And these sense, they involve eyes, skin, and other bodily parts?

Can you see where I am going - you assume that these things exist as a part of your "scientific" explanation.

Isn't that so?

Yes. Indirect realists aren't idealists. They're realists. They just recognize, contrary to the claims of naive realism, that mental phenomena exist, that distal objects and their properties are not constituents of mental phenomena, that many (even all) of the properties of mental phenomena are not properties of distal objects, that many (even all) of the properties of mental phenomena do not even resemble the properties of distal objects, and that we have direct knowledge only of mental phenomena.

They just recognize, contrary to the claims of naive realism, that mental phenomena exist, that distal objects and their properties are not constituents of mental phenomena, — Michael

And you deduce, or perhaps infer, the existence of the world, including the things around you, from what the senses present to you?

How does that work?

And you deduce, or perhaps infer, the existence of the world, including the things around you, from what the senses present to you?

How does that work? — Banno

Are you asking how induction and the scientific method work?

Are you asking how induction and the scientific method work? — Michael

Ah. SO you induce the existence of the world by application of "scientific method"?

SO does this method involve falsification, or is it statistical?

Thanks for humouring me.

Ah. SO you induce the existence of the world by application of "scientific method"?

SO does this method involve falsification, or is it statistical? — Banno

I believe in the existence of distal objects because I believe that the existence of distal objects best explains the existence and regularity and predictability of experience.

I believe in the existence of distal objects because I believe that the existence of distal objects provides the best explanation for the existence and regularity and predictability of experience. — Michael

"Best explanation".

Statistical, then. Bayesian inference? You compared a set of other explanations, and decided that "here is a hand" is the best one for your seeing a hand before your face?

Yes. It's more reasonable than "an evil demon is deceiving me".

Why?

On what basis did you decide that it is "more reasonable" that there is a hand before you than that an evil Damon is tricking you?

What did you use as your Prior? And what constituted the new information you used to adjust the posterior probability distribution?

It's not based on anything. It's just what seems most reasonable to me. I don't pretend that it's anything more than that.

t's not based on anything. It's just what seems most reasonable to me. — Michael

How is it an inference, then, and not a sentiment, or a mere prejudice?

And how is that "scientific"?

How is it an inference, then, and not a sentiment, or a mere prejudice? — Banno

My belief that my experiences are caused by distal objects is a "prejudice". My belief that a distal cow exists is inferred from a) my "prejudice" that my experiences are caused by distal objects and from b) I experience a cow.

But none of this is relevant to the point being made.

Naive realists claim such things as this:

The second formulation is the constitutive claim, which says that it introspectively seems to one that the perceived mind-independent objects (and their features) are constituents of the experiential state. Nudds, for instance, argues that ‘visual experiences seem to have the NR [Naïve Realist] property’ (2009, p. 335), which he defines as ‘the property of having some mind-independent object or feature as a constituent’ (2009, p. 334), and, more explicitly, that ‘our experience […] seems to have mind-independent objects and features as constituents’ (2013, p. 271). Martin claims that ‘when one introspects one’s veridical perception one recognises that this is a situation in which some mind-independent object is present and is a constituent of the experiential episode’ (2004, p. 65). — https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s11098-021-01618-z

the conscious “phenomenal” character of that experience is shaped by the objects of perception and their features, where this is understood in a constitutive, rather than merely a causal, sense. — https://www.oxfordbibliographies.com/display/document/obo-9780195396577/obo-9780195396577-0340.xml

colours are mind-independent properties of things in the environment that are distinct from properties identified by the physical sciences — https://academic.oup.com/book/5610

Indirect realists reject these claims, and the science of perception supports this rejection.

That's all there is to it.

My belief that my experiences are caused by distal objects is a "prejudice". — Michael

That's fine - My belief that I have a hand is much the same.

Going back over it again, your belief that you have a hand, rather than that you are deceived by an evil demon, is a prejudice, not an inference.

But it's not "scientific", not derived from "scientific method" - something which would be extraordinary in the babe who makes this inference.

After this analysis it is clear that indirect realism is not based on inference nor on science. It is a prejudice.

