The key is that the apple itself and the patterns of light it reflects toward me are not just external facts that I'm inferring or approximating through an internal representation. Rather, they are environmental realities that I am actively making use of, and attuning my visual experience to, through the exercise of my embodied skills. — Pierre-Normand

I think this is, fwiw, one of the clearest, best things I've seen on this. Thanks for that. Really concise and illustrative.

I don't think your two concepts are at odds anyway. The first sentence about those patterns of light being 'external facts' and the latter of about them being 'realities' speaks to me the exact same thing twice over. Suppose i'm wrong, though:
My objection is that all of this could be true, and your perception be indirect. Consider.
You can, for instance, put your hands through those rubber-glove-through-the-wall thing to perform surgery, say. You can even have your patient visually removed, and access it via only a mis-sized image on a screen which is slightly discoloured compared to reality, and has been, in minor ways outside of the portion of the image in which your patient's body sits, altered in terms of shape, contrast, alignment etc...It is almost certainly the case you are wearing gloves 'directly' on your hands, and then through the gloves in the wall. You might also have earphones in. All of the data you need is heavily mediated, on any account really, through other physical matter and changes of medium. I've described a situation where nothing you get is accurate to the reality.
You can still successfully perform this surgery. You do not need direct access to information to use it reliably and effectively, I don't think. This may be why i have no trouble at all with IRism.

I don't think it's either from my reading of that chapter.

It seems that what Parfit is trying to do is simply point out that there are thoughts, without ascribing them to any one thinker. There obvious is a thinker, but this confirmation of thought doesn't also confirm identity for 'the thinker'. I did only read this in the last two days, so I might be way off. It accepts the subjective, while only confirming the objective (that there is a thought - to whom it belongs, or from whom it comes is only a necessary implication).

. If you collapse this distinction, then you lose the indirectness — Luke

You for sure do not. You are speaking purely about linguistic conventions here and not what they pertain to. There is a clear distinction between a shadow and that which causes the shadow, but on your view, your interpretation of the shadow is direct perception of the object that caused it.
Could we at least agree this is plainly wrong? If we do agree, then distinction doesn't matter. This would just be a sorities problem if it did, and we'd have literally no answer.

Phenomenal experience is empirically analogous to a shadow here(well, in the abstract objective consideration of what a Shadow physically is). It is caused (actually, less directly than a shadow) by the activity of light in conjunction with both an apparent object, and your sense organ (eyes). The experience is none of these things. That we, in our minds, do not note the conjunction and process preceding phenomenal experience does not actually involve a distinction obtaining. We have nothing to distinguish. We have only the experience which consists in the phenomenal experience. The 'perception' isn't something we are aware of.
If you take the above re: shadows seriously, you can't make the move you're trying to make about phenomenal experience. It is the same distinction, but you're saying it's not there in the one case.

Supposing you think a Shadow is a direct and reliable way to come to know an object/objects, how could that be? And how do you then apply that phenomenal experience?

I would simply assume your second sentence was a lie ;) It is more likely that this is true, or that I have a mental lapse, or that I am day-dreaming, than is the possibility of God doing those specific things, in response to this thread.

You may enjoy Rob Amster.

However - I would say that if you can’t say something without referring abstractly to other up to date known facticities circa 2024, I applaud your efficiency but laud the lack of a Socratic method ;)

And a forum… just seems the right place for the Socratic method. — Metaphyzik

Unless I am totally misapprehending your meaning... Nice, heh.
Don't be put off. The insistent know-alls are few, in my experience. I'm still in the same boat you are (though, I'm not playing catch-up. Just playing).

I admit that. — Fire Ologist

Ok, Cool.

but because of the words that were communicated — Fire Ologist

I reject that. Someone's incredulity, or lack of knowledge isn't a reason to come to a rash conclusion. Novel situations don't, in the vast majority of cases, Have people invoking concepts they don't understand. Even less so, 'God'. I note you said this wasn't required. But what else is someone going to invoke? If they don't know what God is, in the Testamentary sense, there shouldn't be any way to invoke it.

It was as if the voice knew just what to say, precisely in a way that the person could know something new, maybe even change his life (hopefully for the better). — Fire Ologist

This is putting me in mind of some film I've seen wherein there's a character capable of saying to someone exactly what they need to hear, at exactly the right time to change their mind. It's not the Adjustment Bureau - its something where this aspect is part of the plot but I think it might include time travel? Ah, I wish i could remember. It was recent, and smacks of Nolan. *sigh*.

"Good" truly transcends the context of human society, because human beings are only a small part of life on earth, and we're all integrated. — Metaphysician Undercover

The moral good and bad is supposed to transcend all differences of social context. — Metaphysician Undercover

'Supposed' is the operative word here. And that supposition is erroneous. Point to the Good, sans human interaction?
It literally doesn't come into contact with anything but human minds. 'Good' does not exist outside of human expectation. I think the futile, millennia-long attempt to confer on that word some objective meaning would show this fairly well.

:up:

Not sure. But there are also elected officials who think people can change sex, so meh. It's all a carousel of stupid.

Being a Democrat appears to anti-Democrat bigots as a conflict of interest. — Relativist

Being a conservative, to an anti-conservative, is tantamount to being a literal Nazi.

Its a big carousel of stupid.

Again, refer to Parfit treating this exact issue as you all are treating it:

Because we ascribe thoughts to thinkers, we can truly claim that thinkers exist. But we cannot deduce, from the content of our experiences, that a thinker is a separately existing entity. And, as Lichtenberg suggests, because we are not separately existing entities, we could fully describe our thoughts without claiming that they have thinkers. We could fully describe our experiences, and the connections between them, without claiming that they are had by a subject of experiences. We could give what I call an impersonal description." — Parfit, Reasons and Persons Sec. III

I thought it did. But if God doesn't blip the radar, I get it. — Fire Ologist

Yeah, i think you've intuited how i'd explain that response.
The issue is what reason would that person have to invoke God? I can see none.

