uncaused causes

[Eudaimonist]

Mark, saying "Life experience" means assuming the very senses ("experience" here being reducible to senses) we're putting into question.

No, it means having the very senses that you are putting into question, and having them impact every day of their lives.

There is a context to the very issue of "validity", and that is reason and the senses as used in one's life experience. There is no place that we can stand prior to these in order to doubt them, because the very issue of validity and verification arises with these.

For example, the declaration that one must "prove reason" implicitly accepts that reason has some kind of epistemological authority. We may look back and wonder what makes reason so effective, but if doubt is involved, reason has already implicitly been accepted.

Even very young children, possibly even babies, are aware that there is world external to their bodies and minds, and that they are able to think about that world. It takes epistemologically skeptical or overly rationalistic philosophy to put doubt into them -- reason turned to the service of doubting reason.

This is what I mean by such doubters trying to achieve a non-human perspective. They think that they can stand like a god prior to that which allows them to doubt at all. They rip themselves out of their human context, out of their organic existence, to stand in a vacuum. It's a fake vantagepoint, and totally needless.


eudaimonia,

Mark

 

[Received]

No, it means having the very senses that you are putting into question, and having them impact every day of their lives.

There is a context to the very issue of "validity", and that is reason and the senses as used in one's life experience. There is no place that we can stand prior to these in order to doubt them, because the very issue of validity and verification arises with these.

What I'm saying: just because you have them doesn't mean they're trustworthy or "truth-revealing". Something isn't automatically trustworthy simply because we have no other choice.

I mean, that's exactly the basis of modern philosophy going back to Descartes, and that even contemporary philosophers who aren't content with pragmatism (which I am, and saying "we don't have any other choice, so let's assume this works" is as well) are still struggling with. Imagine if Descartes had said, "we don't really have any other option other than our sense experience, therefore we should assume it's true." No "cogito," man!

 

[Received]

It makes it true as far as we "can/have been able to" determine. It's not as big a problem as some would like to think it is, not in any real, every-day sense anyway. this reminds me of the alleged problem of whether things are something other than what we perceive them to be. For instance, that there is a "cup itself" beyond the "cup" we perceive. I honestly see it as a meaningless problem and/or question.

sandwiches, it's sometimes hard have these niggling metaphysical debates with someone as apparently practical like yourself, because I'm completely with you in spirit with regard to what you wrote.

But still.

Not being a problem in any "real, every-day sense," sounds very much like practicality speaking, and I'm there with you. But in fact, this fundamental difficulty with experience isn't a "real, every-day" problem simply because all of us have assumed otherwise on a moment-to-moment basis. But no matter how much we assume and on whatever scale, this doesn't make our assumptions true. It does make them practical, i.e., a practical assumption. But it's still an assumption.

Have you ever read about pragmatism? E.g., William James' "Pragmatism"? It would be right up your alley.

 

[Received]

Let me be clear that this questioning of our day-to-day experience is actually my fault with rationalism and empiricism as hermetic philosophies, i.e., ones that don't need a starting point beyond themselves.

We need, and arguably we all commit, a type of intuitivism that exists prior to our philosophical schools (e.g., rationalism, empiricism, etc.). That is, we make the leap about very basic things (in this case the external worlds, but also a few others) in order to allow our philosophical schools to get off the ground.

 

[sandwiches]

sandwiches, it's sometimes hard have these niggling metaphysical debates with someone as apparently practical like yourself, because I'm completely with you in spirit with regard to what you wrote.

But still.

Not being a problem in any "real, every-day sense," sounds very much like practicality speaking, and I'm there with you. But in fact, this fundamental difficulty with experience isn't a "real, every-day" problem simply because all of us have assumed otherwise on a moment-to-moment basis. But no matter how much we assume and on whatever scale, this doesn't make our assumptions true. It does make them practical, i.e., a practical assumption. But it's still an assumption.

Have you ever read about pragmatism? E.g., William James' "Pragmatism"? It would be right up your alley.

Let me rephrase this then to clarify myself. Our senses and reason provides us with as much truth as there can be for every and all intents. To say that we don't know if there is truth or a reality beyond what is perceivable or comprehensible is meaningless. It reminds me of the question "What was there before time?" Again for all intents and purposes in any sense, that which cannot be perceived or thought of, even if only abstractly and incompletely, is indistinguishable from that which isn't real. There is no difference, whatsoever, between the two; they are one and the same.

Now to be perfectly clear let me say that I am in no way referring to that which is CURRENTLY unperceived or incomprehensible.

 

[Received]

I think that in order for that argument to hold, you have to equate sensing with reasoning. In other words, to reason is a type of sensation, and to sense is a type of reasoning.

Which I don't think many people would agree with. For starters, sensation refers to the interaction of brain stuff "in here" with phenomena "out there." Reasoning refers to an interaction with "in here" stuff with itself.

 

[sandwiches]

I think that in order for that argument to hold, you have to equate sensing with reasoning. In other words, to reason is a type of sensation, and to sense is a type of reasoning.

You don't have to do such thing. You have to sense reality using your senses and use your reasoning to understand it. So, that which is unimaginable and imperceptible is the exact same as that which doesn't exist. If someone claims there are differences between the two, then they must have imagined some properties of it or they must have perceived said differences. In which case, it would fall squarely back into reality (that which can be perceived or reasoned.)

 

[sandwiches]

This also is very reminiscent of the "supernatural" debate. Many claim it exists or that we can't say it doesn't exist but no one can ever define or describe it. And when it is described, it falls back down to the simply natural.

 

[Received]

You don't have to do such thing. You have to sense reality using your senses and use your reasoning to understand it. So, that which is unimaginable and imperceptible is the exact same as that which doesn't exist. If someone claims there are differences between the two, then they must have imagined some properties of it or they must have perceived said differences. In which case, it would fall squarely back into reality (that which can be perceived or reasoned.)

My point was with senses and reason. Simply saying that our senses and reason provide us with truth begs the question by assuming the very truth we're trying to uncover in relation to the senses and reason. You also seem to be saying that because there's no such thing as a reality beyond our senses or comprehension, that we're left to trust our senses, as if because we have no other choice, we must assume that what we're stuck with is truthful. I don't buy that. I'm also skeptical of the claim that there isn't a reality beyond our senses, and especially beyond our comprehension. It may be something we can't really speak about (given that this reality is quality-less because it transcends our perception of it, and this perception is where qualities come into play), but it's a leap to say that there's nothing beyond our subjectivity.

Anyways, I think I can see how this might be swerving into something like the supernatural debate. I'd like to hear your thoughts in more detail on this matter, though.