Reality is Inaccessible

[Vitruvius]

The scientific worldview doesn't suggest how technology should be applied, that's not its job.

You've never heard of climate change?

And most technology totally wasn't applied based on religious authority, especially not in the last 100 years. (Or maybe we are living on different planets.)

I never said it was. I said religion denied science authority as an understanding of reality, and so - governments and industry felt free to apply technology as it suited them. Hence we have nuclear weapons, but have not applied clean energy technology - even while science has known about climate change since the 1950's. Eisenhower was the first US president briefed on the subject - and that was 70 years before "Trump digs coal." Were science recognised as valid knowledge of reality, that statement would be considered insane.

You just had to make these things up, in order to be able to point to a removable obstacle, that's in the way of fixing global warming. The reality is much grimmer than that.

No, it's really there - a mistaken relationship to science; wherein we use science, but don't observe science as truth. And the proof of the matter is that, if we accepted science as a true understanding of reality, and applied technology accordingly, we could overcome climate change. But we don't. For example, from today's paper:

"The world will soon face “catastrophe” from climate breakdown if urgent action is not taken, the British president of vital UN climate talks has warned. ... But Sharma also insisted the UK could carry on with fossil-fuel projects, in the face of mounting criticism of plans to license new oil and gas fields."

Sharma digs coal!

[Atla]

The scientific worldview doesn't suggest how technology should be applied, that's not its job.

You've never heard of climate change?

And most technology totally wasn't applied based on religious authority, especially not in the last 100 years. (Or maybe we are living on different planets.)

I never said it was. I said religion denied science authority as an understanding of reality, and so - governments and industry felt free to apply technology as it suited them. Hence we have nuclear weapons, but have not applied clean energy technology - even while science has known about climate change since the 1950's. Eisenhower was the first US president briefed on the subject - and that was 70 years before "Trump digs coal." Were science recognised as valid knowledge of reality, that statement would be considered insane.

You just had to make these things up, in order to be able to point to a removable obstacle, that's in the way of fixing global warming. The reality is much grimmer than that.

No, it's really there - a mistaken relationship to science; wherein we use science, but don't observe science as truth. And the proof of the matter is that, if we accepted science as a true understanding of reality, and applied technology accordingly, we could overcome climate change. But we don't. For example, from today's paper:

"The world will soon face “catastrophe” from climate breakdown if urgent action is not taken, the British president of vital UN climate talks has warned. ... But Sharma also insisted the UK could carry on with fossil-fuel projects, in the face of mounting criticism of plans to license new oil and gas fields."

Sharma digs coal!

Okay I don't know how to tell you this, but in the real world, governments and industry aren't interested in the most accurate understanding of reality. They are primarily interested in wealth and power, and both science and religion are tools for acquiring them.

[Terrapin Station]

For me, there have to be reasons other than mere possibility to believe "reality is inaccessible" (mere possibility isn't sufficient, because "reality isn't inaccessible" is possible, too, so on mere possibility we'd need to believe both). Those reasons need to be what I consider good justificational reasons--they need to be grounded either in empirical evidence of some sort or at least a really good logical argument of some sort.

What we should do is present the reasons that we believe are good, justified reasons for asserting "reality is inaccessible." Or in other words, rather than simply asserting it and talking about its implications, how about we actually justify asserting it in the first place?

[Vitruvius]

Okay I don't know how to tell you this,

How about - without the unwarranted condescension?

but in the real world, governments and industry aren't interested in the most accurate understanding of reality. They are primarily interested in wealth and power, and both science and religion are tools for acquiring them.

Do nation states exist? The world didn't come with lines drawn on it, did it? Nation states are human inventions that divide the world into separate sovereign entities, and governments act on that basis in the formation of policy - hence, policies are at odds with 'the real world.'

In scientific terms, the earth is a single planetary environment and human beings are all members of the same species. That's the real, real world.

[Atla]

Okay I don't know how to tell you this,

How about - without the unwarranted condescension?

but in the real world, governments and industry aren't interested in the most accurate understanding of reality. They are primarily interested in wealth and power, and both science and religion are tools for acquiring them.

Do nation states exist? The world didn't come with lines drawn on it, did it? Nation states are human inventions that divide the world into separate sovereign entities, and governments act on that basis in the formation of policy - hence, policies are at odds with 'the real world.'