Especially if it involved a talking bush. — Fire Ologist

:lol:

Now those those standard good qualities are bad. — Astrophel

Even simple matter like definitions are up for grabs — Astrophel

With you so far, and no objections..

This is a big philosophical problem. — Astrophel

Still with you, and clearly that's an interest for several hundred hard-working writers.

because the value put at risk is not reducible to what language can say because its meaning doesn't come out of language — Astrophel

Yes it is.
Yes it does.

It is palpable, in your face reality, this "thousand natural shocks the flesh is heir to." One can imagine choosing one bad alternative over another for one has greater utility, as it goes, but what makes the both bad is inviolable. — Astrophel

Except clearly, there is no consensus on this and it has changed over time. If you want to claim that the vast majority of history has been Ethically "wrong", I would have to chuckle.

So, if the language of Ethics is 'good' and 'bad', lets say, prior to their enunciation and being understood to agents (i.e justification) ... it is useless. And Im fine with that. There is no such thing as absolute good and bad. Im fine with that.

What terms? — Manuel

"these terms" being that we're insinuating (as a jumping-off point) that Telepathy is 'Direct'. So, in these terms that we're discussing, without being 'directly' privy to the person's thought, without mediation, in real-time, there is no direct access. Without telepathy, I think the same - but, that relies on telepathy to be the 'direct' version, in some sense hence 'in these terms'. In some other terms, thinking - then translating to words, then editing, then sending, might be considered Direct but I'd reject that.

I mean you are expressing your thoughts right now by posing these questions. — Manuel

Which is, quite plainly, not a direct transmission of my thoughts. They ahve been sculpted into English words, for TPF. They are not, in any way, a direct access to what I am thinking. Im unsure I grasp how this can be considered the case...

that is, non-linguistic thought, but we don't have a clue on how to do that. We end up expressing our thoughts with words. — Manuel

I am unsure you are being generous here. Some, and on some accounts, most people do not think in words. They have to translate, essentially by rote learned language, their thought to be intelligible to others. So, it's not clear to me that it matters whether we think linguistically, to define thought. I do think it nearly impossible to define 'thought' though. There's no way to extricate each thought from the other, so is it just a mess of mentation? Oy vey.

You could present to me an image of a flower, and say, I was thinking about this, and point to the flower, indicating a kind of visual thinking. But I take that your "thinking about", was about the phenomenon flower, but it must be expressed linguistically. — Manuel

I take your point, but insert a previous objection (which, coincidentally, appears to be where you land despite taking flight from a different perspective):

There is no way i was thinking 'of that'. I probably was having a thought about that. But i couldn't be thinking that. It is external to my thought, and cannot be identical with it. Also, was I thinking of the photo, or the flower (this is irrelevant, but quirky and worthy noting)? Any way you slice this, my thought is indirectly of any given external thing, and my utterance to you is representative of my thought. It strikes me as bizarre that people are so resistant to this obviousness. It's not really a matter of 'certainty'. There is no room for 'uncertainty' about those relations, given the words we have invented for different relations.

"thinking about" is adequately vague enough to ensure that what I'm putting forward holds, at least thus far. If you're claim is actually that when I say "I was thinking of this" I am, in fact, trying to tell you that this thing here was my thought, I would say that's not right. I can't quite tell though, as your passages go from the latter to the former.

you wrote something down, you weren't thinking about these things. — Manuel

I would have been thinking, in terms of content, some swirling collective of thoughts, dispositions, intentions and attitudes that would actually inform you of how i wrote these passages. Not what I intended them to represent.

or something along these lines. — Manuel

Would you accept that 'along these lines' could be "You're not telling me what you're thinking. You're telling me what you intended me to get from you, about what you were thinking"? This seems to me to be the case. And this also allows me to slide closer to concession. If this is the claim, I might need to concede that this is, in fact, what I get from you when you tell me X. But then, the thought you're conveying isn't the thing you wanted me to know. Its about how you're going to tell me about it :P :P

Sure, but why would you in this case? — Manuel

This is important because, you ask a good Q - what reason would I have? Well, plainly (given the quote you've used) to show a hole in your position :)

In the event, I am not lying to you. My point was that now that I've mentioned it it's clear you can't be sure. Nothing I say could ensure the veridicality of my claim (well, short of .... duh du du duhhhh... Telepathy!)

I asked what value was. — Astrophel

I don't understand why that's being asked, though. The proceeding passage doesn't help me I'm sorry.

Ethics is not just about this discomfort or emotional regard. Rather, there is something in the world that this is about, the sufferings and blisses of people and animals that are the object of our sympathy, approval, objective needs to regulate, make laws, and otherwise respond to. — Astrophel

Ethics claims this. I think it fails. Ethics is just discussions about what we should do. IT doesn't ipso facto import any particular framework or conclusory criteria, I don't think.

Showing that these are part of the essence of ethics, I mean, it is analytically true the ethics IS what ethics is about. — Astrophel

Sure. But it gives us no reason to care, other than our own discomfort.

And such things are not invented. — Astrophel

They are. You're giving me states of affairs. Morality is not states of affairs.

A toothache is much more than the sympathy one may have for someone with a toothache, and the toothache is not to be relativized to a collective public sentiment. — Astrophel

This makes no sense to me at all. A toothache is a toothache. End of.

One thing is to have a general indication of what they may be thinking, the other is those moments of knowing exactly what they are thinking. But sure, point taken. — Manuel

:ok: :ok:

which renders it open to investigation. — Manuel

Im unsure it does. But, it could be.

I know of no better way of knowing what someone thinks than reading what they think. — Manuel

I disagree, but thats important. This does nothing for the discussion. If there is no better way to 'hear someone's thoughts, all we're doing is concluding that Direct Perception isn't possible wrt to another's thoughts, in these terms. It doesn't mean we have to call it Direct because we can telepathise. That seems to be a semantic issue.

We should be able to say that, at least at the time of writing Sam or Sarah thought what they wrote — Manuel

I'm unsure that's true. What of Automatic writing? Stream-of-consciousness? Is it a matter of degree? I have written things down months after thinking them (in the proper sense) and only recalled the thought I had initially. Is my writing an accurate depiction of the thought? I think not (hehe).

