What would it otherwise be based on? Science? Science is based on tentative, limited, particular empirical sense data. It's pragmatic. So there would not be universal truth according to that paradigm.

Qualities of experience is not matter. You're asserting this, without justification.

I'm not a Foundationalist, so I am not claiming certainty.

What would it otherwise be based on? Science? Science is based on tentative, limited, particular empirical sense data. It's pragmatic. So there would not be universal truth according to that paradigm. — Dharmi

Of course. The one rule in science is "identical objects act identically in identical situations". Knowing there is matter is a priori to all science.

Qualities of experience is not matter. You're asserting this, without justification. — Dharmi

I think that's a childish assertion

I'm not a Foundationalist, so I am not claiming certainty. — Dharmi

What I am trying to say is that nobody can be a foundationalist in their reasoning. But saying "I believe in matter" is not the same thing as saying "I believe in Platonic forms". Those two assertions have nothing in common because you are matter and speculating about forms is just philosophy. You are not philosophy

Of course. The one rule in science is "identical objects act identically in identical situations". Knowing there is matter is a priori to all science. — Gregory

No, it's not an a priori to all science. It's a priori to modern scientific method that's based on the mechanical philosophy of Descartes and others.

People did science for thousands of years before and they weren't materialists.

I think that's a childish assertion — Gregory

So? Who cares what you think? There are no universals according to your worldview, "reality" is just a mental illness created by the chemicals in your brain and there's no ultimate meaning or purpose to life so there's no meaning or purpose to what you say, think or do. So, I frankly don't give a crap.

What I am trying to say is that nobody can be a foundationalist in their reasoning. But saying "I believe in matter" is not the same thing as saying "I believe in Platonic forms". Those two assertions have nothing in common because you are matter and speculating about forms is just philosophy. You are not philosophy — Gregory

You're right, one is based on natural law, namely Platonism. The other has absolutely no foundation whatsoever. Matter has never been demonstrated to exist whatsoever. What exists are qualities of experience, or Platonic Forms.

People did science for thousands of years before and they weren't materialists. — Dharmi

Platonists can think whatever they want when they do science. Their experiments are on matter regardless of what they think.

There are no universals according to your worldview, "reality" is just a mental illness created by the chemicals in your brain and there's no ultimate meaning or purpose to life so there's no meaning or purpose to what you say, think or do — Dharmi

False. Life has meaning because soul emerges from matter. Truth has no substance but the soul does. Some things are true, but I don't think "uinversals" in the Platonic sense are real

The other has absolutely no foundation whatsoever. — Dharmi

So there is no foundation to the claim you have a body? Lol, tell that to your doctor

Platonists can think whatever they want when they do science. Their experiments are on matter regardless of what they think. — Gregory

No, they are demonstrably not, Matter has never been demonstrated to exist.

False. Life has meaning because soul emerges from matter. Truth has no substance but the soul does. Some things are true, but I don't think "uinversals" in the Platonic sense are real — Gregory

Soul emerges from matter? Dude, you've lost it. Go lie down somewhere. This conversation is over.

So there is no foundation to the claim you have a body? Lol, tell that to your doctor — Gregory

I admitted I have a body, but that body is not "material" that is just an assertion.

Body means material dude

No, it doesn't . That's a language game. You need to read up on Derrida, Wittgenstein.

If the world ceased to exist it would be true there was once a world although there is nothing anywhere in any sense whatsoever

You need to read up on Derrida, Wittgenstein. — Dharmi

No you need to understand you have a body when you go see your doctor. Thanks for the conversation

No you need to understand you have a body when you go see your doctor. Thanks for the conversation — Gregory

I have a body. I'm not the body. And the body is not material. So again, you're on this low level that I'm not engaging with. You think words make reality, they do not. Matter is just a word.

"If the world ceased to exist it would be true there was once a world although there is nothing anywhere in any sense whatsoever"

Which pure empiricism cannot justify in any way whatsoever.

I'm not the body. — Dharmi

...

"If the world ceased to exist it would be true there was once a world although there is nothing anywhere in any sense whatsoever"

Which pure empiricism cannot justify in any way whatsoever. — Dharmi

Empiricism is not the activity of an animal but a human capable of abstract thought

humans aren't animals now? Yeah. Okay.

I have read a fair portion of Plato, some of it many times. I don't have a clear idea of what "Platonism" might be.
There are various thinkers who summed up what Plato meant to them. Many of them disagreed with each other, some as contemporaries and others across generations.
The term seems more like an assigned value that is valued by what opposes it than some idea that explains itself.

Assuming God exists, since he only knows bliss and being, how does he know what pain and suffering feels like? Because he is an intellect and can think abstractly. We can talk about God because we think abstractly. Animals dont. Also, you don't believe in animals because you allegedly don't believe in matter

God is all-knowing and all-pervading. He dwells in every single quantum particle, so he is aware of pain, but he's infinitely beyond it as well. Because he's self-sufficient, self-satisfying, self-enjoying. Unlike organic things, which rely on contingent things to exist, God is necessary being. Relying on none.

Animals are also spirit souls, not matter. Animals are just in their body-avatars just as we are. The body is like a suit the soul casts away after it's use. It's like a machine. The body breaks down, the soul moves onto a different machine.

