Philosophy Now Forum

Skepdick wrote: ↑Thu Aug 31, 2023 9:17 amSo according to you blind people who can't recognize their own faces, and deaf people who can't recognize their own voice don't have that "identity" thing you have.

Good to know...

Odd presumption to have...you do know blind people can hear their won voice, and that all humans have a sense of touch?

Wizard22 wrote: ↑Thu Aug 31, 2023 9:24 am

Skepdick wrote: ↑Thu Aug 31, 2023 9:17 amSo according to you blind people who can't recognize their own faces, and deaf people who can't recognize their own voice don't have that "identity" thing you have.

Good to know...

Odd presumption to have...you do know blind people can hear their won voice, and that all humans have a sense of touch?

So you have an identity, but a blind, deaf quadriplegic person doesn't? Good to know...

Skepdick wrote: ↑Thu Aug 31, 2023 9:33 amSo you have an identity, but a blind, deaf quadriplegic person doesn't? Good to know...

Touch distinguishes yourself apart from your environment.

EDIT:

To expand on this, the reason/cause of it, is because when you touch something, it produces an electro-chemical feedback loop within your nervous system, differentiating 'your body', yourself, from the environment.

Wizard22 wrote: ↑Thu Aug 31, 2023 12:41 pm Touch distinguishes yourself apart from your environment.

All distinctions are conceptual.

If our small minds, for some convenience, divide this glass of wine, this universe, into parts -- physics, biology, geology, astronomy, psychology, and so on -- remember that nature does not know it! --Richard Feynman

You can conceptualize yourself as apart from the environment.
You can conceptualize yourself as part of the environment.

Chop it up however you want in your head, it's still just a mind-game- nothing changes in practice.

Skepdick wrote: ↑Thu Aug 31, 2023 12:46 pm

Wizard22 wrote: ↑Thu Aug 31, 2023 12:41 pm Touch distinguishes yourself apart from your environment.

All distinctions are conceptual.

No, many of them are real.

Skepdick wrote: ↑Thu Aug 31, 2023 12:46 pm

If our small minds, for some convenience, divide this glass of wine, this universe, into parts -- physics, biology, geology, astronomy, psychology, and so on -- remember that nature does not know it! --Richard Feynman

You can conceptualize yourself as apart from the environment.
You can ceonceptualize yourself as part of the environment.

Chop it up however you want in your head, it's still just a mind-game- nothing changes in practice.

No, you *ARE* part of your environment. It's not conceptual. It's real.

Wizard22 wrote: ↑Thu Aug 31, 2023 12:49 pm No, you *ARE* part of your environment. It's not conceptual. It's real.

Wizard22 wrote: ↑Thu Aug 31, 2023 12:41 pm Touch distinguishes yourself apart from your environment.

So are you part of the environment; or apart from the environment?

Make up your mind.

Skepdick wrote: ↑Thu Aug 31, 2023 12:50 pm

Wizard22 wrote: ↑Thu Aug 31, 2023 12:49 pm No, you *ARE* part of your environment. It's not conceptual. It's real.

Wizard22 wrote: ↑Thu Aug 31, 2023 12:41 pm Touch distinguishes yourself apart from your environment.

So are you part of the environment; or apart from the environment?

Make up your mind.

Objectively, yes.
Subjectively, no.

Wizard22 wrote: ↑Thu Aug 31, 2023 12:59 pm Objectively, yes.
Subjectively, no.

And which one is lying? The subjective-you or the objective-you?

Wizard22 wrote: ↑Thu Aug 31, 2023 9:00 am You are not counter-arguing the point...there is no case, no example in history, where men save themselves en masse and leave the women and children behind to die, during a disaster/emergency.

I don't have to counter-argue the point in your precise manner with a specific documented mass incident. Our patriarchal cultures are my example. I recognized it from my earliest memories and experiences -- it is not something I learned from feminism. You are a very stupid person, and I won't waste any more energy talking with you.

Skepdick wrote: ↑Wed Aug 30, 2023 2:33 pm

Trajk Logik wrote: ↑Wed Aug 30, 2023 1:50 pm There are no contradictions in reality, only in the misuse of language.

