:clap:

Do you need to consciously plan on choosing that alternative which you deem optimally beneficial, hence good, relative to your principle, momentary conscious interests in order to so choose? — javra

Richard Dawkins will often say that life exhibits 'apparent design'. He obviously does this to defray the age-old cliche of the 'grand designer'. But design in nature is easy to discern and to represent graphically:



Living forms are shot through with designs, and patterns, at every level from the microcellular to the ecological.

But this doesn't necessarily imply a conscious designer, some being or entity that sweats away on designing such patterns (or beetles for that matter). It might simply be conceived of as an inherent drive or tendency in nature to give rise to progressively more elaborate patterns and designs as pure play or sport (Lila of Hindu mythology. However, ideas of ‘inherence’ are usually forbidden on the grounds that they are ‘orthogenetic’.)

Furthermore, if the design in nature is only 'apparent', then does that mean that only human agents can produce real designs? I mean, designing is something that humans obviously do, but do only humans do that? Put another way, are the only actual designs in the Universe of human origin? And if that's not so, then is there really no actual, as distinct from apparent, design anywhere at all in the Universe? It seems an absurd proposition.

Biological evolution is not sentient and has no conscious plans; in this example, it yet has a telos, hence purpose, that is independent of sentience and its conscious planning. — javra

If you mean biological evolution as a scientifiç principle, then indeed it is not sentient nor does it consciously plan. In it's ultimate form, based on the, get this, central dogma of molecular biology (!), teleos is incorporated into selfish(!) genes, a most extraordinary theory of life and being.

Considering the actual evolution, sentient beings are actually on the scene, and these beings have actual plans. If these are in service of some higher ideal as dogmatized in evolution theory, is highly questionable, and the new dogma is probably an attempt by lack of better or inability to understand truly.

We do not intuit time or space; we intuit objects in time and space. To intuit is to follow from sensation, and the sensation proper of time or space is impossible, insofar as both are conceived as infinite and empty. — Mww

I'd say "to intuit" is not well defined, and people use "intuition" in various different ways which are pretty much all quite vague. Intuition may refer to immediate apprehension by the mind, or it may refer to immediate sense apprehension, perception. The latter would follow from sensation, but the former not necessarily so.

There's a further problem with the concept of "conception". If conception is understood as something the mind does, to create a concept in one's mind, or if conception is understood as receiving a concept from somewhere else, these two different modes of understanding produce different ways of apprehending "intuition".

Our discussion concerns the apprehension of space and time, and I've already cautioned you about the need to separate these two, i.e. not to place them in the same category as both being apprehended in the same way. We can see that "space" is fundamentally conceived out of necessity, it is necessary that we allow that there is something called "space", the medium within which objects exist, allowing them to move around. The conception of "space" is necessary to allow for the reality of independent objects.

But the issue of how we conceive of "time" is far more difficult. This I believe, is because we already have a sense of before and after, within us, by the time we are born. As we grow it manifests as the difference between memory of the past, and anticipation of the future. But I believe a fundamental respect for a difference between future and past is already inherent within the constitution of living beings. This supports a more specific sense of "intuition" which is based in what we know as "instinct".

So I think we apprehend the difference between future and past in a way which is not the product of a logical necessity like our apprehension of space; the concept of space being something required to make sensation intelligible. It is already deep within our constitution as a base for fundamental disposition, and the problem is that we cannot call this a form of understanding. I can say that I intuit a difference between past and future, but I cannot say that this is derived from sensation, nor can I say that it's a product of any logical reasoning. It's something I've received, or simply have, but I do not understand it, nor can I conceptualize it, or sense it in any real way.

Second, the most basic mathematical principles are subsumed under the schema of quantity, not relation, or, in your terms, order. — Mww

I thought the same, but I was corrected in this forum, where there are many participants who are well versed in math. If you look at mathematical axioms you'll see that cardinals are derived from ordinals. And even as far back as Plato there was questioning concerning the relation between quantity and order. Ultimately, we can see that One was understood as first, rather than as a quantity.

When we are very young we learn to count, and counting is first learned as ordering, two comes after one. This is what makes "numbers" so consistent with platonic realism, the number itself is seen as an object with a place in an order. If a number simply signified a quantity, we'd say the numeral signified the quantity, and there would be no need for "the number" as an intermediary between the numeral and the quantity. But since the numerals are used to signify an order, then we have to assume something which occupies that place in the order, hence "the number". Then one comes before two, and two comes before three, etc.. These are not the symbols we are talking about, but the assumed numbers themselves, which have that order, and the symbols, the numerals, represent the numbers.

True enough. But if it is the case we don’t function at all, in any way, shape or form, when we dismiss the basic principles of logic, then it is reasonable to suppose we couldn’t do that in the first place, insofar as we must use them in order to assume their dismissal. It follows that if we cannot assume to dismiss them, we are left with merely getting them as correct as we can. — Mww

I don't agree with this at all, and I've argued it in many places in this forum. We do not need to assume replacement principles to reject principles which we find unacceptable. This is fundamental to skepticism, we can reject principles without replacing them. And, rejection itself need not be principled. So for example, if I refer to this fundamental instinct, this "feeling" which I have concerning the difference between past and future, I cannot understand this instinct, nor can I formulate it in a principled way. However, I can reject propositions based solely on this "feeling" which I have. So we can reject propositions based on "feelings", and dismiss them, though the rejection is fundamentally unjustified, therefore not properly principled, and others might call this rejection "irrational".

Sorry, but the nature of logic is in judgement, not intuition. — Mww

That's not what I said though, I said it was grounded in intuition. And the grounding of logic, substantiation, what makes validity work for us, is fundamentally different from logic itself. The grounding has to do with the relationship between logic and our world. "Substance" is what grounds logic, but it is not a part, or characteristic of logic itself.

