I was responding to you saying:

What I'm saying is that you're only perceiving the real world when you're not in the mental gallery at all. — Clarendon

In your statements so far, that limit is self-evident for you. Pointing out that is not the same for others is not an argument against your thesis.

What I'm saying is that you're only perceiving the real world when you're not in the mental gallery at all. — Clarendon

That suggests that our thoughts about perception are an impediment to perception. I accept that they are speculative but against what measure can they said to be false?

The situation is interesting to compare to the U.S. backed coup in Chile that brought in Pinochet. The corporate backers of that action were stinging from the loss of recently nationalized infrastructure.

Venezuela is decades past that moment.

You set up those conditions of what a "mental state" involved. You presume the difference that you hope to demonstrate.

Upon what basis do you make this distinction?

We do not own our experiences; we just have them.

As in order to secure direct contact with the mind-external ship, the experience would surely have literally to contain the ship. It's not enough that it's 'about' a ship. A note about a ship is about a ship, but it can't thereby be a means by which we perceive a ship. A thought about a ship is about a ship, but again one can't perceive a ship by thinking about a ship. So it won't help at all to make a view 'direct' just to focus on the way in which a sensation is 'about' or 'of' a ship. The sensation would have to include the ship itself. — Clarendon

There is a problem here with comparisons. If one invokes "experience", that includes all that we do not understand about it happening. Thinking about how perception works does not require a zero sum game where the "real" is real or not. If we do not stand on both sides, we cannot judge.

Heinrich Böll and Günter Grass tried to talk about it. Their attempts listened to the silence.

Happy New Year.

My last Rödl quote of the year:

In Metaphysics Γ 3, Aristotle announces a principle—indeed, the first principle—of the science that he has introduced in Γ 1 as the science of what is insofar as it is. In the course of the book, he expresses this principle in various ways. On the one hand he says it is impossible that something both be and not be (adding all the qualifications known from the sophistical refutations). On the other hand he says it is impossible to hold that something both is and is not. Aristotle gives no indication that he takes these formulations to represent different principles. Rather, his manner of writing suggests that he thinks it a matter of course, not requiring explicit mention, that these are ways of saying one and the same thing. It has been presented as a sign of the superior acumen of modern philosophical thought that it has been able to distinguish in Aristotle’s text two principles: a principle of being, an ontological principle, and a principle of thought, a psychological principle. In truth, this is not a sign of the intellectual maturity, but a manifestation of the corruption of modern philosophy by psychologism. — Self-Consciousness and Objectivity: Rödl. An Introduction to Absolute Idealism (pp. 149)

This is a two-for-one as Rödl acknowledges the influence of Kimhi in saying this.

Continuing on the topic of Being not being understood as a class or kind, the following from Bernadette captures an important aspect of Aristotle pursuing "being qua being""

Each of Aristotle's three most theoretical writings begins with a critique of his predecessors; but whereas the second books of his Physics and On Soul present his own definitions of nature and soul respectively, the second book of the Metaphysics seems to be nothing but a series of questions. Nature and soul are there regardless of what anyone might say about them (cf. Physics 193a3); but without perplexity there is nothing to metaphysics. Metaphysics seems to be the only science that in asking questions discovers all of its own field, and so, in completing philosophy, somehow returns philosophy to its origin in wonder. Perhaps, then, being is not just in speech a question (ti esti}; and that which was sought long ago, is sought now, and forever will be sought is precisely what being is. — Seth Bernadette, The Argument of the Action, 19: Essays on Greek Poetry and Philosophy

In the context of the Rector speech, it is helpful to contrast Heidegger's vision with Nietzsche's.

I think my post of three years ago is germane to the role of retributive justice in locating the enemies of the "German people"

Imagine if this passage, we said:

412a11, It is bodies especially which are thought to be substances subjects, and of these, especially natural bodies; for these are sources of the rest.

('The rest' incidentally being artifacts, parts and properties, relations, etc).