I can say I directly see how a person is behaving and using this information, I can directly ascertain what they are thinking. — Manuel

I don't think you can. This doesn't strike me as a reasonable claim. You cannot directly ascertain what someone is thinking other than by literally being privy to their thoughts. A weird notion, to be sure.

It's all direct. — Manuel

It's all several steps away from a 'direct' anything in these terms. You literally don't know hte person's thought. Nothing you've put forward would let you in to know the thought. You make assumptions.

Another option is to say, I indirectly see how a person is behaving based on my mental architecture I have (I am a human being, not God) to try to get what the other person is indirectly thinking - since I have no access to any mind but my own, thus everything is indirect. — Manuel

Agree, roughly.

an honest report of what a person is thinking is not direct. — Manuel

If someone tells me what they are thinking, how could I possibly know that this represents their thought? Well, actually, I know that it doesn't. They have told me the thought the had about telling me about their thought. Not their thought. See what I mean?

What you and I are doing right now. This is direct communication between my thoughts and yours. I am writing down what I am thinking at the moment I am writing these words, and you read them in real time and respond with what's in your mind. — Manuel

I quite strongly disagree, and think this framing is a mere convention to avoid people constantly doubting the honesty of an interlocutor. As an example of why I think your account (this specific one) fails, is because I could be lying to you.

I think it's pretty clear we'll need a new thread to go deeper here. — boethius

I would think so too.

at the end of the day I'm simply not convinced it's possible to avoid "we have a duty to the good of society" for the virtues MacIntyre promotes to be actual virtues and even if it is possible as MacIntyre sets out to do that there is any need to do so. — boethius

As I don't know A.Ms work, I'll take your word for it - but this actually exemplifies exactly what Im talking about. Taking a moral framework pigeon-holes the positions you're allowed to take, and what consittutes a virtue under it. I take no such position so it's somewhat Hard to respond. It all seems incoherent to me without first accepting that Morality is invented and obtains only between the margins of those frameworks.

However, social consequence is only a clarifying and cannot possibly be an evaluative factor of moral positions and theories. — boethius

Agreed. I largely reject the usefulness of thought experiments for this reason, within moral discussions.

I hope that has been clarified above. — boethius

It has. But the mistake in the previous seems to still be live, despite your acknowledgement. But, as with the bit you quoted, I could just be misunderstanding, so it's not too important.

If the social consequences of a position are accepted (what MacIntyre refers to as "paying the price") then of course that "I don't like those consequences" or "people don't like those consequences" is not an argument. — boethius

I'm unsure this has to do with my position. I would, in general, agree, but the social consequences have v little to do with my moral position. My intuitive reaction to them is what informs my moral position on any given act. I couldn't predict what I would think morally correct in a novel situation, for example. My intuitive reaction might include some consideration of the social consequences, but that doesn't support my moral, lets say, claim. The claim is just that it makes me uncomfortable, so I wouldn't do it and prefer others didn't. Because It makes me uncomfortable. No other reasons.

Well if your invoking some sort of social contract — boethius

I am not. I am invoking the (probably, largely ignored) fact that the surgeon has taken on the patient's emotional position. If they have not, and are a sociopath, your point would be apt for them. In this way, my personal moral position is just don't hire sociopaths as surgeons to avoid this problem. But that's mechanistic, not moral. The problem is moral and only exists in that I, personally think it sucks the surgeon did that.

If there are no duties, then there are no duties to keep one's word either. — boethius

No, there is not. I don't invoke one. There is no duty. There is the fact that, upon hte patient's emotional state, completing the surgery successfully would be preferable. If the surgeon actually didn't go in sharing this state, then fine. Walk away. I don't care.

This seems to me nearly a tautology. Even if we could imagine a society that "just so happens to function" even if no one is doing anything that can be described as "political" eventually an existential crisis will arise and the only solution is "doing politics" which if no one is willing to do then society will end, being the definition of existential crisis. — boethius

I don't understand this passage, or it's genesis apparently. Suffice to say, I disagree. It might be another discussion, once I get across what you're doing with this part of your response.
that society might end. And that might be good.

Which you seem to accept in your very next sentence: — boethius

Not at all. The quote you present immediately after this is my denying that it matters, or that there would be a 'crisis'. The society would end. So what?

In my experience, this is the main problem emotivist have to contend with as there's all sorts of institutions requiring duties to be performed to maintain any sort of comfortable life that "feels good". Generally, at least in my experience, emotivists want others to perform social duties so that they can feel good while denying those duties actually exist. — boethius

If people choose, collectively to do things, Great. I don't ascribe any duty to it at all. Society is cool. I have no other thoughts on it really.

I'm not sure this sort of criticism applies in your case — boethius

I would say so, as all these objections sit well with me. I'm not a Libertarian.

We literally have actual settler colonialist genocide happening right now fully supported by Western governments, and you seriously believe that considering that as a moral failure of the West (along with the destruction of the natural world and the habitat we depend on to continue the whole civilization project) is "preening nonsense". — boethius

Yep. I also 100% disagree with your framing of the situations you refer to. But, obviously, this is not hte place Apt for it**. I did anticipate this type of disagreement :P

has nothing to do with colonialism at all, neither now nor in the past? — boethius

This is a bit bad-faithy-sounding. I said nothing of the kind, and intimated nothing of the kind. I spoke about hte emotional undercurrent of the discussions. Obviously it 'has to do' with past colonialism. Heydel-Mankoo covers this from the perspective of a colonised minority (maybe not hte right kind, though ;) ).

it seems bold to dismiss an argument of a pretty well respected philosopher as laughable. — boethius

I disagree ;) Particularly that these issues aren't really philosophical. He's ignoring empirical facts about the political state of most countries - the majority of people take no part, and are not involved. But, as I've not read him, I await your thread/s to discuss that bit further **

equally bold to simply assume society will simply muddle on despite ridiculous political stupidity — boethius

No. This is, exactly, what is actually happening as has happened for the majority of definitely Western Culture - perhaps, all culture.

would you evaluate this as a success? — boethius

Im not sure why you're asking this. I don't think society 'succeeds' or not. It seems odd that your next passage is somehow a reductio to this position. Its not absurd at all. There is no objective measure of success, and I don't have the (socio-political) framework in place to assess the same way you do. Simple :) I could "simply" be wrong about that.

how are you even judging success? — boethius

;) You'll need to figure out where I assessed 'success' in moral terms. I can't see it! If i have implied that, please explicitly point it out because I am uncomfortable with that, if it's the case.