Plaonists believe:

In God
In quasi-ideal Forms that do not subsist in a mind
In a certain geometry of these forms
In innate ideas that represent a previous existence in the realm of Forms
In material objects being either bad, non-existent, or hardly existing at all (like a shadow)
In the body being a vehicle of the soul which is intellectual and has its home in the Forms
In escaping from the phantom world (earth) and returning to ideal existence

What you mean is that the illusion breaks down, not the body? Right? That sounds psychotic, but a lot of people do believe that, pure Platonists being among them

In quasi-ideal Forms that do not subsist in a mind — Gregory

They subsist in the mind of the One, via the Nous according to Plotinus.

In material objects being either bad, non-existent, or hardly existing at all (like a shadow) — Gregory

Yes. Shadows on the cave wall. Not the true reality, not unreal either, but not the true reality.

The rest is correct.

What you mean is that the illusion breaks down, not the body? Right? That sounds psychotic, but a lot of people do believe that, pure Platonists being among them — Gregory

The body breaks down. This is the natural cycle: Creation, preservation, deterioration, destruction.

The body breaks down and dies. It's a machine, like any other machine.

The One of Plotinus is not a mind. It's pure potentiality, the "ideal being" of Rosmini. The system of Plotinus wasn't completed until Antonio Rosmini in the 18 hundreds. Ideal being is what we experience as innate in our minds. It is pure potential and we mold it with our will. The second level of Plotinus has mind, Logos, which is God. This is new ( "neo") Platonism though. Pure Platonism has infinite geometrical "ideal" (quasi-mental) Forms separate from God and the One (the later which supposedly connects our mind to God and rationality)t

The forms for Plato are a true external object for the understanding, not coming from God but instead existing on their own. This is what Aristotle objected too. Other interpretations simply reduce what Aristotle said to nothing

There is no "neo" Platonism, that's something Western scholars who don't know anything about anything at all whatsoever, because they have infinite baggage from being Dark Age savages for eons, made up. Plotinus' doctrine is indistinguishable from Plato's.

If you read the Timaios, Plato discusses the world soul, nous and the One.

Having said that, I'm not a doctrinaire Plotinian, and this is exactly where I disagree with him. God is pure consciousness. And all consciousness is a person. Therefore, God is a personal being, not some sort of pure act ("Actus Purus") or something like that. But your point is taken.

Many today ask "what is consciousness". I don't like it because it's one dimensional. How can anyone answer that question from that angle!? We have reason and will, which are powers that emerge from the part of matter evolution gave you as a body. There is a great recent thread on this forum about emergence, with many great articles cited in it. Something greater can truly come from something less by the way you come what is below (atoms and cells). We are only connected to the rest of the world in how the world effects our body (at the quantum level even). You seem to have a Eastern way of thinking. In the West there are those who believe the soul and body are separate, and those who believe they are one. I think they are one unit that acts as a whole. Not a form with prime matter maybe (Aristotle) but maybe just matter acting at a higher level because of the complexity in the geometry of the brain

In God
In quasi-ideal Forms that do not subsist in a mind
In a certain geometry of these forms
In innate ideas that represent a previous existence in the realm of Forms
In material objects being either bad, non-existent, or hardly existing at all (like a shadow)
In the body being a vehicle of the soul which is intellectual and has its home in the Forms
In escaping from the phantom world (earth) and returning to ideal existence — Gregory

The God as depicted in Timaeus?

The matter of geometry of certain shapes is presented against the need for dialogue to approach the neighborhood of forms. Which dialogues are you going to put in comparison? Cratylus versus Sophist? Protagoras versus The Republic?

Yes, the reference to "innate" ideas are given as evidence for the existence of Forms in many dialogues. But those references don't explain what they are as themselves.

I don't know which statements you are referring to in regards to material objects. I am going to let you educate me on the matter.

The Phaedo refers to the idea of the body being a vehicle of the soul that does not die. Where in the writings does that make the "soul" a home in the "Forms"? Plotinus reasons in that way but I don't know where Plato does.

Suarez and Rosmini are some of my favorite thinkers. The former was Spanish, the latter was Italian

The last dialogue I read was Parmenides. The Forms are pitted against "The One". Plato's references to God are sparingly spread out across his works. I think he called him Zeus (more than likely). Sorry I can't be more specific than that. I haven't read Plato is a few years

Emergentism is just dishonest Panpsychism, and Panpsychism is just dishonest Idealism. So I'm just being honest.

We are only connected to the rest of the world in how the world effects our body (at the quantum level even).

No. We are connected as individuals to the sum total of all reality, because we are the microcosm come from the macrocosm.

In the West there are those who believe the soul and body are separate, and those who believe they are one.

Western philosophy is absolute nonsense, I know because I have a degree in it. Western philosophers can't even agree on basic questions like "are there philosophical problems?" Not totally a waste of time, but logic cannot grasp the fullness of truth, neither can sense perception. Even Western philosophers admit that, though some of them still try to hold onto some degree of "truth" or "reality" many of them understand truth is something pragmatic, instrumental, deflationist, and reality has no true interpretation outside of our cultural, linguistic and historical context.

So, they admit that I'm right. Truth can only be grasped supra-empirically and supra-logically. In the Vedic philosophy, this is done through yogic meditation, vedanta and bhakti.