Difference between knowing and experiencing?

[NotreDame]

By "world"-in-itself I meant the collection of things-in-themselves -- and arguably they wouldn't be particulars; particularity might be a quality of consciousness; there's no telling what this higher reality could be. It can't be proven; it can't be spoken of literally (to speak is to project subjectivity). I don't think I disagree with you at all. I'm just rambling.

I concur it can't be proven, at least not yet, but it is a most interesting point Funyun presents.

I think it is possible to grasp a phenomenon in such a way that you in fact are grasping the thing-in-itself, but that you can never concurrently be aware that you have traversed that wall between the two (unless you are dealing with logic or maths). As you might predict: that which is as it exists apart from our perception of it.

There may not be any evidence of this alternate way it may exist apart from our perception of it but his point remains, we cannot know this, can we?

 

[Received]

Nope. It's analogous to being religious. Intuition is what fires up and dictates us to say "no, silly, no" to the subjectivist who denies the existence of anything that our experiences are rung on. I'd even call the world-in-itself "that which our experiences are rung on". But intuition also fires for the coolheaded, nonsentimental religious folk when trying to convince his atheist friends of something that he feels is closer to him than his skin. We can't prove either the "real" external world, or God.

 

[funyun]

That was seriously one of the best things I've heard in a while.

Cheers

 

[NotreDame]

Nope. It's analogous to being religious. Intuition is what fires up and dictates us to say "no, silly, no" to the subjectivist who denies the existence of anything that our experiences are rung on. I'd even call the world-in-itself "that which our experiences are rung on". But intuition also fires for the coolheaded, nonsentimental religious folk when trying to convince his atheist friends of something that he feels is closer to him than his skin. We can't prove either the "real" external world, or God.

Was this in response to my post? If so, then why begin with the word "nope" when what you said above is consistent, not contrary, to what I said?

 

[NotreDame]

Funyun, what about the following point?

Given the long history of how successfully we have been, and finding no evidence to the contrary, can't we with a high degree of certainty, not certainty itself, know what we perceive is as it exists apart from our perception of it? Maybe this is stronger in regards to those perceptions which have been constant for X number of millennia?

As a reply to your reasoning of:

But, I personally believe we can justifiably and logically proceed under the presumption the world is real, utilizing abduction.

My point being maybe it is more than a presumption the world is real but rather a very likely true presumption based on those unchanging phenomenon our senses detect and finding no evidence to the contrary?

 

[Received]

You have to be careful with your use of "world". It can signify both our perceptions synthesized with the "out there" that allows for them, or the "out there" -- objectivity -- entirely. If in the first sense, the world would be real (or not) in a semiotic sense. A white blur passes before the eyes of a hunter, he thinks it's a rabbit, calls it "rabbit", when it's a human being. Semiotic misrelation -- false reality (and dead hunter). In the latter sense, the world can be false -- well, I guess if it doesn't fit our intuitive feeling for how we think the world is, probably in relation to qualities such as permanence, but most definitely the beyond-only-the-brain one.

Oh, and the "nope" was a response to your question "There may not be any evidence of this alternate way it may exist apart from our perception of it but his point remains, we cannot know this, can we?"

 

[funyun]

Funyun, what about the following point?

Given the long history of how successfully we have been, and finding no evidence to the contrary, can't we with a high degree of certainty, not certainty itself, know what we perceive is as it exists apart from our perception of it? Maybe this is stronger in regards to those perceptions which have been constant for X number of millennia?

Sorry for not responding to your posts yesterday, NotreDame, I was busy; first week back in school.

Firstly, I'd say, and this is just part of my nomenclature, that there is no such thing as "high degree of certainty." Certainty is all or nothing. You are either certain or not, and simply claiming certainty does not mean you are in fact certain. If you are certain of something, your perception is identical to the actuality, and you are concurrently aware of this. I use the word in a very, very strict sense. I'm not trying to hijack the vocabulary of this thread, I'm just expounding my own usage, so that when I use the word you will know what I mean. I use "proof" similarly; if you have "proven" something you can then treat it with certain knowledge. Thus the great maxim: "Proof is for maths and alcohol." So I would instead say "high degree of success" or "accuracy."

And I would disagree we have a long history, or millennia, of unchanged knowledge about anything. I think increasing rigor has unseated just about every perception of the physical world one can think of that has been held over the years. Now, notice I said physical world, as in the collection of things for which falsifiable a posteriori propositions apply. The Pythagorean Theorem will never be unseated as an accurate description of Euclidean space, because it is mathematics, which I have, in my past posts, made special exception for regarding certainty as it is a priori knowledge. We can be certain of mathematics, just as we can be certain of the validity, if not the soundness, of logical conclusions. Soundness for those conclusions I suppose almost always relies on experience, and so a posteriori knowledge.

