeley, have an existence independent of our minds. Berkeley's position is really a form of naive realism.

Edit: Reading back I see this point has already been addressed, but I'll leave the post as it stands in any case.

Berkeley always described himself as an empiricist and said there was no empirical evidence of objects outside ideas and perceptions. But this was underwritten by the 'divine intelligence' and the reality of sprit, without which his philosophy doesn't stand.

Quoting tom

All that means is that one has yet to read Popper.

Reading something, no matter who wrote it, doesn't mean agreeing with it. Hell, even the philosophers I like best are folks with whom I agree no better than half of the time, and there are plenty of philosophers with whom I disagree literally multiple times per sentence.

Quoting Wayfarer

Ed Feser, who describes himself as 'Aristotelean-Thomist', presents the idea that 'the concept of triangle' is neither a visual representation or a particular idea, but a concept.

It's not a particular expression of a visual representation--that is, it's not a particular drawing, say. And after all, a drawing by itself can't be a representation in the first place. What makes something a representation is someone thinking about it that way.

I don't agree with saying that it's not a particular idea, however, but maybe he has some specific technical definition of idea in mind.

Where I really disagree with him is in the second part you quoted. Saying that a concept is objective and can be grasped by many minds at once is nonsense. Concepts are subjective/private. They're also specific sorts of concrete particulars, although of course they're dynamic over time. A concept of triangularity can be an image of a particular triangle, of a particular color, etc. It would just be so to a particular individual at a particular time, but all concepts are to particular individuals at particular times.

Quoting Terrapin Station

Concepts are subjective/private

You often say that, but then you proceed to write in the full confidence that those who read your posts understand what you mean. But if your posts mean what only you mean, then this would be impossible.

Quoting Terrapin Station

A concept of triangularity can be an image of a particular triangle, of a particular color, etc

That is not what 'concept' means. But of course, that doesn't matter to you, because your concept of 'a concept' is your personal private and subjective view of what 'concept' means, which is why it is a waste of time trying to discuss anything with you. When anyone disagrees, you'll just say, 'oh, but that's not what I mean.'

“When I use a word,” Humpty Dumpty said, to Alice, in rather a scornful tone, “it means just what I choose it to mean—neither more nor less.”

Quoting Wayfarer

You often say that, but then you proceed to write in the full confidence that those who read your posts understand what you mean.

Actually, I don't assume that anyone will understand anything in particular, but I expect folks to express when they don't understand something.

At any rate, what it is to understand something isn't to have objective, shared concepts in mind. So this comment is irrelevant to my remarks on Feser's analysis of concepts.

Quoting Wayfarer

But of course, that doesn't matter to you, because your concept of 'a concept' is your personal private and subjective view of what 'concept' means,

Actually, my comments about concepts aren't about meaning per se but about what concepts are functionally, and Feser has it wrong what they are functionally.

Quoting John

Of course it is a particular, but it is not a particular leaf, it is a particular drawing of the generalized form of the maple leaf.

So what? Isn't a real maple leaf just a particular instance of the generalized form of the maple leaf? What is the difference between you drawing a representation of the general form of the maple leaf, and the tree creating a representation of the general form? And we could carry that principle to inanimate things as well, the earth creates representations of general forms, rock, water, individual molecules of H2O, and atoms such as carbon, and hydrogen.

Each atom of hydrogen was produced as a representation of the general form. The general form must have been prior to the individual atom, in order that the atom could come into existence as a representation of it. Just like the general form of the maple leaf is prior to any maple leaf that comes into existence, including the one that you drew, as a representation of the general form of the maple leaf.

Quoting Terrapin Station

And after all, a drawing by itself can't be a representation in the first place. What makes something a representation is someone thinking about it that way.

When a person draws something as a representation, it was intended by that person to be a representation, and so it exists as a representation, according to that intention. This is the case with John's drawing of a maple leaf. It was intended as a representation of the general form of the maple leaf, produced as such, and so it exists as such.

That is also the case with language in general, it is produced as symbols, representations, and exists as such. It doesn't require someone thinking about it as a representation to actually be a representation, because it was made to represent. But to determine what it actually represents (its meaning) requires someone thinking about it.

Quoting Terrapin Station

Reading something, no matter who wrote it, doesn't mean agreeing with it. Hell, even the philosophers I like best are folks with whom I agree no better than half of the time, and there are plenty of philosophers with whom I disagree literally multiple times per sentence.

Sure, but can you find a single point of disagreement with Popper's realist epistemology?

Quoting Metaphysician Undercover

It was intended as a representation of the general form of the maple leaf, produced as such, and so it exists as such.

It can't exist as that outside of someone thinking about it that way, though.

Quoting Metaphysician Undercover

It doesn't require someone thinking about it as a representation to actually be a representation,

Yes it does. It doesn't matter what it was "made to be." Outside of someone thinking about it as a representation, it's just a set of marks on paper, pixels on a screen or whatever.

Quoting tom

Sure, but can you find a single point of disagreement with Popper's realist epistemology?

As I said, even the folks I agree with most I typically disagree with about 50% of the time (especially if we're talking about longer works, as the probability of disagreement goes up with the number of statements they make and opinions they express).

I don't recall where Popper said something about what the "default epistemic position" would be or where he said anything about idealism arising via issues from a default realism, so I'm not sure what work we're talking about. There are a number of texts you could have in mind, since it's not as if he only talks about epistemic issues in a single text. So you'd have to specify what work of Popper's you're thinking of.

Quoting Terrapin Station

can't exist as that outside of someone thinking about it that way, though.

Why not? Explain yourself.

Quoting Terrapin Station

Yes it does. It doesn't matter what it was "made to be." Outside of someone thinking about it as a representation, it's just a set of marks on paper, pixels on a screen or whatever.

Do you think that if something was "made to be" a house, it doesn't exist as a house without someone thinking of it as a house?

Quoting Metaphysician Undercover

Do you think that if something was "made to be" a house, it doesn't exist as a house without someone thinking of it as a house?

The materials exist, just like marks on paper do (re what people think of as representations). There's no concept or meaning etc. of it as a house outside of people thinking of it that way. But there's still the drywall set at 90-degree angles, with a roof, etc.--the materials exist whether anyone does or not.

Re explaining myself--I did. Again, re a representation, all that exists outside of someone thinking about it as a representation is a set of marks on paper or whatever the particular material is that we're talking about.

Reply to Metaphysician Undercover

The general form is just an 'averaging out' of the particular forms. If all of the edges of the dissections of the leaves vary one or the other from straightness, then straightness if the 'averaging out'. If all the dissections are more or less the same size then to be all the same size is the averaging out which produces the perfect form. The drawing is meant to represent the perfectly symmetrical form. Of course it never will be the perfect form, will never have perfectly straight lines and will never be perfectly symmetrical, on very fine scales of measurement irregularities will become apparent; but the lines look straight and the dissections all look equal in size and symmetrically placed. Because they look that way they are a good enough representation of the perfect form; far closer to it than any leaf is.

Quoting Terrapin Station

The materials exist, just like marks on paper do (re what people think of as representations). There's no concept or meaning etc. of it as a house outside of people thinking of it that way. But there's still the drywall set at 90-degree angles, with a roof, etc.--the materials exist whether anyone does or not.

By that logic, then there's no drywall, or 90 degree angles, or anything nameable without someone there naming it. But surely these things are there, the drywall, the 90 degree angles, and also the house, without someone there naming it as such. Likewise, the symbol, or representation is there, without someone there to name it as such.

Quoting Terrapin Station

Re explaining myself--I did. Again, re a representation, all that exists outside of someone thinking about it as a representation is a set of marks on paper or whatever the particular material is that we're talking about.

You call it "a set of marks on paper", I call it "a representation". I think we're both right, but for some reason unbeknownst to me, you think I'm wrong to say it is a representation. But clearly it is a representation because it was created by someone for the purpose of representing. You are completely unjustified in your claim that the set of marks on the paper exist, but they are not a representation. Clearly the marks on the paper are a representation.

Quoting John

The general form is just an 'averaging out' of the particular forms.

