Your intuitions about intuition could use some development. — wonderer1

It’s not my intuitions about it it’s just the simple fact. Even what you cited before about observing people lots of times it’s knowledge, knowledge of body language.

You’re making it more than it actually is which is something a lot of people like to do.

Intuition is rooted in knowledge. The more you know the better it is. It honestly doesn’t matter what you think about it, doesn’t change what it is.

There is more to it than simply acquiring knowledge. Tom Storm and T Clark brought up important points. TS brought up experience and TC brought up attentiveness. — wonderer1

Nope, that's pretty much it. Intuition is improved by acquiring knowledge. That's all.

Did you read the paper or just a summary Darkneos? — Philosophim

I did read it, but in the end it still feels like the "I" is being assumed there.

In the future you might want to start with a summary of what you're getting at an use smaller words, everyone so far doesn't really see what you're getting at.

No, because if I find a cat and try to say its a dog, I'm wrong. If I claim something is a dog, I must prove its a dog. Matching identities to objects is not a circular argument. — Philosophim

you don't prove something is a dog so much as say it is one. Matching IDs to objects is circular because it all comes down to saying it is that "because I said so". Which is fine, I mean that's what definitions are.

No, this is just lazy analysis Darkneos. Which look, if you're not interested in addressing the actual argument, that's fine. I don't care about convincing you. I care about having a discussion over the paper. If you're just going to blanket state that everything I've done is an opinionated assertion without demonstrating that you understand the vocabulary of the argument or the reasoning, then this is just removing yourself from the discussion, not skepticism. — Philosophim

Because it is and all you're really doing is just asserting that it isn't. And I don't know how much I can repeat that point for you to understand it.

I don't have to see inside of your mind to verify this. If you want to take the conversation seriously, please re-read to understand what discrete experience is, and the proof for why it is also applicably known. — Philosophim

I don't have to reread it, that's why I said what I said.

If you're going to dismiss the theory without going over the points and showing why they're wrong, then of course there's nothing to talk about. I'm asking for serious approaches, not dismissals. No, according to the theory 2+2=5 would be wrong. If you're going to not try, then that's fine, I'll just let the conversation end. If you want the potential at actually exploring a theory of knowledge that could be useful in your own life, lets be more serious. — Philosophim

Your theory is just your say so. This is a serious approach and you just keep reasserting your points like they've been shown to be the case. I still don't know if there is an "I" that is experiencing anything. Just like Descartes you assume the conclusion. You're reasoning follows only if you get past the starting point , so far you just insist otherwise. Your theory still requires the same leap of faith every philosophy starts off on. That's the point of axioms, you can never prove them and yet without them you get nothing.

Oh, I don't mean like a human. If that test isn't satisfactory to you, the test is just to see if an animal can separate X from Y. Food vs not food would probably have been a better example. — Philosophim

See my previous statement.

I have. That isn't really considering the points or a refutation. — Philosophim

My point is that animals will try to leave but don't see there is an exit, I've seen it many times before (in fact I have to catch them and put them out otherwise they just fly around). Not to mention it's still an assumption you are making.

That's not a circular argument. If I have the definition of a dog, find a dog and demonstrate that the thing is a dog, that's not a circular argument. Same with sensation. — Philosophim

That is circular though because you're pretty much saying a dog is a dog.

Its not an assumption, its an inescapable reality. — Philosophim

Except it isn't as I have said and shown.

No, this is not circular. If you re-read the section I apply this notion of discrete experience to reality. Its my own reality. Again, if you are a human replying to me, you do the same. If you are able to read these words, you're able to see the black on the screen as something which you can ascribe an identity to. Your ability to make any sense of it requires you to discretely experience those words as something separate from the white nearby. You cannot deny that you do this. For to even attempt to deny that you do this, means you must have discretely experienced a concept that you're trying to deny. — Philosophim

Again no it doesn't mean that, this is just you trying to force your definition on reality.

The M Trilemma issue has nothing to do with axioms. You also did not address my point where I noted the axioms I start with can be tested with the final theory and confirmed. I invite you to try to use the theory and find one of the three logical fallacies that is what the M Trilemma notes. — Philosophim

Not really, axioms can't be tested, they have to be taken as true in order to get off the ground. Trying to prove the axioms is akin to assuming the conclusion.

No, they simply aren't rational under the theory. Its like someone saying 2+2=5. They can believe it all they want, it doesn't mean that they've objectively solved the math problem correctly. — Philosophim

"under the theory" which is pretty much just saying "according to me". They have solved the math problem correctly if according to them 2+2=5. We agree that 2+2=4 but if someone doesn't you can't really convince them otherwise.

Is this an objectively rational conclusion? Claiming rationality is subjective contradicts itself. At that point I can claim from my subjective viewpoint that rationality is objective. And to hold onto your claim, you have to agree with me. Holding onto a claim which leads to a paradox or contradiction is of course, not objectively rational. — Philosophim

Again, according to you.

I've never encountered a bot with your level of sophistication. Its plausible, but that doesn't outweigh the possibility you're a person. Same with the random slapping of keys. Probability wise, I already know that's nigh impossible, so this argument doesn't work either. So its most rational for me to believe you're a human being. So no, your arguments aren't enough. The fact that you typed, "I don't discretely experience", means you do. Since the inductions failed, try to look at the argument as it is and see if you can refute it. — Philosophim

Well, no. You know none of these things, these are all just assumptions you are taking on. There is no reason to think that this is a human being after all if you break it down. Typing "i don't discretely experience" is evidence enough that I don't unless you're claiming to have knowledge of the inside of my mind and subjective experience to verify this, which you can't.

Like I keep saying, your theory fails before it gets off the ground. You can't see (or won't admit) the things you take on faith in order to get it to work.

Even your starting chain of "I discretely experience" is little more than an axiom. It doesn't demonstrate and I or experiencer or that you break things apart as you say you do. I can't get inside your head to confirm it so it's just something I have to take your word for.

Try as you might your theory falls to strong skepticism.

No, I do not assume faith in my observations or even that I can know things. I build that up from assumptions, yes. But then I try to disprove those assumptions afterward. The thing about the theory is once you understand it, you can apply it to every single one of the prior assumptions. Starting with assumptions is not illogical as long as you can go back and prove those assumptions must be. The M Trilemma in specific is about claiming that all ideas devolve into one of three fallacies, circular, dogmatic, or regressive. You've made a claim that the argument is circular, but you have not proven so. If you can prove that the theory devolves into one of those 3, then you would be correct. Can you do so? — Philosophim

You do, we all do, because without that ground faith nothing else is possible same with that you can know things. You cannot prove these assumptions must be without being circular, like using sensation to prove sensation.