My point being maybe it is more than a presumption the world is real but rather a very likely true presumption based on those unchanging phenomenon our senses detect and finding no evidence to the contrary?

I'd say the burden lies on the positive claim, not the opposite (neutral, not negative-- that, my friend is the root of skepticism) claim. But I think since the whole point is being skeptical of our senses, and by extension, our experience as a whole (which I believe is totally reasonable skepticism), we must defer in this fundamental case to pure logic. As I've said before I believe abduction dictates it a perfectly logical conclusion that the world is in fact real, though we cannot prove it, or be certain of it. Thus, we can proceed with the very likely and logical presumption that there is a real external world. And so we can induce from that that yes, our senses can give us an accurate picture of reality-- at least as far as abductively valid conclusions, at most as far as actual knowledge, but never, ever as far as certainty, or awareness of actual knowledge.

 

[funyun]

Nope. It's analogous to being religious. Intuition is what fires up and dictates us to say "no, silly, no" to the subjectivist who denies the existence of anything that our experiences are rung on. I'd even call the world-in-itself "that which our experiences are rung on". But intuition also fires for the coolheaded, nonsentimental religious folk when trying to convince his atheist friends of something that he feels is closer to him than his skin. We can't prove either the "real" external world, or God.

I'm no theist, so I'm sure much of the depth of this is lost on me, but maybe you'll find this interesting as it applies to the above, Received:

"What Schleiermacher calls 'Religion' and the Hegelians call 'Faith' is at the bottom nothing but the first immediate condition for everything-- the vital fluidum-- the spiritual atmosphere we breathe in-- and which cannot therefore with justice be designated by those words."
--Soren Kierkegaard, Journals, 1836

Oh and the world-in-itself as "that which our experiences are rung on" is about as good a description of it as can be made, I think.

 

[Received]

What Soren said. As you probably know, the Hegelian end for man's ontology was submersion in the universal, the ethical. Spirit for Hegel was God as the universe teleologically reaching for the end of history. Consequently things were to be resigned for that end. Which can allow for all sorts of nasty things, and is why Hegel thought Napoleon was history in the flesh. Spirit for Kierkegaard -- and the Christian existentialists (also Sartreans) who followed him -- was limited to the individual. The two views are as antithetical as they can be.

 

[NotreDame]

Sorry for not responding to your posts yesterday, NotreDame, I was busy; first week back in school.

Firstly, I'd say, and this is just part of my nomenclature, that there is no such thing as "high degree of certainty." Certainty is all or nothing. You are either certain or not, and simply claiming certainty does not mean you are in fact certain. If you are certain of something, your perception is identical to the actuality, and you are concurrently aware of this. I use the word in a very, very strict sense. I'm not trying to hijack the vocabulary of this thread, I'm just expounding my own usage, so that when I use the word you will know what I mean. I use "proof" similarly; if you have "proven" something you can then treat it with certain knowledge. Thus the great maxim: "Proof is for maths and alcohol." So I would instead say "high degree of success" or "accuracy."

And I would disagree we have a long history, or millennia, of unchanged knowledge about anything. I think increasing rigor has unseated just about every perception of the physical world one can think of that has been held over the years. Now, notice I said physical world, as in the collection of things for which falsifiable a posteriori propositions apply. The Pythagorean Theorem will never be unseated as an accurate description of Euclidean space, because it is mathematics, which I have, in my past posts, made special exception for regarding certainty as it is a priori knowledge. We can be certain of mathematics, just as we can be certain of the validity, if not the soundness, of logical conclusions. Soundness for those conclusions I suppose almost always relies on experience, and so a posteriori knowledge.



I'd say the burden lies on the positive claim, not the opposite (neutral, not negative-- that, my friend is the root of skepticism) claim. But I think since the whole point is being skeptical of our senses, and by extension, our experience as a whole (which I believe is totally reasonable skepticism), we must defer in this fundamental case to pure logic. As I've said before I believe abduction dictates it a perfectly logical conclusion that the world is in fact real, though we cannot prove it, or be certain of it. Thus, we can proceed with the very likely and logical presumption that there is a real external world. And so we can induce from that that yes, our senses can give us an accurate picture of reality-- at least as far as abductively valid conclusions, at most as far as actual knowledge, but never, ever as far as certainty, or awareness of actual knowledge.

