The existence of evil is insufficient to disprove the reality of an omnipotent, omniscient, and omnibenevolent God. However, by itself, this does not justify the belief that there is such a God. — aletheist

Maybe not disprove, since the theist can always appeal to God's mysterious ways and divine perspective being different from ours, but it sure seems like a rationalization to me, not a good justification for evil existing.

Basically, if people want to believe in an omni-god, then they'll find ways to make the argument work. But it comes across as sophistry to someone who doesn't begin with the premise that such a God must exist.

That is, if there is a philosophical underpinning to higher education, it's instrumental rather than value orientated. Cry as we might about that, it ain't going to change soon. — Baden

Well sure, but then my question is why bother with classes like philosophy if employment in an advanced technological society is the goal? Just have students take an intro computer programming course or Adobe/Microsoft class. Add a business management course. Statistics and data science are hot. Cut a a few requirements and set up internships in their place.

Why are we kidding ourselves with humanities course? Is it really going to help the next E-Corp employee think critically at their job?

Whether I'm fine with anti-realism depends of how that's defined. — Sapientia

Anti-realism and realism are well defined and don't need to be redefined, or we end up with endless semantic disputes that go nowhere. Color is real if it's mind-independent, and anti-real if it's not.

Compare with dreams. Some cultures have thought that when you dream, you go somewhere else. That it's an experience of something real. But we understand dreams to be mind-dependent.

Also compare with shape. We say shape is a property of objects, not of perception. Idealists might disagree, but at the very least, color is understood to be objective and not relative to the perceiver.

We can do so in accordance with an objective categorisation of colour. If it is so-and-so, then it is red. — Sapientia

If the strawberry tastes sweet, then objectively, it's sweet, right?

We can do so in accordance with an objective categorisation of colour. If it is so-and-so, then it is red. You just reject this categorisation, as it seems you must in order to conclude that objects do not have colour and that colour isn't real. — Sapientia

You can do so if anti-realism is fine with you. Also, science "paints" a rather colorless picture. Afterall, where is the color? Is it in the photon? Does that get transferred to the electrical signal travelling to your visual cortex?

The colour of the object is perspective dependent. From one perspective it is points of different colours, but from another perspective, it is mixed wavelengths. — Metaphysician Undercover

Perceptual relativity and the problem of perception, eh? How can we objectively say what color something is if it's relative to how we're viewing it, and the kind of visual system we possess?

Some animals see color better than we do, for example.

Fair enough. How does the fact that we've imported primary qualities into the definition of secondary qualities affect this distinction? — Benkei

Also, I think this distinction has implications for consciousness and Chalmer's hard problem, because if color is a secondary quality, but science makes use of primary qualities, then explaining the experience of color is going to be a conceptual dead end, as Nagel recognized, which again goes back to questions about the nature of objectivity.

Fair enough. How does the fact that we've imported primary qualities into the definition of secondary qualities affect this distinction? — Benkei

I'm not sure how to answer your question other than to point out that these types of discussion ultimately are about the nature of objectivity, with Nagel's view from nowhere, Locke's primary and secondary colors, direct vs indirect realism vs anti-realism, Kant's categories of thought, and so forth.

There was a previous discussion on the old forum (I think) about whether direct realism entailed color realism, and if the scientific evidence was against color realism, then direct realism could not be the case. Needless to say, the direct realists strongly disagreed, leading to charges of anti-realism, and ultimately, a disagreement over terms.

So yes, we do recognize a distinction between wavelengths of light and the color we experience seeing. What that means for perception is disputed. I think it means colors aren't real. It's like the sun rising and setting, which is naive realist language, and still useful to say, but everyone knows it's false in the modern world.

1.Why must the perception of an object's colour and the [actual] object's colour be the same? Or, why can't I say the grey in that picture appears red to me? By insisting I cannot say this, are you saying I'm lying? — Benkei

I would say that objects don't have any color. Color is a property of visual perception, just like smell is a property of olfaction, not the chemical makeup of the odors themselves.

2. Why shouldn't I incorporate what we scientifically know about "red" into the definition of "red"? — Benkei

Scientifically speaking, the world is without color or smell, except for creatures who see color and smell odors. Color is a secondary property, not a primary one, qua Locke.

3. Why shouldn't I apply a descriptive definition to "red" to my experience? — Benkei

That's fine, as long as it's understood in philosophical discussion that the colors we see are based on how human visual perception works and not the properties of objects or photons themselves.