In scientific terms, the earth is a single planetary environment and human beings are all members of the same species. That's the real, real world.

When you studied political philosophy, did they teach that governments are benevolent? If so then that was just part of the government brainwashing.

[uwot]

So, Galileo - arrested, tried, found grievously suspect of heresy, life imprisonment.

Well, the Vatican was a sludge that science had to wade through. In Galileo's time things were changing too fast for them. They were still struggling to deal with the aftermath of Martin Luther and the Gutenberg press. The protestant literalists were gone, but there were plenty sola scriptura sympathisers that would have shattered whatever remained of the Roman magisterium. Banging Galileo up was political, rather than theological.

Newton - forced to hide his unconventional religious views to ascend to the Lucasian Chair.

He was embarrassed by his views. The Royal Society, which published Newton's Principia, was specifically set up to advance mathematical and empirical study; that is what we call science these days and drew a line between itself and natural philosophy, which was as much about explaining phenomena.

Darwin - attacked by religionists, even unto this day.

Yes indeed, but if someone is slapping you with a soggy tissue, do call it a war...

Craig Venter - 2008, developed artificial life in the lab, condemned for 'playing God'

...or give a fuck what people say?

Every movie you see, mad scientist out to destroy the world, defeated by god loving, flag waving hero.

There are other movies available.

It's not a war between science and religion. It's a war waged by religion, against science.

Science is about what happens. You can see what happens by looking. Religion is about why something happens. Why something happens makes no difference to the fact that it happens.

[Vitruvius]

When you studied political philosophy, did they teach that governments are benevolent? If so then that was just part of the government brainwashing.

No.

[Sculptor]

That is not to say that what we perceive in not part of reality, but it definitely demonstrates that our perceptions are partial.

If your perception is only partial, how did you come to know it?

Because science reveals so much more and has shown that how we sense is not the same as what we are sensing. For example the sense of hungriness is actually low blood sugar - but it does not feel like low blood sugar. And when we see an object we are not seeing the object we are seeing the light reflected from the object. When we see red what we are actually seeing is a different wavelength of ligth such that the "red object" is absorbing all other wavelengths. We do not see the reality of it but we see what we like to call "red". Need I go on?. When we hear something what we are actually perceiving is virbrations in the air. The same gap between ANY sense you can name and what is the actual object of perception is always present. Shall I go on? THen there is a whole host of different things out there which we have no mechanism to perceive. Such as all objects which are beyind the ability of light to reflect from. The electron microscope has revealed things that no amount of magnification can show due to the limits of light wavelengths. Shall I go on? There is an entire body of knowledge of illusion in sound and vision that also demonstrate this no brainer. Shall I go on?
Synesthesia shows that sounds can have colour. We are born with appraoximately the same senses but the perception is not the mendated or necessary result of the input.

Perhaps it is your own inadequate perception that is making you believe that, but you cannot know it of anyone else.

Of pehaps you are as dull witted as Vitruvius?

Name any human sense and I can tell you why what we perceive is dissimilar to the objects of perceptiom?
Car to take challenge?

Start here!
https://www.psy.gla.ac.uk/~steve/best/senses.html

[Sculptor]

Do nation states exist? The world didn't come with lines drawn on it, did it? Nation states are human inventions that divide the world into separate sovereign entities, and governments act on that basis in the formation of policy - hence, policies are at odds with 'the real world.'

You should take care not to criticise people for being subjectivists while you are one yourself.

[Vitruvius]

Well, the Vatican was a sludge that science had to wade through. In Galileo's time things were changing too fast for them. They were still struggling to deal with the aftermath of Martin Luther and the Gutenberg press. The protestant literalists were gone, but there were plenty sola scriptura sympathisers that would have shattered whatever remained of the Roman magisterium. Banging Galileo up was political, rather than theological.

Galileo was on trial for heresy, for making an argument that proved that the Bible was factually incorrect. Several Biblical passages describe the world as - "Fixed in the heavens, It cannot be moved." Galileo proved the Bible wrong - and you say, it wasn't theological?

He was embarrassed by his views. The Royal Society, which published Newton's Principia, was specifically set up to advance mathematical and empirical study; that is what we call science these days and drew a line between itself and natural philosophy, which was as much about explaining phenomena.