Yeah I remember the chaos of my undergraduate and law school days. Thanks for taking the time to read my post and reply. (no sarcasm, have to say it because it is easy to take things the wrong way on the net).

Firstly, I'd say, and this is just part of my nomenclature, that there is no such thing as "high degree of certainty." Certainty is all or nothing.

Yeah, it is a habit formed out of exposure and practice to the legal field. I have always been cognizant of the contradictory nature of the phrase but like the way it sounds. I hesitated using it but chose to, for no other reason, than enjoying the way it sounds. We can just substitute, "High degree of probability, or most likely true/correct," for the phrase.

And I would disagree we have a long history, or millennia, of unchanged knowledge about anything.

What about fire producing heat? This knowledge most certainly enjoys a long history, several millennia in fact. What about the knowledge the sun produces heat, which enjoys a few millennia in the analogs of human history? Isn't true there really is some knowledge which is unchanged?

Unfortunately, I do not have time to respond to your thoughts in the last paragraph but will do so later tonight.

Cheers.

 

[NotreDame]

I'd say the burden lies on the positive claim, not the opposite (neutral, not negative-- that, my friend is the root of skepticism) claim. But I think since the whole point is being skeptical of our senses, and by extension, our experience as a whole (which I believe is totally reasonable skepticism), we must defer in this fundamental case to pure logic. As I've said before I believe abduction dictates it a perfectly logical conclusion that the world is in fact real, though we cannot prove it, or be certain of it.

To be sure, the burden of proof generally lies on the positive claim, or the person making it, and I do not attempt to fallaciously shift the burden. When I say, "My point being maybe it is more than a presumption the world is real but rather a very likely true presumption based on those unchanging phenomenon our senses detect and finding no evidence to the contrary?" I am not advocating burden shifting, but rather stating lacking any evidence we are in a giant's dream, or what we see is fake, is what I am stating with the phrase "evidence to the contrary."

Thus, we can proceed with the very likely and logical presumption that there is a real external world. And so we can induce from that that yes, our senses can give us an accurate picture of reality-- at least as far as abductively valid conclusions, at most as far as actual knowledge, but never, ever as far as certainty, or awareness of actual knowledge.

Yeah I concur. But, as I stated previously, I think what makes this such a compelling argument is some of our knowledge has remained constant for so long. This is of course not the only reason, perhaps not even the most compelling, but one factor.

 

[funyun]

Yeah, it is a habit formed out of exposure and practice to the legal field. I have always been cognizant of the contradictory nature of the phrase but like the way it sounds. I hesitated using it but chose to, for no other reason, than enjoying the way it sounds. We can just substitute, "High degree of probability, or most likely true/correct," for the phrase.

Like I said, I'm not trying to dictate the vocab, I'm just letting you know. As long as I know what you mean and you know what I mean, there's no problem.

What about fire producing heat? This knowledge most certainly enjoys a long history, several millennia in fact. What about the knowledge the sun produces heat, which enjoys a few millennia in the analogs of human history? Isn't true there really is some knowledge which is unchanged?

But what is heat? What is fire? In what manner does fire "produce" heat? These were philosophical, even religious, questions until modern science came along, with myriad guesses, opinions, and dogmas. I mean look at the sun, which you brought up. People might have opined that the sun produced heat, but they simultaneously looked on it as a deity. They might have consequently opined that if the sun produces heat, the moon produces cold. Or, that light and heat have no relation, since the moon clearly produces light just like the sun, but the night isn't warm like the day. There was no rigor, just inference from very vague, very unempirical evidence, and definitely no real understanding of the dynamics at work. So they might have had some knowledge, but no context, no systematic, connected view of the world in which to arrange these little snippets of what I would consider mostly coincidental knowledge.

 

[NotreDame]

Like I said, I'm not trying to dictate the vocab, I'm just letting you know. As long as I know what you mean and you know what I mean, there's no problem.



But what is heat? What is fire? In what manner does fire "produce" heat? These were philosophical, even religious, questions until modern science came along, with myriad guesses, opinions, and dogmas. I mean look at the sun, which you brought up. People might have opined that the sun produced heat, but they simultaneously looked on it as a deity. They might have consequently opined that if the sun produces heat, the moon produces cold. Or, that light and heat have no relation, since the moon clearly produces light just like the sun, but the night isn't warm like the day. There was no rigor, just inference from very vague, very unempirical evidence, and definitely no real understanding of the dynamics at work. So they might have had some knowledge, but no context, no systematic, connected view of the world in which to arrange these little snippets of what I would consider mostly coincidental knowledge.

