I’m denying that you can speculate about some extradimensional box, but you cannot ‘see’ it. — I like sushi

Exactly, so where's my role in this phenomenal investigation? You say "let's just investigate what it is we actually experience, let's use that as our measure...", I say "I experience a feeling of being able to imagine such a box", and your immediate response is "no you can't!".

Yep. — Isaac

So your wife and kid are just creations of your mind in your view.

Did you tell your wife and kid mind-creations this?

(This is the sort of scenario where I really would love to be able to interact with you folks in person instead. I'd make sure they know this if you haven't told them.)

I didn’t say ‘no you can’t’. You said you can’t and I agree.

The point is noticing the modes of intentionality: speculating, thinking, feeling, saying, suggesting, reasoning, etc.,. And I don’t mean this in a language based hermeneutical sense only; hence my point about Heidegger doing Husserlian phenomenology in part. You may find that approach more to your liking though.

You can ‘feel’ something about a box. That is a mode. I could have said any 3-dimensional object of perception. There are certain - forgive me I get these Husserlian terms backwards sometimes - ‘aspects’ of a given object of experience (‘object’ in a loose sense of the term) and certain ‘parts’. I think it is the aspects that cannot be removed, but parts can, ie. removing the ‘shape’ of a table being impossible if we wish the table to be concrete object of experience, yet we can remove a leg and the table remains a table.

There are numerous ways to weave this. They are the modes of intentionality at work.

It is irrelevant if this is or isn’t a dream. The experience is subjectively present. We do generally act in the natural mode of being rather than pondering every subjective presentation and turning it over continually in our heads in a state of paralysis ... but we can, and do, alter our modes of thought.

I’m denying that you can speculate about some extradimensional box, but you cannot ‘see’ it.
— I like sushi

Exactly, so where's my role in this phenomenal investigation? You say "let's just investigate what it is we actually experience, let's use that as our measure...", I say "I experience a feeling of being able to imagine such a box", and your immediate response is "no you can't!". — Isaac

Sorry, typo. I’m NOT denying ...

The further point being that it can be easy to fall into a pit of blind speculation. Simply seeing what is and isn’t doubtful adjusts our perspective and allows for a more rigid investigation into phenomenon.

It is even more problematic untangling ourselves from linguistic presuppositions - like with the tame example I gave with ‘hour’.

So your wife and kid are just creations of your mind in your view.

Did you tell your wife and kid mind-creations this? — Terrapin Station

Well not just creations, I never said anything like that. I'm personally quite convinced there's some external reality, but if we're just talking about the division of that reality into this object and that object then - yes, and yes. I'm sure you're aware the we completely alter our actual cellular make up, so I presume you're not associating other people with their material matter. You know we can be primed to think even the table is a part of ourselves, so presumably you're not working on some consistent self-image. People with Capgras syndrome regularly do re-invent who their wife and kids are. So where's this going? What are you trying to say that my wife and kids (there are two, let's not be excluding anyone) are that is there in the external reality?

I'm sure you're aware the we completely alter our actual cellular make up, so I presume you're not associating other people with their material matter. — Isaac

You don't even think there is an object that's another person. So what are you asking about?

We do generally act in the natural mode of being — I like sushi

Why would you?

Sorry, typo. I’m NOT denying ... — I like sushi

Ahh, that makes more sense.

removing the ‘shape’ of a table being impossible if we wish the table to be concrete object of experience, yet we can remove a leg and the table remains a table. — I like sushi

But look at Ramachandran's self-awareness experiments. Does the table have sensory receptors which link to our brains? Typically no. Two minutes of priming perception prior distributions and suddenly it does. There's no essence of table, there's what we currently perceive which is mediated by what we expect to perceive which is mediated by experience of what we have perceived, plus the architecture of the computational system it's put through. Then there's a whole host of other sensory inputs and memory inputs related to the table, none of which necessarily agree with each other. What we actually experience is then the current best guess as to the cause of those inputs. It changes from second to second sometimes, illusions can be created where the interpretation switches rapidly between one option and another.

I think a phenomenal approach can be really helpful. As I said, it's one necessary half of any psychological or neuroscientific analysis, but we have to be aware of the limits it's answers give us. We cannot reduce down the current experience into it's component parts without accepting that the act of such reduction is itself mediated by the very biases and preconceptions we're trying to investigate.