So my first charge here is that you seem to be invoking some moral absolutes in critiquing my statements, whereas if we're basing morality on feelings then my position is equally valid to yours as I clearly feel Western society, the enlightenment project, has failed whereas you feel it's successful — boethius

This is wrong in terms of my position. I think it is. It isn't successful or unsuccessful. There is no ultimate goal or aim of Western society. It continues to move (forward, backward, whatever). Maybe you can use that as a yardstick in which case my position holds anyway. But that's not me. That's just a suggestion. I don't think it success or doesnt succeed. It just is, or isn't. I admit, entirely, that my asking your view on this was more a poke-the-bear than anything. Defend it failing. I don't think you did, on your own terms. But, that's because I don't recognise what would constitute success or failure in your account/s thus far.

Even if you proved me to be factually wrong based on invoking a shared reality neither of us have a duty to accept is real, I would still have no duty to accept any particular facts about it. — boethius

Yep. I've not called you 'wrong'. I think you're making a mistake in moral reasoning. That doesn't make you wrong - and in fact, could only be true if you were convinced of my position - which would negate that conviction :P This is why my position is consistent. It doesn't apply to anything but me and my actions.

I didn't say anything about forcing. — boethius

If no one is willing, and it's morally right to defend the country and you're not inferring that conscription is morally acceptable there... then... What are you suggesting? That seems a dead end.

I take the rest of that passage to be incoherent in light of the above, so I wont touch it yet. Could entirely be me.

This is "the debate" when it comes to moral relativism v moral absolutism. — boethius

What I'm reading as childish, is that it seems your passionate responses presuppose your moral framework. It seems your framework has to take account of your emotional positions. It seems you are enacting the exact same, let's say, discontinuity in your position, that you outlined about moral relativists near the top of the post.

If every point of view is valid and there are no absolute moral claims, then the Nazis were and are equally valid and the holocaust is as laudable social project as creating a health care system. Obviously Hitler felt he was doing good and so if no moral feeling is better than another, then Hitler was doing as much good as anyone else. — boethius

This is the childish mistake you are making. Your underlying point, I would reply to with "Yes. That's correct".
But the fact you've entered a value judgement on the part of your interlocutor is worrisome. I don't think it was laudable, or detestable. It happened. Does it make me, personally, extremely uncomfortable? Even repulsed? Yep. Which is probably what you want to know. But that's nothing but an emotional reaction to hearing certain information. For me that is absolute, in the sense that I can't, currently, feel another way. But that is a state of affairs. Not a moral claim.

You've claimed no one has duties ... Ok, well that clearly means no one has duties to not engage in serial killing nor then stop anyone from doing so. People who "feel like" stopping the serial killer are just as morally justified as the serial killer and anyone who would do likewise, obviously they feel like serial killing. — boethius

Correct. No issues. It makes me uncomfortable. I have nothing to appeal to in telling them no to do it, other than the potential consequences for them - reason with them. Would I bother? Maybe. If i were uncomfortable enough.

Where you get pluralism, which to me clearly seems your comfort zone, is when you allow for a wide range of faiths and goals, but place absolute moral limits on what is morally acceptable in pursuit of those goals. — boethius

I don't. I haven't presented any. You seem to be importing some upper-limit to your conceivable moral behaviour matrix and ascribing those limits to my position. I don't share them. I have limits of my comfort and pursuit of comfort occurs. These are arbitrary, as far as another person is concerned. But, by-and-large people share the same limits of comfort within a society, and so 'getting on with it' can occur without a shared 'moral' framework. This is, probably, what the West does well, compared with many other societies.

If you fall back to social norms — boethius

I don't, other than to say 'Well, this is what's going on". The norms are the norms and tell me about a collective emotional status of the society.

there's negative consequences for failing to do what people expect — boethius

This one is troublesome because, prima facie, there shouldn't be. At least not beyond social consequences - which are pretty much arbitrary - and policy is just this, after collective deliberation. BUT, i would freely let you know that the idea of there being no consequences for certain actions makes me uncomfortable. Again, that's just a state of affairs. Not a moral claim. So, I dislike this, and it makes me uneasy, but I take it wholesale to be the case. Legal and social consequences are arbitrary, other than that they meet a collective emotional benchmark.

Obviously a society in which no one performs any duties (no one keeps there word, no one tells the truth, no one protects any social institution required for society to function) wouldn't be comfortable society to live in. — boethius

I don't know. It might be. But this has nothing to do witht eh position. It's just another speculative state of affairs. I might not like that society. So what?

history of society repeating to itself those duties are real — boethius

So, arbitrary proclamation served by a historical emotional attitude. Gotcha ;)

The adult position is to just accept that indeed society would basically fall apart if no one performed any duties and that's perfectly acceptable to you as an outcome. — boethius

Please refrain from intimating that not sharing your position is somehow akin to be less developed. NOt becoming.

If that happens, it's perfectly acceptable. I don't think you're right, though. I didn't intimate that a society where no one performed duties would be good, or comfortable for me. I don't think anyone is obliged to do so and noted that we're lucky only humans are moral agents - this being because we appear to share the emotivist basis for our moral claims, being of the same species (I presume - brainstates being similar, or within a certain possible range)

but then here with similar considerations the retort is it's childish. — boethius

I really don't know what you're referring to here. My position is as you stated, and nothing else. If i've intimated some other position, ignore it. I don't see that I have, though.

