What metaphysics is, is directly related to whom one is reading; there isn’t a cut-and-dried definition for it, because it changes over time. According to some Continental Enlightenment philosophy, metaphysics is the logic-oriented criticism of reason.

If one were to reduce the basic idea of metaphysics to a fundamental condition, and because physics is the science of human a posteriori knowledge and is grounded in experience so is self-regulating, perhaps metaphysics could be described as the study of human a priori knowledge in the form of rational principles, necessarily, as a priori knowledge is influenced by imagination which has no self-regulation.

It is rather obvious Hegel was considered a philosopher. I don’t recall seeing a list of philosophers in which his name wasn’t included. But I was taken aback by this relatively well-respected philosopher’s opinion on the subject.....

“....It became the fitting starting-point for the still grosser nonsense of the clumsy and stupid Hegel....”, (Schopenhauer, WWR2, Appendix, p16, 2nd ed., 1844)

.....which tends to support the possibility that at least one of his peers didn’t deny Hegel being a philosopher, albeit a thoroughly crappy one. ‘Course, that may not be quite fair play, because ol’ Arthur attacked everybody of German idealist descent, to some degree or another, even its king.

Anyway......coupla cents worth.

I don't agree with the object - perception - concept - mind model except as a subset of what we do. — csalisbury

What is it that we do, that these would only be a subset of?

Cool. Glad to hear it.

On the idea of the correct-ness of concepts:

Concepts are nothing but half a relational proposition, from which a cognition becomes possible, the other half herein being beyond the scope. Whether or not a concept relates to its object is the purview of judgement. It follows that any error in cognition, or even if a cognition can be given, is the fault of judgement, and has nothing to do with whether or not the concept in use is correct in itself, but only has to do with whether or not it is itself the correct concept to use.

One can sleep in a chair, but the regular parent, given the general states-of-affairs in this world, isn’t likely to tell his kids it’s chairtime when the nightly sleep event comes around.

Rather than the requirement to show the nature of OR, wouldn’t it suffice to show the limits of AR? If AR could be shown to be insufficient for epistemic certainty with respect to OR, would the nature of it matter?

Well spoken.

It is odd, though, that such illusory architecture should be the fundamental prerequisite for the human condition.

Good.

Noumena notwithstanding. Your argument stands on its own with no need for even the idea of them.

Carry on.

To force something that is not science into the mould of science is to damage and deform it. — Pattern-chaser

True, IFF we’re forcing a science of metaphysics into the mould of empirical science, but we’re not because the two are mutually exclusive. The criteria governing the methodology in the latter is the non-contradiction between observation and predictable experience, which is always predicated on objective conditions, the criteria governing the methodology in the former is the non-contradiction between reason and a priori knowledge, which has no objective predications at all.

All I’m saying is we can do metaphysics in the same general way we do science, that is, in accordance with a theory-consistent set of rules.
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If we use only science (...) then our understanding (of ourselves) is going to be less than it could be. — Pattern-chaser

Absolutely, if using only science here means empirical science. Although, some great strides have been taken in understanding the brain, which has the eliminative materialists dancing in the aisles. But that as yet says nothing definitive with respect to how a intelligence comes to understand its own condition.

Even seeking a plausible answer to the question whether metaphysics can be treated as a science, is treating it like one.

I find it odd that the human mind, a generic placeholder for the totality of intellect, is required for any scientific thought, and the same human mind then tells us there are things we are not allowed to think scientifically about. Metaphysics is by definition “something else”, other than empirical science, but metaphysics can still be treated scientifically, that is to say, adhering to, and governed by, a set of rules specific to it.

If the fundamental precept of eliminative materialism is the idea that a rational agency in itself has no right to the confidence intrinsic to the contents of its own mind, we are thereby met with a blatant contradiction, insofar as any such eliminative materialist must employ the very thing he denies, at least to some significant degree. While I admit some contents of my own mind are rather unsubstantiated, I certainly claim the right to them.

All science is based on specific conclusions in metaphysics. — Coben

This is true, if one considers the fact that no empirical science whatsoever, is ever done that isn’t first thought. Even if all empirical science is itself fundamentally grounded in observation, which has nothing to do with pure thought, what the empirical scientist does with that observation, is entirely predicated on his evaluation of it, which is necessarily an a priori determination. The study of that evaluation, and all such evaluations, would be the purview of a non-empirical science.

So the question really boils down to.....is a non-empirical science possible.