It's a category error to say that a group of particulars is a universal, or general form, because it requires reasoning to produce a general form from a group of particulars. And, an average is not the same thing as a universal, it is an average. If you follow Aristotle, the universal consists of the essential properties while leaving out the accidental properties.

Quoting John

Of course it never will be the perfect form...

The universal is not meant to be the perfect form, it is meant to represent the essential aspects of the named class of things. So, "triangle" is three sided figure. That's the essential property. Whether it is isosceles or equilateral, or otherwise, is accidental. You can not expect to draw a "perfect form" of the triangle, expecting this to be the best representation of the general form "triangle", because the class of triangle has to include all the possible different types.

Quoting Metaphysician Undercover

By that logic, then there's no drywall, or 90 degree angles, or anything nameable without someone there naming it.

There's none of that stuff per those names, sure. It's important not to conflate the names (and concepts, and meanings, etc.) with the objective stuff, though. I used certain names for it because I have to since I can only type words to you here.

Quoting Metaphysician Undercover

Likewise, the symbol, or representation is there, without someone there to name it as such.

Yeah, again the marks on paper or whatever are there, but it doesn't represent anything without thinking about it in that way. Again, this is just like concepts, meanings, etc. in general.

Quoting Metaphysician Undercover

You are completely unjustified in your claim that the set of marks on the paper exist, but they are not a representation. Clearly the marks on the paper are a representation.

Something is a representation by virtue of standing for or referring to something other than itself. How do the marks do this in lieu of anyone thinking about them that way?

Reply to Marchesk
Suppose the drug in the water is strychnine and you die :’(
Can either the realist or the idealist conceptualize not thinking, I don't think it can't be done, what is non-thought. Thought itself is contingent, it ends, its horizon is death. So it is with all things, they necessarily exist contingently (contingency is necessary). Idealism seems want to be determinative of all that is, what ever is, is only by our conception of it (at least in some forms of idealism) that it is. This can't be if everything is contingent necessarily.

Working on Meillassoux's argument

Reply to Metaphysician Undercover

I didn't say that a group of particulars is a universal. Nor did I say that an average is the same as a universal. But to express the most general character of the edges of the leaves minus all the particular differences from straightness that exist on all the edges of all the dissections of all the maple leaves as a straight line is to represent the universal perfect form of the maple leaf. The drawing by appearing symmetrical with straight lines expresses the idea of the perfect for me. This does not require the impossible; it does not require the drawing to be perfect.

Also I never said there were not many different shapes of triangles. There are an infinite number in fact, but the form of any one of them can be represented in a drawing.

Quoting Terrapin Station

There's none of that stuff per those names, sure. It's important not to conflate the names (and concepts, and meanings, etc.) with the objective stuff, though. I used certain names for it because I have to since I can only type words to you here.

OK, so I assume that without a person to name the stuff, there is nothing there, no "objective stuff"? Or, do I assume that the objective stuff is there, without any names? If the latter, then we can assume that the representations are already there without that name, as they are objectively representations. They are still existing without the name of "representation", just like the drywall, and right angles, are existing without these names.

Quoting Terrapin Station

Yeah, again the marks on paper or whatever are there, but it doesn't represent anything without thinking about it in that way. Again, this is just like concepts, meanings, etc. in general.

You seem to be missing the fact, that the representation is a representation regardless of whether any individuals interpret, or know what the representation represents. It is a fact that the marks on the paper are a representation, because they were put there to represent something, just like any other thing in the universe is a thing, regardless of whether it has name. If you want to deny that there are actual things existing, without being perceived as things, then that's another matter. There might be some substance to your argument, from that premise, because a representation is necessarily a thing.

Quoting Terrapin Station

Something is a representation by virtue of standing for or referring to something other than itself. How do the marks do this in lieu of anyone thinking about them that way?

The act of determining what the marks stand for, is an act of interpreting. Therefore it is an act of understanding existing relationships. It is not an act of creating relationships. So it is necessary that the relationships exist prior to the act of interpreting, otherwise interpreting would not be interpreting, but an act of creating. Interpreting is to determine meaning which is already there, not to create new meaning. The act of creating has already been performed by the one who put down the marks intending them to stand for something.

Quoting Metaphysician Undercover

The act of determining what the marks stand for, is an act of interpreting. Therefore it is an act of understanding existing relationships. It is not an act of creating relationships.

This is where we disagree. It is an act of creating relationships, and interpretations and understanding involve creating meanings. There are no meanings outside of individuals' heads (more specifically, outside of their brains in particular (processual) states). Intending marks one out down to stand for something occurs only in that creator's head. It doesn't somehow transfer or embed meaning in the marks themselves. The marks are just marks. Meaning remains in person's heads.

Quoting John

But to express the most general character of the edges of the leaves minus all the particular differences from straightness that exist on all the edges of all the dissections of all the maple leaves as a straight line is to represent the universal perfect form of the maple leaf.

To express the general form is not to express the "perfect form". That is a mistake. It is to express what each and every one of the particulars has in common. It is an inferred necessity. That is why you cannot draw it as a visual object. Each time you draw it as a visual object, it will contain particulars peculiar to that particular drawing, which will negate the essence of the universal, as that which all the particulars necessarily have in common.

Consider the triangle. Any time you draw a triangle, it will be of a particular shape, and therefore will not properly represent triangles of other shapes. You will not understand what "triangle" means from that visual representation, or even a number of them, you will have to refer to the definition. Even the circle is the same. Any drawn circle is of a particular size. You will not know truly what "circle" refers to, just from visiting visual representations, that it is necessarily two dimensional, and the relationship between the circumference and the diameter (pi), etc., without referring to the definition.

Quoting Terrapin Station

This is where we disagree. It is an act of creating relationships, and interpretations and understanding involve creating meanings. There are no meanings outside of individuals' heads (more specifically, outside of their brains in particular (processual) states). Intending marks one out down to stand for something occurs only in that creator's head. It doesn't somehow transfer or embed meaning in the marks themselves. The marks are just marks. Meaning remains in person's heads.

We are not talking about meaning though, we are talking about representations. A representation is a relationship between things. Relationships between things are objectively real, and exist outside of individuals' heads. "Representation" refers to a type of relationship. Unless you can show how this type of relationship, a representation, is a special type of relationship which only exists within peoples' heads, then you have no argument.

Reply to Metaphysician Undercover Do you agree that representations stand for or refer to something other than themselves?

Quoting Metaphysician Undercover

A representation is a relationship between things. Relationships between things are objectively real, and exist outside of individuals' heads.

So what's the nature of the special kind of relationship between marks on paper and some other thing such that the former represents the latter? Is it a physical relationship? Is there a special chain of atoms that connects the ink to something else (and only that something else)?

I'd say that the relationship is a conceptual one (i.e. we have a particular kind of cognitive attitude towards the ink), which is why it can't exist outside of people's heads.

Quoting Cavacava

Working on Meillassoux's argument

I like how Meillassoux used death and finitude to get around correlationism. That's rather creative. Death by various means is problematic for idealism, or at least the subjective kind. If God's keeping tabs on everything, then death can happen just fine. But if nobody is, then people just stop experiencing for no reason sometimes. And then what? Does the idealist have a coherent answer? Is it okay as long as there is some other experiencer around?

Quoting Marchesk

But if nobody is, then people just stop experiencing for no reason sometimes. And then what? Does the idealist have a coherent answer?

Other people continue to experience (until they don't)?

Reply to Marchesk

I have his book on order, just tracked it and found out it's going to previous address :(

Anyway, I've been reading the secondary literature. He also argues that the realists suggestion that objects exist separately from us ends in a contradiction. If objects are posited as existing separately from thought, it is still only through thought that they are posited. There is no way to determine if what is in itself, is isomorphic with its appearance, with what we know about the object, making knowledge itself problematic.

Quoting Cavacava

I have his book on order, just tracked it and found out it's going to previous address :(

Anyway, I've been reading the secondary literature. He also argues that the realists suggestion that objects exist separately from us ends in a contradiction. If objects are posited as existing separately from thought, it is still only through thought that they are posited. There is no way to determine if what is in itself, is isomorphic with its appearance, with what we know about the object, making knowledge itself problematic.