Think of it this way: you know how when we perceive something, when we are affected by some imprint on the senses, we are never conscious of the information that flows along the nerves? We sense the beginning, we cognize what the beginning was, at the end, in the brain, but all that between, we know nothing about whatsoever. THAT is intuition, in the proper, albeit metaphysical, sense. And because we are never conscious of our intuitions, but we are certainly conscious of the judgements we make on our sensations from which the intuition is given, and logical determinations are the objects of judgements alone, it follows necessarily that intuition cannot stand in any relation to the nature of logic. It may be said intuition is the ground for the possibility of logical determinations, but that is not to say they determine the nature of logic. — Mww

So I think that what you say here about "intuition" is consistent with what I said about intuition grounding logic, if you understand the difference between logic itself, and the grounding of logic. But I obviously do not see the basis for your conclusion "it follows necessarily that intuition cannot stand in any relation to the nature of logic". Remember that standing in relation to something is different from being a part of that thing.

What is at issue is your final phrase here, "but that is not to say they determine the nature of logic", and how we understand "the nature of logic". What is the nature of logic? Where does it come from, and how does it exist? However one answers these questions, and there are different possible answers depending on one's metaphysics, dictates whether this proposition is judged as true or false. If logic is something produced by the conscious mind, for the purpose of understanding all this information you describe as being between the thing perceived, and the perception of it, what you call "intuition", then the exact opposite of what you state is the case. Logic is something created by the conscious mind, shaped and formed for the purpose of understanding intuition, therefore intuition determines the nature of logic.

It is far too common, for people to attempt to associate logic to an external world which is the object of perception. Then they will try to see how logic works to understand this external world. But that is to ignore all which is intermediate, what is between logic and the world, what you call "intuition" here. The problem of course being that we cannot apply logic directly to the external world, all we have is the in between, the information received, the intuitions, to apply logic to. So even if logic is something created by human beings for the purpose of understanding the external world, we are stymied in our attempts to apply it because all we have is intuitions about the external world to apply it to.

Besides....there are those occasions when we employ logical principles even without an intuition, without an object making an impression on the senses. Case in point....the guy that invented the Slinky. Sure, springs and stuff falling are sensuous impressions, but you can’t get a Slinky as such, from those two intuitions. To connect those into an object that doesn’t yet exist requires more than the antecedent intuition of each. In just the same way, you cannot get to 12 if all you have is a 7 and a 5. — Mww

This is why we need to distinguish internal intuitions from external intuitions. This I think is very important. If we simply say that logic gets applied to intuitions, and if internal intuitions are fundamentally different from external intuitions, then we'd need different logic for internal than we need for external.

Kant, I believe outlined this division, space as the condition for understanding external intuitions, and time as the condition for understanding internal intuitions. The senses are the principal medium in the external intuitions, and emotions, or "feelings" (in that sense) are the principal medium for internal intuitions. The internal intuitions are not well understood, because the observations required for science are difficult. Internal intuitions are often compared to, and even described by the same terms as the external, internal "sensations", and internal "feelings" for example. But we do have a clear division in definition of "intuition", between immediately apprehended by the mind, and immediately apprehended through the senses.

Richard Dawkins will often say that life exhibits 'apparent design'. He obviously does this to defray the age-old cliche of the 'grand designer'. But design in nature is easy to discern and to represent graphically: — Wayfarer

FWIW, I think of Evolution as bottom-up design, by contrast with the Genesis story of top-down design. From that pragmatic perspective, the world is designing itself (self-organizing), just as a computer program begins with a general definition of the desired answer, and then proceeds to calculate & construct a more specific answer. But a bottom-up question must be open-ended, as in "what would happen if . . ." So, it seems as-if the material world is following inherent laws (operating system) to calculate the best possible answer to some ultimate question (unknown to us). Hence, each form produced gives the appearance of being intentionally designed to fit its niche in the ecology. :smile:


In evolutionary computation, the computer creates a population of potential solutions to a problem. These are often random solutions, so they are unlikely to solve the problem being tackled or even come close. But some will be slightly better than others. The computer can discard the worst solutions, retain the better ones and use them to “breed” more potential solutions. Parts of different solutions will be combined (this is often called “crossover”) to create a new generation of solutions that can then be tested and the process begins again.
https://theconversation.com/evolutionary-computation-has-been-promising-self-programming-machines-for-60-years-so-where-are-they-91872

" So simple a beginning, endless forms most beautiful and most wonderful have been, and are being, evolved." ___Darwin

We must dispose of the most basic principles of logic, such as identity, and non-contradiction, and we are left with zero, nothing as a starting point. — Metaphysician Undercover

But if it is the case we don’t function at all, in any way, shape or form, when we dismiss the basic principles of logic, then it is reasonable to suppose we couldn’t do that in the first place....
— Mww

I don't agree with this at all, and I've argued it in many places in this forum. We do not need to assume replacement principles to reject principles which we find unacceptable. — Metaphysician Undercover

These two comments of yours say different things, and the second doesn’t respond to mine.
————

However, the nature of logic, and it's ground in intuition...., — Metaphysician Undercover

Sorry, but the nature of logic is in judgement, not intuition.
— Mww

That's not what I said though, I said it was grounded in intuition. — Metaphysician Undercover

I understand you said the nature of logic is grounded in intuition. I’m claiming it is not.

And the grounding of logic, substantiation, what makes validity work for us, is fundamentally different from logic itself. — Metaphysician Undercover

....and you’ve done it again. First it was the ground of the nature of logic, now it is the grounding of logic itself in substantiation. Easily reconciled by admitting the nature of logic has to do with its form, substantiation of logic has to do with its content. The form is given in the construction of principles, the content is given in the construction of propositions conditioned by the principles.
—————

The problem of course being that we cannot apply logic directly to the external world, all we have is the in between, the information received, the intuitions, to apply logic to. — Metaphysician Undercover

Half right. We don’t apply logic directly to the external world, all we have is the in-between, but the in-between consists of more than mere intuitions. We still should consider the role of the cognitive system as a whole, of which intuition is but the initial stage.

So even if logic is something created by human beings for the purpose of understanding the external world, we are stymied in our attempts to apply it because all we have is intuitions about the external world to apply it to. — Metaphysician Undercover

If it is the case that we are not conscious of our intuitions, in some strictly metaphysical sense, then it follows we do not apply our logic to them. Nevertheless, we are not stymied, insofar as we do apply logic to something, so even if we do not apply logic to our intuitions, then it must be the case we do apply them to that which arises from them. Under empirical conditions, that is. Again, because we do apply logic to that which is not under empirical conditions, the ground of empirical conditions, which is intuition, does not qualify as a condition of the nature of logic, but merely the employment of it with respect to understanding the external world.