Well, you seem to be criticizing them for not having it all together. It is plausible 1000 years from now, this date and time will be scoffed at and ridiculed for not having it all together. However, failing to have any understanding of the dynamics at work, or a unifying theory of the world in which these phenomenon exist, does not diminish their knowledge fire/sun produces heat and light. The fact they did not espouse a more complete theory of heat and light, such as light is waves and particles, invisible entities called atoms, and when the electron gets excited, it produces what your eyes detect as light, does not diminish the knowledge they possessed from their mental recognition of a connection between fire/sun producing heat and light.

Those primitive screwheads probably did not know anything about sperm, egg, dna, fertilization, and so forth. Yet, this does not diminish the knowledge they possessed by observing doing X with cavewoman Y results in the birth of a human being. Yeah, they failed to understand the intricacies of why this is the case, sperm, sperm, eggs, ovulation, falloppian tubes, but this failure does not diminish the knowledge they had, no matter how primitive, that sexual intercourse produces a child.

Now, this is knowledge which allowed them to survive, knowledge they used to facilitate their survival. This is knowledge they conducted and conformed their behaviors around. It was an unchanging knowledge as at no time did they observe fire not produce light or heat. They conformed their behavior around it, being in a better position to survive in a harsher environment, realizing they could make fire and the heat/light from the fire assisting them to better survive the tough environment.

In the book, "Moral Animal," by Wright, an advocate of evolutionary psychology, the idea is primitive man made some rather knowledgeable deductions, although simplistic by today's standards, but nevertheless knowledge, and still with us today.

For example, in general the male's attraction to younger women, young women in general, is the result of primitive man, and afterwards, using this as a standard for determining whether the woman could have a child or not. The idea being primitive man came to the realization, knowledge, some women, older women, did not produce a child after having sex with them, whereas younger women did. Now to be sure, they did not have any knoweldge of how the female body stopped producing eggs at some point, but it just so happens their standard coincided with this phenomenon. This is why men today leave their 40 plus year old wrinkled old wife for a younger, more vibrant sex kitty, because primitive man used this physical appearance, this physical distinction, as a predicate of who they would have sex with.

They of course used this understanding of what they sensed, what they perceived, and the deduction they made from it, to ensure their survival, by of course sleeping with the younger women, thereby producing human beings, and perpetuating the species. In other words, they used this knowledge to ensure the survival of the human race, and it worked, much like it would work today, and our knowledge works for us today.

The point, however, is they had knowledge old women did not reproduce. They may have not known why but they made the mental connection they could not. Now this is knowledge, regardless of the fact they failed to espouse a theory of explanation stating the aged women had no eggs to fertilize.

My point here, once again, is this is knowledge, and it is knowledge which has not changed in thousands of years. I think the constant here is compelling evidence we are not in some dream, what we perceive as reality is not fake or phony, and neither a machination of our minds.

 

[funyun]

Well, you seem to be criticizing them for not having it all together. It is plausible 1000 years from now, this date and time will be scoffed at and ridiculed for not having it all together. However, failing to have any understanding of the dynamics at work, or a unifying theory of the world in which these phenomenon exist, does not diminish their knowledge fire/sun produces heat and light. The fact they did not espouse a more complete theory of heat and light, such as light is waves and particles, invisible entities called atoms, and when the electron gets excited, it produces what your eyes detect as light, does not diminish the knowledge they possessed from their mental recognition of a connection between fire/sun producing heat and light.

Those primitive screwheads probably did not know anything about sperm, egg, dna, fertilization, and so forth. Yet, this does not diminish the knowledge they possessed by observing doing X with cavewoman Y results in the birth of a human being. Yeah, they failed to understand the intricacies of why this is the case, sperm, sperm, eggs, ovulation, falloppian tubes, but this failure does not diminish the knowledge they had, no matter how primitive, that sexual intercourse produces a child.

Now, this is knowledge which allowed them to survive, knowledge they used to facilitate their survival. This is knowledge they conducted and conformed their behaviors around. It was an unchanging knowledge as at no time did they observe fire not produce light or heat. They conformed their behavior around it, being in a better position to survive in a harsher environment, realizing they could make fire and the heat/light from the fire assisting them to better survive the tough environment.

In the book, "Moral Animal," by Wright, an advocate of evolutionary psychology, the idea is primitive man made some rather knowledgeable deductions, although simplistic by today's standards, but nevertheless knowledge, and still with us today.

