Her eyes behold afar off

Kylie said:

And yet the quote fails to provide an results, Kant or otherwise, when put into a Google search...

Click to expand...

In my final for Philosophy class I was invited to play the philosopher. I tried to make David Hume and Immanuel Kant type stuff easy. My professor was not impressed and I ended up with a B in the class. I can't remember working so hard for such a grade!

Kylie said:

That may be, but I still have no idea what point you were trying to make back in post 22.

Click to expand...

“Knowledge” Concerning what man can safely say he knows
1. A Priori (what comes earlier) - Knowledge gained prior to or independently of experience. Reasoned.
2. A Posteriori (what comes later) - Knowledge gained from or by sensory experience (Hume). Empiricism
3. Inductive Reasoning- Moving from specific instances or examples to general conclusions (Method of science- theories or laws).
4. Deductive Reasoning- Moving from general statements (universal) to a specific conclusion.
5. Intuition- All at once flash.
6. Philosophy seeks knowledge about the questions of life.
7. Forms: Intelligible world consists of all the forms (non-material essence- entity that is unchanging, eternal, grasped only by the mind) whereas the sensible world consists of all the particular, sensible things. Visible world- as our eyes sees it exists in space and time and is imperfect. Intelligible world is unchanging, outside of space and time, and perfect.
8. Imaging: The mind confronts an image from the visible world and makes a judgement as to what it is.
9. Belief: When we believe, we consider a particular instance of a Form to be fully real.
10. Thinking: To progress from belief to thinking is to move from the visible world to the intelligible world, from the realm of opinion to the realm of knowledge. Plato explains that thinking is a mode of thought that proceeds from assumptions, therefore thinking is not the highest mode of thought because it does not fully understand why its truths are true.
11. Intelligence: The highest ability of the mind to grasp the forms directly, without having to rely on objects. Intelligence, unlike thinking, does not use assumptions. When we grasp a pure form, we understand its relation to all other forms, and thus to all reality. Intelligence gives us a view of the unity of all reality and completely satisfies the mind.
12. Plato's Cave: To become educated means to pass from opinion to knowledge. To advance from opinion to knowledge means to pass from what seems real to what is actually real. The allegory makes clear that the role of an educator is not to put knowledge in someone's mind, but to turn the persons soul to reality. Just as the eye has the ability to see, the soul has the power to attain knowledge. To progress out of the cave unto the great outdoors represents the gaining of knowledge.
13. David Hume- Empiricist: Bases all knowledge on experience. The contents of the mind are restricted to perceptions or sensory experiences called impressions and ideas. Impressions are “all our more lovely perceptions- when we hear, see, feel, love, hate, desire, or will.” Ideas (thoughts) are less lively because they are copies of impressions that arise in our mind as the result of the original impression. Our power of understanding has two objects, relations of ideas and matters of fact. An example of gaining knowledge from relations of ideas is mathematics. Priori (independent of experience or what comes earlier) and Posteriori (experience or what comes later). Since we have no impression of Causality (arising from a cause), we have no genuine idea of it (we cannot know that one idea causes another). Certainty about matters of fact is limited to what we experience. Interference's on matters of fact is skepticism (skeptesthai look at).
10. Immanuel Kant- Synthesis/Critical Idealism: Impressed by Hume’s writings. Our mind organizes experiences in different ways. The mind and the senses both make important contributions to knowledge. Kants reflection on Physics led him to develop a new theory of knowledge that combines rationalism and empiricism into a new synthesis called critical philosophy. Kant agrees with Hume that out knowledge begins with experience, but disagrees to the experience sensual limitations “Though our knowledge begins with experience, it does not follow that it rises out of experience.” Our knowledge of causality is a priori (independent of all experience “pure” knowledge) which is contrasted with a posteriori (knowledge that depends upon experience “empirical” knowledge). What distinguishes a priori knowledge from a posteriori is its necessity and universality. Knowledge achieved by science is priori not posteriori. What make scientific knowledge possible is not my experience of specific objects, but the way my mind structures them. Just as a person with sunglasses on seed things differently, so the human being sees things according to that structure. Kant distinguishes the mind in two dimensions, sensibility and understanding. Sensibility is the minds method to receive representation of things (intuition- insight), Understanding is how the mind actively thinks about those objects. Theories about the forms of intuition and the categories of the understanding lead him to distinguish phenomena (appearances as filtered through our senses and understanding) from noumena (things themselves as they exist independently from the mind which we can never know). Priori judgements can be synthetic. A judgement affirms a relationship between a subject and a predicate (The sky[subject] is blue[predicate]). An analytical judgement affirms something of a subject that is not already contained in the concept of it (Textbooks [subject] are expensive [no concept of textbook]). All analytical judgements are priori, synthetic judgements can be both (according to out experience).

Conclusion - Our mind takes when the senses report and attempts to make a structured reality of it. Man, though, must remember, that his mental structured reality is not true form, but a posteriori, Latin for "from the latter", is a term from logic, which usually refers to reasoning that works backward from an effect to its causes. This kind of reasoning can sometimes lead to false conclusions.