Truth be told, I don’t think it proper to say logic is something human beings create. Logical principles, yes, logical conditions, logical this or that, sure. But logic itself, I think, is just the natural modus operandi of the human being himself. We just are logical creatures, from which we can say the nature of logic just is the nature of human beings.
—————-

This is why we need to distinguish internal intuitions from external intuitions. This I think is very important. If we simply say that logic gets applied to intuitions, and if internal intuitions are fundamentally different from external intuitions, then we'd need different logic for internal than we need for external. — Metaphysician Undercover

It is true he uses those terms, but in context, I think you’ll find they have much different connotations than you’re attributing to them. The importance disappears if it is the case that all intuitions are internal, which they would be if all they do is represent physical objects, and those only given by a particular cognitive system. And if logic doesn’t apply to intuitions anyway, then we have two instances for canceling the notion we need distinctive logics. Distinctions in that to which logic applies, yes; distinctions in the logic that is applied, not so much, no.

External intuition simply refers to the possibility of an external object representable as a phenomenon, and that internally as a function of the system. There is no external intuition per se; there is just explanatory liberties. Kant presumes the reader already understands and accepts the preliminaries, and if he were to then posit some intuitions to be external to the system from which he already posited they are born, he contradicts himself and immediately destroys his entire thesis.

Kant, I believe outlined this division, space as the condition for understanding external intuitions, and time as the condition for understanding internal intuitions. — Metaphysician Undercover

Technically, Kant speaks of understanding from an external sense or from an internal sense. And in that formula, is found the fundamental differences in how space and time are to be understood, if only with respect to transcendental philosophy. But that stuff is deep and convoluted as hell, and requires a whole bunch of blind head-nodding I’m here ta tell ya, so...best maybe leave all that alone here.

Still, I’d like to say I know where you’re going with this, and if I’m right, it is here:

“...We have now arrived at the proper place for explaining the paradox which must have struck every one in our exposition of the internal sense, namely—how this sense represents us to our own consciousness, only as we appear to ourselves, not as we are in ourselves, because, to wit, we intuite ourselves only as we are inwardly affected. Now this appears to be contradictory, inasmuch as we thus stand in a passive relation to ourselves; and therefore in the systems of psychology, the internal sense is commonly held to be one with the faculty of apperception, while we***, on the contrary, carefully distinguish them....”
(*** “we” being him, of course, informing us of what “we” are actually doing)

After wading through five pages, we arrive at, in a damn footnote, of all things....

“....For this purpose intuition of self is required, and this intuition possesses a form given à priori, namely, time, which is sensuous, and belongs to our receptivity of the determinable. Now, as I do not possess another intuition of self which gives the determining in me (of the spontaneity of which I am conscious), prior to the act of determination, in the same manner as time gives the determinable, it is clear that I am unable to determine my own existence as that of a spontaneous being, but I am only able to represent to myself the spontaneity of my thought...”

...which is supposed to explain the reason why there is no intuition of anything that isn’t first perceived and to which the categories may apply, which is itself, a logical requisite. In other words, there is no intuition of the objects of the system, which includes one’s self. Nowadays, this all has been reduced to the notion that we are our thoughts, the “I think” represents the manifold of thoughts, “I am” represents consciousness of the manifold, and “I” merely represents the spontaneity of it.

Anyway....you have great thoughts and you’re not entirely wrong. Just not quite right. But then....is anybody? And by “right” I just mean we’d agree more often than not.

If you mean biological evolution as a scientifiç principle, then indeed it is not sentient nor does it consciously plan. In it's ultimate form, based on the, get this, central dogma of molecular biology (!), teleos is incorporated into selfish(!) genes, a most extraordinary theory of life and being. — Hillary

Yes, indeed. For Dawkins, the implied final cause is immortality, of genes that is. Which in turn makes them selfish.

Dawkins’ Selfish Gene has become very well known and accommodated within fields of neo-Darwinism. (Having read Darwin’s works and his autobiography, I’m confident he would have objected to Dawkins’ theory, whose book I’ve also read.) There however are other, granted so far more fringe, interpretations from scientists in the field. Here is the blurb from a book called "The Genial Gene: Deconstructing Darwinian Selfishness" published in 2009. The book is loaded with data to back up the claims.

Are selfishness and individuality—rather than kindness and cooperation—basic to biological nature? Does a "selfish gene" create universal sexual conflict? In The Genial Gene, Joan Roughgarden forcefully rejects these and other ideas that have come to dominate the study of animal evolution. Building on her brilliant and innovative book Evolution's Rainbow, in which she challenged accepted wisdom about gender identity and sexual orientation, Roughgarden upends the notion of the selfish gene and the theory of sexual selection and develops a compelling and controversial alternative theory called social selection. This scientifically rigorous, model-based challenge to an important tenet of neo-Darwinian theory emphasizes cooperation, elucidates the factors that contribute to evolutionary success in a gene pool or animal social system, and vigorously demonstrates that to identify Darwinism with selfishness and individuality misrepresents the facts of life as we now know them.

Considering the actual evolution, sentient beings are actually on the scene, and these beings have actual plans. — Hillary

Here is what I think is a related take:

Other philosophers of biology argue instead that biological teleology is irreducible, and cannot be removed by any simple process of rewording. Francisco Ayala specified three separate situations in which teleological explanations are appropriate. First, if the agent consciously anticipates the goal of their own action; for example the behavior of picking up a pen can be explained by reference to the agent's desire to write. Ayala extends this type of teleological explanation to non-human animals by noting that A deer running away from a mountain lion. . . has at least the appearance of purposeful behavior."[49] Second, teleological explanations are useful for systems that have a mechanism for self-regulation despite fluctuations in environment; for example, the self-regulation of body temperature in animals. Finally, they are appropriate "in reference to structures anatomically and physiologically designed to perform a certain function. "[49] — https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Teleology_in_biology#Irreducible_teleology

And yes, sexual selection in animals, as one example, is greatly based on choice regarding which mate(s) to copulate with.