So, here, 'subject' is nearer in meaning to the original 'being', and it gives the whole phrase a subtly different meaning, with the caveat that 'subjects' is also not exactly right. But it is arguably nearer the mark that 'substance' (IEP explains where that translation originated.) — Wayfarer

While I appreciate the work of Sachs as a translator and interpreter, the following from the article is problematic:

To Aristotle, this means that being is not a universal or a genus. If being is the comprehensive class to which everything belongs, how does it come to have sub-classes? — Sachs

If there are good reasons not to consider Being as a class, the different ways it is spoken or thought of will not be sufficient instances of being parts of that class which is not a class.

The problem is parallel to the way actuality and potentiality are considered as central to the way mortal beings come to be but Aristotle says we can only explore through analogy.

In any case, this all seems tomfoolery against simply pointing to natural beings as prime candidates for "beings being what they are."

I think de-individualization more precisely than "immersion" describes what Heidegger is after. — 180 Proof

I was thinking of how Heidegger played hide and seek with Nietzsche's version of Dionysus.

Adam Lecznar's Dionysus After Nietzsche does a great breakdown of which aspects of the "Greek awakening" Heidegger wanted to emphasize or ignore.

Works for me, even if that is not the only thing to be said.

Those are difficult questions. Judging from my readings of the Lectures on Nietzsche, the "Last Metaphysic" is the end of finding "value" in a system of the world as conceived as a given condition..

Against that, Heidegger is abandoning a formulation of virtue.

On the other hand, he exhorts his listeners to follow a higher good than their previous understanding permitted. Another thought: The Rector speech speaks of being at war with other people, within and without the borders of the state. Not a great context to talk about the "good" life while glorifying sacrifice.

That document is interesting in how it ties a revival of a "Greek awakening" to his moment. The references to the Republic seem to be a direct appeal to the unified participation in the proposed Ideal city.

There is a desire for immersion at play here.

Being was originally encountered before it was conceptually distorted by centuries of bad metaphysics? — Tom Storm

Heidegger did argue that thesis in many places. It may not be a marker for a particular set of beliefs but does set up a Golden Age logic you have questioned in other places.


Your focus does fit with the politically conservative "cultural war" Heidegger fought earlier as a dutiful Catholic opposing modern expressions of individual liberty. There is a strange twist to his attempt to re-direct the Nazis to his paradigm because many Catholics were put down during that time.

To have been a crucifix on the wall during those confessions....

I accept that trying to understand persons as objects is difficult and integral to our experience over time but balk at the idea that such a development can be reduced to a single habit that can be stopped like smoking or swinging arms after certain verbal outbursts.

The quote doesn't say this specifically, but I interpret the Soul (ousia, essence, form -- subject?, person?) as Transcendent & Potential, and Body (matter, flesh, substance) as Immanent & Actual. — Gnomon

Your depiction of Actual and Potential reverses their roles given in Aristotle's writing:

For this reason those are right in their view who maintain that the soul cannot exist without the body, but is not itself in any sense a body. It is not a body, it is associated with a body, and therefore resides in a body, and in a body of a particular kind; not at all as our predecessors supposed, who fitted it to any body, without adding any limitations as to what body or what kind of body, although it is unknown for any chance thing to admit any other chance thing. But our view explains the facts quite reasonably for the actuality of each thing is naturally inherent in its potentiality, that is in its own proper matter. From all this it is clear that the soul is a kind of actuality or notion of that which has the capacity of having a soul. — ibid. 414a

The key thing here is that matter is not an utter lack of actuality but reflects an architecture of integration. If we investigate with that model in hand, we can start thinking about nature (physis or what comes-to-be.

When talking about the intellect as possibly eternal, De Anima does not present that in the way it is discussed as a personal survival of death in Plato (a topic for another day). For Aristotle, the actuality of life includes all forms and their functions must include all the simpler types even if the more advanced kinds do things the others cannot. Later Platonists, especially Plotinus, disliked this tension and argued against Aristotle in some places and remodeled his model in others. What you call a "hylomorph" has a job in Plotinus.

Whoever you think more correct, the distinction between transcendental versus immanent is a confusing attribution amongst these ideas. With the different accounts of creation, the consequences were what they were. In Plato's Statesman, there is an interesting account of the Maker reversing time to reboot the system but that is quite different from imagining a power above nature that acts willy nilly and directly interferes with the affairs of men. Spinoza said that all that sort thing was the projection of our limitations upon the Creator.