Yes, because you answered my question. To answer my question you would have had to read. If you read, then you're able to part existence out. Can you differentiate between letters? Then you discretely experience. Your very denial that you discretely experience leads to a contradiction, therefore you discretely experience. — Philosophim

Nope. Still doesn’t mean I discretely experience. I could just be a bot after all, or just smacking the keys and yielding this. Can I know the letters, maybe, you don’t know that. My denial doesn’t lead to a contradiction, it’s more like you’re just really wanting to be what is a maybe to be a certainty. It’s not proof by contradiction, it’s wishful thinking at best.

Example: As a very basic test, put an animal in a room. Have an open exit. See if the animal ever tries to leave. A non-discrete experiencer would not be able to recognize there is an exit just like a camera cannot recognize anything about the picture it is taking. — Philosophim

You’ve obviously never seen an animal trying to leave.

Depending on a person's context, yes, it might be more rational to believe God will do it. But they must applicably prove so within their context. Do they have distinctive knowledge of a God that's non-synonymous with another identity? Have they ever applicably known this God? Have they applicably known God to change a lottery ticket before? If not, then its merely a plausibility. Compared to the known probability, its still more rational for them to choose the probability.

Also, we can evaluate other people as being rational, as being rational is objective. I can ask a person all of these questions, and if they give answers that do not align with actually applicably knowing these questions, then we can tell them they did not actually applicably know, and were not being rational. Their feelings or disagreement is moot. — Philosophim

They don’t have to prove anything. Your questions aren the right ones either. Being rational isn’t objective though, it’s subjective. Maybe to you they aren’t rational because YOUR questions aren’t satisfied but that doesn’t mean anything besides you being upset about it.

No, that is an induction. Has every single idea been proven to devolve into the M Trilemma? Of course not. Feel free to prove it if so. An induction is a conclusion that does not necessarily occur from the premises. If you have not proven that all ideas devolve into the M Trilemma, then it is an induction. — Philosophim

I’d argue yes since all ideas eventually have to start from axioms without exception. There is no branch of philosophy without axioms.

Discrete experience is the ability to part and parcel the full set of experience you have. Discrete experience allows us to observe parts of experience. Go back to the camera which merely splashes light on a piece of paper versus that which can interpret sections such as a sun, a field, and a sheep on the paper. As a very simple point, can you see a difference between letters and words? Can you ignore the letter and simply focus on a black piece on your screen? That's discrete experience.

Can you understand concepts apart from the totality of what you experience? That's discrete experience. Because I can form this concept in my head, and I find that simply challenging the idea, "I don't discretely experience" necessitates that I discretely experience, I have a claim that cannot be contradicted by reality. Thus, my first set of distinctive knowledge. This is not an assumption or circular. The very negation of it proves that it must be.

And example of a circular argument is, "The bible tells me God is real. God tells me the bible is truth. Therefore God is real." This cannot be proven by contradiction. If I state, "The bible isn't true" we have a situation in which God doesn't have to be real. The negation does not create a contradiction. I do not see this with discrete experience. — Philosophim

This is still circular as it’s just operating on the definition you say it is. You have a claim that can be contradicted by reality because all you’re doing is just saying that you do this, you haven’t shown that you do. It’s all just words. Also I’m pretty sure monks in Buddhism don’t discretely experience either and Buddhism seems to be against such a view of the world calling it illusion.

Try as you might it’s still an assumption you are making rooted in the faith of your senses.

If you can disprove that people discretely experience, then yes, I will just have an assumption. Until then, its both distinctively and applicably known. If you discretely experience, then of course you experience. Being able to doubt or invent a plausibility such as, "What if I don't actually experience?" is fine. But if you've experienced at least once, which you would need to even ask the question, then its possible that you experience. So once again possibility is more cogent than plausibility, and the plausible question can be dismissed as a less rational induction to believe and explore.

Also, while there may have been assumptions made to think through the theory, I can go back to each assumption and apply the theory to it. Many theories of knowledge fail when this is done. Mine doesn't. If you think it does, please demonstrate where it does. — Philosophim

Yours still doesn’t make it past the starting block. It’s not know other people experience, you just assume that. You can’t even know if you do, it’s just assumed. Nothing you have said so far shows me that you or I do, not even me replying to you.

And most importantly: any study has its sensory foundation on which it builds a complex understanding. All sciences presuppose sensory (I don't use this term. Too Kantian) givenness, and therefore, there is the claim that all science is analytically reducible to just this, as in Kant's, sensory intuitions are blind without concepts; concepts without sensory intuitions are empty. — Astrophel

This is incorrect. There is just sensation, it’s not a presupposition. Also sensory intuitions aren’t blind without concepts and there are plenty of concepts without sensory intuitions that aren’t empty. Again you’re still the wrong here and Wittgenstein was wrong too.

Insulting talk about rambling has no place in a discussion. Don't be a child. — Astrophel

It actually does considering multiple people have noticed it already.

All knowledge is forward looking, and so science's claims are forward looking, i.e., temporal constructions. — Astrophel

Nope. Knowledge isn’t forward looking, it just simply is or rather it's a claim about what is. Science's claims aren't temporal constructions, they just simply are, it's facts about the world which for some reason bothers you considering you want an out so bad. Just because postmodernists say something doesn’t make it so. Like I said it’s not useful when it comes to science only in literature and social sciences. Though stuff like “consciousness is language” is why a lot of people don’t take it too seriously, consciousness isn’t language. And I mentioned Sokol because it showed how there is no quality control for post modernism ideas. You can submit utter bullshit and have it published. You just sound mad.