But none of this is relevant to the point being made. — Michael

Of course, for you it can't be, because the argument just presented undermines the mystique of "scientific method"

And then, yet again, the Authoritarian Quote. Meh.

The upshot is that indirect realism doesn't get the scientific stamp of approval its fans so desire.

Just to be clear, the decision here is not between indirect realism and direct realism. Since at least Austin it has been about rejecting that framing of perception; declining to set the issue in terms of that distinction.

Cheers, Michael

The upshot is that indirect realism doesn't get the scientific stamp of approval its fans so desire. — Banno

This is what the science of perception shows:

The process of perception begins with an object in the real world, known as the distal stimulus or distal object. By means of light, sound, or another physical process, the object stimulates the body's sensory organs. These sensory organs transform the input energy into neural activity—a process called transduction. This raw pattern of neural activity is called the proximal stimulus. These neural signals are then transmitted to the brain and processed. The resulting mental re-creation of the distal stimulus is the percept.

To explain the process of perception, an example could be an ordinary shoe. The shoe itself is the distal stimulus. When light from the shoe enters a person's eye and stimulates the retina, that stimulation is the proximal stimulus. The image of the shoe reconstructed by the brain of the person is the percept. Another example could be a ringing telephone. The ringing of the phone is the distal stimulus. The sound stimulating a person's auditory receptors is the proximal stimulus. The brain's interpretation of this as the "ringing of a telephone" is the percept.

This is indirect realism, not naive realism.

Distal objects and their properties are not constituents of visual or auditory or olfactory experience.

The process of perception begins with an object in the real world, known as the distal stimulus or distal object. By means of light, sound, or another physical process, the object stimulates the body's sensory organs. These sensory organs transform the input energy into neural activity—a process called transduction. This raw pattern of neural activity is called the proximal stimulus. These neural signals are then transmitted to the brain and processed. The resulting mental re-creation of the distal stimulus is the percept.

To explain the process of perception, an example could be an ordinary shoe. The shoe itself is the distal stimulus. When light from the shoe enters a person's eye and stimulates the retina, that stimulation is the proximal stimulus. The image of the shoe reconstructed by the brain of the person is the percept. Another example could be a ringing telephone. The ringing of the phone is the distal stimulus. The sound stimulating a person's auditory receptors is the proximal stimulus. The brain's interpretation of this as the "ringing of a telephone" is the percept.

Sure. Agree entirely.

And what is seen is the shoe; what is heard is the phone - not the percept.

If it were the percept that is seen or heard, then we would have to provide another explanation, how it is that the percept is seen, how it is that the percept is heard. If the sequence produces a percept, and it is that which is seen, you are left with the need to explain how the percept is seen (by an "inner eye"?). We would have the homunculus problem.

If this is to be an explanation of seeing or hearing, the percept is not what is seen or heard, but part of the seeing, part of the hearing.

I feel pain, pain is a percept, therefore I feel a percept. Nothing about this entails a homunculus. The schizophrenic hears voices and I see things when I dream. You are reading something into the grammar of "I experience percepts" that just isn't there and so inventing a strawman for indirect realism.

Indirect realists don't argue that percepts exist, that distal objects and their properties are not constituents of these percepts, and that perception is indirect, as if this latter claim is distinct from the other two. Rather, by "perception is indirect" they just mean that percepts exist and that distal objects and their properties are not constituents of these percepts – and the science of perception supports this.

Which is precisely why so-called "non-naive direct" realism is consistent with indirect realism. See Semantic Direct Realism.

I feel pain, pain is a percept, therefore I feel a percept. — Michael

Nice slide.

Is pain a unique percept, distinct from salience? Pain differs from mere touch in forcing itself on one's attention. Special case; or at least, a different case, with similarities to proprioception. The language here is distinct, as is clear in Wittgenstein's discussion.

Which raises a question that might be provocative.

You know where your hand is at the moment. Do you know this indirectly? What could that mean? How is proprioception indirect?

You know where your hand is at the moment. Do you know this indirectly? What could that mean? How is proprioception indirect? — Banno

It's what I said above:

Indirect realists don't argue that percepts exist, that distal objects and their properties are not constituents of these percepts, and that perception is indirect, as if this latter claim is distinct from the other two. Rather, by "perception is indirect" they just mean that percepts exist and that distal objects and their properties are not constituents of these percepts – and the science of perception supports this.