Best of the season for you and the dear other.

Yes, there has been a sharp falling off of attempts to defend his behavior as a political device.

Experiencing, understanding and reasoning are acts of subjectivity. They are not something over and above the subject but constitutive of the subject itself. So when I engage in these activities I am intrinsically conscious of them as constitutive of me. Or so I would argue... — Esse Quam Videri

Kant made an effort to address this in the Paralogisms in the Critique of Pure Reason. Perhaps you could set your thesis against that since his view is sharply different from yours.

I am reluctant to directly compare this to Descartes as he published in such a constrained environment.

I am also reluctant to make my quoted passage a generality when I put it forward to show an example of his analysis and manner of discourse rather than put the passage on par with the problems he presented in his Metaphysics.

I take the 'soul as the form of the body' to mean the soul (psuche) is the principle of the body. — Wayfarer

The rest of that sentence is important: "the form of a body which has life potentially. The next statement touches on the sense you are referring to: "Substance is actuality" (ἡ δ᾿ οὐσία ἐντελέχειa).

The use of form (εἶδος) is within the larger context of agency. Consider this discussion of "contraries:

But, since only such things as possess contrariety or are themselves actual contraries—and not any chance things—are naturally adapted to be acted upon and to act, both “agent” and “patient” must be alike and identical in kind, but unlike and contrary in species. For body is by nature adapted so as to be affected by body, flavour by flavour, colour by colour, and in general that which is of the same kind by something else of the same kind; and the reason of this is that contraries are always within the same kind, and it is contraries which act and are acted upon reciprocally. Hence “agent” and “patient” are necessarily in one sense the same, and in another sense “other” and unlike one another; and since “agent” and “patient” are identical in kind and like, but unlike in species, and it is contraries which have these characteristics, it is clear that contraries and their “intermediates” are capable of being affected and of acting reciprocally—indeed it is entirely these processes which constitute passing-away and coming-to-be. — Aristotle, On Coming to Be and Passing Away, 323b, Forster and Furley

In the above passage, "species" is the translation of εἶδος and "kind" translates γένος.

For Aristotle forms exist in substances. Their existence is, in some sense, constitutive of substance. This is what I meant when I said he considered form to be immanent to material substances. For him form is literally inseparable from matter. When form enters the mind it is still bound to the matter of the organism, but in a different mode of existence. In that case the form exists in a way that determines “what” the organism is thinking about or perceiving, rather than in a way that determines “what” the organism is. — Esse Quam Videri

By this formulation, you reserve a separate "place" for "forms" that Aristotle resisted. In either yours or 's account, the meaning of the words "matter" and "form" are given through the activity of the soul. I have been chided for quoting too much Kant recently so I will go back to my previous habit of quoting too much Aristotle:

412a6. Now we speak of on particular kind of existent things as substance (οὐσία), and under this heading we so speak of one thing qua matter, which in itself is not a particular thing, another qua shape and form, in virtue of which it is then spoken of as a particular, and a third qua the product of these two. And matter is potentiality, while form is actuality---and that in two ways, first as knowledge is, and second as contemplation is. — Aristotle, De Anima, 412a6, translated by D.W. Hamlyn

This is different from the role of 'material' depicted in Plato or the expressions of 'mind-independence' in modern writings. So far, we are not too far away from Kant. For some unknown reason, we know stuff. This is different from asking why we know stuff. Making the first condition a mystery is not an advance.

The distance from Plato is a different job, some of it done on this site. I won't try that here. Back to the next paragraph in De Anima:

412a11, It is bodies especially which are thought to be substances, and of these, especially natural bodies; for these are sources of the rest. Of natural bodies, some have life and some do not; and it is self-nourishment, growth, and decay that we speak of as life. Hence, every natural body which partakes of life will be a substance, and substance of a composite kind. — ibid. 412a11

At this point, it is tempting to say that this composite is a jazz fusion of 'form' and 'matter.' But the equation of matter and potential in the first paragraph throws all of this into a different light. It is not an issue of inclusion or exclusion from the "intellect." The "ways we talk about it" are not the last words about what it is. We need all three ways because they are not replacements of the others.