Buddihsts are like Wittgenstein: they are right about what they do, wrong that one cannot talk about it. See the Abhidhamma: It does talk about ultimate reality and has extraordinary things to say, that is, if you are a serious meditator. But it's analyses are mostly dogmatic, though, they may be right. Hard to say since one needs to learn Pali. But I noticed it doesn't have the rigorous analysis of Husserl's Ideas or Levinas' Totality or Derrida's Margins. You CAN talk about these things, but only indirectly, which makes the field difficult because this because the material before is obscure to language, and this is because of a lack of shared experience. They say tibetan Buddhists had/have an mysterious language filled with references to things encountered only in deep meditation. — Astrophel

Kinda shows you don’t understand Buddhism or even talked to monks about this. There is a reason they talk about practice. They can’t talk about it which is why near the end of the route you’re told to forget everything you were taught because this cannot be taught or talked about without losing it. Or to cite something they often say “if you see the Buddha on the road, kill him”.

People don't read philosophy. That is why they don't get it. Simple as that. I have encountered some who, finding that they really know nothing at all about what they post , like yourself, are inspired to read after our exchanges. One reason why I go on. You may not admit it to me, but later you will perhaps read to see what it is you have been attacking so vacantly.

Have a lovely time with Heidegger. Rorty considered him, along with Dewey and Wittgenstein, to be among the greatest philosopher of the 20th century. Being and Time is literally life changing.

Later.....perhaps. — Astrophel

They do read it, most just realize it’s more like glorified opinions than truth or knowledge.

But reading this just confirms to me that this is all just ego stroking and you don’t have an actual point and you’re so smart for reckoning with the questions the “normies” don’t. This thread was just you rambling with no point and I think everyone else saw that.

Again it just really sounds like you can't accept reality for what it is.

Then again you did say knowledge is existentially meaningless so it's hard to take what you say seriously. By that logic you know nothing and are saying nothing, as am I. Good talk.

Right, learning is required and the consequences of that learning are not fully predictable. However, I'm not talking in black and white terms, of intuitions either being perfectly accurate or totally unreliable. I'm just suggesting that intuitions can be improved to a significant degree. — wonderer1

By acquiring knowledge

But really, Darkneos, all this says is no. You have to come to grips with this and try harder to actually make a case. I can help you:

You would have to show how context changes pain and any affectivity at all, in the same way the knife's sharpess changes from good to bad given the context of its appearance. You see this, right? You are trying to make the claim that pain qua pain is context determined. There is a very good work on this by Stanley Fish in his Is There a Text in this Class: He argues that context makes the determination, and apart from this, there is no "center" of knowledge claims. All is contingent, just as you are defending here. A student asks if there is a text in the class coming up soon, but the prof is confused: does she mean text to be a textbook? Or is it the that the student left her book and is looking for it? Or, does the prof have a textual frame of reference for the way the ideas will be discussed? — Astrophel

There isn't a case to make, that's just how pain is. That's also not what I am arguing. Some knowledge claims have a center, where it is irrelevant what you think or feel about them. Others do, like pain. Context changes pain and feeling, it always has since our emotions are dependent on stimuli among other things. You haven't really shown how it's not otherwise.

You see this?: text, text or text, three alternative possibilities, each very different, ambiguously in play, at once! This is contingency, and it is the kind of thing post modern thinking is about, this loss of determinacy in foundations of meaning. Is the world not like this when language speaks it's truths? — Astrophel

Postmodernism has a use in the social sciences and literature, but not in science. Despite what they think not every truth is rooted in a cultural or social context. Also you're kinda just rambling now, not making much sense. Though no, that is not what postmodernists are saying either. To be honest I don't think the field ever recovered from the Sokal Affair.

"Recent philosophies suggest pain to be an illusion?" Fascinating! tell me how works: how can it be that my toothache is illusory? — Astrophel

I don't know and I'm not entirely sure it does, ask the Buddhists monks. Though they'll tell you there is no logic behind it and words can't describe it.

I know you don't want to think like this, but I am guessing since this is a strain of philosophical thought that dominates our age, and really: it is on YOUR side of tis issue, that it might be useful to you the next time you you defend your, well, curmudgeon-ism.
Science doesn't think like this because it is thematically outside its purview. That is, it simply don't take up questions like this, just as astronomers do not take up basket weaving. It is simply not what they do. This is philosophy, an essentially apriori "science." — Astrophel

This is still more rambling, whatever point you're trying to make here just seems lost. I don't think like this because there isn't really much value to it. Science isn't outside it's purview though. If anything it probably won't be long before we're able to explain everything since the brain is the root of it all. Neuroscience is certainly advancing faster and faster, though hopefully climate change doesn't get us before then.

If this is philosophy you're more or less proving my point about how useless it is. 5 pages of you typing screeds, going on tangents, and people asking you what the point is and still nothing. I'm honestly just convinced this is more ego stroking than getting at any point that is meaningful or useful, or both. It honestly reminds me of how I used to be.

I'll repeat, it just sounds like you want reality to be something it just isn't and won't be.

Do you speak from experience? Have you tried improving your intuitions, and always failed? — wonderer1

There's no way to improve your intuitions apart from learning about something, and even then it's not a guarantee.

But apart from an ethical context like this, the stand alone pain is absolute. The proof for this lies in the presence of the unmitigated pain itself and the failure to contextually change what it is. — Astrophel

Nope, once again. There really isn't another way to put it, it's not unambiguously bad.

Indeed, nothing can, which is why it is an absolute; but more: an existential absolute! This is not like Kant's pure reason or causality (found in his categories, but causality is especially poignant--so easy to demonstrate intuitively). It is in existence itself, not as an apriori principle, but an apriori actuality. A Real with a capital 'R'. — Astrophel

Again no, pain is not an absolute let alone and existential absolute. You really want there to be something solid don't you. Recent philosophies suggest pain to be an illusion and given what some monks can do there may be truth to that, or at least it seems so.

A most important point in this: I am arguing that it is affectivity that is at the heart of what Truth and Reality IS. — Astrophel

It's not, this has been shown to be false hundreds of times via science.

Affectivity of any kindcannot be mitigated or altered. — Astrophel

Yes it can.

This is why Wittgenstein insisted that ethics and value cannot be discussed: They are IN the givenness of the world, and are irreducibly what they are. We can argue about contingencies, but not about ethics/aesthetics/value AS SUCH! — Astrophel

He was wrong.

I'm giving short answers here because literally nothing you have given is some kinda core aspect to life, not even pain. Ethics and value are discussed literally every day, they aren't given they are made by us. Good and bad can be reverse and they often are.

Again, you REALLLLLLY want reality to be something other than it is and it's....just not.