4. Is this just a matter of definition/semantics? If I define red as what I experience as red unless it turns out that a spectrometer tells me it isn't because it does not have an emphasis of wavelengths between x and y, then by definition the strawberries aren't red. — Benkei

In ordinary language, which assumes naive realism, strawberries are red. But given a scientific understanding of atoms, photons and how our visual system works, strawberries are not red.

5. What is red? (e.g. what's your definition). — Benkei

The color we experience seeing for a certain wavelength of light, depending on the exact visual circumstances.

hey just want to pass their fucking class. Haha. You following? You're not going to convert these people to your particular brand of bullshit by telling them they aren't pursuing enlightenment properly or they haven't been "bit" yet. If someone asks a question about a philosophy course in college, you just need to answer the question... you don't need to beat them over the head with your philosophical zealotry. — Carbon

I'm not questioning the reality of people just wanting to pass a class. I'm also not saying that Mary Ellen or anyone else should be interested in the subject matter. That's up to them. I'm questioning the educational merit of having people take classes they view as just a means to an end.

Why have a nursing student take a philosophy class? Why is that an option for them? It's no different when people have asked why they had to take geometry, and what use it would be to them in the real world. If you can't give such students a real answer, and geometry isn't going to be part of their career, then you're wasting their time.

But it seems to me that a lot of courses could be presented in a way that shows their value. How might a philosophy course aid a nursing student? Well, surely ethics plays an important role in the medical profession. And ethical inquiry is a major part of philosophy. There are other areas of life that affect us all such as politics where ideas have philosophical roots. And ideas matter for policy.

But more than anything, asking questions about our existential condition, what's moral, how we know what we say we know, etc is fundamentally human. Everyone asks these kinds of questions in one form or another. It's like how creating and enjoying art and music are fundamental to being human. Art and music are everywhere, found in all cultures. So we could just force a boring music or art class on engineering students, say, or we could tie the subject matter into how it impacts engineering (good design for example) and life in general.

I don't see how viewing philosophy as something fundamental to being human (we all wonder at times) is somehow a particular brand of bullshit. It's just an observation that waxing philosophical is like breaking into song. Everyone can appreciate a little bit of philosophy like they can music. Why am I here? How best to live my life? What is the good, etc?

Presenting as just a course to get by is like making people take geometry just because.

That's assuming general relativity provides us with an accurate model of things at this scale. But we can consider that the concept of "event horizon" is evidence that general relativity doesn't provide us with an accurate model. — Metaphysician Undercover

Whether GR is accurate or not doesn't change the astronomical data. There is something there. Our understanding of it might be inaccurate, but that doesn't change the data.

Since this is a philosophy forum, let's approach it a bit differently. What is the purpose of teaching philosophy in higher education? Is it just another subject to give students a choice of electives? But why? What do schools and society in general hope to accomplish? What will it do for the students who take these classes? Is it just to meet elective requirements and get a passing grade?

If so, then what's the freaking point? Might as well take a bridge class.

Something is there that's being described by the math, given the massive gravitational effects on nearby objects. And it's condensed to a small area for that much gravity. It also doesn't give off light beyond a certain point. There is real data about the objects we model as black holes.

Here's what I'm getting at with a lot of this: I think you and a few others on this forum have a disastrous tendency to conflate this sort of glamorous image of "the philosopher" with modern academic philosophy. The latter simply does not fit with the former (and probably hasn't for several centuries). Creating "lovers of wisdom" is not the job of academia, universities don't get accredited for that. It's idealistic! It's maybe fun and creative to think about all the exciting and amazing things philosophy can do, but that's not why people go to college. As educators hired by our respective universities our job CANNOT solely be creating really "wise" students who "get it" and are "enlightened". — Carbon

No doubt you're right, but a the same time, it's kind of sad statement on education. And not just philosophy, but any subject matter, bet it art, literature, computer science, etc. So you're basically saying that students aren't there to learn, they're there to get a grade in route to graduating, which will look better on a resume than not finishing college. And those who choose an academic career do so because they like the atmosphere.

So why do we bother with the pretense of education at all? Instead, soon as little Johnny and Suzy can do the three RRRs, send their asses off to job training and trade schools, and be done with the silliness of taking a foreign language (unless that's part of the job training), learning about the Civil War, or reading some great piece of literature.