If these are in service of some higher ideal as dogmatized in evolution theory, is highly questionable, and the new dogma is probably an attempt by lack of better or inability to understand truly. — Hillary

Agreed.

Thanks for pointing me to the Genial Gene! A fresh breeze blowing in! Great!

There's also the example of biological evolution as having a telos. Momentarily suppose this to be true. This telos pulls towards itself. — javra

I'm not clear on what this could mean other than that things have tendencies to go in certain ways. All animals strive to survive, for example.

That offered, can you form an argument for the logical necessity of all final causes being themselves driven by, or else dependent on, sentient agency? — javra

For me, final causes consist simply in the ways things have general tendencies to go, so I'm not arguing that such tendencies logically depend on sentient agency.

You've overlooked issues regarding the contradictions that unfold when considering such monotheistic deity the arbiter of purpose/telos. — javra

I think we are arguing for and/ or from and/ or about different conceptions of 'purpose'. I don't think of the general ways things tend to go as being purposes; I reserve the concept for those things that are either consciously planned. or at least sub-consciously driven by felt needs or wants.

You've also not offered a defense of nihilism. — javra

I'm not arguing for nihilism. I think that existence is replete with meaning, but only insofar as there are percipients.

We in fact can connect particular thoughts and feelings with particular processes. — Hillary

What you wrote after this claim is a generalized conjecture, not an example of a connection of a particular thought with a particular neural process.

Living forms are shot through with designs, and patterns, at every level from the microcellular to the ecological.

But this doesn't necessarily imply a conscious designer, some being or entity that sweats away on designing such patterns (or beetles for that matter). It might simply be conceived of as an inherent drive or tendency in nature to give rise to progressively more elaborate patterns and designs as pure play or sport (Lila of Hindu mythology. However, ideas of ‘inherence’ are usually forbidden on the grounds that they are ‘orthogenetic’.)

Furthermore, if the design in nature is only 'apparent', then does that mean that only human agents can produce real designs? I mean, designing is something that humans obviously do, but do only humans do that? Put another way, are the only actual designs in the Universe of human origin? And if that's not so, then is there really no actual, as distinct from apparent, design anywhere at all in the Universe? It seems an absurd proposition. — Wayfarer

I think you are equivocating somewhat on the meanings of 'design' and 'pattern'. The examples in the images you showed are all biological. Patterns also form in ice crystals, the weather, desert sands, clouds and so on.

I think you're implying something about design similar to what @Javra is implying about purpose. I don't see the concept of design or purpose being meaningful without the inclusion of intention. You speak of "inherent drives or tendencies" and this echoes something of what I said to @Javra above (although I think 'drive' is moving a tad too much towards the anthropomorphic). Your phrase "play or sport" is also anthropomorphic or more properly "animomorphic", since animals also play.

So, I would say the only phenomena we know of in the Universe that we could rightly count as designs (as opposed, of course, to 'mere' patterns) are of animal origin, because only animals have intentions. And humans are obviously far and away the most prolific designers among all the animals.

I think we are arguing for and/ or from and/ or about different conceptions of 'purpose'. I don't think of the general ways things tend to go as being purposes; I reserve the concept for those things that are either consciously planned. or at least sub-consciously driven by felt needs or wants. — Janus

Right, I can see that when it comes to purpose. As I initially said, to me it's a fairly fuzzy term when it comes to precise meaning. It's why I initially used the term teleology rather than purpose in my reply to Wayfarer. And why I tried to elaborate on purpose being a type (maybe better expressed, a subset) of teleology - maybe all too poorly - in my reply to you.

Teleology is the study of final causes, or teloi, which bring about motion by drawing things toward themselves. You were addressing that that all life strives to survive. Here granting this, and though I know this the issue of teloi is contentious in metaphysical discussions, this to me indicates that one of the teloi of life is the sustaining of life. Such that this non-conscious aim, which can become conscious in some such as us humans, limits the activities of all life such that these activities remain aligned to optimally approaching and/or actualizing this aim ... which, after all, is an ideal when considered in absolute, or complete, or perfect form.

OK, I think I see where you are coming from now, and I agree that telos, considered as simply denoting the seemingly invariant tendencies of things to go certain ways (what we call "laws") is everywhere to be seen in nature as we perceive it.

You still refer to these as "aims", though and that is pushing the idea further than I would. It seems the actual concrete tendencies of things do begin to look like aims when we generalize and abstract them as laws. It is easy in thought to reify the notion of a law into something which stands over and above the actual things, the phenomena and processes of nature, directing them, so to speak.

OK, I think I see where you are coming from now, and I agree that telos, considered as simply denoting the seemingly invariant tendencies of things to go certain ways (what we call "laws") is everywhere to be seen in nature as we perceive it.

You still refer to these as "aims", though and that is pushing the idea further than I would. It seems the actual concrete tendencies of things do begin to look like aims when we generalize and abstract them as laws. It is easy in thought to reify the notion of a law into something which stands over and above the actual things, the phenomena and processes of nature, directing them, so to speak. — Janus

I see that. Thanks. Something to consider. One however cannot reduce all teloi to laws since laws, at least as traditionally interpreted, are invariant - this contrasted, for instance, with the Peircean notion of (for me, personally, at least some) natural laws as ever-evolving global habits. Natural laws are also understood to be global. A consciously held goal (which one has chosen among other alternative goals at some point in the past and now pursues) will itself be a telos, but it is neither global nor invariant. But yes, I agree, "aims" is too cognitive for all instantiations of teloi if one is to go about thing as impartially as possible.

I agree with what you say; it is mere supposition that the laws of nature are invariant. I also like Peirce's idea of law as evolving habits.

:grin: :up:

I think you are equivocating somewhat on the meanings of 'design' and 'pattern'. — Janus

Organisms display characteristics which snowflakes and crystals do not, first and foremost homeostasis.

I don't see the concept of design or purpose being meaningful without the inclusion of intention. — Janus

It may be metaphorically said that Natural Selection is daily and hourly scrutinizing, throughout the world, the slightest variations; rejecting those that are bad, and adding up all that are good; silently and insensibly working whenever and wherever opportunity offers, at the improvement of each organic being. — Charles Darwin, On the Origin of Species

My italics.