Its not an assumption, its a proof if anyone can grasp the concept. If you can't discretely experience, then you can't differentiate between the letters, words, and sentences you read. In communicating with each other, we've already proven we discretely experience. To even doubt the idea that you discretely experience means that you have experience, and that you can view it as parts like words and concepts. Its proof by contradiction. — Philosophim

Well no, we haven't proven a "we" here, just assumed. Again you're still making an assumption based on your own experience, but you could just be talking to yourself (a la figments of imagination and all that). I can have experience, supposedly, but that doesn't mean I am viewing it as parts and words and concepts. You're assuming too much.

We can also prove that animals discretely experience. As long as they consistently model behavior beyond random chance that shows they can identify something, they do. Does this mean they can every comprehend what they're doing in a meta analysis like we can? Not necessarily. But, this theory of knowledge can easily be applied to any discretely experiencing thing, not merely humans. — Philosophim

Nope, we can't prove animals discretely experience, we can only infer that based on behavior. Also calling it theory of knowledge is a stretch, you're kinda anthropomorphizing here.

Here's an example.

Probability: The chance of winning a lottery ticket is 1 out of 10,000,000.
Possibility: People have won the lottery before, so its possible I could win.
Plausible: God will intervene and make the next ticket I purchase a winning ticket.

If I was discussing with someone else, or even analyzing these myself, I might be very tempted to want one of these inductions over the other. But, if I understand what's most rational, whatever I or anyone else may feel, its most rational to make my decision using the probability. The most rational conclusion is not to buy a ticket, and put the money to some better use. — Philosophim

Why is it most rational to take your position of probability? Depending on the person it might be more rational to believe god will do it. Something being rational doesn't mean right or true necessarily. This is just another assumption.

If this is a theory of knowledge, it should work everywhere including science. Context is of course important as well. To continue with the example earlier, Newton's laws were still sound when we used them for small bodies. Once relativity was found out, we also could reduce it down to Newton's laws at small bodies. This allowed us to use a simpler equation and set of identities at one level, and the more complex set of equations and identities at another. — Philosophim

Well no, you can have different theories of knowledge like science does where different ones apply to different levels of reality. That's why quantum physics was such an upset.

Agreed, but this theory defeats radical skepticism. There is a base of distinctive knowledge, and everything builds up from that. Further, you can take the vocabulary within the theory, apply it to itself from the beginning, and it still holds strong. If you would like, put forward some radical skepticism ideas and I will post how the theory solves the issue. — Philosophim

You haven't really shown it has defeated radical skepticism, I keep saying you're making a bunch of assumptions. Even the fact I experience isn't certain, I could be wrong in some wacky and EXTREMELY paradoxical or whatever way. You still haven't even gotten past the existence of an experiencer or an I (and Eastern philosophy has some strong challenges to both). You pretty much have to take axioms like everyone else.

As I've noted, my theory starts with a proof by contradiction. To be able to If we couldn't discretely experience, then we could not understand the concept of discrete experience. Because we do understand the concept, we discretely experience. Since this is neither circular, dogmatic, or regressive, I've refuted the Manchausen Trilemma.

Lets go one farther using the hierarchy of induction. The M Trilemma states that all ideas will end in an irrational position.

We don't applicably know this as we have not applied the M Trilemma to all ideas. Therefore this is an induction.

We don't have a probability as we don't have enough applicable knowledge to establish one.
We do know that some ideas have ended by resting on a circular, dogmatic, or regressive idea, we do know its possible for this to happen to ideas.
Its plausible that all ideas fall to the M Trilemma.

Since we know it is possible that some fall to the M Trilemma, but the claim that it applies to all is a plausibility, it is more rational to hold onto the possibility and dismiss the plausibility if we decide to settle on a belief. So the more rational induction to hold is that it is possible that ideas can end up falling to the M Trillemma. The induction that all will, is less cogent, and therefore can be dismissed in any rational discussion. — Philosophim

Well no, we don't understand the concept of discretely experience, again this is just a you thing. Get out of your own head. It is very much circular.

Lastly it's not really induction that all will, it's just a fact. Everything is built on language that only makes sense in a social setting and that we made up to be self referential in order to talk to each other. So off the bat you're on shaky ground. For your theory to even get off the ground it has to take things as a given, just like everything else. Chiefly the axioms listed in the video I posted, faith in your observations and that you can know things. We take these for granted a lot of the time.

You haven't really gotten around it.

The pain is ahistorically bad. It cannot be mitigated for what it is, only how for how it stands against competing interests, and such things are, of course, variable among cultures. But the child, say, who suffers for the greater good, does not thereby suffer differently. — Astrophel

Think you meant historical there, even then it's still not true. But it can be mitigated for what it is, also suffering for the greater good is suffering differently, way differently in fact.

I didn't take it that way. I think we maybe agree on the proper mix of appreciation and irreverence. Some of the old geniuses might be able to revolutionize philosophy again once they were up to speed. — plaque flag

Maybe....mayyybe.

But the matter turns to the notorious good and bad of ethics. Is it at all possible to deny a lighted match on living flesh is "bad"? — Astrophel

Given human history yes it is very possible to deny that is bad.

IOW, doubting and logically evaluating intuitions can lead to having very reliable intuitions in the future. There is a synergy that can arise from the interaction of slow thinking and fast thinking. — wonderer1

Not exactly no, intuition is more just playing off what you already know hence why it’s reliable with an expert. Logically evaluating them won’t take you anywhere.

A discrete experience is not a claim about the truth of what is being experienced. It is the act of creating an identity within the sea of one’s experience. A camera can take a picture, but cannot attempt to put any identity to any of the colors it absorbs. I can take a picture, look at portions of it, and make “something” within the “everything else”. It is the ability to part and parcel within the totality of one’s experience as one chooses.

Is this something I know? Knowledge is a deduction that is not contradicted by reality. I must be able to experience discretely to comprehend the idea of “discrete experience.” But I also must be able to experience discretely to comprehend the idea of the idea being contradicted by reality. For if I could not create identities, I could not create the idea of identities. For reality to contradict that I discretely experience, and to know this, I must be able to discretely experience. Therefore, I do not simply believe that I discretely experience, I deduce that I discretely experience. Therefore, I know that I discretely experience. — Philosophim

Mostly from some forms of eastern philosophy and some branches of non dualism that don't create identity from experience. This also assumes you know the state of the minds of others and just assume people do this. On could also un knowingly be able to experience discretely and yet not be able to comprehend the idea of it, I would cite animals as this case (at least I assume from their behaviors). So this act of creation is more an assumption than a fact of living things, or in this case humans.

