Wayfarer.
Re-read my comment. There are no 'events' and there is no 'physicality' except with respect to the evolving perceptual needs of humans who consensually segment and re-segment what they call 'the world'. Ultimately all definition becomes subject to an infinite regress in which axioms like 'entropy' have ephemeral utility. Such is the basis of pragmatism versus naive realism.

The point I am making is that 'identity' lies in the eye of the beholder (or beholders by agreement). Classical logic ignores that point and any shifting of contextual state transitions. IMO The whole argument is an example of Wittgenstein's language on holiday.

This is all just a semantic game regarding the word 'identity'. The fact that 'two' or more bananas can be considered functionally or materially 'identical', belies the fact that they necessarily 'differ' in their
instantaneous existential locations with respect to an observer....whence the ensuing word salad (or fruit salad :wink: )

Yes ! Philosophy is the only way to attempt to go beyond the limits of classical logic despite the 'anti-philosopher' stance taken by some celebrated physicists like Feynman.
For example, there are philosophical discussions in the literature about the application of Derrida's concept of aporia to quantum concepts like 'complementarity' which defy 'the law of the excluded middle'.

When citing Chomsky we need to distiguish between what he called 'surface structure' which is parochial and contextual, and 'deep structure' which he considered to be a human universal. If he was correct, the latter seems to be linked with the development of specific brain areas, unique to humans, like Broca's and Wernicke's area. It is clear too that much of what we call 'language' is common to other species like, bodily gestures, but because human language consists of complex combinations of units, it can give rise to creative expression beyond the abilities of other species.

Now it may be that what we call 'thought' is highly dependent on the surface structure of human language (the Sapir Whorf hypothesis) including concepts like 'self', but on the other hand, cognitive deflationists (Behaviourists) would argue that there is nothing special about 'languaging' which amounts to no more than a complex behaviour which enhances social co-ordination.

Over and above such discussions of species comparison there is still the problem that such discussion is inevitably constrained by its very subject matter, 'language' itself. That observation has implications for religions, which tend to put 'Man' and 'The Word' on a pedestal, and even for what we call 'philosophy', which might amount to no more than a form of 'social dancing'. Indeed, attempts by would be philosophers to escape to a linguistic vantage point has often given rise to the proliferation of neologisms.

Oh dear ! ....as Wittgenstein might have put it, 'the fly is doomed to stay in the bottle !' :smile:

It means that 'information theory' as per attempted computer modelling of 'cognition' is not applicable. The organism structurally adapts to perturbations in its environment. It makes no 'choice' in the information theoretic sense of 'deciding between alternatives'
Indeed the failure of such models has led to the rise of alternative models such as 'emboded cognition' in which 'languaging' is merely a complex behaviour which requires no concept of 'a world independent of the organic system/s which defines it.' 'Closure' implies 'a world limited by the organism'.
These developments follow the evolution of ideas from Kant, via phenomenology, to linguistic nonrepresentationalism in which there are no independent 'things-in-themselves'.
Socialization implies that individuals 'structurally couple' to form a more complex system which defines its 'joint world'.
'Predation' in which 'a predator' is separate from 'its prey' is seen by Maturana as an anthropomorphism. Predation is merely an automatic structural coupling involving a a temporary 'joint system'.

Thanks...read it...not too impressed.

What appears to be missing in much of the above is an overview of communication called 'discourse analysis', which transcends individual units we might call 'sentences' or 'statements'. As real life social interactions progress, 'meanings' are negotiated such that what appear to be 'contradictions' when taken as static juxtapositions are resolved dynamically. Clearly 'classical logic' fails as a sufficient basis for semantics precisely because it relies on static (rigid) 'set membership'.

You don't seem to understand that your position is one of 'naive realism'.
Try this.
http://www.oikos.org/vonobserv.htm

Sorry, but I have no idea what you mean by the phrase 'true nature of reality' !
IMO, all we can attempt to explain is what 'communication' is functionally about. Maturana for example might describe it as ' structural coupling between biological,systems directed at a mutual goal'. And, If you think 'cause and effect' are essential aspects of the term 'explanation' we are not on the same wavelength.

I suggest you think about your somewhat vacuous phrase 'naming things for the purpose of communicating the named things'. Compare it with ''things are merely repetitive observation events' (Rovelli) and ' all observation involves verbalization' (Maturana).
Whether or not you understand these points, they certainly indicate attempts to transcend your 'naive realism' by emphasizing the inextricability of 'observer' and 'observed'.

The word 'reason' is more nebulous than 'knowledge'.

I am reminded of the celebrated anthropological study of the Azande (Evans-Pritchard) a culture in which many events were attributable to 'witchcraft'. So 'a criminal' as convicted by a Western style court would only be acknowledge as 'guilty', by both himself and others, if the subsequent ritual slaughter of a chicken 'disproved his bewitchment' by a third party.