Metaphysics wouldn’t hold with peer reviewed, experimentally grounded predictions for the explanation of observations, so metaphysics wouldn’t be an empirical science. But if metaphysics holds with a certain rigidity, an internally consistent, logically non-contradictory theoretical foundation for the explanation of something else, it might be considered a science of that something else.

The doing of science is of a different category than that to which science is done. Just as physics is the scientific evaluation of the the known predicates of real objects from which a posteriori knowledge is given, so too can metaphysics be the scientific evaluation of all the possible predicates of pure reason from which a priori knowledge is given. In each case, the object of each science is different, but the doing of the science can be similarly rigid and potentially explanatory.

We treat the world scientifically in an attempt to understand it; we treat metaphysics scientifically in an attempt to understand ourselves.

The present dialogue is with respect to Kant, what he said and the perspective from which what he said, came. Hence, he is saying it never WAS a science, up to his time. Science, of course, having its strict Kantian connotation.

The question remains....was he successful in giving metaphysics a scientifically-oriented credibility? Depends, in the positive, on one’s receptivity for his arguments, or in the negative, one’s ability to refute them, both of which presupposes they are sufficiently understood.

In short, we already use it, might as well figure out how it is possible that we use it. If we figure that out, the meaningfulness of it should be given as a consequence.

Kant asked a very similar question.
Is metaphysics possible ?
His answer was no. — Wittgenstein

It wasn’t just plain ol’ no, because that wasn’t the question he actually asked.

“...Yet, in a certain sense, this kind of knowledge is to be looked upon as given; that is to say, metaphysics actually exists, if not as a science, yet still as a natural disposition of the human mind.....(...) And so we have the question: "How is metaphysics, as a natural disposition, possible?" That is, how, from the nature of universal human reason, do those questions arise which pure reason propounds to itself, and which it is impelled by its own need to answer as best as it can?...”
(CPR, B21, in Kemp Smith, 1929)

Metaphysics itself was never in doubt; metaphysics as a science, never was at all. The Critique’s whole raison d’etre was to determine under what conditions it could become one.

For the record.........

And yes, the discussion of metaphysics is meaningful, if kept within its proper domain.

Paying attention to the title of the thread, and staying in the context of it, should advise the curious onlooker, that

natural biological forms is due to the combined operation of spontaneous genetic mutations and the process of natural selection — charles ferraro

is utterly irrelevant.

My interests also, obviously from a more historically evolved point of view.

True enough. But there is a judicial system now, and there was in Greek antiquity as well. Besides, you’re on record has denying a priori determinations in general, which would be imposing a form, your “actively willing”, on ourselves, as opposed to an administrative doctrine that imposes justice as its due course.

Again, I realize this is not in line with the subject matter, but nobody else is talking, so......

How does Aristotle treat what we now understand as established entirely subjective predications?

I don’t suppose a real thing such as a man, to be passive stuff upon whom is imposed a form of justice, that shapes him in some way? Wrong kind of shape?

Simple as that, huh? Cool.

Guess the explains why there are no statues based on the inverse square law.

Matter can be passive in the reception of an imposed form — Dfpolis

Can we say matter can be passive in its reception of an imposed form?

How is the form imposed? Where does the imposed form originate? What forces are in play to impose the form?

we see open possibilities being closed by experience. — Dfpolis

Experience is knowledge, knowledge is the reception and processing of intelligible information. The total of possibilities in reality are inversely proportional to our knowledge of the information that specifies it. Exactly what I’ve been saying all along.
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Logical possibility: always derived from pure reason, and is the form of physical possibility....
All there is, is what reality is, which means all the information that would or could specific reality already is, as well. All there is must be possible, or it wouldn’t be, regardless of our knowledge of it. The absolute totality of reality is expressible by the totality of information contained it in. Logically, reality and its information are quantitatively equal; there cannot be more reality than information specifying it, and there cannot be more information than reality to which it applies.

Physical possibility: always derived from experience, and is the matter of logical possibility.....
Each part of the matter of reality is existentially independent, even if not necessarily ontologically independent. While it is certainly the case that some part of the matter of reality is identical in substance to another part of the matter, it is never the case that all parts of the matter of reality be identical in substance to each other. That the diverse and discreet arrangements of the substance of the matter of reality can be given to human perception merely by their impression on it, is sufficient to define and establish the physical possibility of them. It follows necessarily that the establishment of the physical possibility of any arrangement of any substance of any matter of reality not present to human perception, is not sufficiently given. That is not to say such physical arrangement not so impressed is thereby impossible, but only that the possibility of it is not established.

