Do you deny that we have five senses?

No. How do you support that we do if you think you can't know what the physical world is really like?

The truth condition refers to states of affairs as interpreted sense data. The truth condition does not refer to states of mind-independent reality. All knowledge occurs in minds, but I have my reason for believing in a physical world independent of minds. What it is like without a mind observing it through the senses is irrelevant. It has nothing to do with us.

Wait, are you saying that you believe this:

"Our minds interpret sense data. We do not have direct apprehension of the physical world. It is filtered through the senses and interpreted by the mind"

because of some definition of "the truth condition"?

And re this:

What it is like without a mind observing it through the senses is irrelevant. It has nothing to do with us. — Noah Te Stroete

Why would we only be interested in ourselves?

No. That was just my coherent belief about the truth condition. My belief in the physical world is an abductive argument which I thought I had put to rest.

Why would we only be interested in ourselves? — Terrapin Station

You’re not getting what I’m saying. Life forms give meaning to the physical world. Without life forms, especially ones with consciousness, the physical world is irrelevant.

I'm asking about your belief that we don't have direct apprehension of the physical world for example.

Neuroscience, cognitive psychology, philosophy of mind. I’m sure you’re familiar with the theories put forth by these disciplines.

Sure, but I don't believe that anything supports that we don't have direct apprehension of the physical world, and I'm asking for what you take to be a good reason to believe that.

Why do we only experience visible light through sight, and not the other frequencies of electromagnetic waves? Why do we see things that are far away as being smaller than things up close?

Push in the side of your eye a little. Did your experience change?

Re light, we just happened to have evolved that way--it had evolutionary advantages for us, but how would that suggest that we don't have direct apprehension of the physical world? If anything, it would suggest just the opposite. Sensing things as they are is going to be a survival advantage.

Re apparent size, that's simply a perspectival difference. And again, how would that suggest that we don't have direct apprehension of the physical world?

Plug your ears. Did the volume change?

Re apparent size, that's simply a perspectival difference. And again, how would that suggest that we don't have direct apprehension of the physical world? — Terrapin Station

Because the way things appear to the senses changes, when the physical world postulate should be constant. Our senses don’t reflect our models of reality. So, our apprehension of reality is not direct.

When you plug your ears, you change sound waves travel from a source to your eardrums. Why do you think that you don't directly apprehend the way that really is?

Perhaps that was a bad example. Sound to the mind has a particular quality. Sound as a model in the mind is air wave compressions.

You'd have to explain that one better.

So, we say that sound is the compression of air waves. Is what you experience as sound anything like the model of sound as the compression of air waves?

Also the color blue. Is what we experience of blue anything like the model of it being a particular frequency of electromagnetic wave?

Nothing is like a model or explanation. Models and explanations are words, equations, etc.

So you are saying that blue is a quality, and that it is directly apprehended? What explanatory power does that have? What kind of knowledge is that?

I’m afraid I am not thinking clearly. I didn’t sleep last night.

So you are saying that blue is a quality, and that it is directly apprehended? — Noah Te Stroete

Yes. That's part of the properties of that wavelength of light/electromagnetic radiation.

What explanatory power does that have? What kind of knowledge is that? — Noah Te Stroete

Why would it need to have explanatory power? And it's knowledge by acquaintance.

Get some sleep, by the way. :wink:

Don't you have to desire to thrive rather than not thrive? — Terrapin Station

Of course, and we know that we do by what Jacques Maritain calls "knowledge by connaturality" -- by being aware of how we naturally respond in various situations. This knowledge of our objective nature is part of the basis in reality for norms of behavior.

I was trying to make the point that brain encoding, an objective phenomenon, gives rise to mental states as an emergent property. — Noah Te Stroete

The notion of "emergence" is that of an unexplained consequence and has no place in an explanatory or causal theory. It is clear that neural processing is a necessary part of most mental operations. It is unclear that such operations alone are an adequate explanation for them. Emergence is a claim that it is, while ducking the burden of an actual explanation.

I think the basis for norms is to be sought in what is known, rather in the mechanisms by which it is known. Thus, we know that we have natural needs and desires which are satisfied by determinate means. That is where I look for the basis of norms.

I was further discussing the objective fact that brains and their emergent mental states model reality through sense data, giving order to the chaotic natural world. Normatives are also an attempt to order human conduct, also a part of the natural world. — Noah Te Stroete

Does mean that you are looking to the means of knowing rather than what is known as the basis of norms? Perhaps in some neo-Kantian way?

If you need a desire for that then there's nothing objective about it.

If you need a desire for that then there's nothing objective about it. — Terrapin Station

So, desires are not empirically knowable?

I am not saying that the experience of having a desire is intersubjectively available. I an saying that the desire itself is. Recently, a 7-year-old girl died of dehydration while in the custody of Trump's immigration goons. Was her desire for water not an objective fact?

Was her desire for water not an objective fact? — Dfpolis

Of course not. Desires are mental phenomena.

Was her desire for water not an objective fact?
— Dfpolis

Of course not. Desires are mental phenomena. — Terrapin Station

@Dfpolis was making an empirical claim about the 7-year-old girl. That she had a desire for water.

Don't you think that is a claim that can be true or false? And one that you can marshal evidence for or against?

No, desires are generally physiological needs, accompanied by mental awareness of the need.