A vision is now needed of problems resolved. The Elements of Philosophy (page 68) textbook, in reference to Immanuel Kant, states that “What makes a scientific knowledge possible is not my experience of specific objects, but the way my mind structures my experience of objects.” This is therefore the structuring in your mind and is a very important step in troubleshooting. Take time to visualize, use your total senses in building a complete scenario of your resolved problem. Sensory input:

A. Visual - Detects sight - Imagination of the scenario
B. Audio - Detects sound - Audio of the improved communications
C. Olfactory- Detects smell -The smell of the scenario resolved.
D. Gustatory - Detects taste - The good taste employed in the scenario resolved.
E. Kinesthetic - Detects touch - The right touch in what you are about to do.
F. Spiritual - The satisfaction of the outcome

See a good vision and use your imagination. This is Plato’s first step to learning. Though it is inferior to knowledge and embodies a different form than the actual goal you are trying to attain, it is sometimes a more perfect object, as we tend to make objects better through our imagination. This builds important spiritual entities like hope and anticipation. Like the Christmases of yore, the anticipation of the event was just as important as the event itself. Also check other important things such as your vocabulary. Seeking knowledge before seeing a vision keeps your troubleshooting on the right trail. Like a guided missile, which is on the right track from the instant it leaves its silo, so we need to renew our vision to keep our lives on track to what Dante called “our star” Inferno Canto XV. Other sensory input is important too. Good taste and the right touch give your vision the “icing on the cake.”

Socrates taught that since virtue was not knowledge it could not be taught and was somehow a divine gift. I would contend that every man has a degree of virtue (which I consider spiritual light) given to him by God and that man has also a degree of obscurity or darkness within his spirit. This obscurity (or dark holes within mans spirit) causes him to err in his ability to put life in its appropriate perspective. Therefore I believe that mankind must show vigilance in finding perspective and troubleshooting problems that arise in life. I would also caution against bad habits of the soul. These are things such as drugs, alcohol, and inappropriate contentography that causes the void in mans heart to grow even deeper. I believe that once bad habits are devised they create even greater voids within the heart that causes it to develop even worse habits. There should be no need of bad habits if a human being is engaged in correct lifestyle.

The light of the body is the eye: if therefore thine eye be single, thy whole body shall be full of light. - Matthew 6:21

The eye takes images, adjusts the magnitude via the Iris, allows light through the pupil, focuses the images via the lens, rods and cones detect light in the retina that trigger nerve impulses that pass via the optic nerve to the brain, where a visual image is formed.

The eye in scripture here is the imagination. If the imagination is correct the whole body, soul, and mind are full of light (happiness and satisfaction).

Warden_of_the_Storm said:

All this is showing is that you really do not understand evolution and really have no desire to understand it.

Click to expand...

It is important, for the sake of spirituality, that we divide the man into three parts… Physical, Spiritual, and Intellectual. If E = mc2 then we can divide and conclude that...

Mass (m) = Energy (E/c2) And there are three varieties...

Natural E/c2 - All mass is basically cooled plasma, the sun is the visible form of E/c2
Mental E/c2 - Our thinking can produce creativeness, light, and good things
Spiritual E/c2 - E (motivation, warmth, love) / c2 (faith, hope, charity, joy)

The Natural E/c2 in the form of mass produces a gravity that attracts other objects
The Intellectual E/c2 produces a gravity that draws us to study
The Spiritual E/c2 also has a gravity that draws and makes religion attractive

The scripture below refers to the makeup of angelic beings. These creatures are made of pure energy and light which illuminates the whole. They have no need of human pleasures or teachings as the correct light and energy are in their makeup.

His countenance was like lightning, and his raiment white as snow - Matthew 28:3

If you listen to the minister below you will find energy and light proceeding from the voice of his...

Warden_of_the_Storm said:

Honestly, all you're doing is proving me correct.
I feel compelled to ask: have you made any serious attempts to understand the theory of evolution or evolution in general?

Click to expand...

If E = mc2 then we can divide and conclude that...

Mass (m) = Energy (E/c2) All mass is basically cooled plasma, the sun is the visible form of E/c2

This makes mass and E/c2 eternal stuff. Mass can change to plasma (E/c2) and plasma back to mass. To believe that the big bang (where the mass turned to plasma) cooled to form planet earth and separate into the many metals, organic chemistry, and biology is something far fetched. Especially as with the instrument of the eye who must take in visual representations and makes sense and imagination of it. And the entire eye will turn back to the earth from which she sprang with nothing to show for her but dust.

rockytopva said:

If E = mc2 then we can divide and conclude that...

Mass (m) = Energy (E/c2) All mass is basically cooled plasma, the sun is the visible form of E/c2

This makes mass and E/c2 eternal stuff. Mass can change to plasma (E/c2) and plasma back to mass. To believe that the big bang (where the mass turned to plasma) cooled to form planet earth and separate into the many metals, organic chemistry, and biology is not something far fetched. Especially as with the instrument of the eye who must take in visual representations and makes sense and imagination of it. And the entire eye will turn back to the earth from which she sprang with nothing to show for her but dust.

Click to expand...

Not to mention H20, which is hydrogen and water and will explode separately.

Warden_of_the_Storm said:

Okay, I'm going to repeat myself, since you made zero attempt to answer my question.
Have you made any serious attempts to understand the theory of evolution or evolution in general?
And it's a pretty simple yes/no question.

Click to expand...

In my younger days I was an atheist. The story of what turned me around is told in the link below. I can tell you it was an energy and a light that penetrated the inward man....

George Clark Rankin - Rockytopva Testimony

Warden_of_the_Storm said:

Once again, I'm going to repeat myself, since you made zero attempt to answer my question.
Have you made any serious attempts to understand the theory of evolution or evolution in general?
And it's a pretty simple yes/no question.

And please, actually ANSWER the question.

Click to expand...

If you want to bet your eternal soul on such nonsense be my guest! I once was an atheist believing it all evolved but had a change of heart.

George Clark Rankin - Rockytopva Testimony

Warden_of_the_Storm said:

I'll take this serious attempt at deflection as a no, you haven't made any serious attempts to understand the theory of evolution or evolution in general.

Click to expand...

Which is the visual representation your mind has made of the situation... In which... Is a filtered view of reality!

Warden_of_the_Storm said:

Or is just a reflection of what we see from God's creation and the science that has studied that creation.

Click to expand...

I like the way that was worded and will agree.