I'm saying that the conclusion is a contradiction, — Michael

The conclusion is B, because If A, then B, and A. It's a simple modus ponens. So you're saying that the conclusion of a modus ponens is a contradiction.

The conclusion is B, because If A, then B, and A. It's a simple modus ponens. So you're saying that the conclusion of a modus ponens is a contradiction. — Terrapin Station

Yes. His conclusion is "every human-appearing non-conscious thing is conscious".

Semantic content doesn't matter for that, does it? I asked you that earlier and you just ignored it.

Semantic content doesn't matter for that, does it? I asked you that earlier and you just ignored it. — Terrapin Station

Doesn't matter for what? I don't understand your question. It is a simple fact that "every human-appearing non-conscious thing is conscious" is a contradiction. Therefore, if it follows from two (or more) premises then one (or more) of the premises must be false. That's how a proof by contradiction works.

Doesn't matter for what? — Michael

For assessing the argument. (Or in other words, the whole focus of the discussion we've been having)

Sure, we can reason about reason, " turn it back to face itself"; which presumably a dog or chimp cannot. — John

I see by virtue of the light that strikes my eye. So does the dog.

I have a capacity to take that light as an object in its own right, to investigate it, to devote my life to the study of light, if I so choose. My powers outstrip the dog's in this respect, even with respect to the light and sight we have in common, or with respect to any object we encounter in the world.

We can investigate and hypothesize about histories of reason, in animal and human lineages, just as we can with histories of digestion, if that is what we find thrilling. — John

If we find it thrilling, or for any other reason.

Let's note in passing that hypothesis is only one factor of investigation; and that without some corresponding investigation, hypothesis is just a sort of talk.

But we have no clue as to its origin and its mysterious ability to make the world intelligible, just as we have no way of rationally working out what the absolute origin of the world, or its capacity to be made intelligible by reason, is. — John

You say "no clue?"

What is the origin of the power of sight or hearing, the power of motility or digestion, the power of speech or rationality? Any of us can pluck the eyes from his own head, if he has no clue what "origin" the power of sight has in him. And where did these eyes come from? With the rest of this body, traced back to an act of conception, say the old-fashioned kind. And where did those parents come from...

We've got plenty of clues about the empirical origins of animals and animal powers. Do you have some special reason to imagine that rationality, alone among those powers, flies down from the heavens full-grown to dwell in hearts and minds?

What special mystery do you find in the way that rationality "makes the world intelligible"? One might face the whole of existence with a sense of awe; and any piece of it with the same awe. I see no more mystery in the fact of rationality than in the fact of sentience, or in the fact of life, or in the fact of existence. And look, here we are. That mystery is no obstacle to understanding.

This is where reason ends and faith based on intuition begins. — John

What do you mean by "intuition"? I'm not accustomed to treating "reason" and "intuition" as if they were mutually exclusive. Nor "faith" and "reason", for that matter.

I do acknowledge a thing we might call faith without reason. For instance, "we have no reason" to believe any of the infinite horde of imaginary possibilities the mind can add to the balance of appearances. I'm not sure anyone actually has that sort of faith; for in the end, it seems there's something like a feeling that drives one to favor some such fancies and to reject the others, instead of maintaining tranquil repose in the balance of appearances; and for the one thus driven, the feeling may be said to count as reason for his faith. Once the faith gets going, it becomes a habit in its own right.

I'm not sure what any of this has to do with our conversation about rationality, sentience, animal life, and philosophical zombies. Of course we can have faith in anything we imagine, based on nothing but whim or feeling, if we've run out of other reasons for faith. Another option is to suspend judgment in such cases.

Shall we suspend judgment here, or begin trading fancies?

Of course no one is constrained to step beyond merely empirical inquiries if the latter are found to be satisfactory. That's certainly a matter for the individual, and individual taste. — John

No one is constrained to heap imaginary possibilities upon the balance of appearances, and thus distort his own sense of natural fact.

The formation of taste is a mystery.

Let's note in passing that hypothesis is only one factor of investigation; and that without some corresponding investigation, hypothesis is just a sort of talk. — Cabbage Farmer

Without investigation there would be no hypothesis to begin with. That seems obvious, so I'm not seeing your point here.

What special mystery do you find in the way that rationality "makes the world intelligible"? ... I see no more mystery in the fact of rationality than in the fact of sentience, or in the fact of life, or in the fact of existence. And look, here we are. That mystery is no obstacle to understanding. — Cabbage Farmer

That's right, and I did already note that the world is co-mysterious with reason. I also agree that the mystery of being is no barrier to empirical understanding. What we don't know is why things can be understood or what the significance of that is. Of course, it's also true that if things could not be understood then there would be no sentience, and no life to speak of. My point was just that empirical investigations don't even begin to approach such questions.For me these are the interesting questions; the ones that cannot be answered by empirical inquiries; the latter are best left to science, it's better at them than philosophy is.

What do you mean by "intuition"? I'm not accustomed to treating "reason" and "intuition" as if they were mutually exclusive. Nor "faith" and "reason", for that matter.

I do acknowledge a thing we might call faith without reason. — Cabbage Farmer

No, reason and faith are not mutually exclusive. We always have reasons for believing. But we do believe things for reasons which are not merely based on empirical evidence or logic. Such beliefs can range from thoughtless inherited superstitions to the most sophisticated intellectual intuitions based on profound inner understanding. There can be no empirical evidence or purely logical justifications to support such inner intuitive understanding; that is where faith in the proper sense comes in, must come in if we are to trust in our inner understanding. That kind of understanding (akin to mysticism) tends to engender the deepest kind of certainty by its very nature. I think this is what constitutes real intelligence in the most important sense, which is essentially non-normative, and I don't think its conceivable that AI or p-zombies will ever get there, to refer back to the OP.

Animals are p-zombies. — tom

Nonsense.

Antonio Damasio thinks that every single living thing is intentional. Every single living thing moves towards nutrition and growth, and away from harm and danger in a dynamic and adaptive way, at a much greater rate than can be attributed to chance. Even if this can be entirely reduced to physical biology or whatever, emotion, motive, intention are fundamental and univocal in all living things.

Nonsense — Wayfarer

I totally disagree; I think it is rubbish.

Here's a d-zombie: ;-)

I totally disgaree; I think it is rubbish. — John

Animals don't possess qualia. You can prove they do?

If we can conceive of p-ducks then duckness isn't physical
We can conceive of p-ducks
Therefore, duckness isn't physical

Sorry, made rude remark, since deleted. What I will say is, I really fail to grasp that point, therefore will refrain from further comment on this particular issue, thanks for the feedback.

Can you prove they don't...or...can you prove you do?

:D Well, dance with Daffy Dack, or crack a d-zombie-ack, that's a d-regulation mindfrack!

Can you prove they don't...or...can you prove you do? — John

Creatures that possess qualia have radically different behaviours to those that do not. Perhaps a better phrasing is that in order to explain animal behaviour it is unnecessary to ascribe to them subjectivity. For humans, it is impossible to explain their behaviour without it.