I suggest you read my statement again. You have analysed it in the style I call 'seminaritis' which invents ridiculous contexts. Nobody but idiots actually claim they 'know they will win the lottery'.And who but a more foolish atheist would attempt to dissuade a 'believer' in their confidence in 'events attributable to a creator' ! My statement is entirely consistent with Wittgenstein's 'meaning is use'. No wonder W called much of philosophy Geschwätz!

'Knowledge' is a word applied to a state of confidence, shared or individual, that an event, or sequence of events.. was/is/will be.. the case. Words like 'belief', 'truth' and 'justification' are merely negotiable aspects of that state of confidence.

"Kin selection" appears to endorse the biological fact that existence of individuals are subvervient to group gene transmission mechanisms. What we call 'cognition' is defined by some biologists (Maturana et al) as 'the general life process' and in that sense there is coherence between the concepts.

Beyond that possible linkage, speculation tends towards 'word salad'.

With my 'pragmatists hat' on, I don't do 'reality' ...only 'utility'. So for me the concept of 'morality' stands or falls on the basis of its utility, which is related to the context of its usage...i.e. the norms of 'good' interactional behaviour expected by a society. Obviously those 'norms' could be formalised in a religion but are more generally enscribed in secular law. But the origin of those norms is most likely to he explainable by inheritance those mechanisms we call 'empathic'. But we equally can be said to inherit 'tribal competition' which can subdue empathic behaviour.
The fact that the concept of 'morality' is not normally applied to other species implies that its 'existential status' is particular to homo sapiens. That IMO points to only one dichotomy...either 'humanity is special' and has 'free will' because of 'divine design', or 'humanity is special' due to its conceptualization behaviour via language which reifies concepts like 'morality' and 'existence' by the consensual use of persistent 'words'.
"Philosophy is the battle against bewitchment of our intellect by the use of words" Wittgenstein

Look at my 'language comment' inserted above. For an 'exiential relativity' debate, see my topic history.

Of course 'consensus fluctuates' because it has both universal and parochial status and is subject to history as stated above. It is transmitted via language which itself has both universal and local aspects.
Only religionists tend to associate 'morality' with ontology...in particular the 'existence of God' to 'account for morality'. Evolutionary biologists and neuroscientists will tell you that what we call 'morality' is a term belonging to 'folk psychology'. It can be directly related to oxytocin mechanisms in mammalian brains which can 'explain' why even voles can display what we call 'moral behaviour'. (Patricia Churchland)
Of course religionists can always try to play their trump card that 'all knowledge, existence, brain chemistry, etc, are in the gift of the Creator'...but in that case farewell 'debate' !
BTW Unless you are 'a naive realist', consensus evokes 'existence', not vice versa. (Consider the evolution of terms like 'atoms' or 'global warming' to illustrate that).

'Conscience ' is the term we use for sometimes uncomfortable internal dialogue indulged in between different facets of 'self' with different agenda's not all of which correspond to consensual norms. It's about those socially acquired facets 'living with each other'. No doubt 'buffers' are often erected to avoid cognitive dissonance

Polarities like 'subjective-objective' and 'reality-appearance' are rejected by pragmatists. What we call 'morality' is a statistical bundle of empathic consensual behaviors which may have evolutionary advantages for species or group survival. The consensus tends to shift historically according to access to resources, or in cases of intergroup conflict in which groups tend to 'dehumanise' each other and thereby suspend 'moral action' towards them. Selectivity also operates within society and gives rise to 'inequality' issues.
NB Your appeal to 'truth of premises' is irrelevent to a dynamic shift model.

What seems to be missing in Husserl's account is the 'language factor'...i.e. the social dimension in which shared concepts of 'things' are acquired.This is one of the points of difference pursued by Heidegger who ended up with the extreme position of "Language speaks the Man".

...only on a 'naive realistic' view of 'existence'. If 'existence' is relative to observers, 'belief' is irrelevant.

Its really quite simple !
On a pragmatic basis that 'existence of anything' is a concept which stands or falls of the basis of its utility to humans, then 'God exist' for theists who have a use for it, and 'does not exist' for atheists who do not.. On that basis, the term 'agnostic', at best means 'undecided as to the utility for them of the God concept', and at worst, 'sitting on the fence'.
But ontological and epistemological 'language games' will no doubt continue ad nauseam !

I've not detected a major pre-occupation with 'prime mover' arguments here. Rather on language games which often focus on 'holy writ', which would have Wittgenstein and Derrida chortling in their graves.

Language is about social co-ordination with respect to mutual projects. The act of 'attempted definition' is itself a pragmatic attempt to agree about such projects. Insofar that humans have much sensory apparatus in common, there is much 'unsaid' agreement, but since perception tends to be active not passive, the dynamics of social interaction can involve the shifting of 'project goals'. This manifests as subsequent semantic drift over the import of 'words'.* Pragmatism is the ultimate decider because it is a call for consenual project goals.

*In the nebulous social goal situation we call 'philosophy', semantic drift equates to what Wittgenstein called 'language on holiday'.