The passage is no starting point for the distinction between immanence and transcendence in the theological sense because nothing is possible if it is not "natural." Aristotle questions the freedom of the "Craftsman" in the Timaeus. A topic that leads to the third paragraph:

412a16. Since it is indeed a body of such a kind (for it is one having life), the soul will not be body; for the body is not something predicated of a subject, but exists rather as subject and matter. The soul must then, be substance qua form of a natural body which has life potentially. Substance is actuality. The soul, therefore, will be the actuality of a body of this kind. — ibid. 412a16

I won't quote the fourth paragraph but will respond if any of you do.

Trump's reaction to Reiner's death reflects a life inside a recently shaken snow globe.

Are you speaking strictly for yourself or intending to represent what Kant meant by these terms?

I do not have your confidence regarding historical necessity.

For that reason, I don't want to suggest I am arguing against your thesis.

I take your point about originality. I am not an apologist, in the many ways that may be understood.

Kierkegaard makes an interesting attempt at looking at innocence from a personal point of view. It is an instance where the report may be wrong. Explanation needs to be tested against experience.

I think that expresses an aspect of it.

But perceiving what comes from actions is another thing. Conflicts of motivation.

Hmmmn, any redemptive features after that list of bad things...?

Does that call for a justification to match a condemnation? There is an abundance of that sort of thing about. We are not in a great place to set up scales of that sort.

I figure the idea of a personal conscience is worthy, however much or little it came about because of the history of Christianity.

I have read and heard of deontology as the contrary to consequentialism. In those terms, I suppose Kant is more of the former than the latter. He definitely does not subscribe to an ethics of outcomes. On the other hand, Kant does see how an increase of human freedom would make a less terrible world.

But by that measure, Aristotle also holds that virtues are a natural telos for a human. Whatever the design of nature makes that the case does not change the context of an individual "doing those things for their own sake."

I brought in the Critique of Judgment quote to emphasize how the years of "Christian" discourse has put a focus on the "person" not expressed the same way in Aristotle.

I would argue that most Western ethics (secular and identity politics) seem to be derived from Christian values (and I guess classical Greek), though I know some people might consider this anathema. But how could it not be the case after a couple of millennia? — Tom Storm

For Kant, the matter is not a derivation from Christian values but a focus on the concerns of the individual reflecting upon their condition as individuals. The source of the recognition of duty as imperative is said to come from reason itself but the expectation for an individual is a problem of hope and belief. Consider this account of the difference between Kant and Spinoza:

Suppose, then, that a person, partly because all the highly praised speculative arguments [for the existence of God] are so weak, and partly because he finds many irregularities both in nature and in the world of morals. became persuaded of the proposition: There is no God. Still, if because of this he regarded the laws of duty as merely imaginary, invalid, nonobligatory, and decided to violate them boldly, he would in his own eyes be a worthless human being. Indeed, even if such a person could later overcome his initial doubts and convince himself that there is a God after all, still with his way of thinking he would forever remain a worthless human being. For while he might fulfill his duty ever so punctiliously as far as effects are concerned. he would be doing so from fear, or for reward, rather than with an attitude of reverence for duty. Conversely, if he believed [in the existence of God J and complied with his duty sincerely and unselfishly according to his conscience, and yet immediately considered himself free from all moral obligation every time he experimentally posited that he might some day become convinced that there is no God, his inner moral attitude would indeed have to be in bad shape.