Let's stop fooling ourselves if nobody outside of an online discussion forum cares about learning. Because endeavors like thinking and asking questions aren't important and fundamental to being human. I can't help but wonder what the ancient and medieval schools would think of modern attitude toward education.

eah, Kant always seemed to me to be engaged in a purely apologetic exercise that went nowhere. I was never taken in by him. — The Great Whatever

Next, you'll be taking aim at Witty ;)

I don't know if 'foot' would be a possible body-part to genuinely feel you are identified with, but I don't see a reason to exclude it either if, in fact, body-part identification is something you learn from the culture you're born into. — Moliere

Reason we learn to identify consciousness with our heads is because all the evidence correlates with the brain and not the foot. But if panpsychism is true, then neurons (and only neurons in certain regions) in the skull shouldn't be special when it comes to consciousness.

How does my experience of being a human, in a world, emerge from individual particles (that have experience as part of their nature). Is my conscious experience physically located throughout the particles within my brain, only some of them, or is it an emergent entity and exists somewhere else entirely? — dukkha

And also, why isn't my foot conscious? Or is it, and my brain just isn't aware? But then why I am I located with my brain and not my foot?

I never found Humean skepticism about causation to be compelling. It's just obviously so that there is an order in the world that goes beyond mere conjunction. Humean causation, at least on the face of it, reduces the entire universe to radical contingency, which is prima facie absurd.

Also, the idea that the sun could stop shining tomorrow (or water ceasing to be boiled by heat) being analogous to Thanksgiving for the turkey just seems very wrong, as if anything could literally happen at any moment, we've just been lucky so far the cosmos appears orderly.

And all of that just to maintain purity of skeptical empiricism, instead of just admitting the very well could be more to the world than meets the senses. It's too high of a price to pay.

So is your moral realism based on pleasure being the highest good, which wold be true for all beings capable of pain and pleasure?

Because I can sort of see how one would argue for moral realism on those grounds. But I'm an external world realist, so if morality isn't found out there, then it isn't real in my book.

Is there a difference between determining something and objectively determining something? Clearly I can determine it, and so can you, since we already did. — The Great Whatever

We happen to be in agreement that torturing kids is wrong. But I'm sure we can find moral issues that we will strongly disagree with. What then?

If they thought that, then clearly they're wrong. — The Great Whatever

What makes them wrong, though? Because the rest of us say so?

Don't get me wrong, I think it's immoral in the extreme in the non-realist sense. I just don't see how one can philosophically make the case for moral realism.

But that's not true at all. For example, I can say 'I bet/hope that painting is beautiful – so I hope someone gets to see it!' and this makes perfect sense, even knowing no one has seen it. But for this to make sense, it has to have been beautiful independent of anyone's seeing it. In fact, that's why we want to go see it, because it's beautiful. — The Great Whatever

Or because other human beings have similar aesthetic tastes? How do you get from people having aesthetic experiences to the object being aesthetically pleasing independent (real) of anyone?

I think an individual can see whether an object is beautiful by beholding it, but that the object is beautiful doesn't mean that their beholding it makes it beautiful. It already was; they just saw that it was. — The Great Whatever

There do exist sado masochists. One particularly nasty individual in the early 20th century tortured and killed a bunch of kids. He got off on that stuff.

Reason I bring it up is because you have vigorously defended hedonism, and in conjunction with knowing something is beautiful just by perceiving it, how do you account for such individuals? Are they wrong?

think an individual can see whether an object is beautiful by beholding it, but that the object is beautiful doesn't mean that their beholding it makes it beautiful. It already was; they just saw that it was. — The Great Whatever

But what's your rationale for this? It just sounds like an arbitrary claim where you have no means of ascertaining the truth of the matter, since other individuals can see the same object as ugly, and there is nothing else to something being beautiful than our perception of it.

I'm guessing that this all stems from your metaphysical radical subjectivism, where there is no objective truth of the matter, so all truth is whatever the individual beholds.

I'm not sure what you mean. — The Great Whatever

Are we not discussing the case for or against moral realism? I'm confused at your confusion. If morality is no better than beholding a beautiful object for any given individual, then how is it real?

But what if he just replied, 'I don't believe this map is accurate?' — The Great Whatever

Along with all other maps, official documents, governing bodies, etc?

But it's not the best example of realism, because humans somewhat arbitrarily (for historical reasons) determine what cities are the capitols.

Or what if he just said 'I don't believe my eyes reveal objects independent of them?' — The Great Whatever

DC would still be the intersubjective capitol, but for such a person, I'm not going to hold my breath on any realist claims from them.

