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Michael

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Yes they can, they're doing it right here. You're using the term "private sensations" to refer to things that you say can act as truth-makers but can'...
January 24, 2026 at 19:11
Which is another thing I have repeatedly argued. The traditional dispute between direct and indirect realism concerns phenomenology. The new semantic ...
January 24, 2026 at 17:12
This is incoherent. If a) headaches are private sensations then b) the word "headaches" in (a) is being used to refer to things which are private sens...
January 24, 2026 at 17:00
That our scientific understanding of the world very clearly supports the indirect realist's account of perception over the direct realist's. That conc...
January 24, 2026 at 16:47
Yes, I have explained this so many times now. I am concerned with perception and colours and smells and tastes and headaches. I don't give a damn abou...
January 24, 2026 at 15:17
Where have I ever used the word "means"? You keep bringing it up, despite me repeatedly saying that I am only arguing that the word "headache" refers ...
January 24, 2026 at 14:48
The word "rain" refers to the water falling from the clouds, and the word "headache" refers to the sensation I feel having to belabour this very obvio...
January 24, 2026 at 14:45
I'll repeat what I said to Hanover. P1. Headaches are private sensations P2. The word "headaches" refers to headaches C1. Therefore, the word "headach...
January 24, 2026 at 14:10
January 24, 2026 at 14:09
See above.
January 24, 2026 at 14:00
It does. There are no headaches without the private sensation.
January 24, 2026 at 13:58
If just one word refers to private sensations then this argument that you and Hanover keep pushing that meaning is just public use, that private sensa...
January 24, 2026 at 12:28
To repeat an earlier quote from A Problem with Color:
January 23, 2026 at 20:16
P1. Headaches are private sensations P2. The word "headaches" refers to headaches C1. Therefore, the word "headaches" refers to private sensations I d...
January 23, 2026 at 19:04
My objection is to your objection to my claim that the words "red", "pain", "cold", etc. refer to the phenomenal character of first-person experiences...
January 23, 2026 at 16:30
I'm talking about reference. The word "headache" refers to the sensation we tend to feel after a heavy night of drinking, the word "cold" refers to th...
January 23, 2026 at 15:51
I’m not asserting (2). I’m asserting (1) and that the word “hot” in John’s utterance “I feel hot” refers to the sensation he feels. My private state i...
January 23, 2026 at 14:31
The sensation he has makes the use of the word “hot” true because it refers to the sensation he has, and the sensation he has makes the use of the wor...
January 23, 2026 at 14:01
The sentence “John feels hot” is a true description of John and the sensation he is feeling, and contrasts with the false description “John feels cold...
January 23, 2026 at 13:33
Which means what? 1. John feels hot1 in the water 2. The water is hot2 Are you saying that "hot1" does not refer to the sensation John feels in the wa...
January 23, 2026 at 13:07
Yes, and this evaluation is inextricably tied up in the sensations they cause us to feel. That's why even Banno says "John feels cold in the water" an...
January 23, 2026 at 12:14
Both John and Jane agree on the temperature. Is 37°C hot or cold? What do the words "hot" and "cold" mean in either case? I think it quite obvious tha...
January 23, 2026 at 12:02
Yes, and the word "hot" in "John feels the water is hot" refers to the sensation John feels when sitting in the water and the word "cold" in "Jane fee...
January 22, 2026 at 21:16
This is false. The words "hot" and "cold" refer to the sensations that John and Jane feel when sitting in the bath and yet they disagree on whether th...
January 22, 2026 at 21:05
As it should, because the words "hot" and "cold" really do refer to each person's private sensations. John says "the bath is hot" because he feels hot...
January 22, 2026 at 20:46
Yes, so the words "hot" and "cold" refer to those sensations they feel — even though they predicate them of the bath and "disagree". That tells you th...
January 22, 2026 at 20:28
Two people can disagree about whether the bath is hot or cold. It does not then follow that the bath either "really is" hot or "really is" cold, and t...
January 22, 2026 at 20:15
The most recent of those was from 13 days ago. The post I referenced (and repeated) was from 8 days ago. It's not if you want to continue to claim tha...
January 22, 2026 at 19:47
My headache isn't public. Neither are the colours I see. The example with the faulty and then fixed visors is a simple and intuitive demonstration tha...
January 22, 2026 at 19:16
A thrown ball hitting my head informs me about a person throwing a ball at my head, but that doesn't mean that the ball hitting my head is direct perc...
January 22, 2026 at 17:45
It can. But what does the word "orange" mean/refer to in the ending phrase "for me to see it as orange"? It refers to the phenomenal character of your...
January 22, 2026 at 17:38
Yes, worth reading up on fictionalism: In ordinary life we talk about ordinary objects as being coloured, but it's a fiction that we ought recognise i...
January 22, 2026 at 15:59
Sunflowers don't see. They react to and move towards the sunlight but they lack first person phenomenal experience. The dispute between direct and ind...
January 22, 2026 at 15:38
The words "gold" and "white" in the above sentence refer to the phenomenal quality of the experience that some people have when they look at the photo...
January 22, 2026 at 15:31
So point to where in the light and the organism's body I can look to see this "information"? If I open up your head can I see the information you have...
January 22, 2026 at 15:20
Which means what? Here's a non-human biological organism with skin and bones and muscles and organs and photosensitive receptor cells. What does it me...
January 21, 2026 at 18:26
You’re still not explaining what it means for a biological organism to see a distant object. Your first account entailed that we only have direct perc...
January 21, 2026 at 17:05
Several times he talked about Iceland instead of Greenland. His dementia is showing.
January 21, 2026 at 16:02
Well, phenomenal qualities are essentially private, so obviously they can’t satisfy public criteria. You’ve defined “direct perception” in such a way ...
January 21, 2026 at 12:14
For me, to be the "object" of perception is just to be the X in "I perceive X". If I feel pain then pain is the object of perception, if I see colours...
January 21, 2026 at 11:59
Then I think this is our fundamental disagreement. As above with my reply to RussellA, I think it quite appropriate to say that I am aware of these ph...
January 21, 2026 at 11:36
I would add that a mental state isn't really just one thing. There's the "sensory" mental state, but then also the "intellectual" mental state. I thin...
January 21, 2026 at 11:34
I'm not denying that "sense" and "reference" are two different things. I'm not saying that one needs to understand the referent to understand the sens...
January 21, 2026 at 10:31
Then replace "mind-independent" with "exists at a distance to my body and has such properties even when nobody is looking at it". So there's an organi...
January 21, 2026 at 10:22
So shape, size, colour, and motion are "features of the perceptual episode". Do you accept that I am aware of these shapes, sizes, colours, and motion...
January 21, 2026 at 10:14
You're still not explaining what it means for a biological organism to "see" a distant object. If eliminative materialism is true then there is just s...
January 21, 2026 at 10:12
Isn't there a difference between the "virtual object" as a collection of transistors turning on and off and the "virtual object" as the thing seen wit...
January 20, 2026 at 17:34
I’m not really sure what that means. Does the game object exist if the eye is functioning normally but the wearer is brain dead? Does it exist if the ...
January 20, 2026 at 15:31
It's not a consequence of my position. Direct perception of a mind-independent object is not required for our words to refer to it. I've never met Tru...
January 20, 2026 at 14:46
I'm very confused. I'm saying that some of our words (e.g. "red") are referring to phenomenal states and some of our words (e.g. "bird") are referring...
January 20, 2026 at 14:26