The ontological separation of thought and subject does seem problematic, especially if one is a physicalist and reduces thoughts to brain activity. We have this physical thing here which is the Sun and this physical thing here which is brain activity, but what is the relationship between the two such that the latter is a thought about the former? Is there a unique kind of physical connection between the two?

It's even more problematic when the thing thought of isn't the sort of thing that can be physically connected to brain activity, e.g. past, future, or distant things.

I just don't think that realism can provide a coherent account of reference (and so nor of truth).

Even though the subject of our thoughts might be conceptually distinct from thought (e.g. when I think about the Sun I'm not thinking about thoughts), it doesn't then follow that the subject is ontologically separate, just as even though the subject of a painting is conceptually distinct from paint (e.g. when I paint a unicorn I'm not painting paint), it doesn't then follow that the subject is ontologically separate (it's not that there's this painting of a unicorn and also that unicorn).

Quoting Michael

The ontological separation of thought and subject does seem problematic, especially if one is a physicalist and reduces thoughts to brain activity. We have this physical thing here which is the Sun and this physical thing here which is brain activity, but what is the relationship between the two such that the latter is a thought about the former? Is there a unique kind of physical connection between the two?

This is a matter for the sciences to sort out, ultimately, not philosophers. It's a matter of how human beings learn, form concepts about what they learned, and communicate them.

You've already alluded the the physical connection. We're physical beings in a physical world, so of course there is a connection between the sun and our perceiving it, and then talking about it.

If it's all physical interaction, then it's just a matter for science, right?

Quoting Marchesk

You've already alluded the the physical connection. We're physical beings in a physical world, so of course there is a connection between the sun and our perceiving it, and then talking about it.

If it's all physical interaction, then it's just a matter for science, right?

Sure there's a connection (according to the realist). But there's a physical connection between our brain activity (which is us thinking about the Sun) and things that aren't the Sun. So what kind of physical connection counts as reference? This doesn't seem like a question for scientists.

And, again, we can (presumably) think about things to which brain activity doesn't have a physical connection, e.g. future, past, and distant events. So I don't think that reference as being a special kind of physical connection works at all (and so, again, this isn't a question for scientists).

Reply to Michael
Meillassoux falls back on his argument for absolute contingency of everything that is thought, that epistemologically all we really know are the actualization of certain contingent possibilities, and that the real structure of the world is comprised by these possibilities. He calls his position speculative realism.

Quoting Michael

Sure there's a connection (according to the realist).

But not according to anyone else? The sun is just an experience that has nothing to do with our talk of the sun? That sounds rather Landru-like, and it was one of the least convincing things he ever argued for.

Quoting Michael

But there's a physical connection between our brain activity (which is us thinking about the Sun) and things that aren't the Sun.

Sure. But those are likely cultural. I can think about a unicorn. I didn't invent the idea of unicorns. It was out there in the cultural landscape. Anyway, cognitive science would have something to say about all this.

Quoting Michael

And, again, we can (presumably) think about things to which brain activity doesn't have a physical connection, e.g. future, past, and distant events.

Why isn't there a physical connection to things in time or space? I don't get that at all. The sun isn't inside our brains. It's several million miles away, and 8 minutes old by the time we see it. But we talk about it, study it, predict it, explain it, etc.

Quoting Marchesk

Why isn't there a physical connection to things in time or space?

I said that there isn't a physical connection to future, past, or distant things. The first two because (unless eternalism is true) past and future things don't exist, and the last because of special relativity (i.e. the light cone).

The sun isn't inside our brains. It's several million miles away, and 8 minutes old by the time we see it. But we talk about it, study it, predict it, explain it, etc.

That's the very thing I'm questioning. What kind of connection is there between our brain activity (and our vocalisations and writings) and some other physical thing millions of miles away such that the former is a thought (or a statement) about the latter? It seems to me that if no sensible account of this reference-connection can be made then the very realist claim that we talk and think about things which are ontologically independent of our thoughts and speech is an incoherent one.

But not according to anyone else? The sun is just an experience that has nothing to do with our talk of the sun? That sounds rather Landru-like, and it was one of the least convincing things he ever argued for.

I was referring to the claimed connection between brain activity and some other physical occurrence far away.

Quoting Michael

That's the very thing I'm questioning. What kind of connection is there between our brain activity (and our vocalisations and writings) and some other physical thing millions of miles away such that the former is a thought (or a statement) about the latter? It seems to me that if no sensible account of this reference-connection can be made then the very realist claim that we talk and think about things which are ontologically independent of our thoughts and speech is an incoherent one.

Does it make any difference if it's 5 feet away versus 5 million miles? (I don't recall the sun's distance from Earth). Light takes time to travel regardless. Talking about a tree, a star, tea in China, it all takes time to get to us.


The kind of connection is all the physical events leading up to our knowledge.

Quoting Michael

he first two because (unless eternalism is true) past and future things don't exist, and the last because of special relativity (i.e. the light cone).

They did, or will exist, and GR suggests that they do. Also, the future is conjecture or projection for us, not knowledge. It's past events you're questioning, which can be a femtosecond or 5 light years.

Quoting Marchesk

Does it make any difference if it's 5 feet away versus 5 million miles (I don't recall the sun's distance from Earth). Light takes time to travel regardless. Talking about a tree, a star, tea in China, it all takes time to get to us.

It doesn't matter if it's 5 or 5 million feet away. What is the connection between brain activity and some other physical thing such that the former is a thought about the latter?

They did, or will exist, and GR suggests that they do.

But they don't exist now. So how can brain activity be physically connected to a thing that doesn't physically exist? And how can they be physically connected to present things beyond the light cone?

Quoting Michael

t doesn't matter if it's 5 or 5 million feet away. What is the connection between brain activity and some other physical thing such that the former is a thought about the latter?

Obviously, thought would need to be physical in a way that's connected to the physical thing. Computation is one such attempt to do so. How can a computer compute an action based on some event not inside the computer, or some event that doesn't exist now?

Quoting Metaphysician Undercover

To express the general form is not to express the "perfect form". That is a mistake. It is to express what each and every one of the particulars has in common.

All that "each and every one has in common" is that they approximate the perfect (that is ideal) form. So, for example if all the edges of the leaves vary from straightness,the dissections from dimensional equality, and the leaf from overall symmetry to different degrees, in different proportions, and in different ways and directions, respectively, then the perfect or idealized form is one showing straightness of the edges, dimensional equality of the dissections, and overall symmetry. This is also the generalized form of the leaf

Quoting Metaphysician Undercover

You will not understand what "triangle" means from that visual representation, or even a number of them, you will have to refer to the definition.

No, that's plainly wrong. From a drawing of any triangle, I can see immediately that it has three straight sides and three angles; and that is precisely the definition of a triangle. That the three angles must sum to 180 degrees is a necessary corollary of that, which obviously cannot be visually represented, but which, because of its very necessity, it is unnecessary to specify as part of the most essential definition. In fact the angles of some non-euclidean triangles do not sum to 180 degrees.

Quoting John

From a drawing of any triangle, I can see immediately that it has three straight sides and three angles; and that is precisely the definition of a triangle.

No actual drawing of a triangle has three perfectly straight sides and exactly three angles, as required by the definition. Every actual drawing of a triangle consists of irregular lines that have finite width and at least one distinct color, which are not part of the definition. We draw a triangle based on the definition, rather than extracting the definition from a drawing or group of drawings. Each drawing is a diagram--an existent (particular) representation that embodies the significant relations of a real (general) triangle, but is not itself a real (general) triangle. We have to distinguish and abstract the relevant aspects of the drawing from the irrelevant ones in order to recognize it as such.

Quoting aletheist

No actual drawing of a triangle has three perfectly straight sides and exactly three angles, as required by the definition.

Sure, but I have already said that myself. I have also said that the fact that the lines appear straight is sufficient for it to serve as a representation of the perfect form of the triangle. We have no other way to represent it other than by verbal description; which is more cumbersome. Imagine trying to give a comprehensive verbal description of the general form of the maple leaf.

Reply to John
We have no better way to represent it physically, but--at least arguably--we can represent it more perfectly in the imagination, in accordance with the verbal description.