This is true even for proprioception (notwithstanding that "distal object" isn't quite the correct term to use when referring to one's hands), given that proprioceptive errors are possible.

The process of perception begins with an object in the real world, known as the distal stimulus or distal object.

That which appears….

the object stimulates the body's sensory organs.

Perception….

These sensory organs transform the input energy

Sensation….

This raw pattern of neural activity

Intuition….

These neural signals are then transmitted to the brain and processed

Productive imagination…..

The resulting mental re-creation of the distal stimulus is the percept.

Phenomena…..

Full stop.

Of particular note is the resulting mental re-creation of the distal stimulus, as yet has no name, but is merely the instantiation of the system operational parameters in general, constant over every “distal stimulus”, a.k.a., sensibility. In other words, the brain has only been informed that there is an object, which has been transformed into something it can use, as opposed to the object’s real worldly material composition, from which follows the properties which define the object, or articulate how the material composition is to be comprehended, are not included in, nor are they available from, the mere sensation of it.
————

the grammar of "I experience percepts" that just isn't there…. — Michael

This is correct, insofar as experience cannot be of mere precepts, iff the above is the case. By experience is made explicit knowledge of what that distal object is, which cannot occur from mere nameless presentation to the brain without the brain then doing something additional to it, by which a name is given. In metaphysics, this is the domain of cognition; in neuroscience, network enabling, and tacit explication that experience should never be part of the systemic process itself, but is the end obtained by it.
————

And what is seen is the shoe; what is heard is the phone - not the percept. — Banno

What is seen and heard is sensation in general, derived from the stimulus of the distal object, in general. It has not been determined, i.e., as “shoe” or “phone”, or as any particular named objects.

Is it not the precept that is seen or heard, or, in general, it is not the precept that is sensed. It is the sensed that is the precept, non-fallicious cum hoc ergo propter hoc, upon arrival in the brain (in fact), or, arrival in understanding (metaphysically).

The definitive footnote: it can only be said what is seen is the shoe iff there is already extant experience of that particular distal object, and even so, such is merely facilitated convention, and not the technical operation of the system itself, which remains ever constant.
————

Indirect realists aren't idealists. — Michael

They must be, albeit of a specific variety, insofar as indirect realists, as such, cannot be proper scientists. Following the “science of perception”, only an idealist will be inclined to assign conceptual systemic representations to the operation of the brain without ever taking a single measurement, whereas the measurements with which a scientist concerns himself do not have the same names as the idealist’s representations.
———-

All this has been done already. Only the names have been changed to protect ignorance of its ancestry.

What is the physical/physiological difference between mental representations existing and not being mediations and mental representations existing and being mediations? — Michael

If mental representations do not mediate our perceptions of real objects, then our perceptions of real objects are not indirect, they are direct.

You seem to believe that the directness or immediacy of perceptions is completely irrelevant, yet indirect realism is the view that our perceptions of mental representations is direct or immediate, and that our perceptions of real objects (mediated by mental representations or sense data) is indirect.

If mental representations do not mediate our perceptions of real objects, then our perceptions of real objects are not indirect, they are direct. — Luke

What is the physical/physiological difference between mental representations mediating perceptions of real objects and them not mediating perceptions of real objects?

What is the physical/physiological difference between mental representations mediating perceptions of real objects and not mediating perceptions of real objects? — Michael

I don't know of any physical/physiological difference.

Is it your position that our perceptions of real objects are mediated by mental representations or not?

I don't know of any physical/physiological difference. — Luke

So either there is some non-physical/non-physiological difference or there is no difference at all and the way you're trying to frame the issue is a confusion.

Is it your position that our perceptions of real objects are mediated by mental representations or not? — Luke

This is my position. I've been very clear on this for the past 40-odd pages.

Indirect realists don't argue that percepts exist, that distal objects and their properties are not constituents of these percepts, and that perception is indirect, as if this latter claim is distinct from the other two. Rather, by "perception is indirect" they just mean that percepts exist and that distal objects and their properties are not constituents of these percepts – and the science of perception supports this. — Michael

Why can't naive realists simply hold the view that distal objects have the properties that they perceive them to have? I find your view that naive realists hold the view that their perceptions have the same physical constituents as the perceived object to be a strawman. Where did you get this idea from? Your author of Semantic Direct Realism does not define naive realism (GDR or PDR) in terms of the physical constituents of percepts.