Animals do not create knowledge. If they did, they could create knowledge of "what-it-is-like" to feel pain. If they could do that, then what is to stop them creating knowledge of any kind?

Creatures that possess qualia have radically different behaviours to those that do not. — tom

Is that because qualia is uniquely causally efficacious? Or is qualia a necessary product of the types of physical states that are required to cause such behaviour?

Furthermore, how do you justify the above? You must possess some means to determine that all things that behave in such a way have qualia. And obviously you can't use this behaviour as the measure as that would be circular.

Perhaps a better phrasing is that in order to explain animal behaviour it is unnecessary to ascribe to them subjectivity. For humans, it is impossible to explain their behaviour without it.

This suggests the former; that qualia is uniquely causally efficacious. Is this because qualia is a physical thing, or is qualia non-physical but nonetheless able to causally influence the physical world (and uniquely so)?

The robot butler 'knows' how to do a lot of things, but it can't improvise, or adapt, or do anything outside being a robot butler. — Wayfarer

This isn't so in the imaginary case of philosophical zombies, and I see no reason to expect that "improvising", or playing various roles, or developing novel roles, is out of the question for AI in real life. Aren't there already AI music programs that "improvise" music to some extent? Any reason to expect a hard limit in progress along these lines?

On the other hand: Can a human being “do anything outside” being a human being? It seems every creature is limited in its own way.

I agree it's meaningful to talk of such things, but I think the problem with simulated and artificial intelligence is that it conflates intelligence and computation - it says basically that intelligence is a variety of computation — Wayfarer

How do you distinguish such terms from each other: rationality, intelligence, knowledge, sentience, mind? Are they all the same thing to you? Does each one of them imply all the others in your language?

I'm content to say an artificial heart is one sort of heart, an artificial intelligence is one sort of intelligence, an artificial knower is one sort of knower. Are we disagreeing about the facts, or are we disagreeing about the reasonableness of expectations about pending facts, or are we disagreeing merely about the appropriate use of words to describe facts and expectations about which we are more or less in agreement?

There's a difference between saying "intelligence is a variety of computation" and saying "some varieties of computation are varieties of intelligence". The fact that some speakers wrongly conflate intelligence and computation does not entail there is no meaningful correlation between the two terms: just as the possibility of wrongly conflating hearts and artificial hearts does not entail there is no meaningful correlation between the two terms.

To say an artificial man is one sort of man, is not to say the two sorts of man have everything in common. There’s no need to speak this way, and there’s no need not to. It’s merely a matter of how one draws up his terms. What’s asserted and denied in each case depends in part on the bias in the definition. Agreement and disagreement follow from that -- too soon, if we rush to agree or disagree without first understanding an interlocutor’s usages.

which is why the AI advocates truly believe that there is no ontological distinction between the two; that rational thought, and the operations of computer systems, are essentially the same. — Wayfarer

What is “ontological distinction” supposed to mean here? Is there an “ontological distinction” between my left hand and my right hand? Arguably they are two different “entities”. I say that there’s no single “privileged ontology”, that an ontology is just a way of organizing the world into things we agree to call “entities” and “existents” for the sake of conversation or for some special purpose. A valid ontology is not a solution of all the world’s mysteries, it’s just a useful way of speaking.

Anything that exists is "the same" as anything else that exists in some respect or other. I'm inclined to agree that many speakers have an exaggerated sense of the similarity of minds and information processors. In my view, one of the most important differences is the difference in sentience; the zombie discourses bring this out in their own way.

After all it's the absence of sentience, of subjectivity, of a subject, of experience -- that makes the artificial knowing of the syntax engine a mere simulation of knowing, instead of an artificially produced variety of the genuine article. If not for this crucial difference, I might be inclined to call such artificial knowing a sort of genuine knowing. On what grounds, in that case, would I reasonably withhold the label?

They're instruments of human intelligence; but I think the idea that they are actually beings themselves remains in the domain of science fiction. — Wayfarer

I'm not sure what you mean by "beings" here; is this Heideggerian usage? I’m content to say that anything said to “exist” -- oceans, clouds, raindrops, water molecules -- is rightly called an existent, an entity, a “being”, an object, a thing of one sort or another.

So far as I'm concerned the syntax engines are not sentient beings. Or rather: It seems to me an empirical question, whether genuine sentience can be produced by mere AI design, and I see no reason to expect that it can be. A doubt along the lines marked out by Searle in his Chinese Room.

The divergence is because I want to resist what I see as the reductionism that is inherent in a lot of modern philosophising; and I know this rubs a lot of people up the wrong way. My approach is generally platonistic, which tends to be top-down; the Platonic conception of mind is that mind is prior to and the source of the phenomenal domain, whereas naturalism presumes that mind is an evolved consequence of a natural process. — Wayfarer

I'm not sure this explains the "divergence" I had in mind. I mean we diverge with respect to certain maxims you characteristically assert, as when you say things like "reason is always the source of explanation, not the object of it", as if being "the source" rules out being "the object", as if human powers cannot be aimed at themselves, as if there's no such thing as reflexivity, or as if all reflexivity involves unfathomable and incomprehensible paradox. We've cycled through variations on this theme before.

I'm not sure how your platonism is at issue in that divergence. In any case, I like to resist reductionism too, and I might call your platonism a sort of reductionism -- reducing phenomena in a direction opposed to that favored by the materialist.

I guess most materialists nowadays would claim that what we call mind emerges in nature. I'm inclined to agree with that particular claim. But I call myself a skeptical naturalist, and I aim to be about as skeptical about materialist metaphysics as I am about idealist metaphysics. Your platonism sounds a lot like idealism so far, heralding "mind the source", and perhaps "reducing" all things to mind. But I'm not yet clear on your meaning:

If "mind is prior to and the source of the phenomenal domain", in what sense is “mind the source”? How are "mind" and "the phenomenal domain" related to the whole of existence? Does anything exist, according to you, besides minds and the phenomenal domain? Is there only one mind or many; only one phenomenal domain or many? What is contained in the "phenomenal domain" to which mind is prior and of which mind is the source?

What is the basis -- the rational basis, not the pedigree in the literature -- for these views of yours on mind and the phenomenal domain? How do we know, why should we suppose, that "mind is the source"? I say we have good reason to suppose that minds are sources of experience, and hence of phenomena -- no appearances without mind, without sentience -- but I have a hunch you mean something grander: not merely that minds are logically prior to appearances, and that each mind is a "source" of appearances, but also that mind and its "phenomenal domain" exist somehow independently of a physical world, or that mind is logically and chronologically prior to matter, or some such story.

As a skeptical naturalist, I don't count myself a materialist or an idealist, and I do my best to steer clear of metaphysics, which seems to me an exercise in arbitrary fantasy. I call my skeptical naturalism a sort of phenomenology. I characterize empirical science as an extension of ordinary empirical knowledge, and think of empirical knowledge as rooted in phenomenological foundations, in the perspectives of rational sentient agents.