No. He was anti-trinitarian - he became convinced that before Athanasius, the Church had no trinitarian doctrine. He wasn't embarrassed to believe - because his colleagues were scientists. He was required to believe, a very definite set of religious beliefs.

Yes indeed, but if someone is slapping you with a soggy tissue, do call it a war...

Darwin worried himself sick, walking round and around his garden for 20 years, before daring to publish. His wife was religious, and he had children - and there's no doubt from his writings, that he felt enormous pressure. He called his ideas on evolution 'like confessing to a murder.' And that's 1859 - 250 years after Galileo proved the Bible wrong.

...or give a fuck what people say?

It's still happening though, isn't it - even unto this day, and this example is a symptom of a far larger social phenomenon.

There are other movies available.

You seem to be wilfully missing the point.

Science is about what happens. You can see what happens by looking. Religion is about why something happens. Why something happens makes no difference to the fact that it happens.

So if I want to know why, for example, Mars seems to do a loop in the sky - I should ask religion then, should I? No, because their cosmology is geocentric, and doesn't explain the retrograde motion of Mars.

[Vitruvius]

You should take care not to criticise people for being subjectivists while you are one yourself.

I'm not subjectivist, because I don't accept that subjectivism accurately describes the significance of how perception works. The so called 'reality-gap' subjectivists bang on about is tiny, compared to the overwhelming evidence of commonality and accuracy of perception to reality. Traffic lights, art, colour coded electrical wires - how can we do these things if reality is subjectively constructed? Try going to court and saying "Objectively the light was red, but subjectively..." You'd get locked up for contempt of court! It's bollocks - and it's the dominant paradigm. That's why we are going extinct.
We know no truth.

[RCSaunders]

That is not to say that what we perceive in not part of reality, but it definitely demonstrates that our perceptions are partial.

If your perception is only partial, how did you come to know it?

Because science reveals so much more and has shown that how we sense is not the same as what we are sensing. For example the sense of hungriness is actually low blood sugar - but it does not feel like low blood sugar.

How should low blood sugar feel?

And when we see an object we are not seeing the object we are seeing the light reflected from the object. When we see red what we are actually seeing is a different wavelength of ligth such that the "red object" is absorbing all other wavelengths.

Of course, that is how we see objects. What makes you think we are supposed to see them some other way.

We do not see the reality of it but we see what we like to call "red".

So when I see something red, because it produces, transmits, or reflects light in the wavelength that is red, it's actually a different color I'm seeing? If the wavelength is really red and that's what I see, what's unreal about it?

Need I go on?. When we hear something what we are actually perceiving is virbrations in the air.

Yes, that's what sound is--hearing vibrations withing a certain range. How else would we perceive sound if that is not right?

The same gap between ANY sense you can name and what is the actual object of perception is always present.

What, "gap." So far you've only exlained how we do perceive existence as it actually is.

Shall I go on? Then there is a whole host of different things out there which we have no mechanism to perceive. Such as all objects which are beyond the ability of light to reflect from. The electron microscope has revealed things that no amount of magnification can show due to the limits of light wavelengths.

But if what we see is deceptive, how can it be that what we see by means of instruments is correct? If I use a microscope to examine a drop of blood, and I think I see little red corpuscles, they aren't really little red corpuscles, according to your view, but something else. I don't think that can be right.

Shall I go on? There is an entire body of knowledge of illusion in sound and vision that also demonstrate this no brainer.

According to your view, everything is an illusion. If you cannot know what reality actually is, how can you know what you perceive is an illusion?

Shall I go on? Synesthesia shows that sounds can have colour. We are born with appraoximately the same senses but the perception is not the mendated or necessary result of the input.

I have always enjoyed that particular joke. If someone claims to hear colors, or see sounds, or have other confused perceptions, they would have to know what the right perceptions were to know theirs was different. Of course, the real problem with all psychological nonsense is, there is no way to test it. No one can actually know what anyone else's perceptual experience is and there is no way to know if those making such claims are telling the truth or not.

https://www.psy.gla.ac.uk/~steve/best/senses.html

Thanks for the link. I'm glad it included interoception, something that is sadly neglected, especially by those who confuse physiological reactions for what they call intuition and, "feelings."

I saw nothing I disagreed with in that article, because it only reinforces what I already knew about the absolute reliability of perception.