You don't even think there is an object that's another person. So what are you asking about? — Terrapin Station

I'm asking about the placeholders in my model, the same model I presume you have since were both human beings and I think such basics as object permanence are fairly hard-wired (though work by Eric Corchesne with six-month old babies may call into question whether that's pre- or post-natal). there's a difference between beliefs in different contexts. As I've said before, a belief, for me, is just a predisposition to act as if some state of affairs were the case in one's model of the external world (external to oneself). But we use different models for different circumstances. This is what the whole work with mental inference has tried to demonstrate. so when you say to me, in a philosophy forum "are there real object in the external world?" I have to select which model of the external world to use. Here it's a very loose theoretical one and in it I can't honestly see how objects could be defined objectively, so the answer is no. When speaking to, or dealing with people in my social life, I act as if they were independent real objects, because in that context I'm using a different model. The first model would be next to useless in that context, and I learnt as much in the first few months of life.

I'm asking about the placeholders in my model, the same model I presume you have since were both human beings — Isaac

You can't presume there's another human being if there's no object that's another person.

There can be no object that's Eric Corchesne, no objects that are six-month old babies, etc. on your view.

You can't presume there's another human being if there's no object that's another person.

There can be no object that's Eric Corchesne, no objects that are six-month old babies, etc. on your view. — Terrapin Station

As I just tried to explain. One model for one type of behaviour - philosophising - no objects. Another model for another type of behaviour - relating to people, talking about who they are and what they said - objects.

Is there something about this multiple model idea you're not understanding? (and, yes, the very idea of models and multiplicity is itself a model, we can't escape this and look at it from outside)

Is there something about this multiple model idea you're not understanding? — Isaac

If you were answering from the perspective of models earlier, and you have a model where there are other people as objects, etc., then why did you answer only from the model where there aren't other people as objects?

If you were answering from the perspective of models earlier, and you have a model where there are other people as objects, etc., then why did you answer only from the model where there aren't other people as objects? — Terrapin Station

You'd have to reference the exact question for me to give you a comprehensive answer, but as to the topic in general, it's obviously one about the nature of our models, so I don't think it would have explained my position accurately at all to simply answer from within the model which I think is the very one in question.

When we were talking about properties. Specifically whether there are any objective properties. When I was talking about that and asking you questions about it I wasn't talking or asking about your "models," but even if so, why would you answer from the perspective of one model rather than another?

Everything I think is some model or other of the reality I'm thinking about, so there is no question that I can answer outside of some model or other. You asked about 'objective' properties, ones that pertain outside of any of my models. Notwithstanding the fact (one that I did try to communicate at the time) that I don't think it's possible to answer such a question from outside of a model, the closest I can possibly get to an answer would be from a model of how models obtain. That's why I chose that one.

Consider if you asked me in the middle of a chess game "can I take this bishop home?", Id' be crazy to answer from the perspective of the game, "no, bishops can only move diagonally and then only within the confines of the board, so there's no way you can move the piece all the way to your house". I'd presume we were talking about pieces outside of the model of 'how chess works' and in a meta model of spatio-temporal positions which the chess board is just a piece in. The rules of chess don't matter in this model, the 'reality' of the edges of the chess board as a constraint on the movement of the pieces no longer applies.

It's like that with questions about objects and properties. In one model I define objects from reality, I define properties from all the processes around them and I determine that those properties belong to that object. Another model then treats these objects as real fixed entities, like the boundaries of the chess board, and my behaviour assumes them to be.

You asked me a question about the first model , the one which defines and assigns properties.

Everything I think is some model or other of the reality I'm thinking about, so there is no question that I can answer outside of some model or other. — Isaac

You're not just observing models are you?

You're not just observing models are you? — Terrapin Station

No, I presume I'm observing reality, but observing is a model-mediated process. I don't 'observe' without modelling. I see what I expect to see to a certain extent. That's what the whole load of neuroscience I've been talking about seems to show.

but observing is a model-mediated process. I don't 'observe' without modelling. — Isaac

How would we be able to know this without knowing what the world is like sans modeling for comparison?

How would we be able to know this without knowing what the world is like sans modeling for comparison? — Terrapin Station

We determine anything by reference to deeper models, things like consistency and non-contradiction. We know (by reference to these) that observations is model mediated because we can manipulate those models and observe changes. We could, I suppose, theorise that reality actually does change somehow resulting from our manipulation of these experimental conditions, but it seems more parsimonious to assume the variations are internal.

