I wouldn't use the word perceive. You don't perceive thoughts, you have thoughts--in other words, it's something your brain does. — Terrapin Station

Can you have thoughts that you don't perceive?

And if thoughts are something that my brain does, will I see them if I open up my brain with my perceptual senses? My brain is physical correct? So presumably if thoughts are what my brain does, then I should be capable to perceive them by looking at the brain no?

For them to be external, and not simply something someone else's brain is doing, and to perceive them, they'd have to obtain outside of brains somehow and you'd need to perceive them, at least indirectly, via your normal perceptual senses--vision, hearing, smell, taste, touch. Those senses are the means by which you perceive anything external, again, at least indirectly. — Terrapin Station

Okay right - so external is anything perceived by the five senses, and presumably internal is everything that is perceived via other means than the five senses. If that's the case, you just defined internal and external in a very ad hoc manner. As if perceiving a tree is a very different experience than perceiving (read - being conscious) of a thought! It seems that both the tree and the thought are things I can be conscious of. So why separate some as external and others as internal? As far as I see it, the criteria for that separation would have to be based on what you can control, and what you can't control.

Can you have thoughts that you don't perceive? — Agustino

You can only have thoughts you don't perceive, per the definition I use of "perceive." Perception necessarily implies that you're receiving information external to you.

And if thoughts are something that my brain does, will I see them if I open up my brain with my perceptual senses? — Agustino

You don't have to open up your head, you can use an fMRI, for example. You see them from a third-person perspective, of course, not a first-person perspective. Anything that you observe that's not you is the same. You observe it from a third-person perspective only. You don't observe it from the perspective of being it.

You can only have thoughts you don't perceive, per the definition I use of "perceive." Perception necessarily implies that you're receiving information external to you. — Terrapin Station

LOL. So have you just defined thoughts to be internal and the five senses to be external in that ad hoc manner out of your own fiat? Because my dictionary tells me that to perceive = "become aware or conscious of (something); come to realize or understand"

You see them from a third-person perspective, of course, not a first-person perspective. Anything that you observe that's not you is the same. You observe it from a third-person perspective only. You don't observe it from the perspective of being it. — Terrapin Station

Why not?! Why do I have this mysterious first-person access to my brain, and not to your brain for example?

LOL. So have you just defined thoughts to be internal and the five senses to be external in that ad hoc manner out of your own fiat? Because my dictionary tells me that to perceive = "become aware or conscious of (something); come to realize or understand" — Agustino

Now hopefully you're playing retard here and not actually being a retard. I just told you that I define perceive in a particular way, and then I defined it. I explained that that's why I'd not say that you perceive thoughts.

How can that be hard to understand, and how would it turn into whether thoughts and senses etc. are internal or not?

Now hopefully you're playing retard here and not actually being a retard. I just told you that I define perceive in a particular way, and then I defined it. I explained that that's why I'd not say that you perceive thoughts. — Terrapin Station

Why did you define it that way? Do you want me to start defining common words in uncommon ways?! :s

How can that be hard to understand, and how would it turn into whether thoughts and senses etc. are internal or not? — Terrapin Station

Your definition is fucking ad hoc, that's a problem. You're using a word in a way that no one else is using it, and then if I start asking you what you mean by perceive, you say that those are petty details and I'm being a retard - so it seems that either way you're not willing to give an account of your beliefs!

Why did you define it that way? — Agustino

Because of the way it fits with how "perception" tends to be used in my experience.

Do you want me to start defining common words in uncommon ways?! — Agustino

I don't expect you to not do this. I just appreciate one being explicit about it when it's the case. I was explicit about why I wouldn't use the word "perceive."

if I start asking you what you mean by perceive, you say that those are petty details — Agustino

I spelled out why I wouldn't use the word "perceive." It wasn't hard to understand.

Because of the way it fits with how "perception" tends to be used in my experience. — Terrapin Station

So perception is used in your experience in a different way than it is used in the dictionary?! Submit a request to amend the dictionary definition then, but until that time, I'd like you to explain your silly distinctions to me in common language. Are you capable to do that? I want you - in common language - not in goal post moving ad hoc Terrapin Station definitions are whatever the hell I want them to be language - to explain to me why you draw a distinction between the five senses and thoughts (with regards to perception) granted that they're both things that you are conscious of - and please don't redefine being conscious at the moment again - look at the dictionary.

There's these things I'm conscious of that I call sights. There's these things I'm conscious of that I call smells. There's this thing I'm conscious of that I call thoughts. Why are thoughts in a different category than the other two, unless you assume, a priori, that they are "internal" - an arbitrary distinction you've drawn, while the others are "external" - another arbitrary distinction based on a metaphysical worldview, which you haven't even established yet in this discussion, so how the hell do you draw these distinctions? :s

So perception is used in your experience in a different way than it is used in the dictionary?! — Agustino

Yes. I don't personally see dictionary authors as Gods by the way. It's simply someone else, someone just like me in many ways, attempting to report common usage per their experience. I wouldn't expect every definition in a dictionary to agree with my opinion of what common usage is, or to be philosophical coherent, or any manner of criteria. Of course, I'm not only reporting common usage in the definitions I use, but attempting to functionally analyze usage in a way that makes philosophical sense to me.

I made it clear that I reserve "perceive" for external information gained via the senses. There's nothing difficult to understand about that. It's fine if you use "perceive" a different way. I was just explaining why I wouldn't use that word. If you have some deep-seated need for us to use words the same way, then you'd have to conform to my usage, because I'm not going to change my usage.