Reply to aletheist

Perhaps with simple shapes, but I don't believe it's true when it comes to complex shapes, even if they are only as complex as the maple leaf. In any case the physical drawing is the representation of what we imagine, and in regard to complex shapes at least, cannot simply visualize. Another point is, I don't believe it is possible to visualize a line without thickness.

Reply to John
Who said anything about visualizing? There are other forms of representation, especially in the imagination. Probably the most accurate general representation of any shape--whether simple like a triangle or complex like a maple leaf--is going to be one that is vague; as soon as you make it more determinate, it loses its generality and becomes a particular triangle or maple leaf.

Reply to aletheist

A vague representation cannot adequately express the general characteristics of a form, certainly not of a complex form. No vague representation can express the general characteristics of the form of the maple leaf as adequately as the drawing of the maple leaf I posted earlier. That drawing is not a representation of any particular maple leaf but of the idealized general form of the maple leaf. The fact that the actual marks on the screen or paper have thickness or that the precise proportions of the general form are not shown is irrelevant. Such a drawing gives us an enhanced ability to visually and explicitly grasp the form of the maple leaf. Of course i don't deny that people have a prior implicit (vague) grasp of the form of the maple leaf; but such visual representations allow us to sharpen up those vague implicit understandings and make then more explicit.

Quoting John

A vague representation cannot adequately express the general characteristics of a form, certainly not of a complex form.

It depends on what you mean by "adequately." In a sense, no particular representation can adequately express the general characteristics of any form, simple or complex.

Quoting John

That drawing is not a representation of any particular maple leaf but of the idealized general form of the maple leaf.

It is a particular representation of the idealized general form of the maple leaf; in other words, a token of a type.

Quoting John

The fact that the actual marks on the screen or paper have thickness or that the precise proportions of the general form are not shown is irrelevant.

Only because we understand it to be so, in light of the purpose of the representation. If that drawing was instead intended to show how a specified hue is rendered on a computer monitor, then the color of the line would be the only relevant aspect.

Quoting John

... such visual representations allow us to sharpen up those vague implicit understandings and make then more explicit.

True, and experimentation on such a diagram can reveal relations that were not evident from its initial construction. This is precisely what makes diagrammatic reasoning so powerful.

Quoting Terrapin Station

Do you agree that representations stand for or refer to something other than themselves?

Yes I agree, that is the nature of a representation. Where we seem to disagree, is on whether or not something can be a representation, i.e. exist as a representation, without having a mind actively determining that it is a representation. Do you not think that if a mind could potentially determined that the thing is a representation, then the thing actually exists as a representation?

Quoting Michael

So what's the nature of the special kind of relationship between marks on paper and some other thing such that the former represents the latter? Is it a physical relationship? Is there a special chain of atoms that connects the ink to something else (and only that something else)?

No I don't believe that this special relationship is a physical relationship. But I don't think that any relationships are actually physical. Things are physical but I don't think that relationships are physical. Suppose that there are two atoms which are assumed to be related to each other, in the sense that they are part of a molecule. If we talk about the molecule, this is a physical object, a whole. If we talk about the individual atoms, then we have divided up the whole into parts, such that each atom is a physical object, a whole. If we want to talk about what makes the atoms exist together, as a molecule, we should consider that this is something non-physical.

Quoting Michael

I'd say that the relationship is a conceptual one (i.e. we have a particular kind of cognitive attitude towards the ink), which is why it can't exist outside of people's heads.

I think that non-physical relationships exist outside of peoples heads, because all relationships are non-physical, and there are real relationships outside of peoples' heads.. The relationship between the earth and the sun is non-physical. The relationship between two atoms, is non-physical. That is why these relationships can only be understood by mathematics, because they are non-physical, and mathematics is non-physical. But that relationships are non-physical does not mean that they only exist in people's heads.

Quoting aletheist

It depends on what you mean by "adequately." In a sense, no particular representation can adequately express the general characteristics of any form, simple or complex.

Yes, there can certainly be many representations of a general form and all of them are only ever more or less adequate. My argument with MU was actually over his assertion that there is a general form which is temporally prior to the advent of any particular form.

Quoting aletheist

Only because we understand it to be so, in light of the purpose of the representation. If that drawing was instead intended to show how a specified hue is rendered on a computer monitor, then the color of the line would be the only relevant aspect.

Well, yes, but we are specifically discussing representations of forms here not representations of colours.

I don't think we are actually disagreeing about anything significant here.

Quoting John

My argument with MU was actually over his assertion that there is a general form which is temporally prior to the advent of any particular form.

What about logically prior? I would suggest that a general form is a continuum of potential forms, and a particular form is an actualization of one such possibility.

Reply to aletheist

Yes, I certainly agree that in one sense general forms are logically prior to particular forms. But from the point of view of the actual development of particular logics, the general logic of a form would seem to be impossible without particular forms from which to extrapolate it, even if those particular forms only occur in the context of verbal descriptions or graphic representations. I think it's one of those inherently paradoxical, multivalent questions.

Quoting Metaphysician Undercover

Yes I agree, that is the nature of a representation.

Okay, so how, outside of someone thinking about it this way, does a set of marks on paper or a piece of metal or whatever stand for or refer to something other than itself?

Reply to Terrapin Station

In your category of "someone" do you include God? Apart from that consideration; did undiscovered textual artifacts stand for or refer to anything during the period that no one knew about them?

Quoting Terrapin Station

Okay, so how, outside of someone thinking about it this way, does a set of marks on paper or a piece of metal or whatever stand for or refer to something other than itself?

Through the relationship which was established by the one who made the marks. When the person made the marks, there was a relationship between the marks, and the thing represented by the marks, which was produced by that person. If you deny that relationship, then you deny the reality of representation. What could ever happen which would annihilate that relationship?

Quoting John

All that "each and every one has in common" is that they approximate the perfect (that is ideal) form.

Well clearly, this is where we differ. I don't believe in the perfect, or ideal maple leaf. I don't think there is any such thing. I believe that the general form of the maple leaf is the things which they all have in common, a stem, veins, a specific number of points, and growing on a maple tree. To that extent, all maple leafs are perfect, in the sense that they fulfill the conditions for being a maple leaf.

Quoting John

No, that's plainly wrong. From a drawing of any triangle, I can see immediately that it has three straight sides and three angles; and that is precisely the definition of a triangle.

You're not seeing the point. If you see a drawing of an equilateral triangle, and someone tells you "this is a triangle", there is nothing to prevent you from believing that all triangles must have equal sides and angles. That is the problem, you cannot, as you claim here, infer the general from an instance of the particular. It is impossible because there is no way of knowing which of the aspects of the particular is essential to the general, and which is accidental. You just make the above claim because you already know the definition of a triangle, so of course you can see that definition in any triangle which you look at. But if you did not know the definition of triangle, you could not, with any degree of certainty induce the general definition from one instance of the particular.

Quoting John

My argument with MU was actually over his assertion that there is a general form which is temporally prior to the advent of any particular form.

What my original claim was, is that there is a form of the particular, which is necessarily prior to the existence of the particular material object. The form of the particular object exists prior to the material object itself. This is inferred from the fact that an object must have a particular form. And when the object comes into existence, as the object which it is, it must be predetermined what it will be, or else it will not come into existence as that object, or as any object at all (because every object is a particular object).

Quoting aletheist

What about logically prior? I would suggest that a general form is a continuum of potential forms, and a particular form is an actualization of one such possibility.

The point being then, that prior to the existence of any material object, there is the potential for that object's existence. But the potential for that object's existence is also the potential for the existence of many other things instead, so that general potential cannot necessitate the existence of a particular object. That is the nature of potential. We can call this potential the general, or universal. Now, in order that a particular object comes into existence out of this general potential, something must choose, or select, "cause", that particular potential. This particular potential is the form of the particular object, which is necessarily prior to the material existence of the object.

Quoting Metaphysician Undercover

Well clearly, this is where we differ. I don't believe in the perfect, or ideal maple leaf. I don't think there is any such thing. I believe that the general form of the maple leaf is the things which they all have in common, a stem, veins, a specific number of points, and growing on a maple tree.