Something tells me you failed basic logic...

P1. There are no contradictions in reality
P2. Language is part of reality.
C There are no contradictions in language.

Are you misusing language or something?

Depending on how your read it, there might not be a contradiction. I could have said, "There are no contradictions in reality, except in the misuse of language" and it not take anything away from the rest of what I said, like when I said that we change the way we talk when speaking to children or someone who is learning our language.

Your first sentence to me is a personal attack. Why do you, and so many others on these forums, resort to such tactics unnecessarily. It just shows how immature you are and how you are emotionally attached to your beliefs and just here to proselytize and with no intent in having an open-minded discussion.

Wizard22 wrote: ↑Thu Aug 31, 2023 8:52 am

Trajk Logik wrote: ↑Wed Aug 30, 2023 1:50 pm"Sweet" is part of the experience. "Sweet" is part of the map, not the territory. According to your statements, the chemical composition is the territory. But how did you get at the chemical composition if not via some part of your "subjective" experience? Again, you can only get at the world via your experiences.

"Sweet" is a descriptor, referent, to the chemical compound. My original assertions state that, sugar, the chemical will be 'sweet' whether I ever taste it or not. The relationship, unexperienced, is Objective. It is beyond my experience. In the same way, that a gold nugget will remain gold, chemically composed and alloyed, whether I ever find it in the ground or not. I can have no experience of gold. It would not change the 'thing' of "gold-ness". This is the disconnection, the S-O Distinction.

It's not a relationship if the sugar was never experienced. The experience is the relationship. So I don't see how something that doesn't exist can be objective. If no observers existed then sugar would just be sugar and there would never be any sweetness.

Everything is a relationship - including sugar. Sugar is a molecule and molecules are a relationship between atoms. Atoms are relationships between protons and electrons, and protons are a relationship between quarks. We will find that quarks are also a relationship, so it is relationships all the way down. There never is anything "physical", just relationships, process, or information all the way down.

So if there aren't any observers then the relationship between sugar and observers does not exist and therefore cannot be objective. It makes no sense to say that something that does not exist is objective.

Wizard22 wrote: ↑Thu Aug 31, 2023 8:52 am

Trajk Logik wrote: ↑Wed Aug 30, 2023 1:50 pmAll of your knowledge comes from your experiences.

Not just my experiences, but the experiences of others, and of all other life really.

Which you only experience indirectly through their actions or words, but they can lie. So, like I said, all of your knowledge comes from your experiences.

Wizard22 wrote: ↑Thu Aug 31, 2023 8:52 am

Trajk Logik wrote: ↑Wed Aug 30, 2023 1:50 pmWhat form does your awareness of the chemical composition of ice cream take? How do you know that you know that? What is it that you can point to if not some other "subjective" experience? For instance, if you read an online article about the chemistry of ice cream, doesn't it take the form of your visual of the computer screen, with a white background and black letters, and your prior meaningful memories and experiences that are integrated with the meaning of the words you are reading? How does that experience get at the objective nature of ice cream?

I agree with your presumptions of subjective experience rooting our knowledge. That's Epistemology.

But when it comes to Objectivity, the objects, where experience is not required, it's as-if the world of objects are waiting as potentiality, as to the experiences that we already have. For example, if we've never eaten chocolate ice cream in our lives, it doesn't change the 'potentiality' of the sugary chemical composition that "awaits" our taste buds. It's there, waiting to be proven. That's the empirical difference, when subjective perception, observation, experience, confers with (objective)-reality.

Objectivity is always a Hypothetical, Theoretical, because subjects cannot confer with it until it is perceived/experienced.

However, that does not mean that Objects depend upon Subjects, to Exist. This is basic Existentialism.

I don't see how any of this answers my question about what form your knowledge takes. How do you know that you know anything? What are you referring to when you say "I know..."