Organisms display characteristics which snowflakes and crystals do not, first and foremost homeostasis. — Wayfarer

That seems to be true, but I'm not seeing the relevance to what is being discussed.

The passage you quoted from Darwin is metaphorical, as he acknowledges. and again it's not clear what you intended it to address.

You're right, my bad, I've dragged this thread completely away from its OP. Appreciate the input, back later.

I'm finally - after much fear and trepidation, am reading Kant's Critique, and it certainly helps to have read a decent amount of commentary on it, makes it much smoother.

I'm currently into his Of the Deduction of the Pure Concepts of the Understanding Third Section. I'm aware there is likely more about Hume here, aside from his comments on the Prolegomena.

It seems to me that the move Kant makes is correct, in essence. Nevertheless, causality is a bit harder that merely arguing that it must be an a-priori aspect of our cognition. It undoubtably is, but there is no guarantee that these apply in "ordinary experience", as a necessity, there are exceptions and illusions.

But, even granting that most of the time, we are roughly correct in our causal inferences in everyday life, the problem of causality in the objects outside ourselves remains entirely untouched.

And the concept is rather obscure, in as much as we can only perceive that it is a constant conjunction, though there has to be more than this to causality.

Of course, Kant would say, plausibly, that of these things in themselves we know nothing. Maybe we don't. But Hume's statement of the problem remains rather fierce, as I see it.

[

These two comments of yours say different things, and the second doesn’t respond to mine. — Mww

You said: "But if it is the case we don’t function at all, in any way, shape or form, when we dismiss the basic principles of logic, then it is reasonable to suppose we couldn’t do that in the first place".

My point was that it is not the case that we wouldn't function at all without the basic principles of logic. Other animals and plants do not use logic and they still function. Young babies do not use logic, and they still function. So there is no reason to believe that without logic we couldn't function. That is my response, I dismiss that proposition as false, and so there is nothing more to say about it in response.

First it was the ground of the nature of logic, now it is the grounding of logic itself in substantiation. — Mww

Sorry, you misunderstood. I meant the nature of logic, and its grounding, meaning logic's grounding . I did not mean the grounding of the nature, which would be in itself a description. It was a simple case of me expressing myself poorly, so that you misunderstood what I meant, and not a case of me changing what I meant.

If it is the case that we are not conscious of our intuitions, in some strictly metaphysical sense, then it follows we do not apply our logic to them. — Mww

I don't think it is correct to say that we are not conscious of our intuitions. I think it is more correct to say that we do not necessarily understand them, but we are conscious of them. We might compare intuitions to our emotional feelings, they enter into our conscious mind, and influence the way we think, but we do not necessarily understand them very well. And since they do have some sort of presence to the conscious mind, we can apply logic to them. The difficulty is in producing accurate premises to work from.

Nevertheless, we are not stymied, insofar as we do apply logic to something, so even if we do not apply logic to our intuitions, then it must be the case we do apply them to that which arises from them. Under empirical conditions, that is. Again, because we do apply logic to that which is not under empirical conditions, the ground of empirical conditions, which is intuition, does not qualify as a condition of the nature of logic, but merely the employment of it with respect to understanding the external world. — Mww

What I meant is that we are stymied in our attempt to apply logic directly to the features of the external world, because we can only apply logic to our intuitions concerning the world. And, as explained above, we do not necessarily understand our intuitions, so the premises which we work with might not be accurate.

Now, I read this sentence ("Again, because we do apply logic to that which is not under empirical conditions, the ground of empirical conditions, which is intuition, does not qualify as a condition of the nature of logic, but merely the employment of it with respect to understanding the external world.") over and over, because it seems to be the key to understanding what you are claiming, but I can't get it. Can you try to explain this to me?

Truth be told, I don’t think it proper to say logic is something human beings create. Logical principles, yes, logical conditions, logical this or that, sure. But logic itself, I think, is just the natural modus operandi of the human being himself. We just are logical creatures, from which we can say the nature of logic just is the nature of human beings. — Mww

I do not think that this is correct, and this difference between the way you understand "logic" and the way I understand "logic" is probably why I couldn't understand that last sentence. I think that human beings existed before they started using logic, just like babies exist before they start using logic. So children have to learn logic before they become logical, and human beings had to learn logic as well, before they became logical. Therefore, I think that logic is not "the natural modus operandi of the human being", it is something which human beings have learned.

This is why I suggested that human beings use different types of logic to understand different types of things. Internal intuitions require a different type of logic than do the external.

The importance disappears if it is the case that all intuitions are internal, which they would be if all they do is represent physical objects, and those only given by a particular cognitive system. — Mww

But not all intuitions represent physical objects, some represent internal feelings, like emotions. This is the problem. Any particular cognitive system, when directed inward, needs different principles of understanding, from when it is directed outwards. The two types of "objects" to be understood by these two different directions are so vastly different, that I think they require fundamentally different forms of "logic".

External intuition simply refers to the possibility of an external object... — Mww

OK, now if we can say external intuition refers to the possibility of an external object, can we say that "internal intuition" refers to the possibility of an internal object? And if these two types of "objects" are fundamentally different, then the two types of intuitions will be fundamentally different. And if the two types of intuition are fundamentally different, then we need two types of logic.

Technically, Kant speaks of understanding from an external sense or from an internal sense. And in that formula, is found the fundamental differences in how space and time are to be understood, if only with respect to transcendental philosophy. But that stuff is deep and convoluted as hell, and requires a whole bunch of blind head-nodding I’m here ta tell ya, so...best maybe leave all that alone here. — Mww

Well, no. The deepest, most convoluted part is the best part. If our goal is to understand, why leave the best part alone?

After wading through five pages, we arrive at, in a damn footnote, of all things.... — Mww

I find that in Kant, the footnotes have the best explanatory information.

"...Now, as I do not possess another intuition of self which gives the determining in me (of the spontaneity of which I am conscious), prior to the act of determination, in the same manner as time gives the determinable, it is clear that I am unable to determine my own existence as that of a spontaneous being, but I am only able to represent to myself the spontaneity of my thought...” — Mww

I think this is similar to what I was saying earlier. When we move from trying to understand space, toward trying to understand time, because what we learn about space forces us to recognize that an understanding of time is logically required in order to understand space, then there is nowhere to turn but to one's own presence in time, to derive that understanding. Then we must apprehend the internal intuitions.