The perfect form is just the idealized form, which is the same as the general form. Not just maple leaves have stems and veins. Another kind of leaf may have the same specific number of points, too; it is the averaged configuration of those points and the average length of the edges that join them that count as the general form. Growing on a maple tree is not a general form it is an attribute or associative definition.

Quoting Metaphysician Undercover

That is the problem, you cannot, as you claim here, infer the general from an instance of the particular.

True, the general is inferred from a number of particular instances, which would be, say, from drawings of all the kinds of triangles that you can imagine, or a collection of actual maple leaves. Nothing I have said contradicts this; in fact you have contradicted it by claiming that the general form is temporally prior to the particular instances.

Quoting Metaphysician Undercover

This is inferred from the fact that an object must have a particular form. And when the object comes into existence, as the object which it is, it must be predetermined what it will be, or else it will not come into existence as that object, or as any object at all (because every object is a particular object).

I have no idea why you purport that an object cannot come into existence without their being a (presumably) pre-existent general form which predetermines it to be what it is. What evidence could you possibly have for that claim.? What could such a "pre-existence" look like?

If a thing comes from something else, such as, for example, a maple leaf from a tree, then it could be the tree, another particular, as well as all the conditions of its environment at the time of its advent which determines the leaf's particular form. The form of the tree is determined by the seed, the form of the seed by a prior tree and so on. So particulars are always determined by prior particulars, not by prior "general forms".

Of course everything in the natural world, the whole natural order, may be an expression of either, on the one hand, the spirit, or on the other hand the scientifically conceived virtual realm of 'pre-form'; but the spirit is not a form, and the virtual world cannot be either; to say that about spirit would be to make the mistake of objectifying it, and to say it about the virtual would be to deny the science.

Quoting Metaphysician Undercover

Through the relationship which was established by the one who made the marks.

But what is that relationship on your view? Where does it obtain? Just what, ontologically, is it? That's what I'm asking you. Is it part of the ink or paint or whatever? Where is it located? What is it made of?

Quoting John

In your category of "someone" do you include God?

I wasn't thinking of God there, as I'm an atheist, but sure, for someone who believes in God, that would do. As with everyone else, though, it would just be something that obtains in God's mind insofar as God is thinking about it.

Apart from that consideration; did undiscovered textual artifacts stand for or refer to anything during the period that no one knew about them?

No. Things can't stand for or refer to something without someone thinking about them.

Quoting John

The perfect form is just the idealized form, which is the same as the general form. Not just maple leaves have stems and veins. Another kind of leaf may have the same specific number of points, too; it is the averaged configuration of those points and the average length of the edges that join them that count as the general form. Growing on a maple tree is not a general form it is an attribute or associative definition.

I really think that you're not grasping what a general form is. The general form gains it's intelligibility by participating in, or being part of a larger, more general concept. The concept "red" obtains intelligibility by its relationship to the concept of "colour", not by a visual representation of a red object. The concept of "human being" obtains intelligibility through its relationship to the concept of "animal", not by a visual representation of a human being. Notice that these are relationships of necessity, red is necessarily a colour, and a human being is necessarily an animal. This necessity is what makes the general form intelligible, as a concept. The visual representation does not provide this.

In the case of the maple leaf, it necessarily grows on a maple tree, so this is the necessary relationship which distinguishes the general form "maple leaf". You continue to adhere to this notion that a "form" is necessarily some sort of spatial representation, when I've already explained to you with the example of mathematical objects, that this is not the case. There is no necessity there. That is an illusion of necessity which has left you confused. Try to recognize that forms, or concepts are based in a logical order, an order of necessity, rather than a spatial representation.

Quoting John

I have no idea why you purport that an object cannot come into existence without their being a (presumably) pre-existent general form which predetermines it to be what it is. What evidence could you possibly have for that claim.? What could such a "pre-existence" look like?

I have been referring to a pre-existent particular form, that is my argument. There is a particular form of any particular object, which is prior to that object. Since we only understand the pure nature of forms, as general forms, because these are what is present within our minds, our approach toward understanding the particular forms is through our understanding of general forms. I've been through this logic, which demonstrates the necessity of a prior form, already twice for you. I'll reproduce it again, and you let me know what confuses you. But please release this idea that such a form must "look like" something. That is what we learn from the nature of general forms, they have no visual representation, they exist by the logical necessity of order.

Please read the following, and address your concerns directly to me. Don't ignore it and come back a few days from now complaining, I have no idea what you're talking about.

Quoting Metaphysician Undercover

Let me try once again, to explain this issue. As time passes, there is as you say, "a succession of slightly different forms". At each moment of the present, the maple leaf is this particular maple leaf, it is not that particular maple leaf which it was at the last moment, because it has changed. Therefore at each moment the maple leaf is a new, and different object. So at each moment a new object is created, we can call them MLt1, MLt2, MLt3, etc., each collection of symbols referring to a different object. Let's take MLt3 for example. When that object comes into existence, it necessarily comes into existence as the object which it is, MLt3, or else it is not MLt3. It does not come into existence as MLt2, Mlt4, or any random thing, it comes into existence as MLt3. Therefore we can assume that there is a cause of its existence as MLt3, a reason why it exists at that moment as MLt3, and not something else. This is the determining form of MLt3. Notice that in order for the object, MLt3, to exist at that present moment, as MLt3, it is necessary that the form of MLt3 existed prior to that. This prior form is not MLt2, it is not MLt4, because these are distinctly different. It is nothing other than the form of MLt3, which exists prior to the object MLt3, and ensures that object MLt3 will exist as that object, at that moment in time.

Quoting Terrapin Station

But what is that relationship on your view? Where does it obtain? Just what, ontologically, is it? That's what I'm asking you. Is it part of the ink or paint or whatever? Where is it located? What is it made of?

Those are all good questions, but if they are unanswerable, perhaps they are not so good. I'll start with "where is it located?". As I've been explaining to John, the relationships of necessity which are proper to intelligible objects, forms, are non-spatial relationships. They are relationships of logical order, and "order" is a temporal concept. So "where" it is, is rather meaningless. We have to seek its temporal position.

There are many types of relationships which are not well understood by human beings. Consider the relationship between the earth and the moon, which we call gravity. Gravity might be a property of these two physical objects, such that the two objects are interacting with each other through the means of gravity. But this would mean that a part of each object reached out and touched the other object, and that the existence of these two objects actually overlapped each other. This is counter-intuitive because it implies that the two objects exist at the same place, gravity being a part of each object, and overlapping. Relativity theory separates the gravity from the objects, such that the gravity is understood as a property of space-time. But space-time is a conceptual medium so there is a category separation between the real objects, earth and moon, and gravity which is a property of the conceptual medium, space-time. So that representation of this relationship called gravity, is unacceptable as well.

This leads us to a third possibility in which gravity is real, existing with the real objects, earth and moon, but the gravity encompasses all the physical objects, as one (invisible) entity, while the individual objects, the earth and moon, are just the visible parts of that one entity. In this way, the solar system is one object, with visible parts; the unity (relationships) which makes it a whole is to be found in the existence of gravity.

It is a logical necessity which would force us to assume that these visible objects are part of an invisible whole. The thing which produces the relationships, gravity, and causes that entity (the solar system) to exist as a whole, is completely invisible. This is just an example of how difficult it is to understand such relationships.

What you ask about is the relationship of representation, and this is often present as meaning. We could say that meaning is one type of such a relationship, though some would equate relationships of representation as relationships of meaning. I am not so sure about such an equation. In any case, here, we have an object and the object represents. I think you'll agree with that. Do you agree that the thing which the object represents, is something which will only come to be in the future? So there is a relationship between the object, being the symbol (the representation), and something else, which will exist in the future. That is the type of relationship we are talking about here, a relationship between a present object and a future object.

Quoting Metaphysician Undercover

As I've been explaining to John, the relationships of necessity which are proper to intelligible objects, forms,

Say what? First, what the heck are we referring to exactly with "relationships of necessity"?

Although we might want to just jump ahead to your idea that there are existents with no spatial location. The very idea of existents (or subsistents, or whatever you might prefer to call them) with no spatial location is incoherent on my view.