I suppose most materialists nowadays, apart from their metaphysical diversions, tend to reflect on the world as it appears to us in keeping with principles of methodological naturalism. And I suppose this is why my views may seem to resemble the views of a materialist in certain respects, from the point of view of an idealist who posits another sort of world beyond the reach of Ockham's razor. For a knack with that blade, and the custom of methodological naturalism, seem about the same to me as a habit of respect for the balance of appearances. A habit exemplified in times past by Sextus, Gassendi, and the full-grown Hume.

This divergence, then, is one manifestation of the 'culture war' between scientific naturalism and it's opponents. I'm not going to apologise for the conflict this often causes, but I will acknowledge it. — Wayfarer

I'd be the last to want an apology for a divergence in views. What would be the point of philosophical discourse if we all agreed with each other at every turn?

I'm not sure we understand the "opponents" in the culture war the same way -- but then, defining the culture war is part of the culture war. I hope we're not at war here, but only engaged in sincere philosophical conversation in a spirit of goodwill, aiming together at truth. Plenty of room to diverge without going to war. With respect to that ongoing conflict, however, I’ll declare I’m on the side of the pacifists, and the people, and humanity, and the truth, and plain speaking.

In any case, one reason that we can't explain reason is because of the recursive nature of such an undertaking. To explain anything, we must employ reason, but if reason is what we're trying to explain, then such attempts must invariably be circular. You can't 'put reason aside', and then analyse it from some point outside of it; every attempt to analyse it, must call on the very thing it wishes to analyse *. — Wayfarer

Here exactly is the sort of divergence I had in mind! You’ve jogged my memory: “recursion” is the word you tend to use in this connection, where I expect “reflexivity”.

...as if "recursion" were impossible. Here I am, a part of the world, and a part of the world wants to understand another part of the world. Is this a paradox for you? Can a stream splash itself? Do I use reason to add and subtract; and can I use reason to "explain" my addition and subtraction? Perhaps not without increasing the risk of error, if I try to explain it while I perform the calculation; but easily enough before or after.

We've gone round this sort of circle perhaps a dozen times or more. We can consider ten thousand more cases, it will remain a fallacy from my point of view. Or perhaps you can explain your thinking in the general pattern? Thus far I see no logic in it, only misleading poetry.

If you want to assume that "reason" is the name of a ghost in an eternal platonic world, then I agree, we can't explain it or any of its neighbors. But I'd require quite an account in support of that assumption.

The basic operations of reason - if/then, greater than, same as, etc - are in my view 'metaphysically primitive', i.e. they can't be explained or reduced to anything more simple. They are intrinsic to reason and therefore to science (a point that is broadly Kantian — Wayfarer

What is "metaphysically primitive" supposed to mean?

I call this rather primitive: the capacities to differentiate individual things, to recognize one thing as the same thing on different occasions, to recognize different things as of the same kind, and to act accordingly; and the principles (the logical, conceptual, or organizational relations) these capacities seem to exemplify and require, including principles of similarity and difference, whole and part, genus and species. These principles and capacities seem close to the root of minds like ours and conceptual capacities like ours. And it seems that once experience is organized in keeping with these basic principles and capacities, it’s organized in accordance with, at least, i) basic principles we associate with inferential logic (conjunction, disjunction, quantification, negation, implication) and ii) basic quantitative principles (more and less, many and few, again and another, amounts of the same), and perhaps already -- granting ordinary assumptions about animal life -- basic principles we associate with iii) causal and iv) modal relations.

Accordingly, by my way of reckoning, some of the terms you’ve singled out seem less primitive than others; and all of these principles can be accounted for as emerging along with the relevant conceptual capacities in living sentient beings, in organisms whose sensorimotor capacities are organized according to biological purposes in a more or less regular environment.

I think there are evolutionary accounts of how h. sapiens developed the capacity to reason - but notice the expression 'capacity to reason'. I think the furniture of reason, these primitive terms without which reasoning is not possible, are not themselves something that evolves - what evolves is the capacity to grasp them. — Wayfarer

Let’s emphasize that here we seem agreed: “the capacity to grasp them” evolves. Do we also agree that here “evolves” may be said to mean in the first place, emerges in nature, in the course of natural history, in the course of a biological lineage; and in the second place, emerges anew as each individual organism in the relevant line comes into its own?

Of course a capacity to reason is not the same thing as reason in general, just as a capacity to speak is not the same as language in general, and a capacity to walk is not the same as walking in general. But that fine distinction gives us no clue as to what sort of thing the more general term might be. What is the “furniture” of language or of walking? Where does it come from, and where shall we find it?

Many of us have eyes affording a capacity of sight. All things we call eyes in the relevant sense, have at bottom “the same furniture”, despite variations from one beast to the next. I say we have an empirical concept of “eye” and of “sight”, informed by our experience of eyes and sight. I’m not sure what it’s supposed to mean, what it may add or subtract from that general concept of ours, to say there’s an eternal form of “eye” and an eternal form of “sight”. To me these sound like mere abstractions, intellectual traces of our empirical concepts in the jelly of imaginary possibility. The Platonist, like the Pythagorean in awe of his own power of abstraction, reifies those traces to create a mythical world he calls divine, eternal, and most real, populated by the shadows cast by ideas.

Even granting that the investigation of that shadow world is a meaningful enterprise -- I don’t see how one might warrant the conclusion that the abstract shadow of our empirical concept of “eye” or “walking” or “rationality” or “mind” is somehow the source of the corresponding empirical concept, or the source of the corresponding things in the world that have given rise to those empirical concepts, or the source of the corresponding natural-historical processes that, we say, have given rise to those things in the world, eyes, and walks, and rational animals.

As if some such abstraction were the real ground of every corresponding real instance -- or rather, as if the coming-to-be of every real instance were somehow caused or produced or determined by an infinite host of applicable abstract concepts.

On the other hand: The story we tell from our present point of view in history, in keeping with the custom of methodological naturalism and resisting all temptation to metaphysical abuse of the rational imagination, has no trouble accounting in broad strokes for what appears to be a most general trend in rationality. For it seems the most generic features of rationality -- the features each of us has gestured at in his own way -- are most generic because they tend to emerge when perceiving agents with biological purposes emerge in the world. If the world were radically different, or if we were not perceiving agents, or if we had no biological purposes -- I suppose no such rationality would emerge. But since the world is what it is, it gives rise to biological organisms in some places; and since biological organisms are what they are, life gives rise to sentient animals in some places; and since sentient animals are what they are, their perception-and-action tends to be organized in keeping with the most generic features of rationality. And these are the features that seem to follow from the fact of perceptual identification and differentiation in sentient animal agents with biological purposes.

I suppose that account is an example of what Plato, according to some translators, calls a “likely story” or a “just-so story” in the Timaios.