The only difference — boethius

It isn't a difference at all. It was baked-in to what you had said - I've tried to clarify this earlier in this comment reply, so I shall leave this. But, prior to any addressing my response, this is just plain wrong in terms of my position.

because they feel a duty to do so — boethius

This is perfectly fine, but 'feeling a duty' doesn't mean on exists. That's a self-implication, and not at all a moral claim. I feel the duty not to let my sons die. That motivates me to act. I do not believe such a duty exists outside of what I just said about myself. If I cease to feel that way, the duty doesn't continue to obtain (well, sure, legally it does...)

So, to say those norms aren't actually moral precepts, no one should believe them truly binding in any moral sense, but people act like they are real because other people think they are real and so impose a cost for violating those norms, obviously doesn't work anymore once enough people sees the truth that those norms aren't real — boethius

Yes, it does. I understand what collective agreements are, and I see the consequences of not adhering to some of them. So I adhere to some of them, because I dont want the consequence. There is no duty to achieve it, it's what i want. But this isn't part of the discussion we're having. If I am right, then I am right. You need to explain cogent societies in my terms, rather than saying that my terms don't work because of a speculated failure.

what people felt compelled to do by social pressures — boethius

rather due to the consequences of debates about what those moral truths are. — boethius

I reject, quite strongly, that incongruent suggestion. I don't think this is historically accurate or even reasonable. We've not really had these conversations without Divine intervention.

If you aren't concerned about the consequences of no people believing they have any duties (as, according to you, they should believe because that's the truth) then you're basically in the free riding problem as above. A critical mass of people won't agree with you and so you don't have to worry about that happening. — boethius

This is entirely wrong. I am concerned about the consequences, for myself. I don't care if it doesn't affect me. And if all the people involved have the same view I do, great!
Even if I did, I would not be int he free-riding group. That requires, on your own terms, that I hold hold absolute moral limits. I do not.

First, you're clearly bait-and-switching individual self-interest with collective self-interest. — boethius

Not at all. If you've conflated them, or I've misspoken sure. I have been very clear - neither issue changes the moral considerations I hold. There is no bait and switch. THe same reasoning holds for both. This may actually be what you're missing: If the collective emotional position on something is X, then policy will be X and that's fine. It's not a moral proclamation other than to say "most people here think this is wrong". Cool man. That's what actually happens in life. What do you think referenda are for?

as maintaining any political system whatsoever requires a significant amount of self sacrifice — boethius

That's true, but this is not synonymous with 'society' and says nothing about morality. Its a state of affairs. A small-enough society would not require this. If everyone's moral outlook aligns, no one sacrifices. They are all doing what is right, on their own terms, to protect that society. This is exactly what I am discussing as is the case. This goes directly to the heart of my position: That whicih makes one uncomfortable, one would avoid. If one is comfortable with the duty to defend one's country, at extreme risk, then great. No sacrifice made. You are doing the correct thing, in your own terms, making you comfortable. Your life isn't a sacrifice in this context. It would be for me, because I don't owe that duty (on my terms, that is).

"Self-interest" in your statement above is actually referring to collective-interest which may or may not be compatible with self-interest. It maybe in your self-interest and also the collective-interest to get a job, but it's in your self-interest and not the collective-interest to steal from your job, as a general rule (even if you are guaranteed to get away with it). — boethius

Any case I can't think of where this is actually true (rare) yep. That's fine. Don't see the issue.

Economists just randomly invent abstracted entities (families, companies, organizations, government and the like) and then just randomly say those abstracted entities will act in their self interest to describe how society "should work", but any entity that represents a collection of individuals has collective-interest and not self-interest. — boethius

Unless what you're trying to say is that any individual who comprises a collective has no self interest what do you think the Collective interest is? What does it consist in? Purely the survival of the collective? That can't be right. I hear you, and Im not muddling the two 'interests' up here, I just cannot work out how you're getting 'collective' interest abstracted from the interest of the collected individuals. Emergence doesn't seem to me to be apt for that.

Economists just randomly invent abstracted entities — boethius

Yep ahah agree there. Goes to the above retort about collective interest (what even is that?). Getting a little confused with how some of these responses run in to each other.. .

A critical mass of a population — boethius

Is not a collective in this sentence. It is merely a number of individuals pursuing their self-interests . You are arguing against something I did not say. The 'critical mass' is not intended to 'represent' society. It is just more than 50% of the individuals within it (or, whatever the critical mass would be for the moral outlook of the society to change). It doesn't speak about any collective interest. But also, I don't care. Taken in your terms, the rest of the quote defeats the objection anyway. That possibility is so incredibly infintessimal I can't take it seriously. No significant portion of any society will start raping and pillaging because there are no laws. But if they did, fine.

We could solve the problem but that would require a critical mass of people acting against one's self interest to ignore the political process altogether (something you see as perfectly fine, even morally superior to the many "rediculously stupid people" engaged in politics) because one's effect on outcomes is lower than the cost-benefit of the resources it requires (mostly time and brain calories). — boethius

This seems to indicate you are now just making things up about my positions? I recognise nothing of myself here. I don't see that hyte problem needs solving. If enough people want it solved, nice. Im in that camp.

Ok, well all this discussion to come to the fact you are a moral absolutist, exactly as a suspected. — boethius

I read this quote (what you quoted of me) and it made me cringe. I reject that entirely. I think it is the way things are. I do not think it is a requirement. I was wrong to say that and entirely reject it now. Not sure how I came to type that though. It is not my position. I may have been saying that this is what Western Culture requires, absolutely. Idk. But its wrong on my account anyway. The discussion didn't 'come' there, anyway. That's clearly antithetical to everything else i've said.

So ok, "feelings" mean nothing, we have a quite strict absolute moral rule to abide by. — boethius

We don't. But i apologise for the waste of time this last part has been for you.

doesn't really mean anything — boethius

Correct. That is the end of my direct replies, because the rest rely on the above being my position, which I hope is now clear, it is not. I misspoke and I'm sorry you went to the effort of responding to something that, fairly, would have appeared to be bad-faith. Aside from direct responses...