Quoting Terrapin Station

Say what? First, what the heck are we referring to exactly with "relationships of necessity"?

Do you agree that red is necessarily a colour? That is what I mean by a relationship of necessity, a logical relationship, one such as the relationship between red and colour. A human being is necessarily an animal. An animal is necessarily a living being. A circle is necessarily a geometrical figure.

Quoting Terrapin Station

Although we might want to just jump ahead to your idea that there are existents with no spatial location. The very idea of existents (or subsistents, or whatever you might prefer to call them) with no spatial location is incoherent on my view.

I am talking about relationships which are non-spatial, yet still necessary, such as the ones listed above. I am not talking about non-spatial existents. You really are jumping ahead, to class a relationship as an existent. Existents are individual objects, things, and relationships are the means by which one existent is connected to another. Do you agree that there is a relationship of necessity between a mother and her daughter, yet this relationship is not described in spatial terms?

Quoting Metaphysician Undercover

Do you agree that red is necessarily a colour? That is what I mean by a relationship of necessity, a logical relationship, one such as the relationship between red and colour. A human being is necessarily an animal. An animal is necessarily a living being. A circle is necessarily a geometrical figure.

Do I agree with that? It depends on what we're saying, exactly. If we're referring to how we're naming things/defining terms, then no, I don't think there's anything necessary about that. If you're appealing to something like "natural kinds," I don't buy that there are natural kinds. If you're simply saying that the stuff we're conventionally naming red is a color, and a color is necessarily a color, I'd agree with that, or at least I'd say that I can't personally make sense of saying that logical contradictions can obtain.

It seems, by the way, like maybe you're forwarding the notion of analyticity that Quine argued against in "Two Dogmas of Empiricism".

Quoting Metaphysician Undercover

I am talking about relationships which are non-spatial, yet still necessary, such as the ones listed above. I am not talking about non-spatial existents.

So you'd be talking about relationships that don't exist (or subsist, or whatever similar term you'd use for them)? How would there be those relationships in that case?

I'm not a realist on logic (or mathematics) by the way.

Quoting Metaphysician Undercover

Do you agree that there is a relationship of necessity between a mother and her daughter, yet this relationship is not described in spatial terms?

I agree there is a relation there. I wouldn't agree that it's a necessary relationship (per my comments above). And I wouldn't say that it makes any sense to say that the relationship doesn't have a location/isn't physical, etc.

Quoting Terrapin Station

If you're simply saying that the stuff we're conventionally naming red is a color, and a color is necessarily a color, I'd agree with that, or at least I'd say that I can't personally make sense of saying that logical contradictions can obtain.

No, I'm not saying that a colour is necessarily a colour, though it is this same type of necessity which I refer to. I'm saying that red is necessarily a colour. If you don't agree with that, then so be it, you don't apprehend the same need which I apprehend. It is this need, which I apprehend, that makes me say that red is necessarily a colour.

You see the need to say that a colour is necessarily a colour, and if not there is contradiction, and consequentially unintelligibility. The same unintelligibility results if you do not see the need to say that red is necessarily a colour, and all the other examples which I provided. The relationship is necessary for the sake of intelligibility.

Quoting Terrapin Station

So you'd be talking about relationships that don't exist (or subsist, or whatever similar term you'd use for them)? How would there be those relationships in that case?

As I said, they are relationships of temporal order. An existing thing is related to something in the future, which does not yet exist. These relationships are understood as possibilities. When a particular possibility (relationship of this type) is recognized as needed, it is determined as necessary, and acting on this necessity brings about the existence of the future thing.

Take a logical premise for example. It expresses a certain relationship. The relationship is a possibility, in the sense that the premise is a proposal, a proposition which may be accepted or rejected. When accepted it becomes a necessity, as it is necessary for the sake of the conclusion. The conclusion is the thing which will come about in the future, as a result of accepting the possibility (the proposition, or premise) as a necessity.

Quoting Metaphysician Undercover

The same unintelligibility results if you do not see the need to say that red is necessarily a colour,

That wouldn't be the case just because you're saying it is, though. You're not at all explaining what you have in mind here.

Quoting Metaphysician Undercover

An existing thing is related to something in the future,

I wouldn't agree that that's the case until the future thing comes to be.

Quoting Metaphysician Undercover

When a particular possibility (relationship of this type) is recognized as needed, it is determined as necessary,

I can't read that so that it doesn't sound like you simply do not understand modalities.

Quoting Metaphysician Undercover

When accepted it becomes a necessity, as it is necessary for the sake of the conclusion.

What in the world? I don't believe that's correct at all. For one, any conclusion can follow from different premises--a fortiori because we'd only need contradictory premises for it to follow. But that would even be the case (that any conclusion could follow from different premises) if we were using relevance logics.

Quoting Metaphysician Undercover

The conclusion is the thing which will come about in the future,

That's just ridiculously confused if you're intending it to at all be about conventional logic. Conventional logic isn't temporal.

The more you're responding, the more of a mess your comments are turning out to be. And none of this has anything whatsoever with answering what I asked you.

Quoting Terrapin Station

I can't read that so that it doesn't sound like you simply do not understand modalities.

I'm not talking about modalities, so if you're attempting to understand this under the terms of modalities, it's no wonder that you don't understand.

Quoting Terrapin Station

I wouldn't agree that that's the case until the future thing comes to be.

Do you agree that there is a relationship between the present state, and any possible future state, regardless of whether or not that future state actually comes to be? If so, do you agree that this relationship cannot be something existing?

Quoting Terrapin Station

The more you're responding, the more of a mess your comments are turning out to be. And none of this has anything whatsoever with answering what I asked you.

You asked me to explain the reality of relationships which have no existence. I understand these relationships as possibilities. What are you failing to grasp?

Quoting Metaphysician Undercover

I'm not talking about modalities,

Haha, you're talking about possibility and necessity, so yes you are. That's what modalities are.

Quoting Metaphysician Undercover

Do you agree that there is a relationship between the present state, and any possible future state, regardless of whether or not that future state actually comes to be?

No, not at all.

Quoting Metaphysician Undercover

You asked me to explain the reality of relationships which have no existence. I understand these relationships as possibilities. What are you failing to grasp?

Well, ultimately this is relating to explaining representation sans thinking about things as representations. But yeah, I asked about the idea of saying that there is something that doesn't exist, which is a simple contradiction--you're saying that there is something that there isn't. Again, the word doesn't have to be "exist." There are a number of other words people use for things occurring/obtaining/being/etc. But either there are possibilities or there are not, and if there are, on my view, they have to occur somewhere. There are no things "that there are" that do not occur somewhere on my view.

Reply to Michael

logical separation of thought and subject does seem problematic, especially if one is a physicalist and reduces thoughts to brain activity. We have this physical thing here which is the Sun and this physical thing here which is brain activity, but what is the relationship between the two such that the latter is a thought about the former? Is there a unique kind of physical connection between the two?

It's even more problematic when the thing thought of isn't the sort of thing that can be physically connected to brain activity, e.g. past, future, or distant things.

I just don't think that realism can provide a coherent account of reference (and so nor of truth).

Even though the subject of our thoughts might be conceptually distinct from thought (e.g. when I think about the Sun I'm not thinking about thoughts), it doesn't then follow that the subject is ontologically separate, just as even though the subject of a painting is conceptually distinct from paint (e.g. when I paint a unicorn I'm not painting paint), it doesn't then follow that the subject is ontologically separate (it's not that there's this painting of a unicorn and also that unicorn).

Meanwhile, I was still thinkin...

This is a problem for the Kantian position that holds that whatever is 'in itself' is unknowable, that all we really 'know' are the presumptions that make the reality we see possible. This is a problem because it means that 'knowledge' of what is real, is not about the real, it is about these presumptions---which are not concepts but the basis of the relationships between what we sense and our concepts.

Perhaps this is the wrong way to think about this. When we see a tree, we already have the concept of what a tree is, we are assigning what we see to what we know. There are two parts to this process. The claim that there is something there, and the assignment of what is there to our concepts.