Why can't naive realists simply hold the view that distal objects have the properties that they perceive them to have? I find your view that naive realists hold the view that their perceptions have the same physical constituents as the perceived object to be a strawman. Where did you get this idea from? — Luke

What’s so naïve about naïve realism?

The second formulation is the constitutive claim, which says that it introspectively seems to one that the perceived mind-independent objects (and their features) are constituents of the experiential state. Nudds, for instance, argues that ‘visual experiences seem to have the NR [Naïve Realist] property’ (2009, p. 335), which he defines as ‘the property of having some mind-independent object or feature as a constituent’ (2009, p. 334), and, more explicitly, that ‘our experience […] seems to have mind-independent objects and features as constituents’ (2013, p. 271). Martin claims that ‘when one introspects one’s veridical perception one recognises that this is a situation in which some mind-independent object is present and is a constituent of the experiential episode’ (2004, p. 65).

Naïve Realism

Typically, today’s naïve realist will also claim that the conscious “phenomenal” character of that experience is shaped by the objects of perception and their features, where this is understood in a constitutive, rather than merely a causal, sense.

The Problem of Perception

For the naive realist, insofar as experience and experiential character is constituted by a direct perceptual relation to aspects of the world, it is not constituted by the representation of such aspects of the world. This is why many naive realists describe the relation at the heart of their view as a non-representational relation. This doesn’t mean that experiences must lack intentional content, but it means that (a) insofar as appeal is made to presentation to explain character, no appeal is made to intentional content for that purpose, and (b) what is fundamental to experience is something which itself cannot be explained in terms of representing the world: a primitive relation of presentation.

A Naïve Realist Theory of Colour

This book develops and defends the view that colours are mind-independent properties of things in the environment that are distinct from properties identified by the physical sciences.

Your author of Semantic Direct Realism does not define naive realism (GDR or PDR) in terms of the physical constituents of percepts. — Luke

He says this:

For the naïve realist, the realism and the directness is enshrined in the fact that the phenomena are intrinsic features of the object itself—they are how the object is in itself. The semantic direct realist is agnostic about how the phenomena relate to the object, but asserts that the experience constituted by the phenomena subjectively embodies information putatively about something external. This leaves open the possibility of raising questions about the relation of the phenomenal qualities of which we are aware in perception, and the object about which we are directly informed in perception: are they intrinsic to it as PDR claims, or are they more remote from it.

And while I'm quoting him, I'll add this which gets to the heart of the matter:

In Brewer’s case, however, it is the object per se with which one is directly acquainted (see (i) below.). On the one hand, this avoids the straightforward form of the illusion argument, as I have just stated it: on the other, it leaves the status and role in perception of the object’s sensible qualities still to be articulated. It also arouses the thought that the sense in which it is some external object which is the object of acquaintance is more logical than phenomenological: what would it be for the object to be phenomenologically present—in a sensory form—if none of its sensible properties are directly presented? As nowadays it is permitted to believe in cognitive phenomenology, one might assimilate the direct perception of objects without the direct perception of their sensible properties to that category. But that is precisely a form of semantic direct realism: the directness consists in something more akin to a proposition or a judgement. It is as if the theory is that in all perceptual-type experience there is an at least immanent judgement (conceptual or not) and that judgement has as its object something purportedly in the world. This is SDR and is, as we shall see, also something that a sense-datum theorist can accept.

What is seen and heard is sensation in general, derived from the stimulus of the distal object, in general. It has not been determined, i.e., as “shoe” or “phone”, or as any particular named objects.

Is it not the precept that is seen or heard, or, in general, it is not the precept that is sensed. It is the sensed that is the precept, non-fallicious cum hoc ergo propter hoc, upon arrival in the brain (in fact), or, arrival in understanding (metaphysically).

You sense sensations, then?

At any rate, it’s closed system. You wouldn’t know anything if all you could ever know was yourself, but I suspect that’s the point, isn’t it?