This is fair as I paired this down a bit. The difference between each type of induction is how many steps it is from what is applicably known.

When you know the entire composition of a deck of cards and that it will be shuffled without intent, the next immediate induction you can make is that a Jack has a 4/52 chance of being drawn. There's nothing in between right?

Now look at possibilities. I've seen a jack drawn before. I believe its possible that it will be drawn on the next pull. But its less rational of an induction then utilizing the applied knowledge of the card counts, the suits, and the face. Something being possible only indicates that it was applicably known once. It has no bearing on whether it will happen again.

This allows me a set way to compare two inductions and determine which one is more rational to hold. I'ld say that's pretty useful right? — Philosophim

I guess that probability is more a likelihood within a known quantity like a deck. Possible is if it can happen. Plausible is more like a maybe it COULD be. I'm still not sure how one is more useful than the other though.

Could you specify what was iffy? Let me sum what the difference was.

Truth: What exist in reality.
Knowledge: A set of identities which when applied as matching with reality, are not contradicted by reality.

The point here is that knowledge can never "know" that what it holds is truth. All it can know is that what it currently holds has not been contradicted by reality.

As an example to this abstract, distinctively and applicably known physics from the 1700's is not the same as physics from today. There were certain identities in physics that when applied with the tools available, were not contradicted by reality. However, eventually certain contradictions were found such as with orbiting large bodies. What was applicably know for small bodies could no longer be applied to planets. Eventually relativity came along. Today, we distinctively and applicably know things in science that in 100 years, may no longer stand.

What was the problem you were thinking this missed? — Philosophim

I guess I have a more loose version of truth. For me truth is what IS and what comports with reality and evidence. Because one can "know" something and it be false (flat earth, autism and vaccines). It's why I said that knowledge sometimes yields truth. But I wouldn't exactly say that just because it doesn't know what it's got it has nothing, just that it might be so and not be aware of it.

Science I wouldn't really use as an example as it's designed to be a constantly evolving process, and even then it's complex. Like classical and quantum physics. It's not that classical is "Wrong" per se, just useful at our level of complexity (and that it is if you see what we've done with it). But in terms of reality as it is then the quantum world is where it's at, maybe.

A fantastic question, perhaps the best one. I find epistemology to be one of the core unsolved questions of philosophy, and the most important one. "How do we know what we know," is incredibly important before any serious discussion can occur. Being able to identity what another person distinctively and applicably knows is immensely valuable in debating another person. If you see that the conflict is merely over the distinctive differences in identities, you can refocus energy and efforts on that instead of the applicable.

As well, to my knowledge there is no theory in epistemology at this point in history which allows us a reasoned way to compare inductions and ascertain that one is more cogent than another in a particular situation. Intuitively we feel this, but no one has ever actively given an objective means to do so. Sometimes this is called "The problem of induction". The theory here gives a solution to this problem. — Philosophim

I guess I never really give much thought as to how I know what I know because in the past I tend to spiral into some radical skepticism where I know nothing and end up catatonic. I usually operate on what works and so far it seems to be the case.

While "how do we know what we know" is a nice question to ask, at some point we have to realize that everything ends in some irrational position, according to the Munchausen Trilemma. I think there was a thread on here called On Knowing that seems to illustrate my point.

I think a youtube video I saw put it well: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h2Vx9qoLzFs&t=185s&ab_channel=ExtraHistory

"When you drill all the way down, you'll find something you're just gonna have to believe".

Yes, Darkneos, I am familiar with the philosophy of "Bah Humbug!" — Astrophel

Say what you will but certainty is more a myth humans tell themselves because of anxiety.

Yes, that sounds right. I don't want to pick on Kant too much, because for his time he was a great genius. According to Popper and others, Newton was just a towering figure. Instruments were not precise enough to find fault with his physics. It was if the source code for the matrix had been discovered, a great triumph for species. Small wonder that Kant wanted to secure this treasure against Hume from being falsifiable. Synthetic apriori truth is tall order indeed. — plaque flag

Oh no I'm not saying he's an idiot, sorry if that's how it came across.

It's just that it's hard sometimes to realize how far our understanding of the world has come since then, especially neuroscience and other fields. They worked with what they knew at the time so I wonder what they would say with what we know now.

This kinda breaks down as you don’t really demonstrate we have discrete experiences but just assert we do. Same with a lot of other things in the OP.

Also the differences between the forms of induction are just splitting hairs than any actual distinction between them, apart from irrationality.

I found your “split” between knowledge and truth iffy at best. Knowledge does capture the truth at times but not always.

And my usual final question, what’s the point here?

No, you miss the point: knowledge of anything requires inquiry into that thing. You don't inquire philosophically, therefore you don't understand its issues.

It is not about ego. It is about basic reading. You need to do this, then your anxieties on this will disappear. — Astrophel

Not really, I can understand the issues of philosophy without looking deeply into it.

I have no anxieties around this but it sure seems like you do. For me philosophy is a nice hobby at times but I don’t get too worked up.

Yes, ethics. But how to live depends not simply on setting up a system for personal behavior: such a system needs a grounding in the understanding. Christians have a system, time honored and useful. But it comes with a metaphysics that is confused and dangerous. Philosophy is the tool to discover where things go wrong and how they might be reviewed and revised.
You likely have similar problems in the basic justifications of how to live, and I say this because you seem to be admitting that such a review is useless. Fundamentalists of all stripes think just like this, embracing foolishness, then reifying it in the public consensus. — Astrophel

Not really. Ethics just needs a system for personal behavior, that’s about it. It’s useful to know why but eventually you hit a dead end there.

Philosophy isn’t a tool to discover where things go wrong though. If anything it just ties things up and prevents meaningful action a lot of the time.

I don’t need a justification for living. It’s just as simple as wanting to.

Again you’re painting a lot on here which just reaffirms my position that you’re just stroking your ego here.

They certainly do impact your life if you want to understand things beyond what "people say". Descartes' evil demon is just to demonstrate a point, like Schrodinger's cat. Not just a game, but an illustrative game. — Astrophel

Not really.