The 'claim' is ontological, and it is either true or false in the 'thin' sense (the sense Quine outlines in "On what there is"), the assignment of concepts is epistemological and true in the 'thick' sense (K Fine "The Question of Ontology") and linguistic. The claim for existence only goes as far as stating a particular something exists, it is purely ontological and either true or false but thin. The assignment of meaning to the claim is epistemological, it is linguistic and true or false in the thick sense.

This move seems to abandon the gap between the appearance and the 'transcendental'. The scientist doing brain investigations are studying the ontic character of the brain. Neurons firing, may be how I come to see a tree, this process is responsible for the claim, but its the epistemologically assignment of meaning to what is sensed that provide me with knowledge.

Quoting Terrapin Station

Haha, you're talking about possibility and necessity, so yes you are. That's what modalities are.

No, logical modalities are a very specialized use of these terms, possibility and necessity. Check your dictionary, for the #1 definition of necessary: "requiring to be done". I have clearly explained that I am using "necessary" in this most common way, and "possible" in the related, and #1 way: "capable of existing".

If you refuse to recognize my usage, despite the fact that it is the most commonly incurred usage of these terms, insisting that I must be using these terms in some specialized way, which perhaps you would prefer, I assume willful neglect on your part.

Quoting Terrapin Station

But yeah, I asked about the idea of saying that there is something that doesn't exist, which is a simple contradiction--you're saying that there is something that there isn't.

Since you flatly refuse to recognize that in common parlance we refer to things which are possible, and things which are necessary, according to the primary definitions of those terms, and that these things referred to are not existing things, I'm afraid that I cannot further assist you in understanding what I am talking about.

With appropriate caveats about the limited usefulness of simplistic labels, it seems to me that Terrapin Station is a nominalist and Metaphysician Undercover is a realist, and this is why the two of you keep talking past each other. In other words, TS believes that only actualities have Being, such that existence and Being are equivalent; while MU believes that possibilities and habits/necessities also have Being, such that they can be real even though they do not (strictly speaking) exist.

Quoting Metaphysician Undercover

No, logical modalities are a very specialized use of these terms, possibility and necessity.

Citation for that?

Quoting Metaphysician Undercover

you flatly refuse to recognize that in common parlance we refer to things which are possible, and things which are necessary, according to the primary definitions of those terms,

I'm not denying that (though I am denying that that's about senses of those terms that are different than the senses used in modal logic).

What I disagree with is the idea that if there are necessities and possibilities, there are no necessities and possibilities.

Quoting Metaphysician Undercover

Do you agree that there is a relationship between the present state, and any possible future state, regardless of whether or not that future state actually comes to be?

Quoting Terrapin Station

No, not at all.

You do not recognize a relationship between what actually exists, and what is possible, therefore I assume that for you, any, and every, possibility is pure fiction. And since my position is dependent on the assumption that possibilities are real, we have nothing further to discuss.

If you do not believe that all possibilities are purely fictional, then what supports the reality of any possibility other than a relationship between it and an actually existent state?

I wouldn't say that I see possibilities as "pure fictions." But I simply see them as something not precluded from occurring given a world that's not strongly deterministic through and through. In other words, it's simply a way to talk about the fact that some thing(s) could happen. That doesn't make it the case that existent things and phenomena have relations to non-actualized possibilities.

If I were to think that the world was strongly deterministic through and through, I would probably see possibilities as what must happen but hasn't happened yet.

Reply to Terrapin Station
Would it be fair to characterize your view as "holding that the potential, or possible, is nothing but what the actual makes it to be" (Peirce, CP 1.422)? In other words, do you consider it incorrect to claim that never-actualized possibilities can still be real?

Quoting aletheist

do you consider it incorrect to claim that never-actualized possibilities can still be real?

Yes, although there's some ambiguity there given that "real" has historically been used with so many different connotations. And yeah, I'd basically agree with Peirce in that, although since this would often be misunderstood, I'd hasten to add that I'm not a strong determinist.

Quoting Terrapin Station

Yes, although there's some ambiguity there given that "real" has historically been used with so many different connotations.

Peirce's basic definition was that something is real if it has properties sufficient to identify it, regardless of whether anyone ever attributes them to it. He identified it with scholastic realism, and called his own position an "extreme" version thereof.

Quoting Terrapin Station

And yeah, I'd basically agree with Peirce in that, although since this would often be misunderstood, I'd hasten to add that I'm not a strong determinist.

Neither was Peirce; in fact, he was a strong opponent of what he called "necessitarianism." What I quoted before was his characterization of nominalism; hence my previous suggestion that you seem to be a nominalist, whereas MU appears to be a realist. I do not intend this as a pejorative, just hoping to clarify why the discussion has gone as it has.

Quoting Terrapin Station

wouldn't say that I see possibilities as "pure fictions." But I simply see them as something not precluded from occurring given a world that's not strongly deterministic through and through. In other words, it's simply a way to talk about the fact that some thing(s) could happen.

The point though, is that unless you allow real relationships between what has actual existence, and any real possibilities, then you have no way of distinguishing between real possibilities and fictional possibilities. Real possibilities are distinguished from fictional possibilities through relationships to what has actual existence. In other words, without such relationships anyone could claim all sorts of absurd possibilities, such as the possibility that I could jump to the moon, or some other nonsense. And so, if there are no such relationships, we must treat all possibilities as equally fictional, because they don't have any relationship to the real world, any stated possibility says absolutely nothing about the real world. Therefore your assertion that there are no such relationships produces the necessary conclusion that all stated possibilities are fictions, and there is no such thing as a real possibility.

Quoting Metaphysician Undercover

Real possibilities are distinguished from fictional possibilities through relationships to what has actual existence. In other words, without such relationships anyone could claim all sorts of absurd possibilities, such as the possibility that I could jump to the moon, or some other nonsense.

I don't think that the idea of "fictional possibilities" really makes any sense. Something is either a possibility or it isn't. I can buy a distinction of logical versus metaphysical(/ontological) possibilities I suppose, but "fictional possibilities" seems rather nonsensical to me.

Reply to Terrapin Station OK, let's try this then, we can start with logical versus ontological possibilities. Do you agree that ontological possibility is a sub-category of logical possibility? Anything which is an ontological possibility is also a logical possibility, but not every logical possibility is an ontological possibility. What distinguishes something as an ontological possibility, is a relationship which it has to the actual world. So logical possibilities do not necessarily have this relationship, but ontological possibilities do. Do you recognize the category of ontological possibility as a valid category, and therefore this relationship as something real?

Reply to Metaphysician Undercover

Again, I wouldn't say that possibilities are real, although depending on alternate ways of defining "real," I might agree with that. However, it would have to be some way of defining real so that it doesn't amount to saying that non-actualized possibilities somehow exist/subsist/occur/obtain/etc. (whatever term like that that someone might want to use).

I agree with the subset comments. But I'd say what distinguishes ontological possibility from logical possibility is that logical possibility is simply something non-contradictory in the context of a particular logic, whereas ontological possibility is something non-contradictory that could obtain within the contstraints of a given actual world.

Quoting Terrapin Station

agree with the subset comments. But I'd say what distinguishes ontological possibility from logical possibility is that logical possibility is simply something non-contradictory in the context of a particular logic, whereas ontological possibility is something non-contradictory that could obtain within the contstraints of a given actual world.

Ok, so here's the point. If an ontological possibility is something which could obtain within the constraints of a given actual world, then mustn't we assume that there is some type of relationship between that possibility and that actual world? If relationships between things within that actual world are described as spatial relationships, this relationship must be something other than a spatial relationship.

Quoting Terrapin Station

Again, I wouldn't say that possibilities are real, although depending on alternate ways of defining "real," I might agree with that. However, it would have to be some way of defining real so that it doesn't amount to saying that non-actualized possibilities somehow exist/subsist/occur/obtain/etc. (whatever term like that that someone might want to use).

It is the relationship between the possibility and the actual world which is what I'm concerned with. That is what we were discussing, whether or not there could be real non-spatial relationships. So I'm not concerned with arguing that possibilities are somehow real but non-existent I actually suggested earlier that we start with the assumption that possibilities are non-existent. However, we still have to deal with the reality that some of these non-existent things have a relationship with existing things. It is the nature of this relationship which is relevant to my argument that a representation exists as a representation, without a mind.