Potential, hypothetical, and theoretical are just ideas that stem from our ignorance. They are imaginary concepts that have no reality outside of our minds. Either processes interact or they don't. If they don't then those interactions do not exist. There is no potential, only what exists. To say that there is potential is to just be saying you are ignorant to the facts what is, or will be the case. What will be the case is dependent upon what currently is the case. What is, what has been, or what will be has already been determined and our knowledge of it all is lacking, so it seems like there are probabilities, randomness and potential because we are ignorant of what is, what has been, and what will be. This is basic Determinism.

Wizard22 wrote: ↑Thu Aug 31, 2023 8:52 am

Trajk Logik wrote: ↑Wed Aug 30, 2023 1:50 pmActually, I think language use is grounded more in "objectivity". There is no logical reason why an individual would need to label and name things on their own. If you were the only human in existence there would be no reason to label and name things. Those labels and names are only useful when you have the intention to communicate your own experiences to others, and you have to understand their own knowledge and experience with the same labels and names, or else how do you know what labels and names to use to be able to communicate? This is why we might change the way we speak when talking with a child or someone that is learning our language. We want to make sure that we get our point across, or else why say anything in the first place? You could want to lie, but that still requires you knowing what they know for your lie to be effective.

You kind of missed the point. Language is subjective because of how humans originally named all the phenomena we currently use to communicate. This is why any respective language is optional, no "objective language" insofar as one language has precedence over all others. Which language you choose, is preferential, opinionated. Perhaps some languages are more effective at communication than others though.

The objects referred to by and through language, are again, 'outside' of the means of communication. We can talk, discuss, debate, argue the chocolate ice cream, but that's not the same as you and I in an ice cream shop, with ice cream, tasting the physical/actual/objective differences between them.

No they aren't. Words are composed of scribbles or sounds. You see and hear them just like you can see and hear a train coming down the tracks. You learn a language by observing how it is used and then testing it out yourself and making adjustments based on your visual and auditory feedback. If languages were not objective then there would be no way we could translate one language to another, but we can, and do. Sure, there will be trends in certain groups to use an existing language differently, but we can still translate what they mean to other words, or else what are they actually saying? We all share the same world, so if we expect to communicate with each other about our experiences of this shared world, then we need to agree on the scribbles and sounds being used to do just that. If we are both using language subjectively then we are essentially talking past each other.

Just because language was used one way "originally", doesn't mean that we can't, or haven't, changed its use to reflect our current understanding of the world. We don't even need to change the language or come up with new words to reflect our new knowledge that our beliefs are about the world, not actually the world. Instead of saying "All Republicans are evil", we say, "I believe all Republicans are evil", and "All Republicans are evil" can be taken as shorthand for "I believe all Republicans are evil". In these cases we are talking about our beliefs, not the things we have beliefs about, which could be mistaken and proven wrong with other observations. Knowledge and beliefs are established by past observations and can change with new observations.

Wizard22 wrote: ↑Thu Aug 31, 2023 8:52 am

Trajk Logik wrote: ↑Wed Aug 30, 2023 1:50 pmIt is only subjective if you don't take into account the person's life experiences. People aren't born democrats or republicans. People aren't born racists. There is a history of causal relationships that lead to their current understanding and positions, no different than the causal relationships that led to the evolution of humans, the formation of a hurricane, or how your vehicle overheated and is now not drivable. Given some individuals history and life experiences and their development as a child, it would be expected that they think and believe the things that they do now. In thinking that their views map onto some "objective" aspect of the world is the category mistake I was talking about. Labeling someone's belief that Democrats are saints and Republicans are evil as "subjective" is a category mistake. Both you of you are mistaking the use of language what is really being said. If one merely moves where the language-use is pointing to - at the person's beliefs, and not something outside of that (like the nature of Democrats and Republicans), then you dissolve the S-O distinction because a person's beliefs is as much a part of the world as the Sun and ice cream.

If you see human minds, consciousness, or whatever you want to call it as separate, or distinct, from nature then I can see why you believe in a S-O distinction. But for someone like me who sees it all as part of the same world there is no S-O distinction. Only a misuse of language.

Objects are not "distinct from nature".

They are distinct from my or your understanding with and experience of nature.

