You are viewing the historical archive of The Philosophy Forum.
For current discussions, visit the live forum.
Go to live forum

Michael

Comments

So you're saying that if I see a photo of Hitler then I am directly seeing Hitler, not indirectly seeing him via a photo?
December 10, 2016 at 16:42
What does the principle mean by simulating a physical process? Does it mean replicate? Can a quantum computer replicate consciousness, the Big Bang, e...
December 10, 2016 at 14:53
You said "Indirect realists are saying that we're only aware of the paintings, we're not aware of the processes leading up to the paintings". I'm sayi...
December 10, 2016 at 14:47
I thought it was about perception? So indirect realists are saying that we're only seeing the paining, not whatever processes lead up to the painting....
December 10, 2016 at 12:44
But that proposition as ordinarily understood can't represent that fact as ordinarily understood.
December 09, 2016 at 22:14
No, I've said my piece. Your account of meaning and truth precludes you from being a realist. At best it's quasi-realism/fictionalism. At worse it's a...
December 09, 2016 at 19:14
I have every interest in a discussion. But discussion isn't a one way straight. We both provide answers to questions. And accusing me of avoiding is b...
December 09, 2016 at 19:11
You did this every time. You refuse to answer my questions and instead insist that I keep answering every one of yours. So I'm not going to even ask y...
December 09, 2016 at 19:09
No, I don't think your claim is about language. Now, answer my question. Does your claim correspond to an objective fact?
December 09, 2016 at 19:05
You're not answering the question. Does your claim that the moon is independent of us correspond to an objective fact or not?
December 09, 2016 at 19:04
Your claim that the moon is independent of us has everything to do with our language. How am I to make sense of this claim. Does your claim that the m...
December 09, 2016 at 19:02
It's the same thing. What does it mean to say that it is an objective fact that the moon is independent if not that the proposition "the moon is indep...
December 09, 2016 at 18:52
Evidence can make the assertion of a statement justified. But such evidence might not itself be the truth-maker.
December 09, 2016 at 18:37
Truthmakers are what make statements true, whereas justifications are what make asserting a statement justified.
December 09, 2016 at 16:37
So whether or not the proposition "the moon is independent" corresponds to a fact is a subjective judgement and not an objective fact? And yet before ...
December 09, 2016 at 15:40
Heh. I've just been assuming that Tom is Deutsch. ;)
December 09, 2016 at 15:37
So you're saying that the sentence describes a verification-transcendent fact. That's what I mean when I say that realism requires verification-transc...
December 08, 2016 at 18:47
Cookies are a type of biscuit.
December 08, 2016 at 16:20
Sorry, it's here.
December 08, 2016 at 16:16
And he continues by saying that "ordinary and ontological existence assertions differ with respect to an important sort of utterance evaluation, which...
December 08, 2016 at 16:00
That it's to be understood as saying that the truth of "the moon is independent" is verification-transcendent. That's what distinguishes an ordinary f...
December 08, 2016 at 15:13
I'd say that they're anti-realists. Their claim that the moon is independent is, to use Chalmer's terminology, an ordinary existence claim, not an ont...
December 08, 2016 at 15:00
And how do we determine what realism refers to? Ask self-proclaimed realists what they mean by "I'm a realist". I'd say that for the most part they'd ...
December 08, 2016 at 14:24
It'll be what came before, given that the passage starts with "We are now in a position...". ;)
December 08, 2016 at 14:16
Not to hand. But you just need to read what people have said (and often between the lines). Very few self-proclaimed realists will claim that the exis...
December 08, 2016 at 14:10
Yes, he has a paper: http://consc.net/papers/ontology.pdf
December 08, 2016 at 14:03
Sure, and my claim is that traditional realism is (implicitly, if not also explicitly) truth-realism. It's historically tied to the correspondence the...
December 08, 2016 at 13:41
And I understand this as saying that the truth of "the moon exists" is verification transcendent. Or at the very least, that this is what it must mean...
December 08, 2016 at 13:31
Which is why I (and I believe a few others) think that your self-proclaimed realism isn't realism (as it's usually understood) at all. Of course, if y...
December 08, 2016 at 13:23
I think the easiest way to understand the independence of things is with reference to Dummett's account of realism and anti-realism. If the truth of "...
December 08, 2016 at 13:04
Realists argue for the independence of things. Materialists argue that all things are material. The latter might entail the former, but the former doe...
December 08, 2016 at 09:08
It'll just be the (weak) anthropic principle.
December 07, 2016 at 09:09
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 i...
December 06, 2016 at 18:45
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 th...
December 06, 2016 at 18:39
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...
December 06, 2016 at 16:54
The ontological separation of thought and subject does seem problematic, especially if one is a physicalist and reduces thoughts to brain activity. We...
December 06, 2016 at 16:24
But can you choose to experience whatever you like? Can you make it so that you experience yourself as rich, powerful, and successful? Can you make it...
December 06, 2016 at 14:50
Other people continue to experience (until they don't)?
December 06, 2016 at 14:32
Not 7 years, but this guy got life without parole.
December 06, 2016 at 14:28
From what I can read, Metaphysician Undiscover is saying something akin to "it's the ball hitting the window that caused the window to break" and jkop...
December 06, 2016 at 14:01
Depends on the kind of necessity. Metaphysical necessity is not the same as logical necessity. As a possible example (correct me if I'm wrong), it doe...
December 06, 2016 at 13:33
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...
December 06, 2016 at 12:59
I'm pretty sure that feminists are trying to combat the actual unfair treatment of women, not whatever the above is supposed to mean.
December 05, 2016 at 17:08
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 perce...
December 04, 2016 at 11:28
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". Yo...
December 04, 2016 at 11:07
Sure. But I don't see the difference between saying that conceptual content exists independently of anyone's mind and saying that thoughts correspond ...
December 03, 2016 at 18:36
Well this just seems like traditional metaphysical realism.
December 03, 2016 at 18:19
A sense other than the deflationary sense that you're trying to explain.
December 03, 2016 at 15:42
Is the "independent existence of the world" here to be understood in a deflationary sense or in a non-deflationary sense? If the latter then this defl...
December 03, 2016 at 14:13
What does it mean for a concept to apply to something? And in the case of me dressing up as Harry Potter, how do thoughts apply (in a way that they do...
December 01, 2016 at 21:23