Michael

The existence of M-theory doesn't entail that the things it models – strings, branes, the ninth spatial dimension, etc. – exist outside the model. It ...

But you just said above "I can't talk about , can't even mention it." So which is it?

Yes, and assuming scientific realism, the nature of the external world "matches" the model. It's not just an instrumental tool. Which means what, exac...

Ordinary perception doesn't provide us access to the external world (outside our models), but assuming scientific realism the Standard Model does. Giv...

Then what the hell have you been saying for the last few days when you talk about the external cause of one's perception being a red apple? Are you ju...

That we might say this isn't that, as a mind-independent fact, walls have a pitch. As I mentioned in the other thread, I think you're conflating our m...

Another question: is there a fundamental difference between sight and echolocation? Obviously sight involves light and a visual experience whereas ech...

If you're not considering air, light, or glasses to be a mediating factor between the apple and one's sense receptors then I don't understand that is ...

Neither can I, but it's the position of direct realism that it does. Hence the arguments I've put forward that show the problems with this view. I don...

You're not addressing the question. According to your account we don't directly see apples because air, light, and glasses are a mediating factor betw...

It helps us make sense of the terms. Symbolic logic is used in much of philosophy, not just as an exercise in syntax but to better address the substan...

Unfortunately we’re looking for something more formal to explain this relationship. Can we translate what you say here into symbolic logic?

Causation is a tricky thing to define. The definition I provided above is Lewis’ counterfactual theory of causation. I’m not quite sure how to make se...

How is this any different to saying “if A happens then B happens”?

Secret Service agents who tried to torpedo Hutchinson testimony lawyer up, refuse to testify: panel I wonder why. Oh, that's why. They're unwilling to...

This is where you're getting lost in the irrelevance of English grammar. All that matters is whether or not the world when not being seen resembles ho...

I'm not believing him. I'm pointing out how even the theory you're supporting doesn't make the metaphysical claims you're making.

And I'll refer back to Friston: Of course, he talks about things like "red" and "a rose" as being a "fictive" that is used as some sort of instrumenta...

Exactly. Which is why the objects you see aren't mind-independent. That's the point I've been making since the start.

Because it shows that colours as-seen aren’t mind-independent. If it were the Standard Model or some other theory would find it. Instead, colour is a ...

No I don’t. Waveforms are waveforms. Tables aren’t waveforms. I reject the philosophical position that reduces the everyday objects of perception to j...

As I have said before, the world as seen isn’t the world as described by the Standard Model, and I’ll add isn’t the world as described by cognitive sc...

I know from first-hand experience that colours are present in my experiences. I’m not just some thinking thing that engages in logical inferences. Of ...

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0010945215003226

Of course it is. Some people see the dress as black and blue, others as white and gold. I honestly can’t be bothered to rehash the old arguments where...

Hidden states are only half the picture. There’s also the non-hidden states, e.g the visible colour that is presented in experience and which, accordi...

Because you said before that people can see the wrong colours.

If there’s just one possible case where it isn’t both then the point stands. So you would have to argue that mind-independent objects are every colour...

Quantum mechanics is incompatible with relativity and so assuming a quantum theory of gravity can be found then he need not worry about relativity. If...

Now you're changing what you mean by perception being direct. First you said that perception being direct means that "there is no mediating factor bet...

Then you admit that our visual perception of an apple is mediated by air, light, and sometimes glasses or contact lenses. Therefore, by your own accou...

Air, light, glasses, and contact lenses aren't made up mediums. And what does it mean to "see something differently"? It means that we experience diff...

But there's a number of mediums between the apple and the sense receptors in our eyes (air, light, sometimes glasses or contact lenses), so by your ow...

But do we see the apple directly? Sense data is an emergent phenomenon, brought about by brain activity. If you're asking me to point to something tha...

The air, light, glasses, and contact lenses are the medium between the apple and one's eyes. Hence why, according to your account, seeing an apple isn...

There's air, light, and in some cases glasses or contact lenses. But this just shows that you have a fundamental misunderstanding of direct and indire...

I think that this interpretation places too much focus on the word used to label the metaphysics and not enough on the problem that the metaphysics is...

Can we think without language?

Then explain to me how someone else picking up and eating an apple shows that no medium is involved when they see an apple.

What do you mean by this? If you’re saying that apples directly stimulate our sense receptors then except in the case of touch this is false; apples d...

And seeing that someone’s hands are in contact with an apple isn’t evidence that we directly perceive the world. It isn’t evidence for Direct Realist ...

And as I said before, direct bodily interaction isn’t direct phenomenological experience. So again, read the SEP article so that you can actually unde...

Then there’s no evidence for direct realism, because as the SEP article says, and as you yourself referenced, direct realism is the position that ordi...

I know from experience that I have phenomenological experiences. I can’t speak for you; perhaps you’re a p-zombie. Which again shows why me seeing som...

You’re watching him eat an apple. That’s not the same thing as watching an apple being directly presented in his visual or auditory or olfactory or ta...

Picking up and eating an apple isn’t evidence of a direct auditory experience, or a direct olfactory experience, or a direct taste experience, or a di...

Then picking up and eating an apple isn’t evidence that someone has a direct visual experience of an apple.

Does the blind man have a direct visual perception of the apple?

Bodily interaction is not phenomenological experience. The former being direct says nothing about the latter being direct. A blind man can pick up and...

I don’t understand what you’re saying. The boxes are either empty or have something in it. That’s just the premise of his thought experiment.