It is an important distinction: to be IN an environment implies that this environment is somehow outside or apart from one. I am saying, onw is not IN an environment like this in discussing experiential structure: Rather, one IS the the very structure one analyzes. It is a turning toward one's own existence for discovery, for, after all, the issue here is the relation between ME an that fence post, so what I AM and the distinctions that descriptively rise up when I try to make sense of something like "I experience a fence post" call for a sharp division between us. But is there such a thing? Does the traditional analysis of S knows P make any sense at all when it comes to identifying and releasing P from the justificatory conditions of believing P?

THIS is a very big question to philosophy. The fence post is "over there", granted; but my knowing is over here, on my side of the epistemic fence. What can possibly account for this? A fascinating question. — Astrophel

Not really, being in something doesn’t imply you are outside or apart from it, you’re just making things up.

Also can’t it be both? Why is it either or? It’s not fascinating question though, more ego stroking. And might I add no point either.

Heidegger believes that truth is "made" but the engagement of pursuing truth is an openness that has extraordinary VALUE, and I emphasize this because in this value is the true foundation of human cognition, which is one way to put what I have been arguing. The circle is hermeneutics. The disclosure within this is momentous. This is my position. Observe the value/aesthetic/ethical dimension of our existence, and do not simply register this as a premise, but realize this is "the place" inquiry truly seeks!

A very strong philosophical position. I am saying that Truth is really an endeavor of affectivity. We divide knowledge into categorical parts to pragmatically address our essentially problematic confrontation with the world, but this has led to the current illusion that truth is statistical, logical, rational, while affect is altogether unwelcome in describing truth (indeed, emotion has historically been willfully ignored). This is patently wrong.

As to certainty: this is not nonsense. But only if you are interested. — Astrophel

Yeah philosophers believe a lot of things, doesn’t make it true. Some truth is made and some isn’t. In the case of art it’s what we say it is, simple as. But this isn’t the foundation of human cognition. Also your place is literally nothing but an empty void. When it comes to subjective stuff like that (values, aesthetics, etc) inquiry leads nowhere. Things just are. Why do we like what we like? We just do. Why do I value this? I just do.

Truth isn’t a measure of feelings. It just is. It’s why I regard science so well. No matter how you define or describe it it just works. There is no why, it just is. Truth is statistical and logical and it’s something that bugs people like you because you want the world to be something other than it is. But it’s telling how philosophy is stuck on the same issues for hundreds of years while science advances on. Maybe, just maybe, philosophy isn’t a tool for finding truth, because a lot of it just seems like opinions to me.

Emotion hasn’t been ignored across history, it’s just not used to measure the truth of something (well if it’s subjective like how something makes you feel or if you like something then yeah). Because as research shows us, emotion is often wrong about reality (especially since our evolutionary programming runs against modern issues).

And certainty is nonsense regardless of what you think.

I’m having trouble finding it due to all the pop sci articles.

But suffice to say it’s not something apart from normal cognition, it just happens faster. You don’t just know, you think you do.

However research finds that if someone is an experience in a field then their intuition about something regarding that field is reliable.

So I guess if you don’t know anything about a subject then it’s no better than a random guess.

Intuition is the immediate response you get on a subject based on experience, prior knowledge and culture. In short it’s pretty biased.

As for its accuracy, tests show intuition seems to right about 50% of the time, so you’d have better odds through guessing

Great question. I suspect (as weird as it sounds) that Kant was saying that Newtonian physics is built in to the automatic human interpretation of otherwise obscure Reality (something actually beyond time and space.) It is only in the frozenness or unchangeability of the Form of our cognition that Newton escapes Hume ( and later Popper.) — plaque flag

Kant said a lot of things but that doesn't make them right. Classical physics was just a model that works at the macro level of things but fails when it gets to the Quantum Physics. It's a "good enough" method for day to day but not for understanding reality, at least according to the physicists I've talked to.

Well, this just says you haven't a clue. A bit like the Christian who insists through Jesus redemption arrives, but when asked how defers to faith.

If knowledge is justified true belief, and I am sure it is just this, and you believe "ability to experience" yields a justification, then show this. It is NOT that I am denying that we do have knowledge of the world AT ALL! It is rather that when you take this question seriously, you are forced to reconstrue everything everything you believe vis a vis basic questions. — Astrophel

I have "taken this question seriously" but what it come down to is all I have is experience and experimentation through experience. If that's not good enough then it sounds like a you problem. You say you're not denying knowledge o the world at all but honestly your posts say otherwise.

Anyone, that is, who does not think about serious philosophy. If scientists never tried to understand the fossil record, we would not at all have a concept in place about geologic eras and their subcategories. This is what happens when one chooses not to think. — Astrophel

Understanding the fossil record has nothing to do with philosophy bud, that's all science. Dating techniques, looking at positions in the rock layers, stuff like that. Again you're just making this harder than it needs to be. "serious philosophy" just sounds like you stroking your own ego.

No Darneos; you have it all wrong. This is because you haven't "read" your way into the discussion about the structure of consciousness. It is the only way into a philosophy of existence.

You should at least be curious as to the epistemic relation between a brain and a world. I mean, to have no analytic inquiry about this at all behind you, yet to come out swinging as you do....curious, and then some. — Astrophel

The "Structure of consciousness", at this point I'm really starting to have major doubts about you (as if the primordial origin wasn't enough). The only philosophy of existence that is worth a damn IMO is ethics or how to live. As to the relation of the brain and the world, brain constructs a best guess of reality based on the input of the senses, that's what the evidence shows.

Stuff like the Evil Demon, simulation, etc are nice games to play but they are useless to think about because they don't impact your life.

You're not really curious about this stuff, I think you're just looking to appear "smart" by asking "the big questions". I used to be like that. But after much experience I realized that a lot of the "important questions" of philosophy didn't really matter that much.

Causality is apodictic. Try imagining its contradiction.

The brain: but there is the brain and there is fence post. How does this work, exactly, or even vaguely, such that the former knows the latter. You take a philosopher like Quine, one of my favorites because he was an explicit naturalist in the Deweyan tradition, yet so revered in analytic philosophy, and you find nothing but frustration when it comes to accounting for how it is that causality, which he takes as foundational in explaining the world, produces meaning; and this has to be taken as priority: when you THINK at all, you are not IN meaning, but ARE meaning.
But such questions that apply to this kind of thinking have to begin with curiosity. One has to be motivated by seeing the deficit in human understanding at the basic level. If you don't see this, you really have no motivation, and end up in the back of the class sleeping.

