seeds wrote: ↑Fri Sep 20, 2019 4:09 am Please read the following definition of Kant’s “thing-in-itself” from Wictionary:
And then this from the Collins English Dictionary:Wictionary wrote: thing-in-itself
Noun.
thing-in-itself (plural things-in-themselves)
(from Kantian philosophy on) A thing as it is independent of any conceptualization or perception by the human mind, postulated by practical reason but existing in a condition which is in principle unknowable and unexperienceable.
Synonym: noumenon
Antonym: phenomenon
With the above definitions in mind, one example I like to use for visualizing the meaning of the term “noumenon” can be seen in the Double Slit Experiment.Collins Dictionary wrote: thing-in-itself
noun
(in the philosophy of Kant) an element of the noumenal rather than the phenomenal world, of which the senses give no knowledge but whose bare existence can be inferred from the nature of experience
When a series of single electrons are shot through the double slits, what transpires in the space between the double-slitted wall and that of the detection screen is the perfect example of something that is “postulated by practical reason”...
(in other words, postulated as something that had spread-out into a wave by reason of the phenomenally observable interference pattern on the screen)
...but, at the time of transit, existed in a condition which is in principle unknowable and (especially) unexperienceable with our senses.
And the point is that it is literally impossible for us to directly know, or to directly experience (again, with our five senses) the true status of the electrons - (as they really are) - as they travel from wall-to-screen.
Even though we know (by “practical reasoning”) that something about the electrons is waving, we can only “infer” what is really taking place.
Now granted, I may be taking a bit of license with Kantian terminology, however, to me, the above analogy seems like a fairly simple way of helping us to visualize the meaning of the word “noumenon.”
Yeah, I really don’t see that as being “much simpler.”Sculptor wrote: ↑Fri Sep 20, 2019 8:57 am There is a much simpler way without opening up the can of worms that is QMechanics.
If I see a mug on the next table I shall see an arc supported by two straight lines that support a circle. The edges of those lines have shading towards the middle.
This is the phenomenon of the "mug".
At this point I might be wrong - it may not be a mug at all.
But I build up a 3D picture and add a third dimension; I even had a handle to the other unsighted side. In most cases the mind builds and interprets a whole mug.
What we have here is a phenomenon. The noumenal mug has a lot more information hidden from my senses. Not only its full shape but the internal structures, of molecules of the pottery and the surface glaze. The facts of the mug, hidden from our senses, can go much deeper
With such simple illustrations Kant cautions us not to take for granted our simple sense perceptions; the taken for granted...
But that’s okay, because it might resonate with someone in a way that mine doesn’t. So it’s all good.
The bottom line is, the more analogies the better.
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