Anyway....you have great thoughts and you’re not entirely wrong. Just not quite right. But then....is anybody? And by “right” I just mean we’d agree more often than not. — Mww

Thank you Mww, that makes me feel good, and you seem to be honest. But I would appreciate it if you could refrain from automatically designating the person who doesn't agree with you, as not right.

Other animals and plants do not use logic and they still function. — Metaphysician Undercover

That other animals don't use logic is an implausible assumption in my view. When I used throw the ball for dog onto the verandah and it went over the edge to drop onto the ground below, he used to look everywhere on the verandah, and when the ball was not to be found would immediately run down to look on the ground below. he didn't run off somewhere else in the garden but only looked where the ball could plausibly be. And he did this from the very first time the ball went over the edge, so it wasn't merely an acquired habit.

Of course animals don't self-reflectively use logic; that is they are not aware that they are using logic, and they don't have thoughts like "I am using logic"; but logic is everywhere inherent, obviously to greater or lesser degrees, in the perceptions of both humans and animals, if the behavior of the latter is anything to go by.

:up:

That other animals don't use logic is an implausible assumption in my view. — Janus

Again, this is one of those definitional things. It all depends on how you understand "logic". If we have loose definitions, then all sorts of things qualify as "logic". So I don't think you can conclude necessarily that your dog uses logic, just from the description you've provided of his behaviour.

Take the process of 'trial and error' for example. There are ways that people use this process which clearly employ logic, but there are also ways that the named process may be applied which do not use logic. A simple case of not repeating an action because it ended in something unwanted qualifies as 'trial and error' but I would argue that it does not qualify as using 'logic'.

If we do not accurately describe the process which is being applied, and decisively define 'logic'. we can make all sorts of odd claims of where logic must have been applied. The process of evolution can be said to be a sort of trial and error. But if we say that this means that there is an intelligence involved, which is using logic, we run into peculiar difficulties. Then life itself must be some sort of intentional agent which is applying logic, and using trial and error to evolve itself.

And this just brings us to the problem which Banno demonstrated. Instead of attributing 'logic' to the individual beings which utilize it, we attribute it to the collective of beings. But this exposes the requirement for the fundamental difference in logical principles which I've been outlining.

The law of identity applies to a particular, an individual thing,. We can say that a thing necessarily has an identity, and we can proceed from here, to describe that thing. And, when we have a group of things, we can identify a common trait, and say that the things are 'the same' with respect to that aspect. This creates a whole, a set, which is not a true or real whole or thing, because it's artificial, fictional. Its identity is what we say it is. Rather than having its own identity within itself as the law of identity dictates for a true particular, the set has an identity which is assigned to it, therefore distinct from it. Therefore these are two distinct forms of objects.

So in those two instances, we have two distinct types of objects ("wholes"), the particular and the artificial collection of particulars. Now we need a third type, which is the real, or natural collection of individuals, which would would allow attributing properties to a natural group, and justify Banno's claim that reason is "a group enterprise". This object ("whole"), the group, is not a definable set, nor is it a particular with a unique identity. However, it seems to have some sort of real existence. So how do we make it an object which we can represent as a subject for predication, and employ logic? What type of object has no identity, neither that which is true to itself, as dictated by the law of identity, nor that which is assigned to it as an abstraction?

External intuition simply refers to the possibility of an external object...
— Mww

OK, now if we can say external intuition refers to the possibility of an external object, can we say that "internal intuition" refers to the possibility of an internal object? And if these two types of "objects" are fundamentally different, then the two types of intuitions will be fundamentally different. And if the two types of intuition are fundamentally different, then we need two types of logic. — Metaphysician Undercover

A saw cuts a board, a hammer nails the board to a wall. Can we use the saw to hammer the board? We are, necessarily and without exception, given external objects by the senses. Are we given internal objects by the senses? We are not, so if there are internal objects, they certainly cannot arise from the senses. The external objects we are given are represented as phenomena and are derived from the faculty of receptivity for impressions, which is called intuition. Internal objects not given to us but instead given by us, are represented as conceptions and are derived from the faculty of understanding.

Do you see we don’t need logic for that which is given to us? For anything merely presented to the senses, there is no cognition, there is not yet any understanding, no judgement, and the mere presence of an object to our sensing apparatus is very far from knowledge of it. Remember the scientific equivalent to this metaphysical premise: we are not aware of information transfer on our nerve cells on the one hand, and we have no consciousness of the inception of phenomena from sensations of physical objects, on the other. If the application of logic is a conscious activity by a rational agent, how can logic be applied to that of which he has no conscious awareness?

So we have one type of representation as intuition, another type of representation as conception, and if we synthesize these in a faculty sufficiently enabled to do so......do you see that this is precisely the same modus operandi as imbued in the construction of a logical syllogism? Intuition would be the major premise, just because it is first in the procedural system, a conception would be the minor premise, just because it is after any impression on sensibility, the synthesis of them by the faculty of understanding generates a conclusion, which we call a judgement.

I don’t think anyone doubts that we are imbued with these faculties, the difficulty arises from what they are and what they actually do. Regardless, it is clear logic as a systemic necessity only applies sometime in the overall process after the premises are made available on which it can be applied. While logic can be applied to a single premise, all we will get from it is a tautology, which is not what the system is seeking when presented with an external object. It that were the case, we remain with...there is an object, full stop.... but without the means to determine a knowledge of what the object may be.

Sidebar: the counter argument is, objects tell us what they are, so we know them immediately by the properties by which we are impressed. The nonsense of this should be quite apparent, even to the “most common understanding”.

Anyway, all that to say this: you are correct in saying there are two types of objects, external and internal, but incorrect in saying these are two types of intuitions. The two types of representations corresponding to the two types of objects are united into a single type, which is called cognition, on which only one type of logic is needed in order to determine the validity of it, which is called judgement. As an oversimplification, it is in this way that perception of something with wings, known as such from antecedent experience, is immediately cognized as what it may be, but as yet with insufficient judgement for what it is.