Question: why take this class at all? — Astrophel

Weird that you say that about causality considering Hume made an interesting point against it. We assume causality according to him.

Again this just sounds like more ego stroking, I asked a while ago what the point is to any of this and you haven't given anything. You're all over the place, writing more than you need to, and deliberately being unclear in your communications (other posters are able to do it but you choose not to). This just sounds to me like you want to be special or unique for wrestling with such things.

I wouldn't say causality produces meaning, we do. It's actually a feature of our brains, we are meaning making machines. It's called pareidolia, it's how you can see a smiley face as a face even though it ain't really a face.

Not really sure what you mean by IN meaning or ARE meaning, it's just meaning. But then again heaven forbid you make yourself clear or explain yourself. My guess is that you are IN meaning when you think, you aren't meaning.

I mean it is obvious to everyone that we are limited in our ability to understand and know things around us. That all we will ever get is a close enough or good enough understanding of things, because you don't know what you don't know. I find it odd that someone so versed in philosophy doesn't understand that there are some problems that have no solution. Like the problem of solipsism, there is no way to get outside of your perspective so whether there is a world outside or not you'll never know and there's nothing you can do about it. Or Descartes about what can be known for certain, and you can't truly know if you're being deceived or not. There is a great degree of faith that comes with living after all.

And most people seem to do just fine knowing there won't be total certainty, because life goes on.

Curiosity is fine and all that but it does have to have a goal in mind and at times you have to be able to recognize when you simply can't. So far people have asked you what the point of all this is and as far as anyone can tell there doesn't seem to be one. It just goes in circles.

See above: How do you know objects cannot move themselves? — Astrophel

Experience. That's about it. If an object like a chair moved on it's own I'd have to consider something like ghosts since most non-living things don't tend to move on their own.

Ultimately all we got to go on is experience and our interpretation of it. You can philosophize all you want but if it doesn't stand up to the test of experience then IMO it's little more than hot air.

If knowledge is without meaning then how are you writing this and expecting others to communicate? How do you even know there are others to communicate with?

I think it's as I said before, you're kinda searching for something similar to Descartes except he had to invent god to get out of his funk. But life doesn't work like that, nothing can be definitively known beyond all doubt, it just doesn't exist. Still total certainty was always a myth anyway and we never needed it before. — Darkneos

Yes it can, this is literally the easiest thing ever. Descartes doubted it first off, well not really but many do. The pain can be doubted, and I have read some interesting Eastern Philosophy that alleges similarly as well. Though I can't honestly attest to that.

Then again there was that monk who set himself on fire and then just sat there...

Evidence of what? Evidence for the claim that the world outside our heads is not what we experience? Well, it's really not to the point. But since you asked, the world "outside" of one's head, how is it that is actually get into the head? I'm saying it doesn't because there is no way to even conceive of this. Therein lies the evidence: one way of justifying a denial that P to be true, to show that P is nonsense. — Astrophel

Not really. As to not to the point you don't really seem to have one but that's neither here nor there. Also it doesn't really "get into your head" so much as you are able to experience and act in it if you are conscious and active. It's actually really easy to conceive of it but you are making this hard than it needs to be IMO.

Keep in mind that if your belief that the world is what you see rests with "things working" then your claim would rest with pragmatics. Then you would have to show how pragmatics reveals the way the world is. That is, if S knows P, and to know is to be able to use for some purpose, then knowing is mere pragmatics, but what one knows IS the pragmatics and not the world

Generally science takes a stronger view than this, affirming the nitro's independent existence apart from the pragmatics we experience. But this, again has to be explained. I think it nonsense. — Astrophel

Science itself is a form of pragmaticism to a degree. It's focus is on testable and observable phenomenon and then it tries to generate explanations about what's going on. Granted it won't ever be complete but it's efficacy so far seems good to me.

As far as anyone knows it does reveal the way the world is given what it has done so far.

I can understand this. But a pragmatist like yourself should have an epistemology, just so your claims can be useful philosophically. Reread the things you object to, and consider the simple thesis that philosophy's pursuit of truth is REALLY an affective endeavor. So looking for truth as a propositional affair that only looks to facts is going to lead only to other facts and these the same. It is not about a quest for information about meaning. It never has been. This is the historical error that has made philosophy so intractable.
It has historically been the purview of religion to deal with value/aesthetics/ethics (the same thing in essence), and philosophy has been about analytic arguments at the basic level. I hold that philosophy IS the only authentic religion. — Astrophel

Philosophy's pursuit might be rooted in emotion but I fail to see how that changes anything. From where I stand no claim is useful philosophically because, in my experience, you can argue anything about anything and end up nowhere. If your claim can't apply to reality or affect my life in any capacity then it's kinda worthless. Otherwise we're just naval gazing, which is fine if it's just you. I also think you're just being deliberately obtuse as you aren't making yourself clear nor are you getting to any point from what I see.

Not just a form of cognition, but cognition itself. After all, how do you know modus ponens is right? How do you know objects can move themselves? The world of our understanding rests entirely on intuition.

Talk about brains: perhaps hard to see this, but brains are supposed to generate experience, and thereby give a reductive account of what experience "really" is. This is what I infer from your thoughts. but how is it one knows the brain is there to be this generative source? Why, it is through the phenomenon of the brain which the brain generates.

You DO see the issue here, yes? — Astrophel

Incorrect, the world of our understanding doesn't rest on intuition, not even close. We simply take a few things as a given and work from there. I already explained that intuition isn't good as science shows the universe doesn't work according to it. If anything I'd wager it resets on experimentation, we try things and see what works.

I know objects can move themselves if I see they have a way to propel themselves without the need of some outside force to move them.

There is no reductive account of what experience "really is" it's simply experience. Neurons and signals and all that stuff firing and processing sensory data. We know the brain does this as we have a ton of evidence to back it, and so far nothing to the contrary. Your last part is just nonsense. The brain is just there, the phenomenon doesn't generate it.

There is no issue here you just want there to be one.

Again, this all just reads like someone who wants reality to be something other than it actually is.