If two people give differing, contradictory accounts of some state of affairs, it seems reasonable to assume neither necessarily has clear access to the state of affairs both are trying to describe. We don't need ourselves to have access to that states of affairs to evidence this, it is sufficient that we assume both cannot be the case and so if one can be wrong (which one must) then so can the other.

If two people give differing, contradictory accounts of some state of affairs, it seems reasonable to assume neither necessarily has clear access to the state of affairs both are trying to describe. — Isaac

I can't draw anything at the moment, so we'll use this as a drawing instead:

A,.............................@.....................................B

Suppose A and B are persons. They both say something about @. What would be a reason to believe that @ from A's location is identical to @ from B's location, so that A and B's accounts of @ wouldn't contradict?

For that matter, we can just talk about A and B as locations, without people. The same thing would be the case.

Another way to illustrate this:

From one spatial point of reference, a table has this shape:




From another spatial point of reference, a table has this shape:



We could say those shapes "contradict" each other, but they're both really the shape of the table from different spatial points, and that has nothing to do with models or us our our perception.

A few things perhaps unrelated to each other...

1. Obviously we'd be talking about a situation where we're comparing two participants both in A's place, just at different times, experimentsttry to eliminate variables so, place is a really obvious one to start with.

So to follow through you'd have to say that @ at t1, when A is there, was different (had different properties?) from @ at t2, when B is there.

But if this is the case then we cannot say anything at all about @ because all we know about it is what it was like at t1.

2. The jump from the situation of two observers to say "we can just talk about A and B as locations, without people. The same thing would be the case." is unjustified. The table seeming to be some way is an activity of the observer. The best we could speculate is that it would seem that way if someone were to stand there. We still haven't escaped the fact that we do not access light waves (which themselves are just a model of what we observe on other devices, but let's not go there). We are only aware of visual representations after they've been presented from the occipital cortex, they've already been subject to modulation from backward acting neural connections, and filtered through architecture built by prior experience. The light waves bouncing off the table are a barely related trigger.

What are the properties of a Kaniza square? Are its corners 90 degrees, are its sides straight? How so if when you take the marking circles away there's no square there at all?

A few things perhaps unrelated to each other...

1. Obviously we'd be talking about a situation where we're comparing two participants both in A's place, just at different times, experimentsttry to eliminate variables so, place is a really obvious one to start with.

So to follow through you'd have to say that at t1, when A is there, was different (had different properties?) from @ at t2, when B is there. — Isaac

And indeed things are non-identical through time (which shouldn't be so surprising once we realize that what time is in the first place is change or motion).

But if this is the case then we cannot say anything at all about because all we know about it is what it was like at t1. — Isaac

Saying what @ is like at T1 (and L1 (location 1)) is knowing something about (and saying something about) @.

The jump from the situation of two observers to say "we can just talk about A and B as locations, without people. The same thing would be the case." is unjustified. — Isaac

The justification is what the world is like.

The table seeming to be some way is an activity of the observer. — Isaac

I pointed out that I'm not talking about SEEMING. This isn't seeming. It's what the table is really like.

We still haven't escaped the fact that we do not access light waves — Isaac

That's what's not justified. You'd have to support that claim.

We are only aware of visual representations after they've been presented from the occipital cortex, they've already been subject to modulation from backward acting neural connections, and filtered through architecture built by prior experience. — Isaac

You're wanting to argue for representationalism. You'd need to present the argument for it.

I'm not a representationalist. I think that representationalism is obviously wrong, because the only way to argue for it is to assume that we can know some things non-representationally.

What are the properties of a Kaniza square? — Isaac

The notion of optical illusions is incoherent if we don't know what's really there contra the illusion.

The idea, when we're talking about people, isn't that their perception is infallible. But to know that it's fallible, we have to know what they're getting wrong, which means getting something right. Otherwise the whole idea of fallibility is incoherent.

Saying what is like at T1 (and L1 (location 1)) is knowing something about (and saying something about) @. — Terrapin Station

T1 is an infinitesimally small point, so I don't see how it can coherently have any data attached to it. Even so, properties of some object at some past time were not what you were referring to with regards to 'objective properties'. "Here is a coin", you said, not "there was a coin".