Once intelligence reaches the point of being able to grasp them, then it passes a threshold, namely, that of rationality, which makes modes of being and understanding available to it, which are not available to its forbears. — Wayfarer

I’m still uneasy in my grasp of your use of the terms “intelligence”, “being”, “mode of being”, and “understanding”, among others. It seems clear we have a way to go just to line up our terms; and likely that once we’ve made more progress in that effort of understanding each other’s speech, we’ll continue to agree that we have different stories to tell.

I’ll agree there are various degrees of complexity and adaptability of “intelligence” and “rationality” in animals; and a particular “form” of mind is among the biological “traits” inherited by offspring.

I suppose there’s a “threshold” beyond which sensory receptivity to light counts as “sight”; perhaps another beyond which purposive sensorimotor organization becomes “sentience”; another beyond which animal communication becomes “language”; and so on. Now that you mention it, it seems I’m less sure about where to locate the “threshold of rationality”: For I might expect that the “rationality” of the sentient animal has its origins in a prior “rationality” of the nonsentient organism, consisting in the alignment of biological structure and function with features of the environment regularly correlated with biological purposes. That’s not to say that the two sorts of “rationality” are exactly the same in every respect, only that there’s enough in common to warrant the usage.

So in that sense, those elements of rational thought are not something that can be explained, even though they can be used to explain many other things. — Wayfarer

I believe I’ve made it clear enough, how I’m not sure I follow your reasoning in this regard.

Now it sounds as if perhaps you’re saying: The “elements of reason” have not evolved; and the capacity to reason is not the same thing as the elements of reason; and once organisms have evolved to be intelligent enough to grasp the elements of reason, and thus count as “rational”, those organisms have a capacity that was not available to their predecessors; and therefore the elements of reason cannot be explained….

Strikes me as the very picture of a non sequitur, so I suppose you mean something else.

In any case, I reject the claim that “the elements of reason do not emerge in nature”, along lines I’ve sketched above.

(That, by the way, is why I believe that 'science doesn't explain science', i.e., science doesn't really account for the nature of number or natural law, but it can use its ability to discern these things to explain all manner of other things. — Wayfarer

I agree that “science doesn’t explain science”. Philosophy accounts for the empirical sciences, which remain mere branches of philosophical activity despite general confusion on this point in our time. Only philosophy integrates the various empirical sciences, and the other arts, into a whole discourse that informs as it’s informed by the whole life of individuals and communities.

There’s a difference between science and scientism, and a corresponding difference between being antiscience and being antiscientistic.

Wittgenstein touches on this when he says 'the whole modern conception of the world is founded on the illusion that the so-called laws of nature are explanations of natural phenomena.' TLP 6.371) — Wayfarer

What does Wittgenstein mean in the Tractatus by “the whole modern conception of the world”?

I agree that “laws of nature” are not explanations. I might call them generalized observations or generalized descriptions. We develop these general rules by observing many particular cases, and abstracting some trend or feature they appear to have in common. Such a “law” is a rigorous generalization of a set of rigorous observations that’s useful in constructing or explaining particular cases, and that’s open to correction in light of subsequent observations or superior generalizations.

We use these general rules to explain particular events, for instance in the manner of a forensic scientist, or in answering a question like “Why is it raining?” The same rules play a role in providing more general accounts, for instance in answering more general questions like “Why does it rain?” or “How does rain happen?”

The aptness of the accounts expressed according to the general rules tends to increase along with the range of observations informing the rule, and with the rigor and exactness of observation and generalization. I’m not sure what other sort of equally useful “explanation” of phenomena might be available to us, though it’s clear we’re free to posit any imaginary story we please alongside or in place of such empirically grounded explanations.

I think dogs, elephants, birds, primates, cetaceans, are certainly sentient beings, but that all of what you're describing can be understood in terms of learned behaviour, response to stimulus, memory, and so on. — Wayfarer

I emphasize this question: Does the dog have a rational expectation?

Actually animals are capable of a great many things science doesn't understand at all, like fish and birds that travel around the world to return to their place of birth. They're sentient beings, so we have that it common with them. But those attributes don't qualify as abstract rationality. — Wayfarer

I’m not sure I follow your claim about sentience and traveling fish. But I’m pleased to note we’re agreed that human beings are not the only sentient animals on Earth. I’m also content to say that each sentient animal “has a mind”; do our usages accord in this further respect? Or do you say there’s an important difference between “being sentient” and “having a mind”?

I thought we were speaking about rationality in general. Do you mean to suggest you’ve only been speaking about one sort of rationality this whole time, namely, “abstract rationality”?

What sort of rationality is abstract rationality, in your language? Is it this sort of rationality you say belongs to human beings alone among the animals? Do you also say there are other sorts of rationality enjoyed by both human and nonhuman animals? Perhaps you also recognize a thing called “concrete rationality”? How do you suppose the species, abstract rationality, is related to its genus? And which sort of rationality -- rationality in general, or abstract rationality, or concrete rationality, or some yet unmentioned variety -- is the rationality that “does not evolve”, that “cannot be explained”, and that dwells perhaps eternal among platonic shadows as a “source”?

A lot to respond to there! At this moment I'm commuting with an iPad so can only respond to just a few points but will come back again.

When I refer to the culture war of course I don't imply that I am at war wiith you, or anyone for that matter. It is a reference to what is see as the conflict between scientific materialism and traditional philosophy (to select two examples from a range of possibilities.) Steven Pinker's essay Why Science is not the Enemy of the Humanities, 2013, is an example of the kind of approach I'm arguing against. That often puts me in the company of philisophers of religion or at any rate critics of materialism (not all of whom are philosophers of religion.)

What is “ontological distinction” supposed to mean here? Is there an “ontological distinction” between my left hand and my right hand? — Cabbage Farmer

The distinction between hands is 'chirality'. 'Ontology' refers to 'the study of the meaning of being' - as distinct from the study of phenomena. I say that 'beings' are ontologically distinct from 'objects', which is why it is incorrect to designate objects as beings, or beings as objects. Beings generally are subjects of experience, which objects are not.

Here I am, a part of the world, and a part of the world wants to understand another part of the world. Is this a paradox for you? — Cabbage Farmer

At issue is the relation of objects and subjects. Humans are the subjects of experience, in a phenomenal domain, comprising objects, forces, other beings, and so on. And you're right about me confusing recursiveness and reflexivity - I mean the latter. My bad.

The principle I'm referring to is from the Upanisads, where there is a verse that says 'the hand can grasp another, but not itself. The eye can see another, but not itself. You cannot see the seer or know the knower.' I think a form of this principle is also found in Kant, in the idea of 'transcendental apperception'. I have always regarded it as a first principle.

The point is, the mind organises sensations, perceptions and so on, according to judgements, reason and the like (spelling it out formally takes a lot of text). Because this is the activity of the 'unknown knower' it is determinative of what we consider to be reality, which we instinctively believe to be external or 'other' to the mind.

There is a sense in which that is true, but another sense in which the very notion of 'external' is also in the mind! This is clearly spelt out in Schopenhauer's idea of 'vorstellung' which is why he himself said his philosophy was similar to that of the Upanisads.