Logical possibility is thought, physical possibility is experience. The two can be interconnected, can influence each other, but cannot be confused by a rational mind. And while it is not absurd that the form of matter lies within it, it is patently obvious, with respect to the human cognitive system, that whatever its label or whatever the doctrine is that describes the matter of reality, and its possibilities, everything must relate to how a human understands it. Parsimony dictates, therefore, that the form reside internally and it be that to which the impressions on our perception relate. Descartes’ perfections, Hume’s sentiments/passions, Kant’s intuitions.......all the same in kind as Aristotle’s forms, except for their location.
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Me: Information could in fact be present to cognition, which makes the presence of the information known, and still be unintelligible.
You: The is a contradiction in terms. To be known, something has to be knowable (aka intelligible) which means it can't be unintelligible.

Yours is correct, but it doesn’t reflect on what I said. I can easily know a presence and surmise there to be a content in it, without knowing what the content is.

Point/counterpoint. No harm, no fowl.

Now you’re saying,

The more it is already specified, the fewer its remaining possibilities. — Dfpolis

. To me, “it” in this instance is reality, which gives us the more reality is specified the fewer reality’s remaining possibilities. That is agreeable.

Originally you said

Information is the reduction of possibility. If we do not know it, it reduces physical possiblity. — Dfpolis

. “It” in this instance, the “it” we don’t know, is information. So we end up with...... if we don’t know information, information reduces physical possibilities. Which makes not a lick of sense.

Now, reality can only be specified by the information contained in it. In our Universe, e.g., there is a ton of information we don’t know, and would certainly specify that part of reality to which it pertains. So it stands to reason there is a ton of reality unspecified. It follows that any information we come to know specifies that particular part of reality, thus reducing the physical possibilities remaining to it.

Does an Aristotelian mean to say information reduces possibilities even if we have no idea what that information contains? Let me tell ya....a Kantian, or any reasonable empiricist for that matter, will certainly grant that information reduces possibilities, but only if such information is present to cognition and intelligible. Information could in fact be present to cognition, which makes the presence of the information known, and still be unintelligible, which makes the meaning of the information useless, thus having no warrant whatsoever, including the specification of reality.

What say you?

Maybe not, if you didn’t catch it right away.

Seems like the information we don’t know increases the physical possibilities, not reduces.

Information is the reduction of possiblity. If we do not know it, it reduces physical possiblity. If we know it, it also reduces what is logically possible. — Dfpolis

Might there be an edit in the works here?

Let it be granted that the will is to feelings as the intellect is to cognition.
Let it be granted that the will controls some feelings and is controlled by some feelings.
If the will exercises control, it is a legislative authority.
In such cases as the will exercises its authority, it is the causality for that which it authorizes.
If all causality is conditioned, and the will is an dedicated causality, it must itself be conditioned.
If the will is its own authority, it must be autonomous.
Autonomy is justified as the conditional for the will’s causality.

All conditionals adhere to the principle of cause and effect, but autonomy requires the unconditioned.
No natural unconditional is intelligible to a human, which makes explicit the unconditional for the justification of autonomy can only be thought.

To think “freedom” as the unconditional justification for autonomy, which then justifies the conditioned causality of the will, then the legislative authority of the will with respect to controlling some feelings, stands as justified without any intrinsic contradictions.

The will is an autonomous causality, which carries no implication whatsoever, that it is completely unencumbered, that is a “free will”. In fact, the will may even encumber itself, insofar as its authority controls some feelings by obligating itself to adhere to its legislations at the expense of its own interests, from which, of course, is derived our moral disposition. Feelings, not cognition, is in play here.

And to say free will is a valid conception in itself, disregards all the conditions which make the will a functional faculty whose job it is to legislate, which makes explicit the will absolutely must have the capacity to formulate laws. It isn’t free to make laws, it is required to make laws; it is free to chose which laws to make, but that is merely the fundamental aspect of willing.

Is the concept of freedom a valid justification? If one agrees in principle, sure. If he doesn’t, he must come up with something else, and justify that instead.

I understand all that.