For example, in general the male's attraction to younger women, young women in general, is the result of primitive man, and afterwards, using this as a standard for determining whether the woman could have a child or not. The idea being primitive man came to the realization, knowledge, some women, older women, did not produce a child after having sex with them, whereas younger women did. Now to be sure, they did not have any knoweldge of how the female body stopped producing eggs at some point, but it just so happens their standard coincided with this phenomenon. This is why men today leave their 40 plus year old wrinkled old wife for a younger, more vibrant sex kitty, because primitive man used this physical appearance, this physical distinction, as a predicate of who they would have sex with.

They of course used this understanding of what they sensed, what they perceived, and the deduction they made from it, to ensure their survival, by of course sleeping with the younger women, thereby producing human beings, and perpetuating the species. In other words, they used this knowledge to ensure the survival of the human race, and it worked, much like it would work today, and our knowledge works for us today.

The point, however, is they had knowledge old women did not reproduce. They may have not known why but they made the mental connection they could not. Now this is knowledge, regardless of the fact they failed to espouse a theory of explanation stating the aged women had no eggs to fertilize.

My point here, once again, is this is knowledge, and it is knowledge which has not changed in thousands of years. I think the constant here is compelling evidence we are not in some dream, what we perceive as reality is not fake or phony, and neither a machination of our minds.

Sorry, I can't give an in-depth answer to your post at the moment. I can only give a few short responses.

1) Knowledge has to be justified in order to count as knowledge. This means some examples like what you are talking about are valid and some are not.

2) I don't find this argument, as a whole, convincing. Real world skepticism, taken to its fullest (and doing otherwise would be to miss the thrust of the thought experiment) asks whether or not we can be sure everything is not part of some constructed reality which we perceive as though it were real. So, how do I know all this wasn't planted in my brain 5 minutes ago by some Cartesian demon? Or that I, like the narrator of The Mysterious Stranger, am not some solitary being, the only entity in existence, which dreamed all this up, including my own forgetfulness, perhaps as a way to not be so lonely?

These questions account for everything-- all humans, all of history, everything, and submit that totality to their skepticism. Under these solipsistic scenarios the ancients who looked at fire and connected it with warmth never existed. The teacher in third grade who told you about them never existed. Your school itself never existed, and the parents who took you there never existed. Humans never existed, Earth never existed. It's all in your mind-- it is quite simply, all a dream. So this "knowledge" that you are talking about, which has been passed down through the centuries, is just a bunch of fictitious tidbits of trivia about an imaginary reality. They designate nothing real, just like everything else as far as the thought experiment is concerned, and are just another part of the illusion.

 

[NotreDame]

Sorry, I can't give an in-depth answer to your post at the moment. I can only give a few short responses.

These questions account for everything-- all humans, all of history, everything, and submit that totality to their skepticism. Under these solipsistic scenarios the ancients who looked at fire and connected it with warmth never existed. The teacher in third grade who told you about them never existed. Your school itself never existed, and the parents who took you there never existed. Humans never existed, Earth never existed. It's all in your mind-- it is quite simply, all a dream. So this "knowledge" that you are talking about, which has been passed down through the centuries, is just a bunch of fictitious tidbits of trivia about an imaginary reality. They designate nothing real, just like everything else as far as the thought experiment is concerned, and are just another part of the illusion.

1) Knowledge has to be justified in order to count as knowledge. This means some examples like what you are talking about are valid and some are not.

Hmmm....I am not sure but before commenting perhaps you can tell me precisely what you have in mind?

These questions account for everything-- all humans, all of history, everything, and submit that totality to their skepticism. Under these solipsistic scenarios the ancients who looked at fire and connected it with warmth never existed. The teacher in third grade who told you about them never existed. Your school itself never existed, and the parents who took you there never existed. Humans never existed, Earth never existed. It's all in your mind-- it is quite simply, all a dream. So this "knowledge" that you are talking about, which has been passed down through the centuries, is just a bunch of fictitious tidbits of trivia about an imaginary reality. They designate nothing real, just like everything else as far as the thought experiment is concerned, and are just another part of the illusion.

Maybe they did not really exist but in a dream, but the point remains, they existed in a dream, did they not? Just as when you dream, your characters exist in your dream, they were present in your dream.

Which also means, then, while just another part of an illusionary dream, they are stil part of the dream, those things such as fire producing heat, light, and so forth. Yeah, they may be illusions to us because us along with them exist only in a dream, i.e. we are not real, we nevertheless exist, along with those things, in a dream, and those things exist in the dream along with us. And if it is a dream, the dream has to have some place to also exist, and in this place, is where we exist, along with fire, heat, light, teachers, and people, despite the fact we are not "real" in the sense we exist independently from some other consciousness, i.e. not the product of a dream or the mind dreaming, etcetera, we still exist, along with everything else, in the dream and the thing dreaming.