What is “ontological distinction” supposed to mean here? — Cabbage Farmer

As above.

I’m content to say that anything said to “exist” -- oceans, clouds, raindrops, water molecules -- is rightly called an existent, an entity, a “being”, an object, a thing of one sort or another. — Cabbage Farmer

Notice you have to enclose 'being' in quotes in this sentence.

// to be continued.

//that is because 'beings' are subjects of experience. In very simple beings, this is only present in rudimentary form, whereas in human beings, the nature of being itself can be reflected on. But inanimate objects are not beings, because they're not subjects of experience (although pan-psychism seems to argue that everything is a subject of experience, but I myself don't adhere to that view.)

Without investigation there would be no hypothesis to begin with. That seems obvious, so I'm not seeing your point here. — John

One might hypothesize on the basis of casual observation or on the basis of what's called common sense. I'm not sure that's the same thing as hypothesizing on the basis of "investigation" -- which I might characterize as a more thorough and diligent following of traces. It also matters how the hypothesis may be expected to play along with subsequent observations and investigations.

That's right, and I did already note that the world is co-mysterious with reason. — John

One thing you haven't yet made clear to me: How is "reason" special in this regard, among all other things in the world? Is there anything in the world that is not "co-mysterious" with the world? Is reason the only thing in the world that is "co-mysterious" in this way?

What about love? What about time and space? What about matter and energy? What about imagination, possibility, life, freedom, perception, language, beauty, taste... what about anything else?

I also agree that the mystery of being is no barrier to empirical understanding. What we don't know is why things can be understood or what the significance of that is. — John

Do we know "why" anything is the way that it is, in the sense you mean here? It seems to me this horizon of mystery extends through all our understanding, "within and without" each phenomenon we seem to understand.

We can investigate phenomena, we can reason about the results of investigation and about the course of investigation. It's not only rivers and storm clouds we can get to know better, but also our own minds and the minds of others, including the powers and practices involved in perceiving, thinking, understanding, and speaking.

So far as I can see, the process of thus extending empirical knowledge never yields a "complete" account of anything. But that doesn't mean we don't understand any thing, and it doesn't mean there's no aura of mystery hanging in and around all things, even as we seem to understand them.

So I'm not sure why you single out "understanding" or "reason" as especially mysterious. In what sense, according to you, do we so perfectly and completely understand all other things, that there's no mystery left in them by the time we get done understanding?

Of course, it's also true that if things could not be understood then there would be no sentience, and no life to speak of. — John

I'm not sure I follow you here.

In what sense do sentience and life depend on "things being understood"?

My point was just that empirical investigations don't even begin to approach such questions. For me these are the interesting questions; the ones that cannot be answered by empirical inquiries; the latter are best left to science, it's better at them than philosophy is. — John

I agree, there's a big difference between philosophical activity and empirical science. Though I don't think they're unrelated enterprises: I'm partial to the old, unfashionable view that the empirical sciences are among philosophy's branches.

I don't agree that empirical understanding doesn't "approach" the questions we've raised here in this thread. I think it clearly does approach them, though it never gives a "final answer" in this or any other matter. There's always room for further investigation, and there's always more to be said.

I don't agree that empirical understanding doesn't "approach" the questions we've raised here in this thread. I think it clearly does approach them, though it never gives a "final answer" in this or any other matter. There's always room for further investigation, and there's always more to be said. — Cabbage Farmer

One question I overlooked: A question like, "Why does the world exist"?

I think it's reasonable to expect this sort of question may be unapproachable for empirical understanding. In that case, empirical science has no comment on the matter.

One sort of philosophical approach however, is in keeping with the expectation that there is no answer at all to such questions, in other words, there is no reason that the world exists. The existence of the world is not the sort of thing for which there are "reasons" or "causes". It doesn't make sense to ask for the reason the world exists.

Another sort of philosophical approach would align with another expectation, that if there is a reason for existence, it's not the sort of thing we can ever have reason to suppose we've gotten wind of. If it even makes sense to ask for the reason for existence, it's not a reason we can ever grasp.


Either one of those varieties of response to the question leaves about as much mystery in the world as one could hope for. The whole thing is fundamentally mysterious to us, from here to eternity.

I'm inclined to think that's roughly how things stand. Ordinarily, to deny this is to launch a conversation about the epistemic value of phenomena like gut feelings, psychic visions, and revelations; and about the difference between philosophy and fantasy.

When all that's said and done: In theory there's always room for unwarranted faith, for faith "without reason" or rational justification, or even faith contrary to reason.

I suspect this is why the concept of faith has played such a special role in the Western tradition, a role that many who speak of faith nowadays may not adequately appreciate. For to believe purely on the basis of faith -- instead of on the basis of a bunch of more or less reasonable premises and arguments, or even in the face of quite reasonable premises and arguments to the contrary -- well that's a deep-rooted, powerful faith that deserves the name "pure faith".

Though as I've said, in practice it seems there's always something like a feeling, at least, to serve as a warrant for belief.

One might hypothesize on the basis of casual observation or on the basis of what's called common sense. — Cabbage Farmer

Certainly that's true, but I would call these forms of investigation. Even animals investigate, how much more so do humans?

One thing you haven't yet made clear to me: How is "reason" special in this regard, among all other things in the world? Is there anything in the world that is not "co-mysterious" with the world? Is reason the only thing in the world that is "co-mysterious" in this way?

What about love? What about time and space? What about matter and energy? What about imagination, possibility, life, freedom, perception, language, beauty, taste... what about anything else? — Cabbage Farmer

I had thought we were specifically discussing the relation between reason and the world; the fact, the mystery, that the world is intelligible to reason, so it really wasn't that I was singling out reason from among "all the other things".

And now the question is raised in regard to the "other things" you list here: are they of the world, or of reason, or are they of 'something else'? I would say that some of the things you list would perhaps be best thought of as being of the world, and others would be best thought of as being of 'something else' and I would say that "something else" is best thought of as spirit; what would you say?

In what sense do sentience and life depend on "things being understood"? — Cabbage Farmer

It is only insofar as things are "understood" (and I mean this in the broadest possible sense as equivalent to being perceived) that anything at all appears. So without this understanding, which is perception, there is obviously no sentience, and without sentience there is no life, or non-life or anything else that arises. I mean, we might want to say that non-life, or even non-sentient life could 'be there' without sentience, but I don't believe we have any idea at all of what that 'being there' could consist in absent its appearance to perception and thought. We cannot coherently say that it could consist in anything, because any idea of constitution is a function of our own sentience and understanding.

A lot to respond to there! At this moment I'm commuting with an iPad so can only respond to just a few points but will come back again. — Wayfarer

I’m afraid my response is about as long this time around. A symptom of how much ground we'd have to cover to clear up our terms, sort out our agreements and disagreements, and begin to converse on the basis of such mutual understanding.

When I refer to the culture war of course I don't imply that I am at war wiith you, or anyone for that matter. It is a reference to what is see as the conflict between scientific materialism and traditional philosophy (to select two examples from a range of possibilities.) — Wayfarer

I'm glad to hear that you and I, at least, are at peace.