If it hasn't become obvious by this stage, let me spell one thing out that might be a puzzle piece objectors look for, and can't find:

We have good reason to enact the rules and laws that we do to achieve stated aims. Agreement gives us this reason. Does it oblige us? No. But that doesn't mean that agreement, while i surives, isn't a good reason to act. It states aims. Those aims being arbitrary doesn't negate that we have collectively deliberated and agreed to certain things. We need not consider them 'duties' but 'rules'. Arbitrary, subject to change, but, regardless, they are the rules. I don't see how this isn't 'good enough' to be getting on with. We don't need morally-perfected concepts to get here. Its a hodge-podge. Why's that a problem? We simply do not need morality to do these things 'well' in the sense of achieving stated aims.

Hmm, fair. Thanks for clarifying.

It is, though. Nothing you've said comes close to even a reasonable objection to it. Those more meta-ethical bits you put forward do nothing to this account. Can you explain why it's not defensible? That's a very, very bold claim.

For me 'absolute knowledge' refers to knowledge which is true independent of any and all contexts. I don't believe such knowledge is possible, — Janus

Gang gang.

But the distinction is abstract and has no empirical grounds. All one has to do is observe a perceiver and note that only two parties are involved in the perceptual relationship, and all the indirect realist has really done is implied that the perceiver mediates his own perception, which isn’t mediation at all. — NOS4A2

In the context of this discussion, I don't think this means much unless we return to conflating 'perceptual experience' with 'phenomenal experience'.
In that way, your passage is apt - but it doesn't tell us much. It just tells us that some people take the empirically indirect process of light reflection ->(several mediation points)-> phenomenal experience as direct, because the 'perceiver' encompasses the 'experiencer' and the physical 'perceiving organs'. But the mediation is built into that description, and is simply overlooked - and this causes the problem Mww and I have noted.

But if we pull the two apart - in that we have a process which results in something which everyone agrees is not hte process itself it is quite clear that there is three parts to achieving phenomenal experience when it comes to perception (as opposed to some delusional, self-invoked phenomenal experience such as dreaming).

We have to give a good account of telepathy — Manuel

Fair. "Telepathy is the purported vicarious transmission of information from one person's mind to another's without using any known human sensory channels"

This is Telepathy as its understood (this is from Wiki, but it aligns with six other sources of public understanding incl. Oxford Dictionary), and it is relative to known sensory communication. So, I take your point that the account could be varied, but it is something we can discuss here, I think.

I suppose that reading someone's diaries is as close as one can get, right? Then direct/indirect do not arise here. — Manuel

Well, this isn't accessing someone's thoughts Directly or Indirectly. This is accessing someone's writing. Unsure how to relate it...

I am only pointing out what I think are issues with how these issues are discussed. — Manuel

Fair enough too. It has been a fraught thread.

I don't deny that there is such a thing as indirectly knowing something — Manuel

I am. That's inference (using your example to inform me of context - I think is simplistic and under other criteria you can indirectly know something (the shape of something causing a shadow)). You infer from someone's body language that maybe their utterance is veiled, or sarcastic or whatever. Indirect. Agreed. But, it's an inference, not knowledge of anything (you would need to directly confer with S to confirm their actual meaning).

It pertained to the idea - not said by you, but could be assumed by others, that if we had the ability to enter someone's heads, like we are inside ours, we would have "pure" access to thought: mediation is a must, so we agree here. — Manuel

Ah I see. I reject, but because I do not see this as perception. There is process. There is zero space or time between the thought of the other and yours. They are one and the same. No perception involved. This is, as far as I can tell, the only apt version of Telepathy. All others are just further mediation - so, I actually 'agree' with you, but think your example is misleading.

Communication can be indirect, but often is not — Manuel

Could you outline 'direct' communication on your terms (let us simply jettison telepathy for this exercise)? I'll see if, as you likely allude in your concluding passage, that this disagreement is an error in terms rather than in ideas.

that people know what their partners or close friends will think about certain things — Janus

They don'tknow it, though, do they? They have made an assumption based on statistical analysis and are actually mroe than likely approximately right, and not actually anywhere near the actual thoughts of that person. This is a disservice to the distinction we're trying to make. Some call what you're talking about telepathy also. But, it is plainly not. You use your senses to hear what your partner does thing about some thousands of things, and with an internal analytical matrix of some kind - assume what they think about this novel event/item/object/whatever. There is nothing certain about it. No knowledge at all. Telepathy would guarantee that you have their thoughts correct.

As he says, and I admitted in the first place, I may not be addressing the usual problem, and certainly not in the usual terms. — bongo fury

Fair enough then :P

pgs 224-226 where he follows B. Williams and G.C Lichtenberg

"Descartes, famously, made such a claim. When he asked if there was anything that he could not
doubt, his answer was that he could not doubt his own existence. This was revealed in the very act of doubting. And, besides assuming that every thought must have a thinker, Descartes assumed that a thinker must be a Pure Ego, or spiritual substance. A Cartesian Pure Ego is the clearest case of a separately existing entity, distinct from the brain and body.(19)

Lichtenberg claimed that, in what he thought to be most certain, Descartes went astray. He should not have claimed that a thinker must be a separately existing entity. His famous Cogito did not justify this belief. He should not have claimed, ‘I think, therefore I am’. Though this is true, it is misleading. Descartes could have claimed instead, ‘It is thought: thinking is going on’. Or he could have claimed, ‘This is a thought, therefore at least one thought is being thought’.20

Because we ascribe thoughts to thinkers, we can truly claim that thinkers exist. But we cannot deduce, from the content of our experiences, that a thinker is a separately existing entity. And, as Lichtenberg suggests, because we are not separately existing entities, we could fully describe our thoughts without claiming that they have thinkers. We could fully describe our experiences, and the connections between them, without claiming that they are had by a subject of experiences. We could give what I call an impersonal description."

I can send you a pdf if you;d like? :nerd:

I am somewhat lost now. I don't know why you're asking these things here.