[Sculptor]

You should take care not to criticise people for being subjectivists while you are one yourself.

I'm not subjectivist, because I don't accept that subjectivism accurately describes the significance of how perception works. The so called 'reality-gap' subjectivists bang on about is tiny, compared to the overwhelming evidence of commonality and accuracy of perception to reality. Traffic lights, art, colour coded electrical wires - how can we do these things if reality is subjectively constructed? Try going to court and saying "Objectively the light was red, but subjectively..." You'd get locked up for contempt of court! It's bollocks - and it's the dominant paradigm. That's why we are going extinct.
We know no truth.

The reality gap is massive, so massive it is immeasurable.
Pick any sense and I shall show you how the perception of it is not the same as the object of perception.
And this is not a court of law, this is philosophy.

[Sculptor]

If your perception is only partial, how did you come to know it?

Because science reveals so much more and has shown that how we sense is not the same as what we are sensing. For example the sense of hungriness is actually low blood sugar - but it does not feel like low blood sugar.

How should low blood sugar feel?

And when we see an object we are not seeing the object we are seeing the light reflected from the object. When we see red what we are actually seeing is a different wavelength of ligth such that the "red object" is absorbing all other wavelengths.

Of course, that is how we see objects. What makes you think we are supposed to see them some other way.
What do you mean SUPPOSED? You mean by GOd?
LOL

We do not see the reality of it but we see what we like to call "red".

So when I see something red, because it produces, transmits, or reflects light in the wavelength that is red, it's actually a different color I'm seeing? If the wavelength is really red and that's what I see, what's unreal about it?
There is no such thing as red.

Need I go on?. When we hear something what we are actually perceiving is virbrations in the air.

Yes, that's what sound is--hearing vibrations withing a certain range. How else would we perceive sound if that is not right?
A sound is no like a vibration.

The same gap between ANY sense you can name and what is the actual object of perception is always present.

What, "gap." So far you've only exlained how we do perceive existence as it actually is.
Peception is representation of something else.

Shall I go on? Then there is a whole host of different things out there which we have no mechanism to perceive. Such as all objects which are beyond the ability of light to reflect from. The electron microscope has revealed things that no amount of magnification can show due to the limits of light wavelengths.

But if what we see is deceptive, how can it be that what we see by means of instruments is correct? If I use a microscope to examine a drop of blood, and I think I see little red corpuscles, they aren't really little red corpuscles, according to your view, but something else. I don't think that can be right.
I did not say it is deceptive. We call a thing what we think it is by the fact that we sense it in a certain way.

Shall I go on? There is an entire body of knowledge of illusion in sound and vision that also demonstrate this no brainer.

According to your view, everything is an illusion. If you cannot know what reality actually is, how can you know what you perceive is an illusion?
I did not say everything is an illusion. If you are going to deliberately misrepresent me, what hope have you of even understanding what I am saying.
I am saying that perceptions are representations of something.
We evolved senses, by the acquisition of randomly mutated traits that are preserved due to the reproduction of viable progeny. Other animals evolved different senses. I would hazard a guess that an alien species might see have unimagined senses. But the point is that vision is a consequence of evolution- there is nothing to say that it is necessary. SOme cratures have no sight but "see" with smell.
Try to imagine what a bat "sees" in the dark. Try and use your imagination.

Shall I go on? Synesthesia shows that sounds can have colour. We are born with appraoximately the same senses but the perception is not the mendated or necessary result of the input.

I have always enjoyed that particular joke. If someone claims to hear colors, or see sounds, or have other confused perceptions, they would have to know what the right perceptions were to know theirs was different. Of course, the real problem with all psychological nonsense is, there is no way to test it. No one can actually know what anyone else's perceptual experience is and there is no way to know if those making such claims are telling the truth or not.
Keep on laughing. The joke is on you

https://www.psy.gla.ac.uk/~steve/best/senses.html

Thanks for the link. I'm glad it included interoception, something that is sadly neglected, especially by those who confuse physiological reactions for what they call intuition and, "feelings."

I saw nothing I disagreed with in that article, because it only reinforces what I already knew about the absolute reliability of perception.

The point here is that you "saw nothing". You have nothing to offer. You are as dull witted as Vitruvious

[uwot]

He (Isaac Newton) was required to believe, a very definite set of religious beliefs.

What was he required to believe?