I'm not sure I would locate "traditional philosophy" in the culture war the way you have just now. It seems to me the discipline, and scholars and experts who are said to study and practice it, are enlisted on both sides, perhaps on every front of the conflict. Two experts in the political philosophy of Locke or Plato, for instance, might have conflicting views about these subjects and about politics in general. Philosophers are on both sides of the "culture war", much as climatologists are on both sides of the dispute about global warming; though there is far less consensus in philosophy than in climatology.

I've heard some people characterize the culture war in terms of an opposition between "naturalism" and "supernaturalism". I'm sympathetic to the spirit of that characterization, though I'm not sure I agree with the ordinary definition of these terms. For one thing, I'd want to either erase any implications about metaphysics from the distinction, or assign all metaphysical dogmas (including materialism) to the "supernatural" side. Or I might paraphrase the distinction in terms of a conflict between methodological naturalism and magical thinking, or something along these lines.

Steven Pinker's essay Why Science is not the Enemy of the Humanities, 2013, is an example of the kind of approach I'm arguing against. That often puts me in the company of philisophers of religion or at any rate critics of materialism (not all of whom are philosophers of religion.) — Wayfarer

It seems you and I are both critics of materialism, though for different reasons.

Is this the essay?

At a glance, it seems Pinker characterizes scientific activity as providing tools, methods, and results of investigation that can and should be used to inform discourse in what's called the humanities; promotes two ideals, that "the world is intelligible", and that "the acquisition of knowledge is hard"; and proposes a rehabilitation of the term "scientism" that aligns use of the term with the general character of scientific practice and worldview, instead of with practical and theoretical abuses of science.

Do you get something else from it, and what do you find objectionable in it?

The distinction between hands is 'chirality'. — Wayfarer

That sounds perhaps tautological.

Do you mean to suggest that, if any non-ontological concept of a relation may be applied to two objects then there is no need for recourse to "ontology" in characterizing the difference between the two objects?

'Ontology' refers to 'the study of the meaning of being' - as distinct from the study of phenomena. — Wayfarer

I often prefer to translate the suffix "-logy" in terms of "discourse", "language", "account", "narrative", "story"... "logos".

Why do you say "meaning of being" instead of just "being"? The name "ontology" suggests a logos of being or beings. In what sense is it, instead, a logos of the meaning of beings?

Is this true in other cases as well? Is phenomenology the logos of phenomena, or the logos of the meaning of phenomena? Is biology the logos of life and the living, or the logos of the meaning of life and the living? And so on.

What's the difference between a "logos of being or beings" and a "logos of the meaning of being or beings"?

What is the relation between phenomena and beings? What is the relation between appearing and being?

I say that 'beings' are ontologically distinct from 'objects', which is why it is incorrect to designate objects as beings, or beings as objects. — Wayfarer

You have yet to say what an "ontological distinction" is supposed to be.

Do you mean, in this case, to say that if a thing is an object, or is rightly called an object, then that thing is not a being, or is not rightly called a being?

In what sense is an "ontological distinction" anything other than a definition of mutually exclusive terms? I might say that anything rightly called a lamppost is not rightly called chocolate pudding: Is this another example of an ontological distinction? What's called a left hand is not called a right hand, despite the fact that they are two hands, and roughly symmetrical, resembling and related to each other in many ways.

Beings generally are subjects of experience, which objects are not. — Wayfarer

Is this what you mean by "ontological distinction"? That there are two sorts of thing that exist, corresponding to two sorts of ways of existing, namely, existing as subject of experience, and existing as object of experience; and that a thing that exists in one of these two ways never exists in the other way; and that anything said to exist must be said to exist in one of these two ways?

Are there any other "ontological distinctions" in your language, or is this the only one? Perhaps I've read too much between the lines: Is there a third class, neither subject nor object; and perhaps a fourth, both subject and object? Or perhaps there are further "ontological distinctions" within each class, distinguishing different sorts of subject on the one hand, and different sorts of object on the other along “ontological” lines?

Are the rules of these distinctions axioms of your preferred "ontology", held to be self-evident by its advocates; or are these claims supported in some more explicit way?

How do the terms "being" and "existence" fit into this story about a distinction between subjects and objects? Do you say, both subjects and objects "exist", but only subjects "are"? Is "being" just a synonym for "subject"? So that if we ask about the being-in-general of objects, you will reply, they are not, but only exist; whereas subjects both are and exist?

At issue is the relation of objects and subjects. — Wayfarer

While I'm still not clear on the meaning of your ontology, I'll register this agreement, that it's meaningful in general to speak about relations of "subjects" and "objects" of experience.

I see no reason to suppose that subjects cannot also be objects, as for instance, when a subject of experience takes itself as its own object, in what is sometimes called reflexive experience, reflexive consciousness, or introspective awareness. Or when one subject of experience sees that another subject of experience "is angry", "smells bread", "seems malnourished", "is about six foot three".

I see no reason to suppose that the things that enter as objects of experience into relations with subjects of experience exist only by virtue of being in such relations, and have no existence independent of such relations; though of course this is one conceivable possibility among others.

Likewise, though it's conceivable, I see no reason to suppose that the things that enter as subjects of experience into relations with objects of experience exist only by virtue of being in such relations, and have no existence independent of such relations. For instance, the same dog that sees me fetching the leash on one occasion, may on another occasion die in its sleep, and thus be, to all appearances, without any experience whatsoever, and no longer a subject, and no longer related to objects as a subject; but that thing may nevertheless be reasonably called "the same thing" that was till now a living dog and a subject of experience.

Humans are the subjects of experience, in a phenomenal domain, comprising objects, forces, other beings, and so on. — Wayfarer

I'm still not clear on the way the term "phenomenal domain" fits into the setting. Is it merely a logical term, for the logical domain of "objects of experience", or does it have some specific phenomenological significance, like the "perceptual field" in Merleau-Ponty's discourse? What does it add to, or remove from, the concept of "experience"?

Are all subjects of experience human beings? Are some nonhuman animals both subjects and beings? Are some non-animal things both subjects and beings? Is there a difference between a "subject", a "being", and a "mind"?

Do you mean to suggest that when "forces" and "other beings" are encountered in the experience (or phenomenal domain) of a subject, they are not rightly called "objects"? Is this another "ontological distinction"? Are there, in addition to subjects and objects, also “forces” and "other beings" which are neither subjects nor objects?

It's beginning to sound as though you mean to say that all beings are subjects and never objects, but some beings are encountered in the experience (or phenomenal domain) of other beings, along with objects and forces; that objects and forces are never beings or subjects; and that accordingly, although subjects are never objects, they do figure somehow in the experience of other subjects as "other beings".