Further affirmations: the senses don’t judge, and understanding doesn’t perceive. Everything in its place, this does this job and that does that job, putting things in the wrong places, subsumed under faculties not equipped to deal with them, defeats the entire system.

Ever notice, that for something you perceive but have no experience of, after you figure it out, you’ve added nothing at all to what you perceived? If you added nothing whatsoever to the perception, but you went from ignorance to knowledge of that very same perception......where did the change occur? It could not possibly occur in any faculty having to do with the perception alone, which is precisely the realm of intuition. For instance....a tool. A specially tool. Guy shows it to you, you have no idea how to use it, or even what to use it on. Hell....even that it could be used for anything, but you merely assume, logically, it can because somebody made it for some reason. But you have no real justification for even that assumption, insofar as he could have just been puttering around the shop and threw together some junk and wanted to see how you react to it, which releases the object from even being a purposeful tool per se, exchanging it for a tool the intent for which belongs to purposeness of the guy alone.

So say it is a tool, and he shows you what it does.....you still perceive the object in exactly the same way as when you didn’t know what it was for. If the object itself didn’t change, then the intuition of it couldn’t have changed, which makes explicit the understanding of it must be the sole factor in whatever judgement you came to for its use.

Now, under the conditions you propose, you are using one type of logic for your ignorance, and a different type of logic for your knowledge. Wouldn’t it be the more parsimonious to suppose ignorance is the inability to use any logic, than to suppose ignorance uses a logic of its own kind?
————

If our goal is to understand, why leave the best part alone? — Metaphysician Undercover

Because we can’t get past the initial stages. It’s a system, after all, so we should come to accord on the simple parts before moving onto the hard parts. Simplest of all is....we sense things. Problem is, sensing things is the more simple, but it is at the same time the less prevalent. If the goal is to understand, wouldn’t be better to come to an accord on what it means to understand? To do that, best to eliminate what understanding isn’t, which is anything to do with perception, including intuitions. And apparently, you’re not ready to do that, and, perhaps more importantly, you haven’t convinced me we can’t.

Just not quite right.....
— Mww

..... the person who doesn't agree with you, as not right. — Metaphysician Undercover

Not that you disagree with me, it’s that you disagree with my interpretation of Kant, which you brought into the dialectic. Even if I’m wrong in my interpretations, if you were wrong in the same way, I’d say you were right and we’d agree more often than not. I didn’t mean to imply I was right point-blank, and you should agree with me and because you don’t you are not right. Only a fool would insist he gets Kant right, without fault of any kind.

I should have worded it better. Or left it out. My bad. Sorry.

It may be metaphorically said that Natural Selection is daily and hourly scrutinizing, throughout the world, the slightest variations; rejecting those that are bad, and adding up all that are good; silently and insensibly working whenever and wherever opportunity offers, at the improvement of each organic being. — Charles Darwin, On the Origin of Species — Wayfarer

The passage you quoted from Darwin is metaphorical, as he acknowledges. and again it's not clear what you intended it to address. — Janus

While I don't want to derail the thread from the OP more it already has been, for the sake of historical accuracy, Darwin himself was a teleologist. (Disclaimer: I've only skimmed through parts of the linked-to article, but it serves its purpose of providing strong evidence for the claim.)

The metaphorical aspects of Darwin's given quote regards the very conscious intentionality that we've been previously addressing - but not the issue of goal-directedness. Better expressed, as the terms have been so far used by us, Darwin viewed the very process of Natural Selection as telos-guided yet devoid of that notion of purpose which is contingent on a conscious agency (i.e., that of an omnipotent God).

But not all intuitions represent physical objects, some represent internal feelings, like emotions. — Metaphysician Undercover

Page 2:
Intuitions represent the object the feeling is directed toward. I love my car, the car I can intuit because it is an object, but I do not intuit the love of it. In short, love, hate joy, disgust and feelings in general, are not phenomena, those being the objects of intuitions. We can accede to this, because sometimes we have feelings, but either cannot describe them (because the object to which they relate is unknown), or, we simply don’t know why we even have that feeling in the first place (because the object to which it relates contradicts your experience).

The key is the notion that feelings are not cognitions, but are just some condition in which the subject finds himself. You were all fine and dandy one minute, somebody stepped on your toe the next, and POW!!!....your condition.....the condition of yourself....immediately changes, directly proportional to the feeling in your toe and your reaction to it. And you never cognized a single thing in that briefest of instances. That there is something wrong with your foot is far systematically antecedent to the cognition of the cause of it.
———-

Any particular cognitive system, when directed inward, needs different principles of understanding, from when it is directed outwards...... — Metaphysician Undercover

Absolutely, which makes explicit the natural duality of the particular human cognitive system. On the one hand, as you sit there looking out the window, you perceive all that is presented to your senses. But if you shut off your senses, or make it so nothing is given to them, or just not pay any attention to those that get through, you can still think any object you like, those you know from experience and those you might know if you ever do experience them. But you can also sit there and think objects you will never experience, either because they exist but are nonetheless beyond your capability, or they don’t exist at all. But either way, you understand something about each and every one of them, and judge them accordingly, otherwise you wouldn’t be able to explain how they were thought.

With respect to what you said, though, I submit there are two conditions under which the system can be directed inward, one in consideration of the world but without the sense of it, when you sit there and only think about it, and the other is with nothing whatsoever to do with the world. To direct the cognitive system inward without any regard for the world at all, is to employ the faculties of the system on itself. But if that is the case, and all the objects of experience and thought related to experience are eliminated from contention....where does that which we are inwardly directed toward, come from? What do the faculties of the system employ themselves on? Even to say they operate by different principles, principles are meaningless without something to which they apply, so we still need the something.

......The two types of "objects" to be understood by these two different directions are so vastly different, that I think they require fundamentally different forms of "logic". — Metaphysician Undercover

You went from different principles to different “objects”. But that’s ok; we would have ended up at different “objects” eventually anyway. So....one kind of object is given from sense, the other kind cannot be given from sense, so must be given from within the cognitive system itself. The former will necessarily be imbued with properties in order for it be know as a certain thing, the other can have no properties, but is nonetheless known as something. Hence, “object” as opposed to object.