Therefore, let us consider the case of a righteous man (Spinoza, for example) who actively reveres the moral law [but] who remains firmly persuaded that there is no God and (since, as far as [achieving] the
object of morality is concerned, the consequence is the same) that there is also no future life: How will he judge his own inner destination to a purpose, [imposed] by the moral law? He does not require that complying with that law should bring him an advantage, either in this world or in another; rather, he is unselfish and wants only to bring about the good to which that sacred law directs all his forces. Yet his effort [encounters] limits: For while he can expect that nature will now and then cooperate contingently with the purpose of his that he feels so obligated and impelled to achieve, he can never expect nature to harmonize with it in a way governed by laws and permanent rules (such as his inner maxims are and must be). Deceit, violence, and envy will always be rife around him, even though he himself is honest, peaceable, and benevolent. Moreover, as concerns the other righteous people he meets: no matter how worthy of happiness they may be, nature, which pays no attention to that, will still subject them to all the evils of deprivation, disease, and untimely death, just like all the other animals on the earth. And they will stay subjected to these evils always, until one vast tomb engulfs them one and all (honest or not, that makes no difference here) and hurls them, who managed to believe they were the final purpose of creation, back into the abyss of the purposeless chaos of matter from which they were taken. And so this well-meaning person would indeed have to give up as impossible the purpose that the moral laws obligated him to have before his eyes, and that in compliance with them he did have before his eyes. Alternatively, suppose that, regarding this [purpose I too, he wants to continue to adhere to the call of his inner moral vocation, and that he does not want his respect for the moral law, by which this law directly inspires him to obey it, to be weakened, as would result from the nullity of the one ideal final purpose that is adequate to this respect's high demand (such weakening of his respect would inevitably impair his moral attitude): In that case he must-from a practical point of view, i.e., so that he can at least form a concept of the possibility of [achieving] the final purpose that is morally prescribed to him-assume
the existence of a moral author of the world, i.e., the existence of a God; and he can indeed make this assumption, since it is at least not intrinsically contradictory. — Kant, Critique of Judgement, page 451

One big difference between this and Aristotle is the focus on the inhospitality of nature concerning the life of a person. Is that Camus in the background, firing up a Gauloises?

I am glad to see your rethink because I think it is important to not turn all of this into one goo.

In terms of the next generation, it is a large difference between encouraging a revolt versus some kind of accommodation. That involves the different agendas underway at the time but also how one is to live in the future. What we accept or reject personally involves who we care for, however we choose to understand that.

Orban hyperventilates. Maybe the band can get back together.

One aspect about the difference between Hobbes and Rousseau is how their language appears in different political messaging. There is a "this arbitrary power is better than its absence" set against "there is a better way to proceed that does not require so much power."

Imagining what would happen without X does not seem to be the singular province of anyone.

I see that you have posted your thread and will follow with interest.

In the context of political divisions brought up in this thread, the lack of moral realism is being depicted by Leontiskos as the source for one side of a divide. To put it that way makes the topic political in its own right.

In the formulations of what is "natural" for humans, the debate over kinds of authority has been the central problem. For instance, is Hobbes right that only a central authority can stop the natural war between men or is Rousseau correct that we have come from a different way of life that did not require that much power?

The difference between them is not whether morality is real or not.

Verveake has come up a lot in discussions here. I suggest searching the site regarding Plotinus to get a sense of the disputes underway and what different people make of them, specifically as the issues concern Aristotle.

I am not working that hard so will only hope you get what you are striving toward.

In the more traditional Aristotelian formulation, matter was construed not as res extensa, nor as a bare substrate, but rather as the principle of individuation and potentiality in the world. In this view, a material object is not mere matter (which cannot not exist on its own), but a compound of matter and form. The mind gains knowledge of material objects via the processes of perception and understanding (intentional acts), through which it comes to grasp the very same forms inherent in the material object itself. — Esse Quam Videri

Before the idea came into collision with modern philosophy, there is the view of Plotinus who presented 'matter' as a field penetrated by form but never completely occupied by it. All the ways to understand an "individual" had to be looked for on the side of the intellectual soul.

That does not sum up all that the 'scholastics' said but does reflect Augustine's preference for Plotinus over Plato.

Okay, I will give it a go.

From my experience, the views of 'moral realism' you brought up do not reflect how education works in families and institutions. How sharply one differentiates those from each other is a source of conflict in communities and political structures. Sometimes that adds up to one policy being advanced over another. Other times, that is an underlying feature of life in a particular place that does not get formulated in that way. From that perspective, I don't view any theory of connecting or disconnecting those aspects as important as people looking for what benefits or harms the chances of their hopes and fears.

Consider the habit of adversarial discourse in families. I was raised in one of those as was my son. I have known and worked with people who did not. That difference is a genuine cultural divide that is not simply a product of different opinions. On the other hand, it is obvious that it does influence opinion. What we all choose to do in such divergences is a personal matter of choice that theory cannot relieve us from. Tolerance is easy until it is in your face.