I prefer my logical essences, however, reside in intuition, given from experience, which is given from sense data. That way, I don’t have to re-learn a thing each instance of is presence, and, thereafter I can remember what a thing is a priori, without having it being presented to me at all. And if a new thing is presented to me, all my logical essences, or, which is the same thing, my intuitions, won’t tell me what that new thing is anyway, but only what it isn’t. And if logical essences are retained in sense data alone, I still won’t know what it is, because I have no extant experience of it, hence no resident intuition logically belonging to it and to which it would relate.

“...Understanding cannot intuite, and the sensuous faculty cannot think...”

An ontological hierarchy of sorts? — jorndoe

It is certainly an epistemological hierarchy, and I suppose one could call it an ontological one as well, although purely rational philosophy just grants space and time as ontologically necessary without consideration of their respective origins. That is to say, space and time permit knowledge and without space and time there isn’t any, as far as the human animal is concerned. Besides, physical science covers those ontological fundamentals, even if it is brought up short by its inability to discover the unconditioned just as much as reason is likewise brought up short.
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I'd just say that swimmers in water look different than swimmers out of water. — jorndoe

Quite right, with the monstrous caveat that the appearance of difference doesn’t give you refraction or reflection. One has to extend from mere vision to practical reason in order to qualify why there is a difference at all.

Question: what would a swimmer out of water look like?

would you say that mentioned mental constructs are part of the same larger world (outside reality) as the experienced?
If so, then Galuchat's inquiry seems to indicate a need to differentiate among hallucination and perception, yes? — jorndoe

Hmmmm........

The mentioned mental constructs, re: space, time, points of reference, are not of the same larger world as the experienced; they are the necessary conditions for it. To say that because rational agents holding with these conditions are part of the larger outside world, then by association so too are his conceptions, is a categorical error. To attribute to rationality that which properly belongs to physicality is to ask for a common cause for distinctly different effects.

It can be said there is sometimes a need to distinguish hallucination from perception, yes. All optical illusions are hallucinations from empirical misrepresentation, but some hallucinations are purely logical faults given by understanding itself. In the former, judgement usually reconciles the defect and its cognition is modified, but in the latter judgement often condones it and is thereby cognized as being the case.

But......disclaimer.....I don’t like psychology, so........grain of salt and all that.

Because it is true

The same insights can be articulated in various ways. — Dfpolis

, we arrive at:

......

Awareness may subsequently convert sensory experience to knowledge — Dfpolis

....becomes reason may subsequently convert sensory experience to knowledge.

.....

First is knowledge as acquaintance, (...) (and) There is correspondence — Dfpolis

.....becomes knowledge *of* and knowledge *that*.

....

we come to understand that the concept has universal extension — Dfpolis

...becomes the ground for the viability of the ten Aristotelian and twelve Kantian categories, as universally extendable conceptions.

....

Because of the irrelevance of such differences to the central concept — Dfpolis

....becomes due to the fact these differences are at least logically irrelevant, insofar as no identifying property of an apple may ever be logically applied to the identity of a horse, we are permitted to disregard the totality of properties or attributes of objects of perception, and merely assign concepts to them a priori as understanding thinks belongs to them necessarily. As such, accidents are circumvented.
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This was a little tougher to unpack:

I agree that we have individual associations with objects, but I don't see them as part of the core concept. — Dfpolis

I think you mean we each understand what an object is by the way we associate extant experience to it, but those experiences are not seen as part of the core concept of the object. If that is correct, or at least close, then I would agree, because the “core concept” of an object would give to us the thing as it is in itself a posteriori, by presupposing apprehension of the unconditioned (assuming a “core concept” is some sort of ultimate cognitive reduction), which my philosophy will never allow.

Ever onward......

I also have difficulty seeing any socially redeeming value in transcendental idealism. — Dfpolis

As well you should. The first critique, from which the philosophy of transcendental idealism is born and raised, has nothing to do with social redemption or its value. For socially redeeming value, which is more anthropology or empirical psychology than speculative metaphysics proper, one needs examine the second and third critiques.

Last paragraph.....well spoken.

That is abstraction -- taking what interests us out of its larger context. — Dfpolis

OK. I can handle that.
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what we do focus on has associations, but associations are not judgements. — Dfpolis

Handling that well too, I am.
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My model includes other experiential elements, (...) but it also has a construct, namely that there is a physical basis for the fact that some data is available to awareness while other data processing is unavailable to awareness. — Dfpolis

OK. The latter being the unconscious or autonomic condition, the former being the conscious or attentive condition? But you said some data is available to awareness but some data processing is not. Seems like this is two separate and distinct dynamics, only one of which would seem to have any continuity with the treatise on Realism and experience. What bearing does unavailable data processing have on the topic?
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My perception of an apple is an existential penetration of me by the apple. The apple's modification of my neural state is identically my neural representation of the apple. This identity precludes any separation of perception and perceived -- any perceptual duality. — Dfpolis

Penetration, projection, same-o, same-o. Ok. I get it.