Your concept of passive receptors is fundamentally flawed. Even a single neurone adapts to persistent signals by raising activation threaholds, and in general, perception is deemed to be active, not passive. Receptors are not 'roofs whose structure directs raindrops', they are 'dynamic structures which select what constitutes raindrops'.

Of course ! :smile:
The questioner could start by reading up on 'eliminative materialism'.

You are correct in requesting definition. In real life, nobody uses the phrase 'free will' in the context of mundane choices lke tea and coffee! (Wittgenstein...language on holiday)It tends to be specifically used in connection with the socially loaded concept of 'culpability'. And in any case, the neurological data tends to imply that 'choice' has its beginnings in unconscious mechanisms, some of which can be modified by socially influenced restructuring. (Ref Churchland).

I'm not sure what you mean by 'the workings of natural law'.
IMO There are no 'natural laws' except a limited number asserted by humans such as 'the second law of thermodynamics'. The word 'workings' presents its own problem because it tends to imply the concept of 'causality' which has questionable philosophical status.

The short answer to your question is 'no' for three reasons.
(1) 'Things' are thinged by humans relatively to a continuously evolving 'body of knowledge' which continues to raise further anthropocentric questions.
(2) As already pointed out, 'logic' (in the traditional sense) is merely one aspect of human reasoning. And as far as frontier science is concerned 'reasoning' is more highly dependent on mathematical models more abstract than set theory.
(3) Although abstract models may generate the 'prediction and control' aspects of what we call 'science' the question still remains as to whether that is sufficient to constitute 'explanation'.

What is 'not true' ?

Yes, the 'problem' (if any) might be equivalent to asking 'could a piece on a chess board have a conception of the game of chess' ?
IMO, only Heidegger's analysis of 'being' goes anywhere near 'the problem' by pointing out that 'things' and awareness of 'self' are co-evoked over what we called 'time'. This led me to the pragmatist position that that we can only deal with the idea of 'existence of a thing' in terms of 'human utility'. But 'the problem' of general 'existence' per se is like Kant's noumena inaccessible, and therefore potentially meaningless.

Perhaps a more formal approach to this question is to define 'science' as being concerned with human 'prediction and control'. The branch of philosophy we call 'ethics' is then brought to bear on the 'control issue'.
There is a secondary issue here about the status of philosophy, in that confining its involvement to 'ethics', we are discounting anything philosophy may claim to contribute to 'epistemology'.

As far as my philosophical understanding is concerned, it is the rejection of the dichotomy of theism/atheism on contextual grounds which adds weight to the philosophical deconstruction of terms like 'evidence' and 'existence'.

'The self' does not 'exist' for much of the time! It is evoked by social and physical interactions like the convening of a committee as required. Like all concepts, 'selves', 'rocks', gods'...etc, its status as an entity rests on its transient relationship with other conepts which are coined by socially acquired 'words'. What we tend to confuse is 'self as as an actor amongst others' with 'self awareness'. The first is assigned relative permanence like 'rocks', but the second comes and goes. If in doubt, consider where that awareness goes during sleep, or when engaged in 'automatic' movement or driving a car.
These issues are discussed by Heidegger with his conept of Dasein, and by nonrepresentationalist language philosophers like Quine, who argue that the meaning of any word (like 'self' or 'existence') has no absolute value but depends on the context in which it is used.

Hmm...I note that 'language' has emerged as issue on this thread. I suggest that those who want to dabble with that with respect to atheism might bear the following points in mind.

1. What we call 'language' and what we call 'theism' both appear to be unique to humans.
2. Human language is largely involved in planning and control of our lives, and allows us to anticipate 'consequences'.
3. That anticipatory preoccupation of humans is linguistically/cognitively channelled by theists, like other religionists, into a concern with the 'direction' of their lives, and the inevitability of death, for which they seek 'spiritual guidance'.

IMO. It is only by trying to objectivize human language behaviour that we can observe a significant separation of thesists from atheists. Theists put 'the Word' on a pedestal...language ability being a 'gift from the creator to its image..humanity'. But atheists tend to 'see through' this anthropocentism, and reject the multifarious versions of so-called 'holy writ' in which 'existence of a deity' is merely an axiom on which the linguistic house of cards is built.

In short, 'religion' in general, and 'theism' in particular is the cognitive price many humans pay for their linguistic abilities. Words are the currency of thought. Existential axioms are as arbitrary as basing the value of a currency on 'gold'.

Well said !
Alas some members rely on pedantry as an excuse for ignorance of the literature.

What is it with the US and ridiculous preachers ?
I'm asking you because you are one of them whether or not you're earning from it.

I take 'pernicious' to be defined in a historical context (crusades, religious intolerance, missionary zeal etc). If you are claiming the US has largely escaped such tendencies that's up to you.
I have no idea what you mean by 'the human condition' except perhaps as one of continuous competition and tribal strife, fuelled from time to time by parochial 'convictions', an example of which can be religious. If 'atheism' is an escape from being mentally saddled with that, so be it.