And you're right about me confusing recursiveness and reflexivity - I mean the latter. My bad. — Wayfarer

I'm glad we've cleared up our use of these two terms, at least. Though it's long been clear that this is the sort of pattern you have in mind in this connection, no matter what words we've used. Some riddle of reflexivity, which after all is said by many to be a factor in logical paradoxes like the Liar and in enduring puzzles of self-reference, self-awareness, and self-knowledge in our tradition.

But I've never understood why you bring the riddle to bear in the way you do.

The principle I'm referring to is from the Upanisads, where there is a verse that says 'the hand can grasp another, but not itself. The eye can see another, but not itself. You cannot see the seer or know the knower.' I think a form of this principle is also found in Kant, in the idea of 'transcendental apperception'. I have always regarded it as a first principle. — Wayfarer

You do seem to make much of it, but I'm not sure I grasp the principles by which you apply the rule to particular cases.

I'd test our grasp of the rule itself, which in this form is rather poetically expressed and in need of unpacking to inform interpretation and to guide application to particular cases and contexts. For a feeling of awe at a riddle of reflexivity is not the same thing as a principle by which to clearly distinguish reasonable and unreasonable judgments about reflexivity in a given context.

A hand cannot grasp itself completely, but neither can it grasp a mountain, a sunbeam, a shout, or an hour completely. A hand does more than grasp: A hand can close upon itself, a hand can touch itself, feel itself, wet and dry itself, cut and salve itself, intertwine its fingers, and even clap without a partner....

Of course we can give the same treatment to similar poetic reflections on eyes, seers, and knowers. This is another turn of the wheel, another variation on the theme, another detour through the same path we travel every time you apply this "first principle" of yours in our conversations.

It happens so often, we might as well stick with it here, focus on this recurring thread and see where it leads us.

The point is, the mind organises sensations, perceptions and so on, according to judgements, reason and the like (spelling it out formally takes a lot of text). — Wayfarer

I'll agree that experience is always already organized. I’ll agree that a "manifold of sensation" is always already organized in perception. I'll agree that the organization of experience tends to be "rational", and is the basis of the rationality of sentient animals; and that human judgments and reasoning in one sense can but need not, and in another sense must, follow the tracks of experience.

I don't accept the implication that the organization of experience is in general the product of "judgments of the mind" or of "reasoning". But part of what's at issue here is our definition of terms like "judgment" and "reasoning".

Because this is the activity of the 'unknown knower' — Wayfarer

In what sense is the "organization of experience" the activity of "the unknown knower"? What do you mean by this phrase?

Do you mean to imply that each “mind" is an “unknown knower"? But here it seems we have already said a great deal about minds, as if we could know something or other about them. In what sense is the mind "unknown"? And to whom is the mind unknown? And who is it that is unacquainted with his own mind?

it is determinative of what we consider to be reality, — Wayfarer

Many things may be said to "determine" my judgment about whether it's snowing outside, including my mind, my eyes, my eyeglasses, my position relative to the window, the windowpane, the light outside, the light inside, and the weather.

If I close my eyes, I don't lose my mind, but I do lose the basis on which I sometimes use my mind to make judgments about the weather.

Accordingly, to all appearances, it seems that what "we consider to be reality" is determined by our minds as well as by other things.

which we instinctively believe to be external or 'other' to the mind. — Wayfarer

Do you mean that i) each subject has an instinct to believe it has a mind, and ii) the mind of each subject determines (independently of anything else?) what that subject "considers to be reality"; and iii) each subject has an instinct to believe that the reality determined and imputed by its mind is "external to" the mind it has an instinct to believe it has?

Above I’ve indicated that, as pertains to the unpacking of (ii), I see good reason to say “the mind determines our view of reality”, but no good reason to say “the mind, alone, determines our view of reality”.

Moreover, I see no reason to accept (i). For it seems to me that talk of "minds" is a sophisticated product of human culture, and I'm not sure what it might mean to say "each sentient animal has an instinct to believe it has a mind", as opposed to, for instance, "each sentient animal is at least minimally self-aware."

But if there is no such instinct as the instinct indicated in (i), then I'm not sure how to make sense of the claim in (iii), that each sentient animal has an instinct to believe that what it considers to be reality is "external" to its mind. For by my way of reckoning, the sentient animal, including the sentient human, may have no idea corresponding to our idea of "mind", and therefore it's not clear how to interpret the claim about an instinct in (iii). On the other hand, the sort of self-awareness I call reasonable to attribute to at least many sentient animals, would entail that each sentient animal has some understanding we might express in terms of a distinction between its own body and the rest of the world, and the latter may be called “outside” its body, while its body is called “inside” and “part of” the world.

In any case, I'm inclined to think that traditional talk about the world as "external" to the mind is confused, problematic, arbitrary, and far from instinctive or natural to creatures like us. On what grounds do you assign such instincts to all sentient beings?

There is a sense in which that is true, but another sense in which the very notion of 'external' is also in the mind! This is clearly spelt out in Schopenhauer's idea of 'vorstellung' which is why he himself said his philosophy was similar to that of the Upanisads. — Wayfarer

I recall the Germans in those days were increasingly influenced by their engagement with Eastern philosophy.

What's Schopenhauer's concept of "vorstellung", if it's relevant to our conversation?

In any case, I hope I've made clear the extent to which I agree that the relevant "notion of externality" is only "in the mind" of some thinkers, and otherwise a quite dubious notion.

As above. — Wayfarer

You have yet to make clear to me what you mean by "ontological distinction". Hopefully the line of questioning I've left above will help us closer to mutual understanding in this regard.

Notice you have to enclose 'being' in quotes in this sentence. — Wayfarer

What do you make of that typographical gesture?

As I recall, I put it in quotes because you seem to use the word quite differently than I do, and I wanted to signal the difference -- in particular, to emphasize that I was neither using the word in accordance with your usage, nor suggesting that you should refrain from using the word in your own way in our conversation.

Your use of the term is still opaque to me, along lines I've indicated, though it seems you apply “being”, “subject”, and “mind” to the same things, which for some reason you refuse to call “objects” even when they manifest in the experience of subjects.

Whereas for me "being" is practically synonymous with "entity", "thing", and the other terms I listed in that passage. I often defer to conventional usage in selecting from among synonyms, for instance in speaking of "sentient beings" and "human beings" instead of "sentient entities" and "human entities". But I don't mean to suggest anything special by that usage. The work of distinction in such phrases is performed by the terms "sentient" and "human", not by the term "being", which I'm content to apply to anything that's rightly said to exist.

that is because 'beings' are subjects of experience. In very simple beings, this is only present in rudimentary form, whereas in human beings, the nature of being itself can be reflected on. But inanimate objects are not beings, because they're not subjects of experience (although pan-psychism seems to argue that everything is a subject of experience, but I myself don't adhere to that view.) — Wayfarer

I suppose I could aim to restrict my usage so that when I say "being" in my conversations with you, the term always refers to something that is a "subject of experience" or "sentient entity".

What about things that are animate but not sentient, as I suppose plants may be, or other living things without nervous systems?