I call an object’s modification of my neural state the appearance of an object; it is not yet represented by a synthesis of intuition and concept. So yes, we agree perceptual duality is a non-starter.
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It is this radiance of action which penetrates the perceiving subject -- creating the partial identity of perceiver and perceived — Dfpolis

Radiance of action....ok....just another theoretical tenet.

Not clear about partial identity. What would be full identity? If the apple’s modification of a neural state is identically a representation of the apple, is that the same as saying the apple is experienced? Does this experience correlate one-to-one with knowledge?

Where did “apple” come from? Doesn’t look like this theory has any place for conceptual naming. Must be rather many neural states, one for round, one for red, one for weight, one for the stem sticking up from the top......one for top. One for naming, one for determining the name matches the representation.

I just call it understanding.
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We confuse our abstract notion of the object — Dfpolis

If one holds with the idea that any object of perception is nothing to us until we add our own elements to it, by means of synthesis, rather than take away from its totality those <8 thoughts you spoke about, there is no need for confusing the abstraction for the object. While there is still a chance for confusion, it arises from judgement alone, as an aspect of reason.
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Your reification fallacy is my transcendental illusion. Same idea, different predicates.

Good stuff.

a la Kant, if there were no minds it would be incoherent to have spatio-temporal reference points. — Noah Te Stroete

Kantian speculative philosophy, and Enlightenment philosophy in general, tacitly presupposes the human mind. There is mounds of theoretical expositions on how the mind works, but not a shred on what the origin of mind is, the reasoning being, if one is engaged in rational thought he must have a mind, which makes its ontology, and theories concerning it, quite irrelevant.

So Kant....nor anyone else of any repute....is not going to say anything about coherency in the absence of the human mind. Because all meaning of anything whatsoever, is always relative to a human mind, the very idea of coherency absent the mind, is unintelligible.

But if you mean to say the human mind creates spatio-temporal reference points, then Kant would agree, for the excruciatingly simple reason Nature doesn’t incorporate them in her catalog of physical objects. If she did, you can bet yer arse there’d be a preferred one, which from our perspective of course, there isn’t.

we don’t directly apprehend reality. We perceive an independent reality — Noah Te Stroete

Exactly, methinks. We directly perceive, but indirectly apprehend. As dpolis says, we add elements from within us. Which is the fundamental principle grounding epistemological dualism.

Experience doesn’t amount to data unless it is interpreted. — Wayfarer

That’s the first thing I said back on page one.

Great minds.......etc, etc, etc.

Yes. Although as Janus pointed out to me a while ago, while he fully admits to it in the 1781 edition, as quoted below, he does not go so far in the 1787 edition. Makes one wonder who or what caused him to back off from declaring for the metaphysical doctrine he himself developed. Probably figured it was so obvious everybody should declare for it.

“...From the start we have declared ourselves in favor of this transcendental idealism, and our doctrine thus removes all difficulty in the way of accepting the existence of matter on the unaided testimony of our consciousness, or of declaring it to be proved in the same manner as to the existence of myself as a thinking being is proved...”

Bear in mind the proof spoken here is merely a logical proof, based on the concept of law, which is itself based on the principles of universality and absolute necessity. Very Aristotelian on the one hand and very Cartesian on the other.

Not saying you’re wrong, just wondering how projection would work, as you see it.

Six of one, half dozen of the other, when it’s all said and done.

Fine. Again. Square one.

So what mechanism does reality use to project itself?

Why don’t we just say reality appears to us, rather than projecting itself? That way we don’t need a projection mechanism for reality......it’s just there. Besides, reality can project itself to hell and back, but it’s completely irrelevant to us, until we are affected by that minuscule part of it we perceive, or can possibly perceive.

Gimme back those gold stars.

You haven’t said anything that isn’t reducible to human cognition. I asked for the mechanism for reality projecting itself, but I got back how it affects us, which is not its projection but is merely our own receptivity.

Ergo, reality ceases to exist when there isn’t any? Or reality is still all there, just doesn’t project itself in the absence of wavelengths we can see? I can experience the reality of electrical shock in the dark. Trust me on that one.