I made it clear that I reserve "perceive" for external information gained via the senses. — Terrapin Station

That's an ad hoc definition. What the hell is external information, and why isn't your minds capacity to perceive thoughts another sense, just like your eye's ability to perceive sights is a sense?!

There's these things I'm conscious of that I call sights. There's these things I'm conscious of that I call smells. There's this thing I'm conscious of that I call thoughts. Why are thoughts in a different category than the other two, unless you assume, a priori, that they are "internal" - an arbitrary distinction you've drawn, while the others are "external" - another arbitrary distinction based on a metaphysical worldview, which you haven't even established yet in this discussion, so how the hell do you draw these distinctions? — Agustino

Are you claiming here that you're a representationalist or epistemological idealist?

That's an ad hoc definition. What the hell is external information, and why isn't your minds capacity to perceive thoughts another sense, just like your eye's ability to perceive sights is a sense?! — Agustino

Didn't you learn about your senses in elementary school? Why do I have to pretend that you're a toddler who hasn't even gone to kindergarten yet?

Are you claiming here that you're a representationalist or epistemological idealist? — Terrapin Station

I've asked you to explain to me how you draw those distinctions - I don't see what my own position has to do with your explanation.

Didn't you learn about your senses in elementary school? Why do I have to pretend that you're a toddler who hasn't even gone to kindergarten yet? — Terrapin Station

Yes, in my school I learned that I do perceive my thoughts, as well as objects in the external world. I have no clue what school you went to, maybe it was one for the kind of people you accuse me of being, but if you go out for a bit and ask 10 people if they perceive their thoughts, you'll see that more than 50% answer yes.

I've asked you to explain to me how you draw those distinctions - I don't see what my own position has to do with your explanation. — Agustino

Because I'm not going to play a game where we pretend that we're robots.

Yes, in my school I learned that I do perceive my thoughts, — Agustino

Did you learn about your senses?

Did you learn about your senses? — Terrapin Station

Yes, I did learn about the five senses. What about them are you inquiring?

Yes, I did learn about the five senses. What about them are you inquiring? — Agustino

You asked why your thoughts aren't another sense.

You asked why your thoughts aren't another sense. — Terrapin Station

Quote me where I asked this. As far as I remember I asked this:

There's these things I'm conscious of that I call sights. There's these things I'm conscious of that I call smells. There's this thing I'm conscious of that I call thoughts. Why are thoughts in a different category than the other two, unless you assume, a priori, that they are "internal" - an arbitrary distinction you've drawn, while the others are "external" - another arbitrary distinction based on a metaphysical worldview, which you haven't even established yet in this discussion, so how the hell do you draw these distinctions? :s — Agustino

So that above is a strawman. I was told in my school that I perceive thoughts using my mind, and I perceive objects via my five senses. They're both perceived via something (which is part of me - my mind, or my eyes, etc.), so in this regard there is no distinction between them, and yet you're trying to draw a distinction.

Quote me where I asked this. As far as I remember I asked this: — Agustino

"and why isn't your minds capacity to perceive thoughts another sense"

"and why isn't your minds capacity to perceive thoughts another sense" — Terrapin Station

Ahh I see - well that's the commonality I was pointing to by that:

They're both perceived via something (which is part of me - my mind, or my eyes, etc.), so in this regard there is no distinction between them, and yet you're trying to draw a distinction. — Agustino

Why does it matter to you if I use the word "perceive" in a particular way versus a different way that I'm specifying?

Why does it matter to you if I use the word "perceive" in a particular way versus a different way that I'm specifying? — Terrapin Station

What word shall I then use to point to the commonality I have specified above? Should I invent a new word?

Well, we could simply say something like "Both thoughts and perceptions are mental phenomena"

Well, we could simply say something like "Both thoughts and perceptions are mental phenomena" — Terrapin Station

That's still problematic because I wouldn't say trees are mental phenomena, and yet they are perceived via the 5 senses.

It's a toddler mistake to conflate perceptions and what's perceived.

It's a toddler mistake to conflate perceptions and what's perceived. — Terrapin Station

I'd say that we become aware of objects via our senses of them, but our senses aren't mental. Our awareness/consciousness of them is mental, and the mind reaches out, as it were, to the objects via the senses.

I'd say that we become aware of objects via our senses of them, but our senses aren't mental. — Agustino

"Perceptions" aren't the same as various senses either.

The point I'm really trying to drive at is that you obscure the relevance of the intellect/mind vis-a-vis perception by redefining perception as you want to. Perception represents the awareness/consciousness of the mind of something - and that can be via thought or via the five senses. But thought is equally a mechanism, just like the five senses are. Thought is just as much external as the five senses can be. Using the five senses I can sense internal matters - such as pain - and external matters, such as seeing a desk in front of me. My thoughts can be both internal - and self-directed - as well as external when they happen to me without my will or effort.

The point I'm really trying to drive at is that you obscure the relevance of the intellect/mind vis-a-vis perception by redefining perception as you want to. — Agustino

The definition of perception has absolutely nothing to do with any ontological stance. It's about word usage only. I simply wouldn't use that word in that context. There's nothing more to it than that. It's not as if any ontological stance I have is determined by what I'm naming anything.

The definition of perception has absolutely nothing to do with any ontological stance. It's simply about word usage only. — Terrapin Station

Sure, but by rendering the word unavailable, you literarily force me to invent a new word :s - which is quite strange if you ask me. We should be speaking with the way language is commonly used, not re-defining it, etc.