Perhaps a silly question - but if, as Kant and subsequent others suggest, space and time are built into our cognitive apparatus and not the universe , does this not suggest that the laws of physics are a reflection of how we process reality, not reality as it is in itself (the ineffable noumena). And does it follow from this that hypothetical sophisticated aliens who do not utilize human cognition might have developed an entirely different and efficacious alternative to our physics? A physics which appears to map onto their world the way ours appears to map onto ours? And there's the possibility that even this account of reality, however it might appear, is still just an appearance... — Tom Storm

According to general relativity that isn't the case. The laws of physics do explain how we process reality (partly, rest is neuroscience).

Kant many have posited a lot of things but that didn't make him right. I mean...he did exist prior to all the massive scientific discoveries that rocked our understanding of reality. IF anything science demonstrates that our intuition isn't a good measure of reality.

From what I read it's more like he is saying that reason alone, absent experience, can't lead to any real knowledge. It's sort of like trying to form an untainted truth about the world.

It just seems to me like OP is after some untainted source.

All you're really gonna get is a representation. Even our brains only give us a best guess about what the world around us is like, and even then you still run into the Evil Demon and other issues. You can think you found the ground level but that will still remain a belief.

But I'm pretty sure that Kant said you CAN'T know truth through pure reason alone.

What is it to know? If there is no way to account for this, then we are lost. I mean, if language is only self referential, and one cannot grasp even in the imagination what, at the most basis level, of knowledge claims could even possibly be, then knowledge isexistentially without meaning. What do I mean by existentially? Reference is to existence, and existence refers to the palpable "sense" of being here, and this refers to not simply raw physical feels and impositions, but, thoughts, and affectivity (a broadly conceived affectivity that comprises our ethics and aesthetics). Do thoughts exist? Of course. Existence is not to be reduced to "metaphysical physics". Does affectivity exist? A foolish question, really: nothing could be more palpable.

I think language gets lost in language, and it is the familiarity of language that removes for our sight an original existence, not original in an historical sense, as if once long ago, but original as in something primordial and "under the skin" of what we call experience.
Easy to access, in a way, because while language creates an analytic divided world, it also puts it back to gether again; in other words, language is also redemptive when the direction of inquiry goes to basic questions: those words you're thinking now, from whence to they come? I am thinking of Beckett's book Molloy. the idea is how to get around the extraordinary claim that it is language that speaks! Not "me". Molloy/Molone is dying, but it is not the death of the body, but of language, and words that linger to the end, grasping for existence, knowing soon words will not sustain the monologue that is the self. — Astrophel

If knowledge is without meaning then how are you writing this and expecting others to communicate? How do you even know there are others to communicate with?

I think it's as I said before, you're kinda searching for something similar to Descartes except he had to invent god to get out of his funk. But life doesn't work like that, nothing can be definitively known beyond all doubt, it just doesn't exist. Still total certainty was always a myth anyway and we never needed it before.

certainly logic is not about nothing, nor is affectivity; but concepts like these that quantify and divide experience, because they are categories, do not represent the original uncategorized primordial whole. — Astrophel

"primordial whole"? Now I know you're talking nonsense.

That said I'm struggling to find the point to any of this. If it's suggesting that what we take as knowledge isn't reflective of reality, I'd hate to say that doesn't seem to be the case. The world outside our heads might be different than that which we experience every day, but unless you can provide evidence for such a thing it's useless speculation.

So far in my life everything I know seems to work out just fine and it's how we can interact and to some degree master the world as it is. Evolution may have evolved us for certain aspects of survival but I have no reason to doubt the world is what I see each day unless there is some dimensional break.

Though to be honest I've failing to see the point of your question or what you're aiming to achieve here since you're kinda all over the place. I'm guessing you're hounding for something that in reality doesn't exist, some foundational ground to make for knowledge. Hate to say it but there is no such thing. We take a few things as given, our axioms, and just hope for the best.

I will add that intuition isn't a special form of knowledge but still another form of cognition (something you seem to have a bone to pick with) as it is based on prior knowledge, culture, and personal experience. It's sort of like "thinking really fast". Even feelings are rooted in some form of cognition though not one you are aware of. Brains are weird.

PS: I do wonder if there is a way to write your stuff in a way that's easy to understand.

But this is just to the point I am making. But you need to make a further step into inquiry: when you analyze a star's light and bring forth a conclusion there is beneath this, or presupposed by it, a structured consciousness that does the bringing forth of the basic conditions for "receiving" anything at all.
What makes science singularly disqualified for philosophy is that it doesn't look at the world at this level of inquiry. Nor does it thematically take up the caring and value that you raise here. As a scientist you do indeed have more or less strong interest, occasionally exhilaration. But it goes further still: to speak at all, to have a thought and draw a conclusion or affirm a conditional or negation is inherently affective. the point I make here is that it is these analytical conditions, which are typical in everyday living, tend to reify the categorical analyses, reducing the world to its own abstract image. The actuality, intuitive givenness of things, if you will, of putting the eyes to the computer screen, implicitly drawing conclusions, rejecting others, then, consummating an inquiry! At this level the experience is a singularity. — Astrophel

Hate to break it to you but there isn't anything beyond that "abstract" image that you think science is reducing reality to, that's just what it is. It sounds like you really want reality to be something other than it is.

If anything a lot of these posts just sound like extreme frustration or dissatisfaction with how things work.

Considering how complex the brain is, no not really. And like was mentioned before ethics slows down progress (though as stated I'm glad for it).

Some problems in science are slower to progress than others, and it might involve some diverging paths. But so far all the evidence have points to it being a function of the brain and not some kinda "soul" or "ghost" like people think it is.

How though...well we're not quite there yet. I swear people really need to learn patience when it comes to science, these problems are hard. Just because humanity doesn't tolerate ambiguity well is no excuse, though I guess psychologically we do like filling in gaps just to feel better.

Again, you tell them that. If you look through my threads with them you'll see it's pointless.

Like in these threads for example:

https://forum.philosophynow.org/viewtopic.php?t=40294
https://forum.philosophynow.org/viewtopic.php?p=652138#p652138
https://forum.philosophynow.org/viewtopic.php?p=652127#p652127
https://forum.philosophynow.org/viewtopic.php?p=652119#p652119

It's more like they were trying to use the fact that meaning is subjective to say I can't say they're wrong. It's literally to just terminate argument.

You try arguing with them, I had an aneurysm from trying.

No that’s not socially correct either, again you’re just making stuff up to prop up your argument.

Also it doesn’t really matter what Shakespeare said.