I never said that objects are distinct from nature. I hope I have made the point that nothing is distinct from nature, including our beliefs and experiences.

Any object that is distinct from our understanding and experience is to just say that there are things in the world that our limited observations can access. We cannot even talk about such things as we can only talk about what we have experienced, not what we haven't. There are parts of the universe that do not interact with other parts, but that doesn't mean that because I can image that they do that there is any actual potential that they will. My only point here is we can only ever talk about our experiences and our experiences are relationships with other objects. Just because some object hasn't been experienced doesn't mean it is different than objects that have. We're just talking about different relationships. There is nothing special about experiences either as they are just a type of relationship, and everything is a relationship. So the S-O distinction is meaningless because there is nothing special about unexperienced and experienced objects (relationships) - just different types of relationships.

Wizard22 wrote: ↑Thu Aug 31, 2023 8:52 am

Trajk Logik wrote: ↑Wed Aug 30, 2023 1:50 pmMy own mind/consciousness. It is part of reality, not distinct from it. It is the one thing I have direct access to. From there I assume that my consciousness is about the world. It does seem quite natural to do that though.

One of the 'realest' experiences I've had in life, was during a nightmare in which a strange being was in my bedroom, and the terror I felt was "most real". So I think that humanity in general, base reality on their emotions and direct physical impressions, extreme pain or pleasure for example, traumatic losses, depression, sadness, the pivotal events of life which most deeply ingrain upon the Psyche.

However, logically, I think it's very important to consider that reality is not based on you or I subjectively, but 'reality' has premise in Objectivity instead. This would be "purely rational", or as Kant described it, "Pure Reason".

I don't believe reality is based on our subjectivity. I believe that reality is based on relationships of which our minds, or experiences are just one type of relationship. I also use the terms "process" or "information". Information includes the notion of aboutness. Our experiences are instinctively understood to be about the world. Effects are about their causes. Information is every where causes leave effects. Our experiences and beliefs are both effects of prior causes and causes of the effects they leave in the world.

Trajk Logik wrote: ↑Thu Aug 31, 2023 5:41 pm Depending on how your read it, there might not be a contradiction. I could have said, "There are no contradictions in reality, except in the misuse of language".

Exceptions, contradictions. Potato/potatoh.

You could have also said "There are contradictions in reality and I think a contradiction means so, so and so."

Trajk Logik wrote: ↑Thu Aug 31, 2023 5:41 pm Your first sentence to me is a personal attack.

No it isn't. Pointing out that you are wrong is not an attack on you.

Take your intellectual insecurities elsewhere - I don't give a fuck.

Skepdick wrote: ↑Thu Aug 31, 2023 1:04 pmAnd which one is lying? The subjective-you or the objective-you?

Neither.






From the point-of-view of the Subject, this image appears as a left hand. But objectively, a perspective from 'behind' the image, it would appear as a right hand. Is the image Left or Right? Subjectively, it is one. Objectively, it is both at the same time and moment.

Lacewing wrote: ↑Thu Aug 31, 2023 3:22 pmI don't have to counter-argue the point in your precise manner with a specific documented mass incident. Our patriarchal cultures are my example. I recognized it from my earliest memories and experiences -- it is not something I learned from feminism. You are a very stupid person, and I won't waste any more energy talking with you.

How rude, Lacewing... I see you lack fatherly discipline in your upbringing, how disappointing.

Next you'll blame your lack of manners and uncoothness on men too??

Wizard22 wrote: ↑Fri Sep 01, 2023 8:21 am

Skepdick wrote: ↑Thu Aug 31, 2023 1:04 pmAnd which one is lying? The subjective-you or the objective-you?

Neither.






From the point-of-view of the Subject, this image appears as a left hand. But objectively, a perspective from 'behind' the image, it would appear as a right hand. Is the image Left or Right? Subjectively, it is one. Objectively, it is both at the same time and moment.

There is no perspective from "beind" the image. Because the image is not 3 dimensional.

You are playing mind-games with yourself.

ALL observers see only this perspective. Theperspective where there is a thumb on the right, not on the left.