What is it that's "only present in rudimentary form" in "very simple beings"? I might agree that sentience, self-awareness, intelligence, objectivity, imagination, freedom... are less developed in some animals than in others, and that it seems such terms admit of varying qualities and degrees.

I suppose human beings can reflect on "the nature of being", either before or after they've decided what they mean by the phrase, or as part of the task of definition. It seems human beings are much better at "reflection" and "abstraction" than any other animal species we know; and that this opens us to a special domain of peculiarly human knowledge and confusion. It may be we're the only ones to reflect on "the nature" of anything. It seems that you and I are more or less in agreement in this one respect, while drawing rather different implications.

In these regions of our conversation, I always recall this passage from Plato's Theaititos:

But what about the power which makes clear to you that which is common to everything, including these things: that to which you apply the words 'is', 'is not', and the others we used in our questions about them just now? What is that power exercised by means of? What sort of instruments are you going to assign to all those things, by means of which the perceiving element in us perceives each of them? — Socrates, in Plato's Theaetetus (McDowell trans.)

// to be continued. — Wayfarer

I hope so.

I enjoy our exchanges and the pattern they weave over time. The similarities and differences in our vocabularies and in our views make for about as fruitful an exercise in philosophical conversation as I might hope for, not least because each of us seems eager to carry on in a spirit of goodwill, despite the difficulty of the task and the differences that turn up in the course of the exchange.

When I refer to the culture war of course I don't imply that I am at war wiith you, or anyone for that matter. It is a reference to what is see as the conflict between scientific materialism and traditional philosophy (to select two examples from a range of possibilities.)
— Wayfarer

I'm not sure I would locate "traditional philosophy" in the culture war the way you have just now. — Cabbage Farmer

By 'culture wars' I'm referring to the perceived conflict, widespread since the Enlightenment, between science and religion, and the sense that science has undermined the traditional basis of spiritual values in Western cultulre. Pinker's essay on this topic sparked a long debate (in which he was supported by Dennett) with Leon Wieseltier, who had previously writen an incendiary review of one of Dennett's previous books in the New York Times. Suffice to say, I side with Wieseltier (and that review conveys what I think is the gist of the debate). So, to the extent that traditional (or pre-modern) philosophy was in some fundamental way linked to the Greek-Judeo-Christian theistic tradition (and granted that this link is multi-valent), then the rejection of theistic religions, and the attempt to ground human nature in a purely naturalistic account of the world, constitutes what I see as the fundamental divide underlying the 'culture wars' (or at any rate, that is the conflict that I am generally commenting on.)

I often prefer to translate the suffix "-logy" in terms of "discourse", "language", "account", "narrative", "story"... "logos".

Why do you say "meaning of being" instead of just "being"? The name "ontology" suggests a logos of being or beings. In what sense is it, instead, a logos of the meaning of beings? — Cabbage Farmer

From your comments on the meaning of this term, it's clear that we understand it very differently. I have been criticized over my use of the word 'ontology' but I do base it on the dictionary definition, which says that the word 'ontology' is based on the first-person participle of the Greek word for 'to be' - the first person participle of which is 'I am':

The compound word ontology combines onto-, from the Greek ὄν, on (gen. ὄντος, ontos), i.e. "being; that which is", which is the present participle of the verb εἰμί, eimí, i.e. "to be, I am", and -λογία, -logia

So 'ontology' was originally intended as 'the study of the meaning of being', but even more specifically, the meaning of being in the first person. That distinguishes it from the characteristically 'third-person' view that is fundamental to naturalism.

(Heidegger differentiated the study of the meaning of being from the domain of the natural sciences. It's a fundamental distinction, because ontology is not concerned with 'what exists' - that is the role of the sciences - but the 'meaning of being' as a philosophical question and in the context of the human condition. It is precisely that understanding which he says has been generally forgotten or obscured by a fundamental error in Western metaphysics.)

for me "being" is practically synonymous with "entity", "thing", and the other terms I listed in that passage — Cabbage Farmer

You see, that is why I am saying that 'being' is fundamentally different to 'entity' or 'thing'. Entities or things are disclosed to, or appear to, or for, beings. Being is the primary ground or reality, being is what truly is. But being is never an object of perception, it is invisible to us, in a manner analogous to the blind spot caused by the optic nerve. So even though 'the meaning of being' seems obvious to us, in fact it's obscured or misapprehended by a kind of cultural 'blind spot' which we tend to look through, rather than at.

You know that you can actually detect your blind spot by holding a piece of paper with a dot on it at a certain distance from your eye, at which point the dot becomes invisible. Well, the human blindness to the 'real nature of being' is analogous to that, although it's a lot more far-reaching. That is the import of the argument from the 'unseen seer, the unknown knower'. That is pointing out that 'being' which is the ground of all existence, is not actually disclosed by analysis of phenomena. (This is an ancient idea in philosophy.)

And that is also why dogmatic materialists such as Dennett are obliged to deny that the first-person perspective has any particular significance, and to insist it is something can be completely accounted for by science (which he claims to do in books such as Consciousness Explained. Materialists are generally obliged to deny the existence of the unconscious on the same grounds.)

In contrast, Dennett's opponents insist that the 'first person perspective', the 'experience of being', is of a different order to what is disclosed in third-person terms (as per Chalmer's essay Facing Up to the Hard Problem). That is where the ontological distinction between 'things' and 'beings' shows up in the contemporary debate. (Dennett's response basically amounts to dismissal, which I am saying is another manifestation of the 'blind spot'. Have a look at the abstract, and Table of Contents entries, for William Byers, The Blind Spot.)

I suppose human beings can reflect on "the nature of being", either before or after they've decided what they mean by the phrase, or as part of the task of definition. It seems human beings are much better at "reflection" and "abstraction" than any other animal species we know; and that this opens us to a special domain of peculiarly human knowledge and confusion. It may be we're the only ones to reflect on "the nature" of anything. It seems that you and I are more or less in agreement in this one respect, while drawing rather different implications. — Cabbage Farmer

That's an extremely well-chosen passage from Plato. Socrates is asking, what is it that 'sees reason'? What is it that discerns sameness and difference? You see, I think whenever you make a truth statement -that 'such and such is the case', or 'such and such is not the case', then you're straight away in a domain that is only visible to the rational intelligence, namely, the domain of reason. It is because the faculty of reason that humans can see and abstract likeness and unlikeness, or similarity, or equals - an ability that is intrinsic to the nature of rational intelligence. What is the origin of 'rationality' if not the ability to perceive 'ratio'? And it was the ability to perceive 'ratio' and 'logos' that was at the origin of the Greek conception of rationality (and indeed science).

I enjoy our exchanges and the pattern they weave over time. — Cabbage Farmer

Thank you, that is very kind. I know I've gotten into deep waters here, and I've made many contentious statements. That's my problem, I tackle these issues from too general a level instead of picking one or two aspects of a problem and working on them, and I tend to go in 'guns blazing'. But regardless, I hope I have made the point about the distinct meaning of 'ontology' and the distinction of beings and objects a bit more clear.