The metaethical discussion about why a person might find something morally interesting isn't that relevant to the thread. The thread assumes S has a moral outlook, and acts can be permissible but they wouldn't want to do them.

The OP didn't stipulate this. The OP stipulated that S thinks act A to be morally permissible, but they shouldn't do it. This is perfectly fine. It's permissible to have children on a lot of people's view, over the age of 35. But one may think this a bad idea.

The most we seem to be able to conclude from more sophisticated parsings of "I doubt" is that "something doubts", and not what that something is. — Banno

This is Parfit's conclusion - he insinuates that there is no personal identity, and so the Cogito could not be a basis for a discreet doubter.

Really? That's a bit surprising. It's been my experience that if you know someone for some length of time, it can happen that you can tell what they are thinking given a specific situation. Not that it's super common, but not a miracle either. — Manuel

You can guess. You can use statistical analysis to guess approximately - and people are disposed to overreact when someone comes close to their thought. This is what people on LSD think is telepathy. It is literally just knowing things about a person and assuming something accurately. I find it hard to see why you would consider this exact. DMT was originally called telepathine for this reason.
Janus is right, this is common. But it isn't even close to telepathy or 'knowing another's thoughts'. It is guessing based on familiarity.

There is always mediation though, even in our own case. — Manuel

I'm not sure what this is in reference to, but given I don't take Telepathy as obtaining, I agree. There is mediation in every case of human perception.

What we "hear" inside our heads is not "pure" either, it's due to some processes in the brain of which we have no access to. If a person is angry or upset or is sharing an idea about something interesting or whatever, they can do what we are doing right now, putting into words what we think. — Manuel

Yes. And as such,

I don't follow — Manuel

as to what was to come from that statement? I am aware that this is how communication works. It's indirect. Could you outline what the bit to be discussed is?

It appears that you haven't read any Hume at all. — Corvus

Suffice to say you are not an honest interlocutor. Take it easy.

I probably don't understand the concluding question adequately, I don't think. I'll take a stab at the end.

As to the description of ethics generally - not yours. The collective emotional discomfort with it is what leads to policies. But, quite obviously, it is your moral position that prevents you from doing it regardless of policies.

If I'm understanding you, I think its redundant question. We are 'ethical' about many things, but this is also a function of our position on what is morally interested.

But most folks leave out of their life calculations that most actions are done or not-done for now-reasons, neglecting future-reasons. That is, when you get older, either you cannot any more, or you realize that should/should-not yields to either I will do, or I will die never having done. And add to this the importance of memory. You cannot remember what you have not done. — tim wood

I've just been through a section of Parfit's Reasons and Persons which deals with exactly this issue - whether future reasons constitute 'now' reasons. Parfit feels that a bias toward the near, as he terms it, then means neglecting these reasons one will have - which means, overall, your life will go worse. An interesting position.

Which is to say that their moral code has made them deny a significant part of their own humanity. — tim wood

I personally take this sort of rule-following as non-moral. This person is just obeying. They haven't considered the morality of their acts outside of whether it is permitted.
I don't think the followers of rules are doing anything moral - the creator/s may be, though.

:ok:

The question is, in my mind, IF an act is not morally objectionable as a private act, then what does this say about the public judgment that it IS objectionable? Isn't the latter rendered vacuous, no better than the same the personal "feelings" of revulsion that I suspend when trying to be objective and fair and nonjudgmental? — Astrophel

Yep. Morals are emotional positions and nought else, on my view. Its a good idea to discuss them, and form groups of affinity. Some would very much enjoy seeing a woman 'engage' with her dog on a bus. It may be their optimal fantasy, in fact.

That is just saying determinism is true, and freewill is false. — Corvus

I think you might be trolling at this point. You asked for a logically sound argument. THere it is. You're now objecting to empirical matters. I cannot get on with someone who moves goalposts as far as you do, so either you begin to reply in good faith, or Im not continuing beyond this post. You are getting this wrong, point blank period.

logical argument, which clearly is not. — Corvus

This is exactly what the above is - a logical argument. It is logically sound. Whether the premises hold was not asked. I am unsure whether they do. Good arguments either way - but your hilariously misplaced self-assuredness makes it impossible to have a discussion in good faith. Truth Seeker seems to be having exactly the same experience.

Write down exactly back to front determinism replaced with freewill, you get the same conclusion for freewill is true and determinism is an illusion. — Corvus

Yes. Which is a logical argument. Ha... ha? That's what you asked for. I'm getting the feeling you area bit lost and pretending you have a grasp on this.

Sorry mate, go and think harder, and you need to brining in something which makes sense for your argument. — Corvus

This is you being uneasy, I think. Te snark seems to take the place of veritable objection.
Sorry mate, you are wrong and can't even understand that you are. There's no help, if that's the case.
See. I can do that too,. But i don't, because it's unhelpful and irrelevant.

You must write down all the determinant properties for X, if X is determined. And prove those properties are necessarily true. If you do that, I will show you why they are false. — Corvus

I am pretty happy to dismiss you as trolling at this point. If i were able to do the former, you are precluded from doing the latter. That's logic.
I gave you the logically sound argument. You did not ask for the empirical considerations which would prove it true. Those, I did not claim I had. The actual point htere, which you seem to be wandering around without addressing, is "Do you accept that all events have prior causes?" If so, that syllogism holds and defeats your position.

We can get somewhere if goalposts aren't moved, and accounts aren't prematurely closed.

Mary Midgely's comment about the way women don't put each other down — Jack Cummins

Is laughably wrong.

the two interact and are consequently inextricably intertwined. — Ludwig V

I think this is a mistake. I think it is a mistake that leaves us, necessarily, in a hopeless loop of arguing with anyone who disagrees with one end of the spectrum (biology v culture) because there is no possibility of extricating them. I think we can. The charge that any observations are culturally-bound seems wrong to me on many levels.

It's an interesting case, though I think we should keep in check that brains are assumed to be very complex objects with an extremely rich - and largely unknown - inner structure. — Manuel

Definitely. Personally, i'm not even willing to consider telepathy as formulated for this reason. It's a step-too-far in speculation.