One of the “vast” differences, then, is that the one object is empirically determined when the cognitive system is directed outward, the other “object” is rationally determinable when the cognitive system is directed inward and examines only itself. It would seem to be the case that for determinable rational objects, principles different from those which ground the propositions containing conceptions longing to objects of experience. But granting the differences in principles is most readily accomplished by granting differences in their source, rather than the form of their logic, in that it is possible for two differing sources can operate under one logic, if both the sources and the logic are all contained in and used by, a single unified cognitive system.

There are differences in objects and principles, but they arise from differences in reason, not differences in logic. These all belong to a far different philosophy, the outer world of sense being epistemological, the inner world of feelings being moral. In the former Nature is the causality of its objects and they belong to it alone, in the latter it is we who are the causality of the objects and they belong to us alone. Just as there is no real physical basketball in our heads, there is no real physical beauty in the world. Reason in the former is pure theoretical, reason in the latter is pure practical. Judgement in the former is discursive, in the latter it is aesthetic. Imagination in the former is productive, in the latter it is re-productive. The former is conditioned by space and time, the latter is conditioned by our innate constitution. The former defines our intellect, the latter defines our character. The former concerns itself with what is, the latter concerns itself with what ought to be.

All without a necessary difference in logic as such.

There’s my take on the topic. I’d be interested in yours, assuming your take is as sufficiently explanatory as mine, the correctness of either being irrelevant. We’re in the realm of speculation here, after all. Although they both should be equally intelligible, I should think.

So.....your turn.

Consider this. If we look at the world o matter, two charged dead pieces interacting with another seem to have an intention to move towards or away from each other. The teleos and causation seem to lay close to one another. Same thing with logical necessity and causation.

Other animals and plants do not use logic and they still function. — Metaphysician Undercover

That other animals don't use logic is an implausible assumption in my view. When I used to throw the ball for the dog onto the verandah and it went over the edge to drop onto the ground below, and he didn't see it go over, he used to look everywhere on the verandah, and when the ball was not to be found would immediately run down to look on the ground below. he didn't run off somewhere else in the garden but only looked where the ball could plausibly be, since it could only have gone off the verandah in the direction I was able to throw it. And he did this from the very first time the ball went over the edge, so it wasn't merely an acquired habit.

Of course animals don't self-reflectively use logic; that is they are not aware that they are using logic, and they don't have thoughts like "I am using logic"; but logic is everywhere inherent, obviously to greater or lesser degrees, in the perceptions of both humans and animals, if the behavior of the latter is anything to go by.

That other animals don't use logic is an implausible assumption in my view. — Janus

Such behaviours can all be explained in terms of stimulus and response, without any requirement to introduce logic. To us, the behaviour can be said to be logical in that we observe the dog looking in the likely places. Maritain addresses this in his essay on the cultural impact of empiricism, where he says

the merely sensory psychology of animals, especially of the higher vertebrates, goes very far in its own realm and imitates intellectual knowledge to a considerable extent. ....

For Empiricism there is no essential difference between the intellect and the senses. The fact which obliges a correct theory of knowledge to recognize this essential difference is simply disregarded. What fact? The fact that the human intellect grasps, first in a most indeterminate manner, then more and more distinctly, certain sets of intelligible features -- that is, natures, say, the human nature -- which exist in the real as identical with individuals, with Peter or John for instance, but which are universal in the mind and presented to it as universal objects, positively one (within the mind) and common to an infinity of singular things (in the real).

Thanks to the association of particular images and recollections, a dog reacts in a similar manner to the similar particular impressions his eyes or his nose receive from this thing we call a piece of sugar or this thing we call an intruder; he does not know what is sugar or what is intruder. He plays, he lives in his affective and motor functions, or rather he is put into motion by the similarities which exist between things of the same kind; he does not see the similarity, the common features as such. What is lacking is the flash of intelligibility; he has no ear for the intelligible meaning. He has not the idea or the concept of the thing he knows, that is, from which he receives sensory impressions; his knowledge remains immersed in the subjectivity of his own feelings -- only in man, with the universal idea, does knowledge achieve objectivity. And his field of knowledge is strictly limited: only the universal idea sets free -- in man -- the potential infinity of knowledge.

Such are the basic facts which Empiricism ignores, and in the disregard of which it undertakes to philosophize. The logical implications are: first, a nominalistic theory of ideas, destructive of what ideas are in reality; and second, a sensualist notion of intelligence, destructive of the essential activity of intelligence. In the Empiricist view, intelligence does not see, for only the object or content seen in knowledge is the sense object. In the Empiricist view, intelligence does not see in its ideative function -- there are not, drawn form the senses through the activity of the intellect itself, supra-singular or supra-sensual, universal intelligible natures seen by the intellect in and through the concepts it engenders by illuminating images. Intelligence does not see in its function of judgment -- there are not intuitively grasped, universal intelligible principles (say, the principle of identity, or the principle of causality) in which the necessary connection between two concepts is immediately seen by the intellect.

Actually that passage is highly germane to this OP, for fairly obvious reasons. Hume's is a textbook case of 'not seeing', which is then brandished as the establishment of some profound philosophic insight, when it is really more an absence of insight - which Kant correctly diagnoses.

....we may be sorrrounded by objects, but even while cognizing them, reason is the origin of something that is neither reducible to nor derives from them in any sense. In other words, reason generates a cognition, and a cognition regarding nature is above nature. In a cognition, reason transcends nature in one of two ways: by rising above our natural cognition and making, for example, universal and necessarily claims in theoretical and practical matters not determined b nature, or by assuming an impersonal objective perspective that remains irreducible to the individual I.

The Powers of Pure Reason: Kant and the Idea of Cosmic Philosophy
Alfredo Ferrarin

Such behaviours can all be explained in terms of stimulus and response, without any requirement to introduce logic. — Wayfarer

I don't think so. Perhaps you could explain how you think that might work, because the Maritain passage you quoted certainly doesn't. For me it is absurd to deny intelligence to animals, when the range of species so clearly show very different levels of intelligence..