Quoting Metaphysician Undercover

If an ontological possibility is something which could obtain within the constraints of a given actual world,

It only obtains when it's actualized. (All actuals are possible.) Otherwise, it's just a way of talking about the fact that something (some object, event, etc.) isn't precluded/prohibited by anything.

Quoting Metaphysician Undercover

However, we still have to deal with the reality that some of these non-existent things have a relationship with existing things.

Saying that something that doesn't exist (or occur, or whatever--it's important to not get hung up on the particular word we're using) has a relationship with anything is simply nonsense. There's nothing to have a relationship if it doesn't exist/occur/whatever term you'd use.

Quoting Terrapin Station

It only obtains when it's actualized. (All actuals are possible.) Otherwise, it's just a way of talking about the fact that something (some object, event, etc.) isn't precluded/prohibited by anything.

We're just going around in circles. You accepted that there is a difference between a simple logical possibility, and an ontological possibility. Ontological possibility has been designated as a special type of possibility Now we must allow that there is something which substantiates that designation. You can't say that a possibility is only ontological after its been actualized, because the actualizing of one possibility excludes many others, but prior to the actualizing of that one, the many were all ontological possibilities.

Quoting Terrapin Station

Saying that something that doesn't exist (or occur, or whatever--it's important to not get hung up on the particular word we're using) has a relationship with anything is simply nonsense. There's nothing to have a relationship if it doesn't exist/occur/whatever term you'd use.

I take this as a denial of ontological possibilities then. Clearly possibilities are not existing things. If we assume that there is no relationship between a possibility and an actually existing thing, then we have no principle whereby we can say that a possibility is an ontological possibility.

Reply to Metaphysician Undercover

I explained this already:

Possibility in general is (p) just a way of talking about the fact that something (some object, event, etc.) isn't precluded/prohibited by anything.

Logical possibility is simply (p) a la something non-contradictory in the context of a particular logic, whereas ontological possibility is (p) a la something non-contradictory that could obtain within the contstraints of a given actual world.

Quoting Terrapin Station

Logical possibility is simply (p) a la something non-contradictory in the context of a particular logic, whereas ontological possibility is (p) a la something non-contradictory that could obtain within the contstraints of a given actual world.

OK, so as I said, "ontological possibility" is defined according to a relationship to an actual world. Do you not agree that to understand what an ontological possibility is, we need to determine the nature of this relationship?

Reply to Metaphysician Undercover

It's not a relationship of something to something else. It's just a way of talking about the fact that something (some object, event, etc.) isn't precluded/prohibited by anything.

Reply to Terrapin Station Well what you said, is that the ontological possibility is "something non-contradictory that could obtain within the constraints of a given actual world", So it clearly isn't just a non-prohibited way of talking, it is expressly prohibited by the constraints of an actual world. What I am trying to get at, is this relationship between that actual world, and the way of talking. There must be some relationship there, or else "ontological possibility" refers to nothing, it is fictional.

Reply to Metaphysician Undercover

Oh, well, there's a relationship between how the world is ways of talking, sure. That's what I'm referring to when I say that it's a way of talking about the fact that something isn't precluded/prohibited by anything. "The world is such that x could happen." That's all that possibilities amount to. That doesn't mean, however, that possibilities occur (or whatever word we'd use) or that they're somehow "there" to have relationships with things when they're not actualized. But the actual world has a relationship with our possibility talk, sure.

Quoting Terrapin Station

That doesn't mean, however, that possibilities occur (or whatever word we'd use) or that they're somehow "there" to have relationships with things when they're not actualized.

To a realist, it means that possibilities are real, even if they do not occur; i.e., are never actualized. In other words, there is more to reality than mere existence; possibility and necessity are just as real as actuality. Peirce wrote about this in terms of three categories: Firstness (possibility, quality, feeling), Secondness (actuality, fact, action), and Thirdness (necessity, law, thought).

Quoting aletheist

To a realist, it means that possibilities are real, even if they do not occur;

To a realist on possibilities, they are real, sure. Again, I was trying to avoid disputes about "just how possibilities <>." I don't know what neutral word to use that won't devolve into squabbles over just what their ontological status is as something "there is."

Quoting aletheist

there is more to reality than mere existence;

I don't agree with this.

That Peirce had the views he did doesn't affect my own views. You seem to agree with Peirce the vast majority of the time, though, and he seems to be very influential on you. Much like Tom and David Deutsch (though not exactly like that, maybe, since Tom often seems to be Deutsch's PR firm or perhaps his father or something).

Quoting Terrapin Station

You seem to agree with Peirce the vast majority of the time ...

I have been reading a lot of his stuff lately, so I am trying it out in order to ascertain the extent to which I agree with it.

Quoting Metaphysician Undercover

I really think that you're not grasping what a general form is. The general form gains it's intelligibility by participating in, or being part of a larger, more general concept. The concept "red" obtains intelligibility by its relationship to the concept of "colour", not by a visual representation of a red object. The concept of "human being" obtains intelligibility through its relationship to the concept of "animal", not by a visual representation of a human being.

It seems we are talking about different things. I am saying that any form, any general configuration of structure, so to speak, can be represented visually. Of course the bilaterally symmetrical form of a human being is related to the bilaterally symmetrical form of other terrestrial vertebrates. This can be seen most clearly by presenting visual images of the general bilaterally symmetrical structure showing four limbs, head and torso, and so on.

So, any general form at all that can be grasped can be represented visually. Even the general form of a piece of music can be represented visually as a score, but the score does not represent the differences between any actual performances of the piece of music. Going back to the maple leaf example, the particular form of a particular leaf can never be represented perfectly in a visual image. In that sense any representation of a particular leaf is like particular leaves, which are themselves, conceived in a certain way, representations of a general form. But that general form can only be perfectly symmetrical idealized form. In a similar way the score represents the perfect form of the music; the exact timing, syncopation, pitch and so; which no particular performance of the music can ever achieve.

So, I am claiming that any form that can be intuitively grasped can be represented in a generalized way as a visual image. If you want to disagree then you would need to provide an example that contradicts this claim.

Quoting Terrapin Station

As with everyone else, though, it would just be something that obtains in God's mind insofar as God is thinking about it.

Yes, but God, by definition, is always thinking about everything.

Quoting John

Yes, but God, by definition, is always thinking about everything.

Why would God need to think? It occurred to me a while back that God has no need for intelligence, because there are no problems God needs to solve. Intelligence is for animals, who are limited by their bodies and environments. They have challenges to overcome to survive.

God has none.

Reply to Marchesk

Perhaps God is thinking, including the thinking and intelligence of animals, and all problems are really God's problems.

Quoting John

Yes, but God, by definition, is always thinking about everything.

That doesn't help anyone else, though, unless you say that God's mind is everywhere at all times, so that nothing exists that isn't God's mind.

Reply to Terrapin Station

Yes, that's right.

Quoting Marchesk

Why would God need to think? It occurred to me a while back that God has no need for intelligence, because there are no problems God needs to solve. Intelligence is for animals, who are limited by their bodies and environments. They have challenges to overcome to survive.

Good point. It is said in traditional theology that angels have no need for speech.

The issue is, what is 'thinking'? Whole can'o'worms there. But one distinction I would make, is between 'discursive reason', which is conscious thought and calculation based on words and reasoning, and 'intuitive perception', which is of a different order altogether, e.g.:

Plotinus wishes to speak of a thinking that is not discursive but intuitive, i.e. that it is knowing and what it is knowing are immediately evident to it. There is no gap then between thinking and what is thought--they come together in the same moment, which is no longer a moment among other consecutive moments, one following upon the other. Rather, the moment in which such a thinking takes place is immediately present and without difference from any other moment, i.e. its thought is no longer chronological but eternal. To even use names, words, to think about such a thinking is already to implicate oneself in a time of separated and consecutive moments (i.e. chronological) and to have already forgotten what it is one wishes to think, namely thinking and what is thought intuitively together.

There are many parallels in Eastern philosophy.