If telepathy followed, I don't think direct realism would stand (nor indirect to be fair, I don't think for most cases these terms are too helpful). — Manuel

I think DR would stand. You have had the thought of another person. Nothing more direct could be perceived, I don't think. Partially (in terms of our disagreement, anyway) because I think this is false:

e have instances, rare to be sure, in which we can read exactly what we had in each other's mind — Manuel

I do not think this has ever occurred. It is not possible, as best I can tell, or as far as I know. More than happy to be put right here, though. It would be very exciting! But, forgive any skepticism that comes along with..

We still have no clue how the brain causes these inner thoughts to arise. Something important is hidden from us, but direct/indirect does not enter — Manuel

For answering this question, that's true. This particularly part of the process of perception occurs after the Direct/Indirect difference would have been noted (i.e, all the data is already in the brain for it to crunch and decode into an experience.. Whence comes the data? Direct? InDirect?). Even in the Telepathy case, the data reaching the brain is still prior to the experience itself. What Mww point out, and rudely ignored that I'd already canvassed was that use of 'perception' to mean 'phenomenal experience' both doesn't make much sense, and ensures this conversation is impossible.

So, in the Telepathy case, 'perception' retrieved or received data directly from another's mind with no interloping/interceding/mediating stage or medium - but the brain still has to make that into an experience of hearing words (or whatever it might be). So, for this part whether or not something is Direct, or Indirectly perceived is irrelevant. But I don't think that's been the issue at hand. I am sorry if i'm misunderstanding here.

but he could also tell me exactly what he is thinking — Manuel

He could not. He could tell you what his interpretation, as a physical mode of communication required, of his thought into an intelligible medium for traversing space and time. You can see here exactly why this is indirect vs telepathy proper. Some argue that speech is telepathy - but this misses the point, i think.

Short: Yes
Mid: This is my view of morality, and we're lucky that only humans are sentient enough to be considered moral agents. This means most people's morality will align on my account, even if they have different moral frameworks for arriving at the "yes/no" portion of whether to act.
Long: Ah, well. There are millions. Millions of things make me uncomfortable, and I'd rather not be the kind of person who did them because that would be, on my account, shameful or embarrassing. These extend to no one else, even in cases that would effect someone else, attitudinally speaking. I don't want to be that person, regardless of who is effected.

Having not read any responses my take is:

You're describing despair, in other words. This is a organisational tool that often avoids sunk-cost fallacies in one's behaviour. But, when it is faulty, it has one missing most opportunities for novelty that are available - the attitude doesn't stop with Human behaviour, unfortunately.

Direct and indirect then both apply, in different senses: direct because connecting in an unbroken chain; indirect because involving links and transformations. — bongo fury

Isn't this kind of side-stepping the debate and saying "You have your truth, I have mine" the way Uni students who can't handle be wrong do? (applies equally to DR or IR here, if accepted).

Not that any of us would ever do such a thing on this forum. — Banno

I would like for this to be a bit of comedic self-awareness *crosses fingers*.

The issue that would be helpful to have clarified is what would "directly" perceiving an object imply? How would it differ from what we have (whatever its epistemic status may end up being) ? — Manuel

Telepathy is an example i've given a few times in the thread. Has been ignored. On it's current formulation, it would be 'direct'. There is literally nothing between an immaterial thought from one brain to another, because the assumption is no space or time has been interacted with.

you are treating your explanation as something of which you are certain, as something you know, giving only lip service to your doub — Banno

:up:

"Determinism" is a thought-experiment, not a truth-claim. — 180 Proof

Interesting. Even moreso in that this smacks of many of our number here on TPF.

(unrelated)An interesting article from a few years back with bold claims.

I thought my argument was clear in my reply to you. All my actions and expressions are caused by my freewill. What else could it be? — Corvus

Oh, I would say your argument was fairly clear, but it was weak. There are many many, many ways for you to be deluded, or wrong. More than there are ways you to be right. That, alone, is a good reason your argument isn't. at least 'good enough', if not a bad one. It could be determined by prior causes, which are determined by prior causes, which are determined by prior causes. Either, you end up with a logical regress - whcih you either need to solve, or make peace with.

I have not seen the logical proof of that. Where is it? Or you could prove again here.
How do you know all events have prior causes? — Corvus

You asked for a logically sound argument.

P1. IfDeterminism is true, Free Will is not possible;
P2. Determinism is true.
P3. Your choices are determined.
C. Your concept of Free Will is an illusion.

As noted, I'm not too heavily married to this, beyond have no evidence otherwise currently. I assume (in some part of my mind) that we will find empirical evidence to defeat the above. But, the above is logically sound.
It seems that your argument against determinism is just that you like the feeling of Free Will and would prefer it was not an illusion.

What if what was said was exactly what the person needed to hear and the person didn’t even know they needed to hear it? — Fire Ologist

This doesn't seem to touch my question. I have often had this experience and never once even considered that it could be 'God'.
Defocalisation/derealisation/depersonalisation/drug use is a well-known tool for insight. Many people claim that they themselves are God, or that Eric Clapton is God, after undergoing such experiences as much as people receive genuinely helpful insight into their well-being or place in the world (or some such else as would be important to a given S). Simply spacing out having given you the impression of an omniscient all-pervading, personal force of Creation is... odd**.

The words become more important than how on earth the kid knew to say them. — Fire Ologist

I would hazard a guess that a religious person would think this, as communication with the dead isn't off the table (and, in fact, is somewhat sought after!). For a Hard Atheist, I cannot imagine giving a toss about the content more than that it had happened. The implications of the latter are immense in comparison to the first. I could also charge one who actually responded the way you seem to imply, as being perspectivally ignorant. The latter matters for everyone. The former only matters to you and yours.

But, this just speaks to biases.** The religious v the irreligious. Only cases such as Francis Collins give me pause here, and it is pause to consider what type of mental facilities are required for being a decent scientist. Gullibility seems to be involved..