Is there a difference between there being a truth to the matter, and an objective truth to the matter? Claiming there's no truth to the matter would seem to commit one to saying nothing is tasty, which is wrong, since plenty of things are. So you must have something else in mind. — The Great Whatever

Realism - there is no real taste value. Similarly, there are no real moral or aesthetic values. Only subjective or culturally defined ones.

don't know, because I've never tried fruitcake (that I can remember). — The Great Whatever

The point is that there is no objective truth of the matter about whether fruit cake tastes well. In fact, the taste of fruit cake is entirely a creature and individual matter, for those who can taste fruit cake as anything.

I'm just pointing out that that's an odd belief, and I'm not sure how to convince you otherwise. — The Great Whatever

Shouldn't that tell you something? If I claimed that New York was the capital of the US, you could show me how I'm wrong.

What is more objective than looking at something and seeing that it's beautiful? Aren't all methods of inquiry in some sense observational like this? — The Great Whatever

No, consider taste:

Me: This fruitcake is the best tasting stuff on Earth. You: fruit cake is disgusting. It should never have been made. It's an abomination to human taste buds.

Turkey Vulture: might as well be a rock. (I have no idea whether turkey vultures have an interest in fruit cake but I'm guessing some animals would be totally disinterested).

What is the truth about whether fruit cake tastes amazing? It's entirely a subjective matter. There is no objective, or real fact of the matter.

Do you always think you're wrong, or there's no fact of the matter, juyt because someone disagrees with you? People have different opinions, that's perfectly common. — The Great Whatever

Right, and in some cases we have objective means of determining who's right. But this is not so with aesthetics or morality.

No; whether the object is beautiful is. Of course, I can often tell whether an object is beautiful by seeing (etc.) it. — The Great Whatever

Even though people disagree with you? What makes so sure?

Why would the culture's opinions matter? Just because someone has an opinion that p, doesn't mean that p. No? — The Great Whatever

Because there is no other fact of the matter.

Uh, I don't know. I would have to know what song you were talking about. — The Great Whatever

So you are the arbitrator of what's beautiful?

Really? What are those methods? — The Great Whatever

Those would be scientific, logical or mathematical methods. They're objective.

Shouldn't you look at (or otherwise experience) the thing itself, to find out if it's beautiful, rather than asking or observing whether people find it beautiful? — The Great Whatever

So when I find a movie or song to be beautiful and moving, and then other people, perhaps even friends or family, find it to be otherwise, who is right? Am I beholding the movie or song correctly, or are they?

So, is the idea that if people defend different sides of an issue, there's no objective truth to the matter? — The Great Whatever

For morality and aesthetics, I would say yes, because we have no other way of determining their truth than what people find moral or beautiful.

It's different with empirical or mathematical claims, because we do have means to investigate independent of what one group or another thinks. There are still some people who remain convinced the world is flat, but they're simply wrong. This is easily shown.

But if we have two cultures, where one thinks that torturing kids in some situations is moral, and the other disagrees, then what independent means is their to determine who's right?

'm not sure about this. It seems to me that certain things are beautiful and others less so, or not. Isn't this a kind of realism about aesthetics? Certainly I don't think my beholding them makes them beautiful, rather I appreciate that they are (and others can too). — The Great Whatever

You behold them as beautiful because of the kind of creature and individual you are, not because they are beautiful. A turkey vulture likely finds the smell of dead carcasses to be intoxicating. Humans find it revolting. But okay, that's a different topic.

It is interesting how in the past you have defending radical subjectivism, and I've defended realism about the world, yet here we are totally the opposite side.

think the moral realism/anti-realism debate can be approached in a different angle: moral realists typically believe moral truths can be discovered — darthbarracuda

But where are they discovered from? Nature is no guide to moral behavior, plus the whole is-ought distinction. It's left to human culture, and human cultures vary quite a bit. Individuals and groups within a culture often disagree a lot on what's moral.

So to TGW's point that disagreement doesn't mean there's not an objective reality, this is true. However, we have no justification for thinking so, because we can't know it. I think it goes farther than that, actually. Moral values only exist in social groups, and social groups disagree on what's moral, therefore there is no real standard.

Just to put this out there for everyone, as a counter to TGW's claim that torturing children is objectively wrong because presumably everyone agrees, consider the institution of slavery throughout history, particularly in the Americas.

There are other examples. Some cultures have practiced human sacrifice, probably as a sacrifice to their gods. Then there's female circumcision, untouchable class distinctions, conquest by war, and many other abominable practices that were seen as justifiable and even good. There's probably even been some offering of children as a sacrifice, given a couple references in the Old Testament.

And then there's how the Spartans treated their kids to toughen them up, which might be considered as a form of torture to modern values.