You'd have to support that claim. — Terrapin Station

So I have to support claims where you get to say "it's what the world is like" without further evidence. The justification that we do not directly observe light waves are the numerous optical illusions where what we are convinced we observe are actually retinal negatives, polarisation, inferred colour in the peripheral region (which can't even detect EM wavelengths) and downright hallucinations.

The notion of optical illusions is incoherent if we don't know what's really there contra the illusion. — Terrapin Station

I didn't ask about the notion of optical illusions though did I? I asked what the properties of the square you see there really are.

T1 is an infinitesimally small point, so I don't see how it can coherently have any data attached to it. — Isaac

That mathematical view of time is just an abstraction. Time is simply motion or change. T1 is the changes or motion that are/is happening from some frame of reference (as opposed to the changes or motion that happened or the changes or motion that's yet to happen). So it's not an "infinitesimally small point" from most reference frames.

Re objective properties, they're the properties of x from some reference frame/reference point, which is a given relative spatiotemporal location. That should be understood, because it's an inescapable ontological fact.

I didn't ask about the notion of optical illusions though did I? I asked what the properties of the square you see there really are. — Isaac

Yes, you did--that's a well-known optical illusion and you're asking about it. I actually see the "pac man" shapes and can tell it would give the illusion of a square. So yeah, those properties are there. Learn something about seeing things how visual artists see them. It's important for visual artists to learn how to see "what's really there" rather than seeing illusions, rather than filling in information from concepts we might have, etc. That's part of what makes the difference between amateur/"naive" and mature/professional visual art. Kids will draw a table as square or rectangular with 90-degree angles because that's what their concepts of tables are like (well, aside from circular/oval/etc. tables obviously, lol). They need to learn how to see what the table actually looks like from a given spatial location. Part of the trick to that is to learn how to just see shapes (without naming them, applying concepts, etc.), colors, textures, etc.--so you don't even think "table" or whatever.

The justification that we do not directly observe light waves are the numerous optical illusions where what we are convinced we observe are actually retinal negatives, polarisation, inferred colour in the peripheral region (which can't even detect EM wavelengths) and downright hallucinations. — Isaac

And again here you're talking about optical illusions. Can you address what I just said about optical illusions and fallibility so I don't have to just repeat it here?

That mathematical view of time is just an abstraction. — Terrapin Station

Yet...

T1 is the changes or motion that are/is happening from some frame of reference (as opposed to the changes or motion that happened or the changes or motion that's yet to happen). So it's not an "infinitesimally small point" from most reference frames. — Terrapin Station

...and this isn't an abstraction?

I'm struggling to see any more depth to your argument than "things are not the way you think they are, they're the way I think they are".

Yes, you did--that's a well-known optical illusion and you're asking about it. — Terrapin Station

No, I specifically asked you about the square you see, not the optical illusion as a whole. I want to know what the objective properties of that square are and in what they obtain.

Visual artists are not immune from optical illusions. As I've said you are experiencing one right now. There are two small blind spots in front of your eyes through which no light rays pass. I know this because if I put an object there in people who have damaged eye muscles (restricting movements of the pupil) they cannot see it. The image you see there is made up by your brain to fill in the gap. Your peripheral vision has no colour, do artists see all peripheral images in black and white? No, they make the colour up like the rest of us. Does the number 5 emit red light? No, so why do synathetes see it as red, do 'artist' synathetes see it black like it 'really' is?

...and this isn't an abstraction? — Isaac

No, the changes that are happening from some frame of reference are not an abstraction.

I'm struggling to see any more depth to your argument — Isaac

I don't know why you think I'm forwarding an argument. I'm simply explaining.

No, I specifically asked you about the square you see, not the optical illusion as a whole. I want to know what the objective properties of that square are and in what they obtain. — Isaac

Obviously there isn't a square.

What happened to addressing what I said about optical illusions and fallibility? This is the second time I'm asking you.

I'm simply explaining. — Terrapin Station

Ha. You're simply 'explaining' what is the case, as opposed to what I think is the case. As I said...

I'm struggling to see any more depth to your argument than "things are not the way you think they are, they're the way I think they are". — Isaac

Obviously there isn't a square. — Terrapin Station

But you see a square. People can be genuinely fooled by optical illusions, they really see a square, it has right angles, straight sides, the lot. So where are those properties? What are they properties of?

What happened to addressing what I said about optical illusions and fallibility? This is the second time I'm asking you. — Terrapin Station

You said artists see things as they really are. I answered that they don't. What more do you want me to address?